Remember Your Nature

Every life-form contains a universe of its own light. There is a breathing, burgeoning, expanding and contracting ocean of energy that makes up every "thing" on this planet, within this solar system, and beyond this one. 

It is impossible to name the incomprehensible, inarguable complexity that makes life, life.

This is why it is difficult for me to accept how our western rational consciousness has been indoctrinated... to see and make meaning of the world, in majority, based on what we see on the surface. 

There is, unquestionably, many variables that contribute to why this is -- why our common mode of perceiving the world is largely shallow, disjointed, and lacking in depth and complexity. I'm sharing how my own western, rational mind tries to make sense out of this hall of mirrors we find ourselves in, and helpful insights I've come to that support me in moving beyond ego-constructed reality and feeling and experiencing the "real" world.

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To me, prayer is alignment. Prayer is a place we cohere ourselves with - it is a frequency that is always here, waiting for us to fully embody.

Taku Wakan Skan Skan. Something sacred in motion. 

Alongside my community, I participated in ceremony yesterday to honor the summer solstice, praying for peace in the hearts of all beings. To me, prayer is song, it is feeling, it is the creative pulse of life flowing within every breath. I can truly experience prayer when I get out of my own way and allow my own knowing to wash over me. 

I felt inspired to translate my prayers into this .mp3. I've been purifying the doubt and unworthiness that has lived within my line for a long time -- and in its place, a fierce knowing is finally being given space to breathe. Knowing that my life is sacred. Knowing that my devotion to living in truth, becoming one with the real world, IS what makes my life a living offering. Knowing that we all have the potential to be living sanctuaries on this Earth, walking in a good way, honoring the sacred life at the center. 

Listen with headphones for full effect. I encourage you to listen with your heart. Listen, listen.

opening sound: Ready by Alexandra Blakely

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You've heard the story of the big bad wolf, but what about the reality of the compassionate alpha?

I'd like to call myself a wolf apprentice... deeply curious about learning the ways and wisdom of these powerful creatures. I'm entering into a wolf mentorship, if you will. 

Here, I share some misconceptions within our perceptions of wolves, why the lone wolf is rare and represents a deep separation from self, and how wolves can inspire us to become honorable leaders — using our immense power and firm principles to serve the harmony of the pack we are responsible to. 

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"That's the sea of LOVE. Boy! I'm going to live in it! I'm going to BE it! I'm going to submerge myself in it! You gotta protect yourself... from what? Love? Once you know there's no place to hide anyway, then you wonder who you are hiding from?" - Be Here Now, Ram Dass, p. 70 - 71.

I'm no longer looking to escape myself, but lean fully into my humanity — in order to experience the sacred within the fabric of existence itself. In order to experience healthy ego development and embrace how my personality harmoniously meshes into the web of life... in order to create more thriving life. God IS the real world.

Here's some logic that makes sense to me - based on my own phenomenology and practice. Full of paradox and contradiction. As life is. 

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Dr. Angelenia Semegon, or Silver Fawn, is a developmental psychologist and Native American spiritual leader residing in North Florida. 

Silver Fawn grew up in the Ocala National Forest learning to commune with foxes and allow in the nourishment of the trees around her, touching a relationship with nature that was so ancient and true to her roots as a daughter of a full Cherokee.

She shares her story of growing up unaware of her native people's way, her journey of leaving the woods and entering into the world of science and empiricism, and her initiation into embracing indigenous healing to eventually become a beloved, profoundly attuned, and highly-respected ceremony holder under the altar of the Lakota elder Basil Braveheart. 

Silver Fawn was my professor and mentor at Flagler College in St. Augustine FL, empowering me to understand the mechanics of the mind and supporting my thriving in the academic realm, and Silver Fawn has been my most trusted spiritual mentor and elder whose influence and care I credit so much of my maturation and evolution to. 

On this podcast she shares her teachings about balancing masculine and feminine energies for fullness of expression, recognizing the strengths of feminine leadership, as well as an immensely valuable explanation of the power of forgiveness: what it is, why it is important, and how we can begin to utilize it for our own peace and healing.

What an honor it is have her here. Her wisdom and knowledge has been one of the greatest resources of my life. I pray that her words stir the deepest knowings of your heart. 

