shirleytwofeathers
Long ago, the Great Bear wandered freely throughout the sky. His massive paws took him far across the boundless ceiling of the world. He hunted and fished, feeding there in the rivers of the sky. All throughout the first spring he did this, until his belly was full and he was happy.
Little did he know that three braves had discovered him feeding that spring and they sought his meat and pelt to feed their families in the long winter that they knew was coming.
Without warning, the braves ran out after the bear. The Great Bear took off running, trying to escape from the hunters. All through the long summer he ran, trying to get away. The braves, however, were very cunning and strong. It was in the first autumn when their arrows pierced the Great Bear and he died.
The blood of the bear spilled out of the sky and tinged all of the leaves with red and orange. The trees then dropped all of their leaves in mourning for their friend.
The Great Bear was reborn the following spring as is the way of bears, and the braves set out after him again. They do this each year. If you look into the sky and watch, you can see the three braves trailing behind the Great Bear as he runs from them towards the horizon, only to do it again with the coming of spring.
An Iroquois Legend
Adapted by Harriet Maxwell Converse
There was a time, says the Iroquois grandmother, when it was not needful to plant the corn- seed nor to hoe the fields, for the corn sprang up of itself, and filled the broad meadows. Its stalks grew strong and tall, and were covered with leaves like waving banners, and filled with ears of pearly grain wrapped in silken green husks.
In those days Onatah, the Spirit of the Corn, walked upon the earth. The sun lovingly touched her dusky face with the blush of the morning, and her eyes grew soft as the gleam of the stars on dark streams. Her night-black hair was spread before the breeze like a wind-driven cloud.
As she walked through the fields, the corn, the Indian maize, sprang up of itself from the earth and filled the air with its fringed tassels and whispering leaves. With Onatah walked her two sisters, the Spirits of the Squash and the Bean. As they passed by, squash-vines and bean-plants grew from the corn-hills.
One day Onatah wandered away alone in search of early dew. Then the Evil One of the earth, Hahgwehdaetgah, followed swiftly after. He grasped her by the hair and dragged her beneath the ground down to his gloomy cave. Then, sending out his fire-breathing monsters, he blighted Onatah’s grain. And when her sisters, the Spirits of the Squash and the Bean, saw the flame- monsters raging through the fields, they flew far away in terror.
As for poor Onatah, she lay a trembling captive in the dark prison-cave of the Evil One. She mourned the blight of her cornfields, and sorrowed over her runaway sisters.
“O warm, bright sun!” she cried, “if I may walk once more upon the earth, never again will I leave my corn!”
And the little birds of the air heard her cry, and winging their way upward they carried her vow and gave it to the sun as he wandered through the blue heavens.
The sun, who loved Onatah, sent out many searching beams of light. They pierced through the damp earth, and entering the prison-cave, guided her back again to her fields.
And ever after that she watched her fields alone, for no more did her sisters, the Spirits of the Squash and Bean, watch with her. If her fields thirsted, no longer could she seek the early dew. If the flame-monsters burned her corn, she could not search the skies for cooling winds. And when the great rains fell and injured her harvest, her voice grew so faint that the friendly sun could not hear it.
But ever Onatah tenderly watched her fields and the little birds of the air flocked to her service. They followed her through the rows of corn, and made war on the tiny enemies that gnawed at the roots of the grain.
And at harvest-time the grateful Onatah scattered the first gathered corn over her broad lands, and the little birds, fluttering and singing, joyfully partook of the feast spread for them on the meadow-ground.
Hear me, four quarters of the world– a relative I am! Give me the strength to walk the soft earth. Give me the eyes to see and the strength to understand, that I may be like you. With your power only, can I face the winds.
Great Spirit…all over the earth the faces of living things are all alike. With tenderness have these come up out of the ground. Look upon these faces of children without number and with children in their arms, that they may face the winds and walk the good road to the day of quiet.
This is my prayer ~ hear me!
~Black Elk, Sioux Indian
Message of Purification from the Yukon Territory January 23, 2007
“Hothooka Caunotka “Sign Of Purification”
Saugh-he, a sign of purification has been sent to the people, that
The Morning Star will start to be seen right before the night and
Light dances together. This is clear to the people of understanding
And balance. This message of purification from Creator is speaking
That end times are near, as people know it.
