Getting Started with Flower and Gem Essences
How do I get started with flower and gem essences?
There are a couple of ways to get started with our essences. Many people discover essences through the gems or flowers they are visually drawn to. They purchase one or two essences at a time and take them following the directions for use on the label. Another way to get started is to request a confidential consultation with our flower and gem essence practitioner, Ava Zhan. Ava will create a custom essence blend for you (usually comprised of three to seven essences). You can work with essences on emotional or spiritual blocks you are looking to work through, and essences are also helpful with a range of physical complaints.
What type of concerns can I address with flower and gem essences?
Flower and gem essences are most known to help one grow in the larger area of emotions (mood, negative thought patterns, irritability, feeling overly sensitive, lacking emotional resiliency, feeling brokenhearted, lonely, insecure, shy, uncomfortably dependent, easily stressed out, etc.). Many flower essence users are initially drawn to the practice for the emotional growth, and then they discover the many other ways one can grow through the use of essences in the areas of spirituality and creativity. Flower essences can help one become more loving, caring, affectionate, and patient, for example; or less rigid, fearful, anxious, irritable, or shy. There are essences that help one attune to nature and enhance the expression of creativity, and others that help one achieve new levels of spirituality and introspection. In the hands of a skilled herbalist and flower and gem essence practitioner, many clients also make tremendous strides with improving physical complaints, weakness, or illness.
How do I choose an essence or a few?
Choose an essence that calls to you through its image. A flower or gem image contains a rich message through its colors, shapes, and light reflections, and it will resonate more strongly with an individual who might benefit from its essence. A different way to choose an essence is to read about the essence properties. Prioritize what concerns you would like to work on first and choose one or a few essences that in concert will support your personal growth in the set direction. It is best to choose only one to three essences at a time that all work on the same larger concern or goal.
Keep in mind that when you choose essences on your own, you may have a harder time addressing the most pressing issue you are hoping to resolve (you will benefit, but often in unexpected ways), or it may be hard for you to find the essence that addresses your very specific need. For this reason, we highly recommend that you consider working with an essence practitioner. A practitioner has studied many essence lines and many healing modalities and going this route will probably save you a lot of time and money. For instance, if you are grappling with a recurring dream or your relationship with a parent has been troubled for the last 20 years, it would be a tremendous shortcut to pinpoint your essences with a practitioner in one or a few sessions.
How do I use the essences?
Essences can be taken directly from the dropper onto the tongue, only 2–3 drops at a time, or by placing the drops in a small amount of water or juice. Ava recommends taking 3 drops, 3 times a day until you have finished the bottle. You will benefit the most if you take your essence every day for a month or until you finish the bottle, rather than occasionally. Some people also like to add drops of their essence to their skin care products or to their bath.
What benefits can I expect when using essences?
Essences create shifts in our awareness. They particularly help with emotional and spiritual growth. When guided by a flower essence practitioner, essences can help with stubborn issues of personality that we may want to change in ourselves (such as impatience, difficulty relaxing, difficulty feeling close to people, social anxiety), and they also offer tremendous help around stressful events and with old or new trauma.
What is the difference between choosing my own essence or ordering a custom blend?
In choosing an essence for yourself on your own, you are entering a journey of self healing through your own intuitive means. It is a wonderful, valid approach, and for this method we suggest that you use up to three essences at once only. If you have trouble choosing or would like a practitioner to prioritize and guide you, Ava will work with you one on one and create a custom blend that is matched specifically to you at a given time. One other fundamental difference between choosing a single or combination essence or going the custom way is that for custom blends, Ava uses a much wider library of essences. The essences sold in our online store are all made by us. For the custom blends, Ava also uses other highly reputable lines of essences from essence makers in the Americas, Australia, Asia, and Europe.
How does it work to have a flower essence blend custom created for me?
Purchase a custom blend + consultation package, then e-mail Ava at ava@pnwessences.com to set up an e-mail exchange or a phone or video call. After your blend is determined, we will mail you your essence blend bottle to use for a month or two.
