“If there was something in the air
If there was something in the wind
If there was something in the trees or bushes
That could be pronounced and
was once overheard by animals
Let this Sacred Knowledge be returned to us again.”
– from the Atharva-Veda (VII, 66) as quoted in Entering the Circle*
Ever since I was a young girl I knew I had a very specific purpose, though I wasn’t sure exactly what it was. Then shortly after my first trip to the Pacific Northwest and northern California, where I spent time in the Old Growth forests and hung out with the ancient Redwoods, I “got” it very clearly: “Listen to the Earth, write what she tells me, and share it with others.” The words came just like that and I never doubted for a moment that it was real or true. I also understood this to mean that I had a role to play out in the world, which has been exciting but also difficult and painful. This article is part of that story.
It was the mid 1990s. I had just dropped my three boys off at school. Now I was home sitting in the kitchen listening to our local community radio station. A colleague of mine was on the air talking about yet another corporate assault on the Earth. This was a call-in program and I usually listened because the conversations could be quite interesting, sometimes I’d add my own two cents to the dialog. But this morning was different.
When I started my activist “career” years before, I was filled with hope and enthusiasm. I knew without a doubt that my work was fulfilling my purpose. I’d had many signs that confirmed this, from conversations with trees to the people I met in my travels. My relationship with the Earth, with Gaia, was a very personal one and it fed my heart and spirit, keeping me strong and generally optimistic about our chances of making a difference, of “healing the planet”. I was connected to a wonderful bioregional community that included people locally, of course, but also around the country. Our bi-annual gatherings, called Congresses, fed my heart and spirit. We were like-minded souls who knew the Earth to be alive, inspirited, and wise. Much more than an inert collection of rocks, plants, bodies of water, and so on that the dominant culture, which we strongly opposed every chance we got, regarded as nothing more than resources to feed the all-important economy. Furthermore, we believed that it was our birthright, and responsibility, as human beings to actively participate in the life of the Earth, however it made sense to us. And this wasn’t just a physical thing, like planting a garden or hiking or whatever, though it may involve those activities. No. To us, to me, active participation meant fostering a real relationship with the Earth, a relationship similar to friendship or marriage.
One of my core beliefs was (and still is) that the most important thing we can do is to fall in love with the Earth, like we love our children, our lovers, family, friends. When we act from love we’re much less likely to cause harm – and if we do blow it, and we will because we’re not perfect, we acknowledge it and change. So instead of a laundry list of actions, this is what I’d tell people in my speeches and workshops. Furthermore, I believe that our love matters. Just as love soothes and heals when those we care about are in pain, so does our love of the Earth make a difference. But that morning, listening to the radio, my heart ached and I felt hopeless. How could I possibly inspire others when my own inspiration was gone?I felt like such a fraud.
As I listened to the voice on the radio go on about the latest force of destruction I couldn’t help but notice how excited he sounded. And I thought, how can we possibly stop the insanity when it appears that we get off on it? Was our excitement about all the crap actually making it stronger? We were giving it even more power?
In the beginning, in the early to mid 1980s, the focus of my work was on creating an economy for the living Earth. It was an exciting time, and projects like community currencies, land trusts, community-owned banks and credit unions, community-supported agriculture, public/private partnerships, co-ops and worker-owned businesses, flexible manufacturing networks were just getting off the ground. I took this a step further to integrate an awareness of the Earth into the practice of community economics which I called Gaian Economics, using healthy ecosystems as models for healthy local economies. Appropriate scale. Cooperative. Participatory. Balanced. Harmonious. At this time there were no college courses on ecological economics, and as far as I knew, I was the first person to integrate ecology and economics and put it out there.
Then I started doing corporate research – looking into corporations destroying the Earth and people, particularly indigenous and poor people, for profit. There were no computer databases and most information came from print sources and personal contact. I liked the research and felt I was making a contribution. One of my articles on corporations destroying the rainforest was chosen by Project Censored as one of the most censored stories of the year.
