Mastering Bach Flower Therapies

A Guide to Diagnosis and Treatment

Mechthild Scheffer

• Publisher: Healing Arts Press
• Year: 1996
• Print ISBN: 9780892816309
• eBook ISBN: 9781620550366
• Topic: Medicine
• Subtopic: Alternative & Complementary Medicine

In Mastering Bach Flower Therapies: A Guide to Diagnosis and Treatment, Mechthild Scheffer presents a comprehensive guide to incorporating Bach flowers into your life. The first practitioner to recognize the psychological underpinnings of the Bach flower remedies, Scheffer demonstrates that emotional and physical well-being are inextricably linked and shows how the flower therapies can be a powerful tool-not only for healing individual symptoms, but for putting the course of one's life back on track. With a thorough diagnostic questionnaire and color spectrographs of the most popular flowers, Mastering Bach Flower Therapies gives you all the expertise you need to put the healing therapies to work. Scheffer's groundbreaking best-seller Bach Flower Therapy: Theory and Practice revolutionized the science of Bach flower remedies, detailing the healing properties of each individual flower. Rather than using a dry, theoretical approach to treatment, Scheffer gives first-hand accounts of patients cured by the flowers and provides expert commentary on the course of their diagnosis, treatment, and recovery.

1

HEALING THROUGH THE SOUL

An Introduction to Bach Flower Therapy

When someone is sick he feels and thinks differently. Compared to a healthy person, he may be jittery, resigned, bitter, stubborn, or impatient. As Edward Bach proposed sixty years ago, the patient’s consciousness has undergone a negative change by turning away from its higher self and the laws of its soul.^*3 In contrast, a positive change in consciousness—apart from treatments modern medicine might provide—is the deciding factor in every healing process; therefore, every crisis or illness offers us the chance for a positive character change, a step to maturity, a quantum leap in character development.

Edward Bach, among others, observed that with every medically definable illness negative moods such as impatience, despair, and hopelessness become apparent. What is decisive, though, is the fact that every medically definable illness is at some time preceded by such negative moods. If such negative moods can be recognized early on and made positive, physical illness may be prevented altogether.

Today, if one is in a position to take a clear look at our environment, one will notice with horror that a large part of the population of our so-called civilized countries is approaching a state of collective illness. Feelings of resignation, hopelessness, fear, depression, confusion, and helplessness abound and are determining the general feel of life, especially in the younger generation. Perhaps that is why these young people have characteristically been the quickest to recognize and embrace the message of an English physician who combined the abilities of a scientist with those of a modern shaman. Sixty years ago Edward Bach recognized that certain plants have the energetic potency to target negative moods in a subtle way without influencing them arbitrarily. He called them “happy fellows of the plant world,” and they served as catalysts for the transformation of negative consciousness into positive consciousness, allowing a profound connection with one’s higher self.

Initially viewed with skepticism and the subject of ridicule, Bach Flower Therapy has now become for many people their salvation; it has changed their fate. The following letter from a young Swiss is representative of many others:

I was born on a farm in Eastern Switzerland, the second of six children. My mother had wished for a girl, but I turned out a boy. Shortly after birth, I developed an eye infection and so I became the problem child of the family. My father tried to break my strong will through punishment and beatings. I had a very hard childhood and I was very defiant. During puberty I often thought of suicide. After school, I worked for a year on the family farm; I was practically forced to do that. After the year passed, I worked as a letter carrier for the post office. I wanted to get away from the house as soon as possible.

After a year at the post office I got a job with an insurance company. I stayed there for five years. During this time I studied each Saturday in order to obtain a commercial degree. When I was nineteen, I met a man who was thirteen years older and I was drawn to him. My mother was outraged and there were dramatic scenes. But I had my way. Shortly after my departure I also changed jobs. I went to a large bank where I was hired as a computer operator.

The early days with my friend brought many problems. As pressures from home disappeared, many things that had not been dealt with came to the surface. I couldn’t manage them by myself. On the advice of my doctor and my friend, I started psychiatric care. My psychiatrist found strong manic-depressive states. He said that it was in my family, that I carried a heavy, hereditary burden. I was on various medications for five years, including Lithium.

For a while I was balanced by the medications. But deep inside of me trouble continued to boil. I started working intensely, as if work was a drug to which I was addicted. I worked at home in the garden, bought animals, half of a farm, all this on top of the work in my office. The drug was outstanding. After fifteen to eighteen hours of work, I would sink into a deep sleep, and all my real problems would seem to move aside. But inside, these pressures took their toll. And so, three years ago, I collapsed and had to be taken to the hospital. I was operated on twice for various cancers, and subsequently underwent twenty sessions of radiation.

My entire outer field of reference—work, the animals, the garden, my friend, my house, my farm—was practically destroyed in one day. I had to give everything up. I only had myself. I was standing in front of nothingness, the ruins of an existence that I had collected for twenty-five years and that I thought represented success. Outwardly and inwardly I was a heap of junk. Negative feelings like hate, envy, jealousy, and many others were determining my being.

