Wondrous Little Character Called Chi

Understanding something about Yin and Yang remains so difficult. My experiences of fifteen years study and application of the two in gardening convinced me their relationship with each other remain very important to a garden’s continued health and stability. Yin and Yang are pivotal upon which all things are dependent. Trees, shrubs, birds and insects, the weather, ourselves, whatever become compositions of Yin and Yang.
I realised gardens can become overly Yin or Yang, yet harmony becomes a product when they are at peace with each other, and as such their blending create a garden’s naturalness.
There is something else out there influencing and reacting with Yin and Yang to give a garden its ‘life’. It’s a ‘life-force’ energy recognised by ancient Chinese. They described it as Qi. In the west, Qi has become more or less known as Chi. It is this energy I became attached to.
Chi stemmed from Yin and Yang reaction and that becomes rather confusing and bewildering. I for one became bewildered in understanding their relationships. I just accepted the explanations of those ancient Chinese because they were great observers of their surroundings and wanted to live in contentment with them. They cultivated the Chi of a place so its energy remained imbibing and auspicious. An uplifting energy for continued health, happiness and prosperity.
I realised auspicious Chi could be harvested, if that’s the right word. We as gardeners could create surroundings that encourage its auspiciousness, and as such, empower what lives within.
But, how do I to translate something of Chi’s mystic and charm to the everyday gardener? I thought I could take a journey with Chi and let it tell me something of its influence and character, but also its unsettledness and destruction. For Chi has moods and remains a product of change alongside time; time and change guiding its presence and influence, and remaining quite complex and confusing as it does.
I recalled spending a few days staying with my niece and family at their pleasant home (and neighbourhood) at East Lindfield in Sydney and thought I’d create a wondrous little character, (Me Chi) to take me for a wander within some of the suburb’s gardens and neighbourhood, and in doing so, it could relate something of our relationship with them.
I found Me Chi’s journey quite compelling and suggest it is present in every garden. How we relate and discover it is up to the gardener and those who enter such places. Maybe it’s within our imagination, but I’m sure it’s something else. Something powerful and influential and governing our presence alongside that of any living creature. Maybe that’s the way it should remain!