Naked tree huggers

[Greenbare Woods]

We don't have a section for Naked in the News so I am posting this here.  Naked protesting at Berkeley, California. 

http://dailycaller.com/2015/07/20/tree-huggers-at-berkeley-get-naked-with-trees/

Also their TreeSpirit project has several nice photos of getting naked in nature.

[MartinM]

I'm all for naked tree hugging to protect the natural environment, but non-native invasive eucalyptus seemed a strange choice for protest.

I do enjoy going into the woods and naked tree climbing. One effective way of getting close to nature. As you look around the woods, some trees just want to be climbed.....

[jbeegoode]

It sounds like a lifeless dirt lot with no roots to protect from erosion and came across to me as crappy superficial reporting. There is more to this. I suppose those that are interested in more than nudity must look at the website. Whenever I drive or fly into Oakland/Jokeland, there is that distinctive aroma of eucalyptus that greets me. I didn't know that it was a problem. After looking at the websites and debate, I'm glad that it isn't my area.

 I'm surprised that only 50 naked tree-huggers showed up in the San Francisco Bay area. Maybe its that more naked tree huggers are more apt to get naked and hug trees in privacy, a more intimate context. I liked that the tree hugging included children in a healthy manner.
Jbee

[John P]

Sorry for the extraneous clothing, but it wasn't a very warm day.

[nudewalker]

Sorry for the extraneous clothing, but it wasn't a very warm day

Early spring? One of those boy the sun looks good but winter refuses to quit? We hope to stay south a little later this year to miss those false alarms of being fooled by the sun!

[John P]

I think I got over-quoted there!

But it was autumn, not spring. Well into October, in spite of the green leaves all around. We hiked up to the shelter on Glastenbury Mountain, and it ended up being the first below-freezing night of the season. I can recall thinking that if I ever did that kind of trip again, a warmer sleeping bag would be a good idea.

If you want to see a full record of that outing, there are lot more pictures here:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/28291527/Naturism/Vermont/vermont.html

[jbeegoode]

I wonder if anyone has ever bumped into the deep forest peat shark at night.
Jbee

[nuduke]

I have to say that I usually like to 'interact' with trees on my walks.  I sometimes hug them and sometimes just touch them and also talk to them (I thank them if they sheltered me from view, for instance).
Why? I have no idea! 
I never came across any references to the positive benefits of tree hugging although lots of us seem to know of it and / or have gained benefit by doing it.  I doubt if it does anything for the tree!
What it does for me is ensures I grasp a moment of stillness, of contemplation of where I find myself actually, metaphorically and metaphysically.  Trees represent an upwelling of earth energy ...which doesn't exist but which we can train our minds to embrace and thus experience.  Spirituality I think is the word.  As a devotee would visit a shrine or a holy place to demonstrate an experience of faith, for instance, so physical connection with trees and stones and the earth pays homage to the calming effect of naked time in nature when you can get it alone and undisturbed for a bit.  Religion?  No. Invocation of inner strength and outer calm?  Yes.

John

[jbeegoode]

Earth energies DO exist. They have a consistent electromagnetic frequency, are calming to all, just like being barefoot on nice moist soil. Trees tend to represent these energies in their makeup and their close attached relationship with the earth. Twisted trees often have artescian water under them, or other reasons creating a vortex creating a twist. Much of the phenomena is known from anecdotal evidence spanning millennia, but can be followed up, investigated readily. Some of us are more in tune with these energies. It has been shown to be not just a more active imagination or mathematics of chance. When I have attempted to give energies to trees and shrubbery, I have been amazed to find that it is they that give out overwhelmingly more to me. It is good to lean up against a tree and have a sit, more than just taking a load off.

Around here, trees are rarely good for hugging physically. They are bushy and have protective prickers. I have to get to the mountains for that. The bark on most trees is often too rough for naked skin me. I can't fathom how bears can do that to innocent trees!?!  I don't actually hug trees literally, but rare occasions, but I do know them as beings based in water and energies. It is good to open ones self to loving all with respect. I talk with these before I take from them. Having a relationship with what you eat, plant or animal, is enhancing. There is a lot of energy there, besides the slower moving particles we touch and see reflecting light.

