Feeding Your Soul, One Stem At A Time with Yvette Timmins

On this week’s episode of The True North Show I am joined by Yvette Timmins, an amazing woman who I have had the pleasure of knowing and working with over the last year. Yvette shares with us the power of nature, and in particular, the energy that flowers have and how they can heal. Even if you have a couple of roses sitting in a small vase by your bed or in your loungeroom can have a dramatic effect on the energy which flows into your soul. Even the colours of the flowers can have different vibrations and effects and I absolutely LOVE the insights she gives us as to the power of a red rose.

Bio:

For Yvette Timmins, flowers are more than just a profession they are a family legacy.

With a Grandmother, Great Aunt, and Great Grandmother who were all florists, it would be easy to say that creativity is in her blood. However, Yvette believes that the art of floristry isn’t a special skill reserved for the chosen few; it is an innate ability available to anyone willing to silence their inner critic and connect with nature.

With over 30 years in the industry, Yvette has truly “done it all”. She has climbed every rung of the ladder, moving from a Casual Assistant to Senior Florist, Shop Manager, and Shop Owner, eventually becoming a Floristry Teacher and the Principal of Bloom College, which she founded in 2013. Her leadership extends to the national stage, where she served as a founding director and board member of Flower Industry Australia.

Beyond the business of blooms, Yvette is a champion for the mental health benefits of creativity, she has witnessed firsthand how working with nature decreases anxiety and nurtures the soul. This passion led her to co-found the charity Floral Acts of Kindness and to write her recently published book, Feed Your Soul with Flowers.

Today, through her online membership and app, Yvette is dedicated to ensuring that geography and physical ability are no longer barriers to learning. She is here to help you grow your business and feed your soul, one stem at a time.

Use this link to purchase the book – Feed Your Soul With Flowers

https://study.bloomcollege.com.au/Feed-Your-Soul-Flowers-Book

Social Media:

Website: https://bloomcollege.com.au/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bloomcollege
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bloomcollege

Transcript:

Megan North (00:34)
Hello and welcome to The True North Show. I’m your host, Megan North, and I’d like to start by thanking the sponsors of the show: Quantum Awakening, Beth Lewis, Anne C. Clarke, and of course our lovely guest, who has kindly supported the show and featured on this episode.

Today I am joined by Yvette Timmins, who believes that flowers are more than just a profession — they’re a family legacy. With a grandmother, great-aunt, and great-grandmother who were also florists, it would be easy to say creativity is in her blood. However, Yvette believes the art of floristry isn’t a special skill reserved for the chosen few. It’s an innate ability available to anyone willing to silence their inner critic and connect with nature.

With over 30 years in the industry, Yvette has done it all. She’s climbed every rung of the ladder, moving from casual assistant to senior florist, shop manager, and shop owner — eventually becoming a floristry teacher and the principal of Bloom College, which she founded in 2013. Her leadership extends to the national stage, where she served as a founding director and board member of Flower Industry Australia.

Beyond the business of blooms, Yvette is a champion for the mental health benefits of creativity. She has witnessed firsthand how working with nature decreases anxiety and nurtures the soul. This passion led her to co-found the charity Floral Acts of Kindness and to write her recently published book, Feed Your Soul with Flowers.

Today, through her online membership and app, Yvette is dedicated to ensuring that geography and physical ability are no longer barriers to learning. She’s here to help you grow your business and feed your soul, one step at a time.

Yvette, welcome to The True North Show. I’m so happy that you’re here today.

Yvette Timmins (02:41)
Thanks for having me, Megan. It’s a privilege to be here. Thank you so much.

Megan North (02:45)
You’re so welcome. From the flower shop floor to leading a national industry and healing hearts along the way, Yvette has learned how petals can create profit and peace. Stay with us — after the break, Yvette will reveal how to feed your soul and grow your business one powerful step at a time.

Megan North (after break)
Welcome back, everybody. I’m here with Yvette Timmins, a third-generation florist who has turned a family legacy into a global classroom for creativity and wellbeing.

Yvette, with everything from owning your own shop to Bloom College and now your online membership, I’d love to start by understanding what the defining moment was that led you to pursue your true passion and purpose.

Yvette Timmins (04:20)
It’s a great question, Megan — and it’s probably not one I can answer as one defining moment. There have been multiple… and there still are times where I’ve doubted whether what I’m doing is my true passion and purpose. I’ve had moments where I’ve thought, “Maybe I should be doing this,” or “Maybe I should be doing that.” Then there are defining moments that lead me back.

A couple really stand out. One was the first time I walked into a classroom to teach on my own. There were beautiful students in front of me, and I had this future vision. It’s not something that happens many times in life, but this one was very defined and prominent. I could see a future. It felt like the universe — or my spirit guides — or something in spirit telling me, “You’re in the right place. This is what you’re meant to be doing.”

