My individual tree communication experiences, as noted in “Top 50 Peak Spiritual/Mystical Experiences” and repeated below here.
by Don Chapin
28. Redwood communication, August 6, 2008 –
On the way to the coast through the redwoods, doing “my thing” in attempting to merge energies/commune with those magnificent trees… this time received an almost overwhelming feeling of love. Later that day, while meditating in the hotel room in Gold Beach, I “learned” that this global meditation can also take the form of tapping into the love I felt coming at me this morning, adding the pink light/God’s love and feeding all of that back to Earth. Very interesting concept… and it works!
38. Redwood consciousness, December 29, 2011
CA 1 and the Redwoods… the next-to-last day of a week-long driving loop. encompassing the Bay area, SF, Santa Rosa and a coastal drive, back to Talent, OR.
In a trip leg from Mendocino to Crescent City, the drive from Mendocino on CA 1 to where CA 1 intersects with 101, traverses a tremendous, apparently virgin Redwood forest that is absolutely astounding. I started to extend my consciousness through the forest as I have done on many previous occasions, but then something began to “happen.” While driving through the myriad twists, turns and switchbacks, I suddenly began experiencing intense feelings of completeness and joy… an indescribable spiritually uplifting event that, except for having to accomplish the driving, would have reduced me to tears. I experienced tremendous waves of thankfulness that these magnificent plants existed, along with their natural supporting undergrowth, and could feel their presence as an integral part of my own presence.
The next day, leaving Crescent City and driving thru the redwoods on route 199, I experienced the distinct feeling that these trees were communicating telepathically… no, that word (telepathic) implies a conscious effort and this communication capability was inherent. Further, this capability extends to “lower” forms of vegetation, as well, potentially including fields of corn or wheat, for example. This communication is similar in concept to that attributed to “the field” of quantum physics, yet different in that it is limited to plants, with an occasional opening to other life forms, such as I might have been briefly exposed. (See quote of the Mayan priest/shaman in Topic #5.)
Postscript, Dec 30 thru Jan 1: Have been experiencing uncharacteristic bouts of “spaciness” and vertigo(1). In a telephone discussion with a friend on Jan 1, he later said he’d immediately picked up on a very “spacey” quality in my voice.
Postscript, Jan 1 thru Jan 6 (and beyond): The “spaciness” and vertigo disappeared as I got into end-of-year spreadsheet updating, but then I was experiencing “fast-flying-knats” that rapidly traversed my visual field, top to bottom. Initially, as an automatic reaction, I’d swat my upper chest in an attempt to smack them, only to eventually discover there was no “them,” including this being the time of year that bugs of this nature weren’t around.
(1) O.K., I’d just turned 73 and have experienced some light vertigo periods in the last few months, but this level of intensity is relatively sudden, a much heavier-than-usual experience, and accompanied by this “spaciness,” which is quite uncharacteristic. Yet, it is forcing me to be far more conscious of “the now,” and to not take even normal body movement for granted. Also, having previously been a Type A working personality, I’m now experiencing a far more laid-back outlook, at a considerably deeper level than I had intellectually been attempting to incorporate previously.
5. Tree talk, 1990
Several years earlier, in late 1974 and 1975, I use to make several trips to Arnold Engineering Development Center near Tullahoma, TN, driving from the Nashville airport down I-24, which was tree- lined fro many miles. It was such a beautiful area, that I often “extended my consciousness” while driving to “touch” the mostly evergreen trees on each side of the highway.
Now, in 1990, Diane and I often drove from Santa Rosa, CA out to the coast near Jenner, going through the redwoods west of Guerneville. It was, again, such a beautiful area that, on the first such trip, I again began extending my consciousness as I had done in Tennessee. However, this time I received a shocking surprise, to the extent that I had to really concentrate on staying on the road. I received a response back from those redwoods that said “Hello, old friend. It’s been a long time.”
And here we think of trees and other vegetation as independent plants without a thought process or consciousness????
Quote – Hunbatz Men, Mayan priest/shaman, or ‘day keeper’ on Yucatan Peninsula (from p. 297 of The Mystery of the Crystal Skulls, Morton & Thomas):
‘… people in America and in Britain they are now destroying the jungles, even as far away as Brazil. But even though Brazil is a long way from the United States it does not mean that the Earth changes we accelerate there are not going to affect the United States. And because they are killing the trees in Brazil now the trees in the Mayan area are also beginning to die. Because all the trees in the world they can communicate. The Maya, we say, don’t kill any tree because if you kill any tree you are killing your family. When you kill a tree it is like killing your own brother or sister. In that way, the Maya, we believe in the trees. But the trees are only one part of the Mother. The trees are for the Maya the skin of our mother, and the oil it is the blood, and the rivers they are her sweat, her perspiration. But the mistakes today they are accelerating her life and now it is not good because the big change is coming.’
