Finally...

As you take the remedy, don't be surprised if nothing appears to happen at first. Very often when you first use essences it may take a few days to notice an effect. Actually, your friends may notice a difference before you do. Over time the issues for which you chose your combination will surface and appear in a different, more positive light, allowing you to gain experience and wisdom from them as you release any emotional sting they hold for you.

Sometimes there may be a need to re-evaluate the situation after a few days if you find new issues or emotions emerging. This is not uncommon and shows that the remedies are working. At that point you may need to add some other remedies to your combination.

In homeopathy an aggravation or 'healing crisis' can occur. This is when the symptoms temporarily worsen before improving, and it may be a sign that the chosen agent is a good frequency match, but possibly at a sub-optimal potency. In flower essence therapy, aggravations are rare as long as there is no potentisation by serial succussion, as in homeopathy, and even then they are uncommon. This method of preparation was not advised by Dr Bach. In fact it was his search for a means of avoiding such aggravations that led him to his method of preparation of flower remedies.

Aggravations or healing crises can occur in flower remedy therapy, even if rarely. If you should get one, it may be because the emotion that it is treating is strongly held within you, and perhaps it was buried because it was too painful to process at the time. If this is the case, then supportive methods can help.

The healing crisis may bring deep insights and understanding as a result. To get through it, however, some support may be helpful.

Suggestions include grounding the feelings by writing them down on paper to release them, then burning the paper; taking your remedy less frequently for a while; using a supporting remedy such as Walnut (Bach); having help and sympathy from a friend; taking a walk in nature, or other helpful means.

At any stressful time the simple technique of centring yourself by breathing slowly and deeply from your Hara or balance point, low down in your abdomen, is an incredibly powerful one. It is even more calming if you put the tip of your tongue behind your top teeth on the roof of your mouth.

Over a few days and weeks, as you take flower essences, you will notice their incredibly powerful yet gentle action working as tools of transformation and as catalysts for change. To help develop self-knowledge and awareness as you heal it is useful to keep a diary or journal of any feelings and memories which surface.

It is worth remembering that we all carry several layers of emotional imbalance. It is not uncommon for an appropriate first essence combination to unmask another layer, often a sadness one, which immediately deserves a different combination such as the Bereavement Mix or the Blues Mix.