As spring is unfolding on the mountain, ten thousands vegetal life-forms grow into a symphony of greens. At the Five Immortals Temple, this is a time to prepare our gardens to grow vegetables and medicines.
After an intensive week of training the Wudang Five Dragons Heavenly Dipper Dragon Shape Sword form, students worked in the gardens as a collective. We planted potatoes and corn, and prepared beds to grow more food. We also harvested lots of bamboos to build fences around our Herbal Medicine garden, and planted seedlings of Dang Gui (当归 Angelica Sinensis), Ban Zhi Lian (半枝莲 Scutellaria Barbatae), Di Fu Zi (地肤子 Kochiae Fructus), Tie Sao Zhu (铁扫竹 Indigoferae Bungenae), Chuan Xiong (川芎 Ligusticum Chuanxiong) and Pu Gong Ying (蒲公英 Taraxacum), along the dozens of other Chinese Medicine plants that have already been seeded in the garden over the years.
Our purpose with care-taking a food and medicine garden is to produce for the temple fresh organic food and medicinal herbs. Food and herbs that grow from the soil without any chemical, from one own’s work, carry an energetic power of nourishment and healing far superior to the products that have been transiting through the market and the exchange of money.
The work is physical and grounding. Amongst the Western students of the Five Immortals Temple, many had never taken care of a food garden, nor knew how to recognise and use herbs to make medicine, even though those are fundamental life-skills. This provided them with a first-hand experience that may generate a new view on life, nature, and the inter-connectedness of humans and the Earth.
Through hard work as a collective, we all found joy and peace of mind.
