Resolving Inner Conflicts: What Vervain Taught Me
Inner conflicts leak so much energy and so many resources, and make your life path messy and inefficient.
I’ve just returned from another trip to Europe where I spent time with my parents. For a happier European adventure, read about my Mary Magdalene pilgrimage in the South of France. I arrived back in the US depleted, exhausted and just out of sync with everything. This inner conflict about living in the US versus Europe has been playing out for years and might have just reached its peak. My businesses and personal life are in the US, but my parents, sister and close family friends are in Europe. I am constantly pulled between the two, endlessly feeling guilty.
This year, I consciously decided to spend two months in the US and one month in Europe, hoping to bridge the gap a little. Yet as I reach the end of the year, I feel unsettled, ungrounded and discontent, straddling two worlds, neither fully here nor there.
I’m not enjoying traveling much either, which is surprising for me because I love to go on adventures. On the return leg to the US, my flight was canceled because of strikes. The next one was delayed twice, and once we boarded, we were asked to disembark because of a technical issue. When we finally landed, there was no gate available and we had to wait on the tarmac for over an hour. Meanwhile, my daughter was in the ER with an awful virus, and I had a budding toothache.
Sitting on that tarmac, I knew something had to change. Resolving inner conflicts starts with naming them, so I turned to an old friend, Dr Bach's flower essences, to find out what was really pulling me apart.
What Is an Inner Conflict?
An inner conflict is when two parts of you are pulling in opposite directions, each with its own agenda and life direction. This conflict is held in the body as a constant tension as the two parts literally compete with each other for attention and resources. It's exhausting, and it never feels like you can arrive and enjoy life, because the energy never fully settles and you are constantly pulled from one to the other.
As Goethe put it so eloquently in Faust: "Two souls, alas, are dwelling in my breast."
What Did Dr Bach Say About Inner Conflicts?
As I pondered this tricky inner conflict, my intuition pulled me towards Dr Bach’s spiritual philosophy and his work with flower essences. I had used these essences extensively in my early twenties, while navigating the challenges of that time.
Flower essences are diluted infusions of flowers in spring water preserved in brandy, developed by Dr Edward Bach in the 1930s. In his 1931 book Heal Thyself, Dr Bach explained his core idea that illness arises when the personality drifts from what the Soul is asking of it. Disease is then "in essence the result of conflict between Soul and Mind." Bach created 38 flower essences, each corresponding to a specific negative state of mind or emotional imbalance. These 38 essences were divided into seven groups:
Fear
Uncertainty
Insufficient interest in present circumstances
Loneliness
Oversensitivity to influences and ideas
Despondency or despair
Over-care for the welfare of others
He also created Rescue Remedy, a combination of five of the essences, for acute stress, shock, and trauma.
According to Dr Bach, disease was a corrective signal showing where the personality had gone off course, so it could return to alignment.
Bach's remedies don't target diseases; instead, they address the person's emotional state and temperament. Two people with the same dis-ease could need completely different essences, because their inner conflicts differ.
Healing ultimately came from reuniting the personality with the Soul, with the remedies acting as gentle support. Bach's resolution was a union of the personality and the soul, not a victory of one side over another.
If you look up Dr Bach, you will find no scientific proof that his remedies do anything more than a placebo. Edzard Ernst's 2010 systematic review in Swiss Medical Weekly found Bach remedies performed no better than placebo in clinical trials.
But I have always believed in placebos as tools. Ted Kaptchuk's 2010 Harvard study in PLoS ONE found people with IBS improved on placebo pills even when told they were placebos. The body heals in its own language and beliefs, and flower essences are part of mine.
Yet as I continued my research, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that Dr Bach’s work has continued evolving and progressing, thanks to therapists like Dietmar Krämer and Mechthild Scheffer.
How Do You Find Your Inner Conflicts With Flower Essences?
You can map inner conflicts in two ways: body zones and muscle testing.
Dietmar Krämer mapped the Bach flowers to zones of the body. So if an issue appears on a certain part of the body, I can use his body zone map of the flower essences to resolve the inner conflict expressed physically. For example, both my big toenails have some kind of issue going on with them. When I look up the flower essence for them, the left toe points to Wild Rose flower essence (apathy) and the right toe resonates with Holly (envy).
Another way I can work with this is by using muscle testing to see which inner conflict is housed in which body part. Muscle testing is a technique from applied kinesiology that reads changes in muscle strength as yes or no answers from the body. It is a technique I use daily as I believe it connects us to our Divine Feminine wisdom.
This method works well whether your inner conflicts are conscious or unconscious. Here is how I do it:
Check that my muscle testing is working
Get clear on what I'm testing
Ask my body where the conflict is housed by holding different parts of my body and testing: front or back; left, right, or middle; above or below the navel; and so on
Once the body part has been isolated, I look up Dietmar Krämer's body zone book to see which Bach remedy is connected to this part and follow his instructions.
Alternatively, I test the different Bach flowers to see what this body part wants.
Once I had my method, I began with the conflicts I already knew were there.
Why Did Vervain Keep Showing Up for Me?
I started with the inner conflicts I was already aware of. Interestingly, one flower kept showing up: the Vervain flower essence. Four of the nine conflicts I tested pointed to the same essence.
Four out of nine is hard to ignore, so I went back to Dr Bach's description to understand what Vervain was trying to tell me.
What Is the Vervain Flower Essence?
Vervain comes from Verbena officinalis, and it's one of Bach's original Twelve Healers, which correspond to the twelve primary personality types or foundational soul patterns.
