let kindness win

There is a thread of truth in everything. Look for that which is most true.

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If you are feeling sea sick, stop spinning around.

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The Best thing in life is right under your nose…

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I am finally becoming my friend.

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The best way to help any one or any thing is to be at peace.

Today was a beautiful day at Oceti Sakowin Camp. The snow is melting quickly. This photo shows where our winter tent had been. We were able to clean up around the area fulfilling my first obligation to be here. Many familiar faces greeted us. The people worked busily trying to clear the camp with everything available to them. Of the 10,000 people who walked through this camp over the past several months, only a few hundred are here now to restore the natural beauty. Winter, rumors, and fear drove many away. It is hard to hear local media slander the Water Protectors and not report on the stellar effort and commitment that is being made.

When concerns grew today and people moved toward the #1806 bridge to see why police were moving the barricade, people talked to one another in calming voices, offering support to stay peaceful. I was reminded of the dignity and kindness that I witnessed here in months past. They expressed gratitude that the ambulances might be able to move more readily back to town, shaving thirty minutes off the drive. Of course, it would have been helpful had the authorities made contact with the camp before moving the barricades…we still hope and pray for mutual respect.

It had been difficult to be away from this camp over the past few weeks. It was hard to listen to social media feeds and read statements of police harassment, racist profiling, instigated chaos and inhumanity. It was confusing at times. It was disheartening at times. But the prayers and the people standing for the water and for their sovereignty never wavered. A voice would speak out in the darkness, lighting the way. It was not always the same voice. It did not come from one leader, one organization or one tribe. The voice of clarity was carried among many people and continued to guide. And the prayers brought me home again.

My hope to be here is to give support to the clean up. To support those who are facing court cases (please sign and share this petition), and to be witness to the ongoing effort of these very fine people who are battling numerous odds asking for our humanity to be restored and for the water to be protected.

Here is my new podcast site, Humanity Rising, with the first two episodes on the stand at Standing Rock. I hope to add some interviews while I am here.

Oh, and we will be there for Honoring Our Grandmothers, this Saturday, February 18 at Cheyenne River Camp.

I will do my very best to give you the most accurate and updated information daily. Best to you always; keep up the Good Fight. Love wins.

Thank you again Ryan of Standing Rock Rising for the great photo!

 

Calling upon Grandmothers and Grandfathers,

Who risked all that I might be.

Who struggled with sorrow and suffering,

And woke everyday determined to Live.

To the Ones who succeeded to find Peace,

And the Ones who failed in their endeavor.

To those who held onto Love and

Those who surrendered to hatred and fear.

I call upon your strength to keep walking,

upon your losses to teach me, and

upon your wisdom to guide me.

I ask for your courage, that I may not falter.

This is my promise to you, I will do my best,

To hold fast to Life; and not succumb to joylessness.

This is my defiance to ignorance:

To Remember when all is taken or lost,

My heart belongs to Love.

Love is my beginning; it is my end.

My gratitude always.

Thelma and Louise are friends of mine. They have been living at the farm for nearly fourteen years. They are sheep. When they were four months old, I put them in the back of my SUV, looked at them and said, “You must be Thelma and Louise, ‘cause this is your last ride”. Never saw the movie, didn’t have to, everyone tells the ending.

What an amazing journey for a person who grew up across the street from an industrial park and spent twenty-two years in Chicago to have sheep as neighbors. The journey has not been without its harrowing moments. When Thelma got gangrene mastitis the veterinarian who came to check on her said put her down, most don’t survive. Putting down a sheep is done with a gun. By now Thelma had gone through two pregnancies and I had learned the value of keeping family units in tact. It makes for happier sheep and the mamas and grandmas can teach the young ones, making my work a bit easier. Thankfully a wise elder veterinarian told me if you are willing to give her four shots, four times a day for a while, she may survive. I did just that in that bitter cold January with a flashlight in hand until the day she looked at me with those big eyes that said “if you prick me one more time I am going to deck you.” And so I learned. I learned that green grass was all they needed and clean water everyday and that moving them around to cleaner pasture kept them from the worms that cycle every three weeks or so. I learned that there was no need to feed corn; they stay plenty fat and much healthier on grass in summer and hay in winter.

Although they do get a bit of corn in the spring when I cut their wool. I use scissors, because I learned that neither they nor I are happy with tying them up and electric clippers. Oh, and when I learned that Thelma and Louise had their tail bobbed (cut short) I promised them their offspring would never have that happen to them. They need those tails as subsequent lambs have taught me.

With mutual care and love we have carried on. Yes, it has been mutual. These two grandmothers have taught me so much about respect. They have come to me as I cried and have listened to me as I cursed and have helped me to see life’s simplicity just a little more.

