Bach Original Flower Remedies

Retirement is the end of one of life’s longest chapters, but for some it is also the beginning of a new chapter, one that promises to be just as exciting as the one they just finished.

People who see retirement in this manner tend to look forward impatiently to the day they will stop work. They are full of plans for new activities, but their main trouble is finding enough time to do all these things they want to do.

Many people just coast into retirement, living their lives much as before but with more time for thinking and reading.  These are quieter people, but in their own ways their years of rest and reflection are as valuable and as pleasant as those of their more active brothers.

Others are not so hopeful at the prospect. In a world where so many define their worth by what they do – which means in the vast majority of cases, what they do to earn money – the end of their working life comes as a great strain.  Far from taking pleasure at the thought of retirement they see it as something to be put off as much as possible. When the day finally comes, they don’t feel they are opening a new chapter at all. Instead they believe in their hearts that they are closing the book.

Depending on when you retire you could easily have 20, 30 or move years of active life ahead of you. At the risk of sounding glib, you have everything to live for. You are entering the time that has come to be called the “third age”; the time when you are freed from the need to earn a living and from the responsibility of raising children.  Just as you would never seriously consider trying to settle into a fixed way of life in the first thirty years of your life, it is a bad idea to try to dig a permanent rut for yourself in the last thirty. The ideal would be to make your third age as exciting, life-enhancing and enriching as your first age (childhood) or your second (word and child-rearing).

But even the people who look forward to giving up boring and uninspiring jobs may find that being retired is not as much fun as can be upsetting. The ill-prepared person is easily driven into the comfort zone of television and a daily trip to the shops. Before they know where they are, the routine of meaningless work has been replaced by a routine of meaningless housework.

The reduction of income on retirement can also bring problems. Unless they are some of the lucky few to receive a large golden handshake and a generous pension, the loss of buying power can make it difficult to make ends meet, let alone finance the rose-covered cottage and foreign holidays they have been dreaming about.

Successful retirement is like a successful career in that you have to plan before you start. If you’re faced with uncertainty or a host of emotions, as you probably will, then there are several Bach Flower Remedies, which can assist.

The first Bach Flower Remedy to consider as retirement approaches is probably Walnut. This would be especially useful for those who find that their old habits are preventing them from making a successful transition to their new status.

It is all too easy to fill your days with humdrum activity and never do anything exciting or interesting. Heather people may become like this if they get too wrapped up in their minor problems with health, money and other trivia.

The normally capable person who feels overwhelmed at the thought of having to retire, so that he finds it hard to cope with even trivial tasks, is perhaps an Elm type, and so, would benefit from this remedy when things seem too much. On the other hand the Oak person may simply get on with the daily grind, pushing aside thoughts of retirement so successfully that when the fateful day comes it is almost like a bolt from the blue, and leaves him feeling frazzled quite suddenly.

When fear is felt when approaching or entering the retirement years, Mimulus would normally be the remedy to select if the fear could be named. This would apply for example to fear of loneliness, fear of not having enough money and fear of being bored.

Others that may come in useful from time to time would include:

•    Honeysuckle for nostalgia and a tendency to let thoughts of the past interfere with enjoyment of the present.
•    Willow for resentment and self-pity
•    Clematis where daydreams about the future prevent actions someone trying something new
•    Cerato for insecure people who need to have their decisions confirmed by others



Submitted by Janine Tassi