Vervain people are described by Bach as "Those with fixed principles and ideas, which they are confident are right, and which they very rarely change. They have a great wish to convert all around them to their own views of life. They are strong of will and have much courage when they are convinced of those things that they wish to teach. In illness, they struggle on long after many would have given up their duties."
(The Twelve Healers and Other Remedies)
I had to sit with this description for a while. I believe I am rather flexible mentally and open-minded, with no real desire to convert people. The work I create exists to help people should they need it, and it doesn't require believing in it to be transformative. What I did resonate with was the hard work ethic, the constant stress and the struggle to continue beyond what is normal. I also connected with a desire to enjoy life instead of always keeping busy. I felt I was more of an inward Vervain, turning this intensity on myself rather than on others.
Is Vervain Your Flower Essence?
Do you recognize yourself? You might be a Vervain if:
You struggle to rest even when exhausted
You keep going long after others would stop
You feel guilty when you're not productive
Your mission feels bigger than your energy
Like me, you may not recognize the "convincing others" side. Vervain can turn outward or inward:
What Does the Spirit of Vervain Teach?
The Vervain flower essence teaches moderation, tolerance and balance as well as grounded idealism. It helps with nervous exhaustion from overstriving.
It is the antidote to being overbearing, intolerant, and overly enthusiastic, a state that can degenerate into fanaticism.
I find it funny, and a little ironic, that my favorite herbal tea since childhood is verveine, the evening tisane of Belgian and French homes. My body has always shown me what she needed to stay in balance.
We are now in fall, the metal season of letting go of what is no longer alive or meaningful, and heading into winter, the water season of rest. Vervain's message has never felt more relevant.
What does a mission without strain look like? I'm not sure I know how to work without striving. Would I be bored?
Maybe the answer isn't choosing between striving and rest at all. That question led me straight back to the heart of my own life path.
What Happens When an Inner Conflict Is Really a Soul Wound?
Something I have come to realize is that my own personal life path has always been one of synthesis or union. From a very young age, I was told I had to choose between options and it felt like I was rejecting a huge part of myself by doing that. Very quickly, I developed a mindset that allowed me to have both things. To this day, when presented with choices that seem opposite, I always ask myself how I can have both.
My life path reading was born out of this mindset: when I was channeling for my clients, I was always shown two expressions of a soul wound that seemed completely at odds with each other and totally irreconcilable. It was shown to me as expressed through the feminine and masculine. And the healing piece was the union between the two which gave birth to a whole new soul expression and soul path. This has been my most powerful and successful tool to share.
In my case, Vervain is the masculine pushing on alone. The resolution isn't to stop, but to let that drive meet the receptive feminine, so my work can be carried by receiving rather than force.
Today, I offer it as my Intuitive Life Path Reading, for anyone who keeps circling the same conflict and wants to see the soul wound underneath. I also explain what a life path reading can show you in Why You Should Consider Having A Life Path Reading.
What Am I Doing Differently Now?
So, what am I doing differently?
Pausing, resting, and not forcing. Trying not to strive and put so much pressure on myself. I’ve been acutely conscious that I can still enjoy this whole process even if the results are not where I want them to be yet. In all that striving, I lost sight of why I was doing this in the first place.
My full set of Bach flower essences has been delayed, so in the meantime I've been using Rescue Remedy. Fittingly, Rescue Remedy contains both Rock Rose and Star of Bethlehem, two of the essences that showed up in my testing. I’m playing with new ideas and concepts, delighted with all the levels of exploration available to me. I'm also exploring the essences with my rescue dog to see if it can help her. And, of course, I'm drinking my evening verveine.
If you’re interested in investigating further, this article about getting unstuck from old patterns, is your next step.
FAQs: Resolving Inner Conflicts
Q: What is an inner conflict?
A: An inner conflict is when two parts of you pull in opposite directions, each wanting a different life. The tension rarely resolves on its own, and it often shows up in the body as fatigue, restlessness, or a feeling of never fully arriving.
Q: Can Bach flower remedies help with inner conflicts?
A: Dr Edward Bach designed his remedies to address emotional states rather than physical illness, and many people use them as gentle support when working through inner conflicts. Clinical trials have not shown them to outperform placebo, so they work best as one tool among others, alongside self-reflection and support.
Q: What is the Vervain flower essence used for?
A: Vervain is one of Dr Bach's original Twelve Healers. It is traditionally used for people who overstrive: those driven by a strong sense of mission who push past their limits and struggle to rest. Its positive quality is balance, holding your ideals with ease instead of strain.
Q: How do I know which Bach flower essence I need?
A: Start by reading the descriptions of the 38 Bach remedies and noticing which emotional states you recognize in yourself. Some people also use muscle testing or body maps that link essences to specific areas of the body. Choosing by how you feel, not by a physical symptom, follows Dr Bach's own philosophy.
Q: Can inner conflicts affect the body?
A: Many traditions, from Dr Bach's philosophy to modern mind-body approaches, hold that unresolved emotional tension is felt in the body as fatigue, tightness, or poor sleep. If you have physical symptoms, see a medical professional, and treat inner conflict work as a complement to care, not a replacement.
Ready to Untangle Your Own Inner Conflicts?
Inner conflicts drain us because two parts of us are fighting over the same energy. Naming them, whether through flower essences, muscle testing, or a reading, is the first step toward resolution.
If you’re currently struggling with your own inner conflicts you can’t seem to untangle, the Resolving Inner Conflicts Light Language Activation was created to help you begin on your own, and the Intuitive Life Path Reading goes to the root by looking at the soul wound underneath it all.
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