In Vancouver the cherry blossoms are in mid-swing. We had a ferociously windy storm last night and the light pink blossoms of the first batch were cleaned out of town. I was astonished to see that even the sidewalks had none of the pink confetti of fallen blossoms on them. The dark pink buds of the next batch are on the verge of opening, in a couple days they will be showing us their amazingly pink fluffy selves.

As a result, I have been exploring the rose family Rosaceae. This family has a deep connection to the heart — just inhaling their perfume will strengthen it. The Rosaceae family includes strawberries, apples, raspberries, cherries, plums, blackberries, hawthorn, peaches and pears, all of which have five-petaled flowers. Many of the Rosaceae are recommended for toning the heart and circulatory system. Hawthorn is especially effective, but even the aroma of apples stewing is said to lower blood pressure. Rosaceae’s fate has been closely connected with mankind’s since that irresistible apple in the garden of Eden. Other legends tell of how the original Rose was awoken from its slumbers by the first ray of the rising sun in the great garden of Persia. It is also said that only as many rose blossoms bloom as there are human souls living on earth. As a matter of fact, when it is a soul’s time to leave this material world, the only thing she can take with her is a rose.

The Turkish say they were told via dreams that the first rose sprang from the blood of Venus. Rose water is called the Dew of Paradise and is sprinkled over their food as a condiment and added to their yogurt or candy. It is no surprise the rose is connected with love and Valentines day or even with funerals and death. It warms and supports the heart in times of loss or in times of passion. Another very interesting connection between the heart, the rose and Venus is that Venus creates a five petaled rose pattern as she rotates around the earth.

I had a very strange experience while training some young cooks how to bake at a remote hotel in Myanmar. The Chef there was from Rakhine state and soon started talking to me of Shambala. As I listened I realized he was talking about what I knew at the time as Shangri-La, a hard to reach place which people from any religion could attain by finding their true self. Shambala means “to make sacred” and is said to have been a beautiful city in what is now the Gobi Desert of Mongolia. An interesting side-note about the legend of Shambala is that in it, a being from Venus, Sanat Kumara, comes to Earth to help bring out the light within each of us, which we are unable to do on our own. An Australian meteorologist found that on the days that Venus was closer to the Earth, the Earth’s magnetic fields calmed down. Other astrologers have found that Venus’ close vicinity to Earth is linked to births of famous artists and musicians. Side note here might also be that supposedly the gleaming white marble city of Shangri-La was originally built on an island in a huge lake, there is nothing left of this lake now– just the Gobi desert. It seems that mankind has found it difficult to remain on the sustainable path for a very long time now.

As the spring kicks into full swing, with the weather variable, it is good to detox and to clean out the metabolic waste created from the digesting of the years events that take place in the winter. In our modern world, our digestive systems are dealing with many foreign elements, released into our water, air and food. We are also digesting, on another level, energetic frequencies which effect us in ways we do not understand, the rose, both petals and hips provide very gentle digestive, circulatory and nervous system support that help process these energies.

The smell of rose is being used more and more as anti-stress aromatherapy. I think of rose in conjunction with meditation and other community movements that are shifting focus to the heart. The Heartmath Institute, for example, has recently developed the Global Coherence Initiative which is a project to unite millions of people in heart-focused care and intention, in order to shift global consciousness from instability and discord to balance, cooperation and peace.

I moved to New Zealand in 2001, fulfilling a longtime dream, seeded when I was in fourth grade and heard that a tiny country called New Zealand had gone nuclear free, thumbing it’s nose at my hypocritical birth-country USA. By 1998 I was fed up with the unknown amounts of GMO’s in the US food chain and the constant lies we are told about our food. With the help of a very good friend, I fled the country and ended up working in Myanmar for a couple years before finally moving to New Zealand. Arriving in New Zealand, I soon realized every country has these issues. Multinational corporations are manipulating politics all over the globe. But I also discovered something special about Aotearoa (New Zealand), it seems to be progressive in exactly the ways the world needs. It was the first country to allow women to vote. As the world turns, the first rays of a new day, a new year, a new age, shine onto Aotearoa, before the rest of the world. As a result, I got the feeling that people living in Aotearoa seem to be at the forefront in processing these energies. The time that I spent there opened me up to ways of thinking that I had never before considered and ended up turning me inside out.

One example of someone who is processing these energies is Tony Knight, the owner of Lotus Magik. In June of 2002, I participated in a full moon meditation he organized, invoking light and love for healing the Earth. According to the Shambala tradition there are three major full moons (Aries, Taurus and Gemini) during which the healing intentions for the earth are particularly powerful, and meditating in groups helps to bring through these energies. When he drove me home after the meditation he told me Aotearoa is an anchor point, or a gateway for bringing through the energies of Shambala. Listening to him I decided I much preferred the legends of the potential return of Shambala to the prophecies of impending apocalypse from my religious upbringing. (More about Tony’s experience with Shambala – quite interesting)

A couple years ago I spent a year in the Catskills of New York with our in-laws. They live in a pristine mountain area with wilderness all around, much like Shambala. At the door of our trailer-home was a wild rosebush, that I trained to come up our porch during the summer. I have a photo of the lovely deep pink roses beside my computer and just seeing them cheers me up immensely, warming my heart. That area of the Catskills also has a plethora of rose quartz that can be found in the rivers or along the trails.

We are currently in the middle of one of Venus’ 8 year cycles. Venus passed across the sun in June of 2004 and is set to do so again in June of 2012, forming one of the five petals of the rose. I sure hope my heart is beating coherently before then and helps to bring peace to our world. Walking down quiet roads lined with cherry trees, the sweet bubble gum aroma and the pink candy-land world of spring, goes a long way towards helping that to happen.