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.
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.
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