Honey, Give me Some Honey!
According to Benjamin Franklin “If you have no Honey in your Pot, have some in your Mouth.” “The Honey is sweet, but the Bee has a Sting.”
And the list of those who didn’t fail to refer to the sweet substance called honey may continue. Yet I don’t know why but I find the song “Honey, honey” interpreted by the Feist to be appropriate when deciding to take on a subject like this one.
I bet all of you have tasted honey at least once in your life time. Numerous songs include in its lyrics the word “honey”, being used either as a form of endearing or referring to the sweet substance. Yet, few of you probably know that honey dates back for150 million years, being considered the food of the gods and the symbol of wealth and happiness in ancient times.
At first, due to its properties and due to the fact that it was highly valued mainly for its taste at that time, it was often offered as a tribute. Egyptians used it as a form of payment, whereas Greek and Romans considered it to be the proper gift for gods, the ambrosia of the gods, as they often called it. In order to protect the spirits of the deceased, Greek people used to bring honey as a tribute to gods, hoping in this way that the spirit of the deceased will be taken good care of, entering god’s good graces.
Moreover, German peasants used to offer their feudal lords payment in honey and beeswax.
And now, once you have found out these things, imagine how would it be for us to go and offer someone honey, as a gift let’s say. Would that person appreciate this? Would he or she tend to make wry faces behind us?
Well, the answer belongs to you.
It was only later, in the 17th century, that people discovered other uses of honey, being used for such things as making of cement. No matter how weird this sounds to us today, they used it for this. You may also find it strange the fact that at first Norsemen used it in order to sweeten their beer. How that tasted, they knew it.
Have you ever heard about honey wine or mead as it is called? Well, you must have read about it if you are keen on reading romance novels and if you didn’t find out yet, it is an alcoholic drink made from honey, a drink also known as the “nectar of the gods,” being highly praised for its taste.
It was also at that time, that honey began to be used in food preparation, in furniture polish and varnish as well as for medicinal purposes.
Why should we turn ourselves into honey consumers? Besides from the fact that honey contains vitamins and antioxidants, thus proving to have numerous beneficent effects on our body, it is the only food that includes all the substances necessary to sustain life, including water.
And if this is not enough to convince you then perhaps the fact that when talking about the benefits brought by honey in our lives one can mention such things as skin aspect improvement, better metabolism, better sleeping habits, curing insomnia, wound healing, better looking hair, improved digestion and athletic condition.
The fact that honey hosts such vitamins as B1, B2, C, B6, B5 and B3, clearly explains the effects honey treatments have on our skin. Yet, besides the vitamins, it also contains a large amount of minerals, antioxidants and amino acids, which are wonderful ingredients for our hair, skin and body. And show me a woman who doesn’t want to have a shiny, healthy skin. As it is well known, honey and beeswax are the main ingredients of many skin creams, lip-balms, and hand lotions.
Being used in beauty regimes since the time of Cleopatra, honey has kept its popularity and is still highly valued even nowadays.
Do you want to look like Cleopatra, have the hair of Queen Anne of England? Then you should consider using it yourself.
As it is well known, Cleopatra used to pamper herself with long honey and milk baths in order to maintain her youthful appearance.
These baths seem to have worked just right on her, as she became legendary known for her breathless beauty.
As historic facts show it, she was not the only one who discovered the benefits of honey.
It was also said that Queen Anne of England used a honey and oil concoction to keep her long hair lustrous, thick and shiny.
Madame du Barry, known as the official mistress of Louis XV, used honey as a form of facial mask, lying down for a rest while the honey did its work.
Therefore, you should be doing the same. Go and make yourself a honey mask and continue reading this article which is meant to reveal you the wonderful benefits of this enchanting substance called honey.
Due to the fact that it has the property of attracting and absorbing moisture, honey has also been used as a healing agent of wounds, combating infection and having acquired anti-microbial properties, and more to it, preventing scarring.
Its wound healing property was discovered ever since the First World War, as it was reported that at that time they made use of a mixture of honey and cod liver oil in order to treat the wounds on the battlefield.
Given the fact that we live in the era of speed and everyone is engaged in a fight for survival, if we may call it so, many of you may suffer from insomnia, being unable to sleep at night, and as such being unable to function at full efficiency during the day. As it has been discovered, honey can solve this problem for you. The main condition is that you give it a taste and then honey will at first raise your blood sugar level, and as such lead to an increase of insulin, and further on cause an amino acid called trytophan to enter your brain, finally being transformed into serotonin. And you most probably heard of serotonin as it is a substance that has to do with relaxation. And we all need to relax from time to time and improve our day-to-day habits. We may call it some sort of weakness chain. It all starts with a tablespoon or perhaps two of honey.
And what better way than tasting the sweetness of honey, and let it do the whole work for you. A miracle of nature as one may call it.
Among the benefits brought by honey, one can also mention the fact that it improves digestion, regulating intestinal function.
Have you ever complained about dry, damaged hair and you have tried all possible treatment, besides honey and none of these has had any results? You should give a chance to honey too and see what miracles it can make with your hair. Try to mix honey and olive oil and use it on your hair, and you will see that your hair condition will improve.
According to Dr. Paul Gold, a Professor of Psychology at the University of Virginia, “people remember things much better after they’ve consumed glucose, a form of sugar found in honey.”
Therefore, another benefit from honey.
Glucose, is also the ingredient that makes honey a natural booster, driving away fatigue
and improving athletic performance. Therefore, if you happen to feel tired or you have decided to follow the steps of ancient Greek athletes and do performance in this field, you should try and use honey as stamina as they did.
As Agnes Sorel called honey “the soul of flowers”, we should also consider it a sort of a miraculous gift given to us by Mother Nature.
In case you haven’t discovered yet the benefits of honey, you should start now. Even Hipocrates seems to have become aware of them when saying that it “”cleans sores and ulcers of the lips, heals carbuncles and running sores.”
Yet, as you could see there is more to it than just this. The list of benefits proves to be a very long one. And perhaps all its ingredients, its taste, its healing properties would make you keep around you at least three jars of honey, one to be used for eating and cooking providing a unique aroma to your food, one in the bathroom for first aid treatments and one on the dressing table for our beauty needs.
Given the effects honey has on our body, we should most probably be attracted to it like bears to honey. We should learn from bears and taste its sweetness, either directly from the jar, or from our own bodies, as we try to embellish them.
Therefore, next time you have your ‘honey’ around you, you should ask him or her to bring you some honey.
