Over the holidays, Thembi’s house burned to the ground. She and her husband, Charles, their four sons and several other young men from Zimbabwe who were staying with Thembi’s family got out of the house in time, but all their material possessions were lost.

You may remember Thembi from earlier blogs I wrote about her or from her recipe in the Green Hope Farm cookbook.  She worked here at the farm for four years after arriving from Zimbabwe as a political refuge. Her husband, Charles, a soccer coach for the Zimbabwe national team, found himself unexpectedly seeking asylum in the US when he was put on Mugabe’s hit list. When he took refuge in the US, Thembi found herself single parenting her four boys in Harare. It took Thembi three years of arduous effort to get herself and her children to the US to join Charles.

How Thembi got her children and herself out of Zimbabwe is a tale of determination and courage. After years of challenges including many bus rides back and forth to South Africa to get food for the children, she finally managed to get all the paperwork to join Charles in the US. During what was supposed to be a last trip to the US embassy to get things finalized, all her documents were stolen inside the embassy. It looked like all was lost, then Thembi made the US officials look at their camera recordings of her showing her paperwork at the first embassy checkpoint. Even when it was agreed that the crime had been committed on US property, Thembi was on her own to get new documents.

When Thembi first stepped on US soil, it was July 4^th. She would want you to know that she arrived in heels. This was probably the last time in her life in rural New Hampshire when heels were a good idea.

During Thembi’s four years working at the farm she taught us a lot about going with the flow and seeing life as an adventure. Her deep faith matched her sunny optimism and enormous heart, while her infectious sense of humor and her funny stories of life in Harare took us to another world, truly.

It was an enormous change to leave her familiar African world of family, friends and the bustle of the city to live in the wilds of New Hampshire, but she did it with zest. Her house adjoined the playing fields of Kimball Union Academy where her husband worked, and her boys, soccer players all, took to this life of green grass at their doorstep. Thembi rolled with the whole country thing even as she preferred concrete to turf. She even managed to impart her sense of style to the many layers of clothing needed to keep warm during New Hampshire winters.

After her years at the farm, Thembi got herself enrolled in college and begin a job that worked better for her schedule as a student. We were very sad to see her leave the farm but also awed by her continuing determination to live her dreams in a new country.

As Thembi navigated the aftermath of the house fire, I was reminded again of her indomitable spirit. She greeted everyone who came to help with genuine concern about how they were doing. As we sat at a neighbor’s kitchen table only hours after the fire, Thembi wanted to know all about everyone at the farm and laughed with delight at various tidbits of good news. She literally had no shoes or clothing beyond her pajamas, yet she celebrated our lives without a thought to herself. As the days passed, it became clear that her optimism and general go with the flow attitude wasn’t just shock. Thembi has the gift of accepting what is AND embracing it. Day after day!

I do not know if her equanimity is because she already lost her country, her friends, her family and all her material possessions when she left Zimbabwe. I can imagine that someone who had lost so much already could react to more loss with bitterness, but there is not a shred of this in Thembi.   She is calm about beginning again. She isn’t grimly determined but instead sees it all as the next adventure of her life.

Thembi is anchored in a profound sense of being taken care of by a caring universe even in the midst of this traumatic circumstance. I am sure it took a great effort to find this anchoring, but now it flows from her like a river.

Yes, there is much for her to organize for all her boys, but it is just stuff and they will figure it out. She is moving on and embracing what lies ahead with the same open-hearted optimism, faith and sense of humor that helped her create a new life in America. In the aftermath of the fire, she gives her optimism and love of life to all who enter her orbit. She gives from a place of riches far beyond material things. It is awesome to witness and I thank her for her example with all my heart.

Here are a few photos I have of Thembi.

Her grandmother lived on a farm in the country so Thembi always loved being part of farm activities like harvesting  wild ramps in the spring.

 

Here is Thembi at her bon voyage party at the farm.

Thembi is always ready to chat over a cup of tea.

Every morning here at the farm, there is a race to the mail pile. Staff goddesses arrive a few minutes early in hopes they can snag the pile before someone else does.

