Healing Animals with Flower Essences

by gloria scholbe
May 2001

Flower Essence remedies are part of the emerging field of healing called Energetic or Vibrational Medicine. They do not target physical symptoms of disease. Instead, they heal personality and emotional disorders that are the underlying cause of many illnesses in humans and non-human animals.

Eastern healing methods have recognized life-force energy and its effect on the physical body for thousands of years. Traditional Chinese Medicine calls this vital force ‘Qi‘ and Ayurvedic Medicine calls it ‘Dosha’, which is categorized into three personality types. Personality affects emotions and an individual’s response to stress.

Modern conventional Western medicine has recently begun studying the relationship between mind/emotion, the nervous system, and the immune system. This field of study, called psychoneuroimmunology (PNI), approaches the mind/body connection through scientific investigation of circadian rhythms, biofeedback, and the mind’s effect on the immune system. Stress causes a decrease in white cells, which are responsible for fighting disease.

Since emotions, personality, and stress have a direct effect on the immune system, an ideal healing method would address them as an underlying cause of disease. Flower essence remedies were developed to answer this need. They heal emotions gently and with no side effects.

How Flower Essences Work

Flower essences heal the body by bringing its physical, mental, and emotional energies into harmony and balance through the principle of resonance. Everything that exists vibrates at the atomic and molecular level. These vibrations create an energy field, which is balanced when the body is healthy and unbalanced when the body is unhealthy. Flower essence energies help to bring an unbalanced energy field back into harmony with the healing frequency of the plant’s life force.

One way to illustrate this theory is by plucking a guitar string. The vibrations of this string will cause other guitar strings to vibrate in harmony with it. Flower essence energies work the same way but at a different level than those available to our five senses.

When the flower essence is administered, its vibration moves outward from the physical body to the area of imbalance within the energy body. Once it reaches that spot, the match of energies brings the imbalance back into harmony. The new resonance now cascades throughout the physical body, returning it to balance.

Questions of how subtle forces working at the atomic level can affect the physical body will some day be answered in the field of quantum physics, which explores the nature of energy. In his book Plant Spirit Medicine, Elliot Cowan explains it this way: “Energy has certain tendencies. The moment we look for one of those tendencies, it manifests itself, while all the other tendencies remain latent. This is a bit like getting to know a person. If you are provoking someone’s anger, his or her tendency to express affection cannot be observed at the same time.

“According to modern physics, although our world appears real and solid, it is actually an insubstantial realm whose features shift according to the psyche of the person who is observing it. Modern science and ancient wisdom concur, then, in describing our world as a dream – a tissue of appearances made of energy and consciousness.” Dr. Stephen Nezezon, in an interview for the Flower Essence Society Newsletter says:  “I am grateful for my original training in physics. If modern physics were truly understood by the medical community, we would have a different scientific basis for evaluating healing.”

Flower essences do not work on a physical level; they heal at the emotional level and affect the physical body through the mind/body connection.

Emotions and Disease

Emotions produce changes in the hormones that affect nerve function, digestion, respiration, circulation, and the immune system. In his book, Spontaneous Healing, Dr Andrew Weil M.D. discusses how some diseases of the body are related to emotional or psychological issues. Sometimes physical disorders are a direct expression of mental turmoil.

Back pain is an example of this. Some of Dr. Weil’s back pain sufferers are referred to Dr. John Sarno, author of the book: Healing Back Pain. Dr. Sarno believes most back pain results from the mind’s interference with normal functioning of nerves and blood circulation to muscles. He calls this condition Tension Myositis Syndrome (TMS). Once emotional issues are cleared, the back pain often disappears even though x-rays show that physical cause may still remain. It is well noted by conventional medical practitioners and by insurance companies that people being treated for emotional disorders, like depression, are at high risk for physical disorders.

Dr. Weil describes depression as “a state of high potential energy, wound up and turned inward on itself.”

According to Dr. Bruce Fogle, some emotions are ancient mechanisms for marshalling a body’s defenses against perceived threat. Threats cause a surge of chemical reactions that prepare the body for managing the threat. This is called the ‘fight or flight’ or stress response.

Depression is a way of dealing with stress that hasn’t been relieved by ‘fight or flight’ action. The body requires this action to help to it disperse the chemicals produced by the stress response. Some depression is normal and works well to calm down short-lived stress. Long-term chronic stress and depression, however, place a burden on the immune system to which it eventually succumbs.

Animals and Emotions 

Dogs exposed to constant stress develop heart problems, gastric disorders, skin diseases, and other health issues, just as people do. Symptoms of emotional problems in dogs include repetitive behaviors such as: licking, circling, self-mutilation, whining, over-activity, and under-activity. In birds we see similar behaviors: feather plucking, over-preening, self-mutilation, over-activity, and under-activity. These and many stereotypical behaviors are directly related to stress. Stress is defined as mental or emotional tension characterized by feelings of anxiety, fear, etc. What about other emotions like love, grief, anger, and jealousy? Do animals have them?

