Flowers Archives - the Numinous

FEMININE ESSENCE: THE POWER OF LILY HEALING

Posted on July 27, 2016March 11, 2019 by Elyssa Jakim

Reclaim your femininity and embrace your personal power with the aid of lily healing, says Camilla Blossom Bishop… Artwork: Dasha Lyskovets

I am a flower whisperer. And recently I have been hearing the voice of the lilies—the feminine flowers of rebirth—whose message is for us is to create our own lives, and in doing so create a new Earth. Lily healing wants us to treasure our unlimited creative potential and reclaim our feminine nature as sacred.

The power to create is the most beautiful energy on the planet—and it’s potent. Creation energy is a powerful force for good, and our bodies thrive when we express our creativity, artistically or otherwise. The lilies want us to celebrate this!

Lily healing and the lily flower deva, or spiritual icon, is inviting in a new way—a kinder, gentler, more loving and compassionate time. She wants to co-create with us to anchor new fields of expression on our planet, new paradigms. To allow our feminine intuitive selves to take the lead. And when our intuitive and feeling sense is the guiding force, nothing can be forced into being. Only presence will work in as we call in these new earth energies.

Lily power is gentle, subtle, fluid, and graceful. She works like a water Goddess to purify our emotional waters, especially regarding our sexuality, since sexuality and creativity go hand-in-hand. She can help us clear shame, guilt, and grief by connecting our heart and essential innocence with our sexuality.

I believe the lilies have chosen to speak to me now since our societies are missing important vibrational yin frequencies. For how can we express our true selves without access to our full sensual creative power? We can’t.

And the lilies want to help. Lilies bloom to remind us to take full reins of our self expression. To begin expressing ourselves to ourselves—and to then allow this to expand naturally out in the world. Accept this invitation and you will exude feminine self-love and self-worth.

Lilies blanket hills, hide in dark forests, and survive and thrive in severe weather conditions of Oregon where I live. Below are the messages these wild lilies asked me to pass on to you…

“Lilies give women permission to be women.”
Stop waiting for others to reassure you, notice you, or tell you how. You have PERMISSION to express YOU…even if others around you aren’t. Spend time feeling your own essence, listening to your womb, asking your heart what it needs, and following your intuitive guidance. Go within. Enjoy your unique feminine expression.

“Tears are your medicine.”
When I first met Avalanche Lily, a delicate white lily with petals that splay back, it was raining. All her petals were drooping with tears of rain. I felt so sad. I sat down on the wet forest floor and wept. Hard. Like the grief of womanhood had caught up with me. My frozen avalanche tears were thawing out and flowing again. This lily helped me cry. Avalanche Lily want you to cry, too. Let your tears flow. Let go of grief. Tears awaken your beautiful heart and purify your soul.

“Create! Women, Create!”
Bright orange with brown spots, the Tigress lily led me to tribal belly dancing to open up my hips and creative 2nd chakra. Tiger Lily tells you to fire up your sexual creative expression. Get those hips moving. Be wild, untamed, free.

“Create the life you want. You have the power to do this!”
I was hesitant to enter a relationship with Trillium because I was resistant to my own power. Trilliums are the midwife’s flower and hold the power of rebirth. Soul rebirth is never easy. Trillium holds you like a midwife when your soul is in labor pains. She whispers in your ear to keep going…you are birthing your sacred feminine nature. There is no going back. Let her energy move you along. It’s worth it. You’re worth it. Keep going.

“You can release the sins of our fathers.”
Queen Bead Lily is a stunning white beauty that glows in the dark forest at night. I was told: “Use this flower for the sins of our fathers.” It’s medicine has been a Goddess-send. The Queen helps you cleanse abuse trauma and cellular memory from your body with great compassion and unconditional love. Create a space of love so trauma can be released. Queen Bead Lily can offer you her compassionate presence and love.

“Do not be afraid to take up space.”
I was guided to drive up to Mt Hood when I spotted a statuesque white and pink lily. Mt Hood Lily’s heady fragrance is a delight. This glorious wild lily tells you: Be large. Take up lots of space and claim your full-sized energetic self. Make lots of room around yourself so your creativity can blossom. Spread your arms wide and say: this is my creative space! Be a glorious BIG woman.

***

Lily’s spirit is like an angel, and the lily devas will assist anyone who asks. To connect with her spirit yourself, meditate and ask the lily deva for an energetic transmission. Allow your body to receive her healing energy frequencies. Smell lily flowers, take lily flower essences, grow them in your garden, or visit them in the forest. Make lily art, poetry, books, dances, songs, and creative projects to connect with her more.