We love our mail! Your cards, letters, photos, art, funny and heartfelt stories lift us up and make us laugh. Sometimes we cry right along with you, grateful you have trusted us with your sorrows as well as your joys.

Whichever lucky goddess snagged the mail shares the news and leaves the cards on the big office kitchen table for the rest of us to read too. Email news is savored too. When you send your news on email, it gets read out or we hover around the computer screen to catch up. We ooh and ahh over photos of your beloveds be they canine, feline, equine, feathered or human.

I shouldn’t leave out the rabbit news and photos here. We love this too!

We are grateful for every being that has gotten to work with Green Hope Farm Flower Essences and grateful to hear from you about how it’s gone.

Sometimes it is hard to believe that Green Hope Farm has been here for 30 years, a milestone we are going to celebrate with you in 2017.

Sometimes it is hard NOT to believe this. We get cards from you and discover your children who were frolicking like young colts just a minute ago are now parents of their own children. That happened to me too! A precious new mother was sharing her birth story with us on email this morning, and I realized the birth story I was sharing back with her was for Ben who is 35!

I feel very lucky about being part of this virtual village. And grateful too because I am a part of it thanks to all of you. Someone described the work of loving kindness as a kind of heart gardening with each of us heart gardeners. I want to thank each of you for your heart gardening.

As the staff will tell you, I love every last card you send and every last thoughtful enclosure. These sharing from you fill the office and literally hang from the rafters! Sometimes I am a little disorganized with my thanks. I just want to make sure you all know we appreciate your love! And I thank you from the bottom of my heart for all the blessings you have showered on us in this year and all the years we have been here.

Love, Molly

A lovely Flower Essence practitioner from Australia asked for Flower Essence suggestions for a series of concerns yesterday. Her questions and the Essences that came forward to suggest themselves reminded me that the balancing of masculine and feminine energies and healing the wounds of patriarchy is a global concern.

I am just going to let her questions unfold as they did in her email as the questions took me on a journey. I hope they will take you on this journey too!

Q: What suggestions do you have for core soul issue of feeling like one doesn’t fit in/belong here on earth

A: Psychillis Macconnellaie from St John is good for this as it helps us graft our life to new or uncomfortable terrain. We also have a combination remedy called Home Away from Home made from all the Flowering plants in our greenhouse- Greenhouse plants have to come to terms with living away from their native habitats as well as removed from the soil they naturally belong in, so this Essence brings much wisdom to the topic of how to thrive in a place that is not home. You might also consider Rosa Mundi – I absolutely love this Rose for this issue. Its I AM affirmation is. ” I AM in this world but not of this world.”

Q: Suggestions for non-acceptance of incarnation, resistance to fully embracing incarnation, not really wanting to “be here”, superficial involvement in life

A: Clematis is the traditional remedy suggested for this, and it does help people awake from daydreaming through life. Here are some other thoughts- Carry Less offers support to remove the sort of filter that we may be seeing through that leaves us feeling life is not worth investing in. Morning Glory has such an enormous expansive energy that helps us open up to embrace life. Belerephon of the Open Door has a magical and mysterious way of ushering us through doors to new places where we feel engaged and reborn. White Flower from Druid is another powerhouse of rebirth that connects to our lives in a new way.

My last suggestion may be the most important. It is so vital right now for us to feel connected to our lives. Being fully present is the only way we can take our lives forward. Our Grounding mix with its many Tree Flower Essences helps us to feel our roots while also expressing ourselves in the world. It is a wonderful ally.

If it’s been too painful to stay connected to our day to day life, one other individual Tree Essence, Redwood, helps us be fully present but take the long view that.  “this too shall pass.”

A: Suggestions for self-sabotaging and self-limiting behavior patterns (subconsciously not TRULY wanting to get well)– linked to above issue (I believe this is also the core issue of some people’s restrictive eating disorders).

Q: All Ego Contracts Null & Void is the first one that comes to mind. It’s a combination of many Essences that help us break free of old outgrown ideas of what we should or should not do.

Many times the ego contracts come from expectations from authority figures such as parents, but often we have internalized these contracts and made them our own. The ego contracts we most need to break are the ones we have with ourselves.

