FEP73 Expanding Your Understanding of the Bach Flowers
Show Notes:
In this episode, Kathleen and Rochana welcome back our partner in the School for Flower Essence Studies, Ruth Toledo Altschuler.
During these times of progressive overwhelm, we believe that Nature is here for us, and we have the capacity to take in new information when we attune to the plants. In light of this, we’re excited to embark on a deep exploration of nine more Bach Flowers in our upcoming study group, which is more like an “experience group”.
We discuss the value of having a solid foundation of lineage teachings to build on — in this case, Dr. Edward Bach’s original discoveries which have been much enhanced by Julian Barnard’s lifetime contributions in this field. Now, we as modern practitioners have further evolved the way we use and talk about the Bach flowers in our practices. Bach flowers are well combined with the concept of parts work (Internal Family Systems) and other contemporary ways of addressing emotional challenges, affirming that they’re more relevant than ever.
Bach Flowers in Contemporary Practice is our in-depth Bach flower essence study group in which we slow down to learn directly from the plants and the people who have long been using these essences with clients. You’re invited to join our upcoming iteration beginning February 20th, 2025. This is Part Three of a series, but can be taken in any order!
Be sure to register by February 7th to save $30.
Audio:
Video:
Flower Essences discussed during the show:
Show Transcript
Rochana Felde: [00:00:39] Welcome back to the podcast, folks. Glad to be back in this New Year recording. And today, we have a special guest with us. It’s Ruth Toledo Altschuler, our partner at The School for Flower Essence Studies. We thought we’d have her back because we are preparing for a continuation, a third round of our Bach flower study group coming up this spring. And this is really exciting, unique– it’s very unique. There’s nothing else like it in the flower essence schools where we really deep dive into Bach flowers, and we’re taking it to a whole new level. So we use Julian Barnard’s Bach Flower Learning Programme as a baseline to study. And the students, they go through all of the materials that Julian Barnard has prepared and has been teaching for decades.
And if you don’t know who Julian Barnard is, he is in the direct lineage from Dr. Bach, having been trained by Nickie Murray, who was trained by Nora Weeks, who was Dr. Bach’s assistant. So there’s this amazing lineage of passed along information about the Bach flowers. And what Julian does is he also makes the Bach Flower Remedies, still to this day in England, in some of the same places that Dr. Bach made the original remedies. And so what he’s done over the years teaching about and working with these plants, has really got to know them on a very deep level. He has explored the botanical signatures of the plants and really brought a lot of richness and depth into understanding these essence flowers that we didn’t have before that.
And now with some of the newer people on the scene, I guess you could say, there’s been a lot of new flower essences created, discovered, the California flowers, a lot of amazing evolution with this practice. And sometimes we forget the brilliance and just this overlooked depth of the first flower essences, the ones that as far as we practice today. Obviously, flower and plant medicine has been used since ancient times, and some of them in very similar ways to the way to how we think of flower essences today. But the way we use them in practice today really came from Dr. Bach.
And so what we’ve done is created this study group that looks at Julian’s teachings, and then we talk about it as practitioners and how we all use them in our practice today and have come away with really incredible aha moments, findings, and it’s a wonderful information-sharing that we just feel is quite incredible experience. And we spend time, we take our time. We’re spending about an hour on each essence, and that’s why we’re doing this in four rounds. And this is the third of four rounds starting in the spring.
So we’re really excited to dive in again because we don’t know, we never know what we’re going to come away with. It’s not just like teaching some rote curriculum. It’s an exploration, and we all come away richer from the experience. So welcome back to the podcast, Ruth. We’re glad to have you back.
