Podcast Episode #7 

This is Verla Fortier of Your Outside Mindset Show where I shine a light on aging adults who may have a chronic illness, and who are taking back their outside mindset by looking or going outside to spend time close to trees, shrubs, and plants. I started this podcast for 2 reasons: Because I want to help people to recognize that going outside is not just a nice thing to do, but it can save your life. And that by going outside you will live longer, prevent dementia and control your chronic illness.

Imagine you are 8 year old little girl and your idol, Elizabeth Taylor, wants to talk with you.  Well that is how I feel about my guest today. Diana Beresford Kroeger in her 7 books,  gave me the evidence based science combined with soothing poetic prose that  I needed to understand and believe that trees were not  only saving my life with systemic lupus, but all of our lives. Her books made me want to blog treesmendus.com  and inspired me to write my book “Take Back Your Outside Mindset” and  “Take Back Your Outside Mindset Workbook.“

DIANA BERESFORD-KROEGER is a world-recognized botanist, medical biochemist and author, whose work uniquely combines western scientific knowledge and the traditional concepts of the ancient world. Her books include The Sweetness of a Simple Life, The Global Forest, Arboretum Borealis, Arboretum America–which won the National Arbor Day Foundation Award for exemplary educational work on trees and forests–Time Will Tell, and A Garden for Life. Her new book is To Speak for the Trees: My Life’s Journey From Ancient Celtic Wisdom To A Healing Vision of the Forest.

Looking into future one elder told Diana that nature would be destroyed. The elder prophet called this “Time of Now”. This says Diana is the time of people getting to together and holding hands – speak across the globe for the trees. We all must be educated and speak about trees. We will disregard this message at our own cost. Diana is being faithful to this message from the ancients given to her. 

As Diana says, when you are given a sacred  trust you do not look at money – what is important is knowledge. Beresford-Kroeger calls her sharing of science and the sacred, philanthropy of the mind. For example Beresford-Kroeger provided the science to influence and reverse the recent refusal of the world UNESCO site in North Manitoba. 

Diana’s research world is “the workings of the heart.” Her medical research in cardiology cites hemodynamics, the making of  synthetic blood which oxygenates the blood for transplanting organs to take place and for treating cancers. She is excited about this research from many points of view. 

Diana wants us to remember that:

Sixty four (64%) of all the medicines that we are using are found in trees. The trees are healing.

The body will absorb what it needs. Beresford-Kroeger has degrees in organic chemistry and did her PhD in DNA in humans compared to plants. 

DNA recognizes self when you go out into nature, and you are being cured by different things at different times.

We all need to keep an eye on our own health. 

In her humorous and warm way, Diana asks us to do this exercise: 

“Do something, find an evergreen, a white pine – there should be a few around Winnipeg – a good mature pine or a stand of pines.

If you don’t have a white pine, find a friend who does. Don’t go with your arms having down, go with a pie, and say I’d like to walk around your tree.

Hold your head high, like you are going to sing opera, so the lower regions of your lungs can draw in and carry the tree aerosols. While you are doing this pick up some twigs and pine cones to hold in your hands – like worry stones. This way you will pick up good bacteria.

What do you wear? Leave your hair loose. No hat, try to have bare arms and legs – or the minimum clothes and walk  slowly for 15 to 20 minutes.

Do this in May, June, July, August, and November, once a month, walk around that tree for 20 minutes. Hold shoulders straight, head high, walk around, so that lower regions of lungs can carry in the aerosols. 

These aerosols are Beta Pinene and Alpha Pinene. Then pick up a couple of pine cones and hold these in your hands like a  worry piece. 

By doing this you are increasing your T cells in body  giving your body the ability to stop Cancer. This time near trees is  increases  your blood’s neutrophils and your hemoglobin. It also makes your white blood cells more active. The effect of this simple exercise lasts for 30 days. So do this every month.  And then after that have tea. There is nothing better than that. Pass it on to everyone else. Start with a tree and do it,” Diana tell us.

Diana please talk to us about the Celtic Tree Alphabet that you describe in your  book To Speak For The Trees 

Diana Beresford- Kroeger starts her answer to this question by saying that “there was greater protection of the forest at the time of Christ. And later in the Aboriginal cultures and in the ancient world, forests were protected. It was understood that sacred trees that produced medicine . The Celtic culture had their form of an indigenous sweat lodge, called “house of perspiration to soak in aerosols.” 

In ancient times in Ireland, we knew to “sit by the willows when we are anxious. Everyone knew this. The ancients put cattle and horses by the willows to settle them down. The knowledge was there. Knowledge of the ancient trees.”