So it comes to no surprise that they are still the friskiest, most in your face, ‘I want hay now’ of the lot. Louise must have heard about the buffalo at Standing Rock, because she has taken to this immovable posture when I ask her to leave the hay room. I mean immovable. No matter what I do, no matter what I did in the past that worked, she does not budge. And then I have to laugh. I break down laughing, because I love being shown how ridiculous I am. Of course grandmother, you want to stay and eat some more. Who am I to rush you… so my morning coffee waits a bit and I smile at her determination and grit and know that I recognize in her what is in me.

Thelma has always been a bit more reticent, but none the less determined and she has these eyes that tell you everything her words would if she could. When I come in the late winter to sit with them, getting them used to me being so close and cutting their wool, she is always the first. She comes to me and lets me scratch her neck. As she melts into the feeling, slowly the others come around to see what is happening. She proves to them that it is safe, that I am safe and on we go.

Now there are still a few who are not eager to have their wool cut. And it shows, some with two years of wool and counting…but I am determined to win them over, time and patience permitting. Letting kindness win.

Knowing how I love these friends, you could have knocked me over with a feather to learn that people have been feeding skittles and other left over candies to their cattle instead of corn or hay – for decades. And “science” has concurred that this is ok. My friends, this is not ok. When you abandon your humanity in even the smallest ways, you lose so much. When consciousness and conscience are abandoned, no amount of excuse will bring you peace. If this is the new normal, keep it. I want none of it. How we treat one another and, yes, that includes all of life and all of matter that surrounds us, defines us. You can profess all the faith in the world, but if your heart is full of ignorance your actions will reveal the truth. Find other ways, my friends. Find other ways, but do not sacrifice the gifts of love and kindness and clarity that are your birthright and bring you joy.

That’s all for now, I must go and be with the sheep and Beauty, the mule, who is proving he likes their company and is trying oh, so hard not to have them run away from him. But that is another story.

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Thanks Margaret for the grammar help. Not one of my strengths…

There are many among us who are desperate. This loss of hope has not come on all at once. It has been created drop by drop, over time, sometimes deliberately, always out of ignorance. Despair is the void created by the extraction of all that is good from within us. And if there is an enemy worthy of our battle, this is it. To know the landscape of our soul so well that when an intruder comes, it can be ushered out. That is the vigilance we need right now. Some of us have lost the skill, some have never learned. It is possible to shed hopelessness. It is possible to rekindle the passion of life. We must want it. Longing for peace is the vigilance required.

Despair will collude with itself. Like will follow like. So the first order must be to fulfill our own heart’s longing. Then and only then can we help another.

And if you cannot help another, at least take pause and refrain from adding to the downward spiral that is driving mental illness and suicide to epidemic levels. Every thought, word and deed can add to despair or can halt it. Choose what you will feed.

Despair is emptiness. In can be transformed. We can do this. We must.

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I wrote this piece in response to the number of people, particularly young people, who have been in touch recently and are expressing levels of despair and anxiety that are not normal. We are not designed to contain this kind of darkness. We need to help one another.

Photo compliments of NOHO

what we can do until we try.

Everyday brings challenge. Today the 30 degree temperatures and gentle rain bring on more of the ice that hinders movement. It is easy to ask, “What the hell am I doing here?” but I have learned it is of more benefit to pay attention and to take each step carefully. It is better to breath and keep my body lose, rather than tense up for the fall that may or may not come. It is better to give a chuckle that people actually think there is no such thing as climate change rather than berate them. It is best to take these opportunities of adversity and create ways to make better whatever comes.

The proverbial making lemonade out of lemons doesn’t come out of the air. It comes from human beings who – whatever hand fate has dealt – are able  to keep walking with hope and beauty in their hearts. That is the everyday challenge.

I am learning that I can use everything available to me to make the path safe for me to walk. I have used straw and lime, ash and dung. I have learned that once my footing is secure, then I can think about making others safe. But most of all I allow myself the simple truth that this time will pass and the ice will melt and the grass will replace the bleak winter that has held so much for me to remember and to learn. I will not curse this time, no matter how much I fall. Because it is my time. It will not come again. And what I am learning today will never leave me.

We do not know what we can do until we try.

“Hate is too great a burden to bear.”                                                                                  Martin Luther King, Jr.

One of my favorite things about January is that we remember and revisit the wisdom of Dr. Martin Luther King.

