As will become apparent as you read, I have written this post in stages. I considered simply sharing the meditation with you, but I felt it might be dishonest to provide a meditation meant to heal but then not share with you my own doubts and processes. So, if you’re not interested in reading about the challenges I faced in this, you can skip straight to the meditation. Otherwise, keep reading.

***

Weeks after so many of our plants were damaged by herbicide sprayed by a farmer, my heart still hurts, and I’m angry, irritated, and hopeful by turns. I had finally begun to feel predominantly hopeful, but then one evening, my husband pointed out how, though our tomato plants are growing large, they are gnarled in ways they should not be, permanently disfigured from the herbicide.

On the night when we spotted the damage and understood what had caused it, I couldn’t sleep because of my anger, irritation, and sadness, so I decided to focus on trying to heal the Earth with energy. There’s part of me that wishes such meditations and visualizations could immediately heal the plants that have been damaged, but there’s also a big doubting part of me that says such healing is impossible. It’s a struggle every day, wanting to believe, yet doubting. It seems no matter how many times I see nearly instantaneous results from energy work, I still have some reservations—particularly when I don’t see immediate improvement.

Then, of course, I realize that, like damage within our own bodies, no matter how many repairs we’re making, some hurts take time to heal, and that also holds true for the Earth. If all humans died tomorrow, Earth would survive. She would heal faster with us gone, but it would still take some time. She would be changed from our presence here, but she would continue. That’s what I have to remind myself in this case: Perhaps I do not instantly see results after using these meditations that come to me and that I share with you, but that does not mean there are not positive changes. My inability to see the changes (especially funny, considering the damage to my physical vision) does not mean those changes do not exist. Think of the tomatoes, for example: changed, gnarled, but growing vigorously and mostly (apparently) healthy, nonetheless.

 

As I write this, my guides remind me of how often I tell people that we can affect other lives in huge ways by things that seem insignificant to us, forgotten as soon as they are done but that live on in the memory and soul of other people for the rest of their lives, influencing many aspects of their futures. Perhaps that’s what we’re doing with these meditations: adding another ounce to the scale of healing so Earth can be more resilient, heal more quickly, and become stronger faster when the time is right.

All I know is that I was given these meditations by my guides or my intuition—or maybe even Earth herself—and that after I do them, I feel better and I feel the Earth thanking me, and so for me, that is enough.

***

On Friday 26 May, I tried to begin sharing these meditations but was feeling emotionally blocked about the topic, so I drew a rune to gain some insight. Before drawing from any oracle, I take a moment to tune in more finely to the voices of my guides. As I did so this time, I immediately heard, “When we heal others, we heal ourselves.”

Then I drew two runes and looked at them: Raido and Laguz. The initial feedback I received from my guides was “surrender to the emotions.”

Raido urges me to reliquish control to the Divine. My guides added, “We will guide you in creating the meditations [for others], as we have given you them for your own use. It is with Divine energy that the Earth will be healed.”

The rune also urges me to surrender and release the pain to the Divine. My guides added, “Cry. Remember that to cry is to heal. Continue your work. You heal the Earth a little every day, even when you aren’t aware of it.”

***

The following Monday, as I mowed our lawn, I got a good look at the plants all over our 3.4 acres. I was saddened at the sight of so many plants damaged and dead from the herbicide, as well as from rodents, insects, and Lord only knows what else. But then I was reminded by my guides to not get so focused on those losses that I missed the bigger picture: all the successes.

Yes, we’ve lost several trees, bushes, and flowers over the years, but those numbers pale in comparison to all the plants we’ve nurtured through the years.

We’ve been planting things on this property for more than nine years, and some loss is inevitable, my guides reminded me. Truly, it’s amazing, given the hurdles we’ve faced, with rodents girdling trees and bushes; deer eating trees and shrubs; herbicides killing sunflowers and who knows what else; pesticides killing pollinators; and the quality of the soil unable to support much without amending (nothing we planted in our vegetable garden grew in our first year here), that we have grown as much as we have.

Truly, we have done well, and we should be proud. We have been healing the Earth, and a few trees and bushes and flowers lost here and there are only battles. We are winning the “war” for the health of our land. We do this on many fronts, but especially by educating ourselves on the plants that are native to the area and learning how to read the land. (The plants that grow on the land can indicate the “quality” of the nutrients in the soil; there’s a process of natural healing that occurs—certain plants grow, do their work for the soil, die off, and are replaced naturally by other plants, each wave successively building on the work of those that came before.) Once we understand this, we can discover what nutrients should be added and/or vegetation planted to move this succession along a little faster.

And of course, every time we work the land physically, we are working it energetically, but we can also do energetic work without physical work, and that’s where these meditations come in. They can be done at night, in the dead of winter when it’s too cold to be outside, or even from half a world away.

Before all of these realizations—actually, on the night after we discovered the damage to the plants—as I lay in bed, agitated about the herbicide-induced damage, I decided to call “up” healing energy from Earth and “down” from the Universe to neutralize the effects of that herbicide on our property and to heal our plants. I felt the usual amount of energy that I do when doing energy work alone.

