A Simple Tree Meditation for the Middle of Summer

Oooops....was what I said to myself when I took a look at the date of my last post. It's been a while! Suffice it to say that I've been out in the woods. I hope you all have, too.

We've just passed Lammas, the "feast of first fruits" in the pagan calendar. The gorgeous black raspberries that were so abundant and delicious this year are on their way out here in Southern Ontario. We're just starting to benefit from the beautiful peaches and gorgeous yellow plums grown in the Niagara region. Now that solstice and the intense heat of July have passed, we're beginning the long, slow slide into cooler weather.

Source

The trees are reaching the height of their activity for the summer. They are fully present in their physical forms, and busy with the activity of drawing energies from the earth and the sun in order to foster growth. If you have never talked with a tree, or communed with the woods, now is an excellent and relatively easy time to begin.

Today when I was out in the woods, I spoke with Brother Oak, my favourite tree and the one I go to when I want an immediate answer to a question. I asked him what he thought would be the best information for me to pass on to people today. He showed me a simple meditation you can do with a tree in order to connect with the energies of the season.

If you already have a go-to tree that you like to connect with, then ask that tree to help you with the meditation. If you don't have a go-to tree, then wander through a wooded area until you find a tree that grabs your attention or that you feel attracted to. (If you find yourself tripping over a root or getting your shirt or hair snagged on a low-hanging branch, it could be that you've met your tree.) This meditation is best done with an older tree.

Needless to say, this is not the only way to commune with a tree right now. They have lots to say and want to help you with whatever questions or energies you bring to them. However, if you're at a loss in terms of what to do with a tree that wants to talk to you, this is an excellent way to begin and can help you feel really great.

This meditation is best done standing with your body facing the tree. Stand with your spine straight and your feet flat on the ground (or as flat as possible if the tree has lots of big roots). Acknowledge the tree in your mind and allow any imagery or words that might come to you.

Shift your awareness down to your feet. Allow your feet to spread out and relax. (Energy does not flow through tension.) Imagine the tree's roots spreading down into the earth. Ask the tree to show you how deeply he or she draws energy. Ask him or her to drop you down into the earth's core, where these energies originate. Note that, depending on your talents and proclivities, you are more likely to feel your way into this energy than to see it unfolding in your mind's eye. Feel yourself connect with the earth's core, and feel any warmth, tingling, or sensations that bounce back up at you and into you. Don't force the energy. Just allow the tree to help you feel what she or he feels.

Once you're comfortable with this, ask the tree to show you what it feels like to draw the energies of the sun down through his or her leaves. Relax your head and face completely, and make sure that your spine is straight so you can receive these energies. Feel the activity of the leaves as they receive the energies of the heavens. Allow those energies to pour down on you and through you.

Once you're comfortable with the two energies, focus on relaxing and opening your insides, especially throughout your chest and belly. Allow the energies to mingle and move freely. Note any sensations that follow.

We are open to the twin energies of the earth and sun all the time, but this meditation will help you to work with them more abundantly. If you have any questions while you're working with the tree, ask them, and see if any words or imagery or sensations come through for you.

When you're finished, thank the tree for his or her help.

Further Reading: How to Talk to a Tree

How to Feel Energy With Your Hands

In my last post, "How to Talk to a Tree," I mentioned that one of the things you should try to do when you approach a tree is to feel the tree's energy field with your hands. A large, wise or older tree typically projects its field several feet out from its trunk, although you'll feel more if you hover your hands a few inches over the bark.

A while ago, when I was helping a couple of friends get into tree communication, I put together a set of instructions for learning to feel energy with your hands. If you've never worked with energy, or you don't know what your own energy field feels like, this is a good starting place. The exercises I mention are based on  the Chinese discipline of qigong, which I write about more extensively on Tai Chi With Melissa.

I hope you have fun using these exercises. Enjoy!

In western culture many people are not used to the idea of the auric field or “chi bubble” or energy body, although the presence of this energy field is considered to be as plain as the nose on your face in many eastern cultures, and is common knowledge in alternative healing circles. One straightforward way to think of this energy is as the electromagnetic field generated by your cells. All living systems generate this field. The goal of this exercise is to begin to feel it with your hands.

