Eucalyptus – Plant Spirit Teachings

Eucalyptus in history

It’s thought that Eucalypts originated 35-50 million years ago, around the time Australia separated from Gondwanaland. 

Interestingly, the earliest Eucalyptus fossils (so far), were discovered in countries where it is no longer considered native – in Chile (a 51.9 million year old fossil) and New Zealand.

The oldest Eucalyptus fossil found in Australia (NSW) was a tree stump in basalt, dated to be 21 million years old.   

There’s a correlation between the rise of Eucalyptus pollen with the increase in charcoal levels in the soil.  Basically, with fire and the indigenous practices of burning off, Eucalyptus prospered. 

Fire and Water

Around 70% of Australia’s vegetation is Gum tree. Eucalyptus is as much a part of this land as water is within our bodies.    

And this is where I want to begin.  For in a group monthlong spagyric process (herbal alchemy) with a Eucalyptus species (Blackbutt, E. Pilularis), water was a significant theme. 

Water and fire.  Polar elementals.  Always in relation with one another, always interconnected.  Eucalyptus pilularis is fire retardant, lives in a fiery land and knows how to find water. 

I am going to use she speaking of Eucalyptus pilularis for the feeling and themes within the plant spirit teachings were deeply feminine, even though the masculine shone through too.  

Deep gratitude to Sam Killick, Kristy Morgan, and Tahlia Reynolds for their insights during the alchemical journey, that help to bring this greater picture of Blackbutt through.

I’d say that many Eucalypts share the broader themes included below. 

Plant Spirit Teachings of Eucalyptus – Blackbutt.

Firstly, she broadens our capacity for receiving.  Just as the roots reach deep to tap into the waters of a dry country, she deepens our capacity to receive and find nourishment. 

For me, that looked like expansion – to see the Eucalyptus trees as a collective.  A community, embracing diversity.  Not one tree, but a we.  The forest as one being.  As well as the love that is always emanating from them. 

Eucalyptus broadened my capacity to experience nature connection (something I’ve been deeply practicing for almost 20 years, yet there’s always more to learn!)  

I realised they were constantly aware of me and my intentions.  As soon as it was in the ethers, they knew it.  Where I sit in my pockets of time to ‘connect’, they are in constant connection.  Each time I consciously shared my intentions, it was clear they already knew.  This was a revelation to me.  So in tune with us and our needs, no matter how unaware we are. 

She helps us to see the subtleties of how we’re all constantly feeling each other, how all the information is out there, hanging in the ethers in the droplets in the air.  This aspect of knowing through the water in the air, became even clearer tuning into Eucalypts in the desert regions.  (See article Of Gum Trees, Ghosts). 

But more than simply knowing, was the immense generosity and love she radiates.  Eucalyptus medicine is like a gigantic mother’s hug.  Constantly giving, whether we’re there to receive it or not.  She gently shows us where we have alienated ourselves, closed down or shut off from the love that is all around.  She reminds us we must be open to receiving. 

Don’t feel you need to do it alone she whispers. 
Don’t be afraid to let go, like she drops her branches. 
Do less, sit on your hands more.  Just be.

Another watery theme of surrender became apparent.  Eucalyptus is able to let go her branches when they become too much to carry.  (see article When Trees Call)

Synchronously, there were 5 deaths in my world during the four weeks of our Eucalyptus alchemy.  If you know Rosemary’s medicine, you’ll already recognise many overlapping themes, yet Rosemary works on a much more personal healing level, Eucalyptus is broader, more communal.    

Eucalyptus speaks of returning inwards to the sap and essence deep within.  To release the outer world. 

Incubation

This is a key word for Eucalyptus.  Whenever there is a need for taking time out; to incubate; to go into a dark, inner cave; to gestate; to sit on something and wait for the right time; think of Eucalyptus. 

The word incubate goes back to ‘to lie on, to sit on’. 

Eucalyptus asks What are you incubating?  What are you hatching?

We incubate the energies that we sit in.  When we sit in stillness, we incubate and hatch stillness.  If we’re ‘doing’ all the time, then we incubate and hatch from that place. 

We can incubate diseases. 

Getting a cold or flu may force us to take time out to incubate, to hide in our cave for awhile.  And this is one of the physical aspects of Eucalyptus – respiratory problems, chest infections, colds and flus, nose, sinuses.  Eucalyptus clears space in the sinuses and helps us balance out the water in these areas and bring healthy humidity again. 

Eucalyptus is the herbal breathworker.  It helps us to inhale fully again, to clear the airways so we can sing clearly the song of the universe. 

There was a beautiful softness, stillness and peace that came invariably as we started our processes with Eucalyptus. 

Peace, gentle, soft, still, slow.  As one participant put it “it’s a peace we rarely allow ourselves to feel.”  Or another “a sleepiness that feels like softness”.  Often we felt like koalas spaced out on Eucalyptus leaves.  Time was different. 

At the same time, there’s an instantaneous energy to Eucalyptus.  Like women in community – they are constantly holding space, yet their networking means that everything is known instantly, yet with little effort.  (We’ll come back to this community theme).

Eucalyptus medicine softens rigidities and hard edges.  She brings us into a diffuse awareness, where boundaries are softened and harmonised, a deep feminine awareness.  This is how Eucalyptus lives – in this diffuse awareness, the tree is a part of the ethers all around, their awareness extends through the air and the water droplets within the air.  They live in a big collective.  They can help us with our diffuse awareness – help cleanse it – both energetically and physically. 

Flexibility and Release.