But on that particular morning the pain of everything I knew combined with the excitement of the voice on the radio became too much. Tears rolled down my cheeks and my heart felt as though it would break. Then I looked down at my hands and instead of my clean relatively soft hands I saw, instead, gardener’s hands. Calloused, dirt in the creases and under my nails. And I heard: “It’s time to take your own advice. Go to the Earth. Dig in the dirt.” I blinked and the vision was gone. But something inside had shifted.
As so often happens in life, shortly after that incident my father suffered a serious stroke and had to be moved to a nursing home. My sister, disabled from a car accident years ago, was doing her best but long-term she could not live alone so I made the decision to move to our family’s home in Fryeburg, Maine. For almost a year I made frequent visits between Vermont and Maine while my middle son finished his last year of high school. Then at school’s end my youngest son, Colin, our cats, and I made the move. Just like that my years of activism were over.
I loved waking up each day to the large white pines and huge, ancient maples that live on our land, not to mention the views of my beloved White Mountains which were my playground as a child. The trees and the mountain views were the main reasons my father purchased this house and acreage after my mother died. Since he couldn’t spend hours each day in the woods now that he had to care for my sister, at least he could have big trees and views of the mountains that he knew and loved so much. As for me, the beauty was so very healing! I felt like a child again, meeting and making friends with the ancient oaks and maples and the huge white pines, getting to know what grew where nearby, dreaming about the herbs and flowers I would grow.
My first garden was a disaster. Everything I planted was eaten, mostly by groundhogs. So, with help, a large, fenced garden with a wonderful gate was created. Since the soil here is basically beach sand, leaves, rotted hay, compost, a truck load of rotted manure, and pretty much anything else organic I could find were mixed into the soil. Then Colin, a friend of his, and I created several raised beds bordered with bricks, rocks, cord wood, anything appropriate we could find. And yes, my hands were now calloused and dirty.
My vision was to grow as many of the herbs I use for medicine as possible, and to get to know them intimately. I also wanted lots of flowers and plenty of vegetables. I’d been using herbs for years and made some of my own medicine from dried herbs I purchased. Now I wanted to hang out with them, nurture them, listen to them. They were to be my teachers. Ah the lessons! I’ve learned that some herbs, like some people, don’t like to be transplanted. Others generally considered “weeds” can’t be treated like garden plants. They either come up or they don’t and are best wild harvested. Some have their own plans for where they want to grow despite where I may have first planted them, while others remain happy and contented for years getting to a certain size and staying there. And some take over and need to grow where they have a certain amount of freedom. Some plants come into the garden, either on their own or because I plant them, stay for a few years then disappear. Motherwort, for example, came just when I needed her most, when I was going through menopause. Then she left.
It didn’t take long for me to hear the voices of the plants in a very personal way. Each spring it seemed that one plant in particular would call to me as if to say, “Pay attention to me this year. You need to learn from me!” Mostly the lessons fall more under the category of plant spirit medicine than strictly physical attributes or qualities, though they are definitely connected. Plants often have a story to tell, and since I’m the one listening, these stories are especially relevant to my emotions, spirit, and purpose. (Of course my teachers aren’t just plants in the garden itself. In addition to the wonderful trees here, this land is blessed with partridge berry, goldenrod, mullein, berries, wild roses, sweet fern, wild sarsaparilla (Aralia nudicaulis), and many others.) In general, the garden is a place of peace, beauty, and joy. Entering through the garden gate, I always pause a moment and take everything in. Even if it’s raining. There are times when I enter the garden and everything just glows, plants surrounded with golden light even (or especially) on gray, misty days. On warm, sunny days the fragrance combined with the buzzing bees is intoxicating. I am often moved to tears for no reason other than it’s just so gorgeous!
The garden teaches hard lessons too. Basic life stuff like facing fears, letting go of expectations, and especially (for me) learning that I am NOT in control. I’ve learned that plants, in general, are hardy creatures and can survive, even thrive, during weather that I’m sure will kill or stunt them. Whether it be too much rain, not enough, extreme heat, an early frost, even six inches of snow in early May. So when I’m chewing my fingernails over the latest torrential downpour, wondering how my baby basil, carrots, or lettuce will survive, the plants just ARE. And the rain stops and I go into the garden and most of the time even the most seemingly fragile plant is perky and happy. All my worrying was for naught. Of course sometimes damage does occur. That, after all, is life.
