From Daily Practice with the Soulflower Oracle

“We may each become more fully realized individuals, as we realign ourselves by listening with our hearts to the teaching of the flowers.”
--Isha Lerner

Oracle decks do not predict the future and they won’t fix our problems for us. What they will do is help us to connect directly to our own inner wisdom, our intuition. Like a mirror reflecting back at us the truth of what’s in our hearts--what we will see reflected is not anything that we don’t already deeply know and understand--it is just reminding us of the truths we may have forgotten as we deal with the “realities” of everyday physical existence.

So when we have a daily oracle practice, instead of always looking outside of ourselves for guidance and direction we instead begin to look to our own hearts, to our own inner knowing, our intuition if you like. And the more we do this, the more we learn to trust ourselves. And the more we learn to trust ourselves, the more we begin to experience and move through life guided by the wisdom of our hearts rather than the voices in our heads.

The Soulflower Plant Spirit Oracle is a very simple daily self-care, self-empowerment tool that will help support your own spiritual journey and reawaken or strengthen your connection to the Earth that supports us all.

You can use the cards in any way that supports you. The point is to learn to trust yourself and that the messages that you are receiving are for your own highest good and exactly what you need to hear at that moment.

Sometimes you will be aware of the significance of the message you receive right away and sometimes you may realize its relevance sometime later.

The practice itself creates space for daily self-reflection, and mindfulness, and that begins to ripple out into our daily lives such that we eventually begin, over time, to view our lives not as something that is happening to us but as something that we are co-creating for the express purpose of getting to know our true selves better.

Each new moment, new day, new moon and new year is a gift of a new beginning, and the perfect time to start reconnecting with yourself and the Earth. The wisdom is there, it is in our DNA, just like a seed dormant from neglect. Once we start tending to it, once we start mothering ourselves, we will remember. Just like a seed “knows” how to grow, how to thrive and bloom, so do we.

We can’t rush the process, of course. Nature never hurries.

And the flowers, the plants, the trees, the water, the mountains, the whole Earth is here cheering us on.

While we may feel alone at times, the truth is we are never alone and we are not separate from any other part of the world that surrounds us, seen and unseen. The plant spirits are all jumping for joy that you are here ready to connect with them and willing to let them reflect back at you the truth of who you are.

The plants have never forgotten who they are, but humans have, and now it is time to remember and reconnect with our whole selves, and by doing so, reconnect with all that is.

So take a moment to ask for a message that is not only for your own highest good but for the highest good of all. And when you are ready, pick a card.

SAMPLE CARD WRITE-UPS

Calendula • Communication
(Calendula officinalis)

Our thoughts and words have great creative power, both positive and negative, for ourselves and others. Calendula helps soothe your thoughts and words with warmth and compassion and understanding so that there is a balance between assertiveness and receptiveness in communication with others.

Calendula is one of those plants that is good at soothing almost everything. She has a long history as an ally for the skin, digestion, supporting the lymphatic system, facilitating ceremony, and even is soothing to the eye as a beautiful golden dye.

Energetically, Calendula is soothing, too. She reminds us to pay attention to how we use our words. Words have a lot of power and an energy all of their own, to hurt and to heal, not just other people but our own selves, too. Even silent words, our thoughts, have the power to impact our physical health, mental health and well-being. Every cell in our bodies is listening and communicating back to us through the wisdom of our symptoms.

Many of us were raised to be “nice” girls. You know, to be seen, but not heard. This makes it hard for us to learn to speak up and articulate our feelings, our personal truth. Instead, we bottle up our emotions, minimize them, even doubting that they are even valid. We shame our anger, blame our weaknesses and hide our resentment.

And so the voice of our truth gets quieter and quieter, as we bury it deeper and deeper. The challenge from Calendula then is to connect with your heart and find the words that express your truth, that express your feelings, define your needs, and to speak them every single day, particularly with those you love.

Honest communication without drama, blame or victimhood, and preferably before resentment builds up and you lose your cool.

Communication is not a one-way street, however. Communication is just how we let others know how we feel. Listening is how we learn to communicate from our hearts and not from our ego minds. It is easy to hear and not so easy to listen. Easy to be assertive and not so easy to be receptive--especially if what we are hearing doesn’t resonate with us.

Calendula helps soothe your thoughts and words with compassion and understanding for yourself and for others.

Effective communication from the heart is a delicate balance between assertiveness and receptiveness, speaking and listening, giving and receiving. We are all doing our best to communicate what our hearts know, but we have yet to find all the words to express it.

How do you choose to express yourself?

Affirmation: I listen to my heart before I speak. My truth, when spoken with love from my heart, will never create harm.

Dandelion • Release
(Taraxacum officinale)

Let it go! Dandelion wants you to listen to the messages your body is sending you and to release the attachments that no longer serve your soul’s journey. Whatever you are hanging on to, she will help you detoxify one thought at a time, releasing negativity and self-judgment, and restoring ease and flow to your life.

Dandelion is the great detoxifier! She is a powerful ally for all of our bodies--physical, mental and emotional. She helps you to recognize and release burdens that you may not even know you are carrying, but for that annoying pain and tension that you feel from time to time in your neck and shoulders, perhaps?

Often, these burdens seem to be a natural part of the human condition, although they are definitely not something we are born with. These stories and beliefs are so deeply ingrained in all of us that we rarely question them, and we have to do some serious digging to uncover them. Dandelion’s roots go down deep!

A common belief is that we are in control of our lives and experiences and that with hard work we can assure success and happiness. If success is elusive it is because we are not working hard enough.

Dandelion wants you to know that you can’t control everything. Life is not meant to be a constant struggle (ironically, think about how some gardeners battle Dandelions.) And yet we all seem to perpetuate the story that life is hard, a battle even, until we release our souls from our physical bodies in death.

We need to realize that releasing is not the same as forgetting.

“Let it go!” says Dandelion. And so you try, but it keeps coming back, right? We keep finding ourselves rehashing the same story, experience, or thought over and over again. But releasing is not the same as forgetting, and we are never going to be able to forget all the events, stories, and traumas of our pasts. They helped shape who we are today. We can, however, release our attachment to them. Remove the labels we wear to define who we are and instead allow them to be simply part of our amazing journey.

Close your eyes and remember yourself as a child playfully blowing on the fluffy Dandelion seed-heads and watching your wishes gently float away. Trust is key. So set your intentions, visualize your dreams, and then release control of the outcome.

It’s no accident that Dandelion is so abundant the world over, growing in all the nooks and crannies and hard places. She is reminding us all of the power of our thoughts to shape the world around us simply by releasing our stories, beliefs and negative narrative about it.

What can you let go of today?

Affirmation: I am aware of the power of my thoughts. I let go of all limiting thoughts, beliefs and fears.