Edward Bach (1886-1936), creator of the Bach Flower Remedies believed that physical illnesses are symptoms of "...our fears, our cares, our anxieties and such like that open the path to the invasion of illness." He thought flower essences worked by altering a patient's mental state to one that was conducive to healing. His focus was mainly on the symptoms of psychosomatic diseases.

On medicine:
"The medical school of the future will not particularly interest itself in the ultimate results and products of disease, nor will it pay so much attention to actual physical lessons, or administer drugs and chemicals merely for the sake of palliating our symptoms, but knowing the true cause of sickness and aware that the obvious physical results are merely secondary, it will concentrate its efforts upon bringing about that harmony between body, mind and soul which results in the relief and cure of disease."
-from Heal Thyself
The essences are created by letting flowers sit in a bowl of water in the sun. After a while, the flowers are removed and the mother essence is preserved with ~50% brandy. Stock bottles (what you buy in a store) are created with ~15 drops of the mother essence and preserved in 30-40% brandy. The essence is then administered from a (usually) self-made dosage bottle with ~15 drops of stock to 1 oz of water. The essence does not contain any extracts from actual flowers; their healing "vibrational" aspects are thought to remain in the water even after they are removed.

The Bach Flower Remedies are:
agrimony, aspen, beech, centaury, cerato, cherry plum, chestnut bud, chicory, clematis, crab apple, elm, gentian, gorse, heather, holly, honeysuckle, hornbeam, impatiens, larch, mimulus, mustard, oak, olive, pine, red chestnut, rock rose, rock water, scleranthus, star of bethlehem, sweet chestnut, vervain, vine, walnut, water violet, white chestnut, wild oat, wild rose, willow

Log in or register to write something here or to contact authors.