When we speak of sending healing or praying for healing "for the good of all," many restrict their focus to "the good of all living people." I am increasingly coming to believe that it is important to expand our focus to include all other conscious living organisms, and Gaiag

The greatest challenge in our world today is for humanity to grow beyond our separations – from each other, from the world on and in which we live, and from the Divine.
 
The governments of the world have not been able thus far to transcend local, individual, self-interests – to cooperate and collaborate in solving global problems that threaten the survival of all life on our planet as we know it. We face growing threats of overpopulation, poor uses and exhaustion of water and other natural resources, nuclear holocaust, and global heating.

None of these issues is being addressed in truly collaborative, trans-national, global healing manners. In this blog entry and several ones to follow, I share my educated opinions, enhanced by my intuitive sense of how we might address these separations.

Let me start with our separation from other living organisms.

Most of us have become distanced from Nature through our urbanization. We may have a garden - but this is more often a hobby for show; an adornment to our dwelling; or an expectation of our social circle – than an entity we connect with in a serious way through heart and spirit.

Plants as foods are found in the market, divorced from the natural processes of preparing the soil, planting, watering, weeding, dealing with pests and diseases and harvesting. To these are added the further distancings of removing inedible parts of the plants, preserving, packing, shipping and distribution.

Meat, poultry and fish are divorced from breeding, birthing, raising, dealing with animal health issues, slaughtering, butchering and then again the preserving, packing, shipping and distribution.

Most of those who raise the plants and animals have come to view them as products of their labors; as commodities to be manipulated to best advantage; as investments to be maximized; in short, as "things" rather than living organisms. One has only to look at a chicken farm that has been optimized to contain the maximum number of birds per cubic meter to see that we are not relating to animals as conscious, living beings. Our gardens may similarly be filled with "things" that we manipulate to our aesthetic tastes and conveniences. We do not sense an individual plant or tree as a living being with its own consciousness.

In short, we have lost the sense of the individuality of living organisms that nurture our body and soul by giving of themselves for our pleasure, convenience and sustenance. Most of us have little awareness of the consciousness in other living species. We perceive them as "less than human" and therefore feel entitled and empowered to use and exploit them at our will and whim.

Many religions teach that humans are the pinacle of Creation, and that other living organisms were created to serve our needs. While we may thank the Creator as we use and consume them, we feel no inclinations, much less obligation, to thank these living plants and animals them for their sacrifices – often giving not only of their fruits but rather their individual lives – for our benefits.

My first personal introduction to the consciousness in plants was in a visit the Findhorn community, in 1978, on the north shore of Scotland. There, Peter and Eileen Caddy, with Dorothy Maclean, produced unusually large and healthy fruits, vegetables and flowers in a climate that is cold and inhospitable outside of the very short growing season. Their innovative ingredient was talking to the plants and to the nature spirits who help them grow. They acknowledged not only each and every element of the land and every living organism as sentient partners on their farm but also had names and vividly clear personalities for other parts of their environment that most of us would consider to be inanimate – such as their cars and the communal dishwasher.

I was not prepared to accept that trees complained to the sensitives at Findhorn when they had been cut down without anyone explaining to them first why they were being taken down; not that they were appeased when sensitives sat in meditation to apologize and explain that they were overgrown and shadowing the garden so that little else could grow there.

I came away considering these were most likely quaint projections of people’s fantasies, intuitive/ psychic perceptions or simply folklore. Over the years, I read of others who shared these views and reported in detail their communications with garden plants, worms, cats, dogs, horses, trees, rocks and nature spirits. A growing chorus of believers/ experiencers I found increasingly difficult to dismiss.

Being a psychiatrist, and knowing all of the ways that I could deceive myself through wishful thinking, fantasies and anxieties, I still wavered and vacillated for many years between accepting my intuitive understanding of the world and writing off these ideas as dreams and projections of my own mind. I diligently read many reports from intuitives who sense a living consciousness in plants and animals that is every bit as worthy of consideration and respect as is human consciousness. I share the evidence I gathered in Healing Research, Volume 3. This collection of diverse confirmations has helped me to know that I am at least not alone in holding these beliefs, and probably in the good company of people who engage the world on levels that transcend in very healing ways most of the very limited information on living consciousness that I was taught in private and public schools, university, medical school, and extensive training and courses in psychiatry and continuing medical education.

More importantly, I developed and learned – though ever so slowly – to trust my own intuitive sensitivities and healing gifts. I have come to develop my own intuitive awarenesses of plant and animal consciousness. I may sense when one of my houseplants is thirsty; when a dog that is approaching me on a street is okay to reach out for a petting; and when an animal is in pain or other discomfort. This is far, as yet, from the detailed communications of animal 'whisperers,' but it is enough to convince me personally that this is not only possible but vitally real and important.

Look for another blog entry soon: Suggestions for connecting with all living beings on our planet.