The Magic of Flowers: A Guide to Their Metaphysical Uses & Properties - Tess Whitehurst 2013

Cinquefoil
The Flowers

This delicate, five-petaled flower possesses a lovely synthesis of soft, otherworldly energy and potent lucky mojo. Certain species of cinquefoil have been traditionally employed by herbalists and magical practitioners for a large number of uses, from treating diarrhea to inducing prophetic dreams.

Indian strawberry (a.k.a. “mock strawberry”), a species of cinquefoil, is like strawberry’s wild hillbilly cousin. Though strawberries and mock strawberries are actually completely different plants, they appear highly similar in almost every way—the two main exceptions being that the blossoms of the Indian strawberry are yellow rather than white, and the fruit they bear is smaller and said to be lacking in flavor. While this variety of cinquefoil is mainly known as an attractive blossoming groundcover, the plant’s healing and detoxifying properties—which are believed by some herbalists to contribute to the prevention and healing of tumors—have been incorporated in both Eastern and Western herbal healing systems.

However, since there is so little information on this available to the layperson, and because the plant is sometimes described as “mildly toxic,” I don’t suggest employing anything other than the flower essence for healing purposes unless you have access to expert knowledge. I am only relating this information because a plant’s physical healing properties provide windows into the dynamics of its metaphysical and vibrational healing properties.

Magical Uses

Creativity and Playfulness

Remember when you were a child and the mere picture or mention of a faery, unicorn, or monster could send you into another world via your imagination and sense of youthful awe? Although as adults we often seem to think that the words my imagination should be preceded by the words just or only, the truth is that no matter what our age, our imagination allows us to tap into something that is not only very real, but also vital to our happiness, creativity, and the future of the planet. Blossoms of cinquefoil—through activating our imagination and sense of playfulness—create an energetic window into this something.

This aspect of cinquefoil’s magic can also provide wonderful support for naturally dreamy and sensitive children who may be feeling closed off or less playful due to any sort of emotional challenge.

For any of these purposes, try spending time with a flower or taking the essence. Or, if you’d like to stimulate your creative and playful mind, you might soak in the following bath.

IMAGINATION INCUBATION BATH

Draw a warm bath and dissolve one cup sea salt in it. Light a yellow candle and a stick of rosemary or vanilla incense. Add nine fresh Indian strawberry blossoms or nineteen drops cinquefoil essence to the water, along with an aquamarine crystal. Before getting into the water, place your left hand on your heart and your right hand on your belly. Take some deep breaths and consider your intentions. Perhaps you’d like to find your direction with your next creative project, find a creative solution to a challenging situation, or rediscover a sense of playfulness in your relationship or career. Feel the feelings you’d like to feel regarding your creative and playful intentions. When this feels complete, get in the water and soak for at least forty-five minutes. As you do so, consciously relax your mind and allow it to freely wander.

Freedom and Liberation

Sometimes we just need to break away and rise above. Cinquefoil’s energy—like an old friend from our “wild days”—can help us to cut loose and free ourselves from things like:

✵ limiting beliefs

✵ low self-esteem

✵ long-standing unhelpful patterns

✵ relationships that don’t serve us

✵ inner restrictions or restraints

✵ sexual or social inhibitions

✵ fears and worries

Try taking two to four drops of the essence in a glass of water or sparkling cider (or, if your inner guru gives you the green light, an alcoholic beverage of your choice). Drink with the intention to liberate yourself from whatever you need liberating from. As you imbibe the flower’s vibration via the beverage, feel your attachment to the condition, thought, pattern, or issue unraveling and dissolving, leaving you free. Or you might try spending time with the blossom or performing the bath ritual from the previous section with the intention to liberate yourself.

Healing

A core tenet of holistic medicine is that our mind and body are connected. As such, by helping us to dissolve and liberate ourselves from mental and emotional patterns that are no longer serving us, cinquefoil can be a good complement to physical healing endeavors, especially when they involve long-standing issues. Just to clarify, for serious medical issues I don’t suggest using cinquefoil essence exclusively but rather as a gentle complement to other modalities. For this purpose, I suggest taking the flower essence regularly as needed.

Luck

Cinquefoil has an all-around positive energy that can help us to get into our most natural and harmonious life flow—in other words, he can help increase our luck. You might like to add cinquefoil blossoms or essence to any magical endeavor performed for the purpose of increasing abundance, blessings, or luck.

Magic

The realm of magic and the realm of the imagination are one and the same. In fact, both words contain a similar root: magos. If you’re working on honing your magical abilities and becoming awake to the realm of magic in every moment, you might consider working with cinquefoil’s vibration. For this purpose, try any of the previous suggestions or create the following mist.

MIST SMUDGE

Before creative visualizations, rituals, or other magical endeavors, mist the space with spring water into which you’ve added ten drops cinquefoil essence and ten to twenty drops thyme essential oil.

Prophetic Dreams

Traditionally, cinquefoil leaves have been employed as a smudge before bed to induce prophetic dreams about one’s true love. Similarly, you can create the following mist smudge to induce prophetic dreams about your true love or anything else.

DREAMTIME MIST SMUDGE

Add nine or twelve drops cinquefoil flower essence to a mister of rose water, along with four drops neroli and eight drops lavender essential oils. Shake gently and lightly mist your bedroom before bed. Then, as you drift off to sleep, silently repeat what you would like to receive prophetic dreams about for as long as you remain conscious and focused. Phrase your statement in a positive way, as if you already know the answer to your query. For example, if you’re wondering what city to move to, you might repeat, “I live in the perfect city, where I thrive in every way.” Or, if you’d like to know how to meet a wonderful romantic partner, you might repeat, “I am in love with the most wonderful person, and she (or he) is in love with me.” Be sure to keep a notebook and pen or a voice recorder next to your bed so that, upon awakening, you can capture any impressions you receive.

Wild Joy

Feel like your domestication is putting a kink in your joy? Been a little too long since you ran with the wolves and howled at the moon? Take cinquefoil essence as desired to help rediscover your inner wild man or woman.

Incidentally, getting in touch with your wild joy in this way can also help align you with your most ideal life path. After all, how can you follow your bliss unless you get wild and crazy enough to let yourself find it in the first place?

Magical Correspondences

Elements: Water, Air

Gender: Male

Planets: Uranus, Jupiter