The lilies celebrate our rebirth. They celebrate our sacred bodies and the creative space we claim. The lilies offer their medicine and messages to help us realign with our innate feminine nature and self-worth. When we honor our beauty, we create a new world full of blossoming lilies. Our fragrance lingers on and touches all those who want to celebrate and reclaim the sacred feminine too.

Camilla Blossom Bishop is a catalyst for the mystical, an empath, fairy shaman, and flower essence alchemist. She has written and taught widely since 1997. She connects deeply with the spirit of nature and fosters relationship with the lands, waters, plants, nature spirit, devas, Ancestors, and nature elementals. Camilla’s products, including the White Lily Essence, are available at her on-line ETSY Shop: NatureSpiritMedicine.Or visit CamillaBlossom.com.

BACK TO NATURE: LESSONS IN LOVE WITH PLANT MAKEUP

Posted on June 22, 2016November 4, 2018 by Gabriela Herstik

Connect with mother nature, and recognize your own true beauty. Gabriela Herstik interviews Jess Morgan, the owner of Good4You Plant Makeup…

Can speaking the language of plants help you become more beautiful? Jess Morgan, owner of Good4You Plant Makeup thinks the answer is a deep, resounding YES. Finding time to appreciate the natural world and to listen to the voice of nature can have a profound effect, one that makes you feel the love of the Universe. And she believes that in honoring this cosmic connection with Gaia we can find beauty in the world around us, AND ourselves.

Plant Makeup is a makeup and skincare company that’s all about this numinous approach to beauty, by crafting products from locally grown/foraged or certified organic flowers and herbs. Here, Jess shares her special brand of plant-based wisdom…

THE NUMINOUS: First and foremost, Good4You started in 2004 in a medical herb greenhouse. Can you tell us more about this experience?
JESS MORGAN: Yes, it’s been a 12-year journey of learning about plants—and wanting to work for them! In my late teens I was searching for the answer to life’s meaning. A major quest—and I found that answer in plants. When I walked into the green house on that special awakening day, I was able to feel this great love in my heart coming from all the green friends that surrounded me. Further, I felt plants wanted me to ‘work for them’ in a way. As humans, we are from the Earth too, but I feel we are becoming disconnected from this. So Plant Makeup is to help people remember.

TN: You also told me you “felt called upon to be a voice for nature in our modern era.” What’s the message they want you want to send?
JM: The highest goal nature has for us is to help us see all the beauty on Earth, and so the message is really for everyone to get outside! As well as to inspire generations to come to be continual care takers of the Earth. I hope everyone can find the inspiration to do more Earth work, as on a deeper level I feel like this can help align everyone more with their true purpose—which is to find a way to live harmoniously with nature, a situation which is out of control right now.

My work is also my own small contribution to awakening people to the fact plants and nature are talking to us at all times, trying to communicate with us through the heart, so they can explore their own connection and further be inspired to take action for the overall good of the planet.

TN: How has this mission cultivated more compassion for you in the way you live and interact with nature personally?
JM: My work has taught me that what we put in and on our bodies is definitely a way of interacting with nature. For example, the more fruits and vegetables we eat, the better we can operate as bio-machines of the Earth. Our minds become clearer and our bodies feel better! For this reason, I personally love a diet (when I can) of fresh juices, rice and beans with steamed vegetables, salads, and lots of kale (I know, such a cliché—LOL).

TN: What’s your advice to someone looking to lead a more natural life?
JM: It’s is hard to do everything sustainably, but it is important to do whatever we can. Investing in a reusable water bottle for example, or riding your bike or walking instead of driving a car. In my experience, making eco-conscious decisions becomes very fulfilling, almost freeing the ego since these choices are connected to a deeper idea about what it means to be a human here on planet Earth. Any anyway, eventually we won’t have a choice about these things.

TN: So how does honoring the earth change the way makeup affects you, if at all?
JM: In using Plant Makeup, we can enhance and honor the cosmic force that we truly are. Since all the products I make are 100% natural, the way I see it there’s nothing in them to block our natural beauty being able to emanate from within.

TN: How do you communicate and honor the plants you work with? Can anybody do this?
JM: Plants and animals communicate through the heart and, yes, everyone can do this— if we keep an open mind. Not that it’s impossible, it’s just not something we’re consciously trained to do in our society. The best way to practice is to just sit quietly outdoors where you can be undisturbed, and invite a quiet mind so that the miracles of nature can be awakened in you. For example, when people talk about finding inspiration when they take a walk in the woods, I believe this is nature calling to us to live our purpose.

