Conflict Re-solution. . .

So he’s done it again.  Rush Limbaugh has gotten himself into trouble for hurling defamatory remarks at someone for the simple reason that her beliefs run entirely counter to his.  Sponsors are leaving.  Peter Gabriel is pulling his music from the show.  “THE SKY IS FALLING,” the OP EDS scream.

And we pretend we’re actually surprised by this?

Whether students of Rush Limbaugh’s or Keith Olberman’s dojo of broadcasting, pundits survive on one thing and one thing only: conflict.  For every corporate sponsor that pulls its ads, another two will rear their heads and pony up for the time.   And that’s what this whole thing is really all about.

For all their intelligence and articulation, media personalities such as these are simply mouthpieces for a corporate agenda that dons its colors and trudges off to battle in the war for the almighty dollar.  Red vs. Blue.  Christian vs. Moslem.  Liberal vs. Conservative.   The media draws the teams, appoints the generals and pipes the war directly into our living rooms at the behest of Pepsi, Nike, and McDonalds.

There’s a reason the Buddha sat by the side of the road and laughed his ass off at the moment of his enlightenment.

For the record, “Conservatives” are not all Bible-thumping xenophobes conspiring to wipe out everyone whose wicked ways will corrupt us all and drag the world to hell.  And “Liberals” are not all long-haired New Agers running naked in the streets with needles hanging out of their arms, a joint in one hand and a bottle of Jack Daniels in the other…but that’s what those who manipulate the media would have us believe.

Of course the stereotypes exist.  You’ll find them hanging out at the fringes.  As you get towards the middle though, you’ll find that most people want to be left alone to worship, live and love as they see fit with no intervention from others.  They want their children to be happy and healthy, and they want a chance to support themselves and their families – regardless of religion, the color of their skin, or the color of the uniforms they wear.

Our politicians labor largely to keep themselves in office.  If letting “gays” into the military garners that corner of the voting market (and, coincidentally, makes it that much easier to find soon to be cold bodies to send somewhere brown people who look at God through different eyes are sitting on a bunch of oil) then that’s what they’ll push through.  If keeping those same “gays” out of the military corners a bigger sector of the market, then THAT’s what they’ll do (at least until the end of the election cycle).

It’s push and pull, brought to you by your good friends at Monsanto, GE and Exxon.   And they don’t care how it’s spun it as long as the coffers are full and the average American falls in line, dollar in hand, for his slice of the GMO pie.

Gandhi said we should be the change we want to see in the world.

Ask yourself what kind of change YOU want to see.

Now ask yourself what kind of change Rush Limbaugh, Exxon and MTV want to see.

Then ask yourself what you can do about it.

The mainstream media has almost completely buried the Occupy movement, while tyrannical politicians like Raum Emanuel slam home legislation ripping what’s left of the Bill of Rights to shreds. (Look it up, if you don’t know, it’s a real eye opener considering how close he once stood to the current President).

“They have the guns”, an old song says, “but we have the numbers.”  So what do we do?  Do we form ranks brandishing signs and clubs?  Do we pummel and shout the world into shape according to our own designs?

I think the solution lies a little closer to home.  We can’t change the views of others, but we can change ourselves.  We can decide to be an example of the peace we want to see in the world.  A very wise man once told me that it’s every adult human being’s right to act like an asshole.  Unfortunately, some people abuse that right.  To hate them for it is a waste of energy.  To argue with them is a waste of time.  But to provide an example for them is to put into action the very ideals by which we live.

It takes guts to live by your word – and that road is often difficult, demanding almost superhuman commitment.  Only we can determine if it’s worth it.

Our time in this place is limited.  What we do with it is entirely up to us…

An Open Letter to the Children of the Earth…

My Dearest Children and Grandchildren,

To those of you here at this moment, and those of you still waiting to be born; I apologize for writing this from such a confused and anguished place.  We as a people have squandered everything our predecessors put aside for us, and so we have nothing left to give you.

