Wednesday, April 20, 2005

Ebbie's latest

I've been meaning to link to Ebbie's latest post for a couple of days now. I was sincerely moved by her insight and struck, once again, by how synchronous our cycles and aspirations are, even though we're several hundred miles apart.

In Circling the Sacred Mountain, Thurman writes of a Lakota saying: "All beings are our mothers." The Lakota tribal thoughtform is one of reverence for all beings as one family, all sacred emanations of the creator.

As I googled "Lakota" and "mother" to try to find the exact quote (unsuccessfully) I stumbled across an account of the massacre at Wounded Knee. One section in particular was like a knife in my gut. It was about a nursing mother who was shot just as she reached the flag of truce. The child, not realizing the mother was dead, kept nursing in her arms.

I will not turn away from this. I will not build a wall to keep this out. That woman is me. That child, now motherless, is me. I breathe in the pain of violent death. I breathe in the loss of a mother for a lifetime. I breathe in the fear and the mourning, I take it in and try not to let it choke me, try to stay open and breathe.

Out, I breathe relief to that mother and that child, wherever they are. I breathe out comfort, cool moonlight to those who witnessed it and to my own pain and loss. I breathe out compassion and companionship, sunlight on water, to all those who have suffered losses from violence, so many of us through the ages, over and over.

I close my eyes to others' suffering every day. And every day I lose an opportunity for healing, comfort and sharing. May I open my eyes and my heart to that pain and loss, and may I always offer comfort.

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Continuing the google process, I ran across a link about the Lakota mindset for raising children that was just beautiful. I hope you get a chance to read it, and I hope it inspires you as much as it does me. I realize that I'm preaching to the choir - you who read this blog are already very aware that children are sacred and special.

And guess what? We're all children - just a few years down the road.



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