Sacred Feminine and Masculine

On the becoming indigenous programme the subject of the sacred feminine and masculine showed up multiple times in one form or another. The masculine and feminine dynamic is a central theme of many peoples lives. In the modern world hierarchy and patriarchy are defining forces a fault line if you will that runs through many cultures. The inequality, division and misunderstanding that springs from these forces can be a powerful trigger. In the context of indigeneity comparisons of how more traditional peoples relate the masculine and feminine in their cultures has proved an interesting inquiry.

A caveat before I go further. It is too simplistic to equate the sacred masculine and feminine with physical gender. In my view conversations on this subject can too easily slip into this frame and in our group that also happened on occasion. Nevertheless, the marriage or balance between these two dominant archetypes is a significant defining motif of our times and worthy of much reflection and transformation. For me I try to remember that both archetypes live in me. To other is not helpful.

Bayo Akomalfe spoke about everything being entangled, nothing needs fixing. There is too much emphasis on othering. It is too simplistic to externalise the imbalance, wound or issue outside of oneself. Thus bringing the binary into focus, the separation between masculine and feminine qualities, characteristics or features then becomes ever more real. One being stronger, better, more powerful, effective and in control than the other. When the tensions, mystery, awkwardness are present - what do we do then? Bayo invites in this edge, let's the tensions dwell and move amongst us, he engages it and listens deeply. This does not imply fixing or solving. Instead it suggested seeing, revealing, recognising and acknowledging. It's in the paradox of simultaneously holding opposites, such as the sacred masculine and feminine, that something new can emerge. It need not be a battle or a contest. No winner is required.

Charles Eisenstein put forward the idea that to heal ourselves we also need to heal the other. What this represents is a new unifying story for health, for economics, for life itself. Charles brings in the paradigm of the gift. Can we drop the binary of masculine and feminine? This is very controversial because so much trauma lies underneath these archetypes. Mutuality needs to breathe. What is being grieved when the relationship between the masculine and feminine appears in the room? What can and needs to be praised also?

Loretta Afraid of Bear suggested the feminine needs new forms to witness and to speak into. Remember there is no other, there is no outside. There is no them and us. Notice all the compassion and beauty around. Notice your own patterns when triggered. What emotions show up? Can this emotional response be expanded into compassion? What is wanting to hide, to be unseen? With Loretta we are back to grief and praise.

Mac Macartney shared that the ancient stone circles that are dotted around the British Isles are a reminder of times gone by where peoples practice ceremonies to awaken the dragon. The circles representing the eye of the dragon opening and waking up again. The legend of George slaying the dragon some believe is a reference to the goddess being subdued and defeated. From that moment god cultures became dominant. And now we live through times when goddess energies need to be woken placed alongside god energies.

Balance as Martin Shaw might say, 'comes when the king and queen marry the  land'. What this implies is restoring balance so each of us can become a the river to our people and land becomes fertile and regenerative. When the sacred feminine and masculine are aligned and in deep relationship with one another no one dominants the other. They both shine in their own beauty.

I find it very difficult to do this subject any kind of true justice. It is stark and subtle all at the same time. This theme has streaked through history, culture and day-to-day life for thousands of years. The relationship between masculine and feminine is unlikely to shift over-night, or will it? Who knows? What is known is the subjugation of the goddess, the sacred feminine, has been happening for thousands of years and yet there is evidence that it was not always like this. The impact of this denial, power over of the feminine, has detrimental and harmful effects on everyone and everything. Maybe at the heart of the dis-ease many people, more than human beings and the planet experiences' lies this imbalance between these two primal qualities.

Sundance - Ceremony and Ritual

(Notes from a one week course taught at Schumacher College from 9 - 13 Nov 2015, teachers Loretta Afraid of Bear, Linda Delorimer and Tim 'Mac' Macartney.)

Ceremony and Ritual
We are always in ceremony. Life is a ceremony. The ancestors are around and they are listening. They want to help us, if only we would to ask. Nothing about ceremony is a contest. Be prepared each day of your life to get involved and to be challenged. As in life, ceremony has beautiful aspects and hard aspects. You don't have to make excuses for anything. You are part of the ceremony whether you go inside the inipi (Sweat Lodge) or not.

The first grandfather was rock. In the beginning there were four gods - Sun, Air, Earth, Rock - in the four directions. This is known as four to the fourth power. The rock grandfathers know everything. If you are in a place of huge challenge you can say to them, 'It is too hard for me, I am going to give this pain, question, issue back to you because I do not know what to do with it.' Our time on Earth is short. Make this time count. Feed the grandfathers in ceremony. Ask the grandfathers for help and healing. Take care of yourselves in this most critical and challenging of times, where many are governed by convenience and commerce and not those activities that are regenerate and life bringing. Be humble and respectful of the natural ways. YOU can make things happen. The holiest time is between 1.30 - 3.00am in the morning. It is the most holiest and magical time for an inipi.

