August 20, 2014
(photo: donna bellingham)
the one thing I've learned from these social movements is that the circle is sacred...I have witnessed unhealthy toxic abusive destructive people who have lost touch with their cultural traditional roles...but I have seen so many more with their cultural traditional roles intact and full force...
I have witnessed unhealthy toxic abusive destructive men who have lost touch with their cultural traditional roles...but I've seen men reconnect to it or men who never left it...so many different people so many different ways so many journeys that intertwine...
so how do we use our influence in a good way? how do we use our love to teach? how do we show our traditions to one another?...
we have to maneuver in ways, with our words, with our tone, with our actions, that invite everyone inside that circle...We cannot control others, fix them, or save them...All we can show them is who we are....
As hard as it is, and I fail at this too, everyone's journey is their own, even when it effects us negatively...my anger should be given over in ceremony to the Creator...but sometimes i choose a path alone and with no one to slow me down and talk me through my bad decisions, my angry outbursts, or urges to blame, override what I have been taught...
not everyone is healthy, men, women, two-spirited, young, old - no one is immune to dysfunction...but we can love them or we can discard them or we can blame them or we can pass responsibility onto others...
I don't see many Elders running around pointing fingers blaming others of their faults, nor do I see Elders chasing people around trying to change them into someone better, but what I do see are the Elders waiting for us to go to them...with love & open arms no matter how healthy or unhealthy we might be...to me that is welcoming me back into the circle...to me that is teaching our ways by action...and to me that is showing me the place in which I can heal...
don't let hurt hide hope.