Quite a few years ago...
A good friend came up to me, and said..." Brother we need to do ceremony, I'm trying to get off heroin. I bought a bag today and I don't want to do it."
I needed some work as well... it was a good idea...
So we went to my home and lit some candles in the tipi and had a ceremony... we took a very strong, and special medicine, that gave very powerful insight and vision, that opened up communication in ways that was unspeakable...
My life was changed by what went on in that tent... I had never seen nor experienced anything like it before in my life... and I cannot talk about all that went on in that huge tent. But we nearly lifted it off the ground...
We felt well and went to go give offerings down from my house at the killing tree... an old growth fir with an eagles nest on top of it... the tree is littered around its base with the eagles kills...
We go and give offerings there and respect the world tree and spirit of all that is...
You have to walk through a clear cut to get to the killing tree... all of my spiritual family goes to this tree and prays... its been a way I have helped started for us... and its become tradition...
I was very hungry on the walk over... we had worked harder then I had in a while in ceremony... but we were fasting, and we had not broken the fast yet...
I felt my stomach growling as I walked through the new understory... I felt my will, a pull from the gut...
I relaxed and allowed that feeling to take over, I could see all around me at dusk in this clear cut, this place full of life force renewing the land, full of spirit... I could see all of the energy around us, the life force, the chi, the prana, the pnuema, spirit, shakti, mind, consciousness, the land, the spirit of the land and sky, the great mystery... and many other words what I saw/am... moving in patterns filled with patterns and potential... I saw it moving... I opened up and allowed it to move me... I felt total instinct take over... a bird was in a tree and spirit moved me to it... it was not I that was hungry but the whole land and the land would give me what I needed because it was me, I was it... all of my instincts were just an antenna for one being, the whole, the totality, that like me knows its self from its locality between two eyes but can know itself as the whole, and like me knows its self as the land I was walking on, feeling hungry on.... and this land, this larger me said in that moment through the experience of being moved... if you got your self in shape enough, and allowed the whole to work through you enough in this way the bird would be in your hand and then your gut...
I turned to my Friend and told him what had happened...
He was walking behind me wearing my jacket and hat, filled with medicine and a sense of wellness... and he said... "I never want... I have all that I need... I experience this all the time..." I looked at my jacket and my hat... and his large eyes... and said.. yeah including a nice jacket a head full of medicine and a good hat... we both got a good laugh from that...
We went down to the tree and before we payed our respect...
We layed down on the forest floor and looked up into the canopy filled sky of dusk and felt the earth move through us...
A raccoon walked up to us, raccoon being a sort of totem for our little band of people...and gave us his love and blessing... standing right next to our heads chattering in raccoon speak at us... we felt we had been generously gifted allot that night and thanked raccoon for his blessing and he walked away.
We circled clock wise the tree and picked up bones and beaks and feathers and felt our hands moved to place them in the tree... this is how we learned to be people... we felt our bodies moved by the whole, starting with where we are standing, and we felt the whole speak its prayers through us as us... we felt our bodies moved to roll tobacco and we were moved to light and smoke the tobacco and our bodies were moved to face all six directions... and this is how we learned to relate to the killing tree and to life... It was not an idea or a learned thing, it was spirit moving our bodies and hearts... we blew tobacco to the six directions and to the tree and the eagle on top of the tree and we took our tobacco and we gave offerings of the tobacco to the tree blowing on it with our breath as we were moved to do... literally moved... our minds our hearts our intentions our feelings our bodies thoughts... all antennas for this remote control being played with by the great mystery by the one mind, the one animating spirit we all share, the one soul... and we blew tobacco on each other said thank you gave each other hugs and broke our fast, by going to the nearest dumpster and getting eggs from it, as our totem would.
It was from this work and many other ceremonies and experiences like this that bioregional animism first came to be...
It was events such as these that started this fire...
Thank you heron...
where ever you are...
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