And then, prior to that, when I had a breakdown and I was in hospital, I was given a whole lot of flowers. I was riddled with anxiety and depression, and with that comes a lot of guilt — for me, anyway. I felt guilty because I was the only patient I noticed who had flowers, and I had a room full of them.

I was being moved to another area of the hospital where I couldn’t take the flowers, so I gave flowers away. I gave flowers to one woman, and the change in her was so dramatic. The shift was huge — I felt it, she felt it. It really stayed in my mind afterwards.

I thought, “There’s something so much more to flowers.” What they do to us physically, internally, mentally, emotionally — they have a vibration, and they can positively affect our vibration too. I couldn’t have put that into words then, but it was such a physical, visceral moment that I still recall.

Megan North (07:23)
I got really emotional when you were sharing that, because I felt it too. It’s really beautiful.

With your ancestors — your great-grandmother, grandmother, and great-aunt — do you think they understood the power of floristry as well? Did they ever speak to you about it?

Yvette Timmins (07:56)
No — and I didn’t learn floristry from them either. I didn’t even know until later, after I started studying, that they were florists.

The first national floristry competition I ever won, when I was an apprentice, my great-aunt came. She was shocked, because what I made in the moment — and to give context, you’re given a box of flowers and accessories, called a surprise box — you don’t know what’s inside. You can’t plan. You just have to think in the moment and let creativity run.

What I made was what her mother used to make — my great-grandmother, who I never met. My great-aunt was so overwhelmed she left early. She said, “That’s exactly what my mother used to make.” It really was incredible. I’m sure she was there in some form.

Megan North (09:30)
That would give you a different sense of what you were doing — almost like you were channeling your ancestors.

Do different flowers have different vibration and energy? Are they like people in a sense?

Yvette Timmins (09:58)
Yes, absolutely — although the difference is they don’t carry a negative vibration. This is only positive. They don’t have baggage. But they’re really good at cleansing and absorbing ills and carrying that away.

Especially trees. When I’m running, I’ll ask the trees to take my anxiety — absorb it and run with it. Flowers can do the same.

Different flowers and their vibrations affect different parts of our chakra system too. And it’s not just a belief — science has measured vibration. The rose, for example, has been measured as carrying the highest vibration out of anything they can measure — not just flowers. A rose is 320 megahertz.

I use rose energy around the heart chakra. I have meditations for that.

Megan North (11:28)
And can this connect to colour too? Like red flowers helping the base chakra, orange and yellow…?

Yvette Timmins (11:43)
Most definitely. For instance, the sunflower for the solar plexus can give you a boost of pure energy. You can meditate on a sunflower beaming light into that area — the front and back.

And what flower therapy is about is that you don’t physically need the flowers in your presence. You can tap into their vibrational energy without them being there. A facilitator helps guide the process, but it’s a practice that can be learned.

Megan North (12:32)
So even a picture of a rose can connect you to that energy?

Yvette Timmins (13:03)
Most definitely. That’s why meditations work so well — you block everything else out and attract in the energy of that flower into the space where it’s going to do its work.

Megan North (13:21)
And you do flower therapy sessions with clients too?

Yvette Timmins (13:27)
Yes. One of my favourite parts is sensing where energy is needed, where it’s lacking, and where we can add more.

One of the first parts is having someone lay down on a bed of flowers — a vibrational bed of roses feeding into the heart chakra. The roses are often different colours, and people usually understand why those colours were there. Sometimes it doesn’t mean anything to me at first, but they’ll say, “Pink was my mum’s favourite,” or something like that.

Different flowers come in for different people — I don’t always know what will show up.

Megan North (14:36)
My mum loved carnations. My dad would buy her a bunch every week. I love roses, but depending on my mood, I’ll gravitate to carnations because they remind me of them.

Yvette Timmins
That’s so sweet — comfort and nurturing, I would imagine.

Megan North (15:02)
Definitely. And that hospital moment — was that the first time you realised flowers can change how a person feels, not just how a room looks?

Yvette Timmins (15:07)
I feel like it’s been there as early as I can remember. I remember cutting flowers from the garden and bringing them inside.

I also remember my uncle getting married — I might have been eight or ten — and the wedding was in our garden. I was horrified no one had thought to get flowers. I asked mum and dad to drive me to the florist, picked out the flowers, and did the arrangements. I’d never been to a wedding before, but I just knew you needed flowers.

Megan North (17:10)
So when you were in high school, did you think floristry might be your path?

