‘Trauma is not just an event that took place sometime in the past; it is also the imprint left by that experience on mind, brain and body. This imprint has ongoing consequences for how the human organism manages to survive in the present.’ Bessel van der Kolk
‘Trauma is not just an event that took place sometime in the past; it is also the imprint left by that experience on mind, brain and body. This imprint has ongoing consequences for how the human organism manages to survive in the present.’ Bessel van der Kolk
If you have experienced trauma of any kind, it will have an ongoing impact on your life until you have the opportunity to restore balance at an energetic, emotional and mental level. Any trauma healing journey needs to facilitate the release of the energetic imprint of trauma in order to be effective, and that’s why flower, gem and crystal essences are so useful. They can be used to restore balance throughout your entire energetic system, and they can help you to transform the difficult thoughts and emotions associated with traumatic events.
We’ve created this guide to help you to recognise which flower essences will be most useful for you if you are healing from traumatic experiences. The secret to using vibrational essences successfully for trauma healing is to identify how trauma is affecting you personally so that you can choose the most useful essences to restore balance to your system.
How Trauma Affects You Energetically and Emotionally
Experts recognise that certain issues tend to affect people who have experienced trauma. This varies from person to person and depends on the type of trauma you’ve experienced but it’s common to feel some or all of the following:
- Disconnection from your physical body and lack of physical co-ordination;
- Feelings of instability and insecurity, feeling unsafe long after any threat has passed.
- Feeling emotionally numb and shut down; unable to trust your feelings;
- Dissociation, unable to be present in the moment or connect with others;
- Mental disorganisation and disorientation, brain can’t take in new information;
- Feeling stuck in the past and unable to move on;
- Overwhelm and inability to cope;
- Hypersensitivity to noise and bodily sensations;
- Hypervigilance, feeling on alert all the time, unable to relax and settle;
- Feeling that what happened was your fault; self blame, shame or guilt;
- Negative self image, low self esteem;
- Inability to trust others and form healthy relationships;
- Anxiety, dread and panic;
- Feeling out of control and prone to explosive rage;
- Feeling powerless.
Do you resonate with any of these? We’re going to explore the most useful flower, gem and crystal essences for these states, and for the Four F responses that get triggered during a traumatic experience.
What Happens in Trauma? Fight, Flight, Freeze or Fawn
When something traumatic happens, the energetic system gets flooded and overwhelmed. We simply don’t have the capacity to emotionally and energetically metabolise what is happening at the time so we reflexively go into one (or more) of the Four F trauma responses (Fight, Flight, Freeze or Fawn) to survive, function, keep safe and protect ourselves from harm.
Fight is the impulse to defend yourself when you feel attacked, Flight is the impulse to escape from danger, Freeze is a shutdown/playing dead when you feel under threat, and Fawn is an attempt to placate or appease somebody else in order to avoid danger.
Fight, Flight, Freeze and Fawn are all unconscious responses to what we perceive as threat and are simply how our systems cope when we sense danger. However, over time they can become our default response to life and, like any unconscious pattern of behaviour, they can keep us feeling stuck, limited and disconnected from our true selves.
Taking the flower essences that relate to the trauma responses you identify with will help you to move out of the past and update your energetic system with the message that the threat has now passed and you can respond to life differently.
This is an important part of the healing journey, because when we stay stuck in these unconscious coping mechanisms after we no longer need them to keep safe, we miss out on connecting fully with ourselves, other people and life itself in healthy, meaningful ways.
Flower Essences for the Four F Trauma Responses
Do You Get Angry and Defensive?
It could be that you’re stuck in a Fight Response. From the Bach Flower Remedies you could choose Holly if you feel angry, defensive, suspicious and distrustful, and Impatiens if you’re irritable, impatient, and your temper flares quickly. From the deeper acting Essences you could use Inner Peace to release suppressed anger and rage or Solar Plexus Chakra to help you with aggression, anger, boundaries, and power issues.
Do You Try to Escape When You Perceive Danger?
It could be that you’re stuck in a Flight Response. From the Bach Flower Remedies you could choose Clematis if you’ve disconnected from your body, feel disorganised or disorientated, and Agrimony if you avoid your emotions and escape with addictive substances or behaviours. From the deeper acting Essences you could use Feeling Safe to restore inner security and trust or Base Chakra to release fears about physical safety and survival.
Do You Feel Numb, Frozen or Disengaged?
It could be that you’re stuck in a Freeze Response. From the Bach Flower Remedies you could choose Star of Bethlehem if you feel shocked, numb or shutdown, Clematis if you’ve mentally checked out, can’t concentrate or feel spaced out, and Wild Rose if you’re withdrawn and disengaged from life. From the deeper acting Essences you could use Base Chakra if you’re feeling ungrounded, disorientated, disorganised or don’t want to be here on some level.
Do You Try to Avoid Conflict and Gain Approval?
