Poets, Mavericks & Prophets

Notes On Alchemical Psychology is a series of texts dedicated to personal creative therapeutic work, merging the old ways & the new. In this note, I talk about the sweet & steely alchemy of befriending flowers.

Flowers got me through difficult times. Their scent, their colours, their presence, their lively company. In gardens, parks, alongside roads, on markets, across meadows, in flower pots on small balconies, in empty wine bottles filled with tap water — my portable vases while on the road.

Even when I was low on monies I would buy myself flowers, just to remind the universe that this is where I am at, although frustrated and desolate. The hue and perfume and loveliness of a particular flower helped me stick with humanity, and this Earth, rather than give up on it, in an onslaught of nihilism. It saved me from a selfish, dry, isolated existence.

But, nihilism I still do have. Whenever I am faced with what humanity does, to itself, to other beings, to nature so abundant and alive. We are truly the proverbial excrement from where the roses grow, as the French saying goes, dark and bloody, a rotting pile of bile and envy, sadistic as anything we were thought in history — when the enemy was always someone other that us.

Yet this “us” is what we are confronted with, each day, in our environments or across the globe, with our malignant mobs, bullying and gossip, the frenzied triumph of hate. Unbearable at times, particularly when observed in those closest and dearest. Then, we only need to glance at the mirror when in a state of rage — allow our own eyes to meet their inverted reflections, reminding us where the shadow truly lies.

In those moments of hard truths and no exits it is a particular challenge to move out of our own sense of hopelessness, our personal and collective hell, and find fertile ground in the endless opportunities for true beauty in the sacred now.

This is why flowers can be our instant remedies, as they are beauty incarnate, each and every one of them a testament of just how much Gaia loves its creations — including us, its prodigal children. Even their withering petals are glorious, a reminder that all is transient, yet everything remains. In one form or another.

My practice is to gather the fallen, and transmute them into oils, add them to baths, honouring the never-ending service that flowers offer to our spirits and bodies, and especially our busy, silly minds.

When I was growing up, in a country far away from the one of my birth, my family had a rose garden. This was a brief interlude in living in buildings (before and after), but it helped me understand what pure joy is.

Just sitting on the grass and looking at those bright miracles, allowing my mind to wonder, that’s what made me a storyteller. Comfortable in the imaginal. Feet firmly on the ground from where the flowers grow, while my head safely rested in the clouds. Searching for worlds yet unnamed. Writing things down. Drawing, endlessly drawing.

It was easy, then, to snap back, at any time, because my friends, the flowers, reminded my soul when to return to its bodily abode, by their very presence.

Everything else in my life is a detour to that physical yet holy space, that temenos, where I learned how to befriend bouquets. Smell the roses, figuratively and literally. In fun times, moody times, lonely times, and most importantly — at times when all seemed lost and eternally grey.

There is nothing as unconquerable as a flower. All on Earth are enchanted by it. All humans bow to it. Whatever their character.

Even the ones who destroy their soft beauty are not unaware that desecrating these emissaries of Mother Earth will have its price — and that the price will be high.

Nature defends its own, everyone feels that, deep down in the fragile centre of their bones.

That’s true power.

AUTHOR: ©Milana Vujkov

Photo by Mirjana Vujkov (mom): A corner of our family rose garden, cc.1976, Tehran, Iran

Disclaimer – These notes follow a personal journey, and are offered as philosophical & creative inspiration. Although I am a psychologist by education, the material within them is not therapy or substitute for therapy. However, they are dedicated as temenos for accessing the therapeutic numinous, in hope of being of good service to your soul in exploring the potentials of each moment in time.