Alena Hennessy - The Healing Guide to Flower Essences: How to Use Gaias Magick and Medicine for Wellness, Transformation and Emotional Balance

Utilizing flowers for their subtle yet transformative powers of healing dates back almost 3,000 years and has occurred in many cultures throughout the world. The ancient Egyptians were known to collect the dew from flowers and use its energetic properties to treat intense emotional states. For centuries, the Chinese have been known to embrace the energetic vibrations of flowers as beneficial for ones well-being. The Balinese have a long history of placing flowers in bathwater and taking a long soak for beauty and rejuvenation.

Hildegard von Bingen (10981179), a mystic, writer, composer, and Benedictine abbess from Germany, was a highly in-tune visionary who later came to be known as Saint Hildegard. She wrote texts about the medicinal, theological, and elemental healing properties of botany and the natural world. She, along with her fellow nuns, would place muslin cloths over flowers to soak up dew. Hildegard had an innate understanding of the doctrine of signatures, the idea that parts of nature, including flowers, have direct counterparts in the human body and can assist in providing restoration and relief. The nuns would collect the muslin in the morning and use it to wrap ill patients as necessary.

The Swiss physician, alchemist, prophet, and botanist Paracelsus (14931541) was a radical medical practitioner because of his views on health and nature. He looked to nature as a true healer instead of the accepted paradigm, which was less holistic. Paracelsus understood the doctrine of signatures philosophy as well; he collected dew from the flowers to treat emotional imbalance, for instance. Paracelsus appreciated the flowers innate ability to provide health to the human body.

Centuries later, the true father of flower essences was Dr. Edward Bach (18861936). Bach was a dedicated physician from London who understood that traditional medicine, or allopathic practices, has its limitations in providing well-being. Dr. Bach became drawn to a homeopathic approach, one in which he embraced the healing power of flowers. He began to collect wildflowers with which to treat patients and noticed positive results. He continued to study and reflect upon the gifts of each of these flowers, as related to treating human beings. To quote Dr. Bach about the magnificent power of flower essence healing:

To raise our vibrations and open up our channels for the reception of our spiritual self, to flood our natures with the particular virtues and to wash out from us the faults which were causing them. They are able, like beautiful music or any gloriously uplifting thing which gives us inspiration, to raise our very natures and bring us nearer to ourselves and by that very act to bring us peace and relieve our suffering. They cure not by attacking disease but by flooding our bodies with beautiful vibrations of our higher nature in the presence of which disease melts as snow in the sunshine.

In the 1930s, he left his successful medical practice and focused solely on working with flowers and their doctrine of signatures for treating patients. He innately understood that his patients physical ailments were related to unintegrated charges from emotional and mental states. To make flower essences, Dr. Bach would place a flower in a glass bowl with water and let it soak for several hours. The water would receive the energetic imprint of that flowers healing capacity. We still use this method today.

Dr. Bach created a foundation of essential remedies for flower essences, each representing healing powers of vibration for certain characters or negative emotional states. Here are some of the plants he worked with and the negative characteristics they help address:

Agrimony: suffering behind a happy demeanor

Aspen: fear of the unknown

Beech: irritability and lack of compassion

Centaury: lack of boundaries

Cerato: doubting easily

Cherry Plum: fear of losing control

Chestnut Bud: repetition of harmful patterns

Chicory: high expectations in love

Clematis: constant thoughts of the future

Crab Apple: self-loathing

Elm: easily overwhelmed nature

Gentian: feeling discouraged

Gorse: deep despair

Heather: excessive self-interest