parenting includes understanding and tending to the special nutritional needs of infants and children. The grow- ing brain requires cholesterol (animal fat) in order to develop properly. The young immune system needs large amounts of vitamin B12 to thrive. Both of these, as well as several dozen other nutrients required for children, are avaliable to us only as gifts from the animals.
Young children are omnivores. To limit their diets due to parental conceptions of what is and is not spiritual food is to short-change their intelligence and health for the rest of their lives.
Vegan, raw food, heroic, and overly strict macrobiotic diets do not provide adequate nourish- ment for infants and children. Vegetarian diets that include butter as well as full-fat cheeses, yogurt, and milk, may supply enough cholesterol and vitamin B12, and others of the sev- eral dozen critical nutrients that come to us only as gifts from the animals. The optimum diet for very young humans is rich in or- gan meats, muscle meats, and all kinds of fish, but not processed meats (sausage, salami, bacon, ham, bologna, hot dogs). I have heard parents defend a limited
diet as “more spiritual.” Perhaps they are, for the parents. But, as an herbalist, I do believe that plants are as sentient as animals. I know that plants are capable of feeling. To eat only plants does not strike me as more spiritual, only more cut off from the gifts of life and from life itself. And that is not my definition of spiritual.
All of life is holy and whole and part of everything that is. Spiri- tual parenting connects to the larger picture. It sees the flow of generations, the web of Ances- tral connections, the spiral of life turning, turning. Spiritual parent- ing sees into the fabric woven of blood lines and song lines, and makes of it a garment suited for each new baby. If there is a ritual, so much the better. Rituals help us spin our stories together into a beautiful tapestry. Rituals tie the new baby into the carpet of incarnated souls that precede it: parents and grandparents and great grands and so on. Baptisms, christenings, and godparents, be- ing presented to the community and naming ceremonies are some of the rituals of spiritual parent- ing.
It is important to remember that each child’s soul chooses the parents and the home it needs for its growth and understand- ing. We do not have to be other than we are to engage in spiri- tual parenting, we need only to love who we are. When we love ourselves as we are – with all our faults, our tempers, our
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impatience, our lacks – then we can truly offer unconditional to our children. And, that, to me, is what spiritual parenting is all about.
The goal of spiritual parenting is not to create a perfect child (tiger mothering not withstand- ing). The goal of spiritual parent- ing is to nurture a whole and holy child. To do this requires that we become whole and holy our- selves, not by forcing ourselves to fit into a preconceived mold of spirituality, but by allowing the natural flow of spirit to burst open the gates our hearts so we fall in love with life itself.
Spirit is as close as your breath; spiritus is breath. And our breath is a gift from the plants. Let their joy inform you. Let them teach you how to keep the spirit
Susun Weed, author of the Wise Woman Herbal series, is an extraordinary teacher with a joyous spirit, a powerful presence, and an extensive knowledge of herbs and health. Ms. Weed is the voice of the Wise Woman Tradition, empowering women worldwide to reclaim their health and wellbeing through knowledge, simply and safely. Visit:
www.herbshealing.com
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