visionary plants

Regularly i am in a rush when i hop in the car and go screaming backwards down the steep incline that is my driveway. Regularly i am in a rush to get home when i go screaming up the driveway, ending whatever activity took me away from home. Using the driveway is routine, a natural part of my everyday existence.

Driveways connect us with the world. Driveways create an impression about your home and way of life.
Driveways are a necessary evil that accommodate our comings and goings. They are something we don't ordinarily consider unless we are making them or repairing them for they are used mindlessly.

Every day i use the driveway to enter and exit my home. Everyday, the existence of one plant
creates an environment of happiness. This one plant constantly reminds me of how easy it is to create a positive attitude.

Visionary plants can have an affect upon one's psyche according to herbalists and researchers. They can touch us in ways that may change our lives. Visionary plants were usually ingested and or smoked and came to be synonymous with 1960's western hippie culture.

"The common denominator of this otherwise rich and ramified group of
phenomena is the subject's feeling that his or her consciousness has expanded
beyond the usual ego boundaries and has transcended the limitations of time
and space" (Grof 1985, 127-129).

Plants such as these can be powerful agents used to promote self discoveries....but smoking them or ingestion is necessary to create these visionary states. My plant only requires a glance for natures "voice" to speak.

i am not in any way shape or form a gardener. In fact i have a purple thumb when it comes to plants. i have an unusual ability to kill them off and recognize deep in my core that not all of us have the necessary attributes with which to grow plants. i excel in other areas and had i lived in a village would probably be employed making implements for daily living. Villagers would have wanted to keep me far far away from the garden for i may have severely threatened the food supply.

The special plant on my driveway is not strikingly beautiful, it has long trough like leaves a heavy stem and produces one edible fruit. But this one plant in the middle of my driveway directs me everyday to that peaceful place within which helps me work for peace outside myself.

My search today for information on driveways, visionary plants, shamans and pineapples finally lead me to a woman that is called the "Peace Pilgrim." That was her name and she wore a tee shirt that had it emblazoned upon her. She died in 1981 after having spent 28 years walking for Peace.


Some of Peace Pilgrim's own words:

"Do you know God? Do you know there is a power greater than ourselves which manifests itself within us as well as everywhere else in the universe? This I call God. Do you know what it is to know God, to have God's constant guidance, a constant awareness of God's presence? To know God is to reflect love toward all people and all creations. To know God is to feel peace within - a calmness, a serenity, an unshakeableness which enables you to face any situation. To know God is to be so filled with joy that it bubbles over and goes forth to bless the world." (2)

"No one walks so safely as one who walks humbly and harmlessly with great love and great faith. For such a person gets through to the good in others (and there is good in everyone), and therefore cannot be harmed. This works between individuals, it works between groups and it would work between nations if nations had the courage to try it." (3)

"There is a spark of good in everybody, no matter how deeply it may be buried. It is waiting to govern your life gloriously." Peace Pilgrim

Peace Pilgrim has a book that can be obtained for free at:
www.peacepilgrim.com
PS. i have done everything i can to make this link work but the blogger.com interferes.
Copy and paste it to get to the site.
Sorry....maybe it is too peaceful to work.
________________________
(1) Peace Pilgrim. Peace Pilgrim: Her Life and Work in Her Own Words. 1991,
Ocean Tree Books,
Santa Fe, New Mexico. Page 27.
(2) Peace Pilgrim, page 87.
(3) Ibid, page 31.