I also like Carry Less for this, as this issue can again be about the filters of perception we carry around with us such as, “With all my flaws, I deserve ill health.” I see this as a wound of patriarchy. Patriarchy suggests the goal is being perfect. The territory beyond patriarchy, the territory of a balanced masculine and feminine, dismantles this goal orientation as well as notions that perfection is what life is about.

Q: Suggestions for paralyzing fear that true self will be “exposed” or “found out” by others (even if there are no wrongdoings or wrong-beings in this lifetime).

A: This is the issue coming up for all of us and most particularly womankind. When I first made The Sacred Feminine combination remedy, I was stunned by the Angels’ description. It is so visceral and immediate. It calls us to let go and let the birth of a new humanity happen NOW and in the VESSEL of our own bodies. It is a call to embody our truth and live it. Yes we have fears, but we have to let the Divine Feminine be born in each of us anyways!

THE BIRTH IS UNDERWAY! Why not embrace it!

Needless to say, this remedy is all about supporting us to get into the delivery room and let our purpose be born in all its wild beauty.

Fragrant Ladies Tresses and The Way Forward are also good because they release this sense that paralysis will prevail. It won’t! These two Essences help us experience that there IS a way forward. We may well have no idea how the Divine Feminine will balance out what has been, but it is good to feel with every fiber of our beings that the BALANCING IS UNDER WAY!

Q: Suggestions for profound fear of the loss of, removal of or harm to loved ones as a result of the aforementioned “exposure”

A: If this has a past life component, Spiddal is great for taking back personal power lost in previous lives. Carry Less also helps to release these past life filters that the old plot line will necessarily be repeated, but Spiddal and also Inishbofin help us to step forward with a new sense of personal power that we and a new plot line can and will prevail.

Chinese Knotweed, a new one from Taiwan, helps with this fear of loss- Here is the beginning of the description of this new friend, “Chinese Knotweed supports determination to follow God’s plan with detachment from all worldly ideas, material infatuations or fear of loss. Her Flower Essence represents complete trust in the divine plan and detachment from all else. She helps us to find crystal clarity that Love is to be honoured above all else.”

Closed Blossom Melastoma from Taiwan is another that helps us anchor in the reality beyond the surface dramas so we can experience that inner certainty that we can never lose what is ours: our eternal self and our oneness with all Divinity.

Looking at this question from a pragmatic angle, if there is an external force of harm at work, Indian Rhododendron from Taiwan and also Rattlesnake Master help remove the toxic forces that threaten- I like how Eight Saints from Taiwan connects us more clearly to the mighty forces at our sides-

The last one that feels important to mention is Sky Flower from Taiwan. It reminds us of the forces of universal order at work. As the Sky Flower description says, “Sky Flower dispels misrepresentations from people or situations with the understanding that, under Heaven, all is plainly clear. She stops us from kowtowing to false faces, freeing us to go where the messages take us without fear and doubt. We will overcome.”

One of the things I have noticed over the years is that the Angels always lead us to make Flower Essences that will be particularly appropriate for the time in which they are created. For example, Equanimity, this year’s Venus Garden remedy feels extremely relevant for right now. This is true about the Taiwan Essences too.

When GHF friends come to us, searching for specific Essences for specific situations, I look to this new collection for appropriate Essences and keep finding them there!

Q: Suggestions for spiritual superiority – disdain for humanity and all of its wrongdoings and downfalls, errors and imperfections.

A: The Camino collection is so good for this as these Essences remind us we are all on the journey together- Rabanal and Galicia are specifically helpful as Rabanal helps us hold the stories and suffering of those around us with particular tenderness while Galicia helps us be compassionate when we are amongst people who don’t experience the journey in the same way as we do.

If this spiritual superiority is an East-West issue then I would look to the new Himalayan Balsam Essence. This opens the door for us to embrace an eastern point of view about our shared planetary home. This is a helpful one to work with first if the Taiwanese Essences feel alien, as this new beloved helps us find the oneness in east and west.

Q: Suggestions for general superiority/speaking ‘down’ to people/ belief that others are useless and idiots and only you are capable.

A: This is the way I frame this in my own mind; This attitude springs from a misunderstanding that we can be better or worse than any one else. The truth is that we are all one and therefore all equal. This idea of superiority/ inferiority is perhaps the worst legacy of patriarchy.