What if I am avoiding alcohol?
The base of our essences is brandy and water, so if you're avoiding alcohol there are a couple of ways to go. Place the essence drops in water or juice and leave to sit for a few minutes to allow the alcohol to evaporate, then drink the liquid. Another way is to mix the drops in lotion and rub it into the skin, or spritz it into the air above or around you. For custom essences, we are able to prepare them in glycerin instead of brandy for you upon request.
Can I take flower essences if I am under homeopathic care?
Flower essences can be taken alongside other medicines, including Western (allopathic) medications, herbal medicines or supplements, and vitamin and mineral supplements. If you are taking low-dose homeopathic medicines (X potencies or very low C potencies, below 30C), taking flower essences at the same time is fine. However, if you are under the care of a classic homeopath, the homeopath most likely would not want you to take flower essences simultaneously because then his or her reading of your progress with homeopathy may become more difficult. In our practice, Ava will create a custom blend for a client who is under a homeopath's care, but she will ask you to check with the homeopath first, since that treatment is already underway. If you are taking a custom blend created by Ava and she is monitoring your progress, also let her know if you at any time add a homeopathic remedy to your regimen.
Can an essence change me in a way I may later regret?
Sometimes people new to taking or using flower essences have a vague sense of nervousness or fear. On some level they are afraid that the essence might alter their personality, plant something in their psyche that wasn't there previously, or change them into someone they do not want to be. While flower essences are often referred to as powerful, rest assured they do not change people into different people. They have the mysterious effect—if we are lucky, since it is not always a given—of removing or easing what is unhealthy for us, such as bothersome or sad repetitive thoughts, a negative outlook, or tension in social situations. An energy healer may describe it as debris that is moved out of the aura or stagnant energy that moves again.
Using Flower Essences with Children
Can children be given flower essences?
Yes, children respond extremely well and fast to essences. If you have any concerns, it may be best to work with a practitioner and stay in touch when giving your child an essence in case you notice any unexpected changes, such as changes in sleep pattern or behavior.
How do I use them with children since they are preserved with brandy?
Children can take essences by placing the drops in water or juice, and setting it out for a few minutes to allow the alcohol to evaporate before drinking. One only needs 2 to 3 drops of essence at a time, and children may need only one to two doses a day, sometimes even less.
PNW Essences Versus Other Lines of Flower and Gem Essences
How are your essences prepared?
The carefully selected plants or gems are infused in water under the sun or moon for a certain number of hours (depending on many factors, such as the season). The plants or gems are then removed, and the mother tincture is strained and preserved with brandy. There are exceptions to this procedure: for example, rare plants are not picked; instead, the bowl is placed underneath the blooms for a longer period of time. Some gems are not immersed in the water, but are infused using an alternate method to avoid any risk of heavy metals or other potentially harmful gem components entering into the water. Our essences are stored in dark glass in a dedicated room and amplified with Moroccan quartz. It is a mysterious, mystical process, but in the end, with proper storage, one gets a vibrational infusion of flowers and gems that deliver serious results. In Australia, the flower essence healing modality is gaining recognition and approval by medical doctors based on research and clinical studies and some essences are approved for use by doctors in a hospital setting.
Who prepares them?
All our single and combination essences are prepared by Ava Zhan, our flower and gem essence practitioner. Each individual bottle is also prepared by Ava herself to ensure uniform and positive personal intention.
How do you know what the properties of each essence are?
Our essence descriptions and the details on their properties were provided by Ava Zhan, our flower and gem essence practitioner and essence maker. Ava has studied a range of healing modalities, from Western herbalism and nutritional healing to flower and gem essence healing, chakra healing, medicinal mushrooms, and doctrine of signatures. The properties that she assigns to essences are initially proposed based on her studies and the doctrine of signatures. Then these notes are compared to the same plant properties described in authoritative books by herbalists and to the conclusions of other well-established essence makers. Finally, the essences are used in our clinical practice with clients and by other practitioners, who exchange their notes and observations after they have worked with our essences with clients.