In 1883 native peoples in North America were prevented by law to practise their ceremonies. This pushed these ways underground until the law was relaxed in 1978 and repealed in 1994. It has only been 21 years that Inipi and other ceremonies life the Sundance have been legally and openly practised again.

There are certain times in the year to observe sacred practises. These are similar if not the same for all indigenous traditional peoples. Such as, new moon and full moon, or the solstices' and equinoxes. The purpose of the Inipi at 1am is to activate our dreams. Woman on their moon do not enter the lodge because they are already in a powerful and activated state. We all gather the following morning and share our dreams.

Lakota/Oglala Creation Story
Indigenous peoples often practise an oral tradition in the telling of stories and history. Loretta Afraid of Bear comes from a long lineage of ancestors who do just the same when telling their creation story. So it was for us on the first evening, we sat and heard the story to begin all stories.

We call the Creator, movement. That movement brought about where we are today. We are all star people. Women bring everything. Women bring life. Women are the co-creators. It is important to be in sync with spirit. Put spirit first. Place life at the centre. Every action has consequences. There are no rules and yet we seek balance and to bring balance back.

Take care of family. Take care of the old people. Take care of the children.

There is a spiritual connection to bring us in sync. We don't have hierarchy. Women own everything. There's a balance that comes with that. Every race has original instruction. Native Americans have their instructions. Do the indigenous peoples of the British Isles have a memory of their instructions?

People are going to start waking up. Who is responsible for taking care of the Earth? The Lakota people say that in the mountains of Asia and Africa some of this knowledge is being kept.

White Buffalo Calf Woman brought Lakota the sacred pipe. She was black, red, yellow and then finally white. First came the black people in the west, then the red people in the north, followed by the yellow people in the east and finally the white people in the south. The common thread between them all is spirituality. What is it within our spirituality's that we can all link together?

There is a place where we all are the same colour, we are one race, the human race, and our palms remind us we are one, as all palms no matter what your heritage are the same colour. This is a powerful way to be reminded of our commonality. This also links us back to Pat McCabe and the five fingered ones, as the human race is known. By showing our palms we are all one.

Let's Dream
When in ceremony it is important to be attentive to everything going on around you. The next morning after the Inipi we sat in circle and shared our experiences of our night and day dreams. Two different themes arose from the group sharing. The first was 'Water', which appeared strongly in three people's dreams. It was suggested they walk to the river Dart near by and bring water back to our alter for us to be humble before. The second theme was the sacred feminine and masculine. Again this dynamic came up in many sharings that day.

We were reminded that transformation is hard. That we are going to feel things strongly and yet not to be sombre about it. Life, the work, ceremony is all about relationship. It's about building relationship. This is the cosmic flow and we don't want to interrupt the movement.

During ceremony, particularly Sundance, the highest offering we can make to Spirit is our flesh. Woman give from the top of their arms. Men from their chests. When you are making a decision your body knows the answer. The giving of blood and flesh is particular to Sundance. In the UK, Martin Shaw strongly recommends not to cut flesh or give blood as it communicates to the spirits in a way we may not wish to encounter. Menstrual blood giving is a different matter again. When in ceremony everything is in conversation. Be attentive. Listen. And most of all be kind.

The Lakota have seven sacred ceremonies.

• Keeping the Soul
• Sweat Lodge - Inipi
• Vision Quest
• Sun Dance
• Making Relatives
• Puberty Ceremony
• Throwing of the Ball

We stand in sacred space all the time. The idea is when in sacred space we all hold one another and we move about with complete freedom. This is how it should be. The themes that arise within the group during ceremony alert us to where our fears are and what is open to transformation. It is the twin path. The intertwining of the practical, down to earth and grounded part of life with the loftier spiritual, imaginal and invisible part of life. Where the profane and the sacred meet. We are all walking the twin path, each of us finding our own balance and relationship between the two aspects of life. When in ceremony the spirits teach us songs and provide us with other messages to bring back to our communities, to our village. Remember ultimately there is nothing to fear in our world, not even death.

Inipi - The Sweat Lodge
I    - you
Ni - energy inside our bodies
Pi  - all of us together as one

Our bodies do not forget how to heal themselves. Inside the inipi what one person feels we all feel. Our ni recognises each others ni. When someone has stress or fear we can smell it. Don't feed the negative energy by saying bad things. When things are 'outwards', negative or out of balance it is not so much what happens as how we respond to what happens. We have to help one another. Healing, ceremonies and rituals are coming together. The Lakota do not have a word for compromise. To find balance does not mean giving up your values, your needs or your alignment. Duality and wholeness co-exist. That is the way. That is the twin path. And that is paradox. It all comes together by being in relationship. Participating in the whole. Bringing what you bring and contributing this to your community. It is about seeking to listen to the whole and by being good to one another.

