How many | How much, how often | Making a dosage bottle
It is part of our cultural bias to think that for a remedy to work we must swallow it. Indeed this is the way that the vast majority of people still take their flower essences, by placing several drops in a glass of water.
But topical use of flower essences can be just as effective and in some instances even bring about a much more precise healing reaction than internal use. Flower essences are energetic products; they contain the energetic imprint of the flower and not its physical properties. For an energetic essence to work, it must be introduced into our energy system. This can be through ingestion, but it can also be through placing several drops on the inside of the wrist, in the palms of the hands or the soles of the feet (where we have all of the reflex points), on the chakras or acupuncture points. Essences can also be vaporised in the air around us or into our energy field or aura.
Topical applications are of particular interest to people who have an intolerance to any alcohol (brandy is used to stabilise most flower essences). It is also a good way to administer essences to a newborn baby or small infant, by putting a drop on the top of the head, or alternatively by rubbing the essence into the hands or feet. Putting 7 to 10 drops of an essence into the baby’s bath water is also an effective way to introduce the essence into the energy field.
Essences mixed with essential oils and all the Petaltone essences are for external use only. For details on how to use essences in sprays, please read our related article.
There are a lot of different beliefs and rules that exist on how many essences should be taken at any one time. Some people believe that only one essence should be taken at a time. Others believe that you can take up to five or six at a time. For some people essences must be diluted, while others feel that they should be taken pure. Flower essence producers have varied opinions on the subject. Our opinion and experience are that there are no rules! Our energy systems are so highly evolved, and the vibration of the essences can be so subtle, that some of us can easily mix 20 or more essences together and get fabulous results.It is very important to listen to your intuition. If you feel that you should only take one essence at a time, then take one essence. But if your intuition tells you to take ten, listen to it.
The story of the Heart Spirit essence is an interesting example of this. Sabina Pettitt, the producer of the Pacific Essences, says that single essences work most directly, but if a combination seems appropriate, 4 to 5 essences may be mixed together. However, one client who really wanted to heal all of his old heart wounds, asked that all of the essences that related to the heart chakra, the heart meridian and the heart protector meridian be mixed together - a combination of 20 essences! He then took the essences every 15 minutes through the day. The results were spectacular, not only for this client but for others who tried the combination. Thus the Heart Spirit essence was born.
We can do our own combinations by mixing essences from several producers, to benefit from the energies of not only various realms (plant, mineral, animal), but also different continents.
Here again opinions and beliefs vary as to the number of drops (from 2 to 11) and the number of times per day (anywhere from 2 to 7). The number of drops is not particularly important. Many essence bottles indicate the recommended number of drops on the label. You can test the number of drops by dowsing or kinesiology, your health care practitioner may specify the number of drops to take each time, or you can use your intuition. A particularly sensitive person may wish to take only 1 or 2 drops at a time.
What is more important, in our opinion, is the number of times a day an essence is taken. Most essence producers and therapists would agree that the essences should usually be taken at least twice a day. In the morning on rising and in the evening before going to bed. Some producers suggest that the essences should be taken 3 times a day, others 4, some as many as 7. Here again, in our opinion, there are no hard and fast rules. It would, however, seem that taking the essences regularly, at least twice a day, over a period of at least 3 to 4 weeks gives the best results for most people.
The way to increase the dosage of your essences is to increase the number of times that the essences are taken during the day rather than to increase the number of drops taken at one time. Emergency essences are often taken every 5 minutes or so.
Using your intuition is one of the best ways to determine when to take an essence. If your eye or your thoughts are drawn to the bottle, chances are you need the remedy.
If working with more than one flower essence, you may wish to make up a dosage bottle. This is done by adding 7 drops of each essence to a 30ml dropper bottle filled with 70% still mineral water and 30% brandy or vinegar.
Some people prefer to take the essences directly from the stock bottle (which is a first dilution from the mother essence), while others prefer to make a second dilution or dosage mixture. While a dosage bottle will not be stronger that the first dilution or stock bottle (flower essences are not like homeopathic remedies in this respect), the essence will maintain the same energetic level, provided it is stablised with alcohol, red shiso or vinegar.
