Elizabeth Keedy

This post is a transcript of a video I recently released through my MOMENTS OF A MYSTIC YouTube channel. You can watch the video below. If you’d like to receive my newsletter, with special offers and updates to my blog, feel free to subscribe 😊.

Last week’s post: Coping With The Grief Of Losing An Animal Companion – Again

Are the trees healthy where you live?

I’m in the UK, and I’ve been noticing for more than a decade that the trees are sick and dying, and it’s getting worse every year. 

As our external environment is a reflection of our inner selves, what does that say about our world?

I first noticed the horse chestnut and the mountain ash getting sick, when I lived in Yorkshire, northern England. And when I moved to the south west of England in early 2020, the trees were the same.

I recently noticed the sweet chestnuts are going the same way, too.

And then we have the Mountain Ash trees, also called the Rowen tree. I’ve been told a few times since I’ve lived in the south west that a batch of trees were imported from Europe to somewhere not too far away. They came with a disease, which spread. And while this might be true, the Mountain Ash have shown signs of decay for years. So, to me, this isn’t new. 

The Mountain Ash are sensitive trees, the last to grow leaves from late Spring to early summer. And the first to lose their leaves in late summer to early autumn. So they’re hardly green for long.

The devastation you see here is in my local woods, where mountain ash trees have been felled to stop their branches from falling on unsuspecting walkers. Large areas are now exposed. Once green and lush. A home to wildlife.

The sycamore are following the chestnut trees, their leaves developing brown patches that spread and shrivel into dried, curled spindly fingers, nothing like the glossy green they once were.

But what concerns me most are the oak trees. The oaks are a mighty tree that live for hundreds, even thousands, of years, if left alone. They grow slowly, forming strong roots that help them stand tall in any storm. The oaks are often home to nature spirits, such as, tree nymphs, dryads, goblins and fairies.

And recently, I’ve noticed early signs of the oak leaves developing these same brown patches. Typically, the oak is the last to lose their leaves in Autumn, often the only green deciduous trees holding their colour as we move into winter. But now, in October, and even though the autumn colours are late this year, very late, in fact, the oaks are showing signs of the same disease.

Some might say it’s the weather conditions. The damaged leaves show signs of a fungal infection. But fungi don’t kill healthy plants. They consume dead and decaying matter. So fungi are not the cause, they are nature’s cleaner uppers.

And even if it was the weather, would that really be the case year after year? And in different areas of the country? No. Something else is going on here.

I spoke to the trees

So, I asked the trees. As I connected with their energy, I felt roots growing from my feet and my arms stretching like branches. I had a sense of quiet power and great wisdom. With peace and stillness. 

A single word came into my mind: contamination. All around, contamination. 

The trees then showed me how they experience our world. At first, I noticed an uncomfortable frequency that went right through me, like scraping nails down a blackboard, but so much worse. I wanted to cover my ears, but the sound was in my head. It made me want to curl up into a ball and scream for it to stop.

Then, I sensed the air around me. My chest felt heavy, like I couldn’t breathe. It made me gasp. The trees reminded me they use carbon dioxide to make oxygen. They are the lungs of this world. And without carbon dioxide and the trees, we, the humans, cannot breathe.

Then I saw water, falling rain, rivers flowing, or stagnant, but the water looked dirty, and felt as if it burnt my skin. 

Contaminated. That word was still echoing through my mind. This environment I experienced, it felt unnatural. Man-made. 

I felt so sad, I felt guilty and sorry. But the trees told me not to cry because life always follows a cycle. And our world is entering the death part of the cycle. Death must happen before rebirth.

The never-ending cycle of life, death, and rebirth happens to everyone and everything. Nothing stays as it is. Everything is always in transition. 

As their energy ebbed away, they left with a parting message: stand strong in your light; don’t let anyone or anything take it.

And as they left, I wept.