Animism and oneness

"Hishuk ish ts'awalk, everything is one."
-Nuu-Chah-Nulth People Vancouver Island

From Derrick Jensens book listening to the land.
An interview between him and John A. Livingston.

"DJ: Does the feeling of the extended self, lack of self/nature dichotomy, come and go or do you feel it always?

JL: It comes and goes, depending on the situation. If one is in the right circumstances, then its there. At other times it takes an effort of will to retrieve it. But I think we may be addressing the wrong side of the self other split.
What about the concept of "the other"? Maybe that's the problem, not self. I think the self other dichotomy may be so pernicious because we spend all of our time concentrating on self, and we seem to take other as a given. If there were no other, we wouldn't need the idea of extended self. I don't think the coyote sees the bunny rabbit as other. She is what she eats. No doubt the rabbit sees the coyote similarly- another part of the same being. When I scratch my head, which is the "other", my fingers or my pate? Coyote and rabbit similarly. Gazelle and cheetah. Whatever.

DJ: A transformation of parts of the self.

JL: Parts of a greater unit. Transforming, interacting, always toward new forms or levels of integration. Each death is the beginning of a new miraculous process of transformation> always within the greater whole. So that butterfly is me. I am that frog."



So transformation and a relief of the self other split through the perception of transformation relieves the idea of boundary's between us. This is one of the most common animist perceptions of wholeness and oneness. Its a missing point that aleaves the other/self split misconception. Its what I have learned from the snake, several times.

You are that....

Snake has come to me upon occasion during visionary states and once consumed me, whole, opening me to the whole, and telling me that "there is no such thing as positive or negative energy, there's just energy doing what it needs to do". After being consumed by the snake, my fear and panic was gone, I became the snake, a cobra, my back straitened and my cobras hood opened and I was filled with light, millions of voices speaking at once taught me the lesson of non-duality.
On another occasion snake came to me, and introduced itself to me as my soul. I did not trust the snake and argued with it, telling the snake that I was my soul and it was its soul. The snake insisted that it was my soul and then showed me, after I argued some more about the condition of my personal autonomy, that is was also the soul of every one I had ever known, and all of the spirits that I work with as well, transforming himself into each other them. Then I saw the truth of what snake was telling me... there is one soul and we all share it, we are it... all that is. The snake then began to tell me of my need to learn about transformation. This was many, many years ago.

Rarely do those of us who study transpersonal models pursue concepts of non-duality and oneness out side of eastern and western metaphysics and philosophers. East/west philosophers such a Ken Wilbur have dominated these discussions and have actually in the past claimed that animist traditions where on a lower level of development in comparison to say Buddhism, and that earth based religions or spiritual traditions such as neo-paganism...

"Well-meaning efforts to re-enchant the world by neo-pagan ideas and practices cannot fully restore what modernity has eliminated, namely, the interior dimension of personhood, soul, and spirit. Second, by calling for the return of various kinds of neo-pagan nature worship, some people may fall prey to what Wilber calls the "pre/trans fallacy."[17] It is a fallacy to confuse a) surrendering personal-egoic consciousness by regressing to a more primitive, pre-conscious state with b) transcending of egoic consciousness by moving toward an authentically transpersonal state." Michael Zimmerman

Animist as well as neo-pagan people around the world have integrated their own unique ways of relating to non-duality, the "transpersonal", and oneness in incredibly diverse ways. Each showing a perspective that is unique to a people of place. Transpersonal states, experiences of oneness and non-duality are cross cultural and not dependent upon some heirarchical ladder of development, that only certian asiatic groups or balding american philosphers get to experience and talk about. They are natural phenomena that all people around the world experience and have their own unique ways of understanding, knowing, preceiving and communicating.

For example, once again...
"Hishuk ish ts'awalk, everything is one."
-Nuu-Chah-Nulth People Vancouver Island

Animist people and their philosophies on oneness can help us increase our understanding of the universe, not to mention help us in developing our own unique way of understanding oneness and the transpersonal as an animist and reinhabited person of place. Other than human persons as well can be ( in my above example with snake) teachers of this wisdom, and the purely simple observation of nature itself can show our interrelatedness and oneness, if only one has the open eyes to see it.
Imagine for a moment that there is no word for other and self in your language, nor perhaps even an implied we! What would that be like? How would that change your perception and way of thinking and behaving? How would you address what we would call and perceive as an "other" if say you met an "other" on the road?
The Maya of Central American address this by saying ( in an English translation of coarse) "Inlakesh" which means roughly "We are different faces of each other", "you are another My Self", There is no real elequant English translation but in a nutshell it means we are all one. Another way this self other split is addressed is by looking into totemic relationship dynamics and family dynamics. Every one or thing is related ( quite literally and figuratively) every one is family, and every one is alive because we are one, every thing/one is intelligent because we are one, every thing/one is aware because we are one and I myself am aware, and just like in any family unit or kinship sharing occurs... and in this case it is also a sharing of attributes as well as qualities, powers and responsibilities, not to mention ways of seeing and knowing and being, this is where the shaman and transformation comes into play... but I will leave you to think that one over yourself.
Wakan Tanka is anoher example in the Lokotah way of relating to the world...

"In Lakota mythology and traditions, Wakan Tanka (also known as Wakan or Wakanda by the Omaha Tribe) is the term for the "sacred" or the "divine" as understood by the Lakota people. It is often translated as "The Great Spirit" or "The Great Mystery", and is typically understood as the power or the sacredness which resides in everything, similar to many animistic and pantheistic notions of God. Every creature and object is either understood as wakan or having aspects that are wakan. "

Then in some cases the animist perception and conceptualization of oneness is often simple (NOT to be confused with dumbed down) and often times integral to their relationship dynamics. For those of us concerned with reinhabitation of place and doing so as an "new animist" it is an important thing to contemplate. A challenge then for us is to look past eastern and western philosophical conceptualizations of oneness and non-duality and find our own unique sense of what that means to us as a person of place. As well as why that would that be of importance, to sense it as a person of place?