But then, suddenly, I felt greater power, as if I were performing an exercise with a group, and I realized that perhaps the nature spirits I so often thank and request help from on this land and in our home were aiding me, along with my healing guides. With that surge of power, I also realized I was no longer “in charge” of what I was seeing and doing; I was simply along for the ride. I saw in my mind widdershins¹-spinning vortexes of green light, almost like whirlwinds, rising from the ground all over our property, especially in the areas where we have concentrated areas of trees. They swirled quickly, spinning and spinning, like dervishes glowing green as traffic lights in the dusk that covered the land. I felt the energy of them pulsing through me as they spun in place, drawing up the poison from the plants and the Earth, the whirlwinds neutralizing the poison itself before flinging it out as harmless component molecules to benefit the Earth.

 

I acted from long intuitive practice, naturally stepping into this role of trying to heal our land with the help of my guides and the local elementals, but if you don’t have this much experience, I have written below the process that my guides suggest.

 

Location-Specific Earth Healing

Before you get started, a word of warning: Remember to let the healing energy of Earth and the Universe do the healing. Do NOT use your own energy! Simply request that the energies of Earth and Sky or Earth and Universe come together to do the healing. Your role here is to do the calling, to do the requesting. When your attention is focused, the energy is attracted to your focus, your vibration. Otherwise, the energy is simply neutral, waiting to be used. (Think of a your attention like an electric fan. Without the fan being turned on, the air is there, just kind of “hanging about,” but when you turn the fan on, it draws in air from behind and directs it to a specific location. That’s what you’re doing in this situation: directing and focusing the energy, requesting where it should go and what it should do.)

 

Settle yourself in a comfortable seated or lying position in a place where you will not be disturbed. Take a few moments—this may be a few seconds or even several minutes, depending on your state of mind and your experience—to center yourself and calm your mind.

Focus your attention on the land you want to heal. Picture it in your mind, recall its scent, call up the way you feel when you’re there … anything that you naturally feel or experience when you think of the place or are there. This practice tunes you in to the energy and personality of the place and enhances the positive effects of this energy work.

At this point, I usually offer up a brief voiced² prayer or statement of intent, and I invite others to work with me. You can request specific entities, such as nature spirits, any healing guides or guardians that you are aware of, or even angels. If you don’t actually have experience with any such entities but would like their support, simply make a request that any who would like to help you in this healing endeavor, and who have the highest intentions and regard for the experience, step in and help you.

I am open to any help, so my request is usually something like this:

God of all, I am here, now, with the intent to help the land heal. I come with the best of intentions to act in the highest good for the land, myself, and all others. I pray to act as an instrument of Divine will. I will to will Thy will. I invite all other beings who would like to help, who have only good intentions for the Earth’s highest good—to join me and aid in this work, that our combined focus and intention may help more surely than my own.

Feel the request go out from your heart.

At this point, I usually wait a few moments for everyone who is joining in the work to arrive. You can wait a few moments, but you needn’t wait long. They will respond quickly to your energetic request. Your call and their arrival are nearly instantaneous, given the nature of energy, but a few breaths’ time allows everyone to get settled into the new group energy and focused on the task at hand. Feel your energy and theirs connect, and feel the power of your intention.

Invite Earth’s energy to come up from the core of the planet, and then invite Universal energy to come down from the center of the Universe. Feel the two energies combine and cover everything around you. Focus on the presence of this energy as it fills your energetic and physical body. Request—again, I recommend this be voiced—that the energy seek out all poisons in the location to be healed and that it neutralize any energies that are not serving the highest good of the land and the plants, animals, and other entities that dwell in, on, above, and around it.

Envision some of the energy forming into widdershins-spinning vortexes, or the violet flame. (The healing energies may appear in any color, though in my experience, they are often golden, green, violet, or some combination thereof.) Whatever you see is appropriate, is the Universe and Earth working together to heal the Earth in the way it most needs.

“Watch” the vortexes and witness their work. Let them spin naturally until you have a sense that no more poison is there to be neutralized, that the work is done. Maybe you will see nothing as the energy works. Maybe you’ll simply sense the energy pulsing through you and around the area. What’s important is your intent.

Once the goal has been accomplished, the vortexes may dissipate on their own, or perhaps you can visualize them dissipating, and all the neutralized particles in the air settling down, falling harmlessly back to Earth. Remember to thank anyone you may have called in for reinforcements.

Also remember to ground, to return to Earth any excess energy that you may have picked up during the process: Touch both hands and feet to the ground and visualize any excess energy draining out of you and into the Earth to be recycled. It may also help you to eat and drink afterward. Carbs (the less refined, the better, in my experience) and chocolate tend to be good for grounding, so have a slice of bread or a small chocolate bar if you like. This will also help replenish any of your own energy stores that you may have inadvertently reduced or depleted while working with the energies of Earth and Universe.

 

 

Notes

1) Counterclockwise. I have no idea why—maybe it’s my Wicca training—but though I say “clockwise,” I almost never say “counterclockwise” anymore. Particularly when I’m discussing energy work, “widdershins” is the word that spills out of me.

2) The intent is most important, so vocalization is not necessary, but there is power in the voice, and it lends weight to our energetic intent and makes clear to those listening (Spirit, guides, elementals, etc.) that you are serious.