I also love to honor the plants I work with by offering bird seed, always composting, and giving thanks for their gifts. When I collect a plant from the earth, in the case of foraging, I ask for permission first. Most of the time the plants say: “Yes, please use me!” They want to share their gifts. But sometimes they say no. Most of the time I am actually “called” to certain patches or led places to discover a specific medicine for someone, a new plant that wants me to learn about them, or simply a secret the Earth wants to share with me to help me admire its beauty.

TN: What’s the most notable thing you’ve learned throughout your journey making plant based makeup?
JM: Be yourself. We have to really stick to our vision in life, which can so easily get toned down by all the distractions around us; technology, our current job, family, world affairs, etc. It might be harder but it’s more rewarding to follow your own dream. It also might not be possible immediately, but any time we step out into nature and think “wow, what a beautiful day,” we are taking a step in the right direction. Overall, Plant Makeup is the manifestation of my own never ending fountain of nature-based inspiration. A reminder to live your art, to be your dreams.

Discover more at Plantmakeup.com

UNCONDITIONAL SELF-LOVE: A SACRED ROSE QUARTZ RITUAL

Posted on February 13, 2016March 11, 2019 by Laurey Simmons

Learn how to use a Rose Quartz ritual as a tool for self-love and beautification. By Laurey Simmons of The Colourful Dot.

What is it about children and their innate attraction to sparkly and beautiful things? I remember so clearly walking along the beach as a child, looking for the prettiest pebbles, just feeling so full of LOVE, even at this young age, for the beauty of Mother Earth and her magical powers.

This kind of instinctual love can become more difficult to access as we get older and our hearts carry more scars. And with Valentine’s Day approaching, this is a sacred moment for us to remember our innate sense of LOVE ENERGY – which Mother Earth can effortlessly remind us of, if we are open to receive.

Crystals are my direct path back to that instinctive childlike enchantment, and as a make-up artist and spiritual adventurer I have found magical ways of using them to help my clients embody inner and outer beauty. After all, nurturing our innate beauty is not an exercise in vanity, but actually a practice in bringing us closer to the divine.

For me, unconditional self-love is an essential ingredient of inner beauty. And one of my favourite tools to activate this aspect of our self is a Rose Quartz ritual. This gemstone works with the energies of the heart, gently nurturing compassion for self and other.

So how can you use a Rose Quartz ritual to awaken your inner goddess? A simple but very nurturing ritual I love weaves Rose Quartz into a bathing experience. Here’s how:

I always begin with spiritual cleansing of myself, my space and my crystals. I love to use the smoke of burning Palo Santo, a ‘holy wood’ from South America that was used in ancient ritual and ceremony to ward off bad energy. It’s really important to make sure you open a window while cleansing, so that any energy you are wanting to be rid of can leave. Trailing the burning wood around myself and the Rose Quartz, I watch as the smoke travels and fades mystically, as if in a sacred dance. I instantly feel lighter. As I breathe in this rich, heavenly scent, I visualize the smoke spirits soaking up any negative energies, and kindly transporting these energies away.
Placing some flowers or a plant at the end of the bath will also allow you to drop deeply into the present moment. I often just gaze at the flowers, absorbed intimately with Mother Earth and all her natural beauty. I have this beautiful quote about flowers as a reminder:

“When you take a flower in your hand and really look at it, it’s your world for the moment.” – Georgia O’Keeffe.

To elevate your sense of smell, have a relaxing oil burning. I like to use Rose and Geranium oil with this specific ritual. As the aroma fills the air, I enter deeper into a meditative state, visualizing the molecules of scent travelling up through my nose, down my chest and into my heart centre. Here the scent is absorbed by a delicate pink rose, slowly opening its petals to reveal a white healing light.
With this image firmly rooted in my heart, I mindfully place the Rose Quartz pieces around the bath. I will usually have a blessing which I will speak when placing each stone. A great blessing for this ritual is: ‘“May I be bathed in the light of unconditional love.” I will also add some Rose Quartz tumble stones (small polished stones) to the water, so that when bathing, I’m fully immersed in the absolute and unconditional love of Mother Earth. Once in the bath, I then imagine the crystals surrounding me linking with each other in a loving, active embrace.
When your bathing ritual is over, it is important to ground yourself. I like to visualize tree-like roots anchoring me down to the core of Mother Earth as I dry myself.

