It’s a beautiful afternoon, a lovely surprise after many weeks of cold and wet, and the perfect opportunity to sit outside with my tree friend. The ground is still saturated, though, so I collect a cushion from our outdoor furniture and place it on the ground at the base of the western red cedar. I lean back against their trunk and let my eyes and thoughts wander for a while.

I’m terrible at meditating. I have ADHD, anxiety, and chronic muscle pain, so sitting and paying attention to anything isn’t easy for me. But as I try to find the most comfortable position on my cushion, I remind myself that, for the purposes of the Plant Spirit Ally Challenge, meditation is an exercise in attention, and can look like a lot of different things. I don’t need to empty my mind or detach myself from anything: I just need to be here, now, with this beautiful being who I want to know better.

I listen to the skittering feet of squirrels running up and down the trunk and along the branches, to crows calling, to the occasional barking dog or shout from a child at play. I breathe in the scent of damp soil, moss, and tree bark. I lean back and look up into the soaring branches, watch them sweep back and forth gracefully in the breeze. Eventually breath slows and my body stills, and it’s time to begin.

I focus on breathing with the tree, thinking as I breathe out how red cedar (and other plants nearby) will take in the carbon dioxide. Breathing in, I reflect on how grateful I am for the clean air under the cedar’s sheltering limbs. After several breaths, my body begins to sway almost imperceptibly, subtly moving in time with the lazy swaying of the branches above me.

A few more breaths, and I feel an almost sweeping sensation in my chest, a feeling of clearing and opening as my body relaxes against the supportive tree trunk and a pleasant calm settles over me.

The moment of stillness is short lived: an irate squirrel apparently takes exception to my presence at the base of the tree, plants themself in a nearby shrub, and proceeds to scold me shrilly for several minutes. But even this interruption has it’s charm. It certainly makes me laugh, partly at the squirrel, and partly at how seriously I tend to take myself. 

I wonder why I don’t do this more; just sit outside in the company of all my green friends and do nothing besides look, listen, breathe, and rest. 

Breathing or meditating with a plant is such a simple practice, and sometimes it doesn’t seem that impactful. But the thing to remember is the most meaningful practices are rarely peak moments. When we first start to attempt to connect with the world around us, it’s easy to expect grand epiphanies every time we’re in the company of our beloved green saints. Because we practice religion and spirituality rooted in nature, it’s easy to expect nature to become, suddenly, transcendent. But that’s exactly the point. Many land-based practices are the very opposite of exercises in transcendence. What is holy is what is right here, right now. And while engaging with this very present holiness will sometimes result in moments of profound wonder, moments in which we make a connection or receive insight or find some broken part of ourselves made whole, these experiences are still exceptional moments sprinkled throughout a lifetime of ordinary ones. We don’t revere the world around us because of the miraculous: we revere the common, the every day, because these beings are precious and valuable in and of themselves, regardless of how they affect us, regardless of whether or not they grant us some exceptional experience.

Today’s practice was incredibly mundane, and beautiful because of it’s mundanity.The joy of breathing in the breath of trees, of gazing on their beauty, and finding a moment of peace in their company, is precious and perfect. It doesn’t require more. To put it another way: A visit with a dear friend benefits us even if we only drink tea and stare into space together. This applies whether that friend is human or other than human. Trees really are the best sorts of friends.

Not sure what the Plant Spirit Ally Challenge is? You can learn more about it here.

If this post inspired or informed you, or just made you happy, feel free to buy me a cup of ko-fi or purchase an item from my ko-fi shop. Your support helps with the cost of web hosting and other expenses, allowing me to spend more time creating posts for you.