While this will be your burden: struggling beneath the crushing weight of an ever-increasing debt which not even your grandchildren will be able to resolve, it will also be your freedom.  For by coming to realize how stupid and reckless we were, you will be freed from the lunacy, greed, and fear that brought us to this place.

Do not waste your time and energy hating us for what we’ve done.  For it has been said, quite truthfully, that hatred is like swallowing poison and hoping that the other person dies.  Instead, learn from our mistakes, pity us if you must, forgive us if you can, and build upon the remains of everything we’ve torn down.

Be gentle with the Earth, and she will sustain you.

Care for her, and she will care for you.

Listen to her, and she will teach you everything you need to know about yourselves and those with whom you share her, be they two-legged or four, winged or finned, rooted  or wind-blown.

In our blind and insatiable quest for power, we have ravaged the Earth and torn away her secrets.  We have stolen her minerals, polluted the waters of her life-blood, burned her precious forests, and waged war against her children in the name of the Creator and material wealth.  And whenever we experienced a brief respite from this madness, rather than extending an open hand of friendship, or attempting  to bridge the gaps we’d so foolishly opened between ourselves, we hid behind our flags and erected monuments to our dead.

I do not ask you to understand the things that we have done.  I only ask that you move beyond them, listen to the true sound of your hearts, and find the courage to love and respect one another.  I pray that you and those who come after you will do the one thing which is the responsibility of every generation – yet seems to be the very thing upon which we have almost entirely turned our backs – I pray that you will work to leave this place a little better than it was when you found it.

To that end, I offer you these words.  I hope that at the very least, you will consider them.  We have moved the clock ahead.  Sadly, we have taken away your childhood before you ever came to experience its joys and wonders.  Like so many of us who’ve come from broken and dysfunctional homes, the roles have reversed, and the responsibility of parenthood falls to you.

Hold your leaders accountable for their actions.  Always remember that THEY work for YOU.  When this ceases to be the case, remind them of this fact.  If they continue to forget,   band together and remove them from office through peaceful resistance and acts of civil disobedience.  This is your right.  And their ranks are far less in number than yours.  The elite may have placed you at the bottom of the pyramid, but YOU support the entire structure.

And they will fear you.  And well they should.  For only you can decide how you should be governed.  And remember when you stand, that not only the eyes of your generation, but those of future generations as well, will be watching.

You have a difficult road ahead of you.  There is no way I can tell you anything else and be honest.  But for the sake of the Earth and all her children, you must place your feet firmly upon the Good Red Road and walk it.  Look to your Creator for support.   Extend a hand whenever a fellow traveler stumbles.

And be ever mindful that the decisions you make during  your lifetime will impact the lives of millions of others not yet even born while you’re making  them.

Know, Children, that not all of us have hidden our faces from the truth.  Some of us have rent the veil and cannot ever willingly be blinded again.  And we look to you as the cradle of a new life for the Earth and her inhabitants.

We do not expect you to act without making mistakes.  But we have faith that you will develop the wisdom to learn from them – and in doing so, begin to heal this beautiful planet and all her peoples of the damage we have so ruthlessly inflicted upon them.

With deepest gratitude, support and love,

Ben Jezierski

“Silver Bear”

Bear it in mind. . .

I’m not a person who typically has prophetic, meaningful or even memorable dreams.  I can pretty much count on one hand the number of times this happens in a year.   Generally, my dreams are psychic patchwork, stitched together from tatters of the day’s events with a rough internal framework holding them together.   A few nights ago, however, I experienced a dream that demanded more than just a casual review.

I was sitting naked at a campfire in a circular clearing.  Suddenly, Grandfather Bear entered the clearing and leapt on top of me, pinning me to the ground.  As I lay there with my face pressed into the rocky earth, he began to nip at my right hand.  I struggled futilely to free myself.

Sensing absolutely no malice in his attack, I realized immediately that this was an initiation of some sort.