IG: https://www.instagram.com/embody.faith/?hl=en

Guanyukdahjayte, or Where The Trees Meet The Sky, is a Chief of the Cayuaga Nation of the Haudenosaunee, born on the Seneca Reservation in New York. 

I met Guanyukdahjayte, or Uncle Al, sitting in a Lakota sweat lodge with our community, and I want to thank Joe Fire Hawk for connecting us and encouraging Al to share his wisdom on my podcast. 

Through song, story, and prayer, Uncle Al shares with us what it means to walk the Red Road, which can be described as the Native American spiritual walk of balance and harmony.

He shares his perspective on what it means to live in the "real" world — to live as the indigenous always have, deeply connected to the land and the spirits of it. He shares about the importance and power of healing ceremonies, what it means to enter into the womb of the mother, and demonstrates how to acknowledge the life that sustains us with a constant sense of gratitude and respect. 

I am so honored to have received his medicine, and to share it with you — so that we all may live.

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Dear One, Holy Earth Surface Walker, Life-Bringer, Life-Bearer...

It is my sincere hope and prayer that you may experience how special and sacred your life is. 

I offer this knowledge and medicine from my heart of hearts, because our Earth needs us to remember the power and wisdom within us, so that we may be able to create more life. To create more life! Thriving life!

Here, I offer a perspective that has changed my entire worldview and everything about how I experience life: that when I am menstruating, I am the Highest Altar of Humanity. My cyclical nature is a gift, an inborn rite-of-passage that initiates me deeper into my inherent wisdom every single month.  

For All My Relations and the Continuing Story of Creation. 

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There was a certain moment in my "self-love" journey where I just became tired. Tired of hyping myself up. Tired of mirror work. Tired of even having one ounce of concern of how I may be perceived.

Because, as I have spent so much time and energy learning how to be IN my body again, I've recognized that my outer appearance is really the least interesting thing about me. 

In a culture that is hyper-fixated on physical appearance, we pour an astounding amount of energy into smoke and mirrors, which unfortunately has left us underdeveloped in, seemingly, every other way.

As I protect my essence and focus on self-healing that leaves me feeling more and more safe, regulated, and at peace within my body, I am now living in a reality where my worth and value are completely independent of however my physicality is manifesting in the world. 

AND, now, this freed-up energy can be re-directed to the places that will develop me as a human, enhance my livelihood, and support my mission in service to life. 

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Personally, I find immense value in listening to the stories of others, where their indirect teachings spark an illumination of wisdom within myself upon hearing these lived experiences. 

It is possible to learn more from one moment of a story—perhaps even told in passing—than from an entire volume of books delineating the nature and meaning of phenomena. Though, both have their specific importance, I believe.

This podcast illustrates a story of a recent lived experience I had: camping on ceremony grounds and fasting during my most recent menstrual cycle.

I not only share the physical events of the experience, but also the significant and subtle aspects of my inner process that demonstrate:

ㅤ♡ how I compassionately faced my resistance and fear while taking action towards a desire,

ㅤ♡ how I lovingly parented myself while navigating obstacles,

ㅤ♡ and how song, creativity, nurturance, and humility supported me in choosing love and maturation within myself.

What I share is vulnerable, raw, and irrevocably true. This is medicine within itself—to practice being seen in all of our humanity, messy and imperfect as it is. 

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AyoLane Halusky, native to Florida, is a Naturalist, Wilderness Guide, and Sincere Human.

Ayolane is my elder in the Tiospaye (spiritual family) we share, and I have sat with him in Lakota healing ceremonies since I was 20. We have shared true God presence together, bare feet on sandy soil and hearts open to all feeling, time and time again.

I see the privilege I have by having a counsel of humble, attuned, and practicing elders available to me. The reflections of these wise beings in my life have been indispensable to my own spiritual development and inner evolution — into more maturity and felt-responsibility towards Life. 

On this broadcast, AyoLane shares his story of healing, finding himself held by the wisdom of the Earth through direct experience and indigenous healing ceremonies. Together we explore some aspects of conscious masculinity, AyoLane sharing his experience with and the importance of rites of passage for men, some characteristics of the sacred masculine and how culture can foster male wholeness, as well as Eldership — what it is not, and what it can be. 

I pray it may be a blessing to you, and that we may all be able to develop into more felt-wholeness. 

IG: https://www.instagram.com/embody.faith/?hl=en