Stiff and sore, fluid no more. 
Luminous light once shielded from sight. 
Awakens

This extends once again into the physical realm. 
We found ourselves singing a song someone knew:

Soften, soften baby,
you don’t need to carry,
the weight of the world
in your muscles and bones,
let go, let go, let go. 

Physically it effects particularly the joints.  Multiple times, though especially during the oil distillation (think Eucalyptus oil) there were weak knees, lameness in elbows, hips, knees.  Many symptoms were right sided. 

After all, I realised, trees don’t walk!  Joints are their weak area.  But even then, the Eucalypts make their weakness their strength.  They release a branch, letting go when they need to.  Strong beyond measure, they will hold on through wind and storm, yet when the weight of holding on outweighs the needs of the whole, it releases and lets go, surrenders.  The branch drops. 

“Neck seized up on right side.  So tight like a branch holding on, but hurting to hold it, going to drop.  The last edges of holding on.” 

Matriarchy, Feminine Wisdom and Wounds.  Matrilineal descent. 

This was another repeated theme.  Matriarchal lineages.  Healing of ancestral matrilineal lines.  Sisterhood wounds.  Wounds of not being in the web, threads of disconnect.  Unhealthy competition.  Feminine wounds – childhood abuse where the mother didn’t act, female to female wounds, tribal wounds. 

Eucalyptus helps break the threads.  When we’re caught in ancient cobwebs of the unhealthy feminine from our ancestral maternal lineages, Eucalyptus can help us clear them away and retrieve soul aspects that were left behind.  (There are layers of Rosemary and Yarrow overlaps in here – they could make very useful allies used together).  Once these begin to clear, the masculine healing may come to be addressed too. 

These themes are so similar to the culture of the original peoples of Australia, which is quite feminine as a whole – living in connectedness, tribal community, deep listening to land, timelessness, all deep themes of Eucalyptus.

Community, Collective, Family

This extends on from the feminine way of living in communion and connection. 

Eucalyptus shows us healthy connection – the web of connection where all the points of meeting glisten and sparkle with life, a connected network from earth to the stars. 

Repairing of broken families. 

Healthy boundaries. 

A clearing of ancestry and reintegrating of lost parts of self.   

Whatever is in the way of a healthy group/ collective/tribe may arise when working with Eucalyptus. 

Finding and honouring ourselves within the community. 

You can read more of Eucalyptus’ words on this aspect in this article: The Spirit of Place

Tree teachings – on sap, essence and water. 

Eucalyptus took us deep into history, its relationship with water means it can take us far back via the stored imprints in water molecules.

My sap is made of this land.
It holds the essence of land.
We circulate this essence in our own alchemy, rising it up to the sky in the ethers, and then bringing it through our trunks and deep down into the earth again. 

We cleanse and restructure the waters back to their true essence. 

Eucalyptus will do this for us too, reflecting back the state of our own waters – however murky or pure they may be.  We can work with Eucalyptus medicine to see our truth, to have it reflected back to us – how authentic or inauthentic we are being. 

Take my medicine to meet yourself.  I’m not for healing, but for reflection. 

Pain can be showing us where we’re being inauthentic or holding on. 

One person saw a circle of women ancestors holding hands within the rings of the tree, mirrored in a pattern in the ice.  Messages of the purity and frequency that water holds, held like dormant seeds in ice waiting to be remembered.  Eucalyptus can help us retrieve and receive them again.  It has instant connection with the waters. 

Eucalyptus can take us ‘to the beginning of time itself’, to tap into ancient memories that can show us the way again.

To heal the wounds, the blood leakages (red sap as a signature), the diluting or mixing of bloodlines, Eucalyptus can help us trust and return home to our true self again. 

Tree singers. 

I met a shy Eucalyptus dryad during this alchemy.  She showed me how a group of tree singers (I perceived them as white-rainbow luminous beings) gather around the base of the tree and they sing the tree.  Their bodies penetrate the earth below connecting in with the fungi systems within the soil.  These beings that sing the tree provide a ring of support that helps the tree stand tall. 

Eucalyptus lives in communion and community – not only with the other Eucalyptus trees (both of the same species and other species) but interlinked with other helping spirits – dryads, tree singers, etc.  She shows us how strong she is when working in cocreation with others, with supportive community and encourages us to grow our community. 

Like so many Australian plants, there is much less differentiation, a deeper level of cocreation and collective consciousness.

Singing the Songlines

When we have lost connection to our dreaming, to our heart or our belonging, Eucalyptus comes to anchor us back into connection, to reconnect the songlines within ourselves and within the land again. 

Eucalyptus medicine is singing the songlines within us and within the land. 

I hope you’ve enjoyed this little taster on Eucalyptus medicine. A little like, share or comment goes a long way 🙂
Eucalyptus Spagyric Essence is available here.

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Check out upcoming herbal courses below:
Rosemary Immersion Day Nov 15
Shamanic Herbalism Flower Training online
Homeopathic First Aid Course online inNovember; and in person Dec 6

About Heidi
I’ve been walking the plant spirit path for close to 30 years. With herbalism, homeopathy, and plant alchemy/spagyrics as early companions, midwifery and shamanism came a little later. After years of listening to the plants, I’ve since taught hundreds of people how to deepen their connection with nature and learn to hear the whispers of plants. I continue to offer The Flower Codes Training/ Shamanic Herbalism online course, as well as various in person shamanic nature-based courses such as Herbal Alchemy Spagyrics.
My published books include:
“The Flower Codes: Plant Spirit Teachings for your Soul to Blossom.”
“Wild Flower Walker: A Pilgrimage to Nature on the Bibbulmun Track”;
and Blue Triangle Butterfly: A Homeopathic Proving