Not only is the Earth a great teacher, she is also a great healer. After a few years I felt my purpose calling. I fulfilled this purpose as an activist. Now I needed to find another path that felt right. Discouraged after three failed attempts to bring folks together around some kind of Earth action, I went to the mountains and asked, “What am I supposed to be doing?” They said, “Trust yourself. You’ll know it when it comes.” A short time later, I woke up one morning and decided to publish a newsletter. Gaian Voices: Earth Spirit, Earth Action, Earth Stories was born. I was thrilled when many of my Earthy former colleagues graciously agreed to help with articles, pictures, and art work. I didn’t have a time frame for how long I would publish Gaian Voices, just that I’d do it until “the next thing came along”. And so I did. I published two to four issues a year, and loved it everything about it. Then there was the oil disaster in the Gulf. This tore my heart to pieces. I couldn’t get the images out of my mind. Just typing these words now, my eyes fill with tears. And the worst part? Disaster though it was, the drilling continues. And now fracking. And so on and so on. Gaian Voices couldn’t be all love and light because that’s not real. But the reality once again was killing my spirit. So I decided to stop publishing after nine years.
But unlike my activism, Gaian Voices wasn’t my whole life. I didn’t identify myself as Gaian Voices like I did with my previous work. It was a much healthier relationship and for this I am grateful to the healing plants, the ancient maples, the huge white pines, the mountains that surround me, the beautiful place I call home. And this time the “next thing” was already present in my life: herbs, the garden, wild-harvesting gifts of forest and field, making medicine, and creams, and other yummy things to nourish and heal the body and spirit. Encouraged by my son Colin and his wife, Lynn, I started a home-based business, Gaia’s Garden Herbals, to sell herbal skin care products and other herbal goodies as the spirit moves. I love the whole process from the growing to the harvesting to melting and blending and experimenting with different oils and butters and essential oils, and especially sharing my creations with others. Because it’s the sharing, whether it be information and stories or more tangible items, that moves and changes us. More recently, my love of fragrance compelled me to begin making natural perfumes and this has become a primary focus of Gaia’s Garden Herbals, though I continue to offer skin care and some medicine cabinet staples.
As an activist and writer, I used my words – in articles and books, at conferences, rallies, and other events, and in the classroom – to influence how people saw the world. I wanted to find just the right combination, just the right essence that would get beyond their intellect to their hearts. With Gaia’s Garden Herbals, I use flowers and herbs, oils and essential oils, resins and roots, tangible gifts of the Earth, blended with care and love to do the same thing – but differently! I love hearing that my products really work – and people are sometimes surprised that they work so well. And I love stories of customers who discover a new favorite perfume and hearing what it conjures for them (which may be different than my story because fragrance touches each of in such a unique fashion). What’s absolutely awesome is I get to share my love of the Earth, the magic of flowers and plants, and tell stories of this herb or that flower, and people get it. And often have a story of their own to share in return. And there’s nothing overtly political about it and I don’t have to convince them of anything. Which is such a relief in these crazy times.
* I discovered this quote years ago and regard it as a sacred prayer. Whenever I feel the need to hear the voices of the trees, I go amongst them, close my eyes, and recite this prayer over and over until gradually the breeze picks up and the leaves whisper to me. Sometimes they just rustle like leaves. Sometimes they envelope me with their soft sounds. Sometimes they have a message for me. Always I feel humbled and renewed.
Note: This piece was written in the early 2000’s. Now, 2022, I am once again using words and activism to fulfill my purpose. And I still garden, still love and make healing creams, salves, and medicine with the herbs I grow and forage. And I’ve added a new dimension to this work – creating natural perfumes, which gives me great pleasure. One of the things I love the most about perfuming is sharing my creations (and my ingredients!) with others, watching their expressions and hearing the stories, feelings, and impressions they bring to mind. It’s different with everyone and always it’s a joy!