Ruth Toledo Altschuler: [00:04:55] Oh, it’s great to be here and to be sharing about this, and yet, I first would like to address the fact that most of us at least are really overwhelmed at this time. And if you talk about a study group and all of that, that might feel like, oh, wow, can I really take on something that will require me to be engaged in a study group? So what I want to say to you and to that is, oh, yes, we’re certainly overwhelmed, we have been progressively overwhelmed, and it seems like over these last months, that has gone up exponentially. So it’s really hard to make decisions and even to think, well, can I really focus and dive into these studies? So what I want to share with all of you, not only about this particular program, but about all of the programs that we have been doing and the kind of approach that we have been taking, following very much on the pathways that Julian Barnard had set and Richard and Patricia Kaminski from FES also of really connecting with the plants, is that every time we go into one of these deep dives of attuning to one plant at a time especially, this really creates a whole other field of information that we enter in that is actually in itself an experience that is organizing, integrating, and healing because we are actually really listening to another plane of intelligence and of wisdom around survival here on planet Earth and around continuing to meet the challenges and grow and flourish and recreate and adapt as well.
So just for the experience of being part of this group and also of being part of a group of like-hearted, like-minded people who love the plants and love to be in a community that’s really generous and mutually supportive and where your voice is very welcome and your contributions really matter is an experience that perhaps you don’t even know you need. So if you feel the spark, know that it is a safe space to be for the current times.
And so in that, I would also like to share the fact that the dimensions of healing that each plant has revealed themselves to us, as Ro was just saying, and open and expand and tell us of possibilities of working with these essences. I’ll just give an example. Let’s think, for instance, of a plant in the Bach Remedies that you know, you’ve heard about it, Centaury, the one of the person who is the mat where people step upon and that they’re always compliant and in service, etc. So you would say, yeah, these are the typical people-pleaser, weaker personalities, etc. One of the things that you will find in the discussions that we’ll have in this group is that we are actually acknowledging that for some people, for survival within certain family systems, they had to create a part of themselves that really sought acceptance and adapted to circumstances, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that’s the essential soul signature that that person has, and yet, they have really needed to have that part. And that part was a survival helper for them. And there are different wounded parts behind that that also need help. So the dimensions of work that has been opened for us with these discussions of the Bach Remedies being both those type remedies, but also being healing elements in other approaches that we have, like internal family systems, Parts Work, etc., is just immense, it’s just fascinating. And we just love how our dimensions have opened and deepened through these approaches. And I’m sure Kathleen has a lot more to say on that.
Kathleen Aspenns: [00:11:12] What you’re bringing forward, this qualities of talking about these– they’re well known, but they have a lot of languaging around them that may be hard to accept. It’s hard to personally identify with something that feels really judgmental. And sometimes the languaging of these essences can feel really like you’re being judged, like you said, that doormat syndrome. That’s not a very empowering thing to say to someone, and yet, when we can apply these more recent insights from Parts Work of saying, yes, as a survival strategy in your family of origin, a part protector, part of you had to learn to fawn to authority, had to manage it by being the pleaser and being the person that did all the things, and that was a survival strategy for you, and yet, that’s not who you are. And so by being able to bring Centaury into– looking at it through a new lens of, these parts of us maybe do benefit from Centaury, but it doesn’t define you and it’s not you. It’s a part that developed as a result of the trauma you experienced, or of the life experiences you had in your family of origin.
I really love how the work that we’re doing is bringing a much richer experience of these essences beyond the slotting people into little categories. It really offers a lot more potential for seeing this multifaceted being that is each and every one of us. And maybe we do have parts of us that respond in this way, but there’s also other parts, and there’s a whole integrated self that is way bigger and way more beautiful. And the experience of really investing this time, we can call it a study group, but we could also call it an experience group because when we are gathered together, really opening space for each one of these essences, we get to know them as people, almost. We had a beautiful sharing from one of our students talking about how having this experience got her to know each one of these essences individually, and as a much richer, more multifaceted, she said she knows them as individuals now. And we carry this experience with us as we go into our practices. Rather than looking for a type and applying a type, we are now able to see this multifaceted being that is, for example, Centaury, and be able to see, oh, yes, this might be a really great component in a formula to support somebody as they overcome these experiences. I think that’s what you were saying, Ruth, right?
