If  today you are feeling a little anxious, afraid or sad,  then take time for self care and to relax  amongst plants in your home, garden., local beauty spot or wood.  Plants and trees are waiting to help uplift our energy. Over the pandemic many of us have reconnected with their therapeutic, natural healing properties.

I actually remember walking into a store and being greeted by the aura of the orchid ( below in the photograph); which had been put for sale on a display shelf by the entrance. I loved it, but also I was unsure of it as it made me feel slightly uneasy. As I looked at it, it was bringing up some unexpected emotions within me. It made me feel tearful. I realised it was healing me. It was up to me whether I was ready to let go. I purchased it, as I decided there was no point being a Reiki healer if I was not prepared to look within myself and be healed.

When I got home I unwrapped the orchid, watered and fed it lightly with feeder and asked it where it wanted to be placed within in my home. When I got to the right location, It enlarged its aura temporarily, to highlight that this was where it wished to be located.

That evening I sat and watched my new house plant and connected with its energy. As I did, I felt the orchid’s aura grow even larger. It radiated unconditional love to me. Tears started to well up in my eyes. Painful emotions and memories were bubbling to the surface and I could feel them being released and dissolved. After the healing time spent together, I thanked my new healing plant. I spent regular time with it over the coming weeks letting go of old thoughts and memories that I didn’t even realise I had been storing.

Months later the orchid’s last few flowers were beginning to die. I had a dilemma, to throw away my unpaid healing friend or to keep a few leaves in a pot. As I connected with the orchid energetically, the orchid told me clearly it had far more to give and was not ready to die. “I will grow far more; watch me “ it said. It showed me in its outside aura a duplicate shadow of its stalks and on the duplicate shadow it was showing me there were new shoots developing. These were the new flowering shoots it was in the process of getting ready to grow.

It was correct. Over the coming weeks and months the orchid grew more shoots and even more beautiful flowers. Once these had died, the orchid asked for the old shoots to be cut back. I am now on the third display of flowers for my healing orchid and this is the best yet. It is truly overwhelming. It asked not to be staked this time so the flowers are like a bridal bouquet, overflowing downwards. It reminds me that nature helps to raise our spirits and heal us, if we look after nature. If we only ask what it wants from us too.

When we buy plants we often look for the strongest, the most healthiest in the display. The ones not yet budding with flowers or slightly smaller often get left behind and sometimes become unsaleable. If we saw pets for sale we would often choose to help and take home the weakest. We assume that plants do not have feelings or feel pain. Yet, it has been scientifically proven that they do; as talked about in the New York Times Bestseller “The Secret Life of Plants”. When we buy plants, such as orchids, it is so easy to think that once they have finished flowering they are similar to cut flowers; finished with and ready for the bin or garden waste.  That they have no future. It took an orchid to change my mindset.