In my experience, this mindset is often a result of growing up in families with black and white patriarchal ideas about spiritual perfection. Both the person who feels worthless and the person who feels superior are equally wounded by this patriarchal values system as both have lost the bead on the truth that we are all infinitely of value!  As it’s a patriarchal wound, I look to Wound Healing to help.

Right now, the new Cacao Essence is also coming up for people for this issue. The Flowers from this tree are all identical and spring right from the mother trunk. This energy in the Flower Essence reminds us all that “We come from the mother and to her we will return.”

Rosemary Essence addresses this mindset differently. It encourages us to feel physically part of humanity and embrace our physicality as physicality diminishes the hold intellectual ideas of superiority have on us. When was the last time any of us were on the dance floor dancing up a storm while simultaneously thinking about how intellectually superior we were from everyone else. IT JUST DOESN’T HAPPEN when we are fully engaged in our bodies.

Soon we will experience ourselves as divinity in physical form. When we live in this territory of the sacred feminine, we will experience our oneness quite literally and will be set free from tired old ideas of separation and otherness.

Last thought about this question- One that is helpful for a number of the last few concerns is Bo He from Taiwan- It addresses issues of kowtowing to elders by adhering to their values. It helps us leave this kowtowing behind.

Q: Suggestions for obsession with maintaining a completely pure body/fear of contaminating body – eating only pure foods, no contact with chemicals, constant detoxification & cleansing of body – (orthorexia) – an essence other than Crab Apple??

A: Many of the Taiwan ones speak to eating disorders- Bleeding Heart Vine for one- This remedy helps us vomit up any mindset that cripples us with confining patterns or a sense of ourselves as bad. This is an Essence helping us towards immense freedom.

Little Ironweed also from Taiwan helps us find that place of deep release so we can proceed forward with a sense of trust in self and in the Divinity within us.

Ixora from Bermuda offers wonderful support. It helps girls and all womankind know that we own our own bodies and don’t have to establish sovereignty by attacking our own bodies to assume control of them- OUR BODIES ALREADY BELONG TO US!!!

Wound Healing comes forward again as I continue to view so many of these concerns as reflecting patriarchal wounds about perfection. Obsessive ideas of patriarchal perfection dissolve in the experience of just being. Grounded in the Divine feminine, we know we are already everything.

We know we are here to love not to accomplish.

The Sacred Feminine encourages us to find this place of being in the Divine feminine- Solandra is so helpful for supporting us to actually break up the habit of doing doing doing or in this case, cleansing, cleansing, cleansing.

Two other thoughts. The fear component is addressed by Common Knapweed– Its affirmation says it all, “I AM enough.”

Last, consider the wonderful Therese Bugnet Rose which is intent to release us from a preoccupation with our looks.

Q: Suggestions for the “Good Girl” mentality, not wanting to make a mistake, always asking permission, fear of getting it wrong, stickler to the rule

A: This is such a cohesive list of questions as they all dovetail. Here we are back to confronting patriarchy with its ideas of perfection and getting it right i.e. these wounds patriarchy has left in everyone most especially women-

In addition to the ones I have mentioned like The Sacred Feminine, I love Pomegranate and Wild Red Morning Glory. They are great here for helping us know with our whole being that we are powerful. We hold the seeds of all creation within us! We are forces to be reckoned with. We don’t have to apologize for existing!

Last thought- We made The Red Tent to support women not to feel so alone- WE ARE A SISTERHOOD!

Q: Suggestions for “Half-job Harry” people, who passionately start something but lose interest quickly and don’t follow through or finish what they start.

A: On a logistical level, Pumpkin helps us get things done and dismantles the habit of procrastination by getting us in touch with the tremendous life force of Pumpkin. This pattern can arise from a place of believing in our own power to accomplish anything. Queen Anne’s Lace helps us “pull the threads of a divided situation together.” In this case, it helps us to dismantle our sense of somehow not being up to the task.