In the days that follow, people will look at the sky nation and
Witness and feel the return of two brothers that helped create Earth
Mother in the birthing time.
One brother who has the care of the top of Earth Mother and his
Brother who has the care for the bottom of Earth Mother. In these
Days the Morning Star will come and be with the two brothers and they
Will start to return Earth Mother to her natural rotation.
This has been shown for ages in many Petroglyphs within the Mayan and
Egyptian pyramids and the carving and inscription on many rocks and Bones.
Earth Mother has been manipulated and characterized throughout the
Ages by people that are not so suggestive of doing good for Earth
Mother and Creators creations.
The two brothers will work and walk with the Hothooka. The Hothooka
Caunotka as my ancestors spoke of them, will dance with the wind and
Find the ones that remember the original teachings of the old ways.
The Hothooka Caunotka walks strong with Earth Mother’s purification Dance.
The return of the Morning Star and Hothooka Caunotka, is a message to
All that a new day and new way of life on Earth Mother is here and
The purification has started.
Some changes will begin when the feeling of fire burn within the
People. Their fires will burn with desires and conflicts if they
Don’t remember the original old ways of teachings.
With this time of purification on Earth Mother, all life as humans
Have known will be changed. There will be messages and messengers
That will precede the Morning Star dance. These feelings and messages
Are for those on Earth Mother who understand the old ways and the
Teachings of Creator and Earth Mother.
The feelings and messages will be found in the rocks within their
Sacred grains and the waters. Creator will issue a great light with
The Hothooka Caunotka dance. Things will change in their manner of
Being. Every living thing will be offered the opportunity to change
From the largest to the smallest of creation.
Those that have returned to the old ways that understand the original
Teachings, they live and walk in a natural way; will not be harmed by
The coming of the Morning Star and Hothooka Caunotka dance. They will
Survive and work together to purify and help each other re-build
Earth Mother. In the ancient teachings of the old ways will they have
The ability to understand these messages to be given from Creator and Earth Mother.
It is important to understand that these messages will be found in
And on every living thing, all will carry these messages.
All life forms receives these feelings and messages from the Creator
And Hothooka Caunotka; those that walk, fly, swim, crawl or stand.
The appearance of the Hothooka Caunotka will be the opportunity for
All to change their ways; everything that will be experience will be
A matter of their choice.
Many will appear to have lost their souls in these times. So intense
Will the nature of the changes be that those who are weak in
Spiritual understanding will not maintain their balance of thinking,
For their walk was nothing without faith.
People will disappear, for they were only hollow vessels for the
Darkness to use. Things will be so dark and out of balance in the
Cities, that many will choose to leave.
Only those who return to the values of the teachings of the old ways
Will be able to find peace of mind and balance during this Purification.
It will be a hard time for people with children; they will be avoided
Deliberately and in some manner treated with force. Many of the
Children in these times will act and be un-natural. Some will be from
The star nation. Some from past worlds, some will be created by
People, in an un-natural manner and will have no soul.
Many of people in this time will be empty in faith, they will have no
Life force in their eyes or balance or their actions.
As the time gets closer to the purification, there will be those who
Walk as ghosts through the cities and canyons they have constructed
In their self-made mountains.
Those that walk through these places will be very heavy in their
Walk; it will appear almost painful as they take each step. These are
Disconnected souls from their faith, Creator and Earth Mother’s Understanding.
After the arrival of the Hothooka Caunotka, they will begin to vanish
before your eyes like smoke from the coals of a fire. Others will
have great deformities, both in the mind and on their bodies; because
the fake gateways that protected these people will be opened, there
will be much confusion between sexes and children and the adults.
Life will get and be very perverted and there will be little social
order in these times. Many will ask for their misery to end and still
others will appear as if untouched by what is occurring. The ones who
remember the old ways of teachings and reconnected their souls and
faith are those who remember who their mother and father are.
The Hothooka Caunotka will show people many signs in the sky nation.