By chance I met, at this zero hour, a man who had many times helped his fellow man. I attended his classes and slowly started living again. But because I was still weak and the negative feelings were very strong, I had to pass through the deepest lows once again. Only through the help of my friend was I saved from ruin. Slowly but surely, the climb from the darkness of night into daylight began. In one course I heard something about the Bach Flowers. I was very interested and signed up for an introductory session with great expectations. After a comprehensive discussion, the therapist suggested that I spontaneously pick out six of the thirty-eight small Bach Flower flasks. I pulled out six bottles and was filled with great joy. They were almost all flowers that the therapist had already prescribed in her notes. I had intuitively picked the correct flowers for myself; they were Cerato, Oak, Crab Apple, Wild Oat, Hornbeam, and Willow. I was to take these in four different bottles, in a sequence of four phases.

The first bottle was filled with the Cerato and Oak Bach Flowers. Shortly before I began taking the Bach Flowers, I started working as a gardener for a company that manufactured biological products, cosmetics, and healing aids, among other things. Through my work with the plants in the garden, I experienced a change in myself that was now, by using Cerato and Oak, intensified. I gained great confidence in myself and knew that I was doing the right thing. Through the use of Oak, I stopped looking at my life as a continuing struggle. I started to consciously experience playful and sentimental moments.

I became calm and learned to look at things in a positive light. Living in my new house, working at my new job, I was alone and content. I intentionally wanted to live by myself, in order to cleanse. I wanted to make something positive out of myself, out of my life, before I attempted to live with anybody else again. I was now also free from all medications. I started to expand my consciousness. I read the book Bach Flower Therapy and began seeing things as though through different eyes. Finally, after twenty-five years, I started living my life. I experienced a great sense of inner joy that filled me almost daily.

The first combination of Cerato/Oak was now replaced by Hornbeam. From this Bach Flower I did not notice anything at first. I tried to gain insight from suggestions in the book. Suddenly I realized that, on a completely different plane, something was starting to stir. I was becoming alive again and started giving in to an unexpected spontaneity. That is something that I have kept to this day: I do what gives me joy, and therefore I remain inwardly and outwardly alive. It was not the outer circumstances that had changed, but so many things were different inwardly that I began to see the world in a new light.

Then it was time for the third phase, Crab Apple and Wild Oat. After all the positive experiences that I had had so far, I learned through the use of Crabapple that no being is completely fulfilled. I understood that something like that was not even possible, otherwise there would be no possibility for learning. I had often had a sensitivity toward, or an obsession for, cleanliness that made me find many things revolting. That now changed. I learned gradually to look at everything from a higher viewpoint, and I saw entirely new connections. Finally I could follow my entire life back to my birth and go through it again, this time from a higher point of view.

And so I started to organize my life anew and brought clarity to all the connections. I was now ready to cleanse not only myself but also the relationships with people from my dark period. I started to accept the scars on my body and realized that the operations had been an opportunity for me. I learned to be grateful for all the learning possibilities my life had given me and started to realize that I could even help other people through my experiences. Slowly I understood that man has to start at the bottom and climb one step at a time, proving himself worthy with each step he has reached. A rough outline of a goal began to take shape, a goal that had always slumbered deep inside of me. In order to achieve this goal, I had many steps to take. The energy of the Wild Oat gave me the leading thread or direction to achieve the goal.

It was at this time that I met my future wife. I immediately had the certitude that she was the right one. We married shortly after our first meeting. To this day I have never regretted that step; I also have the certainty that I never will.

The final Bach Flower that closes this therapy is Willow. Through Willow I learned to take responsibility for my destiny. I recognized that everything that happened was ultimately due to what I was carrying inside of me. I now know that the darkness in my life has given me a great opportunity for learning. Was I not the builder of my own destiny? I had arranged the stones in my quarry, so that now I could build a house with them. It was not the bad disease or evil doctor who had given me all this suffering, all the scars. No, I alone was the perpetrator and the victim. All the things that I did to myself finally allowed me to reach a point where I could be rational and could courageously view problems as chances to learn. I try now to do justice to the lesson I’ve learned.

The Bach Flowers were catalysts for me. They gave me the strength and courage to see myself as I really am, and to be able to say yes to myself. They haven’t changed anything about me externally and yet they have changed everything. They have helped to merge my body, soul, and spirit, have given them the opportunity to work together. Two drops out of a thirty-milliliter bottle of water and alcohol. No scientific thinker will accept that! The Bach Flowers help one find the way inward. Often one must clear the blocked street or shovel the snowed-in road. It takes longer to reach one’s goal, but once the road is free and clear, we are free to travel it, with all its consequences; this road is always worth it.

The positive restructuring of one’s personality is not always experienced as dramatically as in the previous account. Often, the positive transformation of one’s consciousness is initially apparent only in smaller, seemingly trivial behavioral changes. A fifty-year-old consultant from an old military family wrote:

The first time I had a very positive experience. My furrier promised to do an alteration for me at a low summer price—“maybe it will cost fifty marks,” he had said. When I went to pick up the alteration with a friend, the furrier himself was not there. His mother handed me a bill that was 100 marks higher, because supposedly new fur had to be used. I left it at that, which was a pattern of mine—always putting up with this type of situation. A couple of days later it suddenly hit me. I got on the phone, spoke to the furrier right away and explained my situation to him. He explained it as an error on the part of his mother, and said I should deduct the 100 marks from the final bill. It was that simple! For the first time I had consciously stood for what was rightfully mine. For me that was an experience.