Beyond bathing, I also recommend adding some magic to your morning beauty routine. Did you know you can use a Rose Quartz massage stone to apply moisturizer? In ancient times, Egyptian women added powdered Rose Quartz to their beauty potions to prevent wrinkles and to restore a glowing complexion. So, with gratitude and respect for the ancient beauty wisdom of our sister goddesses, I will apply the cream with my stone and visualize my face glowing with a white nourishing light, restoring my inner and outer beauty. An extra little tip to give you Rose Quartz energy on-the-go is to add one or two small Rose Quartz tumble stones into the cream itself, making sure you have cleansed and blessed the stones beforehand.

I hope this Rose Quartz ritual brings you the space to relight the flame of self-love and inner beauty. Here is one of my favorite passages on inner beauty to send you on your way:

“Beauty is life when life unveils her holy face.
But you are life and you are the veil.
Beauty is eternity gazing at itself in a mirror.
But you are eternity and you are the mirror.”

– Kahlil Gibran, excerpted from The Prophet (A Borzoi Book)

FIVE NEW WAYS TO CELEBRATE THE NEW MOON

Posted on July 13, 2015November 4, 2018 by Gabriela Herstik

Looking for some inspiration for ways to celebrate the New Moon? Gabriela Herstik rounds up some unusual ways to work your New Moon magic… Images: Marco Imperatore via Behance.net

Keeping track of the moon is one of the easiest ways to align yourself with the Universal source energy, and the New Moon is the perfect time to harness this to help call in your desires! The energy during the New Moon and consequently the Waxing Moon (while it’s becoming fuller again) is all about growth, abundance and manifestation – aka it really is a truly magickal time. Read on for 5 cool ways to celebrate the New Moon.

Perform a Love (Yourself) Ritual
If there’s any time the moon cycle is all about summoning an extra dose of lovin’, it’s when it’s dark and new. For once in a New Moon though, take a second and focus on loving yourself – i.e. spend some time loving on you and honoring your own spirit. Once your own soul and spirit are fresh and loved, shiny and new, everything else will come to you!

So treat yourself – prepare a meal of all your favorite foods, pour yourself a glass of expensive wine (or whiskey!) and listen to some music that makes you and your spirit dance and sing. Take a bath, adding some salt, crystals and fresh flowers, and relax. Think about how wonderful you are (seriously!) and why you deserve all the things you’re manifesting in the coming month. Because no one deserves your love more than you do.

Align Your New Moon Yoga
Besides the fact that yoga is pretty much a godsend answer to any spiritual crisis, it is also an absolutely perfect way to summon some extra energy on the New Moon. Set an intention at the beginning of your practice – preferably focusing on something in the abundance and manifestation section of your wants and needs list – and get your asana moving!

Cater your practice to what you intend to bring into your life – if you want more love, why not add some heart openers? Need to bring more balance into your world? Think twists and balancing postures. Get creative and remember, your practice on your mat is a reflection of your life off the mat. Own it!

Plant Your Intention
Just to get really literal with the “planting seeds of intention” metaphor – plus the fact that plants are a sweet way to bring in some extra love into your home, and that caring for them is super relaxing and meditative. So hit up your local nursery, see what’s in season and what speaks to you (you can also find out the spiritual meaning of different plants HERE) and prepare to bring home your new best friend!

Get a little planter and decorate it with symbols relating to all the things you’re manifesting in this moon cycle – before long, you’ll probably even find yourself talking to your plant about all the good stuff you’re calling in. But mostly, be inspired to honor the spirit of the plant and grow in abundance with it.

Make some new moon wishes
Writing down your wishes (aka intentions) for the coming two weeks is a really great way to visualizing what you want to manifest. So set aside some time in a sacred space, whether it’s among best girlfriends, sitting under a favorite tree, or cozying up with your pet, and think about what it is you TRULY want. The trick then is to write out your wishes as if you already have them (i.e. “I am so thankful for my incredible job” etc).