There are many who have not yet understood the humanity of Dr. King. Many who have not taken the time to drink in more than the allotted sound bite, “I have a dream”. Many who have not yet begun the transformation from doubt of the possibility of peace to the commitment to act on behalf of peace, as did this courageous man. Today there are some who assert he could have done better, and there are some ready to dismiss the practice of nonviolence altogether making Dr. King an easy mark for intellectual debate.

As I see it, the movement that encompassed Martin Luther King was right on. Evolution doesn’t come along and change things over night, as much as we may wish. It is however, undeniable that we would be here now had it not been for the people of that time and the stand they were willing to take.

Having learned from Gandhi and as a man of peace in his own right, Martin knew the perils of asking white patriarchal hierarchy for justice. He knew and was delivered the harshest of judgments and paid the ultimate sacrifice for his efforts. So when people sit back and call his undertakings failures, I am suspect. Perhaps it is time we stop putting pedestals up for the heroes we create and setting them up for the fall.

The greatest way to honor those who call forth our humanity – is to stand next to them not behind them.

In other words, be your own hero. Learn from the voices of the past. Recognize that if we can stand together none would have to fall alone. Save time and energy on philosophical debate and put into action the truths that you carry in your own heart.

I will continue to learn from the genius of this man and draw courage from his character. I will take what I have learned and move deeply within myself to match his humanity with my own. What I will not do is walk lockstep behind him, nor will I take him down with hindsight babble.

One year before his assassination, he began to link the Vietnam War to poverty and racism. In doing so he not only risked the anger of his government but also the rejection of some of the people on whose behalf he spoke. Yet the words are as true today as the day they were spoken. We are foolish to continue to ignore them.

“Why I am opposed to the war in Vietnam”

We insult our own humanity when we do not change the course of action that keeps bringing us to war.

Stick with love and lay your burdens down. Stick with love and war will end.

Thank you Martin.

I am a Peace Warrior

During a conversation recently regarding NATO’s intervention on the Russian border, I was asked what would it take for me to want to stop Putin’s aggression; I took time to think about that.

I have to make things personal, I have to think about who I am and what I know about myself, and I had to admit that if I were accosted by someone, I would fight to the death if it meant saving my life or someone I loved. And then I had to think more about this honest revelation. Here is what I know:

Every day my peace is being assaulted by ignorance. Every day what I know is possible is being corrupted and attacked by ignorance and greed. Every day there are provocateurs infiltrating my humanity demanding my allegiance, my integrity and every bit of my worth to stand up for inhuman acts perpetrated by the very authorities deemed to be for my protection.

This is not new. I have lived through the lies that brought us Vietnam, through the lies that destroyed Iraq, and have witnessed our invasion and co-conspiring against six additional sovereign nations in the last few years. Now I have the first hand experience of militarized police attacking unarmed citizens at Standing Rock, N. D.

And we are about to do it again.

So when I am asked, what would I do to stop Putin, I can only answer this: I will do everything within my power to help people realize there is no need for war. That the military might is a corrupt invention of power and greed and that it has outlived its course in human history.

I may not succeed.

But I will not surrender my understanding of peace to anyone. I may not succeed in convincing anyone. But I will not compromise my humanity.

I may not succeed in my insistence that fear and hatred can be replaced by love and kindness. But you can count on this: I will keep putting my words, actions and prayers towards that end.

Why? Because any thing less is absolute folly.

Let us not leave more regret to those who will come after us. Let us for once, stand up in one voice and declare, “Enough.”

Stop for a moment and ask yourself, “What is peace worth to me”? And when you hear the cry of your soul saying, “It is everything”, then I say give yourself to that, fight for that. It is time we acknowledge that what is crying to be heard within us cries as well in every beating heart. It is time for Peace Warriors to rise.

Arguments for and against the costs of war will rage on, or we will, each one of us, end the war within our own being with one courageous and decisive blow, “I stand for peace.”

 

photo compliments of Lauren West

 

 

You get good at what you practice.

Things are moving at break neck speed these days. Pundits are paid to spin it all even faster and if we are not careful, it is quite easy to jump on stories, opinions and judgments that lessen us as human beings.

It is commonly thought that it takes 60 days to change a habit. So how about taking this challenge – try not to say, “I hate” for 60 days. Try not to speak or cast blame until you have read, heard or at least considered all angles of a story.

And how about this: in place of “I hate”, tell yourself, “I love”. I love you so much that I am not willing to demean you. I love you so much that I am willing to hold you like a lotus, above the dirty water, so that I can really see how beautiful you are. Try loving yourself so much that you are not willing to demean yourself by dropping down into the filth.

Yep, it isn’t easy. It is much easier to agree with the pundits on either side. But there is that seventh direction – within, that keeps calling.

Answer the call. We can do this.

