SPIRITUAL GARDENING
by Bob Makransky
(excerpted from the author's book Magical Living)
The time when humankind decided to move from silent knowledge to reason was the same time it moved from hunting and gathering to
agriculture. Agriculture was not undertaken because big game had
died off, or any such reason, but rather because humanity wanted
to experiment with thinking, social organization, etc. The human
and grain gods made a deal at that point to help each other out.
A similar deal was struck with e.g. the bovine god. Cows, in
return for the loss of a certain measure of freedom (reduction to
the status of property, having their children taken away from
them, etc.), received in return freedom from random predators and
the condition of something to be protected and defended by some
pretty intense little monkey-like creatures.
Similarly, the way back to silent knowledge is through hunting.
However it is possible to apply much silent knowledge to the
practice of agriculture - hence these lessons. What follows are
some samples of notes I've channeled regarding agriculture.
Q: How should I control insects and diseases in my garden?
A: Put three pieces of copal (or any acrid incense, such as
patchouli) in your censer, and waft the smoke towards each
infected plant as you walk down the row. At the same time, ask
the afflicting agent to please leave your plants alone because
you need them. You should feel as though the incense smoke is
carrying your thought towards the plants. It's a good idea to
leave a plant or two (maybe the one or ones at the end of each
row, so you remember) for the insects or disease. Don't waft
incense at these plants. Tell the insects or disease that these
plants are for them. Be nice about it. Be sincere. Mean what
you say. Say it out loud.
Frankincense (or any light, happy incense such as sandalwood) is
used to prevent disease and insect infestations (where copal is
used to cure infected plants). Waft the incense towards each
plant in turn, sending that plant the wish that it will grow well
and be fruitful. It is best to be naked when you do this (or any
gardening), simply because that is the most joyous way of doing
it. This means gardening at night, in the moonlight, so the
neighbors won't see you.
Q: Will this method work for anyone?
A: It will work for anyone who believes in it and means what
they are telling the animals or plants. Actually, the incense is
completely unnecessary. That's just for you, to help you pay
attention to what you're doing and give you the sense that you're
doing something "magical". It's the thoughts and desires that
you have and express that are the gist of the matter.
Q: What do I do about gophers?
A: Dig out the gophers' burrow and put a trap in it, to trap one
gopher. It must be a trap which catches the gopher alive and
unhurt. Take the captured gopher to a cage in a dark, protected
place, and give it food and water every day. Talk to it gently
when you bring its food and water. Tell it you won't hurt it -
in fact, you'll let it go - but it must take a message back to
its brothers.
Keep this up (talking gently to the gopher when you feed it)
until you have gained its trust. This doesn't mean friendship or
petting it, but rather until it knows it has nothing to fear from
you. How long this takes will depend upon you and the gopher.
When you sense that it is calm (unthreatened) in your presence,
tell it that it and all its brother gophers must leave your
garden and orchard. Appoint some other place on your land where
you don't care if there are gophers, and tell the captured gopher
that it and its fellows must move to this other place. If you
want to sweeten the deal, promise that you'll plant sweet
potatoes or beets at this other place just for them. If you do
make a promise like this, you must keep it.
Then, after repeating this message to the captured gopher for
some days (until you feel it has "understood"), release the
gopher back into its tunnel, bidding it to take this message to
its fellows.
This same method will work for cutter ants. Stand over their
trail while they are working (it won't work if they can't hear
you), and ask them to please find food in some other direction,
as you need these trees yourself. Be polite. One such
treatment should be enough. If it isn't, repeat the next day,
but ask them why they didn't obey you the first time. Write down
their answer as you are writing this (by automatic writing). You
may have to work out some sort of compromise or make a deal with
them.
Q: What about planting our own bananas?
A: Bananas are your angels. Anything coming from them is love -
love - love, from the tenderness of young leaves to happy,
humorous browning splotched leaves, to the spongy, thick, soggy
stems. And the tall, older leaves. They all fully participate
in love. Of all plants, these will give and receive love more
than any other. Their blessings come down with a gentle, steady
flow of love droplets.
This is why you must always have bananas growing close to
wherever you live (preferably fruiting, not ornamental,
varieties). If you ever go North at least grow one as a pot
plant. There is no greater gift you can give to those in the
North than these plants.
Q: What about Biodynamic techniques?
A: Yes. Steiner's techniques as enunciated in his lectures on
agriculture are excellent. He was a genius, and in touch with
the spirit keepers of agricultural knowledge (as were also the
founders of Findhorn). However, Steiner's techniques are no more
valid than the ones we are channeling to you; they are merely
more detailed, more specific, and more complex. A professional
farmer would do well following Steiner. And anyone who elects to
use Steiner's methods would do better making the formulations
themselves rather than buying them ready-made. The important
thing is to put one's own, personal vibration into the soil and
plants. Stirring plain water - joyously - for hours and then
spraying it on the soil or plants is better than using store-
bought formulations and not stirring long enough, or stirring
without a joyous heart. Everything you do in agriculture should
be done with joy, or else you are better off not doing it at all.
Fortunately agriculture is innately a joyous occupation, so this
isn't hard to do.
Q: Steiner had a lot of wacky techniques for dealing with weeds,
insects, and disease; but even Pfeiffer and his other followers
admit they don't work. Why not?
A: Because they doubt they'd work. It is your (and Pfeiffer's)
doubt that keeps these techniques from working. If you had no
doubt whatsoever that they'd work, they'd work.
That's the only reason your rationalist / materialistic world
"works" - that when you turn on a TV, it turns on - is because
you believe it. If you believed in these techniques with the
same certainty that you believe turning a key in an ignition will
start a car, then they would work.
Q: How should I graft?
A: As usual. However, fill the censer with frankincense (or
sandalwood). Cense the tree from which the scions are to be
taken. Tell it that you are sorry to hurt it, but that the twigs
you are taking will become new little trees. Ask if this is
okay.
Cense the scions with the wish that they take and prosper. Cense
the rootstocks and apologize for hurting them, and tell them they
will be getting new "heads" which are more productive, and that
they will soon be living in the actual earth. If you feel that a
particular scion or rootstock objects, then don't graft that one.
It wouldn't take anyway. Then graft as usual, but as you do each
graft talk to the stock and scion and wish them well, that they
may join and prosper and be fruitful.
After grafting, run your hand gently up the rootstock and scion,
and as you do so visualize in your mind's eye the graft taking
and healing, the tree growing from a sapling to a young tree to a
mature tree; and as your hand passes above the top of the scion,
look up and see the mature tree full of fruit.
Then bend down and kiss the graft, with the wish that it will
take and the tree prosper. Do this with true love and good
feeling. And then commend the tree to the earth.
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