In this way people will know that Creator is not a dream. Even the
people who do not feel their connection to faith will see the faces
of the Grandfather across the sky nation.
Many things will begin to occur with people that will not make sense,
for reality will be shifting in and out of their dream time. There
will be many paths to the lower world that will open at this time.
Things long forgotten will come back to remind people of the past
creations. All living and forgotten things want to be present for the
great day of purification when the forever cycle of Earth Mother starts.
The People will receive many warnings allowing them to change their
paths from below the Earth Mother as well as above. Then one morning
in a moment, the purification will awaken. Many things will then
begin to happen that people want to be sure of their exact nature;
for much of what reality was, will not be seen in the now, it will be gone.
There will be many different animals on Earth Mother in these days of
the Hothooka Caunotka dance, some that have never been seen before.
The nature of humans will appear strange in these times. The people
will walk between worlds and they will house many spirits even within
their bodies. After a time people will walk with the Hothooka
Caunotka from the top and bottom of Earth Mother and start to
rebuild, but not until the Hothooka Caunotka has left their mark on Earth Mother.
Nothing living will go untouched. The way through this time can be
found in your heart and reuniting with your soul. Getting simple and
returning to living with and on Earth Mother in harmony with all
creations. Remember, people are the caretakers of Earth Mother and
the fire keepers of our own faith and soul.
Our Ancestors that walk with Hothooka Caunotka are coming home to see
how their Ancestors have fared on their journey, walk with peace.
~Creator as Chief, Grayeagle
Many of us take our dreams for granted, not realizing that the dream state is actually an expanded state of consciousness. Due to the fact that the ego lets go of a lot of the control it normally exercises during the day, we become more open to healing forces that help us to regain balance mentally, emotionally, physically and spiritually as we dream.
There are many different schools of thought regarding the meaning and use of dreams – I call the dreamwork I teach the Esoteric Dream School since I believe that humans are spiritual beings, here on an evolutionary journey. I believe we have a higher self, that part of ourselves which is more enlightened and is the one constant at the core of our different lifetimes.
Our higher selves often work with us through our dreams – healing, advising, encouraging, and sometimes warning us of coming dangers. It is also possible to receive great spiritual gifts and knowledge in the form of visionary dreams. In the shamanic tradition for example, it is known that a developing healer can be initated as a shaman and given specific healing powers in the dream state. Such dreams are life transforming.
Anyone who desires to derive spiritual guidance and more conscious benefit from their dreams can achieve that goal. When I started in 1986, I could not remember much…an occasional clearer dream, otherwise just nonsensical fragments. Once I made the decision to start keeping track of them new insights about consciousness appeared from the very start. Today, I remember my dreams most nights and am able to apply the information they give me to my everyday life. I am also able to assist others, not only as a dream interpreter, but as a dream traveler, searching out and gaining information for various problems they request help with.
There are 3 basic steps to becoming a proficient dreamer if you consider yourself inexperienced.
1) REMEMBER YOUR DREAMS
Start to record your dreams. Have a journal – for that purpose only – by your bedside and write down the very first dream fragment you experience. It does not matter whether or not it seems important. By getting the journal and devoting time to this activity, you are sending a message to your consciousness that you are more interested in your dreams. This will automatically increase your ability to remember.
Write page numbers in your journal so you can make your own index of content. Don’t forget the date, make a few short notes about what you were doing that day, and whether or not there were any other influences, such as a full or new moon. As time goes by, you will observe certain patterns to your dreaming that will assist you in understanding their meaning.
If you are still having difficulty remembering your dreams, give yourself positive suggestions mentally a few times just before falling asleep. Examples of such suggestions are “When I wake up in the morning, I will remember my dreams.” or “Tonight I will take a photo of the most important part of my dreams and remember it when I wake up.” In the morning I will often use the following suggestion before arising if I am having trouble with recall: “I can and I will remember my dreams.”
Another important aspect of writing down your dreams is that often you will understand the meaning spontaneously as you write. The same effect can be achieved by sharing your dream with a friend or dreamwork partner who is willing to listen.