In some cases, new perspectives and realizations for the spiritual and soulful development of the personality are obtained after a relatively short period of treatment. A Swiss social worker writes, “In my religious development I experienced a positive step in the direction of faith, trust, and the ability to pray without making any special effort.”

In every case one can conclude that Bach Flower Therapy sets in motion a positive process of development. According to one psychologist: “The question, if the problem of a personal situation has been solved, cannot always be answered unequivocally. But the development process has been set in motion, and has such an individual course, that it sometimes cannot be verbalized for other people.”

Following is a typical account after therapy of a few weeks, in which the author, a naturopath, has been participating in a seminar:

Today is the end of the first bottle, and with it the first cycle of my drops. What I have learned so far with their help is, I think, the ability to touch my own shadows. I studied many things outwardly that I thought could never be inside of me, because they made me feel so uncomfortable and ashamed. But obviously these feelings are part of me.

Aggression, fear, hate, and despair all lived deeply hidden in my inner self and suddenly, with the use of drops, I experienced them outwardly for the first time. Things were happening to me that, I am certain, would have never occurred if I had not been ready for them. I fear that I have experienced and discovered only a very small part of my shadowy side, but I believe very strongly that my body and my soul will only let me deal with as much as I can handle. Somehow, this thought gives me confidence in myself and I feel protected and sheltered.

2

WHAT IS THE COURSE

of a Bach Flower Therapy?

Because Bach Flower Therapy corresponds to the inner powers of each individual, we can safely say that there are no two identical developments resulting from the same Bach Flower Therapy. With a Bach Flower Therapy it does not make much sense to try to develop either a course of action or a record of symptoms as one might in a true homeopathic repertoire. Trying to do so would shift one’s view from what is best and unique about Bach Flower Therapy, which is the inner dynamic of the individual.

The course of therapy depends on a constellation of occurrences, which takes into account both the history of the patients and their surroundings, but above all the “quality of time.” All of these factors play a deciding role and color patients’ symptoms in an individual fashion. Because these factors are unique to a given moment and person, the development and course of a therapy cannot be repeated.

While the observations presented here are drawn from twelve years of practice with Bach Flowers, they may serve to inspire awareness of the beginning Bach Flower patient’s own observations.

Primary reactions that could appear in the first days after starting the therapy include:

a. A deep inhalation and a change in eye expression immediately after ingestion

b. Intensified sensory perception

c. Feelings of warmth and joy throughout the entire body

d. Reactions, as if responding to sensations caused by electricity, a sting, a flash, a prickly feeling, cold, etc., especially on the left side of the body

e. A strong need for rest or sleep because so much energy is being used up on an inner plane

f. A sense of dizziness or confusion during the day

g. A metallic taste in the mouth

h. Flashes of past-disease symptoms, such as rheumatic aches or pains

i. An outer sign of psychic cleansing in the form of rashes that subside in two to three days—for example, eczema on the left hand, an outbreak on the skin of the right index and ring fingers, or strong itching on the heels, knees, and elbows

j. Heavy menstrual flow in women

k. Dreams about keys during the first night

The following passage describes the appearance of immediate reactions with subsequent physical symptoms after taking a mixture of Heather, Holly, and Pine.

I took the first four drops in the evening around seven o’clock. Later, between ten and eleven o’clock, I was going to bed and was standing in my bathroom when I let out a groan. I was very astonished, especially since it was followed by similar outbursts—moans and groans and then whimpering that changed to crying. The words came to me: flayed creature. All this seemed to come from a place over which I had no influence. I was bewildered and felt like a spectator. In the night I had an attack of angina that I had felt com...

Table of contents

• Cover Image
• Title Page
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• Chapter 1: Healing Through the Soul: An Introduction to Bach Flower Therapy
• Chapter 2: What Is the Course of a Bach Flower Therapy?
• Chapter 3: The Bach Flowers as Developmental Aids in the Ordering of Oneself
• Chapter 4: Experiences with Animals and Plants
• Chapter 5: Experiences with Rescue Remedy
• Chapter 6: The Bach Flowers in the Medical and Natural Healing Practices
• Appendix 1: The Goal of Bach Flower Therapy
• Appendix 2: Therapeutic Definitions of Dr. Edward Bach
• Appendix 3: A Step into the Future: Bioenergy Radiation of the Bach Flower Essences
• Appendix 4: Deficiencies Cured by the Thirty-eight Flower Essences
• Appendix 5: Questionnaire for the Self-determination of the Correct Bach Flower Combinations
• Footnotes
• Index
• About the Author
• About Inner Traditions • Bear & Company
• Books of Related Interest
• Copyright & Permissions