Article: Working with Plant Spirits
By Maria Owl Gutierrez
Photos also by Maria
WaccoBB.net
THE INVITATION
When I was nineteen, I worked at an organic nursery for a little while. I was just beginning my path as a spiritual seeker, and I was preparing to go on my first wilderness fast to Death Valley in California. During this time, I had a “power dream”. One of those dreams one wakes up from tingling, not knowing which reality is more real – the dream or the waking world. In the dream I was sitting on a four-poster bed inside of a cave deep in the Earth. I looked at the brass foot-rail and saw a mother Western Bluebird casually standing there talking to two of her babies, also standing on the brass railing. For some reason, I could hear what she was saying clearly in English, though her beak wasn’t moving and there was no audible sound. I became elated, thinking that, after wishing it for so long, I finally had accomplished the gift of being able to hear the language of animals. The mother bluebird then looked at me directly and telepathically said, “Of course you can hear us. You’ve always been able to hear us. We love you. We’ve always loved you.” Suddenly she was sitting in front of me, a human-sized bluebird and we hugged. And then, as is the way with dreams, she turned into a green gourd growing like a flower out of a teracotta pot. The gourd telepathed, “We love you. We’ve always loved you.” Then it too became human-sized and I hugged it. Within the hugs I shared with these beings was a feeling of familiarity, of family. When I woke, I realized that this was a special dream, a power dream, and I wrote it down before heading off to work at the nursery. I arrived at work around 8:00am. The doors were open, as a co-worker had arrived before me. I noticed immediately that we’d received a new spindle full of seed packages. They were from a new company and so placed where all would notice, by the check-out counter. Me, being a huge fan of seeds, went directly to the spindle to gaze at the beautiful pictures on the seed packages. And to my surprise and shock, directly at eye level, the first seed package I saw was for the Birdhouse Gourd. The image was of a Western Bluebird sitting in front of a gourd the same shape as the gourd in my dream. My jaw dropped. Later I would paint a watercolor of a bluebird sitting in front of a the green gourd of my dream.
I bought the packet of gourd seeds and still have it today on my altar, twenty years later. Last week, while I was co-leading a wilderness quest for Naropa University students with my dear friend Tina Fields, the director of the Ecopsychology program, I shared my bluebird/gourd dream with her. When she found out I still had the seeds she said with enthusiam, “Plant the gourd seeds and make a rattle from one of the gourds. Use this rattle in your Plant Spirit classes for journeying!” Well, why hadn’t I thought of that? Perhaps I’ll paint a bluebird image onto the rattle.
When I look back at that dream today, the feeling of love for my other-than-human relatives swells in my heart. They knew, before I knew, that talking with plant and animal spirits and guides would be at the heart of my work in the future.
To live a life embedded in the deep spiraling root systems of Plant consciousness is to know where you came from and what keeps you alive. To have the humility to bow down in reverence to a tiny seed, is to show you undertand the order of things. As Martín Prechtel writes in his most recent book The Unlikely Peace at Cuchumaquic, “In the original seed way of the old-time Tzutujil (Mayan) village, my work as a shaman and village official was my small part of “keeping the seeds alive,” and it was not a lonely thing. I was simply one of many like myself. But it was respected and honorable, for the magic we maintained was a vital component of the great organic engine of the heart of that Grand Female being upon whose generous breasts everyone knew they were sustained.” (p. 189)
The plants remind us every day that our own lives are also subject to the laws of nature. Strangely enough, we humans can forget at times we’re mortal or we get preoccupied with denying our natural aging process. We tend to forget that the great cycle of life-death-rebirth governs not only our physical experience, but also the growth cycle of our intentions, such as the seeds of thought or belief we plant through our words, which have the power to grow inside of others to help or hinder them.
Earlier this Spring I was guiding a small group of women and men in connecting to the plant spirits on Mt. Tamalpais, a mountain sacred to the original people of that coastal California land. As we sat in circle in a grassy meadow surrounded by forest, we took a moment to acknowledge a full grown Douglas Fir tree growing nearby, whose branches seemed to be reaching out to us. After about ten minutes in silence visually regarding the tree’s presence, we closed our eyes and as I rattled, we silently introduced ourselves to the tree, said why we’d come, then opened up to communications from the tree. I always encourage my students to open to communication from nature beings in whatever way it comes. Often we humans translate “communication” as meaning through a verbal language with words spoken or heard. I have found that plants and trees will communicate through feelings, sparking memories within us, or energy sensations. Even smell. Everyone in this group came out of the conversation-meditation with stories of a special tree from childhood. It makes me smile to remember this, because no other group since has had this experience. It seems that on that particular day, with that particular group, that Fir tree wanted to remind us of how important and strong our connection to a tree-friend was when we were children.
