Hope is a green shoot of possibility

Photo: @psuedon via Avant Gardens

What a stunning representation of the negative and positive emotions of Gorse. The sense of loss and utter hopelessness when a healthy tree is killed, cut down in its prime.  Then Nature’s ability to always surprise us by its resilience and regrowth.

After 8 months of Covid 19 and the restrictions it brings to our lives, it’s easy enough to feel hopeless about ever getting back to what we think of as normal.  You probably know the Emily Dickinson poem about ‘Hope is the thing with feathers that … never stops at all’.  Author Matt Haig has his own version of that: “Hope is the thing with feathers, that craps on you from the sky.”

That’s very Gorse – had hope, hung a lot of faith on it, and now it’s been shown to be worthless.  Not worth hoping, end of the line, it’s all pointless.   But Dr Bach put Gorse in the Uncertainty Group rather than the Despair Group.  Deep down people in need of Gorse are uncertain whether their resigned attitude is correct, whether faith is warranted or not.  They wouldn’t be discussing it if they didn’t have, even unconsciously, a spark of hope left that could be re-ignited.

Many of us have undoubtedly taken Gentian this past year and may now have got to the stage where we are beyond discouraged and finding life uncertain to the point of being depressing.  In all our fears and anxieties the flower remedies resurrect our sense of hope.  The emotional lift that comes with a return to balance and tranquillity automatically engenders hope.

Hope is a green shoot of possibility.   New dawns, new seeds, new growth, are an unfailing and integral part of Mother Nature.  She gives us Gorse so that like Her, our energy and focus is always in the present.