Bach Flower Remedies

SWEET CHESTNUT

Symptoms - Extreme state of anguish. Having reached the end of ones tether. Complete despair without feelings of suicide. I went through the Sweet Chestnut stage just before I discovered Bach Flower Remedies. It is certainly one of the most painful states you can enter into. It is also called 'The dark night of the soul', the night that has to be before morning can break once more.

NB: This is the remedy for changing your belief system. Often the pain experienced in a sweet chestnut state is caused by our refusal to let go of old patterns.

In this state, there is no yesterday, no tomorrow, just an eternal hopeless now where all hope is gone and you will never be free of the pain. This state normally comes about when you have tried everything, and nothing has worked. You've come away empty handed. What is actually happening is that this is the last desperate bid to hold on to old patterns or habits that no longer serve your purpose. Once one passes through this stage, it leads to the awakening of real spirituality.

This most certainly was the case in my experience, and I often wonder how much better things would have been if I had known about Sweet Chestnut back then.

External support can be very important. People who care and validate how you're feeling. Certainly one of the problems can be that those around you can't understand how and why you are feeling the way you are.

Several long term friendships I had at the time were broken when I found I couldn't rely on the people I had trusted to support me in times of crisis. Letting go of them was necessary as they were negatives in my life I did not need. I must say, though, after having done that, I never looked back.

Some say that you should embrace the dark night of the soul and enjoy it. In my opinion, it's a contradiction in terms. If you are able to enjoy it, then you're not really in a sweet chestnut state.