Week 2 Spring Renewal 2021

Spring Blessings!

It has been a very interesting and lively week here for us. I hope your renewal journey work for the past week brought as much energy and life-renewing forces into your lives, as well. Where has your week taken you? Have you practiced one or both of the meditation exercises again? What were your experiences like and reflections? The emails that came from you early in the week filled me with much joy and gratitude as I read about the ways in which the meditations were helpful and supportive to your personal practice. Thank you so much for your presence and the opportunity to share them with you.

Please continue to share your reflections and experiences in the way that feels best and most comfortable for you. You can always email me directly, share during our live video calls, and post here in the blog comments to connect with and inspire others who are journeying with us. My fiber art project is only in its early stages. I have sketched a colorful lemniscate image that brings into my heart and mind the meditation exercise from last Monday. My hope is to embroider it in the coming months. Have you created something using cloth or wool or silk or cotton, thread, etc? It would be such a joy to know where your inspiration is leading you, too.

Last week, I sent a reminder about remembering to anchor our experiences and our work of self-care into the physical realm. For me, it has been the woods and the walk in the woods calling my feet to walk, ears to listen, hands to feel and greet the trees and the plants. Some of you shared that you have been gardening and some have started a new physical exercise schedule. Yet, others have been inspired to cook and bake. How magnificent it is to listen and feel to our inner knowing. Have you found yourself renewing or doing a completely new practice in the physical realm, too?

And the plants! I am so overjoyed to greet them on every walk and every moment among them in the garden and in the woods, alike. This week, the roses by my home began to bloom. Their song and their whispers have been reminding me of important ancient wisdom during meditation moments with them. While I love each of them dearly, visiting one of the Wild Rose bushes in the woods by a small cold stream a few hours away from home was definitely one of the most remarkable experiences of this week. She spoke of the glowing light of love in the realms beyond time and space, but she also gifted some of her still tightly closed flower buds and bright green new leaves. She suggested putting them in some raw apple cider vinegar and later adding petals to the jar. I have been studying the healing blessings of the wild rose for three years now, but have not made such a combination.

Needless to say, I returned home ready to research what it could be teaching me. The work of understanding the healing properties of the leaf-bud-petal rose vinegar is still unfolding for me, but the buds and the leaves are already in the jar. I was amazed to see several buds opening as they sat in the vinegar. They were pale pink and very small, but slowly swelled and unfurled a few petal corners. I can hardly wait to take a look at them in the morning and see how they will have changed. Trusting that all is set for our next visit when the wild rose bush will be covered in blooms, I continue to look through my old herbal journals and through recipes herbalists have shared over time. It is so magical to continually discover more wisdom even when working with one plant for so many years. She has opened a window into cultures that use such vinegars not only in food, but in nourishing sun-soaked skin, in massaging sore muscles after long days in the field, in caring for irritated skin and acne-prone skin, and ... The presence of the healing rose reaches truly around the world. This week several people mentioned to me that her presence on our Earth predates us by millennia. If anyone has suggestions for resources where more about her history and fossils that are known so far can be located, please share when you have time. There are only so many hours in a day. :)

As I say good night and see you tomorrow for our meditation video call, I leave you with a few photos from my work with this healing friend from the plant kingdom.

Create Beauty. Experience Joy. Inspire Compassion.