Savoring Sweetness: Lemon balm & bees teach us to slow down

“If you truly get in touch with a piece of carrot, you get in touch with the soil, the rain, the sunshine. You get in touch with Mother Earth and eat in such a way, you feel in touch with true life, your roots, and that is meditation. If we chew every morsel of our food in that way we become grateful and when you are grateful, you are happy.” ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

Lemon Balm: The botanical name, Melissa officinalis, is derived from the Greek word Melissa, meaning honeybee. This aromatic perennial in the mint family was used by the beekeepers of the Temple of Artemis to keep the sacred honeybees happy and encourage them to come home.

Sometimes there is nothing to work through and we can just savor the sweetness of life. Watching bumblebees pollinate St John’s Wort was my morning meditation during my month at Fisher’s Cottage in the Scottish Highlands. I drank my Chaga coffee and watched the flying teddy bears move between the bright yellow flowers that provided bounties of pollen. Weighed down with yellow pollen the bumblebees occasionally paused on a flower to rest and run their little claws over their fuzzy heads to clean themselves. I couldn’t get enough of it. It’s this kind of simple sweetness that fills me up, reminding me that I am inextricably connected to the smallest of creatures. I know the statistics— one out of every three bites of food we eat is made possible by pollinators such as birds, bats, butterflies, moths, beetles, small mammals, and especially bees. The buzz of wild bumblebees is the sound of vital land.

Author and Jungian analyst Jean Shinoda Bolen writes that Greeks had two words for time: Chronos and Kairos. Chronos is the time with which we mark our days and Kairos is “timeless time; moments at which the clocks seem to stop; feeding, renewing, more motherly time. It's the time with which we feel one..." Kairos time is the sort of time that lengthens life and stretches days so that we inhabit them fully without the sense that we weren’t really there. Time is a strange thing, a few words from a person we love and moments of pure presence can shape us, and linger through an entire life. 

When I find myself moving too fast, feeling restless, I like to take a bath. I might make a strong infusion of lemon balm and St John’s Wort, combining them for their nervine and uplifting qualities, and pour the brew into the water. Lemon balm’s soothing aroma can help us drift into a slower and more sensual state of being. Soothing, cooling and uplifting lemon balm baths are ideal in the summertime. If the season provides, I place fresh flowers or leaves in the water with me. When I feel the warmth caress me and can relish the subtle sounds and sensations of my hands moving through the water, I know I have dropped in. In slowing down, tastes and sensations are more succulent. I feel the hypnotic procession of clouds across pink, purple and blue skies, the kiss of a warm summer breeze on my skin, the vibration of rain against my window, the hiss of a wick as my candle is lit, and the exquisite detail of a tiny flower. 

I used to launch out of bed in the early morning and feel guilty if I went to sleep at night without having been productive. While I wanted and needed huge swathes of time to just be, I felt guilty admitting it.  It seemed like smiling and saying “I’m good, busy,”  was the right answer when asked how I was. But as I created more balance, more spaciousness, and self-acceptance, good and busy became contradictions.  Even if we consciously unplug, it can take time to come down from the frenetic pace of busyness and our attention (or addiction) to technology. If I’m doing things right, my days are long and slow; sometimes bursting with fullness, but not speeding by with busyness. Of course, crazy days appear whether we intend them to or not, but running around with a lot to do is no longer my measure of time well spent. 

Despite their reputation for being busy, bees forage only when nectar and pollen are at their highest levels. When weather or timing isn't ideal, they remain cozy in the hive, conserving energy that would otherwise be exhausted on nonproductive foraging flights. They stay in their hive when temperatures drop into the fifties, if it might rain, or if there are winds above about 15 miles per hour. On cold days, honeybees gather together, taking turns buzzing their wings to create warmth for each other. 

Like honey bees, a Queen Bee rules the bumblebee colony while devoted male drones serve her by cleaning and guarding the nest. The bulk of the work is performed by the females who go out to pollinate, gather floral food, and produce wax and honey from their bodies to feed the drones, larvae, and Queen. Beekeeper and author Simon Buxton writes that the Queen “carries the destiny of all, and she is a goddess whose life is devoted to selfless service within the dim light of the golden city.”

Of the two species, bumblebees are better pollinators since there are more species of bumblebees, a wider variety in lengths of tongue, and thus, the kinds of flowers they are able to feed from. This flexibility makes them adept at cross-pollination and with their furry bodies, they are more resistant to weather conditions such as cold and rain with an oil that makes them waterproof. And since most bumblebees have larger bodies than honeybees, they are able to carry larger loads. 

Bumblebees nest exclusively in the wild and can often be found in burrows or holes in the ground. When a lady bee finds an abundant flower at a particular time, she will remember her interaction, the time pollination was completed, and visit the flower at the same place and time the following day. A bumblebee will synchronize her behavior with daily floral rhythms; essentially, measuring her time with flowers. If she’s feeling tired, she might rest inside or around flowers to take a well-deserved nap. 