Ruth Toledo Altschuler: [00:14:43] Yeah. And I wanted to add yet another layer to that, which is of an area that Kathleen and I are really passionate about, of a work that has been pioneered in the flower essence realm by Patricia Kaminski and Richard Katz, the whole research on botanical families. And when we think about Centaury, that is that little small flower that oftentimes grows on the walk areas and you will step upon it. And just the other day, I was in the UK on a picnic and I was moving myself around on the grass, and suddenly I look towards my side, and I had almost stepped upon a little Centaury plant, which I then photographed, and it’s actually on our page, that same one. However, in this fascinating study, we are looking at the fact that this plant is in the same botanical family as Gentian, which amidst the Bach Flower Remedies is one that it actually grows and blossoms in the fall. And it’s actually for moments of deep discouragement when we’re feeling we’re losing our faith, like moments of darkness. And it’s a plant that has a lot of strength to it.
And then we also bring in other relatives that are from other essence systems, but from the same family to give context. And so we can look at the Explorer’s Gentian and the Green Cross Gentian. These are very resilient plants that grow high up in the mountains, where the weather is really very trying for a plant to survive, and they have such strength and such presence. And so then we look at our little Centuary and see that it’s part of this family. So, what other aspects are intrinsic to this plant that we didn’t even know of because we were just looking at that plant specifically and not so much in context. And we also know that this Gentian family has many medicinal plants. Gentian itself is a medicinal plant and a very strong one too. So, bringing in all these elements, it really adds dimensions and richness to the reflections we have and to how we get to feel and embody the qualities of each one of these plants.
Kathleen Aspenns: [00:17:50] I wanted to mention a moment of how we had the privilege of having a meeting with Julian not too long ago, all talking about Gentian. I just wanted to bring forward that opportunity because, Ruth, you have had this really long personal relationship with Julian as a translator for his teaching into Portuguese for many, many years. And so you’ve developed a close personal relationship and really gotten to know his work and his wisdom transmission that he’s bringing through from spending so much time working with him as he’s teaching. And so to be able to be a part of a meeting on Gentian was really a privilege and really got me to understand Gentian in a much deeper way than I had before, especially this quality that you’re bringing forward about the loss of faith, the loss of strength that comes from feeling like you’re all on your own, and nobody’s here for you, and just that characteristic of Gentian in the typical form, which is somebody who just gives up, it’s that, but it’s also, this time now where we feel sometimes hopeless and sometimes like there’s nowhere to turn. And Gentian brings us back to the knowing that no matter what your faith, no matter what, that at least nature, no matter what, nature is here for us, and the Gentian family will bring that character of strength, of backbone, of stepping up and going, okay, this I can do. I have support to do this.
Rochana Felde: [00:19:49] That fits in perfectly with what I was thinking when Ruth was speaking about how this little Gentian is related to these stronger and more robust Gentians up on the mountaintop, and how thinking about the plant as an individual like that, it’s like they’re being able to gain strength from their family, just like we can in the right circumstances. Just like when I’ve done genealogy and ancestral research and I read about these ancestors that overcame the most extreme odds that you just can’t even really imagine what it was like back then and what they had to endure to go through in order for me to be here sitting here today, is quite amazing. And when I think about that and embody that, I gain so much strength from it. I feel all of that strength from my ancestors and knowing that it’s in my DNA.
And thinking of the plants and the plant families like that and their own relationship and how they can help each other, not just us, they’re not just here for us, but how they can help each other and the planet and that symbiotic relationship is really powerful. And it’s something that I even probably hadn’t thought quite exactly like that before that moment, Ruth, until you were telling the story of the little Gentian that you almost stepped on, and that really illustrates that concept of thinking about a plant as an individual and getting to know it on that personal level. So I love that.
I also wanted to reflect on the concept of thinking in terms of parts or internal family systems, and you don’t even have to be well-versed in that subject. It’s just knowing conceptually, that we as individuals are made up of many parts. And the traditional way of describing the Bach flowers, I always think of Heather. Heather is the hardest one to talk about with clients because it’s for people who are obsessed with themselves and don’t like to be alone. I mean, that’s the traditional explanation of that remedy, but there’s so much– well, first of all, we know there’s more to it when we go into the depth of working with that plant as an individual, but secondly, being able to describe it for somebody in terms of, there’s a part of you out of one of many parts of you that might be feeling this way in this particular situation, not as a personality flaw, right? So that concept is so powerful in working with these plants. And again, it’s not something that one has to study. It’s just a concept to embrace.
