the Bach Flower Remedy:
Olive

Olive: Remedy from the set of the Seven Helpers

About this music

Realised in version for piano bass and drums and performed on several occasions.

An improvised opening on bass leads to slow and complex harmonies on piano. A flowing 2 + 3 + 3 accompaniment then supports a gently flowing melody in crotchet triplets, suggesting the recovery of energy following real exhaustion.

Lyrics for Olive

Olive is an instrumental piece.

About Olive, the Bach Flower Remedy

Olive and Vine are dissimilar emotional states but both are made from species which share the experience of being cultivated since the beginning of recorded history. The dove that Noah sent out from the ark came back with an olive branch in its beak.

Olives come originally from Syria, and from there, their spread through cultivation is a thread which links the whole Mediterranean and Middle East areas together.

Following on from Rock Water and Vine, Bach was continuing a line of thinking towards plants whose basic patterning has been modified by human cultivation/culture. The Helper Remedies relate to the circumstances of people who have grown sick by their way of living. People who have moved away from their basic Type and have become chronically blocked in terms of their energy.

Olive is indicated for deep exhaustion, a constant tiredness following on from worry, illness or grief.

Wild olives are small with meagre flesh so a long time ago people selected and developed strains which gave more oil and weight to the fruit. Olives, however, do not breed true to type from seed. It is necessary to graft the chosen variety on to established root stock. This means that the tree’s root is of one kind while the trunk, branches, leaves, flowers and fruit are of another. The life cycle of the Olive tree begins, then, with a graft onto an established young plant. A scion, a short piece of twig from the selected tree, is inserted under the bark of the root stock.

As it grows, the new tree must be pruned. Olives flower on the young new wood of the previous year. The tree is kept in shape by cutting out the older wood. The fruits of the tree are picked by being combed with a long rake or beaten with sticks. A tree can continue productive life for a hundred years. Old trees are cut down, and new growth comes from the stool – an olive tree renews itself from the ground up.

The olive pattern of cultivation is chronically damaging to the species and to the land. No wonder the land is exhausted!

Olive people are pale, worn out and exhausted. The condition is very much more than tiredness; it is complete depletion of energy.

In the Mediterranean, olives grow on the open hillside. The trees can withstand burning dryness – indeed they love the intensity of light and they crave the warmth of the sun. The Olive tree in the Bible links the experiences of exhaustion, life, apparent death and regeneration. The Olive is proliferous; the energy of the tree is given outwards to the land around. The flower essence makes rapidly as the energy of the plant is quickly released.

Olive trees have been enslaved for thousands of years to provide numerous benefits to humans. It is a system which takes, takes, takes and which does not care for the balance of nature. And yet the Olive continues to give uncomplaining. Noah’s dove with the Olive leaf stands as the emblem of peace. Of all the trees, Olive is forbearing, tolerant and gives energy when others would have given up.

In the Olive state, Bach said, people feel they have no more strength to make any effort. The Olive remedy provides the resources for renewal – from the light.

This account of this Bach Flower Remedy is based on the book Bach Flower Remedies : Form and Function by Julian Barnard.

For full information see HealingHerbs.co.uk→.

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