What it’s Like to Hold and Guide Master Plant Dietas
We, humans, are curious beings. When at a show or movie, we want to know what happens behind the scenes. When we see a magician or stunt person do a trick, we want to see how they conquered this feat. It only makes sense to me then that a common question I receive as someone who holds master plant diets is what exactly do I do? What do I feel? What is happening behind the curtain? Here I will explain what we do when holding a diet, as best I can.
If you’re new to Master Plant Dietas and want to learn more about them, read Neil Kirwan’s magnificent article here first.
The Art of Spiritual Protection
The first priority is protection. When holding the container for a dieta, we want to make sure that it is held in safety and love. There are many ways to do this, so I will share a few of my favorites. Before sitting to open, check on, or close a container, I begin by calling in all of my guides, plants, allies, and all of the other beings and spirits that I work with and asking them to help protect both myself and the person and plant within the dieta container.
There is one thing that I have learned is essential here. It is protecting and holding my own energy first. Not only does this keep me safe from taking on any energy from the diet, but it also ensures that nothing from me unnecessarily leaks into the dieta container. Once I feel settled and safe in my own energy, I can then call in the plant that is being dieted and the person dieting. Most often, I will visualize them in a sphere of protection surrounded by alchemical fire (I learned that last part from White Sage, who said that this would transmute anything that managed to come in or out of the sphere into its highest form.). From there, it depends on what is happening at the moment in the diet, but I will check on the connection and feel into what is going on with the diet.
Singing in the Plant Spirit
As part of holding a master plant dieta, we sing the plant in at the opening, sing during the diet to foster and support the connection or send protection, and sing the plant out at the closing of the diet. Singing is an absolutely essential part of this process, and I have had some absolutely incredible experiences with this. My favorite is when what we call “being sung” happens. This is when spirit takes over, and it feels like you are watching yourself sing as it is spirit singing through you rather than your own voice. The song itself will likely be one that I have sung many, many times, but it will not sound the way that it normally does when I sing it. It takes on a life and vibration of its own.
The song that we sing to open and close the diet also becomes an integral part of holding the dieta. The plant to be dieted chooses the song and tells me what to sing. It never ceases to amaze me how much the song reveals what the energy and process of the diet will bring. It’s like it informs the diet in many ways and brings in the intentions for it more deeply. As I am doing this more and more, I am still amazed at how many people tell me after opening that the song that the plant brought in was exactly what they needed, spoke to them in some way, or captured the intentions that they had written precisely. These plants are wise beings, and they know what they are doing.
Receiving Messages from the Plant
One of my favorite parts of doing this is when the plant uses me as a channel to give a message to the person dieting. In some diets, this may happen multiple times, others not at all or only once. It really depends on the needs of the plant and person dieting and what is called for to help communication between them to be understood.
Once, I was holding a diet for a lovely woman with Cacao, and the only message I kept getting for her was that she didn’t need a message. Cacao just wanted her to know that their connection was strong and that what she was receiving with her own intuition was to be trusted. She only gave this message to empower this woman to trust herself, cacao, and the relationship and communication they had together.
Ways Messages Manifest
Verbal messages are not the only thing channeled through. I have received songs that I was called to share with someone or been told that they should consider reading a certain book. I’ve had websites come through and all sorts of interesting things that the plant used me to pass the request or information on to the person. I also personally have playlists come through to me for every plant that I have done a social diet with, and I have a few times now been guided to share that list of music with someone.
To me, this is particularly special because it really highlights just how much the plants want to share with us. While they may not have vocal cords, they do have messages, wisdom, and even humor to share. I have had a few plants be downright hilarious with what they have to say, and they can often be playful. Mostly, it just feels like a real honor to be able to support the connection between human and plant through this medium.
Knowing When to Give Support and How to Offer It
Honestly, knowing when and how to give support to someone on a dieta can be the most difficult part. If you are doing the work of holding a diet, you, by nature, are most likely caring and empathic and want to help the people and plants that you work with in whatever ways that you can. However, caution must be taken here, and I always check in with the plant before stepping in.
Being on a master plant diet can bring up hidden traumas, feelings, and memories we have not wanted to deal with. While it can have moments of bliss, it can also feel like you are being completely dismantled, drowning in confusion, and overwhelmed with emotions and pain surfacing. They can take us deeply into our shadows, and equally, as challenging, they can catapult us into the vastness of our light.
There are times that the plant will guide me in what to say or suggest for the person to support them through the process. Yet other times, what is needed is for me to just hold the safe container so that the person can navigate through what is happening in a protected space. One example I can give here is when I was holding a diet for someone who was working with all of the ways they did not love and trust themselves and were learning to discover confidence and empowerment. For me to intervene in that process would have been disempowering and hindered what they were learning with the plant. By them just being held so they could do the work with their plant guide, they were able to discover the strength, empowerment, and self-love that they had come to the plant to uncover in themselves.
Cultivating Deep Plant Partnerships & Intuitive Connection
Therefore, feeling deeply into when, how, and even how much to say and guide is a big part of doing this that requires our own trust in our intuition and with the plant that we are working with. But, when that connection is strong, the incredible growth and transformation that can come from this process of diving into deep marriage and partnership with the plants is unparalleled.
While so much of what we do as holders of master plant dietas is difficult to describe as it is often energetic and working with the spirits of the plants themselves, I hope that this gives you a bit of an idea of what we holders do. It’s been one of the greatest blessings of my life to be chosen by the plants to do this work with them, and I hold that honor in my heart every day.
Read more about plant dietas in our blog, “The Bobinsana Master Plant Dieta: Resilience, Emotional Awareness, and Self-love,” by our co-founder and CEO, Kat Courtney.
About the Author
Lindsay Calliandra Rose is a Medicine Carrier, an accomplished herbalist, Plant Medicine integration specialist, and a woman with a profoundly sacred relationship with nature. She began her Plant Medicine journey many years ago with Ayahuasca and Huachuma, and she has completed multiple Master Plant Diets with beings like Rose, Bobinsana, Juniper, Jurema, Cacao, Oak, and Blue Water Lily. Lindsay is an initiated server and carrier of Hapéh. She now works as a preparation and integration guide for those answering the call to work with sacred medicines, and she is apprenticing in the art of guiding Master Plant Diets as well. She is a passionate advocate of safe and transformative experiences with the plants, and she loves helping people navigate these mysterious spaces with grace, love, and support.
