I am becoming more and more conscious every day, and finding so many small joys in that process of waking up.

Today I feel inspired to share a new way that I am observing my life: instead of viewing everything from my own point of view as an isolated being, I can choose to focus on living in partnership.

Partnership… with everything! I can be in relationship with all aspects of my life. With the people around me, with pets, with the air, with nature… and yes, friends, with plants!

All living (and possibly “nonliving”, whatever that really means) beings are uniquely intelligent. My understanding is that what helps me grow most in life is when I collaborate and exchange my own intelligence with others. Life likes to intermingle and create new things from the old, so this makes sense to me. We all know that learning to get along with people who are different than us is a very expansive and positive growing experience (if a bit challenging) – why not take this mindset and use it to open ourselves to relationship with all BEINGS who are different than us?

It’s amazing to me the kind of healing that is happening in the world right now, due to people opening their hearts and minds to consciously partnering with plants. I say this while the experience of meeting the great plant teacher, iboga, is fresh. Iboga is undoubtedly one of the life forms that opened my eyes to the possibility of partnership with non-human beings. It is UNDENIABLE that the intelligence of this plant has been working with me in a very deep way.  And I have seen so many stories now of people who were at the lowest of lows, turning their lives around… due to consuming a PLANT! It was not because the plant’s chemicals interacted with their chemicals in a specific way… it was because there was an exchange of intelligence and love, one that helped dislodge the human from their isolated funk and return them to a state of wellbeing.

So this is one of the lessons I am integrating: how do I expand this experience in my life? Through continuing to be conscious in what and how I consume. Through respecting the life all around me. Through perceiving the world as loving and intelligent, and interacting with it in a more alive way.

It’s a mode of being – one that is actually very natural, but that has been forgotten.

 

Ode to the Dandelion

Consumption as an aware and intelligent being begins with recognizing the awareness and intelligence around you, and approaching that which you are drawn to.

Let’s take a plant you are familiar with – one that is a normal part of your consumption routine – and let’s observe this plant as an intelligent part of the Universe.

I’m going to use Dandelion as an example, because this is a relationship I want to more consciously engage myself in.

The dandelion has spoken to my heart in many ways. I tattooed her on my body last year!

This is a plant that will truly bloom where it is planted.. wherever that may be.

The dandelion is ubiquitous. It is everywhere. It is stubbornly prolific! And most commonly considered to be a weed.

What is the intelligence of the dandelion?

It is the ability to be both hardy and beautiful.

I have noticed that dandelions love to grow in human-curated spaces… I see a lot of them in lawns, and in the grassy space between the road and the sidewalk. They seem to pop up in those spaces more-so than in the surrounding ‘natural’ spaces, such as nearby wooded areas. They are notoriously difficult to keep out of gardens, to the dismay of gardeners who desire to create a specifically manicured landscape.

I wonder if this is part of the dandelion’s spirit! Refusing to succumb to the controlling side of human nature. Dandelion is a testament to the ultimate will and power of Mother Nature herself. She appears, stubbornly, over and over again, and she smiles while she does it with her golden yellow blossoms, gifting us with her body, ALL parts of which are consumable and offer health benefits to humans.

Yes, the more I examine this creature, the more delighted I am by her.

So when I consume her, knowing she offers herself freely, I invite her intelligence to work with me. I acknowledge her intelligence, asking her to teach me about her happiness, and teach me how to thrive in all circumstances. And I engage the part of me that is willing to listen. For she will speak. She is speaking to me now, as I drink a dandelion tea.

She speaks to me in feeling: it is a deep happy feeling. She tells me that real happiness comes from a deep place inside. When we anchor ourselves in that deep happiness, we also create resilience. This is the message of Dandelion for me today: let yourself be anchored to your own happiness… this is the only part of you that creates true resilience. For if you are strongly anchored to something else, and you have missed your happiness entirely, then you are missing the mark and have missed the point. We are all here to bloom for each other. Each of us has a unique beauty, and we came here to show it to the world. Can’t you tell how happy flowers are? They don’t create their beauty through struggle. We can learn from the flowers how to create beauty by embracing the ease that exists within us.

Where is your own light and happiness? Only YOU can find it, and choose to live with and for it. It is the flower that exists within you, wanting to bloom.

 

How do I repay you?

What do I offer in return to this beautiful creature, for her offering of love and joy?

I suppose I offer my words, my own beautiful expression, which she helped inspire. Isn’t what we all want to be loved and appreciated, and to be a part of something bigger? This is a spiritual movement, not a physical movement. So even if I have altered the physical body of the dandelion through my consumption, I have added to the spiritual body of the dandelion by praising her and allowing her spirit to influence and become a part of me.

This is what all us long for, deep down, anyway. We know that the physical body will end, but part of us understands that we will spiritually live on in the world, due to whatever positive impact we have on others.

The plants love to be happy. They know how to love, how to really love – which is to shine for the sake of shining, to give for the joy of giving. I think they want to remind us how to do it, since some of us seem to have forgotten.

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Life is magical. Everything I come in contact with has its own spirit and intelligence. If I continue to wake up the part of me that can listen to that, perceive it and receive it… I can only imagine the ways my world can change for the better.

Thanks for reading; I send you my infinite gratitude and love!

Namaste ~