Olive Harvest; A Journey of Healing, Connection and Vitality
May 2026 | by Kate Mead
In October 2024 I moved to a very quirky house and 1.5 hectares of amazing, fertile and abundant land in the area of the Sierra De Gredos, Spain. That first November I watched the olives ripen and eventually fall to the ground as I simply did not have the time to harvest with everything else that needed my attention. The harvest was beautiful and I felt sad that all the fruit ended up on the ground, as sadly we see with many harvests here now in Spain. People do not have the time or the willingness to work the land as before. There are very little if any financial profits for small scale harvests such as fig, olive, oranges etc, in fact it usually costs to collect the harvests in terms of equipment, processing and work force.
Over the winter I settled into my new home and began to observe the land in the changing of the seasons. By mid May I witnessed the most plentiful olive blossom season I had ever seen. The pollen swirled in the air, covering everything with a delicate yellow dusting. The trees were heavy with blossoms and the ground was covered in fallen blossoms for weeks. I scooped up bucket loads from the terrace to add to the compost on an almost daily basis. This year was going to be an abundant olive harvest. My friends and I started to get excited about collecting the olives in the autumn and producing our very own organic virgin olive oil.
Over the summer we watched the olives grow and the trees become heavy with fruit. We started to plan for the harvest, buying olive nets and asking the locals about the harvest, processing and considerations. Many years ago, whilst travelling I had worked on the olive harvest on Crete and remembered some of the tricks and techniques and also how physical the work was and wondered over 30 years later how I would fare with the physical demands of the harvest!.
When working with nature and natural crops, you soon realise that nature's schedule is the one that needs to be respected and honoured, the harvest was not going to fit around our work schedules. As the time came closer we watched the weather closely. If it rained heavily after months of no rain, we would have to wait for the trees to convert the water into oil and without rain the olives would begin to shrivel and lose oil content. The weather was kind to us and we had a little rain just at the right time and a window of three dry days opened up at the only time myself and 3 friends had time to collect the harvest.
We were all pretty tired and exhausted from the heat of the summer, work and many other commitments, but we decided to go for it and work the land for a few days. I almost called it off as I just didn’t feel I had the time or energy, to be honest I was feeling pretty fatigued. I was thrilled and interested to notice that as soon as we began work on the harvest, our energy picked up and we were able to work physically hard for 8 plus hours a day, all with a song, laugh and smile on our faces. We worked in the traditional way, putting nets under the trees and hitting the olives from the trees with sticks found on the land. We watched the olive piles grow from each tree that we harvested. Working together in the autumn sun, cleaning the olives from leaves and branches and laying the olives out on the nets so that they would not spoil in the days that it would take us to complete the harvest, we all felt energetic and abundant, we were thoroughly enjoying life. After 2 and a half days of work we had 700kg of olives bagged and ready to take to the mill.
Taking the olives to be processed was an amazing experience, we emptied our olives into the start point for processing and we were given a tour of the process, so we were able to watch the entire process of turning the fruit into oil. I must admit when the first trickle of bright, vibrant greenish olive oil came from the press, along with a huge smile, I also had a tear in my eye. We ended up with 77 litres of our organic, cold pressed olive oil.
The entire process was magical, the work was hard physically, but we didn’t really feel it, we felt energised and connected. Working with the land and its bounty helped us all to feel more deeply rooted and in harmony with this small but precious piece of land. I began to be interested in the healing properties of the Olive tree as the change in our energy was pretty miraculous.
I have for many years been a fan of using Olive Leaf tincture to boost the immune system and I would take it at the change of seasons, especially Autumn to winter when working in London and commuting on the tube and swore that it helped keep my immune system stronger. In terms of Homeopathic remedies, we only have a very small remedy picture for Olive Oil and it was not a remedy that I had ever prescribed in 20 plus years of practice, so it was with interest that I looked into the Bach flower remedy, Olive. The Bach flower remedy is made with the blossoms and not the fruit or oil, but the correlation to how we all felt and the healing properties of the Bach flower remedy were striking. Tony Pinkus at Ainsworths who makes and runs courses on the Bach flower remedies, provided me with more information and insight into the flower essence, Olive. You can find details of the Bach flower remedy courses on the Ainsworth website www.ainsworths.com.
Olive Bach Flower Remedy addresses deep exhaustion and fatigue following prolonged physical, mental, or emotional effort. It is one of the 38 original Bach flower essences developed by Dr. Edward Bach in the 1930s.
