TREE TALK – What happens when we destroy them?

By Jacquelyn E. Lane

A terrible scream brought me across the border from asleep to awake. It was high pitched, inhuman and full of anguish. I knew it came from the neighbour's' property though I heard it inside my head yet nothing appeared to be wrong next door. A few hours later the whining of a chainsaw began, a sound that brings dread to my heart. A large chunk of the neighbour's big Pohutukawa tree was cut away that day.

Hearing the anguished screams of trees in danger is not unique to me. My friend Gale told me she was in the kitchen of her Sydney apartment when there was a terrible screaming sound in her head. She looked up in time to hear a chainsaw starting up and to see the top of the tree outside disappear.

Three of us were taking a walk across farmland when the way led to a row of large Macrocarpa stumps. Common on New Zealand farms, Macrocarpa's fast, sturdy growth and spreading habit make ideal hedging and shelter. Without thinking, I left the track and began walking along the row of stumps. Halfway, I registered what I was doing and looked back to see my friends watching me. "Go on, do your thing," they called.

The stumps were well silvered by the sun so the trees were not newly felled yet the elemental life within each was very distressed. As we saw in my first article, the Deva Kingdom is hierarchical and inclusive, meaning there are little devas or elemental intelligence that comes from, or belong to, a bigger one and they in turn belong to bigger Deva and so on until all become One again.

Engaging my higher centres I contacted the Deva that overlights the Macrocarpa species, asking it to come and retrieve its nature spirits from their prisons within the stumps and roots. I helped coax the distressed, wraithlike elementals out and saw them reabsorbed into their originating Deva. Mission completed, the Deva retreated to its higher plane.

Why had the overlighting Deva not done this automatically when the trees were cut down? Shock can interfere with the natural process of death in nature just as it can with humans unexpectedly killed in accidents or crime. Our astral and lower mental bodies can remain in shock and not reabsorbed by the soul until that shock is resolved.

Do such awful consequences always happen when we cut down trees? No, as another incident clearly demonstrated, it doesn't have to be that way.

My husband and I were ambling along a popular river walk. Much of the river bank was designated Reserve but there was a privately owned section of young Radiata Pine trees. In the late afternoon sunlight their trunks and foliage were bathed in glorious gold. Two days later only their stumps were left. I felt sad but I wasn't sensing any distress from the trees. I stood quietly by the fence and tuned in. The overlighting Deva had established a large trunk-like column with 'roots' that went beneath the ground under each stump. The elemental life within the trees was peacefully and slowly leaving, being reabsorbed into the Deva through this etheric structure.

Asking around, I discovered that the owners of the property had employed an experienced man to replace the pines with native species, such as covered the rest of their large property. The stumps were left to rot and the new indigenous trees planted in the gaps. They grew with vigour and swiftness and the plot retained an air of health and vitality. Key here was the owners's intention of healing and restoration, not mindless destruction. I suspect that both owners and workman had made their intentions known and this made all the difference between a traumatic or healthy change to the land.

When my friend Debbie and her partner were ready to build on their steep section, a fifteen year old Norfolk Pine was smack in the middle of the small building site. It could not be saved. I asked for time to warn the tree before it was cut down, even though they had gone to the trouble of finding a sensitive arborist. Debbie joined me a few days before the tree-felling. Not into this esoteric 'stuff', she didn't know what to expect.

First I got her to feel the tree, approaching it step by step, hands held with palms facing the trunk. She soon noticed a feeling on her palms (where there are chakra points) and when she put her hands against the trunk she looked at me in delighted astonishment. She could feel it's aliveness, it's life force.

I contacted the Norfolk Pine Deva and its spirit or elemental life within the tree and explained why it would be cut down. I asked Debbie to join me in sending gratitude to the tree for its being, its beauty and strength and for its roots holding intact the soil of this steep site. Debbie was again surprised by how much she was aware of during this process. I then asked the deva to help its elemental withdraw from the tree, expecting it would be done over the following few days but the withdrawal took place immediately. Just then Debbie's partner arrived and was coming up to join us when there was a screeching from the sky. Two Seagulls were circling above the tree tip, calling. There was a flurry in the topmost foliage and a black bird shot out of the top of the tree. Suddenly all three birds were gone. Birds are an entry point for deva crossing to evolution in the Human Kingdom and they often make a grand entrance when I have completed such work.

"It's done," Debbie's partner declared. It was.

It's easy to avoid traumatising your trees and shrubs. Give them twelve hours warning before pruning or felling, longer if it's a large tree. Express your gratitude for their beautiful presence, explain your intention and ask them to withdraw their energy from the parts you need to prune. You don't have to have etheric vision, just an open heart.

In the next issue of One Smile Magazine we'll look at trees from the inside.

You'll find a reading list on my website: www.jacquelynelane.com/links

Some books are esoteric, others review scientific research on the responsiveness of the plant kingdom. You'll also find information on my website about Deva and my eco novel, The Children of Gaia.

TREE TALK – What happens when we destroy them?