Turning toward Each Other: On Nature and Healing

Some might say that sunflowers are the trees of flowers. For Claudia Linares, they are symbols of light and guides in her search to help people heal and come together.

Sunflowers: golden-maned, heliotropic, world-traveling, pollution-absorbing, pollinator-feeding flowers. This favorite flower can grow up to 10 feet tall and is one of the largest in North America. There are 52 different species of sunflower, all of which are native to areas within the U.S and Mexico. But sunflowers can be found growing all over the world. Sunflowers are heliotropic, meaning they turn their flowers towards the sun as it moves across the sky, following a circadian rhythm in tune with the sun’s patterns. They turn by growing one side of their stem more than the other, and then alternating to change their position. On days when there is no sun, they will turn to face each other.  

For these reasons, Claudia Linares, founder of Girasol Counseling and Tacoma Tree Foundation partner, turns to sunflowers as a source of strength and joy, and a model of her counseling practice. She also turns to them for support, just as she encourages people to turn to each other in times of need.

This past summer, she was away from her sunflowers when they bloomed. Due to a house fire, she and her family had to relocate temporarily. Claudia reflects on this time sharing that “I was feeling sad that I couldn't take care of them but they were like, ‘We got this!’. There’s all of these ways that they will grow or flourish in their own ways.” 

Claudia is a clinical social worker, community advocate, and daughter of Salvadoran immigrants. She works with a focus on family and community systems and liberation psychology. Liberation psychology aims to address individual and collective issues and trauma by cultivating a greater understanding of how systems of oppression impact wellbeing with the goal of creating social change and justice. “The idea behind it is that our liberation is tied to each other. To feel that [we] are walking or accompanying people in their healing journey,” Claudia said. “I chose social work specifically because we don't exist in silos, we exist in family systems, the place we live in, spirituality, larger systems. Most of the people I work with are Queer, Black, Brown, Indigenous people.” As a TTF partner, Claudia has helped us cultivate healthier and stronger communities. Her work as a Spanish interpreter for our bilingual mindfulness tree walks has allowed us to create spaces that encourage linguistic and cultural diversity, and to make our work more accessible to those who do not speak English as a primary language or who want to practice their Spanish.

Wild and urban green spaces are two of the larger systems that greatly influence our individual and collective wellbeing. But traditional understandings of human relationships to nature can get in the way of recognizing the importance of these systems: the division between human beings and nature is deeply embedded in our culture. This division is something that we need to work on bridging if we are to achieve collective healing: “I don't think we can do healing work without including nature,” Claudia explains. “We are nature [...] not recognizing that is part of the wound that we carry. We are not separate beings, and that is really key around healing work [...] we are from the dirt and will return to the dirt. I hope that when that happens I will come back as a sunflower, and I probably have been a sunflower before.”

Sunflowers have taught Claudia what it looks like to live these practices. For her the sunflower is connected to Mayan culture where it symbolizes: “a light that is literally connected to the sun–the sunflower is the sun on earth.” The Spanish name for the sunflower, girasol, refers to the flower’s movement toward the sun: “I like the Spanish name a lot better because in Spanish “gira” means movement and “sol” means sun [...] And it is a reminder that we can move towards that sun [...] when there is no sun, we can move towards each other.” This is exactly what Claudia’s therapy practice seeks to help people do.

At Girasol Counseling, nature can be a place to safely do trauma work with clients, especially for people who have experienced marginalization and racism in relationships with others. “Unfortunately, a lot of us have been wounded by other humans, so forming relationships with nature is a safe place. I think for a lot of people who have not had a lot of safety in our world [...] nature offers us a place of healing,” Claudia explained. In the somatic writing workshop she facilitates for BIPOC community members at the Wright Park Conservatory, nature is a place to ground self-exploration and healing. Some of the questions Claudia asks are: “What does a safe relationship look like? How do you feel when you are in nature?” These questions can be helpful when exploring our connection to nature and how it can be supportive in healing.

Sunflowers themselves help the environment heal. Scientific studies show that sunflowers can mitigate soil and air pollution by removing toxins like lead, arsenic, and some air pollutants. As such, sunflowers are sometimes used for phytoremediation, or the intentional use of certain plants to clean and stabilize polluted sites. In fact, they have been used to mitigate pollution and toxic radiation in places like Chernobyl and Canada. 

Drawing from the sunflower, Claudia’s practice as a social worker, community advocate, and mindfulness expert creates healthier social spaces and stronger communities, helping people work through their trauma, cultivate resilience, and change oppressive systems.

Claudia recognizes that our partnership is important as we both value connecting people to place and encouraging others to care for our shared place. “Place is something that matters to both of us and taking care of the place that we are at. What I've gathered from interactions and following you all on social media is that we live in Tacoma and love Tacoma, how do we make this a good place for us to live and take care of eachother,” Claudia said.

Claudia values the connections she has made through her partnership with us at TTF, as they have expanded her community practice and her professional partnerships. When asked to share a highlight from our walks, she shared a favorite memory from a walk at Swan Creek Park with Sarah Low. They stopped at a Pacific madrone tree, and Sarah asked participants to note how the madrone grows in a different direction because it seeks the sunlight. For Claudia, this image represents how “there isn't just one way to grow–we can grow to the side and be curved.“ The madrone, like the sunflower, grows towards the light. 

“I feel so happy that I have been able to do these walks with you all. I’m excited for whatever else comes from this relationship that we have.”