The Laws, before the  time of Christ, says Beresford, the oral laws, the ancient wisdom, the Celtic culture was very strong – all the way into Europe – known for their learning. This culture put together in a set of laws called the Brehon. There is more on this in To Speak For The Trees. These extraordinary  laws were pre Magna Carta and Napoleonic Wars. These laws included: copyright, divorce, lovely laws, women were protected (coming in and out of marriage). The laws were a little like Sancrit.

The king of the forest was the Oak tree. The birch tree was the protector of women.  In the Celtic Durid’s  tree alphabet that Beresford describes in her book To Speak For The Trees – every letter is tree or a companion plant of trees – treasure of the Celts, especially the Irish. Diana tell us that words like hospital and car come from this alphabet and carries a way of thinking of the forest. This alphabet shows the intimate the connection is between forests and humans. “

Diana, in that alphabet for example you talk about the Hawthorne tree’s sacred status. This sacred status you say is related to fairies, heart health, cariotonics, and vasodilators. Please tell us more. 

“If you go in for a stent or any heart surgery today, the medicine from the hawthorne tree is used today. The Crataegus of the hawthorne tree goes into the lungs, and is one of five plants in the world that open  the left ascending  coronary artery.

If you grow a hawthorne tree and sniff it, you will not have a heart attack.” says Beresford. 

“In June when the hawthorne is blooming, across Canada, any hawthorne will do – put nose deep into the flower – the aerosol you are getting out is Crataegus. This tree flower blooms in June near Winnipeg. There is a slightly acidic smell in cretagan, we start to salivate, the increased saliva picks up the Crataegus, and this crosses the stomach wall into the heart’s left ascending artery.

Saliva increases, this crosses the stomach wall and opens the left ascending coronary artery allowing a greater blood flow to oxygenate this muscular pump.  For centuries the hawthorne tree and been used to treat arteriosclerosis, hypertension, tachycardia, high cholesterol, and some anginas. It is also provides a growth hormone for butterflies – our important pollinators.

In the Celtic alphabet based on trees you talk about the Apple Tree and Gut Health 

“Wash the apple from the tree first.  When you eat the skin of the apple, this goes into the stomach. The design of the apple is extraordinary. The skin of the apple increases intestinal  flora.

Beresford-Kroeger said when she was taking to a healer in Northern Canada, she said ”  when our people stopped eating bush food, we lost our health.” We all need biodiversity of food. We are just learning, we need to keep ourselves healthy.

In the Celtic alphabet based on trees, you talk about the Irish Yew Tree.  

Diana says “yes the Irish Yew was used in Canada by the Aboringinal peoples. When the pioneers came in, we brought milking cows, the yew was poisonous to the cows so they were all cut down. The Irish yew became almost extinct in Canada. The Irish yew has medicines that would be valuable to bring into a community..”

Please tell us about the King Nut Tree

“The Aboriginal people where brilliant. They modified their environment by burning the tops of grasses in March and September. This quick burn produces potassium hydroxide. When you burn the tops of the grass it is ok because the ground is wet. This quick burn releases potassium which is what was needed to grow the King Nut tree. These King Nuts fed the continent.  The aboriginal people made nut milk, nut cream, and the powder could be stored for 2 years. When the Aboriginal people increased the King Nut Tree with their quick burn, they increased the four legged creatures: martins, deer, wolves. moose – so they had even more to something to eat. As the nuts increased the animals increased because they had something to eat. In these nuts were essential fatty acids: linoleic acid and anti-inflammatories. I am growing a tree to bring back the species and will give back to the First Nations people. 

In order to try to get some of the similar benefits of the King Nut Tree my husband and I are growing and eating the nuts from the Black Walnut Tree. 

Diana you say in your writing ” if you want to catch a fish, plant a tree.”  

Beresford Kroeger explains: “Leaves fall on the ground, leaves rotting produce molecular acids. If you notice the brown mark in the vase of the flowers in your home, that is fulvic acid. This is the same fulvic acid that is in the rotting leaves. This goes into the rain, dissolves into rivers, lakes, and oceans. This makes the land is rich in iron. The oceans and lakes are not rich in iron. All these marvelous creatures in the water wake up for that iron. The present of iron dings a  button to produce  protein. This feeds the lakes and oceans. So  plant a tree to plant a fish. All the fishermen in Japan are planting trees. 

And this is related to Mother Trees?

The mother trees are mainly the oak trees. No matter how hot it gets, the oak leaves modify the modify the sun’s rays. Tree are our  most important living thing. Trees and only trees  carry the photosynthetic reaction. The green of a leaf creates the oxygen of the world. If it is not there we will die. Of yes as can artificially produce  enough oxygen for a mouse or for a rat, but not for human beings, not for our world.

When we have too much carbon dioxide in the air, that is because the trees have gone down. There will be no life without trees. 

