Animism & The Plant Spirit Path
In order to engage with the plants on any level beyond the purely anthropocentric and utilitarian, there’s one quite important thing that must be in place- relationship. If we aren’t relating more deeply to the plants, then it makes sense that we can’t really learn directly from them, share with them, work with them to create needed change, and so on. And, in order for those relationships to take place, the plants have to be persons. If plants are just things here to serve the human world, then there is nothing for us to relate to our commune with- the conversation will always be one-sided. But, lucky for us, the plants are in fact people! As human folk, we live in a world that is populated with all kinds of fully sovereign completely conscious, totally aware, and fully cognizant people… and only a small fraction of those people are human like us! The world around us is teeming with life, presence, and consciousness- and this is the essence of our deepest shared spiritual roots; animism.
Animism is the experience that the world is full of persons, only some of whom are human (to loosely paraphrase the scholarly words of the great Graham Harvey). These persons come sin many forms: animals, plants, rivers, mountains, hurricanes, and earthquakes. Many (not all, but many) expressions of our world’s life are indwelled by the presence of a person; a spirit. Most all of us have had this experience at least a few times in our lives, if not since we were wee children. Encountering other and experiencing that other as fully aware of our presence as we were of theirs.
In addition to all of these ‘seen’ persons, there are also hosts of unseen persons who haunt our world. This reality is rooted in the indigenous and ancestral Fairy Faith traditions of Northern European- but can be found equally in all the world’s pre-conversion and pre-colonial spiritual lifeways. From our blessed dead relatives to Fairies, Gnomes, Gods, and Heroes, humans are far from the only persons in the room- and rarely a we even the most powerful (usually just the loudest!).
Plants, in my particular tradition of The Old Ways, occupy a very important part of this animistic experience of the world. They are liminal beings who exist in all the various perspectives of nature at the same time. While the hosts of our Good Fairy Neighbors may experience and perceive the world one way, and our ant friends may perceive the same world in a very different way, and we human folk do our thing, the plants are there in all the parallels of existence.
When we approach a favorite tree or stand of flowering plants, we are seeing, experiencing, and being seen by arcane green spirits who are bridges, gateways, and points of connection between all the worlds and all the perspectives of reality. Here, in the sacred spaces created by plant canopy and root, we are able to reach out and touch the infinite. I often say what we do at the tree we do at the center of the cosmos… and I mean this quite literally. When we have both an understanding and a personal experience of the presence of plants in this way, we can reach out through their liminality to anywhere, anywhen, anything, anyone.
In the deeper aspects of green sorcery, plant spirit work, and the old ways, the reality and immediacy of plant personhood is both essential for the work to happen and the deep mystery that allows the work to happen for the sorcerous seeker. Our willingness to stretch beyond the usual and reach our heartspace into otherness allows for us to experience non-human persons directly and then engage with them intentionally, respectfully, and reciprocally- this process making up the core of all animist traditions no matter where in the world they may be rooted.
So, in our plant spirit work our primary focus is on awakening the ability within ourselves to experience a world full of persons, and then to navigate our spiritual journey through cultivating and nourishing relationships of power, wisdom, guidance, protection, healing, and transformation with these special allies. For me, of course, the focus is on the plant spirits- but I also have many local land spirits, gods and goddesses, heroes, and herbwise ancestors who inform and bless my journey.
If this whole concept is new to you, or if you’d like to dig deeper into the mysteries of animism- I have a gift course you can take right now below, for free, as well as a shorter class that centers how we can reanimate our animism with the help of plants. I hope you’ll drink them both in!
ANIMISM & THE PLANT SPIRIT PATH
THE GREEN ANIMISM COURSE