When she returns from a day’s work, she will chew the pollen she has collected and mix it with her saliva to create honey that feeds the queen and the young, developing brood. Around the time a worker bee turns 10 days old, she develops a unique wax-producing gland inside her abdomen that converts the sugar contents of honey into wax that oozes through her small pores to produce tiny flakes on her body. Workers chew these pieces of wax until they become soft and moldable, and then add the chewed wax to the honeycomb construction. And while bumblebees live in nests with up to a few hundred community members, honeybees build hives for tens of thousands. 

Lemon balm’s history is interwoven with the honeybee and spans thousands of years beginning in Ephesus, an ancient Greek city on the coast of Ionia, in present-day Turkey. The city was famed for the Temple of Artemis, noted as one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world, where the bee was the model of ceremonial life. The Greek goddess Artemis and the great Anatolian goddess Cybele were identified together as ‘Artemis of Ephesus,’  a different side of the familiar Goddess of the hunt. While she is pictured amongst animals and as a symbol of protection, the Artemis was worshiped in Ephesus for fertility and wild abundance. In depictions, she wears a cluster of eggs or breasts around her shoulders and chest and her dress is decorated with lions, goats, griffins, bulls, flowers, and of course, bees. 

With a Queen Bee in charge, the driving force is abundance, beauty, and fertility.  In the Temple of Artemis, the Great Goddess was the Queen Bee, and her priestesses were called Melissai.  Many of the bee priestesses functioned as oracles and humming or buzzing like a bee was traditionally used to enter into trance for visioning and vibrational healing. Greek traveler and geographer of the second century AD, Pausanias wrote "all cities worship Artemis of Ephesus, and individuals hold her in honor above all the gods." 

The 3rd century Greek philosopher and mathematician Porphyry of Tyre believed that souls arrived on earth in the form of bees after descending from the Goddess Artemis, and were lured to the material world by the promise of earthly pleasures such as honey. Honey was a symbol of both life and death and used as an offering to the gods. The dual nature quality of honey as nectar and its magical makers, the bees, represented the spiraling cycle of existence. Early amber fossils from the Baltic coast show that bees were making honey and nurturing beauty before any humans arrived on earth. Bee vitality is linked to that of many other species, including our own.

Egyptians used honey in ritual and embalming practices, and many of their medicines combined honey with wine and milk. Honey was utilized for its antibacterial properties that helped heal infected wounds. Ancient Vedic civilization considered honey one of nature's most remarkable gifts to mankind and it was essential in Ayurvedic medicine. According to Ayurvedic texts, honey’s hypnotic qualities help in the treatment of nervousness, anxiety, and insomnia. Practitioners recommend honey for wounds and burns, cardiac pain and palpitation, all imbalances of the lungs, and anemia. Applied daily to the eyes, honey was said to improve sight. Hippocrates prescribed a simple diet, honey given as oxymel (vinegar and honey) for pain, hydromel (water and honey) for thirst, and a mixture of honey, water, and various medicinal substances for acute fevers. Oxymels are still used by herbalists to this day and I often combine herbal vinegar steeped in apple cider vinegar, with honey. Fire cider, a recipe made famous by herbalist, Rosemary Gladstar, is my favorite. 

Arabians are thought to be the first to have introduced lemon balm’s many uses to the European countries.  Like many others after him, the Arab physician Avicenna, (980-1037) said, Lemon Balm “causeth the mind and heart to be merry.”  Not only had lemon balm been a valued part of their Materia Medica for hundreds of years, introduced to them by the Greeks, but was also grown as a valuable herb in trade. Lemon Balm’s use in the Middle Ages is noted by herbalists, writers, philosophers, and scientists. Swiss physician and alchemist, Paracelsus, deemed it the “elixir of life” and Nicholas Culpeper considered lemon balm to be ruled by Jupiter in Cancer, who also suggested that the herb causes the heart to become merry and helps “digestion, to open obstructions of the brain, and to expel melancholy vapors from the heart and arteries.” 

The carminative properties and high essential oil content of lemon balm do wonders to decrease painful spasms, ease nausea and soothe temperamental stomachs. For headaches, the body uses the plant’s vasodilatation properties to ease tension, while fever and flu are cooled by the diaphoretic quality that opens pores and brings down the temperature. Lemon Balm is also a powerful antiviral that can ease nerve pain, help with insomnia, and calm feelings of anxiousness. The leaves are known for their soothing action on the skin, while they tone and increase circulation. The Roman Emperor Charlemagne thought Melissa was so intoxicating that he ordered the herb to be planted in all monasteries, and since monasteries functioned as the early hospitals, it was only a matter of time before the popular plant appeared in a range of medicines; from tonics to liquors, and perfumes. 

Carmelite Water or Eau de Mélisse was a perfume containing aromatic lemon balm that was in high demand to cover the stench of unwashed bodies since bathing and the exposure of naked skin was thought to evoke ‘sinful thoughts.’ Most people of that time were pretty filthy — many of them bathed only once a year, or in some cases, once a lifetime. Needless to say, the demand for sweet-smelling perfume water was high. Carmelite Water also covered the smell of disease, death, and unsanitary living environments and was also used as an internal and external remedy for pretty much everything. 

