The Herbal Medicine-Maker's Handbook_ A Home Manual - James Green [20]
Herbal medicine-making is the dynamic synapse that lays the roadway between harvesting plants and consuming plant preparations. Therefore, the ritual-process of harvesting is the very foundation of preparing and potentizing these medicines for our use. Intimate attention to the details of our harvest process is the rite that allows the medicine-maker to contact and communicate with the spirit of the plant and imbue this plant spirit in his or her food and medicine. If we choose to devalue this act by ignoring or disregarding the presence of plant spirit, we carry off the physical remnants of the plant, but lose access to the most vital healing power of the herb. And with this same heedless thrust, we can damage the sustaining stability and beauty of our environment. I try to bear this in mind whenever I participate in the circle of giving as the harvester of another being. This holds for all Earthly harvests—plant, animal, and mineral.
Certainly, the science and technology we employ to prepare our herbal preparations are important factors in bringing forth high-quality herbal medicines, and the main body of this handbook offers guidelines for these techniques. But as author of this work I must allege, as I repeat, these are not the most crucial factors. The harvest is. Therein lies the art and soul of excellent medicine-making.
In my opinion the harvesting of a plant is the most critical element in the process of making truly fine herbal medicine.
A clear compassionate intent for one’s use of a harvest, coupled with an animated connection with the plant (one that embraces a sincere regard for the continual welfare of the plant’s community), is what draws forth the spirit of plants to accompany one’s medicine. This “plant spirit” is the “active ingredient” in herbal preparations that medical pharmaceutical science and many commercial herbal industries are so desperately seeking. The active ingredient of herbal medicine, the one that truly supports human health and healing, is not scientifically captured in high-tech wonder-labs, mysteriously contained and transformed by stainless steel vessels and bubbling glass beakers. It is simply embraced in the woodlands, meadows, seashores, and in the domestic gardens where plants and plant communities live. It is conveyed by a green spirit, whoever she or he might be, wherever she or he might work.
“Life begins the day you start a garden.”
—A CHINESE PROVERB
TWO RITUALS
Following are two focusing rituals you might find useful.
These rituals are clearly not intended to impress the plants, and they are not ordained to flip on some sort of magic switch; plants are already our allies, and the magic Nature surrounds us with all the time, where everything imaginable is possible, is always on. These rituals are for you. To receive what you want, you merely have to tap into natural enchantment in a nonresistant fashion. Ritual helps you allow yourself to function at an altered state of knowing and receptivity. In ritual you focus precisely on what you want and hold your attention on the vibrations you choose to harmonize with—at present, the vibration of plant spirit.
The first procedure is a ritualized method for allowing yourself to communicate with plants and receive them as personal allies. The second is a ritual that aligns the pace of your physical and mental energy with the energy of the plant entities you wish to harvest. Both rituals can help you focus on your intent and align your spirit in a relationship with a plant, a relationship that allows you to carry the spirit of the plant along with your harvest of its physical being. If either one or both rituals appeal to you, adopt them, or modify them to suit your nature. If they’re not your style, create your own way. These are merely my means to an end; there are innumerable other ways to woo plant spirit. Seduction is a highly personal adventure. Ritual