Learning about traditional Native American cultures in school also opened my eyes. They seemed to not only care about the planet, but they worshiped Mother Earth in all of her divine feminine glory. I yearned to be connected to others who cared about our Great Mother.
In my early 20s, I had the great fortune of spending time with a Navajo family in their home on their remote reservation in Canyon DeChelly, Arizona. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience where they gave me and two girlfriends a tour of the canyon and initiated us into their family during a powwow they put on just for us. They even let us sleep in a hogan! We had such an incredible experience there. I felt intensely connected to nature and spirit unlike ever before, a high I never wanted to come out of. I vowed to take that feeling with me and do whatever I could to keep the sacred earth/spirit connection alive in my life.
Recently I came across this message from the Council of 13 Indigenous Grandmothers I wanted to share with you, addressing these trying times as we deal with this global pandemic:
http://www.grandmotherscouncil.org/
"As you move through these changing times... be easy on yourself and be easy on one another. You are at the beginning of something new. You are learning a new way of being. You will find that you are working less in the yang modes that you are used to.
You will stop working so hard at getting from point A to point B the way you have in the past, but instead, will spend more time experiencing yourself in the whole, and your place in it.
Instead of traveling to a goal out there, you will voyage deeper into yourself. Your mother's grandmother knew how to do this. Your ancestors from long ago knew how to do this. They knew the power of the feminine principle... and because you carry their DNA in your body, this wisdom and this way of being is within you.
Call on it. Call it up. Invite your ancestors in. As the yang based habits and the decaying institutions on our planet begin to crumble, look up. A breeze is stirring. Feel the sun on your wings."