Bach Flower Remedies
Gentle effective healing
When the first atomic bomb exploded, scientists saw the factual truth in Einstein’s assertion that matter and energy are two expressions of the same thing (E=MC²). In the years since this discovery, quantum physicists have been revealing more proof that matter is energy, that a wave form and a particle are two different ways of witnessing the same phenomena.
Biochemical medicine, such as allopathic pharmaceuticals, naturopathic remedies and Chinese herbal medicine, approach the human bodymind as matter to be manipulated by matter to obtain a biochemical reaction to repress a symptom—too often with doses of poisonous substances. Naturopathy also uses herbal and nutritional supplements to support the immune system, so it has the biochemical supplies needed to heal.
Homeopathy and Bach Flower Remedies approach the bodymind as “frozen” energy disabled by energetic psychological contractions. These dysfunctional patterns can be altered or cleared by the energy signatures of various substances, not only to mitigate a symptom, but to set in action the bodymind’s own healing process. A homeopathic dose may contain only a few molecules to amazing effect without biochemical side effects. Since modern (sic) science can not find the substance at these level of dilutions, it considers it quackery.
While homeopathy may use an undetectable amount of a substance that could have a poisonous effect at large pharmaceutical doses, Bach Flower Remedies never even do that. Dr. Bach, who developed these remedies in the 1930s from his estate, Mount Vernon, did not believe that subjecting a bodymind to poison is a good idea in any amount.
Intuitive knowledge
An “Einstein” of homeopathic medicine in charge of the pathology lab at London General Homeopathic Hospital, while ill, he abandoned his lucrative job to wander the English countryside in search of flowers with “energy signatures” that could heal. He was not only a brilliant scientist, but a world-class intuitive.
An intuitive is someone who can “feel” or “read” energy signatures. Unfortunately, intuitive knowledge not a research method duplicatable by just anyone. This is one reason mainstream science ignores this kind of medicine. The scientific method insists that research must be replicable by any scientist ignoring the fact that not everyone is an intuitive.
Science is beginning to understand how intuition and communication with a plant is possible. Author Stephen Buhner reports that “all biological systems, including human beings, are highly sensitive to both electrical and magnetic fields. The vast majority of the electrical and magnetic signals given off by living organisms contains information. Whole organisms, and not just their parts, give off electrical and magnetic signals throughout their lives. These fields encode highly sophisticated information about the organisms…
…living organisms have learned to do more than simply use these fluctuating fields as part of their physiological functioning or for tracking prey. They also use them to communicate with each other. They pick up electrical and magnetic field communications from one another, alter their functioning in response, and send back responses encoded in the fields they themselves give off. In response, the other organisms alter their functioning and respond in turn. There is an extremely sophisticated electric and magnetic communication that is going on all the time among trillions and trillions of organisms. A web of communications that is so complex and detailed that there is no way to understand it with the linear, analytical mind.”
Buhner also tells us the process by which the heart, as an organ of perception, gains access to knowledge from plants. He writes, “For many people, this way of gathering plant knowledge remains only a vague sensitivity. But the perception of meaning and the elicitation of knowledge directly from phenomena, from plants, can be extremely elegant. The knowledge that is gained can be exceptionally detailed, more sophisticated than that found through reductionist science.
A great deal of information will come in the plant’s initial gestural impulse, what the interior you interprets as flashes on your inner field of vision, physical responses, and complexes of primary and secondary feelings. This first impression bears much the same relationship to the plant as the intimations that come from a first meeting with an interesting person…
…The intimacy deepens when you take time to foster it, when you focus on the plant and take the time to really come to know it…
…As your relationship with the plant deepens…knowledge will come of its own accord…a deeper knowledge of the plant and its purposes, its uses as medicine, will flash into your mind….
…With other plants, though, another approach is possible… You begin to feel that there is some destiny in this meeting and that some truth—some newness of self—is meant to come to you now. You are pulled into the plant, motivated to see more deeply and with different vision. To see from another perspective, aslant to your normal orientation….