Happy New Year, friends; make it a good one.

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Please take some time to listen to words of hope and clarity for the New Year. I am grateful for the friendship of Rivera Sun and Sherri Mitchell and to be included in this podcast from their weekly Love and Revolution Radio. 

New Year’s Special:
5 Guests Envision the Challenges and Possibilities Coming in 2017!

This week on Love (and Revolution) Radio, as the old year turns over into the new, we take a moment to speak with five guests from earlier episodes about the challenges and possibilities opening up in 2017. Kazu Haga of the East Point Peace Academy, Dena Eakles of Echo Valley Hope, Heart Phoenix of the River Phoenix Center for Peacebuiling; Rhonda Fabian, Editor of Kosmos Online; and Larry Spotted Crow Mann join Sherri Mitchell and Rivera Sun to look into what’s coming . . . the frightening, the hopeful, the encouraging, and the inspiring.

 

cover photo compliments of Lauren West

“Teach me how to trust my heart, my mind, my intuition, my inner knowing, the senses of my body, the blessings of my spirit. Teach me to trust these things so that I may enter my sacred space and love beyond my fear, and thus walk in balance with the passing of each glorious sun.”
- Lakota Prayer

Echo Valley continues to support the People of Standing Rock and the People throughout the world who have come together to say, “We are human beings and deserve to be treated with respect. The Earth and the Water are the givers and sustainers of life and we must protect them.”

We recognize the razor path that is being walked at this moment. Human beings are standing before institutions of greed and might and are asking to be heard. The marriage of government and corporation is being called out as the sinister coupling that it is – and the offspring of that union is violence. On one hand people are attempting to be peaceful and assert their rights to clean water and unbroken treaties – in stark contrast to a militarized police force that seems dedicated to support Energy Transfer Partners, the corporation currently breaking laws and refusing to comply with Army Corp requests to fulfill an EIS, Environmental Impact Statement.

And while the American public remains divided over media outbursts regarding the election, Russian involvement and the terrors of what is to be – yet, what is happening before our very eyes is overlooked as if it is harmless. Worse still, as if it doesn’t matter. Canada has now opened the door to bring military might against its citizens who dare to challenge the pipelines there, citing the violence of water protectors of Standing Rock, most of which is fabricated lies – and yet very few and none in power, are uttering cries at the unnecessary and documented violence perpetrated by police.

I was in Standing Rock for nearly seven weeks. I was there for the water cannons, tear gas, razor wire, and concussion grenades. I was there for the militarized tanks and masked men and women who were ordered to harm unarmed human beings. I was witness to our government turning away from the violence and once again allowing treaties – made by the US with Native People – to be violated.

This photo from my friend Ryan of Standing Rock Rising depicts the imbalance of power and the shock of pitting human against human for profit.

So when I listen to friends on social media complain about what they think is coming, I am stunned. I am reminded of the story of the parrots, which have been warned about the hunter’s net, and so remind themselves, “Beware the hunter’s net.” “Beware the hunter’s net.” As they succumb to the crumbs the hunter has left for them inside that very net.

Court cases are beginning for the over 550 people who have been arrested – and nearly half are facing trials without the support of legal representation. This is adding more gasoline to the fire of racism that burns so freely in North Dakota.

Emotions are running high and accusations of violence from water protectors have become the signal for police to unleash unnecessary force upon unarmed people.

This is of great concern to me. This should be of great concern to all of us.

The move to divest is gaining traction with millions of dollars being diverted from fossil fuel extraction and is finally gaining the attention of industries that must now consider moving toward green and more efficient energy production or become obsolete.

Standing Rock is one very important piece in the puzzle of resistance to the continuation of inhumanity and desecration of the Earth. What has been shown is that there is a very real interest in changing the course of fossil fuel use. Oceti Sakowin and the other camps have demonstrated that communities can sustain and thrive without hierarchical leadership. They have proven that capitalism is not the only means of exchange of goods and services – and most importantly, that people who are willing to place their self in the care of a higher power – or are willing to seek a common purpose from a higher vision – are capable of great things.

Everyone I met said, “I came because of the prayers.” Do not forgo those prayers. Do not lose site with what was learned. There are many games afoot; many agendas seeking to be satisfied. But the single most significant thing about the Stand at Standing Rock was that we came together. We did stop the black snake and we made it known that we will continue to stop it every time it rises up.

Yes, we must continue to wake one another up. We must insist on treating one another with respect and dignity, and we must be willing to resist in nonviolent, creative and passionate ways. This is not a time for despair. This is a time for free thinking. This is a time for humanity rising.

Keep the faith, friends. Everything is possible.