Flower Essence Therapy

The Therapy Garden draws on Naturopathic, Humanistic and Transpersonal approaches amongst others, to focus on the individual as a whole person including their mind, heart, body, soul and spirit. We encourage our clients to take responsibility for their own self-healing and self-development and achieve their highest potential, rather than focussing on their problems. To aid their self-healing, self-development and self-actualisation journey, we use flower essences to support the release of negative emotions, trauma and physical pain.

Flower essences are liquid tinctures used in Flower Therapy. The essences contain the vibrational energy of flowers, which can improve negative thoughts and emotions, ease anxiety, help lift depression and relieve pain. Flower essences are made by immersing fully blooming flowers in spring water and placing this in sunlight. Every living thing on this planet has an energy and flowers are no exception. The energy of the flowers transfers to the water and this water, with a preservative added, becomes the flower essence.

The first flower essences of modern times were created by Dr Edward Bach in the 1930s and Dr Bach’s special blend of flower essences called Rescue Remedy (or 5 Flowers Remedy) is today widely sold around the world. Although Rescue Remedy is the best known flower essence product, thousands of different essences are now available, each with its own unique healing or restorative properties. Many of the essences developed since the 1960s are aimed specifically at helping with the conditions and ailments common in our modern lives: stress, anxiety, depression, lack of self-confidence, changing patterns of behaviour, moving on after heartache and crisis, and making life more rewarding. The highest aim of the essences is to help each of us towards ‘individuation’ in Jung’s words, or towards ‘becoming a person’ as Carl Rogers put it. In other words, to reach your highest potential, self-actualise and become your real true Self. 

Flower essence therapy is the practice of using flower essences to treat the underlying mental, emotional or spiritual problems which often manifest themselves as physical illnesses or ailments. Working with the individual client is equally as important as the essences, as every person reacts differently and has a unique personality and unique issues at the root of their symptoms. By uncovering these deep seated issues in the subconscious mind, issues that have been avoided and defended against, the therapist can start to understand your developmental and therapeutic needs and create bespoke remedies comprised of individual essences or blends, for clients to administer orally over the course of their treatment. As Dr Bach wrote more than 80 years ago, “These herbs have succeeded again and again where all other treatment which has been tried has failed.… It is not the disease that is of importance, it is the patient, the way in which he or she is affected, which is our true guide to healing.”

Flower Essence Therapy is a form of energy medicine that can be used in conjunction with counselling. It can be used to help ease daily stress, address mild mood concerns, calm anxious feelings and reduce frustration and anger.  A flower remedy consists of water that has been patterned with the energetic vibrations of one of the 38 different flowers. The Remedy is added to a cup of water (or other beverage) 4 times a day. Like other holistic healing modalities, this treatment seeks to create balance in areas of mental, emotional and energetic disruption. Flower Therapy specifically addresses the emotional body and its purpose is to restore emotional harmony. All negative emotions can be addressed with Flower Therapy. Unlike psychotropic medications (i.e. medicines that treat depression, anxiety or psychosis), flowers remedies treat specific shades of emotion. For example, they address sadness, despair, hopelessness, irritability, rage, resentment, panic, worry, concern about family members, uncertainty, self-doubt, shyness, lethargy, overwhelm, pain without physical cause, impulsivity, agitation, procrastination, daydreaming, vague anxieties, specific phobias and any other disturbing emotion. However, while flower remedies can help ease any negative emotional state, intense emotional distress is best assessed in a clinical assessment for therapeutic intervention.