Make this a ritual in itself – light some candles, burn some incense, grab a crystal or two, or take a bath. Get creative! Use some pretty stationary and put your wish or intention on an altar with some fresh flowers for an extra, supersonic, moon juice blast. Wait two weeks – at the time of the next Full Moon – to see the results of your wish, and wait two more weeks to finish what you started. (The wonderful ladies at Astrostyle.com have more on moon wishes HERE)

Create an Abundance Altar
This is the perfect exercise for all the spiritual hoarders out there (you know who you are). Sitting on an abundance of dried herbs and flowers, crystals, cards and glitter? Make an altar! Following the theme of intention and manifestation, pick a theme for your little sacred space and decorate accordingly. Find photos that resonate with or symbolize what you want. Your altar should be a visual representation of everything you want – and it should feel good to look at. But most of all, have fun with it, duh!

How do you like to celebrate the New Moon? Connect with us and share your rituals on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter!

NEED TO KNOW: A CUSTOM FLOWER REMEDY

Posted on March 4, 2014November 5, 2018 by Ruby Warrington

Of all the plant medicines available to us, flower remedies offer the most subtle – and perhaps the most profound – path to inner healing. Are you willing to believe, asks Ruby Warrington? Images: Addie Juell. Prop styling: Cindy DiPrima.

Over breakfast green juice with my girls, I’m trying to explain how I feel since I started taking the flowers. “It’s subtle. You know those days when it just feels like things are going your way? Then imagine feeling like that all the time…” And they’re intrigued, want the number of the fairy who gave them to me. But still the general consensus, as Kerrilyn puts it, is that: “of all the mystical healing arts, don’t flower remedies require the biggest leap of faith?”

At the tail end of summer 2013, burnt out from too much travel and an avalanche of deadlines all at once, I was ready to take that leap. Introduced to Kerri Aab, a.k.a. Seed To Blossom, by a mutual friend, what did I have to lose? And, when I dissolved into tears during our initial hour-long Skype consultation, what had presented as minor stressors revealed much deeper issues that had been long been festering.

Like a lot of people, I’d had positive experiences using Bach’s Rescue Remedy – but my experience with Kerri took things to the next level, and then some. After that first call (read: therapy session), she mixed a custom blend of seven flowers to address the core issues that had come up. To give you some clues, this included Rock Water, to help balance out perfectionist tendencies, Pine, to help with feelings of guilt, and Elm, to put my large workload into perspective.

The prescription? Four drops, four times a day, while the bottle of drops (the essences are held in an alcohol solution and administered with a pipette) would hold it’s potency for three weeks, so we scheduled a catch up for a few days before that.

Over the following 18 or 19-day period, it’s true that things quieted down on the deadline front. But the change in outlook – and “in-look” – I was able to report back to Kerri in our second session went beyond this external change in circumstances. The best word to describe how I felt I was coming to see things is “acceptance” – of myself, of my surroundings and of the challenges I still faced.

Kerri, who was introduced to the flowers during a 50-hour labor with her daughter, describes her personal experience as that flowers; “making space for my natural light to shine.”

Was it really the flowers? As Alexis Smart, widely recognized as one of the leading figures in flowers, puts it; “why is it so hard to believe that plants and flowers have healing properties or effects? Many of our drugs come from plants.” And it’s not as if the notion of “plant medicine” is exactly alien to us in the now age.

In my second session with Kerri (by the way, one of the least “witchy” purveyors of potions and tinctures I’ve ever met), we switched out the Elm for the aptly named Impatiens flower, to help ease feelings that I’m always running out of time. And slowly, bottle two is doing its work too.

If you think a custom flower remedy might be for you, here’s what you Need to Know:

Know that there are 38 flowers in the Bach medicine cabinet, and that your custom blend can include up to seven.

Know that an initial consultation with Kerri lasts up to 90 minutes, and that the more you’re prepared to bare your soul the more you’ll get out of it.

Know that you can use the flowers alongside any other natural or man-made medicines and that they will still have the same effect, while not interfering with any other remedy you are taking.

Know that unlike other plant medicines (ayahuasca, marijuana) Bach flowers work on a solely energetic level and affect no purely physical changes whatsoever.

Know that this makes them safe for children, pets and even…other plants! Further, infants and animals are impervious to suggestion and the success of flowers in treating them disproves any placebo effect.

Know that Crab Apple comes up most frequently among Kerri Aabs female clients. A cleansing remedy for both mind and body, it works particularly well for people who struggle with negative self-image and issues with obsessive neatness or physical perfection.

Know that in each subsequent session your blend will likely change, as the issues which feel the most urgently in need of a remedy will shift with the ebbs and flows of your life.

Know that you won’t feel the flowers working, but you will know that they are.

Visit Kerri’s website to learn more about her work or book a consultation.

Additional research Andrea Kasprzak.

@NUMINOUS_BOOKS