Mitakuye Oyasin: We are one...
When your ancestors come and you actually KNOW them and know they are with you, they show you things you couldn't normally see, both within yourself and in the world. They don't just visit the spirit, but the whole person, and so the body responds as it will. When you have a vision your body goes in the vision. When I had a vision I dug in it and so my hands were dirty after... I don't understand this but it is true. The native IDEA of the body and spirit, the earth and all of the creatures on it being one- it fascinated me for so long and I yearned to truly believe it. Intellectually I did believe it. I guess it wasn't until I experienced what I believe to be actual contact with the long dead at Wounded Knee and also had a vision and had my vision interpreted by my friend, who told it back to me as if he'd seen it too, that I really felt and experienced that we are one and that the body and the spirit are not sepparable. The people I saw and felt at Wounded Knee were as real to me as the living people I was travelling with. My vision was also real and true, and it was a message for me and for my people, the pilgrims I was travelling with. The person in our party who's grandfather apeared at our sweat when we invited our ancestors in- he FELT what he used to feel in the presence of his Grandfather when his Grandfather was living. Over two years later I am gradually coming to understand this more and more. In so many ways every day I experience the one-ness of all of God's creations and I am thankful that the darkness of my eyes is ever so gradually removed and I can see these connections when they are shown to me, and see so much more of who people really are.

Thursday, October 4th 2007