Our languages

Buddha within Tracey Marie Starks 

At the request of my niece I recently spoke at her high school on language and culture from the perspective of the indigenous people of Turtle Island. It is a complex subject with pain, deep pain in our relationship with the White People. In the intimacy of the classroom setting I thought this a perfect way to convey deep truths to young minds about themselves in relation to the invisible worlds around them. Aside from the discussions about my people's languages I could not learn coming up, and the European languages I learned growing up I learned languages from the Earth, our Mother that took the children far away from what they thought they knew about language. The animal spirits who come with each of us into the world at birth; the Animal People, Plant People, and insects who speak to each other and others who would, or need to listen to their spirits are heard through a language they own, and share with us. Our receptivity is a gift to them, our disregard of them is our shame and misfortune. 


You should not shame children. You entice them, spark their imagination, or leave them wondering and curious about things if you want the relationship with them. Through story they will come to listen to the Elders, and recognize the messages from the Realms of Ancestors. A life lived by the story, and stories you tell keep them attentive to who you are, and what you can gift them as they become who they are meant to become. 


The other language of Native people is in our symbols. Our Medicine Wheel teachings are powerful womb teachings. The concepts they can reveal relating cardinal points with directions from each quadrant's place within the Circle is a force gentle upon knowing the need for understanding, and the requirements of maturation are the needed places to fortify the structure of mind, body, spirit and emotions of each initiate... 

Gregory E. Woods

Keeper of Stories 

3.23.15  

Buddha in an old woman