Anyway, all life is precious and should not be discounted or disrespected. Practical use is a part of that.
Jbee

[MartinM]

Trees are literally an upwelling of nutrients from the earth, carbon dioxide from the air and energy from the sun to create the tree which has its own energy make-up. The complexity of our relationship with the tree, whether electromagnetic, chemical, psychological, sensual or spritual, is too complex to define or understand scientifically. It can only be experienced by someone with sufficient openness, awareness and sensitivity, seeing, feeling, smelling.

The best way experince some trees is simply to gently and carefuuly climb into their branches. As I walk arond a wood, I look around, and some trees seem to say, ' Climb me'. When I find a comfortable spot in the canopy, I sit and listen to the other birds snd animals in the canopy, the wind blowing through the leaves and meditate while the gently swaying with the breeze. Naked, of course, for that direct relationship, and less wahing.....

[jbeegoode]

No climb me naked's around here. Rough bark scrapes all over, especially hugging a branch during a climb. Sometimes a mesquite will be older and have low hanging branches to sit on.
Jbee

[John P]

Here's someone hugging a tree. It's not much of a hug, but then it's not much of a tree.

This is typical scenery in southern Florida away from the coast. Soil that's mostly sand, scrubby vegetation with palmettos (that's what's in front of Dan), isolated trees and the effects of occasional fires.

[jbeegoode]

Kinda tropical desert. I've got a parcel of that outside of Ft. Meyers. Seems that there is plenty of it to go around.
Jbee

[nuduke]

Earth energies DO exist

Sorry, JBee, I expressed myself badly.
You know, as your convert to earthing and as a long time experiencer of the contemplative nature of being naked in nature that I am entirely aligned with your views on earth energy.  You seem to have a much more concrete, palpable perception of it, which probably means my sensitivity to it is blunt compared to yours. I'm just a bit more metaphysical about it - more like what MartinM says.

experienced by someone with sufficient openness, awareness and sensitivity

I may have just sufficient of those things to begin to see it through a glass, darkly!
Earth energy to me is tuning my mind to a particular mental place and the wood, water, earth or stone or whatever natural locale I find myself in at these times, is a conduit to help me focus and let the earth energy (as I term it) settle upon me.  I only experience that particular evanescent feeling in nature, particularly by water (which may be evidence of a manifestation of a real physical emanation, perhaps).  In bed or sitting on the sofa, there are moments of contemplative calm but of a very different ilk.  More like simple relaxation or meditation.  The soul is a tabula rasa at these times whereas in a wood or on damp grassy earth the feeling of being 'at one' is more active somehow.  I call this earth energy - perhaps it is more physical than I give it credit for?  For that reason I am interested in your remark about the consistent electromagnetic frequency of earth energy.  Could you expand?  Maybe it might help me get more tuned in?

John

[jbeegoode]

The reference was basically Schumann Resonance.

I first got tuned in sitting on my property before I built my house. There was a spot where I just felt good. I was drawn to it. Then, the dower friend showed me the spot as an energy vortex using a rod. "That's my spot!," I exclaimed. He was given no predisposed anything. I didn't really have a clue what he was actually doing, other than his warning of negative energies and illness.

 From there I was more open to my senses. I experimented, and read about the phenomena. I sent six blind never before dowing people over the area of "the spot" and they all came up with the same result as the dowser, exactly. A hundred foot trial along a two hundred foot trail and their rod moved exactly at the same spot. This further opened me to receiving, noticing the energies. Belief helps sensitivity. I am always concerned that belief is blinding me. I just needed to escape my skepticism to an extent.

I can intuit places of power, like Carlos Castaneda's Don Juan, but that usually doesn't include dowsing sticks. Sometimes, after I arrive and sit, I begin to notice physical signs associated with these kinds of places. Western scientific training and the knowledge of unconscious intuition tend to conflict. I like to let go and find myself in the correct place. Try sticking that to peer review.
Jbee