Overwhelm, Discomfort and Pain
The ancestors are waiting for us to let them help us. They are always there, ready and willing. We are being asked to lean in to the void, to the abyss, to our fears, discomforts and pain. It can be overwhelming. It can be a barrage of feelings, memories, images, nightmares and all kind of difficulties and challenges. Remember it is ok. Our mind creates the abyss and our hearts cross it. The way through is to feel it all and be with it. Listen to the message trying to be heard. What is the truth wanting to be spoken. The river beneath the river.

Discomfort and pain is a hard place to inhabit. Native people have been through excruciating challenges from previous attempts at genocide and removal from their land, sacred sites and ceremonies. This is on-going. Native peoples understand the discomfort.

Indigenous peoples ask in such times: what is available? are all the elements of earth, air, water and fire in play? Go to safe and holy places. When you feel unseen go to places where you feel witnessed.  Ask, what are the protocols? what is allowable? What allows this sacred space? What do you want to bring into it? Ask your elders for permission to do this? Ask, what are you trying to get out of this? What is it you need to receive from the ceremony? Is it a guidebook, teachings or witnessing. And finally ask yourself, how will this be good for my people? If you can answer these questions you will have something tangible.

Elders are the wisdom keepers of tradition.
Children are the future.
Adults are the bridge.

On the twin path it is essential to attend to both strands - the practical/domestic and the holy/sacred. I commit to attending to craft and using my hands to make things in 2016. I commit to learning sacred song, playing my drum, journeying in pilgrimage the sacred sites of the British Isles and to being in circle.

Shadow Work I

Shadow work.

The storms have been rolling in.
Wind and rain flexing their muscles
Reminding me who's the boss.
Some call it destruction
Others say it's clearance,
Which ever way it's change.

When I spend too long in a place 

Where my shadow is not acknowledged or given space. 

My warrior will eventually show up. 

My warrior has arrived.

And she is guarding the door to my soul.

Protecting me.

I've been feeling provoked, prodded and goaded
Misjudged and out of sorts. 

That's my story.
What's yours?

I need to speak my truth.

That's hard to do when hurt, judged or overwhelmed.

That's hard to do when my shadow is not welcomed.

It's not safe.

Anger is activating.

Anger makes me aware of what's not ok.

Anger makes me attend to the shit going on.

Anger protects me and guards my boundaries.

Anger says STOP!

Anger says no.

Anger protects and empowers me to act.

Anger is my activism.

Anger needs to move, like the wind.

Anger needs a voice, it needs to go some place.

Anger needs to be heard.

Anger is not to be held onto or stored.

Anger needs to flow like tears.

My anger needs to get up, bellow and go.

So I can show,

My vulnerability.

When anger can pass through

I can let go and breathe again
Unfettered and
Free

Five Fingered Ones - Many Ways of Knowing

Five Fingered Ones
In North America the native peoples have a cosmology that includes their medicine wheel. Life is placed at the centre and all decisions are passed through the wheel. If an action or decision does not bring life it does not fit their cosmology.

Woman Stands Shining - Pat McCabe - our visiting teacher (Schumacher College, 26 October - 6 November 2015) was born into the Dine Nation and adopted by Lakota Nation. Pat said to us; 

You were born into beauty

As Beauty

For a joyful life

That is the truth

You have got to

Have the eyes to see it.

The five-fingered ones - human beings - are shifting the components of life in a way that we must heed what we are doing. We are wounding each other through our differences. Separation has to end. The Wiwa people's say these actions could never have happening in the world if they did not first start in our hearts. Some say the masculine energy within us is attempting to over power the feminine energy. The masculine spirit and feminine soul need to come back into balance. The womb of the woman is for some related to the womb of the cosmos. Nothing new is going to happen, no new creation will be birthed until the polarities of masculine and feminine are aligned, healed and reconciled. We have to make a radical new choice collectively as a global human community and run like hell for leather with this new third way.

We need to become indigenous to Mother Earth. This is what it means to place life at the centre. That is a challenge for everybody in the hoop of life. The hoop of life is comprised of every single member of the living community. The integrity of the hoop is being tested. We need to start tending and mending the hoop of life.

We are at a crossroads

Ask yourself - do you want your life?

Reclaim your life.

Proclaim to all, shout it like you mean it;

I WANT MY LIFE

Ask yourself, what amazing thing is going to happen today?

