As we approach Valentine’s Day, I wanted to bring the story of Rose to you, for rose as we all know, often plays a large role in Valentine’s Day, even when people no longer really understand why they give roses on this day, having largely forgotten the story and medicine of rose and why its a beautiful and heartful gift for someone you may want to be more intimate with.
There are so many plants, that we use for certain times, for certain events mainly out of tradition, but have no idea any more why that plant is significant at that time. I have found it incredibly lovely to unearth why plants are used at particular times and always marvel at the old stories that are revealed.
Whether it be rosemary at times of remembrance, mistletoe, holly and ivy on the winter solstice or hawthorn for May Day.
Roses are incredibly powerful and potent as a medicine, yet often many of us can think of them as stuffy, fussy and best left in ornamental gardens. But roses are more sensuous, more fierce and more loving than their more recent reputation.
Roses medicine starts working on people from just the smell of them, breathe a strong smelling rose in and you may find your shoulders drop and a sense that the plant has just whispered into your body - “its all going to be ok”
Most plants work with a specific organ in the body and rose works with the heart and the hearts nervous system as well as our bodies main nervous system.
Rose is a medicine for the physical and emotional heart. Physically they soothe the area around the heart, softening the space around it while also softening anxiety, stress, grief, sorrow and fear.
When taking or smelling rose, our awareness is led to our hearts, and into that feeling space within us. For some, they may have tried to leave their heart and not feel it anymore due to trauma, loss of a loved one, or a breaking or violation of their boundaries, something that causes deep grief and to be safe or to cope they shut away from their hearts.
And although, without the right support or help this may be necessary, after a time, it will be damaging.
The heart is far more than a pump and much research is showing just how incredible the heart is. The heart has been named the organ of perception due to its huge electromagnetic field that is picking up on all the frequencies around us from all living beings, our senses and these frequencies speak to the heart and the hearts nervous system first and then the heart sends information to the brain and the larger nervous system of the body.
The hearts nervous system is called the hearts brain, as it thinks and holds memories just as a brain does.
If we cut ourselves off from the hearts voice that comes in feelings and pictures and sensations, then we also cut off from not just the world within us, but also the world around us. The heart is the gateway the world enters us through, and it is the heart that feels the world around us and how it affects us. If we are not listening or diminishing or squashing the voice, we blind ourselves to what is good and right for us and what is not good and right for us and we may end up always walking into things that do not serve us as well as not really knowing who we are or what lights us up.
Rose, in their gentle, cooling, loving and fierce way, helps us come back to the heart and reclaim that space for our selves, no matter what has happened to us.
Soothing, calming and whispering care right into the centre of it.
Yet roses greatest story is their thorns. The thorns teach us a valuable lesson about balance. People have often said to me ‘if roses are about love, self love and the heart how come they have such terrible thorns’
Yet it is the thorns that I love the most about rose. It is a visual teaching about boundaries and it isnt the only heart medicine with such beautiful thorns, look at the hawthorn, roses sister plant and also a valuable heart medicine that is wonderful to combine with rose.
These thorns show us, that to be in our hearts, to be open and loving and full of self care, we need to have our boundaries in place, we need to have a strong ‘no’ and be able to have our own backs.
Too often we are led to believe, that to be kind we cannot be boundaried or to be soft means we cannot be strong, or to be loving means we cannot be fierce, or to be powerful we cannot be gentle.
Yet rose, and much of nature teaches that these things are not opposing forces that are against each other, we see that these things must come together otherwise we are out of balance. Kindness must come with boundaries, and its must kinder if it does.
When we have our boundaries in place, when we respect ourselves enough to protect and honour who we are, will mean that we will feel safe enough within ourselves to be in our hearts, to be open and soft knowing our thorns are in place.
And so you see, this is a perfect plant to gift someone who you love or want to be intimate with.
For it ignites self love, it brings a person into their hearts and helps them to find their true yes and true no as well as calming, soothing and being a cooling balm on old wounds.
It is just such a shame, that so many roses gifted today have been grown so fast that the smell is no longer inhabiting them, and their thorns have either been removed or bred out of them, meaning we lose the story, the medicine and meaning behind this incredible medicine.
Sending much warmth and wild rose medicine to you all
Brigit xx
Thank you for this beautiful piece on roses. The wisdom you shared is so very timely and important for me personally . Thank you ❤️🌹
This is lovely, Brigit; and very timely and potent for me personally. Roses have held great meaning for me throughout my life. So much so, that Rose is part of my daughter's name, and I have called her Rosebud since she was born. ~ As I am healing and growing older, I am much more appreciative of the thorns. I will be sitting with your words. Thank you for this generous gift!