<http://schema.org/articleBody>
"Whether or not you credit flower child Shailene Woodley, who speaks freely about her clay-eating habits and love of oil pulling, it's undeniable that holistic medicine is in the midst of a renaissance of sorts. It seems like everywhere you go (and in everything you read), there are mentions of natural remedies and traditional techniques.\n\nThis wide-ranging form of alternative medicine derives from the theory of holism, which encourages systems to be considered not by their separate parts but as (you guessed it) an overall whole. In the world of holistic medicine, if there's an ache or pain, all factors\u2014physical, mental, emotional, social, and spiritual\u2014must be considered before treatment. For many, its appeal stems from an anxiety over not knowing what exactly's in mainstream medications whose labels often include little more than a string of unpronounceable words.\n\n\"The way I see it, what we put into our bodies directly affects how we function, how we look, how we think, and how we act,\" says 19-year-old Riana. \"My lifestyle comes from this fear that although prescriptions and medications were helping with immediate problems, I had no idea what else these chemicals and potentially harmful ingredients were doing to my body.\" She follows a strict vegan diet and makes her own herbal remedies to treat everything from headaches to social anxiety.\n\n\"A lot of medicines just address the surface problem and that's not a real solution,\" echoes Sabina, a college senior from Maine who was raised making floral tinctures. In keeping with the holistic medicine ethos, flower essence therapy aims to address not just the physical ailment, but also the underlying mental, spiritual, and emotional problems that may be at the source: \"With flower essences, we seek to restore harmony with the body and the soul, and also with the self and the world.\"\n\nSimilarly, 18-year-old Elizabeth has found success with herbalism in the treatment of her depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder. Dissatisfied with the effects of the medicine her doctor prescribed\u2014she says they made her feel like \"a different version of myself\"\u2014she replaced her pills with herbs like St. John's wort. \"On prescription medication, I felt foggy and never quite like me,\" she says. \"That's not to say I haven't experienced difficulties from just taking herbal medicines\u2014herbs aren't magical cure-alls either\u2014but feeling like myself every day and having that consciousness is something I would never give up.\"\n\nBeyond those looking to alleviate specific conditions, holistic techniques have found popularity with people seeking to improve their day-to-day well-being. 20-year-old Savannah has taken up oil pulling (also known as \"gundusha\" or \"kavala\"), which involves swishing coconut, sesame, or sunflower oil around in your mouth to extract toxins from your body. The practice first and foremost aids oral health\u2014as Savannah explains, \"it whitens teeth, improves breath, and just makes your entire mouth more vibrant\"\u2014though many devotees claim that daily oil pulling affects overall health as well. \"It goes back to what we put into our bodies,\" says Riana, who swishes with coconut oil every morning. \"Our mouths are the entranceways into our bodies, so of course what happens there will carry to the rest of our organs. If we remove the toxins in our mouths, we aren't letting them be digested and distributed.\"\n\nSome traditions are so commonplace that you probably don't even realize they're forms of holistic medicine. Emilie, a student in New York City, has adopted a simple habit\u2014drinking hot water\u2014from the system of Hindu medicine known as Ayurveda. According to Ayurvedic traditions, drinking hot water not only helps eliminate \"ama\" (the toxin leftover from undigested foods, thought to be the root of disease), but also balances the Vata and Kapha doshas, two of the three bodily principles that are the foundation of health. \"A glass of hot water in the morning, in combination with dry teeth brushing, is a really good way to detoxify your system on a daily basis,\" says Emilie.\n\nOne of the most common forms of holistic medicine is yoga, though its healing properties are often overlooked in favor of its fitness advantages. According to the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, more than 13 million American adults practice yoga and research has shown that it's effective for treating anxiety and depression. Haley, a self-described \"spiritual yogi,\" explains that yoga is not only a means of changing her physical shape but her spiritual form as well. \"It helps me purify my mind and develop my consciousness,\" she says. \"If you only look at yoga as a physical ercise and not a mental and spiritual one too, you're not looking at the magnificent scope of what it can do for you.\"\n\nOf course, criticism will always surround the discussion of holistic care being used in place of western drugs and therapies. Practitioners of alternative medicine stress that this debate is not one for the public, but something to be considered by the individual. Elizabeth, who has been using herbal medicines for two years, makes it clear that her experience is hers alone.\n\n\"I'm not saying it's for everyone, and I'm not saying that medication is unnecessary and that everyone should turn to herbalism,\" she says. \"But I used to think my life was always going to be bound to prescriptions I didn't believe in, and then I found another way when I thought there wasn't one. Now I feel like I'm actually conquering my problems instead of just treating them.\""^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.teenvogue.com/story/holistic-medicine>