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I’m Hannah West, editor and webmistress of Light-Path-Resources.org. While I usually publish Don’s own writings and important finds, I have had a few of my own “peak” experiences. I’ve mentioned this one to him enough times that he asked me to share it here.
At the time of this adventure, I and my family lived in Three Rivers, California, about one mile from the north entrance to Sequoia National Park. On January 1, 2000, we and friends visiting for the holiday decided to visit the park. Perhaps all the furor surrounding the potential end of civilization made it seem like a good idea to see some things that were not vulnerable to the vagaries of the internet and the availability of electricity. Living things that had been around for thousands of years without any help from us. Big, ancient trees.
We visited General Sherman. Tall, huge, and inspiring. Lots of people around.
We climbed up to Morro Rock. There is a tree that grows from the rock (not a sequoia) that has an awesomeness all its own.
Then we decided to walk the Congress Trail.
The trees on this trail aren’t as old or as monstrous as General Sherman (one of the oldest things and the single largest living thing on Earth by mass) but there are a lot of them and they’re massive in their own right, so it’s a beautiful walk. Because the forest floor muffles sound so effectively, it’s also quiet. Not eerie quiet. Kind of like the kind of quiet you get when there’s a layer of new-fallen snow on the ground…living…holy…mystic…peaceful. Even our boisterous friends seemed to simmer down in the presence of these mighty elders.
As we walked through this ancestral grove, I sensed a tree calling to me. Not by name, but by spirit. I don’t know how else to explain it but a wordless calling. Heeding that call, I did what you’re absolutely not supposed to do here in order to protect these living treasures…I stepped off the path and walked right up to that tree. I looked up its trunk…so tall, it touched the sky. I threw my arms around it and tenderly laid my cheek against its rough, fibrous red bark.
In return, that majestic living being filled me with a tremendous rush of joy. Not a rush as in “headrush.” A rush like a firehose, like a tsunami. No. Not like those at all, though every bit as powerful and then some. It was so gentle, so tender, as if it knew me personally and really wanted to take this opportunity to share some of itself that day. A rush like a magnificent fountain…a fountain of joy.
It started in my feet and rose through me from bottom to top, cleansing me, opening me, filling me. I drank it in like a thirsty creature in a desert. It filled me to overflowing. I was done. So done. I became the fountain, and I could feel joy pulsing through me like a force of nature, pouring out the top of my head and crashing back to the forest floor beneath my feet. Tears streamed down my face as I laughed and sobbed uncontrollably.
In those few moments, I was changed forever by the revelation of the joy this generous creature had accumulated in its thousands of years of life on Earth.
There it stood, right where it had sprouted millennia earlier. It had seen uncountable moments of life in its own forest and though it had never moved, it had been alive and aware, there to witness the rises and falls of many civilizations near and far. It had been a friend to indigenous people and to countless other living creatures. It had borne children and survived many a fire, a storm, a logger’s blade, and who knows what else. This joy not only stood the tests of time but grew and magnified with every passing moment. The tree’s gratitude for every second of its life was intense, indomitable, insurmountable…as deep and profound as the ocean of God’s love, as infinite and boundless as the night sky.
I was breathless as my tree destroyed and then surpassed my previous understanding of joy. It took my understanding of kismet (the will of God) to an entirely new level. I had experienced it before, but this was an entirely new and far more powerful experience of what Rumi called “fanaa,” the evanescence of the soul as it dies to self and is filled, replaced with the eternal, mysterious divine…touching, melding with, becoming one with the ineffable presence of The One. The Creator. The Living God. Oh yeah. All I had ever desired came to me in one wordless embrace.
My husband spotted it first and gave the others a heads up. “Look out, everyone, Hannah just got filled with the Holy Spirit!!” I stumbled, swooning, back onto the path, ran to him, and threw my arms around his shoulders as we walked. The tears dried on my cheeks and the laughter turned to peaceful introspection as we walked through the forest back to our car and drove home.
Now I think of that tree almost every day, remembering the powerful force of joy it poured through me. It didn’t reveal its name and I didn’t want to be disrespectful by giving it one, but I know we will recognize each other when we meet again. And on that day I will feel it calling to me as it did all those years ago. I will run up and fling my arms around its massive trunk again. I will look up and touch the sky. And perhaps I will even be able to show my dear, beloved old friend how much its fountain of joy taught me about the joy of life…and the importance of sharing that joy along the way.