70. Nishnaabeg Things I Love Pt. 2
70. Nishnaabeg Things I Love Pt. 2
In no particular order - 10 Nishnabeg beliefs, values and world view that make me happy to be alive.
Let’s talk about ReEnchantment.
Transcript
Lezley(00:00):
Indigenous worldview and belief and value makes me happy to be alive.
Lezley (00:16):
Is mise Lezley MacDhaibhidh. Is mise shliochd nam Gàidheil air Turtle Island. Buinidh mi do Thìr nam Michi Saagii.
Lezley(00:23):
I'm Lezley Davidson. I am a Gaelic descendant on Turtle Island. I belong to the land of the Michi Saagiig. Okay, so I just recorded a video, you can watch it, it's the last one, about how the moment that I was validated in feeling and believing that animals are our brothers and sisters. I feel like I'm going to be saying the same things over and over again, but it's because of how integrated and whole Indigenous worldview and belief is that it's overlapped so much, but there's different aspects that I want to talk about. And the one about animals being our brothers and sisters, this is something that I felt as a child. And I know other people have felt this. I know I've spoken to other people who have felt this, and then had Western society basically traumatize it out of you, where you had to close your heart to the animal kingdom, to the animal nation, because of how horribly we treat them as a species.
Lezley(01:33):
Human species devalues and are awful to animals. When they are our brothers and sisters, they are a nation to which we are in relationship with and are deserving. They're deserving of love and honour and respect and our humility. Because Indigenous nations know that animals can exist without us, we cannot. Plants can exist without us, we cannot. Water can exist without us, we cannot. We are the ones that are dependent upon this planet. We're dependent upon all of the nations. And right now we lack humility and we lack love and honour and respect for those nations. And so to have that feeling validated in me was a life changing moment. But watch that video because it doesn't really end up great. Yay, colonization. Yay, colonizer society. Fuck. Okay. So animal nations are brothers and sisters. I mean, anyone who's ever had an animal share their life with an animal knows that when they pass, it is losing a family member.
Lezley(03:01):
Oh, oh, oh, oh. And John Borrows again. John Borrows. He talks in Anishinaabe Treaties and Rules of Law about how Indigenous treaties with more than human nations, with animal nations, with plant nations, with water nations, with all of the nations of the earth, those treaties and those relationships and those accords were brought into their treaties with so-called Canada and with the crown and with treaties around land when all of that was happening. That was the understanding that those treaties, let me, those treaties and the right relationship with those nations was brought into their treaties with the government and the crown. So those treaties, that worldview and those treaties are implied in relationship with the government. So we're already.
Lezley(04:22):
We are all treaty people and we are all in treaty with these nations already. So Indigenous nations and the more than human nations. This is already existing on a legal rule of law, Anishinaabe treaty level. John Borrows. Okay, this one, this is what, what is this? Number five? Yeah. So number five is the value and belief of thinking with your heart, not just your head. And this has been spoken about by several leaders. One is Dr. Dave Courchene, Dave Courchene Jr. also known as Nii Gaani Aki Anini, Leading Earth Man. So thinking just with your head is less valuable than thinking with your heart. And I think we've always known this. This society has been built with head thought, trying to get away from the heart and away from the body and become some pure mind. This whole setup, this whole structure of our societies is based on this.
Lezley(05:38):
Even the religion, Christianity is based on this idea of becoming pure mind.
Lezley (05:44):
Pure mind.
Lezley(05:46):
And every man is like, "That's not rational. You're being irrational. That's not logical." It's all like this false sense of your mind being the only way of knowing that's valuable, which is ridiculous. There's so many different ways of knowing. You can know through your heart, through your head, you can know through your body. You can know through communication with the land, through communication with spirit, through communication with the dead. There's so many different ways of knowing and specifically knowing through your heart, thinking with your heart is a superior way of problem solving and solution gathering than just thinking with your head. And I love that because it's true. Our hearts, this is where we are as well as a society. We are right now as a society embarking across the heart bridge. And that's why everything's so fucked up and feels so weird because so many people are resisting feeling their fucking feelings about everything that's happened because there's a buttload of grief and trauma.
Lezley(07:00):
There is just buckets and buckets of grief and trauma for people to have to process. It's just what's happened. We've all been participating in this world. We've all have histories and ancestors participating in this world to a more or lesser degree. And we all have cauldrons of grief and trauma and shame to process. It's still going to be there. There's no avoiding it. You might as well just take your little piece, take your cup, one bull, one spoon, but take your piece. Take your peace. Hi. Take your peace and just deal with it. We all have a piece of it. You don't have to heal it for the world. You don't have to do more than your share. Just do your share. Do your share. Take care of whatever is yours. Take care of your own trauma and your own ancestral healing and just do that.