“With plants, you must “talk to them like human beings,” as the Winnebago Crashing Thunder’s father said so long ago. “Then,” he said, “most certainly will these plants do for you what you ask.” This respect for your elders is essential, and the information flow that will come from them to you will contain all that you wish to know.” (Stephen Buhner, The Secret Teachings of Plants, p.157)
As children, we didn’t have to think about this way of “talking to them like human beings.” We would just climb a tree and start telling it our problems: how hard things were at home, at school or with a friend. My friend Tina, the same one who told me to make a rattle from the gourd seeds, tells a story of one such moment in her childhood when she, craddled high in the branches of a favorite tree, confided her grief and to her shock, the tree talked back! Loud and clear! And gave her information that she, at ten, had no way of confirming. It wasn’t until later, through research, that she was able to confirm the information and realize how accurate and timely it was.
“You only have to love them, to feel the touch of their communications on your heart, and send out your deep request in turn. They will respond to you if you ask, for that is what plants are meant to do.” (Bruhner, p.158)
Somewhere down the line, through our mainstream education, we forgot about the importance of our connection with plants. We forgot about communicating respectfully. Even if we pursued study in Botany or Horticulture, we were trained to see plants as non-conscious life, to study their constituents for our own use. We became violators and perpetrators of the “Grand Female being upon whose generous breasts [we were] sustained.”
HOW TO RECONNECT TO OUR PLANT RELATIVES
I have led a class over the past year called Plant Spirit Medicine Training: Restoring Balance. The whole purpose of this class is to invite people to participate actively in healing the relationship between plants and humans. The day-long training is essentially a day-long ritual. I tell my students, “If you were sincerely wanting to restore a severed relationship with an old friend, how would you go about it? You’d likely bring a peace offering, a gift. You’d explain where you went astray and be accountable for your part. You’d ask forgiveness and state your intentions to show up as a better friend.” And so, this is how we approach the plants. Although on a greater level, there is a knowing that we are all One. That in the idea of restoring balance with plants we are actually restoring balance with the regenerative and wild within ourselves. Sometimes it’s easier for people to focus apologetic prayers onto innocent beings in nature, rather than their own hearts. But whether the inner-healing comes indirectly or directly, we will receive the healing if we are sincerely asking. As I stand in ritual with my students, the fact that nature doesn’t really need an apology, is unspoken. Most of us are aware that unless we cease our damaging behaviors, the suffering in nature and in ourselves will continue. But how else do we, as humans, learn humility at the depth that we need, to really shift our consciousness, except by stepping free of distractions and feelng our sincere desire for healing? Ritual is one modality that gives us a space to do this.
“Ceremony may be self-derived, it may come from vision, it may be given by a teacher, it may be cultural. But from all sources it has the same underlying root. It is a process in which the human capacity for sacred feeling and reverence is given form and expression. One tells the Earth, one tells Creator, what is felt and thought through specific actions and movements and intentions. This underlying intention held within the ceremonialist is given outward expression in ceremonial form. And in the process humans, the spirit world, the different elements of Earth are bound together in a living fabric that is alive, vital, and new.” (Bruhner, Sacred Plant Medicine, p. 104)
We bring offerings of food, tobacco, cornmeal, songs and poetry. We create a communal shrine outside in nature, one that can be dismantled in respectful “leave no trace” fashion. We call in the seven sacred directions to open the portal between the dimensions of our waking reality and the realm of nature spirits. We then “lay a feast of love and appreciation” for the plant relatives. We call out their names, the ones dear to us, who we’ve had unique or intimate relationship with. “Yarrow. Elder. Dandelion. Nettles. Indian Warrior.” We give thanks to our Ancestors who knew the plants. We give thanks to the Ancestors of the land where we stand, who knew right relationship with these plants and their plant ancestors. And we humbly and sincerely ask for assistance in remembering the ancient knowledge of our Ancestors that we too may be in right relationship with our plant and nature relatives.