Some people believe that all animal reactions are based on instinct; and that attributing emotions to animals is anthropomorphic. Anthropomorphism is rejected by certain philosophies because it acknowledges that animals possess some of the same characteristics as humans. Characteristics most likely to generate the strongest objections are: emotions, feelings, intelligence, motivation, and self-awareness.

Although it is true that emotions are not yet measurable by scientific method, Alexander Skutch tells us in his book The Minds of Birds, that emotions can be inferred by observation. He cites several examples of different bird species that reserve certain songs or vocalizations for special events such as laying, hatching, or fledging of a chick. He calls these songs ‘unessential embellishments’ to life activities that indicate feelings of affection. In other words, there is no survival reason for the birds to sing these songs at these times. It is simply that such sounds express the bird’s emotion at the time.

Reliable field observers have recorded emotions other than affection in birds and other animals. Dr. Theodore Barber describes numerous such observations and studies in his book: The Human Nature of Birds. Although some early documentation was purely anecdotal, those observations were supported by later controlled studies more acceptable to Western science.

One report told of a swallow who tried without success to chase a sparrow out of its stolen nest. Finally the swallow left, but returned shortly with several other swallows, all carrying mud in their beaks. The swallows then proceeded to close the nest hole with mud, trapping the sparrow within.

Dr. Irene Pepperberg’s studies with Alex, the African Grey; Hernnstein’s experiments with laboratory pigeons; and the cognitive ethology studies by Donald R. Griffin, confirm feelings, thought, flexibility, and awareness in non-human animals. Emotions observed in non-human animals include jealousy, anger, grief, revenge, altruism, fear, joy, and love. When one of these emotions is out of balance, how does one select the right flower to heal it?

Flower Essence Preparation

Flower essences are composed of water, which has been infused with the healing power of flowers. Once activated by the flower’s essence, or life force, the essence in water is preserved with alcohol to retain the flower’s energies.

The process involves bringing a thoroughly clean glass bowl, early in the morning when the flowers are fresh with dew, to where the flowers are growing. The bowl is placed on the ground near the flowers and filled with pure water. The flower heads are picked and placed on the water to cover the entire surface. Care must be taken to touch them as little as possible so as not to disrupt the flower energies with the energies of the person gathering them.

After three hours in sunlight, the flower heads are discarded and the water is poured into amber-colored glass bottles that have been half filled with brandy. Again care must be taken not to touch the water so the energy forces are not disturbed. The amber bottle is used to help preserve the flower’s essence.

Flower Essence Systems

Edward Bach is responsible for developing the first modern therapeutic system based on flower essences. His identification of the first 38 healing remedies was the springboard for further research in other parts of the world.

USA Australia Britain France

Deva Flower Elixers

India

  • Himalayan Aditi Flower Essences
  • Himalayan Flower Enhancers
  • Himalayan Indian Tree and Flower Essences
Africa

Andreas Korte Essences

Flower essence systems of healing can be found worldwide. They were used in ancient healing traditions. Within the past century they were rediscovered for use in Western healing practice as an outgrowth of homeopathy.

Animals suffer from many of the same emotional and personality problems found in humans. Oftentimes, birds and other animals reflect the personalities of their human companions, indicating that a flower essence helpful for one would also serve as a remedy for the other.

Flower essences are an ideal and non-invasive approach to healing disease. They repair life-force disruptions caused by personality disorders and unbalanced emotions. In order for flower essences to work, the correct remedy must be chosen for the specific problem. The healer must be sensitive to the bird’s emotions in order to select the proper flower essence. Having a basic understanding of plant signatures or using a reference that contains a flower essence repertory is also required when making an essence selection.\Regardless of whether you wish to heal with herbs, flower essences, homeopathics, nutrition, or any of the healing modalities, you must study and gain knowledge before attempting to use the tool. Until then, be guided by someone who has experience.

References used for this article

Andrews, Ted; The Healer’s Manual
Barber, Theodore Xenophon; The Human Nature of Birds
Callahan, Sharon; Goldstein, Dr. Bob and Susan; Love of Animals; vol. 6. No. 6; Flower Essences Merge Science and Spirit
Cowan, Elliot; Plant Spirit Medicine
Fogle, Dr. Bruce; Natural Dog Care
Graham, Helen and Vlamis, Gregory; Bach Flower Remedies for Animals
Kaminsky, Patricia and Katz, Richard; Flower Essence Repertory
Poutinen, C.J.; The Encyclopedia of Natural Pet Care
Rudd, Carol; Flower Essences: An Illustrated Guide
Schoen, Allen and Wynn, Susan; Complimentary and Alternative Veterinary Medicine
Shealy C. Norman; The Complete Guide to Alternative Medicine
Skutch, Alexander; The Minds of Birds
Stein, Diane; The Natural Remedy Book for Dogs and Cats
Weil, Dr. Andrew; Spontaneous Healing