Spiritual aspects of gardening

Higher topic: Gardening
Underlying topic(s):

Topic in Gardening courses

See also Research page:Spiritual aspects of gardening

Articles


Title & link	First lines of article	Date
Circled gardens	I would like to share with you a little about some things i learned from others and from own experience about growing vegetables, herbs and flowers in circles in your garden. This is quite a magical thing to do and when you apply it well, you will produce fruits that are more healthy and energetic. Several principles are involved here.	June 1, 2006
Designing a circled garden	In a former article i spoke about circled gardens. If you didn't yet read that entry you may first want to do it to know what i am writing about here. On the picture below you see an example of a rectangular garden area.	June 3, 2006
Plants in the spirit world	For some time now i've been researching about plants in the spirit world. I've been doing experiments in my garden and asked some gardeners in spirit world about plants in the spirit world. I have set up a few projects also to learn how to improve the energetic quality of vegetables in my garden and in the spirit world. This is a first conclusion about plants in the spirit world.	May 30, 2011
Energy auras of plants	This is part of a series of reports on my ongoing research into the spiritual meaning of plants. This note is based on preliminary findings and should be seen more as a stimulant to explore an unknown field of knowledge than as carrying conclusive facts. We have been working with one plant in particular to study its energetic properties. It's an ornamental tobacco plant.	June 8, 2011
Why to learn cultivating and using plants	For many people gardening and learning about plants is a hobby. But it can be much more than that. First, when we have a garden, we need to take well care of it. When you sow seeds in pots in a greenhouse, preparing these to plant out later, you'll have to take regular care of them.	2012
The energy reality of a garden	All that exists also exists on the level of energy.Sometimes we tend to think that energy is just energy, but in fact, there are many types of energy. Each energy has a certain inner character and it has a special effect.	2012
Gardening in the Garden of Eden	When we look at ourselves from the viewpoint of our growth and development, we can distinguish three stages. The first is that of our individual growth in a relationship to God. The second is that of our growth by forming families and in all other relations with fellow human beings. The third is that of our learning to relate to the world of creation that is all around us. That world of creation around us is called 'The Garden of Eden' in the Book of Genesis. It is where Adam and Eve lived before they fell to sin.	June 17, 2012

Chunks of information

There's something about plants that not everyone realizes. Plants, through the process of photosynthesis, transform the energy of the sun into a form that humans and animals can receive in their food. Without plants, our bodies would not be able to live and grow. What is true for the physical body, is also true for the spirit body. We need the food and energy that plants provide for the growth of our spirit bodies. But so that our food also really benefits us spiritually, crops need to be taken very well care of not only in a physical sense but also in a spiritual sense. 'We are what we eat' may be a somewhat simplified statement, but 'we are what we eat'.
Plants are sentient beings, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Secret_Life_of_Plants. It means that they respond to how we feel about them and how we relate to them. Personally, i don't have a sentimental relationship to plants, or at least it's not what i aspire. But i do see plants as gifts from God, treasures in many ways. In most cases we haven't yet discovered the uses of most plants. Plants are very much part of our being. We grow from them, they can heal us. All these gems were given to us from the start, before we even existed as human species. I think that the main demand for growing crops in a good way is the attitude of gratitude and wonder in relation to plants. Of course, there are many details in how to grow plants in the right way, to prepare your soil well, to be attentive to the plants you grow, to make sure the environment of the garden is well prepared and protected both spiritually and physically. It's a learning process. Dive in it and discover about yourself and about plants!
From a spiritual viewpoint, attitude is often more important than external factors. For example, vegetables grown organically but by an arrogant farmer can be inferior to those that were grown in what has now become conventional commercial farming, but with respect for the food quality.
How did the great array of naturally healing substances in plants and other living beings come about? No single living being can be understood as existing in isolation. All the animals and plants and micro-organisms were made to be dependent from the environment in which they live. The bodies of animals should not be seen as having a life independent from that of plants and other living organisms. Imagine a beautiful painting. If you isolated the parts of the painting, a figure here, a tree there, then you would not get any good painting. Likewise, all of creation was made in a single symphony of harmonizing elements, in which each element of creation, each animal and plant plays a good role only when understood in harmony to other creations. Health is nothing else than the state of existence in which an animal or a human being exists in good harmony to all surrounding entities in this symphony of life.

