Working with Trees

Ah, picture the scene... A warm summer's day, a young maiden in a long flowing dress skips happily through the field, the ring of flowers radiant in her hair.  She is beautiful... the day is beautiful... life is beautiful.  She spies a particularly majestic oak and makes her way happily towards it, flinging her arms around it's trunk as she approaches and hugging the tree...

How rude can you get?!  With a love for trees, should there not also be a respect and reverence for them?  Would you invade the personal body space of a human you so admired in such a rude fashion?  Could you respect someone who did?

No, of course not.  Nor, I'm afraid, can I afford any respect in this piece to the new age advocates of tree hugging.  So how do you approach and work with a tree?

Well, obviously, as with all of your workings, an awful lot is down to your individuality.  So too is it dependent upon the energy of the tree.  The first thing to realize, however, is that the path leading you to the tree will take you three layers of energy.  A little like humans have personal body space, which they feel uncomfortable if people step inside of, so too do trees.

Of course, when you have stepped inside a human's personal body space, you can easily see them shrinking away, or at least looking very uncomfortable, but how do you know with a tree?  Well, in much the same way, although it is something you have to sense, more often than see.  As you reach each layer of the tree's field, just stop a moment and allow it to accept you before moving further.  Again, you will sense when it's ready for you.

And so you have reached the tree itself.  What is it you wish to do now?  Perhaps you have approached it in need of it's energy or counsel.  Here again, how you achieve this is entirely up to you.  Some will sit with their back resting against the trunk and meditate for whatever purpose, using your subconscious mind to communicate.  Others will talk out loud to the tree.  Others still will write what they wish to say and bury it by the tree, or place divination stones in it's trunk (should an appropriate opening be located there).  Some will voice their question and then look to the bark, the branches or the leaves to divine their answer from.  Meanwhile, some will simply sit, and be, and allow the energy of the tree to wash over and through them.  It's down to you, the individual, to find your own particular way.

A friend of mine recently asked why it is that we talk to trees, when they have no ears to hear, and there is no proof that they even speak English!  A fine question indeed, although a rhetorical one at the time, so it never received my answer.  Of course, nobody can truly give the answer, but mine would be something like this...

However you choose to communicate your thoughts, feelings, wishes and needs to a tree, and whatever language you use, what the tree picks up on is the energy and intention behind it.  Depending upon the method you use, in response it may access your energy at a level in which your own higher self can intuit the answers, or it may use the symbolic representations (such as divination stones) provided to supply you with the answer you seek.  Or it may simply quietly work upon your own energy to provide you directly what you need with no call for explanation.  Again, each individual is different, but the call for clarity and purity of energy and intent would appear to be universal.

So what if you need something more physical from the tree than just it's energy and wisdom?  You may be seeking it's bark, leaves, berries, fruit or blossom for an herbal remedy, for example.  In the case of remedies, I don't need to tell you how important it is that you select both a healthy tree, and evidently healthy material (leaves, blossom, etc.  Ensure that they are whole and healthy, untouched by disease or rot, not half eaten, and so on.) before you use it to heal another.

Next is a simple matter of stating your intent; either verbally or non-verbally.  Just let the tree know what it is you wish to take, and why, and then wait for it's permission.  This may come in the form of a sense that it is ready, or via a sign (such as the leaves you require coming loose in your hand), or it may not come at all.  If the latter is true, please respect the tree's wishes and start again elsewhere.  With the former, of course, you are okay to proceed.

If you need to take more than some bark, leaves, blossom, berries or fruit, look carefully at what it is you need or have to achieve.  Perhaps you simply wish for a piece of it's wood for one of the multitude of uses for it.  In which case, where possible, it's always best to try and take a piece that the tree has already relinquished; something that has fallen to the ground.  However, it may be that you need to remove a branch for the sake of the tree, or to prevent it overhanging a pavement or something.  Here, please use a little extra thought on what you are doing.  Try to imagine how you would feel if somebody cut off your fingers or an arm without at least explaining why first, and then apply this to the tree.  As before, explain to the tree what it is you are going to do, and why.  Once you feel it is ready, you may proceed, but again take care to make the wound as small and clean as possible, trying as far as you can to give the tree energy throughout the process to help with the trauma you are inflicting.

Whatever it is that you need to take, remember that you should never take more than you absolutely need.  Even more important in the case of bark is that you never ring the tree - that you take only patches of bark, and do not leave a clear ring taken from the tree - as this will lead to it's death.  If you need an abundance of leaves, fruit, etc, then try to take these from several trees, instead of robbing just the one of it's gifts.

Lastly, please remember to give back for what you have received; give thanks for the gifts the tree has yielded to you; be those physical, psychological, emotional, spiritual, or a combination of all.  You may wish to leave a small posy of flowers, or a crystal or pretty stone, or leave shiny coins or burn some incense (see the piece on elemental spirits!).  A lot of people leave some form of nutrient for the soil, and these can be obtained now in a stick variety which are easy to carry with you and to plant.  Alternatively, you may wish to give of your own energy, returning some healing into the tree.  The choice is yours; but always remember to give sincere and genuine thanks in one way or another.