It also can be frustrating, worrying and weakening. Crucial here is the question: what has been done to the wood. How was it treated and worked with?
To harvest a tree doesn't mean to kill it. The falling of a mature tree is part of the natural cycle.
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It makes contact with us humans via our senses. We perceive its colour, form and the spirit which has worked it.
A piece of furniture or floor can have a calming, uplifting, joyous effect and supply us with energy. Of what practical value is it for builders and buyers to know about the secret life of trees? From an ecological building point of view, we know that untreated wood is breathing building material; it absorbs, retains, and releases moisture.
In the book of Genesis: The Lord God made to grow from the soil every tree that is pleasant to sight and good for food. The tree of life and the tree of knowledge grow in the middle of the garden.
As such the tree doesn't die when harvested, but when its connections, rhythms and tasks are taken away and when it is banned from the lives of humans.
The death of a tree starts with the destruction of its inherent mystery by wiping out the idea of our natural cycles and the connection between heaven and earth. In many religions and cultures we find trees as symbols for life.
A large variety of wonderful cycles, polar opposites, tensions, rhythms are balancing and harmonizing extremes, shrouding trees in mystery. It is this mysterious vitality behind the tree which decides about its life and death.
The sky's energy floods through the tree into the earth, darkness and light complete each other. A tree is much more than a collection of wooden cells or the sequence of biological reactions.
This energy makes the soil fertile and helps seeds to sprout and grow towards the light of the sun and the cycle closes.
Every tree naturally transmits light into the darkness of the earth and transforms airy energies into solid form. Leaves, needles and branches harness light and the heavenly energies of the sky which then is channeled via the trunk to the roots into the opposite element, the earth. Oxygen, fertility and life reach and penetrate the dark layers of the earth.
The elemental forces touch us when we see how an old oak tree defies a violent autumn storm, when we hear the gentle whisper of Aspen leaves? The language of trees is more beautiful and faceted than anyone could ever put down on paper.
Simply put, the sound of birds promotes the growth of plants. Apart from this, there is a huge amount of interconnection between trees and their environment, which simply keeps us short of words.
Who doesn't know the light and liberating feeling of happiness which overcomes us when looking at a flowering cherry tree in spring? It has been found, that for trees to develop properly, they also need the sound of birds singing!
In this study, it was proven that particular plant cells absorb water and nutrients better with the specific sound frequencies of bird songs. It also affects the sensory world of humans, animals and plants by its form, color and sound.
An example of one of the many ways trees interact with their environment is shown by American research regarding the impact sound frequencies of birds have on the development of plant cells. It carries branches with needles or leaves, flowers and fruit upwards into the sky towards the light of the sun. An exact mirror image to the roots in the soil, the leaves and needles interact with light, air, wind and weather. Trees impact the physical and chemical levels by absorbing carbon monoxide and producing oxygen.
Could this be one of the reasons why we don't like to think about death?
By penetrating this underground with its roots, the tree interacts and changes this world. Deeply anchored in the earth's darkest realms, the tree grows its trunk into the opposite element. As a living and active being, the tree pioneers into the dark world which we came from and will return to. We try to negate this underworld from our thoughts maybe because it reminds us of our own mortality?
Maybe even before that, when the genetic information for the upcoming flower and seed production is being determined? Is it possible to say when exactly life begins? Grasping the mystery of trees leads us to many magical natural cycles.
Does the life of a tree start when the seed is sprouting or before, when the oak seed, beech nut or cembra nut or a winged seed falls off the tree? Or even earlier, when the seed is ripening on the mother tree?
The Mystery of Trees
Life has a better quality to it when we are able to live in homes which have furniture and floors made of natural wood. However, one has to cut down living trees. Is this the right thing to do? Let us provide a healthy environment for our forests and make the best use of this awesome resource. Once wood plays a valuable role in people's lives again and we embrace wood as a divine gift, the forests will be treated best.
Once the wood has been treated, it is toxic and cannot be returned to nature to turn into mulch and provide nutrients for the next generation.
To protect our environment means to accept and use it in a sensible way. When we perceive precious wood in our forests as a cheap resource instead of a divine gift, our forests are in danger. We start clear cutting large areas for profit instead of harvesting mature trees to make space for young ones and give them their chance of developing.
All the faces and animals and other imaginative beings you saw in its knotholes and grain? Subconsciously we experience our surrounding and mother nature in this manner every day. Can we afford to go without them?
Do you remember a wooden object from your childhood, one which you have touched often? Do you remember the floorboards or furniture in your bedroom which you were looking at every day when falling asleep?
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