An article written for the Ontario Polarity Therapists Association magazine, May 2002
Last weekend the Globe and Mail ran a feature article about the use of the common cold virus in curing cancer. Remissions naturally tend to occur when people are sick with a cold or flu. Now scientists are investigating this phenomenon; one man who receives regular injections of the virus has been in remission for five years.
From years of studying Nature in my garden, I know that every force in the natural world moves irresistibly towards balance. Therefore, the perception of viruses as allies instead of enemies makes my heart sing.
Though this man had a cure from an unexpected ‘natural’ source, when he stopped the injections, the cancer immediately reappeared. He is now dependent upon a virus. I wondered if he was using this precious time to search for the root causes of his disease.
Western medical research borrows all the time from Nature with a mechanistic arrogance. Scientists create synthetics that are completely divorced from Nature’s subtle, balancing approach.
Consider the frenzied ads for spring allergies. “Here’s a pill; now you can venture into your backyard wilderness and kill all those those weeds!”
This quick-fix, adversarial attitude towards the natural world mirrors the way we treat our own bodies. Like the white rabbit in Alice’s Wonderland, we run about looking at our watches, “No time, no time, gotta run…” meanwhile, the numerous chemicals in our daily diets amplify our speediness while numbing us to the deeper pain of our disconnection with life’s natural rhythms.
From my perspective, I view the part of the underlying cause of disease as a lack of some fundamental connection with the healing energy of nature. Far vaster than the natural beauty of trees and rivers, nature is the organizing energy in-forming our entire cosmos.
Within this magnificent web of life, curing a disease is actually a minor issue. However, when we are right ‘in it’, understanding the message of an illness and reconnecting with life in a way that is soulful and new is a real challenge! When we try to just get rid of our problems, we have let ourselves be seduced into a very small corner of the universe. Instead, we should be asking at a soul level what inside us needs to become fully alive so that we can manifest what we came here to do.
How does this relate to flower essences?
Vibrational essences, whether they are made from flowers, trees, or crystals work with the body’s subtle energy fields to restore vitality, harmony and balance. They influence the body’s electromagnetic field, which is present in and around every atom, and they remind the body through the principle of resonance, of its primary pulsation with source.
When the soul-body connection is compromised with stress upon any physical, mental, emotional or spiritual layer, the body’s electrical system is the first one to ‘break’. Vibrational essences re-establish the electromagnetic flow of energy between the body and soul. Their subtle electrical capabilities help us stay connected to the pulse of nature while they provide precise blueprints for balance and wholeness. Once reconnected and aligned, we can then see the path ahead with more clarity.
Hard-wired for Harmony
New research indicates that sixty-five percent of the heart’s cells are neural cells, identical to those in the brain. This heart-brain within our chests is directly linked to nature’s unifying rhythms; it keeps the body functioning as a unified whole, with itself and the larger environment.
We are hard-wired for harmony. Wisdom would suggest that we find products and approaches that support this remarkable phenomenon, rather than interfering with these life-forces.
Traditionally, flower essences are used to balance human emotions. From my perspective, we have scarcely begun to understand the tremendous scope that essences can have upon the entire human capacity. While vibrational essences are primarily ‘heart-medicine’, this being their entry-point, they can alter the subtle frequencies at any level – physical, mental, emotional or spiritual. As essences affect the body’s entire electromagnetic field, (extending 12 – 15 feet off the body) not only does the person shift at an internal level, but everything around them starts to vibrate differently as well.
I started working with flower essences over ten years ago, and began making the Raven Essences in 1995. Since then, they have taught me how to listen with my intuitive heart; I am constantly expanding my understanding of how they work.
The essences always point me to the underlying causes if I listen with the same deep resonance that I developed while working with the plants. My desire is to compassionately listen with my clients, not just to them, and to accurately provide them with the energy and wisdom of nature through the essences. With these highly sensitive, responsive tools, I seek to address the underlying cause that is holding the negative pattern in place.
It does not matter whether this is a physical symptom, emotional distress, a relationship issue, a spiritual challenge, or a simple desire to creatively evolve — I trust Nature’s repertoire to support the necessary changes.
