Find a large tree like an oak, maple or cottonwood in a place off the trail where you won’t be disturbed. This activity is a guided imagery.
Close your eyes and relax every part of your body. Feel the bottom of your feet and imagine that your feet are receptors and that you are bringing up energy from deep inside the earth. When you feet, legs and body start to feel warm, imagine that you are connecting your energy to the the tree’s roots in the earth. (The roots extend in all directions. Some are deep to stabilize the tree, while others are shallow so that the tree can absorb water and oxygen from the air.) Now you are very small and are able to go into the roots of the tree. You travel through the maze of roots and finally reach the trunk channels that travel up the tree trunk. (This is called the xylem – Tree rings are made of old xylem tissue). You travel up the xylem, as much as 100 feet vertically. There is water, minerals and oxygen inside the xylem which will help the tree grow. You travel to the outer branches of the tree and feel the wind rustling your leaves. Feel the sun on your leaves and absorb as much sunlight as possible. You have special cells, called chloroplasts, that convert the sunlight to sugar (The plant absorbs only the blue and red wavelengths of light reflects the other wavelengths. Leaves are green because the green wavelength is being reflected and thus is visible to the eye). The chloroplast in the leaf use CO2 from the air, water from the roots, and sunlight to make sugar (its food. This process is called photosynthesis and allows life to flourish on our planet.) The sugars are stored in the roots and are moved downward in a transport channel called the phloem. Now travel in the phloem with the sugars down, down into roots. You ease yourself out of the roots and slowly return to your body. Thank the tree for welcoming you and bless it in some way. Then shake out your tree roots with your legs and walk away.
