Trees as Anamchara
Searles

Fri Sep 22 08:25:25 2000
Trees as Anamchara*p*I wrote this message to a person whose cousin had committed suicide while sitting next to a tree.  Such an action seemed unusual to me because it is my experience that trees usually have a calming effect upon the spirit.  This spiritual interaction between trees and people is so prevalent that many individuals and Druid groups use trees as an aid an a basis for meditation. In many cultures trees are also a connection between tribe and the cosmos (as in the Tree of Life and the Sacred Tree or Bile in Celtic culture).  In a sense we can form strong bonds with trees as individuals and as families.  This spiritual connection and friendship might be the basis for the Celtic idea of an anamchara or the Druidic practice of placing their sacred sites in and around groves of trees. An anamchara is a soulfriend who serves as our guide in life and death within Celtic traditions.  In times of initiation they are our support.  In times of death, they can be our comfort and our doorway to another life.*p*Maybe your cousin being by the tree at the time of his death guided his spirit through one doorway into another one that would allow him to better deal with life and the lessons we all choose for ourselves? As I said in a different posting here, how we die is equally important to how we live. This remark can be misunderstood. In some ways, the memories of our deaths affect those who remain behind in the life we have left and that memory affects us in our own growth. That's one effect of an individual's life and death but there's another more important outcome. That outcome is another life and the choices we make for ourselves at the moment of our creation and inception.*p*Many people and religions see the time of death as a time of creation (and Celts are one of these, if not two). They see that it is important to be with friends and guides at the time of death and also at the time of birth if possible. Books of the Dead contain the religious teachings of cultures about these matters. Among Gaelic Celts, there are people known as anamchara. The anamchara is the soulfriend. It is this soulfriend's duty to help another pass between the worlds and to guide them in their travels. I see these roles as existing on three levels: one that is physical, one that is mental, and one that is spiritual. They touch and care for their friends in death as they also touch and care for them in life. They share thoughts and guidance with their friends minds in death as in life. They uplift the spirits of their friends from one body into another as they attempt to flow like a river from one pool to another.*p*In the passage between life and death, they serve as the midwives of a new life, which is the next one that we choose for ourselves. As Celts are know to believe, there is another life beyond the one that we have and we do choose that life for ourselves prior to our births. This is as true for ourselves in this world as it is for us in the Otherworld that awaits beyond death's doorway. An anamchara might sing to a friend in their dying (or play music if that is their gift). An anamchara might read to a friend of the philosophies they've shared in growing and thinking. An anamchara might shine light upon the darkness of uncertainty while being also the friend that awaits in light at the end of a tunnel of birth-death-rebirth.*p*An anamchara in many respects is like a tree. He/she is like the Shaman's tree between the many worlds and levels of existence that serve to mark our journeys. An anamchara can be like the Sacred Tree or Bile that is the focus of the spirit of our tribe and our people. An anamchara can be the sphere of life that is the circle of a tree's inspirations and expirations such as the willow which has been known a green enclosure for the bed of many a Celtic poet. Trees are sometimes our soulfriends in life and death. I think this is because they are mirrors of our lives and lessons for us about death. Trees grow with a relationship to the life around them. They usually are members of groves of family and symbiotic friends. They sustain life around them through their own attempts at life through regeneration (their nuts and their fruits). They also regenerate life through the death of their leaves, limbs and bodies. This death aids the fertilization of the earth through decay, feeds the hearth fires for the warming of the home or it can form a shelter of limbs, an enclosure of brush and/or a home in the wilds. The death of trees also aids the beaver in the damming of streams, can be made into lumber for the building of homes/houses or it can serve as the basis for the manufacturing of paper, a home for ideas and thoughts as well as the basis for books.*p*They sing to our through the wind whistles and sighs of their boughs and leaves. They sing to our spirit through their soul tones and resonance of form over matter; through their inner music that resonates with our own. They are a pathway of levels of song from the basics of roots the layers of growth and the levels of projection between worlds that are under, lands that are around and heights that are above. They are the frames for pictures and the enclosures of stars. They are the roots of the very earth beneath us.*p*I think the tree that your cousin found in his death was a help for him in his lives. I think it served as his anamchara in the making of choices for this life and for that particular death. It may not have physically been able to change what he chose for himself in death, but I'm certain as I know trees and they know me that it was a friend to him. It was there during his life. It was there during his death. It was there between life death and life again. It was a song to the spirit. It was a guide between worlds. It was a shining example of the light that comes from within the darkness. As his spirit flowed between bodies and pools, it was the sure friendship of the anamchara, being the darkness surrounding but also being the welcoming light to lives beyond choices. A tree is all of life and death and rebirth, even many lives in a grove of lives. It is many connections through association and shaping. It is a part of the Great Song that all Celts hear in the forest of tribal singing and life's longing. Your cousin did not die alone or without anamchara. He lived by the tree of family. He lived by the tree of his own decisions and choices. He lived by the tree of his next life's doorway. His song was the laughter shared between he and his kin. His song was a note in the leaves of your leaves and the winds of family spirit. His song is the pause between breaths, the time between one act of the opera and the next, and the blending of one note in a melody of song and a symphony of singing.*p*Searles*p**br*