A Parker River Wildlife Story

I watched two harrier hawks reacting over territory. It was like two chemicals exploding in a froth of flight. There was nothing personal within their actions other than the story my mind wanted to create. But I have learned not to believe such thoughts and so I watched two harrier hawks simply reacting over territory. Even that is story. We call them hawks. We call it territory.

Yesterday I saw a rabbit bounding across the road before me as I was driving through the wildlife refuge. My first reaction was to smile and laugh. Such a cute animal running in that signature style. But that’s some story I’ve learned from the Disneyesque interpretations of nature. The rabbit is reacting to open territory and an instinctual biological understanding of hazards to its current manifestation.

Of course, beyond this personality, I am that hawk, I am that rabbit. American Indians understood these truths very well. In their tribal races, the Hopi do not run in competition with another. They run because they are one with the wind and they are returning to its nature.

Oh, they tell stories too. Their stories lend personality traits to coyotes and ravens and eagles as well. But it’s not a matter of personification in their tales. It’s not the animal that has the human trait. Rather it’s the human that has the animal trait. It’s all about a point of view.

We see similarities between ourselves and nature because we are more than similar in essence. Today I was those hawks; yesterday I was that rabbit. Although both were and continue to be now. Flying is happening in Consciousness. Running is happening. Wind is.

And it’s an amazing manifestation of variety and creativity. One just can’t help to tell its, our, story.

On Native American Spirit

Vine Deloria, a Standing Rock Sioux, thought that whites in America should investigate the roots of their own spiritual traditions rather than adopt Native American spirituality. I would tend to agree (although I would not limit the quest in a parochial manner).

Not that Native American spirituality cannot provide direction. It’s earth-based rituals, its respect for all life, and its understanding of unity are all beneficial if practiced with an according respect for their origin and cultural possession, especially considering the history of horrendous atrocities made upon the American Indian.

But as practiced by American Indians, and especially by Pre-Contact Native Americans, they come from a pre-existing sense of unity, and a very different relationship with ego. In other words, before the fall.

To we who have fallen, such practices will not help in the rising. They certainly will not help eradicate the ego. In fact, they could become another set of beliefs and identities assisting in a further separation.

For those who are not native to it, Native American spirituality can be a beautiful window into the wondrous world of unity, but it seldom will be the door.