And as long as I am going over and over the notion of patriarchal wounds, I must say that this lack of follow through often springs from the wound of, “if I don’t do it perfectly then I shouldn’t even try”.  This is a wound of patriarchy with its belief in the mind idea of perfection as some absolute of worldly accomplishment.  So Wound Healing again is going to be helpful!  And really, I would like to have everyone on Earth take The Sacred Feminine.

I love the work of Marion Woodman, a Canadian Jungian therapist who worked with women with eating disorders decades before anyone else did. She came to a complete place of knowing THE BODY IS DIVINE. She understood that when we live in this experience, all our choices are different, specifically how we treat self and our greater self of the planet and all its inhabitants. She understood that the Sacred Feminine within us WILL take us to this place of being and truly transform the world.

Q: Suggestions for The “Drama Queen” (melodramatic) mentality & behavior

A: Cosmos, Grounding, Common Knapweed and the others mentioned for patriarchal wounds would be helpful-  Drama Queens do not feel heard. This gets resolved as patriarchal wounds get healed, because then we feel contained and valued by ourselves.

Q: Suggestions for Victim mentality “poor me”, “such and such did this horrible thing to me/said this horrible thing to me” “I NEVER get this or that” I ALWAYS miss out (etc!)

A: Queen Anne’s Lace and Dill help lift us out of our reptilian brain up into the top of our skull where we process events differently. Grape Essence is excellent for Sour Grapes. Most importantly, the ones for patriarchal wound healing are so important here, because this victim mentality comes out of an illusion of powerlessness which is one of the wounds of patriarchy.

I want to close by thanking the beloved woman down-under who asked these great questions and all of you who engage us with your interesting questions and insights. We learn so much from these conversations! Much Love and Thanks to you all.

I am grateful for your questions because they show me where I have failed to convey important information! Today I wanted to write about how long our Flower Essences will stay fully charged with all their electrical information. I hope to address your questions and concerns in this blog.

Q: I just read your FAQ sheet and was struck by the expense of replacing one’s Essences every year.

A: First of all, our Flower Essences can hold their electrical charge much longer than a year. There should NOT be a need to begin again each year.  HOWEVER our Flower Essences have to be cared for if they are going to stay vibrant and full of information. This is true of ALL Flower Essences. They need your love and care to stay fully charged.

Q: So why do you say they may begin to lose their electrical charge and vibrational information after a year?

A: I say this because I’m not sure what will happen to the Essences once they are out of our hands.  Here at the farm, we grow the Flowers, create Essences then bottle and ship these Essences out to you, always considering how to make sure you get the highest vibration Flower Essences possible.  We look to the Angels and Elementals to help us at every step and follow their advice as closely as we can.  After you receive the Essences from us, the Essences need care from you or they will begin to lose their vibrational information after about a year. Its not an arduous amount of care but just a little bit of care.

Q: In what conditions do they last well?

A: I am not trying to make life difficult for you when I ask you to store your Flower Essences in a high vibration spot in your home. It’s just that if you put a high vibration product in a low vibration spot, it is more work for the high vibration product to stay full of light than if you store this product in a happy spot in the first place. For example, most of us would have an easier time keeping our vibration high on a serene beach in Fiji than at a toxic waste dump.

Remember also that if your Flower Essences have been somewhere where the vibration is not high, you can ask the Angels and Elementals to clear and recharge them. The Angels and Elementals are there for all of us. All you need to do is ask for this help, and it will be done.

Q: In what conditions would Flower Essences not last as long?

A:  If you store your Flower Essences in a locker in Grand Central Station, they are going to get tapped off my passer-bys. This draining of electrical information is a problem anytime Flower Essences are stored in busy traffic areas.   We try very hard to address this by shipping Flower Essences directly to your door in a fully charged condition. Additionally we are grateful that the shops and practices where we send our Flower Essences have staff that love and protect the Essences.  Shops where no one loves the Flower Essences are places where the Essences will soon lose their information to whomever pulls on them in passing.

Q: Would using brandy instead of Red Shiso make a Flower Essence last longer?

