Protecting the sacred - Water Is Life

Waking up and working together to bring back the connection to our planet and her gifts.

This year is known as the year of purification in astrological terms (follow Kaypacha and get his weekly Pele report to stay tuned) and this feels to be exactly what it is. Everything that is the shadow of human kind is coming to the surface to be seen in all its ugliness – the hate, pain, fear, destruction, corruption, greed, stupidity, ignorance – to be transmuted and healed. And I include myself here. Until this year I never really thought about politics, I just knew it was a lot of dishonest people being dishonest (my mum was quite anti establishment and used to vote for the raving lunatics when I was little), but, with Brexit and then the USA elections, it is hard not to ignore. Which, I think in a higher sense, this is what this is all for – to ignite people to get off their backsides to make a change and to stop us being blind to that what we cannot – or don’t want to – see. This is also what the age we are entering into – the Aquarian Age – is all about – revolution, new paths to be formed, old paradigms to die and new to be born.

I recently became aware of the struggle of the people of Standing Rock in America. How the government is allowing for a pipeline of crude oil to be built on their sacred land, funded by big banks and corporations who have no cares for raping the earth of her treasures. The proposed pipeline – over 1000 miles long – was originally supposed to go through Bismarck, but white citizens opposed it, so it was rerouted across Sioux territory, who also oppose it, but are not being heard by the people at the top. The line will destroy the Sioux tribe’s sacred sites and would build under the Missouri river, where a likely potential oil spill would destroy their clean water. No clean water = no life. This is another disrespect to the Native Americans – the people to who this land originally belongs.

With Trump having won the ‘college electoral’ election and infamously not believing in climate change (watch this film from Leonardo Dicaprio here to find an overview on climate change, in the same film it is interesting to see how the people of America made Obama change his mind about gay marriage – people can create change) or the importance of keeping fossil fuels (coal, gas, oil) in the earth (I feel like oil is the blood of the earth and we keep taking it!), we are again presented with what is happening. We will not be here much longer if we don’t do something to make this change. Ultimately Earth is the one in charge, we are but guests on this beautiful planet.

(above image Camille Seaman)

The people of Standing Rock, also known as The Standing Rock Sioux tribe (Sioux also meaning ‘allies’), occupy territory in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and North and South Dakota, amongst others. They are a powerful tribe, with rich cultural legacy and have deep ceremonies that express their reverence for and dependence on Great Spirit, Wakan Tanka. They are some of the keepers of mother Earth and her mysteries. Joined by other tribes and water protector activists, they are taking a stand and are protesting peacefully. If you go on social networks, which can come into their own with things such as this, covering what the media doesn’t want you to see, you can see videos of police spraying protestors with ice cold water hoses in zero weather conditions, whilst also shooting them with rubber bullets. I heard someone cry “you’re wasting water” in one video and in another, a man in Native American dress says “they have weapons but our prayers are strong”. One beautiful moment, on a video I saw on instagram, was of when a herd of buffalo came in the distance. There was true joy and hope in the face and spirit of the man on camera. Buffalo is a sacred symbol of abundance and a huge blessing.

This is what is scaring me most about our planet at the moment. We have lost connection to spirit and with what is truly important, and in fact we are killing, destroying and taking that which sustains us. There are many options for clean energy and answers to slow down our fossil fuel (which as the name says, is ancient and we need to find a new ways!) consumption and find clean energy solutions. We have all the answers naturally – sun, wind, water – and we have the means to get there, I think companies like Tesla are good at leading the way.

I have been able to spend time on the land of America. I always feel good when I come as a guest on the soil there. I am honoured to have spent time on the Hopi reservation (another peaceful tribe, based in in Arizona) and have spent time with Hopi elders in prayer and ceremony, and learnt only a little of the gentle and humble ways and their huge reverence to spirit, the earth, water, fire and sky. A few days ago I made a prayer at home, with things I have collected that remind me of Native American culture and I realised how much we have been given. In only my collection, I have ground corn, music, prayers, songs, pottery, a kachina doll, sage, art, clothes, feathers, I have seen sacred dances, I wear Minnetonka shoes. So many natural food and medicines originate from Native American culture.

They have a deeper understanding to our realm of existence, and a reverence that many of us have all but forgotten. Many of us only take from this beautiful planet we live on and we give nothing back. We do not see her beauty and we are not grateful of her gifts. Instead we focus on something completely man made – money and everything that comes with it. We want more and we want it now. We have lost our connection to earth and our connection to spirit.

Thankfully, people are waking up. More every day and amidst this chaos we face, we are also realising that the more we stand together as communities – the more we connect – the more change we can make. We cannot be blind followers to what is happening any more and we need to have a deep respect for the keepers of our planet and learn from their wisdom.

A positive that is so far coming from this, is that, never before have so many tribes united together to work as one for a single goal, which is beautiful. It reminds me of the recent fight that London nightclub institution, fabric, has gone through to reopen; many tribes from across the dance music community came together to support.

It is also waking us up to our sacred connection to the elements of water and of earth. Water is that which sustains us. It was our first home in our mother’s womb before we came to the physical earth. Water is medicine, water is life. Below are two images taken by Tomas Karmelo. The first is of a woman’s meeting in a teepee at Standing Rock- the teepee symbolically represents the womb and the feminine energy has been strong in this movement, the second is a portrait of Sky Bird Black Owl – the first woman to give birth on the Standing Rock resistance camp, she has named her baby Mni Wiconi, ‘Water is Life’.