Observation #2 - If you're in Africa it is more likely to be a zebra

One of the greatest homeopathic misconceptions is that polychrests are more likely to act than a rare remedy. This simply isn't true. Remedies aren't rare because they are ineffective; they are rare because we haven't enough experience to know how to prescribe them. There are no remedies that rarely work, only unknown remedies. Our difficulty is that we don't have a clear sense of the archetype or the main pathology of the lesser known remedies. And because we don't know them we are nervous to prescribe them and so prescribe the remedies we know.

Usually when we give a polychrest we are using it as the best known example of a constellation of symptoms or approach to life.

It is very interesting to me that Massimo finds Aquamarina as, or even more, common and useful than Natrum muriaticum and that Rajan uses Bacillinum more than Tuberculinum. Some of the most profound changes I've seen are from very rare remedies that were prescribed well.

The over-prescribing of polychrests reminds me of a Sufi story where one night a friend comes upon Nasruddin searching the ground under a street light. Nasruddin explains he was trying to open his door when he dropped his key and is now trying to find it. "But your door is way over there" says the friend. "Yes," says Nasruddin, "but there's no light by the door."