…With plants like these, a deepening of the process can occur, engendering a more rapid accumulation of knowledge and understanding. To make this happen, you must take the moment of first contact, the memory of the initial mood and feeling that came when the two of you met, and work with it intentionally. You must take this burst of feelings, this unique grouping, and engage with it in a continual, experiential contemplation…
…Your uninterrupted focus on the phenomenon and the experiential enhancement of the feeling/experience that occurred at the moment of first contact activate a deeper capacity for understanding the meaning inherent in this mode of cognition. The meanings, the communications the plant emits, will eventually emerge within you in extremely elegant and sophisticated gestalts of understanding…
…Hold that initial moment of meeting within you, let all the feelings you first experienced grow until they are all that you feel. Send out in this moment a plea to the plant, to the Creator if you wish, asking to know the deeper healing properties of the plant…
…The tremendously powerful enhancement of the moment of first contact combined with the earnest desire of your deepest self to know flows to the portions of the brain whose function it is to perceive—to unlock—meaning. The disengagement with the phenomenon, the slight stepping away from immediate experience, allows the brain to momentarily reactivate. The pattern of meaning within the phenomenon is then interpreted by those portions of the brain concerned with meaning; understanding then arises within you in a new form…
…This is not a forced process. Rather, the analytical capacities of the brain are allowed to generate—of themselves—linguistic descriptions that capture the essence of the thing, the meanings that are encoded within the feelings you have felt. During this process, the verbal–analytical mode of consciousness does not invent the linguistic phrases to describe the meaning of the phenomenon; instead, the linguistic descriptions of the phenomenon emerge of their own accord out of the store of memories, information, and experiences that you have accumulated during your lifetime. Here the heart and brain work together, the systole and diastole of understanding.”
Some day science will officially recognize how homeopathy, Bach Flower Remedies, heart knowledge, and intuition work, but for now we only can say statistically, in research data gathered from millions of users, patients and practitioners, in Western nations outside of the United States, that they do. Note: the former queen of England’s personal physician was a homeopath and she lived to 96…
Health is a personal responsibility
I use Bach Flower Remedies because I’ve witnessed and experienced over 30 years that they work amazingly well to help regain good mental health and resolve emotional difficulties underlying many physical diseases. To me, seeing is believing and the instant relief from anxiety and fear; the calmness in the face of adversity; and the support to the psychotherapeutic process that remedies engender have made my life happier and my practice more fulfilling watching people revive and thrive.
They also eliminate the need for psycho-pharmaceuticals that can do serious harm to the bodymind. Sometimes psychopharms are needed to suppress behaviors dangerous to self and others, but in the interest of not causing collateral damage, my opinion is that they should only be used in emergencies, or as a last resort after nontoxic remedies have been allowed time to work if the disorder or disease process is not at a critical stage. Please note: I would never suggest you not follow your doctor’s advice. You may be at a stage in your illness where pharmaceuticals are immediately necessary. But if you are questioning whether pharmaceutical approaches are the end all and be all for you, come talk with me. You may wish to explore alternatives which may help, either on their own, or by augmenting other approaches.
Good books
When I read a book, I do not have to agree with every word to get some helpful information from it. Some of these books attempt to explain “why” Bach Flower Remedies work and I don’t think we can know that yet. Our science is simply not at that level of understanding. Ignore anything you perceive as silly, but rest assured, they do work. If you wish to know which remedies to use for what issues, this booklist is very helpful.
Important to note: when selecting remedies you may be blind to your faults or your strengths and choose a remedy that will do nothing, because it actually doesn’t match your personality. This is the reason a trained behavioral professional can be helpful in suggesting remedies for you. Another important thing to be aware of is that many when people feel side effects from pharmaceuticals, they often confuse it with knowing that it is working. “O, I feel woozy, the sleeping pill is working” as opposed to simply falling asleep and concluding the next morning that it worked. The same is true with the remedies. You won’t feel any side effects. When they work, you are simply less anxious and more emotionally functional.
Advanced Bach Flower Therapy: A scientific approach to diagnosis and treatment by Gotz Blome, MD, 1992
Flower Remedies: Natural Healing with Flower Essences by Christine Wildwood, 1992
Heal Thyself by Edward Bach, PhD, 1931
The Secret Teachings of Plants: The Intelligence of the Heart in the Direct Perception of Nature by Stephen Buhner, 2004.