Core Themes (Negative States It Helps Transform)
Olive is indicated when someone feels completely drained of all reserves of strength — both mentally and physically after a sustained period of strain. Key indications include:
- Total exhaustion after effort: This could stem from hard physical or mental labour, caregiving, long-term illness, overwork, or any extended struggle. Daily life feels like an overwhelming burden with no pleasure left in it.
- No energy left to continue: The person feels weary to the point of having “no more strength to make any effort.” Even simple tasks seem impossible or joyless.
- Post-illness or convalescence fatigue: It is especially useful during recovery from prolonged sickness or intense life challenges where vitality has been depleted.
- Distinction from similar remedies: Unlike Hornbeam (which is for the anticipatory “I can’t face it” tiredness before an effort begins), Olive is for the deep depletion after the effort has already been made.
Positive Potential (What Olive Restores)
When taken, Olive helps shift the person toward:
- Renewed strength, vitality, and energy reserves
- Restored interest in life and a sense of pleasure in daily activities
- The ability either to feel genuinely energised again or to rest deeply and properly
- A return of inner faith and resilience to continue (or to recover fully)
Dr. Bach’s own description (from The Twelve Healers and Other Remedies):
“Those who have suffered much mentally or physically and are so exhausted and weary that they feel they have no more strength to make any effort. Daily life is hard work for them, without pleasure.”
In short, Olive is the remedy for when your tank is not just empty, but you’ve been running on fumes for so long that even refuelling feels impossible. It gently restores the deep well of life force so you can once again engage with the world with renewed vigour. It belongs to Bach’s “Insufficient Interest in Present Circumstances” group of remedies.
On my land I have one ‘wild’ (non cultivated) olive tree. It is from the wild olive that the leaves are used to make olive leaf tincture. The much smaller olives from this tree are also known to improve the taste and quality of the olive oil, so during the harvest we paid special attention to this tree and collected as many of the precious little olives as we could. This summer I will also be making olive leaf tincture from this wild tree.
Olive Leaf Tincture
Olive leaf tincture is an alcohol-based herbal extract made from the leaves of the olive tree. It concentrates key bioactive compounds, primarily the polyphenol oleuropein (along with hydroxytyrosol, oleacein, and other phenolics). Unlike olive oil or fruit, the leaves are especially rich in these compounds. Tinctures are prepared by macerating fresh or dried leaves in alcohol.
The olive tree originated in the Mediterranean Basin, with cultivation dating back over 6,000 years . Olive leaves have been used medicinally far longer than the fruit or oil.
- Ancient Egypt: Considered it a “heavenly power.” Leaves were chewed for medicinal effects or used in embalming oils.
- Ancient Greece, Rome, and Mediterranean cultures: Leaves in poultices, decoctions, or infusions treated fever, infections, wounds, rashes, liver issues, high blood pressure, and anxiety. They were also symbolic of peace and used in rituals.
- Traditional folk medicine: Decoctions or tinctures addressed bacterial, fungal, and viral infections, diarrhea, respiratory/urinary tract issues, stomach problems, diabetes symptoms, hypertension, and malaria. In Italy, olive leaf tincture was specifically taken orally to reduce fever. In Greece, hot-water extracts targeted high blood pressure; other regions used them for toothaches, coughs, and inflammation.
Healing Properties.
Olive leaf tincture’s effects are attributed mainly to oleuropein and related polyphenols, which act as potent antioxidants, anti-inflammatories, and antimicrobials.
- Antioxidant & anti-inflammatory — Oleuropein and hydroxytyrosol scavenge free radicals and reduce pro-inflammatory cytokines. May help with oxidative stress and chronic inflammation linked to aging or infections.
- Cardiovascular support — Some human trials show modest reductions in blood pressure (systolic/diastolic) and improvements in cholesterol profiles. Animal studies suggest cardioprotective effects in hypertension, heart failure, and atherosclerosis.
- Blood sugar & metabolic support — May improve insulin secretion and glucose regulation in animal and some human studies; traditional use for diabetes.
- Immune & antimicrobial — Traditional use for colds, flu, herpes, and other infections. Lab evidence shows antiviral, antibacterial, and antifungal activity (e.g., against herpes virus replication).
We all look forward to working with the olive harvest this year and enjoying the vigour and fruits of our labour.