Kathleen Aspenns: [00:23:03] I feel like I want to bring in one of the expansions of my understanding that came about through a previous iteration of this group where we talked about Walnut, and it’s really wonderful because Ruth and I, we’re bringing in decades of experience of working with clients, working with these essences, our own knowings and understandings that are based on our study. And as we prepare this group experience, we’re both independently researching. And so it gives us, I know it gives me, the opportunity to do research which I might not find time for. And doing these deep dives into these individual plants in order to see things that I hadn’t seen before or come to understandings that I hadn’t before really has given me new insights in using these essences. And so with Walnut particularly, it’s one that we use a lot, and it’s not one, thankfully, that has an inherently difficult description to offer to people because Dr. Bach talked about it as the link-breaker. Okay, great. No problem. We all go through changes and we all go through experiences. But when we spent the time to really unpack Walnut and to go into these amazing visual journeys that Ruth prepares for these courses, really being able to feel into the energetic of Walnut, and I love to think about Walnut and the way that it protects its own space, it releases a chemical called juglone in its leaves that drop down into the Earth that creates this force field against other incursions of other plants. And so it creates its own protection. It has its own space. And more and more I’m using Walnut in my practice, both as a container and also a nutritive in many, many formulas to create that quality of spaciousness and protection. Whenever anyone is going through a transformative experience and any kind of a major life change, or particularly when they’re going through an internal change, an internal change along the lines of what we were talking about with Centaury of no longer being the person who is willing to be walked over because that’s what we learned in our family of origin, that was the only way to be, and instead, ah, maybe I don’t have to do that. And the Walnut, in addition, it’s like we’re learning to play with these as groupings, the Walnut creates a container around that for us to have that strength to create that change. Ruth, you have some– I’m sure–
Ruth Toledo Altschuler: [00:26:13] Yeah. I would love to add a little bit to that, especially because I was just working with a client who is going through a major transition, not only of relocation of herself and her child but also transition around the relationship and around professional choices, absolutely everything. And what’s so powerful about Walnut is there’s this layer of the substance that falls from the leaves. There is the layer of when the green fruit begins to develop, it has this black substance that’s actually used to darken wood but also protect wood. It is a substance that repels predators and insects of whatever kinds. And inside that, there’s that shell of the Walnut that you’re familiar with. And then, within that, there’s the gentle, very nutritive and tender seed. So there’s all these layers of protection. And one of the things that we are told by Julian Barnard in such a beautiful way is that in this case, the instructions left by Dr. Bach were that the Walnut flower essence is to be prepared only with the female flowers. And in the case of Walnut, the female flowers are like these very delicate uterus or ovaries. And so it’s that protection of the tenderness of the moment of transition, where you’re still growing into the new form and you really need that strong container, as Kathleen was describing so beautifully, to hold spaciousness for that gentle evolution of what is coming next for you, which is exactly what the client needs right now. And so the whole description of the plant to her in this way added so much to how she can feel and connect with the workings of this essence in her formula right now.
Kathleen Aspenns: [00:29:12] Amazing. And I think that as we’re sitting here talking, as we’re interacting, I’m feeling this container emerging in our meeting right now. And I think that those of you who are listening, I think you’re starting to feel this magical container that’s created when we give these essences space to breathe, when we create a shared experience of hearts, we’re bringing so much of the presence of this essence in. And so even in this little way, I think that you’re able to feel it too, our beautiful audience, listeners. I think you’re here. Yes, Ruth?
Ruth Toledo Altschuler: [00:29:59] And I want to add, without going much into it, because that would be almost like a trailer, one essence that we’re going to be discussing in this new iteration is Beech. And as some of you might know, Beech is an essence that’s very much used for intolerance, for being critical, and judgmental. Well, we’re going to do a deep dive in expanding and also understanding what parts of oneself may be part of these processes and may be addressed by this essence, even if they don’t fit that description. So I’m looking forward to that one.
