©2007 Deborah Bier, Ph.D.
When we first moved to our current home in the late 1980s, there were three willow trees gracing our park-like corner, a spot which all who come and go to the neighborhood must pass along their way. Certainly no older than the age of the house, built in 1952, they were part of a distinctive and lovely piece of open space.
At that time, one of these willows had some health problems, and as a result some lower limbs were removed. My husband decided to paint the resulting wounds with just any old paint he had hanging around the house -- in this case, a rather ugly brown. It was unusually irritating to me, seeing those brown wounds against the gray bark... and why just regular latex paint? Over time, more limb problems developed, and the tree became badly misshapened as more were lopped off.
Perhaps fifteen years ago I began to campaign to have this tree taken down. Knowing my husband loves to cut down trees when needed, I was surprised that he utterly ignored my requests. In fact, during that time he took down one of the other willows -- a perfectly lovely and healthy one -- claiming that I had asked him to! I was thoroughly offended, as were several neighbors who loved that tree. My slow burn of anger and resentment smoldered ever more brightly.
The tree developed a row of shelf fungus: surely a sign of serious interior rot. (By the way: all photos on this page except for the one of the shelf fungus are of the actual willow tree in question.) About a block away, a very large willow with substantial shelf fungus fell in a bad windstorm, crushing the homeowner's car in his driveway and piercing his roof. Why weren't we heeding this sign and taking our tree down, which surely wasn't healthy and in potential danger of falling into the street?
Every time I saw this willow, the same thing would play in my head. The tree itself had told me of its readiness to be taken down -- that it had completed this part of its lifecycle. Why was it still here? Why have I been ignored all this time? Why did he cut down such a nice willow, leaving this horrid-looking one here instead? My resentment built; I stewed and fumed internally. A small nagging wound opened up inside of me -- one that a coat of ugly brown latex paint could not even begin to address.
Last Winter as we were clearing brush in that part of the property, I took a look at this willow and actually laughed. Large holes had opened up in its trunk -- you could see right through it! My husband finally agreed: this tree needed to come down. We saw that the inside was mainly filled with sawdust and soft, rotting pith -- it seemed only the tree's bark was holding it together and upright!
We noticed that one of the holes you could see through was almost perfectly heart-shaped, ringed by scar tissue -- about 10" in diameter. At that moment I realized that all along I had been ignoring the spiritual meaning of the relationship this tree and I had developed, which was now suddenly made clear to me. The classic understanding of Willow flower essence is that it is for resentment, bitterness and blame, plus an inability to forgive. How had I not noticed that for years I had been behaving in an absolutely classic Willow way, harping on the problem and bitterly resenting my husband for not taking down this tree earlier? The willow's deterioration showed me that surely, resentment and bitterness rots from within. Such a habit makes you empty and hollow -- and it errodes holes into your heart. And the longer you hold on to the bitterness, the more it can rot your core... and the more you eat your heart out.
This Spring while we were burning brush, we took the willow down. I had been talking with the tree for months, telling it of our plans, and we were both ready. The tree and I agreed that burning was appropriate and that it would be done with ceremony, respect and awareness, during which I would work to release the relationship between the tree and myself -- and the resentment I had formed regarding this tree. We de-limbed the trunk, feeding the branches to the fire, as I internally took direction from the tree and the gathered spirits. "Notice everything," they all directed. The afternoon took on a crystalline clarity, and an out-of-time quality.
The wind had been steady from the east as I examined the holes that had developed in my own heart. I committed my resentment and bitterness to the cleansing flames as the willow herself burned. Examining myself and parts of my past, there was a moment when I saw my heart as ugly and foul -- and I felt ashamed. I was reminded of the two young crab apple trees I had pruned just before we lit the fire. I called on those crab apples, knowing that Crab Apple essence is for cleansing, and for healing feelings of ugliness and shame. Immediately the wind reversed and blew from the west. My heart instantly felt capable of purity and wholeness again, the shame vanishing.
This was just a couple of days after the massacre of 30 people by a lone gunman at Virginia Tech. As the willow burned, I thought of the bitterness, blame and resentment that would be natural to develop around these events. How easy would it be for the survivors to heal and forgive? I asked the energy released from the burning willow to help heal the anger and pain of those on that campus. And to my wonder, immediately the wind shifted again, and for the first time since we lit the fire, it blew willow smoke directly to the southwest. Being in Massachusetts, this is exactly the right linear direction for the smoke to travel to Virginia.
We dragged the hollow 10-foot section of the trunk onto the fire, attaching it with ropes to the pick-up truck. As it burned, I was told that the stump would sprout and that I would be asked to make an essence from it. Willows have an amazing regenerative power -- something that shows clearly in the essence's signature, and in both the balanced and unbalanced Willow states. A gardening friend recounts that when she was three years old, she planted some sticks in the earth and they sprouted! She thought she was able to perform magic -- but the magic was that she had planted willow twigs, which are known to sprout with little-to-no encouragement. So, too, do anger and resentment -- and they're not that easy to extinguish, are they?
To me, this shows how our life force (surely our most amazing magic) and our anger can try to occupy the same seat. In a variety of forms of non-Western medicine, anger is considered to be an unbalanced state of liver energy. If you examine the English word, you see "liver" can be "live-er" -- meaning one who lives. In Deborah Craydon's book, Floral Acupuncture, the treatment given with the Willow flower essence calls for applying it to a liver point called the "Middle Seal." This "... retrieves your ability to wield ultimate authority through your own internal power... help[ing] you release the stones of indignation and to forgive the actions of others... " (Had I mentioned before that the neighbor whose willow had crushed his car and roof was at that time dying of liver cancer? Perhaps his tree also was having a conversation with him... )
All Summer, I've looked for signs of sprouting suckers around the stump to no avail. Just last week, however, I noticed that a 2-foot section of trunk had been left on top of a woodpile, and THAT is what is sprouting. So, the willow's life continues. I will make the requested essence from that source... and the story and life cycle continues with new life and new growth arising from letting go of that tree and all the resentments that accumulated around it.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Deborah Bier, Ph.D., is a holistic healthcare practitioner in private practice in Concord, MA. She has recently published Healthy Connections: Flower Essences for Better Family, Friend and Work Relationships and Learning About Vibrational Essences. She is also the maker of the Whole Energy Essences, and Publisher/Co-Editor of this Ezine. She is available for private consultations. Read more of her work in Vibration Magazine here.
DESIGN CREDITS: This page was designed by Deborah Bier; photos are from the author and from Clipart.com.
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