Guest Blog by Naturalist Kate Porter: The Plants

Ficus gracing the lobby of the Well-Being Center for Health.  Other plants at the Center include Prayer plant, Vining-Hearts, Swiss-Cheese Plant, Chinese Evergreen, Peace Lily, and Dracaena

Guest blogger Kate Porter is a naturalist, gardener, plant-whisper, soap maker and avid snow-shoer.  She has often admired the plant life at the Center.  I asked her write this blog entry telling us what she sees from the perspective of one who knows plants.


Kate, take it away.....

One of the first things I noticed on walking into the Well-Being Center for Health was how many huge, happy plants they had around the office. Clearly, some folks with serious green thumbs were working here.  I was particularly struck by a big, old ornamental begonia, the same kind I'd recently seen Martha Stewart posing with on the cover of some magazine at the supermarket. I mean, if Martha Stewart was endorsing this plant, you know it's going to be a pain in the you-know-what to take care of. And yet, here it was, thriving in the lobby of the Well Being Center for Health.

You can't fake a love of plants. Folks that get plants because they like the idea of having them often have trouble keeping them alive, especially the more sensitive ones. It takes a degree of awareness and level of attention that just isn't possible in the absence of love. (Take hibiscus, for instance: in order to nurse a hibiscus through the winter you have to practically commune with the thing on a daily basis, tenderly spraying the undersides of its leaves to prevent spider mites from devouring it, carefully monitoring the moisture level of the soil so that all the leaves don't suddenly fall off).

This is why I always take it as a tremendously good sign when a health practice has lots of big, beautiful plants. Plants are like a living testimonial to the kinds of people who work in a health practice and the sort of care you can expect to receive: here are people who are sensitive to the nuances of spaces, who pay attention and care.

Beyond the obvious statements plants make about spaces and the people who create them, they also have an impact on the health of places and the people who inhabit them. Buildings and indoor spaces - like it or not - have significantly poorer air quality than the out-of-doors. Some common indoor air pollutants include benzene, formaldehyde and trichloroethylene. Even mild exposures to these common toxins can cause symptoms like dry eyes, chronic sore throats and headaches.

Concerned about air-quality issues on space-ships, a NASA scientist did a bunch of research on a variety of common houseplants back in the 1970's. This guy discovered that a large houseplant can filter up to 87% of the air toxins out of a room within 24 hours. As a general rule of thumb, I've heard that one large houseplant for every 100 square feet does the trick.

Beyond what NASA has to say about the value of houseplants, anyone who has ever been to the Well-Being Center for Health, someone's house who has a lot of plants, or inside a greenhouse, intuitively knows that being around plants makes you feel better. They help you relax and heal, they improve your outlook on life. And it goes without saying that a relaxed, positive attitude can have a dramatic impact on what we experience and create.

Confessions of a Dictator – 20 Massages in 2 Months (Massage #19 continued)

As with previous massages, during Massage #19 I asked Avery to focus on muscles group and energy releases in the pelvic, lumbar and upper leg area including psoas, gluts, QL muscles, adductors and sit bones. 

As Avery worked my sit bones she relayed an intuitive message, “in your sit bones I am getting that a key to resolving issues with your inner attorney is to sit down and listen, not you, Ahnday, but you, your inner attorney, he needs to sit down and really listen.”

“That would make sense,” I replied, “I feel like I’m running on three cylinders instead of six. He can't stop fighting, arguing and protesting change.  Yet he is the emissary.  I need his energy, especially for writing, since it is the light of the loving masculine that makes articulate the deep knowing of the feminine."

As the massage progressed, I began to see my inner attorney in a new light. Subdued by his full-body cast (again, I am not certain how he got this way – honest!) he was able be more present with my inner dancer, the feminine, as well as with himself. He was able to really sit down and listen.

Restrained by his cast, he went into a kind of retreat, promising to emerge a more hopefuld an willing man.  He began confessing that in truth he did not like begin locked up in an office all day long researching the law, fighting with opposing counsel and writing legal briefs.  He admitted that he missed the outdoors and resented the fact that he just could not be as creative in his work as he wanted to be.  He divulged that he loathed neck ties and the feeling of constriction they created at his throat and that he was tired of being isolated in this profession of worry, control and always having to be right.  As he talked, he lightened up and began discussing with my inner-dancer what a life that was productive, healthy and enjoyable would look like.

