I’m doing a bit of land oracle today at a campsite I’m staying at in Augusta, Wisconsin. For those of you new to “Land Oracling”, it’s basically a term I use for when I sit in a place in nature and listen to the land which encompasses everything that lives in the ecosystem.
What is Land Oracling?
Just like each plant has a unique plantality (like a personality), the ecosystem can have one too. Each place holds a vibration from past and present activities that took place there. Sometimes the land has a story to tell, sometimes it has a request, and other times the lessons come from the observer.
Each place has lessons, messages, feelings, dreams, and history to share. And I have a sense that each space I visit has an energy to it. A unique feel to it. Just like every person has their own personality. That’s what the vibration or the energy of a particular location feels like – each garden, beach, park, forest, lake – they all have their own vibration.
The Upside Down
I’m at a spot in a campground, where I’m sitting on a rock, it actually looks kind of like a little cliff. However, most of the cliff rests under water. I can reach down and touch the water. Then in front of me is a lake, part of the lake, kind of like a little cove where the larger lake came in. And there’s a shore on the other side, I can see it’s very close to me.
White and red pines line the shore across from me.
The water is flat and perfectly still and calm.
When I sit on this cliff, on this rock that sticks out into the water, just a little bit. I see the reflection of those trees and the other side reflecting perfectly into the water. From me to the next shore is a short enough span that I don’t see much of the sky in the water. The reflection makes it look like the trees, the tops of the trees are coming right to the edge by me on this shore. As if I could reach out and touch the tops of the trees that are on the opposite shore.
The Reflection
This reflection looks like somebody took the forest on the other side and just tilted it to me. And it’s a perfect reflection of the shore line in the water. That’s why I’m calling this spot “the upside down”. Because when I look at the water, I sort of feel upside down. I sort of feel like I’m looking at the upside down of what’s across from me. Most times, if I sit on the shore and look out across the lake, I can see the reflection of the opposite shore in the water. But I mostly see an expanse of sky reflected in the water so that reflection of the opposite shore looks very tiny, just like the opposite shore looks tiny. But here, the shore on the other side is close therefore there’s not as much sky to be reflected. I mostly just see the reflection of that shore with just basically a sliver of the sky. So it gives us a wonderful, perfect reflection of the opposite side.
The water is flat as glass
There’s something calming about a body of water, that’s perfectly calm to the point it looks like glass. It reflects that same feeling in me. I want to be calm, quiet, and still just like it is. I want to sit and reflect.
I feel a complete stillness in me. It’s as if all the fluids in my body are matching what’s happening on the surface of this water, just completely still. The calmness feels like the point between each breath. Just that moment of pause when everything’s perfectly full or perfectly empty, like that breath in and out.
The Dreaming
As I was falling asleep in the camper, I had this interesting awareness that everything we need is reflected here already. Every problem has a reflection of the solution. The reflection in the water flashed in my mind. This also happens in the herbal world.
So in herbal terms in the spring, for those that have spring allergies, from all of the things waking up and having pollen, there is also a reflection of the solution for that problem here where I live in Wisconsin, and that solution is the stinging nettles (Urtica dioica). I use Stinging nettle as an antihistamine for Spring and Fall allergies.
In the late Summer or the Fall, when ragweed pollen is bursting, the stinging nettle is going to flower and seed. At this time the leaves get smaller and lose their vibrant green pigment. What is the reflection in late summer/early fall as an antihistamine to the ragweed? The reflection for that time of year is Goldenrod (Solidago canadensis).
Even though certain plants are not at their peak all season long, there are other plants to help with the ailments that are happening all through the year. That’s the amazing news! Because I don’t think humans have been evolving through nature, only to have one type of medicine in place, and then be gone with no other solutions for the rest of the year. There’s always some herbs, some plant that’s at a certain stage that can be used for those problems.
What we need is here
The solution is reflected with the problem.
Solutions are challenging to see when the force of that discomfort is strong and loud.
It’s reflected in the opposite way.
When the problem feels complex,
we tend to think,
the solution needs to be that too.
But . . . what if . . .
the problem wasn’t the complexity.
Instead the feelings of the problem
Is what . . .
Feels. . .
SO BIG and complex,
though,
Not,
Unsurmountable.
I reflect more about this in my podcast which you can find at the top of this blog post.
Plant pictures below.
round leafed sundew Drosera rotundifolia L. – I’ve only seen sundews in bogs. I was surprised to see this tiny one hanging onto the shoreline where people and dogs enter the water. It is very tiny!
Red or Purple Milkweed (Asclepias rubra or purpurascens) – I know this is a butterfly/milkweed plant. The exact species I’m not sure of. It had very large leaves and a pod that was very narrow and long. It was the most unusual milkweed that I’ve seen.
wintergreen leaves, (Gaultheria procumbans) – there was lots of wintergreen covering the ground. Looks like some of the leaves were losing their green pigment and showing off the red, orange, and bronze.
self heal, (Prunella vulgaris) – flowers are coming to the end of their blooming peak
This is a walking stick hanging out on the car. I love to see them! I’ve lived in Wisconsin all my life and have only seen a handful. They always seem to come out of no where. Super camo!
Sweet Fern, Comptonia peregrina – This shrub has a beautiful aroma when the leaves are crushed.
These are blackberry plants. I can tell because the receptacle is still attached and fills the center (Left image shows this).
Which archetype represents your Herbal Pathway? Take the Archetypes Quiz here: bit.ly/QuizArchetypes