A: No it would not. Whether a Flower Essence is stabilized in Red Shiso or in brandy, it is still subject to people or animals pulling on the Essence. It will still will lose its energy if it is not cared for.  Brandy sometimes masks a flat or vibrationless Essence better than Red Shiso, but this does not mean there is data in an old, uncared for brandy based Essence. That is why I am so glad that everyone is getting more adept at feeling into the vibration of Flower Essences to see if they have helpful information or if they are either drained of data or not relevant to one’s situation. The more we work with Flower Essences collectively, the more routine it will be to care for the Essences and the more easy it will be to find the best most helpful Essences for any dilemma we face.

Q: Why do you prefer Red Shiso as your stabilizer?

A: I could go on forever in response to this question.  This plant is generosity incarnate.  As a stabilizer and preservative, it enhances each Essence much as a microphone makes it easier for us to hear a beautiful note sung.  Red Shiso tenderly and thoroughly protects the vibration of each Essence, and it works in complete harmony with the energy of every Flower. Red Shiso is a plant that completely and selflessly has the back of every Flower it works with.

Last spring, staffer Sage Dewey had a dream in which she saw a field of Red Shiso plants grown in an immense spiral.  In the dream she heard the words, “Red Shiso shows us the way.”  In response to her dream, we grew this year’s crop of Red Shiso in a spiral. We also have thought long and hard about what this dream meant.

Red Shiso is an unforgettable plant.  It is beautiful and lush with its ruffled maroon leaves.  It is a tangy edible and makes a gorgeous deep cherry colored tincture for our Essences.  In so many ways it expresses its uniqueness yet never at the expense of any other sentient being.  It thrives with love then gives more love back.  It lives and dies in harmony and with grace and generosity.  It certainly does show us the way, and I am grateful it offered itself to be used as the common thread in all the Flower Essences here at Green Hope Farm.  I can think of no better friend.

I like the way gardens evolve both in response to what is planted and also what naturally thrives. In fact, I like the adventure of seeing what thrives best of all.   I plant specific plants because I love them or the Angels have suggested them. This effort is followed by results. And results are a different story than my plans. The results are more interesting and more beautiful than if I got what I wanted.

There is the surprise happiness when a plant takes to this place and spreads itself with abandon. Why has a lone Yellow Corydalis plant now self-seeded into hundreds of plants encircling the entire perimeter of every building at the farm? I do not know, but I am glad. There is also the letting go of my personality hopes when no matter how many times I replant something, it fails to thrive. The example that jumps to mind is Lupine. Please don’t let me ever plant another Lupine. They always disappear after a single season of bloom.

Over the last thirty years here in the gardens, this interplay of planning and letting the plants make their own way (or not) has led to much unexpected beauty. It’s the magic of the whole enterprise. As I let go of my plans, again and again I see how in this surrender the gardens are free to become much more than anything I could have imagined or controlled (even though I wish Lupine liked it here).

Surrender is involved with the Flower Essences too. When, so many years ago, an Angel in the garden asked me to make Flower Essences, I literally had no idea what the Angel was talking about.  It was another chance to listen to wise counsel, let go of MY ideas of why I was here and follows the bliss of working with Flowers that came into my life through no volition of my own.

No matter how many conversations I have with the Angels and Elementals, I never seem to guess where things are going. That first year of making Flower Essences, I thought the Flower Essences were just for my immediate family. How I could imagine that an entire pantry of Flower Essences was just for a few people is beyond me, but I did.

When the project expanded beyond the gardens of the farm, I was surprised again. Lynn Tidman and I were almost complete strangers when she invited me to go to her mother’s home in Bermuda. This seemed like a lovely but random junket, yet so many Flowers were waiting for us. And from the get-go, Lynn and I were game for the adventure of listening to the Flowers and bringing their Essences home to the farm. The first trip blossomed into many trips of Flower adventures. Climbing trees in hurricanes, borrowing step ladders during dinner parties, dragging cases and cases of “Flower potions” through customs. That sort of thing!

Later it made sense to me that Flowers grown in the very different world of Bermuda would have very different strengths and wisdom than Flowers grown here. It made sense to me that Flower Essences from two different worlds would mean more helpful tools for the blossoming community of people and animals who wanted to work with our Flower Essences. I never seem to get the bigger picture in advance, but events like this have helped me to let go when unexpected things happen, knowing that there is a bigger picture, just one that I do not know yet.