2) LEARN DREAM SYMBOLS
In order to be able to start interpreting the symbols your mind is using to communicate with you, you can start by using a symbol lexicon or even a dictionary. There are various dream interpretation books on the market. Some are excellent.
But a word of caution here: I have found many dream lists that are superficial and superstitious…written on a “parlor room” level if you will. Be selective. In the end, a symbol has the meaning that your consciousness applies to it and there is most certainly a cultural influence to be accounted for.
However, there are many universal themes in our dreams that are common to all humans on the planet, and these themes can be discussed and further explored during dreamwork classes. Other topics to be covered in class are the different types of dreams such as nightmares, clairvoyance, teaching, healing, mirror, etc.
3) PROGRAM YOUR DREAMTIME
As you become a more proficient dreamer, you can eventually learn to program your dreamtime to get advice on a particular question, to visit other places*, or to enter a state of lucid dreaming, which means that you are aware of the fact that you are dreaming while you are dreaming. This is achieved by giving yourself appropriate suggestions before falling asleep.
(*In the dream state the ordinary rules of physics do not apply…our spirit can actually leave the body and visit other places, other dimensions, other ages since we step out of the time/space zone in dreams. The dream state also allows us to communicate with those closest to us who have passed over.)
One of mankind’s greatest fears is that he is alone in the universe, abandoned to fateful forces of destruction. My dreams have time and time again totally and irrevocably convinced me that just the opposite is true. We are watched over, guided and supported through all of life’s trials and tribulations. Dream miracles have become a part of my daily life! I encourage and invite you to start your dream journal today and to become more acquainted with how your dream consciousness is speaking with you so that you can experience your own dream miracles!
Article by: Judith Bourque
One of the greatest gifts of dreaming is that it puts us in touch with soul. It takes us beyond the limited understanding of the everyday self and shows us who we are, what our soul’s purpose is in this life experience and what our heart truly yearns for. There is a word for this vital function of dreams in the language of the Huron, a dreaming people of North America. The word is ondinnonk, and it means a “secret wish of the soul”, especially as revealed in dreams. This expression takes us to the heart of healing.
By connecting with our dreams, and celebrating and acting on the information they gift to us, we bring the energy and magic of soul into our daily lives. As we allow our big dreams to take root in this world, we become whole and well, and start living our deeper story. As we help others to honor and celebrate their soul guidance, as revealed in dreams, we become healers and dreambringers.
Ancient dream healers understood that we are often out of touch, in our surface minds, with our deepest truths and our heart’s desires. Not knowing who we are, forgetting our soul’s purpose, we do terrible harm to ourselves and others. Dreams invite us to get back on the right track, the soul’s track. I learned about this many years ago when I asked for dream guidance in support of a narrow, ego-driven agenda. I wanted inspiration for a commercial potboiler, a thriller that would follow the formula of a successful previous novel I had published.
In my dream, I found myself in a banquet hall where a lavish feast for hundreds of people was being prepared in my honor. But there was a problem. In the dream restaurant, the master chef had walked out in disgust because he was bored with my menu. The message, on waking, was clear. If I persisted in repeating myself – in using my creative gifts for a limited purpose – my deepest creative energy (the “master chef” of the dream) would bow out; the soul and its magic would be missing. I abandoned a major book project because that dream showed me it wasn’t “major” in the ways that serve the soul.
Dreaming not only renews our understanding of the soul’s purpose; it can literally bring the soul back home. From the shaman’s perspective, soul loss is the root cause of much illness and affliction in our lives. We suffer deep grief, heartbreak or abuse or trauma – and maybe then succumb to negative habits and addictions – and a part of our vital soul energy goes away. Chronic depression, lethargy, memory gaps, low resistance to illness and emotional numbness are among the most frequent symptoms of soul loss.
Our dreams can tell us which parts of ourselves may be missing, and when it is timely to bring them home. Recurring dreams in which we go back to a scene from our earlier lives may indicate that a part of us has remained there.
