ISSUE NO. 08 | May 9, 2025

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The Bloom Before Words

There is a softness that comes before speech.
A moment when scent enters the room — before thought, before plans, before performance.

That moment is a threshold.
And flowers know how to hold it.

They don’t speak the language of urgency.
They won’t demand you explain yourself.
They simply arrive — velvet-skinned, sun-fed, utterly themselves — and ask only that you feel.

This is where Sanctuary begins.

Not with the right pillow or the perfect vase.
But with the long-forgotten permission to let beauty touch you.
To let petals say what your heart hasn’t dared to name.

Because here’s what I know after nearly thirty years of creating space for caregivers, helpers, healers in their homes and gardens they live in:

Flowers bring us back to the parts of ourselves we exiled in service to everyone else.

That edge-of-tears tenderness?
That sigh that escapes when your hand brushes a blossom at dusk?
That is not nothing.

That's remembrance.

You don’t have to know why you feel a lump rise in your throat around lilac.
Or why peonies make you ache for something you can’t quite name.
You only have to be willing to let flowers work on you — like the gentle Sanctuary soul-midwives they are.

Flowers Help You Feel — Safely and Serenely

We live in a culture that asks us to numb, rush, explain.

But the magic of flowers, aka Flower Magic, offers another way — a feminine way — to process what’s been held too long.

Here are three ways flowers help you feel your feelings without burning out your system:

1. Through Scent.
Aromas from real, living flowers bypass the rational mind and go straight to the limbic brain, where emotion and memory live. One inhale can ground you faster than a hundred affirmations.

2. Through Beauty.
Their color, form, and fleetingness soften the barriers we’ve built. When we meet beauty without armor, our most honest emotions have room to surface — safely.

3. Through Symbolism.
Each flower holds its own story. Rose for love. Marigold for grief. Violet for truth. These living metaphors let us relate to what we’re feeling — without needing to solve it right away.

This is not indulgence.

It’s sacred maintenance.

It’s a kind of tending that returns you to yourself — gently, gorgeously, in season.

You don’t have to know all the names.
You don’t need a cutting garden or a weekly bouquet subscription. (Though Red Bird does offer these through Florals@RedBirdCo.io.)

You only need to begin noticing.

The scent at the farmer’s market.
The soft invitation of a petal brushing your wrist.
The color that calls to you like an old friend.

Just begin there.

And let the flowers show you what they’ve never forgotten:

Flowers are wild, dear one. And you, beloved, are worthy of wild love.

And speaking of wild beauty — I want to share something blooming behind the scenes here at the farm.

We’ve just planted a 30,000 square foot wildflower meadow — a living sanctuary, full of flowers for cutting, quiet reflection, intimate gatherings, yoga, sacred rest, and feminine return.

(Check out our flower seeding on the tractor here.)

It’s a place I hope to welcome you to.

So if this speaks to something in you — if you feel a flutter of excitement or a longing to walk through that meadow — I’d love to hear from you.

Send me a note with your interest, your joy, your dream of visiting.
There are soft plans taking root — and I would love to include you in the circle being called to this land.

Until then… trust what blooms in you.
And let the flowers keep whispering you home to Sanctuary Within and around you.

Take good care of your precious Self,

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