Wouldn’t it be interesting if we thought of the plants surrounding our homes as neighbors? Imagine what kind of world we would create by honoring the living green beings we share our planet with in this way.

When you think about it, we depend on plants for our very breath: every breath you breathe in is the out-breath of a plant, and as we breathe out we feed the trees and plants around us. I believe that many of us take this exchange for granted. As we continue to cut down large tracts of trees, it’s no wonder that the incidences of respiratory diseases have increased dramatically. Would we continue to look at the woods as “timber” if we really connected to the surrounding forest as if it were our neighboring families? Maybe we should rethink our definition of neighbor to include our green friends, too.

I have come across many interesting articles and stories about how sentient plants are. In The Secret Life of Plants by Peter Tompkins and Christopher Bird, there’s a story of a professor who agreed to hook up his favorite plant to a machine that registers electrical responses. He was giving a lecture in a neighboring town and at the exact moment he put a slide of the plant up on the screen and told of his favorite plant, the plant back home registered a response. How does that fit into our current paradigm?

When I was studying with Tom Brown Jr., founder of the Tracker School in New Jersey, learning wilderness survival and Native philosophy, he would recount a story of a man coming down a trail and Grandfather (his Native American mentor) would comment on the man’s bad mood. When asked how he knew that, Grandfather would say, “The trees are leaning away from him.” In Grandfather’s world, trees were neighbors—they even had surnames! Aren’t we living in the same world still?

When I make a trip to a client’s home, I always find, growing in their yard, the very plants that could help them heal. Is it a coincidence? How did these plants crop up there? Sometimes, when lawns are cultivated so that no other plant than grass is allowed to grow, these helpful weeds still pop up between the pavers! I have friends in the herbal world who tell me they can even tell what a person is dealing with physically by looking at what is growing around their homestead. What do you make of that?

By asking ourselves these questions, we can move to a place of honoring all of life as if it were our own, and loving our neighbors—both people and plants—as ourselves. We could all start today. All it takes is a shift in focus. All we need do is infuse our daily actions with the awareness that we generate these energies by defining them through our actions. As we pick up litter, we empower beauty. When we plant a tree, we empower hope. Some great trees to plant in our region and around your home are slippery elm, hawthorn, vitex aka chaste tree, any of the fruit trees (see page 22 for tips on planting), butterfly bush to attract pollinators, and especially the dogwoods and hemlocks that are endangered.

Also ask yourself, “What is important to me?” As you consider it, think about what energy that represents. That is your gift to your neighbors. Our trees and plant neighbors gift us with many energies—healing, nurturing, care and comfort, to name a few.

To honor those energies, when you see a piece of wood, for example, think about the many moons, rainstorms, sun, water and earth nutrients that came together to form its structure. Honor it as a once- living being that has been carefully fashioned into something useful, practical and comfortable. This awareness empowers the kind of world we should all want to be in…a world that encompasses each other along with plants and animals as neighbors.

A Holiday Stomach-Soother
If you need to call on neighboring herbs for a little relief from your Turkey or Tofurky “hangover” this month, here’s a great digestive tea to try:

Ingredients:
One large ginger root, sliced 1/4 inch crossgrain
Several (6-10) cardamom pods
A handful of cut and sifted licorice root*
1/2 handful whole cloves
Gallon of water

Instructions:
Boil water with the ingredients for 20 minutes. Let sit covered for 15 minutes (If it’s too strong for your taste, add more water.)
If you only have a few of the ingredients, say ginger, that will work, too. Some folks like a ginger peppermint combo. I like to make the tea very strong and use it like a concentrate by adding the water as needed. It will keep in the fridge for up to a week. You can add honey to taste if you want, or use it as a replacement for licorice. The licorice root is pretty sweet!

*Note: Many folks confuse anise with licorice, but they are completely different tastes. Commercial candy licorice is flavored with anise, but the real stuff is very different.

A Healing, Helping Exercise
If you’d like to do a fun, hands-on kind of experiment, try this: find a space in your yard and make a little garden spot. Really put care and intention into the tilling of the soil—maybe add soil amendments like soft rock phosphate and a little lime. Turn it over with some good compost. Ask that those plants that are to be your special herbal allies grow there. Then…wait. See what will come to you. Once they’ve arrived, welcome your new neighbors: research the plants, find out what they do and how they heal, and start healing yourself.

Resources: Plant Spirit Medicine by Eliot Cowan, Sacred Plant Medicine by Stephen Harrod Buhner, The Secret Life of Plants by Peter Tompkins and Christopher Bird

June Ellen (junebug) Bradley is a naturalist and healer at Adawehi Healing Center, an intentional community in Columbus, NC (www.jackiewoods.org). She is also an accomplished artist who brings the beauty and mystery of Nature to interior spaces in paintings and murals.

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