Dreams in which we perceive a younger self as a separate individual may be nudging us to recognize and recover a part of ourselves we lost at that age. Sometimes we do not know who that beautiful child is – until we take a closer look. There is a marvelous story in my book Dreamgates about what happened when a woman went back into a dream of a beautiful five-year-old in a red coat, and found herself fusing at the heart, in a blaze of light, with the part of herself she had lost at age five through family trauma.
Unfortunately, a common effect of soul loss is dream loss. Indeed the absence of dream recall is often a primary symptom of soul loss – as if the part of the sufferer that knows how to dream and travel in deeper reality has gone away, out of pain or disgust. It is fascinating and deeply rewarding to observe what can happen when people who have forgotten how to dream start dreaming again. This can amount to spontaneous soul recovery.
A middle-aged woman approached me for help. She told me, “I feel I have lost the part of me that can give trust and know joy.” As preparation for our meeting, I asked her to start a dream journal, although she had told me she had not remembered her dreams for many years. When she came to see me, she had succeeded in capturing just one tiny fragment from a dream.
She remembered that she was standing over a table, looking at three large-size “post-it” notes. Each had a typed message. But the ink had faded and she could not read the messages.
Slowly and carefully, I helped her to relax and encouraged her to try to go back inside her dream. Quite quickly, she found herself inside a room in the house where she had lived with her ex-husband prior to their divorce, almost twenty years before. Now she could read the typed messages. The first read in bold capitals, “YOU CAN DO IT.” They were all about living with heart, and trusting life.
She realized that she had left her ability to love and to trust in that room for nearly twenty years. I asked her what she needed to do. She told me, “I need to bring my heart out of that room and put it back in my body.” She gathered up the messages and made the motion of bringing them into her heart. As her hands crossed over the place of her heart, we both saw a sweet and gentle light shine out from her heart center. She trembled, eyes shining, and told me, “Something just came back. Something that was missing for twenty years.”
In the most literal sense, dreaming can make us whole. It not only connects us with lost or buried aspects of ourselves. It connects us with our larger identity – our Higher Self – and our larger purpose.
Honoring the secret wishes of the soul, as involved in dreams, requires us to learn some simple and powerful strategies that are central to my dream workshops:
Opening to dream guidance
Start a dream journal, if you are not keeping one already, and resolve to catch your dreams and write up your dream reports, giving each dream a title. You’ll find it very rewarding to dream with intention.
Before going to sleep, write down a question or issue on which you would like some guidance. This can be specific (“Should I change my job?”) or general and open-hearted (“I open myself to the power of healing”). If you remember dreams from the night, see how they might relate back to your intention.
Learn simple steps to clarify dream messages
The all-important keys are:
- Trust your feelings
- Run a reality check and
- Go back inside your dream to get more information.
Your feelings, on first waking up, are an instant and usually impeccable guide to the general quality and urgency of the dream. Running a reality check means checking how elements in the dream relate to your waking life and – especially – checking to see whether the dream may be giving you a window into possible future events in waking reality.
We dream future events quite often, though few of us pay attention and fewer still are alive to the interesting possibility that if you can see the (possible) future you may be able to take action to change the future for the better.
Finally, the best way to understand the full meaning of a dream is to learn to go back inside it, as you might step back into a room, take a good look around (while fully alert and conscious), and maybe talk to someone in the scene or dream the dream onward to healing or resolution.
Open a safe space to share and celebrate dreams with others
When we know that dreams show the wishes of the soul, we will surely want to support each other in honoring this guidance. Start sharing dreams with a friend, by email if necessary. Never presume to tell the other person what his or her dreams mean.
Start by encouraging your partner to tell the dream as simply and clearly as possible, give it a title. Ask what the dreamer felt when she first woke up. Ask her to run a reality check to see whether there are messages about current situations in waking life, or possible future events. Then offer your own thoughts and associations in a gentle way by always saying “if it were my dream” rather than laying down the law.
Finally, ask your partner what she can now do – in a practical, positive way – to honor the dream and act on its guidance. With a little practice, you’ll find safe ways to bring dream-sharing to larger groups and start building a dream community. An office that starts the day with dream-sharing is a vastly more lively and creative space!
Always do something with your dreams!