Flower Essence Case Studies
Frank was referred to me with Ménière’s Disease, a debilitating condition with mild deafness, periodic bouts of vertigo, and tinnitis, a constant ringing in the ears. A busy lawyer, Frank was happy with his work and family. He noticed that when he was under additional stress at home or work that his vertigo could flare up. Clearly he wanted the problem to go away but did not know how to make any changes to assist the healing process.
“What if you didn’t have this condition?” I asked. “What other signs would help you recognize when you are out of balance?” He admitted that he didn’t have any other indicators. “So, for now, this condition is your ally,” I said.
As we talked further, he said he readily put other people first, and had done so all his life. Frank’s parents had modeled this approach by putting all their energy into raising their children, and then they divorced as soon as the children left home.
When I asked him what he enjoyed for himself, he was stumped. “What did you love doing when you were young?” “Basketball,” he said instantly but he had not considered this sport an option in his busy life now. A hard worker and conscientious parent, Frank like many busy people, had lost touch with the activities that nourished his soul.
I made him a family essence to help him release the inherited pattern of over-giving to others while putting himself at the bottom of the priority ladder. Amongst many essences, his key one was Forsythia that ignites the feeling ‘anything is possible.’ He worked with it for about a month, enjoying the mini-ritual of taking the essence as a means of connecting on a daily basis with his own needs and desires.
Later, Frank reported that he had not had a vertigo episode all month and he was beginning to recognize when he put others first at his own expense. He had started running and was endeavoring to form a basketball team.
While his condition was still present, he had accomplished the first step: the pattern, set down by his parents and reinforced through conscientious hard work, had been broken. Frank was listening to, rather than trying to fix, his body. He was changing his priorities and starting to feed his soul.
Often it takes several essences to peel away the layers covering the underlying issues.
Cathy is a strong, independent woman who holds her family together with a thorough efficiency. She was dismayed at her outbursts of anger and frustration towards her husband. We discussed the current situation, and I learned about her family background. While she had very little nurturing from her mother, her father both adored and totally dominated her.
Cathy’s first essence included Hibiscus which supported her mature feminine energy and helped to dissolve feelings of shame, inadequacy, and unworthiness that are culturally absorbed. Other essences gave her assistance with protection and boundaries. At the end of this first cycle, she felt calmer, more grounded, and keen to move on to the next stage of the process.
In the next session, more of Cathy’s painful story emerged. As her healing journey deepened, she began to touch and release the deeper roots of her anger. What had been buried was starting to flow again. The primary essence needed to balance this new layer of trauma was White Lily, ‘a flowering breastplate essence that enables one to hold opposing forces inside oneself with a pure intent and heart-centered strength.’
She was feeling the pain but with the subtle, loving support of the essences, she could view this as a healthy cleansing. Meanwhile, her eruptions with her husband had dissolved.
Recently I met Sally, a massage therapist with a host of minor physical ailments. She loved hiking but often was in too much pain to walk. Her nervous system was in a constant state of agitation and she suffered from irritable bowel syndrome. I made her an Emergency Trauma Solution, which acts like a personal Rescue Remedy. This kind of personal essence gives us a wealth of information about how the individual handles stress.
Two months later, she told me she was pain-free for the first time in eight months. Amazed, I listened as she described her revelation during a brief holiday, that her husband’s tantrums and her mother’s constant demands were deeply affecting her health. She saw that she had been unconsciously absorbing the negativity of those she was close to.
“It’s as if I’d been lost somewhere and am finding myself again,” Sally said. With enthusiastic soul-searching, she was reconnecting with some of her long-lost dreams and reconnecting with friends she had left behind. Her second essence now includes Black Walnut to help her release her attraction to psychically toxic environments while protecting her blossoming radiance.
Nature’s Healing Metaphors
Looking for underlying cause is not an archeological challenge. It is a sacred exercise requiring imagination, dedication and love. This road is rarely obvious; usually it is a winding path that leads us towards wellness.
On this journey, metaphors offer more hope and healing than most clinical diagnoses. A simple rose, a stone, or a tree may offer the inspiration, wisdom and balance needed for change.
In the subtle territory of the heart, there are very few external guides. We each embody elements of the wise seer, the intrepid magician, and the gifted healer. As we listen to the whispers within our own hearts, echoed magnificently by the natural world, we discover that we are constantly being called back to the joy of Life.
