6 years ago today it all started!

 It was this day 6 years ago I did my first ever phantom planter post!

These are the pics and this is what the post read-

"5 native oak trees phantom planted in a field near you. Cost me £7.50 and will provide us with that very handy stuff called air for the next 900 years or so. Phantom Plant, Guerilla Plant, what ever way you want, lets make it a trend to plant trees.

I Challenge You to Phantom Plant a Tree!"....

That was my first ever post guys and I planted these trees on the way to Jampa Ling Buddhist Monastery to get The Phantom Planter blessed by the monks before I put my first post out. The first post I wrote after the blessing at the monastery.

Since then guys its went to places I never dreamt off. People have been taking up this challenge and phantom planting trees in all corners of the world.

The power of faith and belief with a bit of Buddha magic I believe!

Its been the best 6 years of my life! Alongside my phantom planting my own healing and spiritual journey has been growing with the trees. My body, mind and soul has never felt stronger or healthier.

It was Buddhism drove me to do all this, for a couple of years before I started The Phantom Planter I was really struggling with drink and drug addiction and I used to go and stay in Jampa Ling a lot. They had this practice there called karma Yoga and it was going out and helping out in the gardens. I started to read more into this Karma Yoga practice and its believed to be a form of self healing and purifies negative Karma. I was not in the best of health back then and I also had so much negative Karma that I created lurking in the background from living in the Underworld for most of my life. So this Karma Yoga practice sounded about perfect for me!

For many years before that I had planted apple trees around my local estates. I did this just for a bit of fun and never thought anything of it. When I started to study Buddhism more and learn about Karma Yoga I thought to myself that I am going to make tree planting my Karma Yoga practice. I started off using my own money to buy fruit trees and off I went all around the place planting trees. The way I seen it was, if the trees die it was only £30 or something l loosing, I never lost any sleep over spending a few hundred quid on drink and drugs, I was not going to loose any sleep over a few trees that didnt make it. I can always replace them.

This went on for a couple of years planting fruit trees, I had not yet come up with The Phantom Planter, I was just doing this as a form of Buddhist practice and self healing.

Strange though that all them years ago even when I was a hood and knew nothing about Buddhism I was planting apple trees just for fun with no connection to nature or trees at all. I couldn't even have told you what an oak leaf looked like. I do believe that the first couple of apple trees I planted did something to my consciousness and connected me to something much more than we ever know. It was these apple trees planted in the middle of madness that directed me to where I am today!

You see they say in Buddhism everything is about your intention and motivation. You cant fool the Dharma, the underlying law of all that we are. I know back then what my intentions were, I wanted apple trees in my estate for everyone to pick from. It baffled me why they were not everywhere anyway! It was not for money or ego that I planted these apple trees all them years ago, it was purely selfless, it was Karma Yoga that I was unknowingly practicing back then.

The more trees I planted the more addictions and negative thought patterns falled away from my life. Things that used to annoy me in life just go over my head now. I have truly been able to forgive people also, which was a massive thing for me. Holding onto all that hate and anger is a poison in itself. 

I thank mother nature and the Buddhas every day. 

Most nights I listen to monks doing questions and answering. I have never aligned with anything so much in my life. I also believe I had to go through so much darkness, greed and self gratifications to fulling realise how right Buddhism is. This world is riddled with delusion. We must take back our own energy and direct it for the greater good. Buddhism is the tool just for that. A beautiful form of anarchy I like to think of it as. Its like f**k the system in a nice way. It no longer controls or manipulates you. Stick a monk in prison and chances are they'll become enlightened. 

With every negative carries an equal or greater positive. 

I challenge you to phantom plant a tree

Peace and love 

The Phantom Planter