Yvette Timmins (17:25)
Not at all. I went to an all-girls convent school — most of our teachers were nuns. We had work experience in Year 9 or 10, and I had no idea what I wanted to do.

My best friend said, “If you don’t choose something, you’ll be stuck here for two weeks with the nuns.” We workshopped what was closest to home. The bank was closest, but we said no. Next door was the florist, so I said, “Right — florist.”

The first day I walked in, I went home and I knew I loved it. At the end of the two weeks, the owner knocked on our door and asked my mum if I’d like to work part time. It became my after-school and weekend job, and I couldn’t get enough. After Year 12, I went straight into my apprenticeship.

Megan North (18:51)
They must have seen something in you.

Yvette Timmins (19:07)
I owe so much to him, his wife, and the staff. They saw something in me that I didn’t see. They nurtured me and helped me through so much — including when I had my breakdown. If it wasn’t for them, we wouldn’t be talking here today.

Megan North (19:41)
Mental health and wellbeing are clearly important to you. How do you keep that a priority while following your purpose?

Yvette Timmins (20:12)
It’s a constant. When you’ve experienced poor mental health, you understand how necessary it is to preserve and feed it.

For me it’s multiple things: exercise, good sleep, eating well, getting nutrients in, reading, gardening, nurturing plants. Looking after something outside of yourself is important too — pets, children, home, volunteering. But you have to look after yourself first, because you’re no benefit to anyone if you’re not well.

And it evolves. One of the main differences now is I’m more relaxed. In the beginning I had to be strict to form habits. Now they’re non-negotiable because they’re habits — like my morning smoothie, and exercising early.

But I don’t beat myself up if I skip something anymore. I used to do structured meditation — 20 minutes morning and night — but it made me more stressed. Now I have my own meditations, and if I miss a day, I don’t punish myself for it.

Megan North (23:43)
I love that — what works for one person isn’t right for another, and it can change over time.

Megan North (24:32)
I’ve heard gardening has antidepressant benefits — something in the soil?

Yvette Timmins (24:54)
I’ve heard that too. There are books and studies about it, and gardening has been introduced into some prisons in the UK and the US. The data shows reduced recidivism — fewer people go back to jail when they’ve done gardening programs. It’s a rehabilitation process: learning to nurture, to care outside of yourself, and then being better able to care for yourself and others.

There’s also the grounding practice of gardening — and the vibrations from plants too.

Megan North (25:59)
What practices keep you grounded — is it gardening, bare feet on grass?

Yvette Timmins (26:27)
Yes — and being near water too. All elements matter, but water in particular. Getting outside, being in the sun, running, reading, meditating.

And because I work at home, I also have to remember to be around people. I can get too much in my own head. Being around light-hearted people who can also have deep conversations is grounding.

Megan North (27:25)
You’ve mentioned you love reading. What do you read?

Yvette Timmins (27:33)
Mostly personal development. I’m slowly broadening to fiction. I like reading morning and night — morning reading is personal development for “get up and go” energy.

Megan North (28:26)
Does that give you ideas through the day?

Yvette Timmins (28:37)
Yes. I also wake up with an idea sometimes. I like to lie there and listen to the immediate thought — sometimes it’s not a good idea, but sometimes it’s my higher self sharing something I need to act on. Then I read, and often it relates to what dropped in.

Megan North (29:32)
What are you reading at the moment?

Yvette Timmins (29:36)
A book called Ma — about the Japanese art of nothingness. It’s the use of negative space, the void, and how they incorporate it in culture, design, even language. Japanese gardens are planned, but they look natural — asymmetry, space, and pauses.

Megan North (31:03)
The power of the pause.

Yvette Timmins
Exactly.

Megan North (31:09)
Does that influence how you arrange flowers?

Yvette Timmins (31:47)
One of my favourite styles is Ikebana — Japanese floral art. Their ability to use void space — ma — is impeccable. It’s hard. Ikebana is a lifetime study; it’s not something you master. I find it challenging because I like to keep filling and adding. But it’s valuable to learn, and it flows into other areas of life: you don’t have to fill every space.

Megan North (32:59)
Restraint.

Yvette Timmins (33:02)
Yes — exactly.

Megan North (33:09)
Tell us about your book, Feed Your Soul With Flowers. What can people expect?

Yvette Timmins (33:31)
It’s a book about principles I use for good mental health. There are ten principles. Each principle has action points and activities, and then at the end of each section you create a floral arrangement related to that principle.

For instance, one principle is alignment — becoming aligned to who you truly are and what you want to create. You make an arrangement as a physical enactment of that intention: “This is my intention. I’m aligned.” The energy of the flowers helps guide and support that.

We’re never aligned 100% of the time, but it’s a way to engage it and stay aligned as much as possible.