Daily round of checks

The bigger your garden is, the more it needs your daily round of checking all plants. Plants are living organisms and their condition and needs can change by the day. So if you have your garden near to you it's a good idea to take some daily time to inspect what needs to be done. Watering some plants, pruning others, weeding a field, etc. Plants in pots that stand behind glass or in a greenhouse may run out of water within the day when the sun shines hot. It will help your garden work if you set up this kind of procedure for yourself.

Integrated garden

Dianthus, digitalis, garlic, White cabbage, potatoes.

What is an integrated garden? It is a garden with a variety of different plants, medicinal plants, herbs, flowers, leaf vegetables, root vegetables, berry bushes, etc.

My garden is very much a spiritual garden. It means that i do my gardening in cooperation with the spirit world and with regard for the spiritual components in the crops. One plant is not the other. If we wish to give plants energetic and spiritual properties, we need to treat them with special care and give them the best environment.

Just like we enjoy a garden with a variety of colors and flowers, so plants also like company. Of course, plants don't 'like' in the way we do, but they flourish energetically when they receive energy elements from other crops.

Each plant species has its own energy and also receives typical energies from the cosmos and the earth and all that is around. Flowers receive other energies than roots. Plants can mutually enrich one another in the sense of energies.

Crops grown in such a garden have better nurturing elements for your spiritual well-being.

Your garden as extension of your home

A garden around our house is an extension of the home. With 'home' i don't only mean the place where your family lives, it is also a spiritual environment with conditions that are unique for your situation. Most gardens are at the outside of a house and apart from beautifying your home and giving you your home-grown food, they also act as protective environment.

When you pay attention to the natural events in your garden, how well the crops grow, what kind of animals visit your garden, etc., you can learn much about the spiritual situation around your home. Your garden is part of a temple and it depends on yourself whom you invite in that temple. Preferably you invite God and the highest spirits there, but it always is a challenge to keep the spiritual atmosphere in your garden serene and pure. The natural events in your garden help you to evaluate the spiritual situation.

Relationship to plants

In my garden i grow plants that always respond well. Some other plants i have difficulty with cultivating. It's not always a matter of knowing or not knowing how to grow these plants or what conditions they need. It's more something in the personal relationship with plants.

Some plants i can love easily, but other plants i have difficult feelings about. I don't always know why that is, but for some reason certain types of plants are very likable for me while i feel less excitement about other plants. Some plants i don't know well and have little feeling about.

Plants as species do have something that could be seen as their individuality. For plants this is more on the level of the species than of the individual plants. Once you like a daisy, you'll like all daisies. When you dislike a thistle, you'll probably have dislike for all thistles.

This phenomenon is part of the spiritual reality of gardening. When you cannot love a plant species so much, you most likely have more difficulty growing it. It also means that we can improve our ability to grow a certain species by making effort to learn to love that plant. This can be done by means of theory, for example reading more about the plant, or by practice, cultivating that plant and getting to know it.--JE 00:53, 21 July 2012 (PDT)

Gallery

Field with circled crops. This photo is from when I planted and sowed in my garden for the first time. Because it was already late in the gardening year I had little choice, but I planted courgette, leek, Brussels sprout and strawberries and I sowed spinach and chard. The photo shows that I did it in circles and ellipses. There is a spiritual reason why it is done this way. It's an old tradition in some or more Native American tribes.
A field of rapeseed 'cut off.' The rapeseed was sown in circles but the field was cut to make room for a path.

External links

Harvesting kale and considering the energetic qualities John Eagles note on Facebook (Photos not yet uploaded to ERW
Plants in the spirit world John Eagles note on Facebook
The energy reality of a garden John Eagles note on Facebook

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