A Carmelite water recipe published in 1829 in Mackenzie’s 5,000 Receipts reads, “Eau de Mélisse de Carmes: Take of dried balm leaves, 4 oz., dried lemon-peel, 2 do.; nutmegs and coriander seeds, each, 1 oz.; cloves, cinnamon, and dried angelica roots, each, 4 dr.; spirit of wine, 2 lbs.; brandy, 2 ditto. Steep and distil in balneum mariae, re-distil, and keep for some time in a cold cellar.”

Of all our senses, scent can most vividly convey and conjure emotional memories. The scent of gingerbread in the oven, an apple orchard in blossom, our grandmother’s perfume, or a bouquet of lemon balm, can trigger long-forgotten events and experiences. When we pick up a scent, our olfactory neurons generate an impulse and pass it along the olfactory nerve to the olfactory bulb in the brain, which processes the signal and then relays information to the limbic system an area within our brains that includes the hippocampus and supports our emotional responses, behavior, our long-term memory, and the perception of smells. Tastes also conjure body memory since taste and smell work together to create our experience of flavor. British writer and gardener John Evelyn described lemon balm as, “sovereign for the brain, strengthening the memory, and powerfully chasing away melancholy.” Since the olfactory bulb that helps us smell, and the hippocampus that helps us learn can and does rejuvenate throughout our lives, lemon balm is used in aromatherapy treatment for Alzheimer's disease and dementia.

To forage successfully, hummingbirds and bees, must learn and remember not only the color and shape of flowers that contain nectar and pollen but also how to get to them. Since the species of flowers that are in bloom in the morning might be replaced by a different species in bloom in a different location in the afternoon, they have evolved to memorize local features and routes, as well as the time the flowers blossom. Hummingbirds know every flower in their territory, which is vast, and know where each and every hummingbird feeder is along their migration path. And while plastic bowls of sugar water might be well-intentioned, they don’t contribute to the cycle of life and offer no nutrition for the hummingbirds; it is the equivalent of giving them a candy bar. It might give them a burst of energy, but we are all much better off planting and offering them native flowers with vital, life-giving nectar instead. When we plant flowers that attract hummingbirds and other pollinators instead of offering them plastic bowls of sugar water, we add more beauty, calm, and healing to the world.

Imagine if we measured intelligence by how well we knew the location of and behavior of every flower; navigating the world through landmarks of wild beauty. What an intoxicating world that would be.

If it’s a beautiful day and flowers are particularly rich with nectar, or if there is a lot of pollen ripe for collection, honeybees may take advantage of the bounty and go back to the hive to recruit. A returning honeybee performs a figure-eight dance to tell workmates where good supplies of pollen can be found. This performance excites unoccupied workers and inspires them to leave the nest and pollinate flowers marked with the scent of the dancing bee. This is a boon for their colony and honey production but it can actually be a disadvantage in terms of pollination. Whereas honeybees will rush off to mine a certain pollen source, bumblebees will stay around, patiently working an extended area until it is fully pollinated. While both produce honey, bumblebees don’t produce a surplus of honey the way honeybees do. They harvest just enough to feed and care for themselves and their extended families. 

Bumblebees help pollinate many of our wildflowers, helping them to reproduce and without this pollination, the abundance of many of these plants would decline. As bumblebees only feed on flowers, they need far more plants than equivalent species who are also able to eat leaves or roots. It has been estimated that a stomach full of honey will give a bumblebee about 40 minutes of flying time, so they need to forage regularly to survive. But without the energy in nectar, a bumblebee cannot fly, and if she cannot fly to reach flowers to get nectar, she will die. Thus, their population is dwindling due to habitat fragmentation, among other things; they are suffering from a lack of natural, uninterrupted beauty.

Although worker bees only live for about six weeks, they spend their lives performing tasks for the survival of their colony, and in turn, their species. After a bountiful spring, summer, and early autumn, an entire bumblebee colony dies except for the regal Queen. She hibernates underground and rests, often blanketed by autumn leaves before she emerges to set up her new colony in spring. She needs early forage sources in order to fuel and provide food for her first brood of offspring. We can help her by ensuring early and late blossoms and leaving our yards, parks, or outdoor spaces a little more wild for nesting sites. If just one queen dies, an entire potential colony will be lost. 

A hummingbird, bee, and butterfly's life may be fleeting, but we all measure time differently. These small creatures are always seeking the sweetest nectar; reminding us to seek out and find beauty in each day. When we slow down enough to notice the intricate patterns on butterfly wings, the seductive scent and velvet-like petals of wild rose, the true beauty of so-called weeds, and engage all of our senses— touch, taste, smell, sight, sound— we drop into Kairos time; timeless time. Like the brilliant hummingbird and the royal bee, we can choose to remember the location of each flower and the sources of life’s sacred nectar. Not the sugar substitutes, but the flowers in full bloom.