Spirituality and cultivating native plants

Discovering an obscured layer to ecosystem restoration.

Earlier this year, I planted a very small native tree sapling in a sea of non-native plants. Within weeks, a little insect had found a snug, safe home in the leaves of the native tree sapling. It had found the nutritious and familiar leaves of a native tree. That little insect, folded up tightly in a leaf, surprisingly filled me with heart-exploding joy. I remember crying. That insect meant so much to me. It meant the hours, strength, frustration and sweat I exerted restoring habitat meant something. A single native plant can support an insect which can fed a songbird baby and so forth. I felt the connection to all that life by planting the native tree. I kickstarted the healing of the ecosystem. It changed me that day.

I had challenged myself for a long time to be more unidimensional, pick a discipline, become an expert. To be more singularly focused. In graduate school, being multi-disciplinarian was pretty radical. Ethnobotany struggled for air and was systematically marginalized by the scientific method.

I have spent many years trying to reduce my life to scientific knowledge. Friends whispered consistently in my ear that there was more. That the spirit was strong in me, that I had unlimited energy and power. It was intangible for me though. I recognized that nature was complex and I could sense people’s energy but I still needed science to keep me upright and marching forward.

Early in college, I self-labeled myself a scientist and clung to it as a religion, my belief system. I would meditate and do yoga, read the spiritual books that came my way. However, I believed myself to be an academic at heart. I remember reading spiritual books and smugly concluding that science could explain it all. Most importantly, I remember conceding, that if there was anything science could not explain- a little mysterious magic was okay. A little mystical spirituality was allowed….

What I realize now is that I am dimming my light. I am learning how to be a spiritual botanist. I worked so hard in academia only to reject it. Then, I worked so hard to build my business as an ecologist and landscape designer, only to feel hopelessly empty and unable to serve my clients.

I have the luxury of the time, energy and strength to plant native trees and restore native habitat on my own property. It is very difficult manual labor work and I have been so humbled. The challenges have been abundant and many unexpected. I persisted. I learned a lot, more than I ever learned in the classroom or collecting data at a field site. I put my heart, soul, spirit, sweat, tears and laughter into restoring native plants on my property.

The land has rewarded me in ways unimaginable. The energetic connection I feel to the land is strong. The plants I have planted have spread and moved, sprouted new generations, grown thick trunks, and of course, many have perished. It has all been a huge lesson in human humility and left me feeling spiritually connected to nature. The most unexpected healing part of restoring native habitat has been the wildlife and the positive energy they bring. I expected to feel connected to the earth by cultivating native plants but I didn’t expect the profound spiritual connection I feel with the wildlife that thrive in the habitat I created. The holistic feel of the sum of all the parts, all those beings, has far exceeded my imagination spiritually. Where I have restored nature, it pulses with life and energy, glowing with light and spirit.

Cultivating nature is about reconnecting with the land, and in addition to healing the ecosystem, we also heal ourselves.