The Magic of Coltsfoot
Coltsfoot Sun Essence
So for the last few weeks I have been working with Coltsfoot. It appeared all over our garden this year probably because of extra damp. However - I love how sometimes plants appear when needed - it seems suited for the Covid challenge. It’s a remedy for persistent coughs, not used so much these days because of the concern over alkaloids and liver damage but it’s an age old remedy, and Culpepper speaks of it with reverence. (Just spotted Ground Ivy everywhere too, also a respiratory lung healer)
But - with Coltsfoot my instinct was not to use it as a syrup or a tea or to smoke it (as some do) but to make a flower essence.
I made the essence at Equinox - before and since then I have been drawing and meditating with it. It’s like a mini sun - this is the feeling of its effect. To awaken your inner sun. I felt an exceptional link to the heart and the pineal gland, our inner sensory organ for light. While there are many scientific, spiritual, biological and metaphysical functions or associations to this ‘third eye’ - I am only describing my inner sense for what this flower brought me.
I write all this with trepidation, not wanting to fantasise or feed any esoteric existential dialogue around the Corona virus. Not wanting also to appear too cosmically orientated when grounded approaches, logic and practicalities and action are important. But my heart lies with my own instincts and powers of observation and investigation. I trust that - and share for the sole reason of helping anyone it might resonate with.
So here goes…
It felt like it showed me that in the sun there are beings of light, ancestors and older beings, like angels (I told you I was going to get cosmic!) It illuminated this place in the middle of the brain, and like an electric switch it meant the spirit-self was on, which cause me to soften, and surrender all thoughts for my attention to drop into the heart. It was as if molten golden honey filled me inside - warming, connecting, peace-bringing - despite all the fears and anguish around people currently suffering.
When I made this remedy it was surrounded by Bees. I also included in the water some Mexican amber, like it was fossilised sunshine turned into resin by trees thousands of years before.
Amber also actually has electrostatic qualities to it. The Classical Latin/Greek names electrum and ēlektron, are obviously connected to “electron” and also a term ēlektōr meaning "beaming sun”. In Chinese remedies it’s used to tranquillise the mind (more at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amber)
The pictures I made also show a connection to a beaming sun.
Now (today, 7th April) this sunshine flower is in its full moon stage, with the seed heads forming (like fluffy white crowns, like small soft dandelions) It’s now, I feel I can write about it and make the essence available.
To summarise what this essence brings is qualities of:
Warmth, healing, wisdom - it feels protective and cheerful
Light to your emotional core - and helps you adapt to the grief, deaths, the passage of fear and circumstances of change
Lets you feel you are in company, and that those passing over, are also not alone
Reminds you of your spiritual self, and that if that is kept illuminated, there is balance. You can keep your relationship to nature intact as a force of individual sovereignty and truth
Courage to take action from your instinctive self again, grow food, listen.
It has been a beautiful journey with this plant.
Final essences were made today on this full moon 7th April 2020.
I got up at 5am, the moon was so bright and the sun was also up - it was definitely beautiful to feel the Earth and be alive - deep gratitude for this in the knowledge of other states of being.
If anybody would like to try this essence please contact me directly - you can see it on the flower healing page. Our house is virus free and I made the essences with gloves on in sterile conditions as much as is possible, but I have to put a disclaimer in as uncomfortable as it might be!
Eleanor - artsbotanical@gmail.com