I knew instinctively that even though I couldn’t possibly throw him off, I needed only to wait for the right moment, and I could escape.  No sooner had I reached this conclusion, then he released his grip and I slipped free.

As the scene shifted I found myself walking down a gravel path.  I was dressed in gray deerskin and moccasins; simple yet durable clothing well-suited to the rigors of the journey that lay ahead of me.  Behind me, I felt the presence of Grandfather and Grandmother Bear.  They smiled, and I knew that they would always be there to protect and advise me as the situation required.

The message here is obvious.  This work is not something that can be forced, or pummeled into shape.  Grandfather’s nipping of my right hand, the hand of strength and masculinity, reflects this.  This also seems to be indicated by my being clothed in gray deerskin at the end of the dream.  Among its many symbolic meanings, Deer stands for gentility.  This is the reason why we receive the Grandfather Stones from the fire with White Tail deer antlers before placing them into the pit at the center of the sweat lodge; we wish to offer them some measure of gentleness after their ordeal in the sacred fire.

Gray is the color of neutrality, a mixing of white and black  - Masculine and Feminine – into a new color blending the sacred energies of both.  The presence of the male and female aspects of Bear walking behind me on the path away from the clearing at the end of the dream speaks of my need to commit to balancing these energies within myself.

The spiritual path is not for the faint of heart.  To walk it truthfully, one must constantly be aware not only of one’s actions, but of their implications and the inspiration from which they spring.  We struggle with the apparently contradictory task of abandoning ourselves completely, that we might be hollow bones through which the love and healing energy of the Creator can flow unimpeded, while strengthening ourselves to withstand the rigors of faith, and the work this journey requires.    It is through the bringing together of these two seemingly opposing viewpoints, like striking flint and steel, that a divine spark is produced, illuminating the pathway of our lives. . .

I don’t know…

Lately, I just don’t.

I’ve been in an odd place these last several months; gearing up for some intensive inner work, I think.  There’s a feeling of something deep inside clawing its way to the surface – or rather, the skin of the onion is peeling away, and whatever’s hiding at the center is getting closer.

This was brought to light the other day while reading the latest installment of Michael J. Melville’s blog Ancient Whiteagle Wisdom.  Melville talks about dealing with the Inner Critic.    As the child of an emotionally abusive and fragile alcoholic father suffering from PTSD, this is an entity with which I am quite familiar.  The Inner Critic was always there, checking my responses, dogging my every step lest I fall out of line and set the Old Man off.

With him, it wasn’t so much the threat of physical violence as it was the things he’d say to my Mother and me, the way he’d treat us when he was drunk, and withdraw in shame once he sobered up.   From the time I was a child, there were constant arguments and emotionally charged stand-offs between the two of us.

At the time, of course, I was unequipped to see these things as a disease, and so as not to push him, I developed a highly tuned survival mechanism.  I could tell from the way he said good morning (or didn’t), the look on his face, the way he walked, whether or not he had his morning coffee, what kind of mood he was in – when the sea is rough, you learn to navigate quickly, or you sink.

Home life was an almost continual training ground for these survival instincts.  I was a student in an emotional dojo, pitting myself against a man who, although loving us in his own way, lashed out constantly from a place of fear and anguish.

Years later that training remains mostly intact.  And while there may have been times when it’s proven itself invaluable, there have been many more times when it’s been the source of at best annoying, at worst almost crippling, false-positives.

Often (especially in the presence of Elders) I find myself scanning the crowd for a reaction.  Sometimes this comes dangerously close to interfering with ceremony.  Thankfully, I was given a bit of advice by a teacher several years ago that echoes through everything I do to this day:

“We do nothing for show; and we do nothing TO show.”

In times of conflict, I hear these words, and remember what it is that brought me here.

The path we walk is sometimes a difficult one.  Follow it deeply enough, and we’ll  end up facing our shadow. How we react will govern the course of our actions for the rest of our lives.

We do this because we must.

We do this because the work demands it.