WARM UP
If you are able to stand, that’s preferable, but you could do this exercise while sitting in a chair. If you do wish to sit, use a hard chair (kitchen / dining room chair) and sit toward the front of the chair with your feet flat on the floor. If you’re standing, stand with your feet shoulder width apart.

Bring your hands together, palms almost touching and fingers pointing away from your chest, in front of you. Your arms should be straight out from the centre of your chest. If your shoulders bother you, you can do this with your hands at belly level.

Slowly open your arms until they are stretched out to either side of your body, like you’re opening them to hug someone. As you open your arms out, try to make the movement come right up from the ground, pushing your feet into the floor to make yourself bigger. Do this whether you’re in a chair or standing. Try to feel that the movement of your whole body, as you make yourself taller by pushing into the floor, pushes your arms out to the side.

Bring your hands back together in front of you. Repeat the opening and closing movement, pushing into the floor to get taller and spread your arms wide, and relaxing down into the floor to bring the arms back together in front of you.

As you move, try to keep your shoulders relaxed and down. Don’t stop at the extremes of the movement – just keep moving gently. Try to relax as much as possible. You want to move softly and smoothly, not stiffly. A good image to use is that you’re pushing through water, moving the hands out to the side and then gathering the water in front of you.

When you’ve done that a few times (eight to ten repetitions), change your hands so that you’re pushing the water out in front of you, palms away from you. If you’re using the water imagery, you’re trying to splash someone – but slowly and gently. Then pull the water in toward you, palms facing you. As you push away, you want to push your feet into the floor to get as tall as you possibly can. As you pull in, relax back into the floor. Do this eight to ten times.

SENSING YOUR OWN FIELD
After you’ve warmed up, you’re ready to play with your energy. Bring your hands in front of you at or just under chest height, elbows bent so your hands are a few inches away from your body, fingers pointing away from your chest, so that your wrists sit at a comfortable angle. Imagine you’ve got a small ball of dough (about the size of a tennis ball) between your palms. Roll the imaginary ball of dough between your hands, first moving the hands in a circular motion toward you. Again, you want to make the movements slow and gentle - don't attack the imaginary dough like you are trying to punish it!  After a few moments, switch the direction of the rolling, moving the hands away from you, still keeping the imaginary dough between your palms. Keep your hands relaxed as you do this, fingers straight and gently spread.

After you’ve played with the rolling movement for a little while, try pulling your palms apart six to ten inches and then pressing them back together, keeping a couple of inches between them. As with the rolling motions, keep your hands relaxed, relax your whole body, and focus your attention on the palms of your hands. Play with these movements, alternating between the rolling and the stretching motions.

What you are looking for is any sensation you feel in the palms of your hands as you practice the rolling and stretching movements. If you feel something, just take note of it and continue the movement.

Common sensations are heat or tingling. Some people feel that there is a magnet repelling their hands from each other as they press them together. A feeling of fluffiness or something jello-like between the hands is also common. You might feel like there is something warm swirling around the hands, on the palms, on the backs, or both.

If you feel any of these sensations (and there are no doubt others you can feel), congratulations! You’re feeling your chi!

The reason why the sensations happen is that when you do this exercise, you are making the electromagnetic fields around the hands interact with each other. The hands are polarized differently, so the fields “buzz” a little as they encounter each other. Feeling your own chi is a preliminary step to getting a sense of what it feels like when your field interacts with someone else’s field, or a tree’s.

If you don’t feel anything the first time, please don’t be discouraged! Try again when you’re feeling relaxed and calm. Just sink into the movement, try to focus your mind on what you’re doing, and note any little sensation.

You can do this exercise “cold”, but it’s even better if you’ve recently been physically active in some way. Stretch a little, go for a walk, hit the gym, or even do some deep belly breathing. While you’re still feeling the buzz, go through the warmup and then try rolling and stretching the palms.

So – play with it, have fun, and if you do try the exercise, please let me know how it goes! I am very happy to answer any questions you might have.

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.