Valerian is one of the most beneficial herbs if taken into account its benefits. It has no known side-effects and doesn’t even cause dependency. It’s useful for its sleep-inducing properties as well as for giving relaxation to the mind.

Valerian enhances the natural body process of getting into sleep and also gives calmness and refreshing feelings and also relieves the tensions and stresses. It also improves general sleep quality. It has good effect on smooth muscle, and is considered a powerful and safe muscle relaxant. It can be safely used in muscle cramping, uterine cramps and intestinal colic. Valerian’s volatile oils do not simply have sedative properties but also a predominantly regulative effect on the autonomic system. Valerian is used world wide as a relaxing remedy in hypertension and stress related heart problems. There is an effect here beyond simple nerve relaxation, as it contains alkaloids that are capable of lowering abnormally high blood pressure.

This is can be as re-vivifying as sleep itself, and indeed all that is necessary in more cases than not. The true nature of sleep still remains a mystery. Everybody goes through stages of REM (rapid eye movement) sleep, a stage where dreaming is associated with minor involuntary muscle jerks and rapid eye movements, indicating that active processes are occurring in the brain.

It is important not to suppress the dreams dreamed during this stage. Emotional experiences are processed by the mind in those dreams, and much arising from both the unconscious and daily life is balanced and harmonized. Whilst sleeping pills have a marked impact on REM, Valerian does not interfere with this process as it is not powerful enough to suppress these necessary REM phases.

Amongst other effects, Valerian decreases both spontaneous and caffeine-stimulated muscular activity and decrease a number of measurable processes in the brain. Research comparing the relaxing properties of Valerian and a number of other plants on the muscles of the digestive tract, has shown Hawthorn and Valerian to be the best, followed by Passion Flower and Chamomile. Especially interesting is the finding that combining all the herbs acted in a synergistic way, being relaxing at low dosage levels.

To be effective it has to be used in sufficiently high dosage. The tincture is the most widely used preparation and is always useful, provided that the single dose is not counted in drops, but that 2.5-5ml (l/2 - l teaspoonful ) is given, and indeed sometimes 10 ml at one time. It is almost pointless to give ten or twenty drops of valerian tincture. Over dosage is highly unlikely, even with very much larger doses. For situations of extreme stress where a sedative or muscle relaxant effect is need fast, a single dose of one teaspoonful may be repeated two or three times at short intervals.

The dried herb is prepared as an infusion to ensure no loss of the volatile oils. Two teaspoons of the dried herb are used for each cup of tea prepared. With these doses expect a good relaxing, anti-spasmodic and sleep-inducing effect, and above all rapid sedation in states of excitement. A cold infusion may be used: a glass of cold water is poured over two teaspoons of valerian root and left to stand for 8-l0 hours.