We do this that we might become an example to those embarking on a similar journey. . .

Slowly, but. . .

In the true spirit of winter, I find myself withdrawing lately.  Looking inward.

It’s an odd feeling after the steady rush of activity that was these last several months.  I move a little slower these days.  My mind drifts a bit more.  And long hot baths have become an almost nightly occurrence. It’s good to relax and take the time to clean up my own spiritual back yard; to nourish myself on what took root in the spring.

The work I have been doing revolves around the house.  No major projects, much to my wife’s chagrin, but we started on the garage this morning, and the “Honey-do” list is dwindling, albeit slowly.

My spiritual practice also seems to be deepening.   While my journeys are less frequent, they are more impactful.  Grandfather Bear is asleep, after all, and it wouldn’t do to awaken him for frivolous reasons.

I’ve also recently completed my healing regalia. Or rather, I should say, Grandfather completed the regalia through my hands.  It’s been an interesting two and a half year process, and much wisdom has come about through working with my “bear skin”.

What started as a dialog between myself and a tutelary spirit has finally established itself in the physical world – and that is indeed the essence of what this path is all about.  We act as a bridge, a wire if you will, plugged into the Spirit world and the Physical.  The energy of the Creator flows through us and manifests here for the greatest good of all.

As I’ve heard so many times around the arbor and the lodge, “All we need to do is show up, and the work somehow gets done.” And there’s never any shortage of work, or energy to accomplish it.  “Ask Spirit for energy, and you’ll receive it,” our Dance Chief Kristen often tells us.  And so it comes – as much as needed – and enters the world that my people may live. . .

Mother Earth / Father Sky. . .

Photograph by Angel Gisondi

“So let’s make our steps clear that the other may see”

“If I should Fall Behind”

-Bruce Springsteen

“Sacred relationships…are a bitch,” he said; the laughing one – a child of Coyote.  This was accompanied by a mischievous grin, a twinkling eye, and an offer of advice if my wife of less than two months and I should ever hit a rough patch.

We’d gathered together in the small but welcoming one-room building for a potluck after a sweat at a lodge appropriately named “Open Heart”. It was a particularly strenuous lodge, and everyone was tired, hungry, and grateful for the brevity of the blessing and the generosity of the menu – there is, after all, no food like sweat lodge food.

As the meal and the afternoon wore on, a cake was brought in celebrating not only one of our group’s being awarded Teacher of the Year, but the joining of Marie and me as well.

The outpouring of affection has really been something to observe.  So many have wished us well, hugged us nearly to the point of breaking, and shown their love with cards, gifts and other gestures.

On one level, the joy expressed is that of a community coming together in love.  But on another, there’s something that just feels right when the Masculine and Feminine impulses come together.

I’m not talking about sexual preferences here.

I’m talking about something much more deeply-rooted than that.

We incorporated the sacred pipe into our ceremony.  We stood together on the Medicine Wheel, she carrying the bowl, and I the stem.  Grandfather Eddie accepted these symbols from us – symbols of the Divine Feminine and Divine Masculine – and joined them together that the prayers of all might be carried to the Great Spirit on Eagle’s wings, wrapped in sacred smoke.

And so Earth and Sky came together.

At the very center of instances such as these, there’s a balance that resonates almost beyond words – an essence of pure Creativity that neither pulls nor pushes.  It simply exists, and for the good of all that is, that is enough. . .

Visitation rites. . .

“…everything that is
is alive

the lantern walks around
the walls of this house have tongues
even this bowl has its own true home
the hides asleep in their bags
were up talking all night
antlers on the graves
rise and circle the mounds
while the dead themselves get up
and go visit the living ones.”

“Things a Shaman sees”
-David Cloutier

The system is failing, folks.  The bipartisan “Super Committee has failed to offer a solution for the staggering $1.2 trillion debt that we’ve  piled onto the backs of our children’s children.  Markets crumble, houses are foreclosed, unemployment is on the rise – yet a cabal of powerful men in grey suits serves up nothing but flippant sound bites in hopes of shifting the blame and covering their collective asses – and the slavering maw of the military industrial complex gorges itself on an ever-increasing smorgasbord of natural resources culled from the very populace it’s sworn to protect.