So that is why I write and try to save all the trees.  We need trees to keep the rivers, lakes, and oceans going. With no trees, there is no life. 

There is  a chapter in your book “Where Are the Trees? ” Please explain why there are so few trees in Ireland today. 

 The English, tried to destroy the people, culture, they were aware that the trees were very important to people. So they cut them down. I am a woman of peace. I  want dialogue. 

In To Speak For The Trees, the reader follows a story that starts with the traumas of Diana’s childhood and then that transforms into caring and love. 

“Yes I loved my early Medicine Walks with my elder Nellie. She would tell me look at the shape of the leaf, remember how this looks. Observation, noticing, has be instilled into us. We must be faithful to it. We must stand  up to the plate.

How I am doing it is by writing and speaking – all my books are peer reviewed at institutions like Harvard to look for the flaws in thinking. My books are published manuscripts. They are there and form the  background for thinking about trees.

When a large university in the US said I don’t think Canadians share your view of Aboriginal cultures, Diana Beresford-Kroeger said “well I do. And you will never have the right to publish my work. Nope. You can always say nope. 

Always look for the good in others. Don’t throw yourself away. Treat yourself with respect and all the people around you with respect. It will work out. “

Thank you Diana Beresford-Kroeger for writing To Speak For The Trees and for sharing so much of your scientific and sacred  knowledge of the trees. In doing so, you are showing us how to speak for the trees. 

 Listeners thank you for listening to the end. Take a look The Call of the Forest to see her documentary and see if you don’t think Diana is a little like the Elizabeth Taylor of the trees. Do you remember when Elizabeth Taylor was one of the first outspoken advocates for people with AIDS? 

During the interview I think you will agree that Diana is a deeply relatable and comforting person. She goes out in her garden every day where she lives near Ottawa – and experiences such light and high beauty in the smallest things – and in doing so — Diana Beresford-Kroeger imparts her gentle wisdom.

And after reading her book To Speak For Trees I wonder if her capacity to rejoice is related to the  sadness in her early life as child, and in a few of disappointments  in the conventional world of  science and academia.  

In her seventy something years of life, she gives us new vital angles of  thinking  about our lives with trees.  She is saying yes there are all these dark and difficult things in the world, but we still experience beautiful things and see takes us by  the hand to see new relationships outside in our gardens, yards, and forests. For example, to catch a fish, plant a tree.

In To Speak For The Trees, Diana takes courage from her own Irish Celtic indigenous history. All along that she knows she needs people on this journey with her.  To engage us she uses language, the printed word in her books, plant chemistry, botany, peer reviewed science, story, history, comfort, and caring  to give us images of what is good in the trees – an in natural world. What is more, she shows us how to give this to other people.  And as practoical as ever, Diana tells us to poke our noses into a Hawthorne flower for our heart.

She creates for us beauty and order and loveliness in a world of chaos.  She knows that she cannot make this journey alone. She wants us along. For Diana it is not about one single hero, it is about the people around her. And that is what has survived in her ancient Celtic story of healing in To Speak For the Trees.  

After I wrote my book Take Back Your Outside Mindset, and workbook,  I sent Diana Beresford-Kroeger a copy not expecting to hear back from her because I did not know her, she is written up in Wikipedia and is already A Global legend in her time.  But DBK wrote me a real letter back – she is that kind of person. 

When I wrote back to her so say I was told her starting  this podcast, she wrote saying “go for it! It sounds good for a lot of people.”  At that moment I felt like golden life was shot into my veins. She made me feel braver.

So I invite you as Diana does, to join Diana on her nourishing journey, she wants you to come along, she wants to make it easy for you, she wants to share her knowledge with you. So start  as she says by looking for her documentary Call of the Forest, use her free tree app associated with the film that gives you the health benefits of each tree in your region. Take your time and read all of her amazing work.   

By joining Diana you will be exercising the muscle to hold the sadness  and the beauty of trees together so that you can plant, care, and speak for the trees. Diana  is seeking you out because none of us can we make this journey alone.

Take her advice today: find a white pine and lolly gag around it for 15 minutes with a friend – holding a pine cone like a worry stone in your hand. In doing so, you will be taking back  that image in your hearts and your minds of trees – and of the sweetness that life can be. And if you need to, you can check her peer reviewed  science that  tell us what is happening and will continue to happen for one month in our bodies after that time spent with a tree.

Let’s take a deep breath of thanks that we have tree air to breathe today and that Diana gives us the courage today to speak for the trees.  

Give yourself the room for this kind of strength to keep going and  keep taking back Your Outside Mindset ….because if you ask me we all need a little more of Your Outside Mindset . To show your support for the show please press the subscribe button and comment on this episode.