“I think it’s the case that sometimes we need to be restrained, to be put in a full body cast or the equivalent in order to be willing to change,” commented Avery.

At the end of Massage #19 I felt good and not just physically.  The willingness of Avery and other therapists at the Well-Being Center for Health to explore the mysteries of the body, energy anatomy, and spiritual transformation, brought insight where once there was obscurity. 

For instance, through this massage marathon I learned that the numbness in my right arm resulted from the emotional and the physical and that my inner-attorney, who symbolized my lower ego during this time, was, in ways I had not recognized, still ruling my consciousness and my life.  I also learned that one key to getting my inner attorney to relinquish control and work in partnership with other aspect of self was to get him in the position – in a full-body cast if necessary - of listening to his own feelings and feelings of others.  Through this process of deep listening and feeling relationships heal, common ground is broached and peace is established.

I felt that during Massage #19 my discussion with Avery had helped bring issues explored during this massage marathon to fruition.  I was feeling confident in my new understanding. Though we had not exhausted the mysteries, we had, I thought, succeeded in gaining enough understanding to apply new concepts and principles in the future.  In fact, it was as if these spiritual issues were loose ends and we had managed to tie them into a neat bow.  

At the end of Massage #19 Avery loaned me a book on Jin Shin Do that explains, among other things, how to perform acupressure releases on the self. As I biked home I looked forward to Massage #20.  I believed this final treatment would simply repeat the insights of previous massages and be a gentle, relaxing and peaceful way to say goodbye to this massage odyssey.

I was wrong on several counts!

Making Friends with Lucifer - 20 Massages in 2 Months (Massage #19 continued)

This conversation with Avery reminded me of a small museum in the city of Antigua. I had the pleasure of visiting this museum in 2008 when traveling in Guatemala.  The museum was dedicated to the work of local artisans who, though once Mayan, or other indigenous tradition, now practice a "blended" form of Catholicism in which indigenous rituals and understandings are “hidden in” Catholic symbols, saints and rituals.   

For instance, households in Guatemala might carve a wooden statue of Christ. Each year the statue is repainted in a ritual which is also part of the annual Christmas celebration.  Over many years these statutes become beautiful pieces of folk art layered in ritual paint.

In the museum a platform of large, hand carved statues of Lucifer caught my eye.  These statues resembled the version of the Devil I grew up with one notable exception.  Painted in several layers of blood red paint, the statues had horns, large pitchforks, pointy tails, menacing facial expressions and over-sized red phalluses that protruded from the pubic area of each statue with such prominence it was as if they were trying to make a point!

Equally striking was a phrase printed in the museum’s educational literature to the effect that in this "blended" tradition Lucifer was seen and related to as a teacher. 

This idea of darkness as a teacher made intuitive sense to me.  After all, if we believe that Loving Light is in fact stronger that the light comprising Lucifer, then the idea that Evil or Ego has something to teach those seeking the Divine is ultimately empowering. I suppose the New Age version of this teaching might be the command to, "embrace the shadow."

This idea of Lucifer or Ego or Shadow as teacher suggests that it is possible to relate to these less pleasant energies - energies provoking our greatest fear - in a healthy way that promotes enlightenment and a closer relationship with the Divine. If it is indeed the case that Ego need not overpower us, then it must be possible to relate to Ego in a way that “embraces” and also transforms it into loving energy.  In this idea of Lucifer or Ego as teacher is much hope and much power!

(If I have one regret about this trip to Guatemala it is that I did not bring home one of these Lucifer statues!)

As Avery finished her work on the Jin Shin Do release points in the shoulder and began side-lying work, I mentioned to her that as with Massage #18, my inner dancer (the feminine) had stopped preparing to dance, had left her studio and was now vociferously demanding change from the inner-attorney (the masculine).  Likewise, as with Massage #18 my inner-attorney lay restrained (and subdued) in a full body cast.

If Ego is my teacher, it follows that Ego, can help me understand my relationship to that which drives him - fear.  It follows that Ego can help me understand the ways I manage – and avoid confronting - my deepest fears through control of self, others and the environment. 

If Ego is my teacher, what then am I to learn from my inner-attorney and his current interlude with the body cast?  This is my question.

(for more, see next post)