Post-scriptum to yesterday’s ‘Principles’ - from the Shakti side, .
‘My’ trees have taught me something from their natural subtle energy field - one of Shakti’s vast diversity of manifestations. I normally share this kind of thing only one-on-one, since so few have sense for the subtle, but today I hope some will take this seriously, with appropriate lightness of heart, and find benefit in it.
Large trees (diameter at least one foot) can transmit to us the kind of energy that they themselves mediate between Sky and Earth. It’s very simple.
Stand in front of such a tree (you may need to develop some intimacy with it first). Facing it, or back to it. Barefoot. Thinking nothing, expecting nothing, initiating nothing. Body needs to be relaxed and receptive.
Drop into your hips, body is not stiff, knees not locked but ‘soft’. Allow yourself to be wrapped in the tree’s field, and it to be wrapped in yours. The tree will transmit to the hips an oriented vibration relevant to the time of day (morning or afternoon/evening) - it feels like a vortex, flowing clock-wise or anti-clock-wise. You can also feel whether the vortex is rising through you from Earth or descending from the Sky. I am not specifying which vortex direction happens when, nor its vertical direction, to avoid your mind setting an expectation.
This is an example of subtle energy that is available to us any time anywhere. It is real and readily experienced. It was a surprise for me the first time my hips went into a gentle rotation, and since then I’ve made a habit of it. I enjoy feeling it ‘work’ twice a day, AM and PM, and never cease to delight in the regular shift from clockwise to counter-clockwise. I often set out to meet the tree in a tired state, and walk away feeling considerably better after just a few minutes - calm, centered, full of benevolence. Again, this is subtle, so it does not deliver a ‘burst’ of energy.
Initially the ‘vibration’ may be limited to just a swaying front-back or sideways. The main thing is to let this vibration sway the body. It can be very small - but it is unmistakable. Once the tree ‘knows’ that you ‘get it’, it will make the movement wider or more pronounced.
Just adding to your arboreal practice, the mystic horticulturalist we publish, Alan Chadwick, studied under Rudolf Steiner in Switzerland as a teenager, and was instructed to sit meditatively at the base of a pine tree. He did not mention vortical movement, but to understand the principles of Saturn. Can’t say I know what that means, but the implication might be the different trees have different tales to tell us in their language.
Many thanks for a beautiful practice!