Yes, the system is failing…

And so it must, if we’re ever going to survive.

Our society has lost its way.  Or rather, like a team of horses fitted with blinders, the general populace finds itself goaded into a narrow alley way by the relentless prodding of fear and greed, charging headlong towards the cold harsh reality of a brick wall, seemingly without the ability or desire to turn itself around.

And yet, the prodding continues.  The twin drums of jingoism and consumerism set the pace for a dead-end ride that can only end one way.

The homunculus of our consumer based society, fueled by testosterone, rapacious corporatism, and blatant Empire building has gorged itself on the lifeblood of Pachamama and her children, and finding itself ensnared in the trap of rapidly dwindling resources, now turns its rabid fangs upon itself.

I’ll leave the speculation as to the exact steps that brought us here to the social scientists, economists and philosophers.  What’s clear, however, is that our society at large has cast aside its connection to the Divine Feminine. We have torn down the Earth Mother and put up the Whore of Babylon in her place.

Which brings me to the symbol that accompanies this post. What appears to be a three-pronged pitchfork is actually a letter from the younger futhark or Scandinavian runes.  The name of the rune is “Yr”, and I’ll relate its relevance to the contents of this already lengthy post after a bit of necessary background.

This past Sunday afternoon, I had the great privilege of being summoned to a council of spirit Elders during a shamanic journey.  We sat beneath a moonless sky spangled with millions of stars, the meager firelight illuminating an occasional buckskinned knee and wrinkled cheek.

A pipe was lit and made its way around the close-knit circle.  As I readied myself to receive the chanupa, a pair of bony hands reached across the fire, grabbed my collar, and yanked me towards a stern and furrowed face hovering in the darkness above the flames.  I recognized the face as that of an elder I’ve visited several times in recent months.

“ You will be the spiritual keeper of this land,” he snapped.  “You’re an Elder now, so act like it.”

Without waiting for a reaction, he shoved me back into place. The tension was broken almost immediately when a roar of laughter erupted among the Elders.  Relieved, and somewhat dumbfounded, I raised the pipe to pray, and passed it to the Grandfather seated next to me.

It was then I noticed for the first time that our circle was comprised entirely of men.  “Where are the women?” I asked the now smiling medicine man who’d rebuked me.  His gaze shifted over his right shoulder, and I became aware that we were surrounded by a circle of women just beyond the reaches of the firelight.

“The women support us,” he said.  “They operate from the shadows to protect us and give us strength.”

With that, he touched a stick to the fire and both circles vanished, leaving me staring at pit of smoldering ashes, the runic symbol in molten silver at its center. This is not the first time I’ve been shown a rune, but my unfamiliarity with the language required some research before I could make sense of its meaning.  While the explanations from several websites vary only slightly, this from Articlesbase.com seems to capture the essence:

“On this physical plane of reality we live under the Law of Duality. Man-woman; hot-cold; dry-wet; gravitation-levitation; etc, etc. These seemingly opposite forces dissol(v)e when they meet in the center…

Rune #16 YR.(I)ts primary runic function is to balance the male-female energies. The main rune-meaning for YR is mystical union.

Within all of us is the desire for union with ourselves. Men desire the union with women, who are their spiritual counterpart. Women desire the union with men who are their physical counterpart. We all spend a great deal of time and energy searching our counterparts on the physical plane…

Other meanings for Rune YR: Rune of Mystical Union; Rune of Perfection; Rune of Night and Moon; Rune of Process Bringing Radical Change; Rune of Overturning of Affairs.”

By their actions the Elders had spoken clearly. The time has come for a radical shift in the way we conduct ourselves on this planet. Clearely our species will never survive unless we as individuals learn to balance our Masculine and Feminine impulses. . .