In the 60’s, like so many hippies of the time, my friends and I became convinced that “natural is better”. Many of us started to become interested in natural and organic foods, yoga and meditation, so we began to transform ourselves into it and personally, I became fascinated with plants. When I went to college I made my own major – the term “holistic health” didn’t exist – so I studied Mind Body disciplines. That form of study enabled me to study the whole concept deeper. I also developed an insatiable appetite for travel. I wound up working in the natural products industry in different areas including retail and eventually it lead me to learn more about herbs.

Around circa 94, I was asked to go on a project to China as the official herbal expert. It was hilariously wonderful and it quickly became apparent to me that if I could create projects in countries like China, then I could easily adapt the same principles of the project, to other countries around the world. At the time I was conducting a lot of seminars and I talked a lot about medicinal plants and not too soon after I started, I was contacted by a wealthy businessman to do some work for him. I told him to get into the business of extracting herbs such as “kava”. So he sent me to Vanuatu South Pacific and the business took off from there. 2010 is my 16th year doing this for a living along with lecturing worldwide on the topic of plants.