MIMULUS relates to the soul qualities of Courage and Confidence.

Individuals who are sensitive in their awareness to their surroundings yet use this sensitivity to extend their knowledge and integrate it into relevant and constructive coping responses demonstrate a positive Mimulus style.

Considering always the worst of all possible options to the present reality is a reaction of the negative Mimulus type. Their emotional fragility may be indicated by their inclination to stammer, blush, become hypersensitive to many kinds of things, suffer from weakened or overstrained immune systems, and express fears to almost any form of involvement with the physical world. Whether from a negative personal experience or from cautionary information read or heard, the negative Mimulus person amplifies and projects these past possibilities onto all present and future realities and possibilities. Relevancy and discernment is lost to fear of the uncertain.

Perhaps only 5% of the world population are true Mimulus types. They often become artists, painters, musicians, authors, actors. In the positive expression they may be very gifted in dramatizing a reality into the awareness of the less aware and less sensitive. In the negative Mimulus state, they can become paranoid and subject to deception and manipulation by those who promote frauds, the occult, New Age, and many forms of hysteria. Like canaries to the miners of the past, they detect social injustices and political deceptions long before the larger public yet their often extreme representation of the dangers which are growing often is ignored and treated as fantasy entertainment or extremism. For this reason, many live quietly within their own personal hell.

I am a gifted person who can see opportunities and realities as possibilities before they materialize. Projection of the past unto the future gives me reason to expect that more terrible outcomes will occur unless they can be avoided. Most often, this suggests that my choice of not being involved in the practical, everyday, and interpersonal aspects of life will help safeguard me from the terrors which have and will continue to befall others. As I am stimulated by most changes and presences in the environment, I find it best for me to have a personal space or room in which I can relax alone and in the quiet. By stabilizing my surroundings and minimizing my human contacts, I can best maintain a balance between reality and possibility.

When strong personal beliefs are reversed in reality there is a possible introduction of a negative Mimulus trauma. If one has confidently assumed that one's friends and relatives would always be loyal and supportive yet most of them abandon one when their support is most desired, as in a marital separation or divorce --- any context for lotalty in the future may now fall to doubt. Ability for interpersonal commitment is fractured to avoid the anxiety of constant doubt that others can be trusted.

If one has a job which is highly valued and has been doing it well and been acknowledged by one's manager, yet, the company is sold and this person is now fired to make way for a preferenced employee brought along by the new owner -- all future employment positions may be perceived as unstable and open to loss by betrayal at any time. Ability for employment commitment is fractured to avoid the anxiety of constant fear of loss.

A further example is of a person who has usually been employed and has been materially fortunate yet loses a large income and savings through embezzelment. Now, as a poor person they become friendless. This may leave the victim perpetually fearful and doubtful of advice received indicating a financial opportunity. Ability to utilize the expertise of others to assist one's goal attainments is fractured by the anxiety that nothing is ever as it seems.

These are emotionally painful realities which can happen at any time to anyone. Surviving dramatic emotional losses in the positive will require an awareness that most relationships are NOT built on trust, openness, compassion, empathy, and commitment. Place your confidence and trust where it has been earned and you will be seldom disappointed or betrayed. An acceptance that the insecurities and fears of others often contributes to injustice and manipulation does not prevent one from working to reverse such a dynamic.