Every Plant Spirit Medicine class I’ve led with the purpose of healing our relationship with the plant people has brought tears to the eyes of my students. The tears arise not only from the pain of having been severed for so long, but also from unexpected hidden wounds that need healing. It’s as if the moment the plants know we’re present and open, they begin to heal us. They begin to balance us energetically and emotionally. They seems to know exactly how to help us. When did we lose faith in this kind of elder teacher, who holds such power and intelligence?
“It has long been known among indigenous cultures that when people forget their place in the web of life without periodically renewing connection with the sacred, illness and disharmony follows.” (Bruhner, p. 104)
In my home, I have an altar to Plants combined with my Ancestor Shrine. On this altar I have a bowl within which are the dried plant parts – leaves, flowers and roots, from many of my personal plant allies. I frequently sing to them, spend time meditating with them or just sit and talk with them. I have a separate area on the altar for seeds, which are arranged in a mandala representing the sacred Web of Life. The seeds I pay special care to, because they are the babies, and also because they are quite literally the future of life on Earth. Earlier in this article I mentioned how seeds remind us of our own power and surrender to and within the cycles of life-death-rebirth. When I sit with my seeds I ask myself, what seeds did I plant yesterday with my words, behaviors, and energy? What seeds will I plant today?
For me, my Plant Spirit and Seed altar is connected to my Ancestor shrine because I can’t seem to perceive of the two as separate. I am alive today because of the seeds my Ancestors planted, the plants they ingested, and the sex they had to create human seeds of future generations. I know for a fact my indigenous ancestors from Mexico lived in harmony with the plant people. They understood that the people are the plants and they can’t be divided. So on my altar I have Mayan red beans and blue corn inside of a Mayan woven pouch gifted to me by two Mayan elders in thanks for an article I wrote about their struggle against Monsanto corportation. I also placed dried herbs before a picture of my bisabuela, great-grandmother, Rafaela Ramirez De La Cruz, who is Indian and practiced herbalism to the end of her life. I have less proof of herbalists on my Mother’s side, who are from Scotland, Holland and England, yet, it wouldn’t surprise me. I’ve had a recurring vision for over ten years of a female ancestor who ended her days as a hermit healer and midwife living on the shores of a Scottish highland loch. In any case, for me, Plant Spirits and working with plants to heal, go hand and hand with working with my ancestors.
I encourage anyone desiring deeper connection with Plant Spirits to begin with a simple altar. Think about what plants are special to you. What flowers are you drawn to and why? What is the emotion you feel when you hold these plants, flowers or seeds? Perhaps the gift they are offering is to bring balance to you through emotional healing? Another way to know the plants better is to go out to them in their own territory, rather than a domesticated setting. Sit with them in their turf and witness their community and ecosystem. The medicine offered by these wild relatives is more potent than their domesticated or hybridized cousins. Often, these wild ones will sing to you, if you show the appropriate respect and patience! Drawing the plants is a beautiful practice to deepen connection as well. This elicits presence and clear witnessing. And of course, you can just talk to them wherever you are. Introduce yourself, feel your appreciation pouring from your heart like water, to nourish the plants near you. Then perhaps venture to ask a question and stay open to whatever way the plant responds! You may be surprised by how readily the plants join you in conversation. If they don’t come quickly, keep showing up on your end; they will eventually see that you are sincere and they will start giving up their blessings. It’s not always due to plant resistance that communication is slow, though. It could be that we are rusty at this type of thing, after all that mainstream training. Be compassionate and patient with yourself as well. Keep showing up for yourself as well. Remember, you are reclaiming an acient birthright that was taken from you without your knowing it. It may take time to build this muscle of interspecies communication. But be assured, with practice, as with everything, this muscle will grow, just as the seed sprouts, puts down roots and one day bursts forth with flower and fruit.
Maria Owl Gutierrez has been in service to her community as a ceremonial leader, counselor and healer for 15 years. Her work is deeply rooted in indigenous wisdoms and ecopsychology. She has a M.A. in counseling psychology and is also a trained herbalist and practitioner of hypnotherapy and energy medicine. She served on the faculty at New College of California in the concentration of Consciousness, Healing & Ecology from 2004 - 07. She has been a guest instructor at Dominican and Naropa Universities, as well as presented at Center for Spiritual Living and Unity Church. Maria is the founder and director of Ancient Path Vision Quests and The 13 Moon Women’s Initiation and currently has a spiritual counseling and healing practice in Sonoma County, CA. Her website is:www.mariaowl.com