Lezley(08:06):
Fucking process your feelings and do that and we can move across the bridge because the heart is the doorway to basically embodiment of spirit in the world. It's the doorway to the unseen. It's the doorway to communication with the unseen. The heart is the bridge between Tì agus Anam, between land and spirit. The heart is the bridge. The heart is how we communicate with spirit.
Lezley(08:42):
And the heart connects our body with spirit. The heart is like the center for the whole wheel to turn. I mean, it's so integral and it changes everything once we engage the heart in all the decision making, when we trust the heart. And it's not a coincidence that emotion has been vilified by this particular structure, by the authors of this particular framework of fuckery. Emotion, of course, is vilified and demonized and feminized and made less valuable because it literally is a force for transformation. You cannot grieve your actions and continue them. You cannot feel the pain of what you are creating and continue it. It changes everything. So does play. We'll talk about that later. Okay. So number six, you have a personal and particular relationship with spirit, not in the way of a personal saviour.
Lezley(09:55):
There's not a God for you and a God for me. There's not a need for you to accept a particular God in order to be saved. That's bullshit. But in God is Red, Vine Deloria... Nope, it wasn't in God is Red. It was in Ways of Knowing. It was in ways of knowing. Vine DeLoria talks about how we are all individually in particular and personal relationship with spirit, which I love because it's true. There's no one way to be in relationship with spirit. There's no one way to be in relationship with the unseen. It comes through people in all kinds of different ways. And anyone who says, "I know the way and my way is the only way," is immediately a red flag.
Lezley(10:47):
No, no. You are a unique being who has never existed here before and will never exist here again. And your relationship, you are a portal to spirit. You are an intersection and a portal of spirit and land together, and there will never be a relationship with spirit like you have. You have a particular and personal relationship perspective with spirit and land. And that's the way it is and that's respected. That's expected and respected in Indigenous worldview, in Indigenous belief. You're expected to understand things from your place, which leads us to number seven is everyone has their own place in the circle. So it's very similar. It's very similar to having a personal and particular relationship with spirit, but it's the understanding that you are the only one who can speak about your experience in your place in the circle, that this is a unique experience to you.
Lezley(12:05):
You are a unique person who exists within a community, who exists within relationship to all other nations, and that your perspective is valuable, needed, wanted, that you are made as you are, that you are made by creator as you are and as you are meant to be. Community is here to guide us and to steer us, but you are the one living your life. No one can live your life for you. So no one can tell you what your meaning is, what meaning you're making. No one can tell you what your life is about or why you're here. Community, like I said, is here to guide you and assist, but this is your life to decide for yourself how you live and how you see and what meaning you make and what myth you are making about the things that are happening to you. This is fucking beautiful and I love this so much about the inclusion of all perspectives and the respect.
Lezley(13:26):
Indigenous nations may not want or agree or whatever with what you're doing, but they do respect your right to do that even if they think you're crazy. There is an honour and a respect that that is your place to walk, that's your path to walk, that's your place in the circle, that's how you see things and it is your right to do that. And one thing I love about Indigenous worldview is that you are fully within your life. You're fully within in your life. There are four cardinal directions and then above and below. So I think there's six directions. In Celtic worldview, there's nine directions. There's the cardinals above and below, within, without and moving through. And both Michi Saagiig, Nishnabeg, both Anishinaabe worldviews and Celtic, specifically Gaelic worldviews, place the human being in the middle of their life.
Lezley(14:42):
The inheritance of Roman and Greek worldview is one that sits above and outside and is an observer. The idea of objectivity is irrelevant and almost impossible in Indigenous worldview because you are fundamentally a part of place. There is no being outside of creation and observing. It's ridiculous and it's stupid. You're fully within a life. You're fully within and connected and in relationship with all things. And so you can only observe your life from within creation. All right. Associated with the idea of your place in the circle is also the ethic of non-interference. I love this. And again, it's the respect for you to live your life as you see fit. Even if you are careening off the rails and you are heading down a path that no one wants to see you, they respect your right to walk that path and no one will interfere with your decision making.
