This is an assimilation of a few posts I have made on the HealingwithBachFlowers Facebook page. Do connect with it and Like it if you wish to improve our connection.

The subject of ‘Controlling Behaviour’
Ideas on Bach Flower Remedies that can help if you see unhelpful issues arising in everyday life.

Recently, giving advice to another professional for a Client unknown to me personally, problems tangling up a life brought some really interesting insights to the range of positive help the Bach Flower Remedies can give. I want to communicate on a few different hot topics but, so you actually read it, for this one honing it down to ‘Control’.

Classic Bach Remedy ideas for modifying controlling behaviour are Vine, Crab Apple, Chicory, Cherry Plum, though,as extra examples I’ll add ideas for Rock Water, Mimulus, Beech.
As always, my preamble is remember we have all the remedy vibrations within our psyche/feeling nature….
Our ability to control is part of our ability to organise, discriminate, manage, structure and create as the intelligent beings that we are. We only address control as a ‘problem’ when it does not serve us or those around us. The need to control seems to come from insecurity and fear, lack of trust. This may arise from past experiences, but whatever the background, maybe see how these remedy energies resonate with issues you may have noticed. See how this goes and your feed-back is welcome….you do not have to agree!

VINE energy concerns how we use our individual power- from physical and intellectual to material and emotional. We make the choice – not always consciously- how and when we apply our will, our wisdom, our ego.
Strong Vine energy out of balance can make people domineering, manipulative, bullies. They have to be right. They can be cruel, selfish, ruthless.
Often these behaviour patterns are learned – a result of treatment they may have experienced themselves or observed and copied.
The up-side and dramatically different expression of balanced Vine energy is simply more loving and warm; strong leadership and guidance, good organisational skills, kind and creative encouragement support of others.
A team-builder rather than a lone ego.
Watch and feel the magic effect of such a transformation that the Flower essence Vine can assist us in manifesting!

It has been a long interval in posting so I re-read the Vine entry above, and saw I made what I consider to be a classic error. I made reference to ‘they’ dealing with all this stuff as if somehow I am removed from such behaviour, rather than the inclusive ‘we’. So my status is ashamed and apologetic!

CRAB APPLE, in regard to controlling behaviour. Because Crab Apple energy and behaviour relate to attention to detail, order and routine, cleanliness – all quite normal things to attend to for daily functions, hygiene, practicality, out of balance it can be hard to identify and manage.
Extreme behaviour shows up when we get upset when routine or specific orders are disturbed or threatened. OCD patterns connect with this part of us. As individuals we can feel unsafe, fearful, angry, defensive which arises when our ‘safe’ ‘known’ world is threatened in some way.

CHICORY: controlling behaviour….how does this manifest? Well, in the imbalance of this energy within us, our expression of love in whatever form, is loaded with conditions – if you do this, I will do that. In countless ways, the principle is always the same and there will is no end to the see-saw of bargaining. Emotional blackmail- however subtle the communication of it is.
The solution is to release the hooks and set the loved one free…and if help is needed to enact this, Chicory Bach Flower Remedy is one of the potential helpers.

CHERRY PLUM for controlling behaviour is fear-based, usually from a vague place difficult to pin-point. The premise is to keep things safe I need to keep things the same, hold everything together, hold my breath and then the worst won’t happen. Outside of feeling like this, logically, we know that change is inevitable – life does not stand still. Yet this unreasonable fear can take hold and stultify the natural flow of life for us and those around us.

ROCK WATER energy is naturally about managing the apparent ‘chaos’ of the world. So, it is all about structure and order to create workable frameworks within which our world can function. Systems created that we can rely on, making our lives less stressful in principle.
A rigidity can set in where we do not like these structures disturbed, so we attempt to control fluctuations where and when we can. If you have had experience of a big Railway delay or cancellation of flights you know how frustrating the ‘not-knowing’ is. Vulnerable as we cannot control the outcome, and the authorities leave us in the dark. Tempers fray, we all can get fractious. And much of this dissolves once the new departure time is announced, as an end is in sight and this return to order is reassuring.
Rock Water therefore assists us to be more flexible and release the need for control when this is called for.

MIMULUS & BEECH: to complete this first attempt at covering a topic: this time Controlling behaviour:- two very different energies here from our feeling natures…
With Mimulus the form of control often goes unnoticed, even unconscious as we avoid situations or encounters that we believe we might fail at, not enjoy, find distasteful. The negative aspect of this is that it cloisters us and keeps us ‘small’ – a protective instinct of caution that has its place and a choice we make.

Beech’s controlling influence on us individually as well as to others is through the persistent, tenacious critical voice. Judgemental, needling, perfectionist, overly unkind and intolerant comments, beliefs and attitudes can stunt, even suffocate the developing and creative faculties and potential in any of us. This is learned behaviour, so often but it is a tough-rooted ‘weed’ to extricate..and a weed is only a plant growing in the wrong place….(the Vervain in me must defend the plants we label weeds!)

I hope you can discern these aspects within the whole picture of the Remedy, and find them interesting. DO let me know and add to the understanding too.
Aren’t the Flowers Gorgeous?!
Julie x