Megan North (35:03)
And you wrote it years ago — you’re revisiting it now?

Yvette Timmins (35:11)
Yes. I wrote it in 2016 and sat on it for a long time. During COVID I finally edited it and released it, but so much has happened since then. I’ve learned more through energy healing courses and flower therapy sessions, and I want to incorporate that into the book now.

Megan North (36:13)
If you put flowers in one room, but you’re working in another, does the energy move through the whole house?

Yvette Timmins (36:39)
Yes — flowers and plants change the energy of a space immediately, and it works through the whole house. But I also move mine. If I’ve got flowers in my office, I’ll take them to my bedside at night. I love waking up and seeing a fresh flower. It supports sleep too — and it’s the first thing you see and smell.

Megan North (37:34)
What’s in the pipeline for you?

Yvette Timmins (37:50)
Two new memberships. The first is Bloomers Club, the flower therapy membership. We meet online and work through seasonal flowers — their vibrations, energies, activities, and meditations. Members also get access to the Feed Your Soul With Flowers course designed from the book, and they receive a copy of the book.

The second is Business Bloomers Club. Members also get flower therapy, plus business coaching for people starting or growing a floristry business. They access the full floristry course — beginner to advanced designs — and business training: how to start a floristry business, marketing, and more, with weekly coaching.

It’s important to nurture yourself as a business owner. If you burn out, you’re no good to anyone. Your business can only grow as much as you do — it’s not just the nuts and bolts.

Megan North (40:32)
Absolutely — especially when you’re starting out and wearing every hat.

Yvette Timmins (40:57)
Exactly. It’s about self-awareness: knowing your strengths and weaknesses. You can learn some skills, or get a basic understanding and then delegate — bookkeeping, marketing, accounting, whatever it is.

Megan North (42:36)
What advice would you give someone exploring their true passion and purpose?

Yvette Timmins (42:53)
Lean into it. Your body doesn’t lie. If you feel pulled towards something, run with it. What’s the worst that can happen? You don’t like it and you stop.

It’s not failure. Failure is not trying — and regretting later that you didn’t. If you feel pulled to do it and others tell you not to, block the naysayers out. At the end of the day, you’ve got to make you happy.

Megan North (44:05)
How has your path evolved over time? What’s shifting for you now?

Yvette Timmins (44:32)
I love variety and change — there are pros and cons. Sometimes I can chase the “new shiny thing” and not give enough focus to consistency.

What’s been really good for me is relearning how to tap into the higher self daily — listening, asking questions, waiting for answers. It’s remembering that the answers are within, and we don’t always need to look externally.

Help from others can remind you — but ultimately the answers come from within.

Megan North (46:20)
What does this year look like for you?

Yvette Timmins (46:36)
Professionally: the memberships and revisiting the book. Personally: I’m getting married and going on a honeymoon — two big focus points.

Megan North (46:57)
Are you doing your own flowers?

Yvette Timmins (47:08)
I did think about it, but your hands get messed up — and I’d like nice manicures.

Megan North (47:16)
What flowers are you drawn to?

Yvette Timmins (47:22)
My favourite colour has always been blue, and I’ve loved blues, greens, and white. I’ve never been big on red… but now, with falling in love and understanding real love as a feeling, I’m so drawn to red. The flowers will be red and pink — a combination I never expected, and I’m loving it.

I’ll have roses, hydrangeas, dahlias, phalaenopsis orchids, and anthuriums.

Megan North (49:33)
That’s so interesting — red roses and love.

Yvette Timmins (49:40)
More recent studies suggest the red rose carries the highest energy. Some beliefs say the energy of God is found in the red rose. The original Damascus rose is very powerful — I ingest it daily and spray it on my body.

Megan North (50:56)
What is one lesson or truth you wish you’d known earlier?

Yvette Timmins (51:04)
That the answers are within. Slow down. Tap in, align, and listen. Quiet the mind. Get into nature — it’s one of the most powerful, easy gateways into your own portal of self-love, acceptance, and growth.

Megan North (51:44)
What a beautiful way to finish. Thank you for bringing your authentic self — there’s so much to reflect on, and you’ve taught me so much.

Yvette Timmins (52:19)
I’ve loved chatting with you, Megan. Thank you.

Megan North (52:21)
Thank you. And I feel the audience will gain a deeper understanding of how flowers can benefit us personally, mentally, and environmentally. Thank you so much.

Yvette Timmins (52:41)
You’re most welcome. Thank you.

Megan North (52:43)
And I’d also like to thank my audience, supporters, and sponsors. I hope you have an amazing rest of the week, and I look forward to seeing you again next week. Thank you so much, Yvette.

Yvette Timmins (52:56)
Thanks, Megan.