How to Talk to a Tree

Many people yearn to commune with trees and their spiritual essence, but most believe this is not possible. However...communing with tree spirits is part of our human heritage: we just need to recapture an ability that we have lost over many generations of living in cities and gradually growing apart from the natural world. 

 ~Nathaniel Altman, Sacred Trees: Spirituality, Wisdom & Well-Being (Sterling Publishing, 2000)

So, just how do you go about talking to a tree?

Different people have different ideas. Over at Beliefnet, Valerie Reiss, expanding a list created by Mara Freeman, advises that you begin by noting how you feel as you walk among trees. Find a tree that resonates with you, and approach it, feeling its energy with your hands. Ask the tree's permission to spend some time with it. Sit beneath the tree and see what thoughts come to you. Allow the tree to take you into a state of meditation. Ask it questions, waiting for a response. When you're done, thank the tree.

Reiss writes about the kind of experience she's had using this method:

I had a mind-blowing semi-mystical experience hugging a crab-apple tree - I was able to connect to it and sense its power as a growing, living being.

I didn't hear it speak in words, but I did feel its wisdom resonate in me as a cleansing, rooted power - the tree seemed to be reminding me that I was just as whole and holy as it - no less pure, no more essentially complicated. What I also humbly realized was that trees, like every other being on the planet, like to be loved, noticed, given energy.

Over at Bookmice, Darkchilde recommends offering tobacco, using sage to smudge yourself, and deciding ahead of time what you want to ask the tree. "As with other forms of communication with beings other than humans, the information you receive may be in the form of visions, images, smells, tastes, colors, or almost anything else. Keep your ears open, too, for any sounds of particular birds or other animals that might be nearby."

Finally, Nathaniel Altman advises entering the realm of trees in a calm, aligned state. Enter the tree's energy field with a sense of respect. And above all, keep an open mind about what is about to happen. Altman writes:

Some of us may have preconceived mental images of what we would like to happen, or what we think will happen, or what we have time for when we are about to work with nature beings; in other words, we want to have mental control over our experience. 

One of the first things you'll learn about trees, however, is that they are full of surprises. It's important to stay open to what the tree wants to tell you or share with you. Altman also recommends an offering of tobacco. If you like, you can invoke the tree's spirit by saying or thinking that you come in the spirit of oneness. Altman suggests that you work to ground yourself, getting in touch with the earth, either through your feet or by sitting down on it. In my experience, once you enter the tree's zone, it will ground you in a much more hardcore way than you can probably ground yourself. Trees view us as very unrooted, and think this is a fault that requires immediate correction.

I wanted to start with these suggestions by other people because the method I've developed might not work for you, and it's important to devise a ritual and method that feels right.

In any case, here's how I recommend that people do it:

1. Choose a tree that you feel comfortable approaching. If you actively like the tree, things will go better.

2. Feel your way into the tree's energy field, using the palms of your hands and your whole body to sense the tree's power. You might feel a tingling, a sense that the air is thicker around the tree, or a vibration - a quality commonly expressed by larger, older trees.

3. While we're on the topic, older trees are more likely to be able to help you out that younger trees. Older trees in my experience have more connection with collective memories of the time when humans weren't so disconnected from the world of plants, and will try to help you reconnect with that world in quite profound ways.

4. I started out going into each interaction with a tree by offering energy healing. I am more and more convinced that the energy connection you make with a practice like reiki serves as a conduit for communication with the tree rather than an offering per se. Most trees have a much more powerful healing capacity than what humans can draw through our relatively small bodies. The most important offering you can make is your willingness to show up, commune with a tree, and learn. I do still offer reiki each time I connect with a tree, though, so this is speculation.

5. I prefer to hold my hands a couple of inches above the surface of the trunk, and face the tree (as in tree-hugging mode). Sometimes I lean against the tree, and occasionally I've been led to rest my forehead against the tree. I think a face-to-trunk connection is more powerful than when you turn your back to the tree. You wouldn't turn your back on a person you were talking to - so why turn your back on a tree?

6. Say hello. It would be weird to enter into conversation with anyone without saying "hi" first - I know, we're talking to trees, which is fundamentally weird by many measures, but there's no call for serious breaches in etiquette.

7. Feel any physical sensations as you connect with the tree. The first thing that a tree will do for you is correct your energy. As noted above, trees think we are terribly unrooted, and that we often fail to connect with the energies of the sun, as well. On an energetic level, we are supposed to work the same way as trees do: drawing energy from the earth, up through our feet, and drawing light from the sun through our eyes, and solar energy down through the crown of our heads. If you feel like your feet are sinking into the earth as you commune with a tree, or you find yourself standing up a little straighter, this is the tree correcting your energy flow for you. That's the primary form of tree communication. If that's all you get out of a session of tree talking, that's pretty good.

8. Open your mind's eye, as well as your mind's ear (not to mention your mind's touch, taste and smell). Chances are you won't experience any communication as actual sounds or visual effects that you see with your eyes. But you know how when you imagine something, you get a distinct visual image in your mind's eye? Or when you're processing something verbal, like a conversation you plan to have, you experience the words playing out in your mind? That's what you're looking for in communing with a tree: thoughts and images that don't come from you, but from the tree.

9. How do you know you're not making it up? Well, this requires practice. I've been told things by trees that I would never have thought of - and I've got a huge imagination. Start by asking questions with distinct, yes / no answers, and wait and see what happens. My friend Rita asked her tomato plants last year if they wanted to be pinched back, since popular wisdom states that this is what tomato plants need. When she asked, she added that she needed the answer to be very clear, because otherwise she wouldn't get it. Resonating in the air all around her, and in her head, she got back a very distinct "NOOOO!!!" Needless to say, there is no tomato plant pinching in her yard! If you make it clear that you want the answer, it will get through to you.

10. Have a conversation. Trees are intelligent beings. I don't mean that in an abstract way at all. They are capable of sophisticated exchanges about energy, our place in the world, the way plants communicate, human / tree bonding, earth changes, human potential, astral travel and our relationship with Mother Earth. Many of them want to teach us. After all, they have a huge investment in building a better relationship with us. All of our lives depend on it.

11. Enjoy your physical, emotional and spiritual experiences among trees. I've found that my time in the woods has only become more joyous, more profound and more filled with love the more I've talked to trees, from the wise oak to the stalwart white pine, and all points in between.