Yes, yes, I know. It’s easy enough to believe all this when it’s a trip to Bermuda. But these early experiences helped me when I had the choice to surrender and trust in a bigger picture when it was both my arms broken into dozens of pieces, death threats from a sibling, disinheritance. I may be Mollyanna, but it’s not because I never left the greenhouse.

This year it’s the Taiwan Flower Essences that fill me with awe about the bigger picture I do not understand.

When Sarah embarked on her trip to Taiwan, it was not organized around making Flower Essences. Yes, we discussed Sarah making Flower Essences in Taiwan IF SHE GOT THE CHANCE and left it up to the Angels from there. It looked like most of her time would be taken up in tutoring at the Taipei International School.

When Sarah came home, it was abundantly clear that this was one of those moments when the Angels and Elementals had a much bigger plan than we had imagined during our casual pre trip conversation about making Flower Essences.   Sarah had been led all over northern Taiwan by the Angels and Elementals. Like the treasure hunt that it was, she was sent from one place to the next with Flowers calling out to her on each of her adventures.

When she came home, we agreed that tapping into the wisdom of each of these Flower Essence gems was a project best saved for summer when she could spend long days hearing the Flowers share their truths. When summer arrived, Sarah went out under the Larch tree and sat there for days, listening and learning. Together we read the amazing history of Flowers in this Flower loving country as we wrestled Latin names to earth. But mostly, Sarah went deep. Deep into conversation and connection with these old Flower friends.

Each time I read Sarah’s descriptions, it strikes me that I couldn’t have heard these Flowers speak in the same way as Sarah did. Her long loving connection to all things Chinese opened doorways of understanding that I don’t have. I can only feel gratitude to the Angels and Elementals for the perfection of their complex planning and to Sarah for her listening and following with such steadfast determination.

The fact that the Taiwan Essences felt outside my understanding showed me all the more strongly why I needed these Essences and why they may be a blessing to others. These gentle friends from afar help us understand ourselves to be part of a seamless unity of one precious planet. They help us know this unity with every cell of our being.

More specifically, this collection bridges east and west. I love how these Flower Essences take us into another frame of reference while also helping to dismantle anything in this world-view that doesn’t serve us all. That’s Flower Essences for you. I have never met one that doesn’t help us find greater harmony with each other.

There is a longer document describing the Taiwan Essences than the short descriptions online and in our brief handout of New for 2016 Essences. The long definition is available on request. I hope to post it here once I get some technical help during Thanksgiving to get the blog site to stop deleting the Chinese characters. In the meantime, I share Sarah’s introduction from this longer document:

“Collected from the island of Taiwan in January 2016, the Flowers from this collection have an important message to share with us. This message is largely about dismantling our outdated patterns of kowtowing.

For example, various Flower Essences in this collection push us to stop kowtowing to hierarchy, elders, and past ideas of self. The word kowtow comes from the Chinese ?? which is the process of bowing and touching your forehead to the ground. This was a custom that was used to show respect, most notably to the Emperor but also to others (such as elders or religious figures) who were deserving of such respect. When I say that the Taiwan collection is about moving beyond kowtowing, I do not mean to suggest that respect or custom is inherently bad, but I do think the Flowers are trying to teach us that this way of looking at the world is limited, that hierarchy is not a structure to be worshiped. The Flowers seem to live in a realm that is beyond these human constructs, sending tendrils of sweet wisdom down to greet us in our worldly sphere.”

To add to what Sarah says here, I am particularly struck by the geography of Taiwan and its history of breaking away and refusing to kowtow to mainland China. It does not surprise me that its Flowers would be all about peacefully but unapologetically holding one’s personal power and autonomy, sense of mission and purpose.

Humanity seeks a new balance of personal power within the context of interconnection. We are one big family, sometimes squabbling, but still one big family. We look for ways to hold out light and be our authentic self within the whole, respectful of others but also not subservient to any viewpoint that would repress anyone’s wholeness or holiness. The love of the Flowers with their incredible inclusiveness and individuality brings so much support. And here in the Taiwan Essences we find elemental voices of truth-speaking, strength, vision, respectful bridge building without kowtowing.   I am most grateful.