It could be that you’re stuck in a Fawn Response. From the Bach Flower Remedies you could choose Agrimony if you avoid conflict and try to keep the peace, and Centaury if you put other people’s needs first because of an unconscious need to be liked in order to feel safe. From the deeper acting Essences you could use Throat Chakra to get comfortable expressing your true feelings and emotional needs, or Feeling Worthy to enhance your self worth.
Essences for Releasing Buried Emotions Related to Trauma
As well as the ‘Four F Trauma responses’, there are many other ways that trauma can affect you emotionally. We hope this guide will help you to identify how you respond to life so that you can choose the most effective essences to help you to release the past and move forward in your life.
Do you regularly feel overwhelmed and unable to cope?
Trauma overwhelms the energy system with sensations that can’t be metabolised at the time so this can leave you feeling emotionally overloaded with reduced capacity to engage with life afterwards.
From the Bach Flower Remedies you could choose Elm if you regularly feel overwhelmed, or if you’re usually a capable and responsible person but are currently feeling that you can’t cope. From the deeper acting Essences you could use Chamomile Flower Essence to release emotional tension that builds up as a result of dealing with stressful life situations and events.
Do you keep revisiting a traumatic experience?
Trauma can keep your energy stuck in the past and it’s common to revisit the memories of what happened or to experience flashbacks that take you back into traumatic memories or sensations.
From the Bach Flower Remedies you could choose Honeysuckle to help you release energy from past trauma and White Chestnut to help if you experience repetitive thoughts, incessant mental chatter or find yourself ruminating on past events. From the deeper acting Essences you could use Inner Harmony if you want to calm your over-active mind and settle your energetic system so you can relax and switch off.
Do you feel that what happened was your fault?
Many people feel shame for not being able to escape from trauma, particularly with sexual trauma or any kind of physical attack.
From the Bach Flower Remedies you could choose Pine if you feel shame about what happened, believe that you deserved it on some level, blame yourself or believe that there’s something inherently wrong with you. From the deeper acting Essences you could use Purity of Heart to transmute buried feelings of unworthiness, shame, fear or anger or Forgiveness to dissolve feelings of guilt and over responsibility.
Do you feel withdrawn, despondent or hopeless?
Peter Levine says that ‘trauma defeats life.’ It often leads to ongoing feelings of bleakness and despair that make it difficult to engage with life.
Peter Levine says that ‘trauma defeats life.’ It often leads to ongoing feelings of bleakness and despair that make it difficult to engage with life.
From the Bach Flower Remedies you could choose Sweet Chestnut if you feel in deep despair; at the limits of what you can endure, Mustard if are under a dark cloud of gloom, feeling withdrawn, separate and isolated, and Gorse if you feel hopeless and unable to see the point in anything.
From the deeper acting Essences you could use Inner Joy to release any feelings of low mood, hopelessness, despair and despondency or Yellow Rattle if you get swamped by deep dark feelings of despair and melancholy.
How To Use Essences Successfully For Trauma Healing
We hope these suggestions have helped you to identify the most useful flower, gem and crystal essences to support your trauma healing. As a general guide, we recommend taking the Bach Flower Remedies that you resonate with alongside a deeper acting essence combination.
If you would like more personalised advice about which essences to take, please don’t hesitate to contact us by email or phone and we’ll be happy to help.
You can learn more about How Flower Essences Help Recovery from Trauma here.
If you have found this post useful, please share it with a friend who is on a trauma healing journey.
Please Note: Flower, gem and crystal essences do not replace treatment from a qualified trauma therapist, and we recommend seeking professional support when required.
How to Use Your Essences
Bach Flower Remedies
Use 1-8 Bach Flower Remedies at a time. Put 4 drops of each remedy in a glass of water or put 4 drops of each directly on your tongue. Alternatively, make a combination bottle (see leaflet for more information). Take Bach Flower Remedies 6-8 x a day.
Deeper Acting Essences
Essences: Use one deeper acting essence at a time and put 4 drops on your tongue 3-4 x a day. For best results, do not add to a glass of water or combination bottle.
Sprays: Spray liberally into your auric field 4 x a day or 2 sprays on the tongue 4 x a day.
With all flower, gem and crystal essences we recommend you continue until the bottle is finished or you notice a difference in how you are feeling.
See Also:
- How Flower Essences Help Recovery from Trauma here
- Larimar Essence Review
- The Energetic Blueprint – Etheric Body Essence Review
- More Essence Suggestions for Shock and Trauma
Share Your Experiences…
Have you used any of our these Essences for shock and trauma? We’d love to hear your experiences of working with these essences, so please do leave us a comment and share your experiences!
Are You New To Flower & Vibrational Essences?
You can find out more about Flower & Vibrational Essences in our guide here.
Jackie Stewart has been using Crystal Herbs essences for 25 years and trained as a Flower and Vibrational Essence Practitioner in 1999. She joined the Crystal Herbs team in 2019 and is passionate about how essences help us open our hearts to co-create a world that thrives on Love.