Real dreamwork is about energy – about bringing vital energy from a deeper reality into the daylight world. In my workshops, we turn our dreams into stories, drawings and songs; we stage spontaneous dream theatre; and we agree on action plans to work with the guidance of our dreams and the powers that speak to us in dreams. Sharing a dream with another person is already a step towards action.
Writing yourself a personal motto inspired by a dream – a bumper sticker – is a further step. Buy the red shoes, make the phone call, plant those flowers, study the transformations of the Goddess or the Bear in myth and art, as your dreams may guide you, and you are taking a longer step on the road of soul, the only road to walk.
Author: Robert Moss
- Grandfather Sun
- Illumination, Enlightenment, Knowledge
Out of the Void, first came Grandfather Sun. This is the actual sun around which our planet earth revolves. It is light, illumination, enlightenment and knowledge. For example, let’s look at the word enlightenment. It means to put light into, to lighten up. It is plain to see that when Grandfather Sun shines on the planet, it definitely lightens things up. This teaching is not only literal, but translated into an internal symbolic sense, it is the great symbol of gaining knowledge.
Within us there is a “fire from within” which burns inside us. It is our spark, our sexuality. We speak of this as the “little sun”; it is our own Grandfather Sun which burns within us. When we are connected with the external Sun, we can ask it to ignite our own inner fire. Or using our awakened inner fire, we can connect to Grandfather Sun. This is the male seed for all life. The fire of the male seed explodes as the dance of active-conceptive energy.
From: Shamanic Wheels and Keys
You must learn to see. There is seeing the visible. Most people see only the physical world around them. But there is also seeing the invisible. There is emotion, spirit and mind. The whole circle of the Human Being is both these things ~ the visible and the invisible. Most people refuse to look at the whole Circle and see what is really there.
From: One is the Sun
If you come to me as a victim I will not support you.
But I will have the courage to walk with you through the pain that you are suffering.
I will put you in the fire. I will undress you, and I will sit you on the earth.
I will bathe you with herbs, I will purge you, and you will vomit the rage and the darkness inside you.
I will bang your body with good herbs, and I will put you to lay in the grass, face up to the sky.
Then I will blow your crown to clean the old memories that make you repeat the same behavior.
I will blow your forehead to scare away the thoughts that cloud your vision.
I will blow your throat to release the knot that won’t let you talk.
I will blow your heart to scare fear, so that it goes far away where it cannot find you.
I will blow your solar plexus to extinguish the fire of the hell you carry inside, and you will know peace.
I will blow with fire your belly to burn the attachments, and the love that was not.
I will blow away the lovers that left you, the children that never came.
I will blow your heart to make you warm, to rekindle your desire to feel, create and start again.
I will blow with force your vagina or your penis, to clean the sexual door to your soul.
I will blow away the garbage that you collected trying to love what did not want to be loved.
I will use the broom, and the sponge, and the rag, and safely clean all the bitterness inside you.
I will blow your hands to destroy the ties that prevent you from creating.
I will blow your feet to dust and erase the footprints memories, so you can never return to that bad place.
I will turn your body, so your face will kiss the earth.
I will blow your spine from the root to the neck to increase your strength and help you walk upright.
And I will let you rest.
After this you will cry, and after crying you will sleep.
And you will dream beautiful and meaningful dreams.
And when you wake up I will be waiting for you.
I will smile at you, and you will smile back.
I will offer you food that you will eat with pleasure, tasting life, and I will thank you.
Because what I am offering today, was offered to me before when darkness lived within me.
And after I was healed, I felt the darkness leaving, and I cried.
Then we will walk together, and I will show you my garden, and my plants, and I will take you to the fire again.
And we will talk together in a single voice with the blessing of the earth.
And we will shout to the forest the desires of your heart.
And the fire will listen and whisper the echo, and we will create hope together.
And the mountains will listen and whisper the echo, and we will create hope together.
And the wind will listen and whisper the echo, and we will create hope together.
And then we will bow before the fire, and we will call upon all the visible and invisible guardians.
And you will say thank you to all of them.
And you will say thank you to yourself.
And you will say thank you to yourself.
And you will say thank you to yourself.
~Yogesh Kumar