Ask yourself, what sacred practice did your peoples use to connect themselves to life?

No one is a mistake

No one is without purpose

Spirit will tell you where and who you are

Paradoxically our intellects will not

It is like expecting one key to open every door

The five fingered ones have fallen asleep

We need to remember

We need to awaken

The plan is Life

Place life at the centre

It's real simple

Life makes life

There are many ways to the bottom of the valley

There is more than one trail

Know the trail where you live

You've got to want your life

I can't tell you what's up in your land

Most people die at 25 and get buried at 75

Not me and not you!

Indigenous practice removes the vail

They lift the enchantment

It is said, Coyote threw the gossamer vail

Over the heads of men to bring despair

Coyote expected us to brush off the vail

But we didn't

Now Coyote is working out how to remove the vail.

Many Ways of Knowing
As the five-fingered ones we have more than one way to meet the world we live in. This broad spectrum of ways of knowing is a the hallmark of indigeny. Indigenous people have learnt and know how to live in a balanced and harmonious way in one place. They have done so for thousands of years in some places. To create a relationship with a place you have got to have a means of communicating two ways. Firstly each person has to proclaim themselves. You have to want your life and say so with vitality and meaning. We each have a name by which the spirits know us. The spirits can't do jack until you ask. Give it a go. Interactive with life. But remember do not quest for a vision unless you mean it.

Indigenous ways require a commitment and a discipline to place yourself before the truth frequently. This can be done using many different methods.
Meditation being one
Create an alter or sacred space inside and outside
Rest your body
Rest your mind
Be conscious of what you feed yourself with stories, books, videos, media, movies
Spend time in nature
Be in circle
Have buddies, a tribe, a clan that is interdependent to one another
Pay attention and observe what's happening around you
Intentionally step away from human systems (cities, technology, machines, ideas)
Slowdown
Find ritual and ceremonies for this moments in life
That you want to acknowledge and observe
Grieve and Praise

For example, when you arrive somewhere new, call out and tell the place of your arrival, lay down offerings, such as tobacco, fruit, nuts. Mother Earths trying to call her children home. Arrival rituals pay respect to this calling.

The land in the UK is very lively. The ancestors speak of a history between Mother Earth and the five fingered ones. Mother earth remembers this lineage. The Uk is like an enormous Oak tree that grew over time to be so big full of ceremonies. There came a moment when the Oak tree was cut and hidden. Now what remains are the roots from this old Oak tree and the roots are still there waiting for us to connect back to them again.

We need remember that we each have a divine connection within us that cannot be effected by anything or anyone, including ourselves. When we get off track and out of alignment we are brought back to the hogan, to the womb and the songs are sung to us again so that original beauty can return. Balance and harmony are reconstituted.

Remember it is all choice and free will. No one or no-thing can make you do anything you do not willing want to do. As we move into a deeper into the surrender our frequency changes. Interactions with the natural world recognise our depth of practice. Why surrender? Our minds make a problem out of everything and seek to come up with solutions. We get enraptured by stories of fame and riches. The thriving life way does not focus on what's in it for me mentality, the take approach to life because in the thriving life way the intention is We. This is referred to as the move from ego to eco.

Becoming Indigenous
There are some who will scoff at the idea of 'becoming indigenous' and others will deride the idea of creating a learning programme with this title. You will find some arguing for non-indigenous to be in one place and to leave the indigenous peoples alone. For white folks 'becoming indigenous' is radical and as a programme title it is controversial. As Colin Campbell would say it has heat from the conflict, but heat need not be a bad thing. Pat McCabe reminded us that it is everyones birth right to have a relationship with Mother Earth. No one has the right to get in-between you and that. Loretta Afraid of Bear looked into the eyes of each one of us and said, 'You are Indigenous'. Irrespective of the division there are Indigenous Medicine peoples willing to enter a conversation on 'Becoming Indigenous' and defend every persons right to seek this relatedness to land and ancestors.

Cultural appropriation, toxic mimics and  inauthenticity are a whole other conversation. One that is necessary and valid but not to be conflated with someone's ability, willingness or birth right to rebuild and connect to their land and peoples.

When we don't put life at the centre and when we cannot sit in the mystery we resort to something else. That something else is conformity so as to avoid the discomfort. The challenge is not to be drawn into the binary. Hold the paradox. wait to see what can then emerge within the paradoxical space.

In the divergence and controversy around 'Becoming Indigenous' hold both the favourable and supportive views alongside those less supportive and encouraging.Acknowledge the extremes and polarities present. The paradox is to honour the diversity without deferring and allowing separation to occur. Stay connected, stay in the circle, keep the hoop strong. No one life form is more special or more important than another. All life is needed to ensure the hoop is intact, in health and in strength.