Kathleen Aspenns: [00:30:51] Yeah, I think we’ve all had those moments of Beech, but every time we spend more time with these essences, new experiences arise. And I have absolutely no doubt that we’ll be bringing through our experiences and the cases that we’ve used Beech with, which are myriad, but just like as before, the students who come for these, some of them have lots of experience and some of them have very little experience, and yet everyone has something to share. Everyone will be able to enrich this environment. So if you’re one of those who feels like they don’t know a lot, they have a little experience with the Bach flowers, but they don’t know, oh, there’s going to be– I’m going to be in over my head, I hope that that doesn’t stop you from taking part because it’s really been amazing that some of the newer folks who join really have amazing insights that some of us, we’re just blown away by what comes forward with this shared experience because it’s bigger than us. These gatherings are bigger than what I bring, they’re bigger than what you bring, Ruth, they become something new because we are working together to surface and even generate new ideas around these essences.
Rochana Felde: [00:32:31] Yeah. That is absolutely the feeling that I’ve walked away with from the past iterations of this, and every participant has walked away with that, like you say, no matter the experience, no matter the training. There hasn’t been any experience like this before and it’s one that evolves. I think it could go on forever. It could go on, the way that the flowers are evolving, the way that humanity, that we’re evolving, and we’re evolving together in this beautiful way. And as you say, Kathleen, when they’re given the space, when we give the space to really connect and sit with the plants in this way, there’s always something new and wonderful that comes through.
Ruth Toledo Altschuler: [00:33:30] And I would say new and old and ancient, and this, I feel, is the time when we need to really be receiving this ancient knowledge of the plants that have been here for so long before us so that we can help one another in creating what one of my Brazilian native leaders has been calling our Ancestral Future. How can we create a future that is actually rooted in the deepest ancestral wisdom that is beyond us, as Kathleen was saying?
Rochana Felde: [00:34:23] Yeah, absolutely. So when I say new, new to our modern sensibilities because this is ancient indigenous information that has been on the planet for a very long time, and we are constantly rediscovering this amazing wealth of knowledge and healing.
Kathleen Aspenns: [00:34:45] Wow. I can hardly wait. We are going to be starting this version of this study group, experience group on February 20th. And we can’t wait. And we can’t wait to see you if you’re willing and able to join us. We certainly have and really welcome you, and we also will welcome you the next time if you’re not able to be this one. It’s really a beautiful sharing, and we hope that you’ll be willing to join us and eager to join us because you’ll get a lot out of it for essences that maybe we think, oh, yeah, I know that one, I’ve been there. And I’m going to be really excited.
I wanted to mention one more essence that means something to me personally. We’re going to be talking about the Aspen. It’s going to be on our first version. And the Aspen, aside from it being the origin of my name, it helps us be connected and it helps us to tap into this energetic connection that we all share, and be able to harmonize and resonate as one, and to be able to support all of our nervous systems through the community that we experience. And so we really hope that you’ll take part. And if it’s not right for you right now, you’ll be welcome somewhere in the future. And we have always lots of wonderful offerings over at Flower Essence Studies that you can join our mailing list and be on the list for all the beautiful live community events that we offer every month. We have a free live community Zoom, and we also support our community through this podcast. So we really encourage you to be part of all the things that we have to offer. Many more things are coming, and we would love for you to be part of it. So, well, come on down.
Rochana Felde: [00:36:55] Thanks again for joining us today. And I’ll just reiterate that the name of the course if you’re interested, is called Bach Flowers in Contemporary Practice, Part 3 starting February 20th. And you can find that on floweressencestudies.com.
Ruth Toledo Altschuler: [00:37:20] And just in case you’re wondering whether it’s okay to come into Part 3, it absolutely is because each part is independent and you will really get a lot from it, and then you might even be curious and want to watch Part 1 or 2 or not.
Rochana Felde: [00:37:40] Yes. We welcome you to any part in any order. All right. Bye-bye now.
Kathleen Aspenns: [00:37:52] This podcast is meant for educational and entertainment purposes only. We are not physicians and do not diagnose, prescribe, or treat medical conditions. Please consult with your own physician or healthcare practitioner regarding the suggestions and recommendations made by the hosts and guests of The Flower Essence Podcast.