Lezley(16:05):
People will advise, they will suggest, they will recommend, but no one is going to interfere or judge your choices. I mean, we're all judgey, so I'm sure that happens. There is a honouring of your decisions. And also there is an allowing that things can happen that are beyond the community's understanding at this time. There's an understanding that you are built the way you're built, that you were made the way you were made, and an idea that all things are there for the betterment of the community, for the betterment of the world, for the betterment of the wholeness. So the best that everyone can do is be there in support of you and guide you and pray for you and hope for the best, even if you're kind of going off in a different direction, but also support you if even when the community doesn't entirely understand maybe what is happening or why, there is the principle of non-interference that you are honoured to live your life as you see fit and walk your path the way you see fit because no one else can walk that path for you.
Lezley(17:33):
Non-interference, love that. Indigenous nations also have the ability of holding ambiguity, which I think is beautiful and very nourishing and very fertilizing for transformation and for thought because they can hold two things as being true at once, even though they may be contradictory. They can hold ambiguity, they don't. Ambiguity, okay, Gichi Manitou, one of the translations of Gichimanitu is the great mystery. I fucking love that because as a mystic, my whole life is about learning how to be in relationship with spirit, learning how to connect to and be in relationship with spirit in the physical world. The great mystery, it's perfect and it's so ambiguous. Well, what does that mean? I don't know. There's no final answers for what the great mystery is. It's a mystery.
Lezley(18:46):
It's up to you to go and find out and your discoveries may be different from mine and we can hold those both together and they can both be true. My truth, and this is the thing about holding ambiguity that I love in Indigenous cultures is there is room for your truth to be different from my truth. There's room in their worldview for that, that their truth is not necessarily threatened by my truth. And there's more likely an interest in discovering common ground, discovering wisdom through difference, holding both things as true and valid allows for and thoughts. Oh, this is true and that's true. This can be and that can be. Instead of either or, it's my truth or your truth. And so if I want my truth to be true, I need to destroy you. What a waste, gross. So holding ambiguity, fucking love that.
Lezley(20:03):
That's maturity in cultural presence. That's maturity in embodiment. It's a maturity. It's a mature worldview. Only toddlers have an either or thought. It's toddlers. And I mean, honestly, Western civilization, the patriarch, all of that is stuck within a toddler mindset. Okay. And I just learned this one. This is number 10. That was number nine. This is number 10.
Lezley(20:40):
Vine Deloria talks about the difference between Indigenous, what he calls Indian religion, tribal religion versus Christianity in that there is no final universal truth. Wait, is that what he said? Oh yeah. There is universal truth. There's ongoing eternal learning versus... There's ongoing learning versus a universal eternal truth that is forever the same everywhere for all people in every instance. The idea of having to accept Jesus as your saviour in order to be saved, that Christianity hands that out as if it's an eternal truth forever in every place. And according to Vine DeLoria Jr. Indigenous religion is far more ambiguous, holding ambiguity and holding difference and allowing new transformation, new ideation, new revelation to come into the culture, to come into the community. Christianity is very set. No more prophets. Time of prophets is over. No more prophets. No more revelation. No more understanding.
Lezley (22:09):
There's no more truth to know. We know all the truth is stamped at no races done.
Lezley(22:15):
Which is so bullshit and a retarded way. It retards thought and it retards discovery and growth. To have your spiritual understanding stopped at a particular point is anathema to our ability to grow as a species and to interact and be part of this grand mystery that's happening. We are in constant revelation and this is a beautiful nourishing aspect of Indigenous worldview and belief and morality is that there is always more to know that spirit has revelation for us, that different places have different revelations to offer, that there is always something new to learn, that we will always be given what we need to know in order to walk through what is coming for the next period, that we will know, that we will be taught, that if we can just be fucking humble enough to listen and to be taught and to feel our feelings and be in our bodies and love and respect the world that we've been given, we'll be fine.
Lezley(23:47):
It's a simple ask. It's just a simple fucking ask. It's a simple ask. Okay. And Indigenous worldview and belief and value makes me happy to be alive. It is constantly, constantly, constantly validating things that I believe and how I want to live and the structures of life that I want to be guiding us. They're Indigenous and we're all Indigenous to some place and we're all required to reconnect to our Indigeneity and then root in place where we are. Okay? So if you're interested in more of this, in the practice of doing that through my own pathway, check out Braiding Roots. It's what I've been doing for the past three years is actively practicing this in the world and creating a pathway for you to practice, to begin that process of coming back to your own Indigeneity and then rooting on Turtle Island. Okay. If you're interested, check it out.
Lezley(25:03):
It's free. For a year, it's free in the library. Practice. Okay. Okay. Love you. Bye.
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In no particular order - 10 Nishnabeg beliefs, values and world view that make me happy to be alive.