Posted on Aug 17, 2014
As many of you are aware, I have an interest in spirituality as well as psychology and appreciate whenever I can bring those interests together. So this blog will be an opportunity for me to introduce you to some native spirituality that dovetails beautifully with the journey metaphor for counselling and life.
Some time ago, I came across an article on “The Four Directions: A Spiritual Guide to Centering Yourself” by Roy Henry Vickers (Spirit of the North, Summer 2010). In this article, the four directions are the four doors of the sweat lodge experience.
EAST is the direction of the teacher (pray for lessons and for something to teach) and faces the sun—that ball of fire that gives life to the earth, the season is spring, and the element is fire. It is the also the direction to pray for children.
SOUTH is the direction of the healer (pray for healing and wholeness) and for women, the season is summer, and the element is the earth for mother earth provides food for the body and medicines to help us heal.
WEST is the direction of the visionary (being able to see in the dark and with our eyes closed as well as to clearly see the way to journey through this world) and for men, the season is autumn, and the element is water.
NORTH is the direction of the warrior (pray for courage to stand in the strength, truth, and beauty of who I am) and of the elder. The season is winter and the element is wind.
Recently I read another version of the four directions, including three more, in the novel Keeper’n Me by Richard Wagamese (1994/2006, pp. 306-307). The seven directions of life make a circle, the complete journey, the whole human being.
EAST is the place of light where the sun comes from. Learn illumination, the beginnings of knowing.
SOUTH is the place of innocence and trust. Learn to listen to the teachings with an open heart and open ears.
WEST is the look-inside place and of growing. Learn to investigate what you feel.
NORTH is the place of wisdom. Learn to pause, look back along the path you followed and see the lesson. Reflect.
UP & DOWN is the motion of life; the day-by-day things that we get hung up on and forget how far we have travelled. Lessons that come from breathing; power of choice; practice the wisdom we found from travelling the first four directions.
INSIDE is the place of truth. “You gather there with all the travelers who made that journey too, and you are alone no more.”
If you are feeling lost on your own healing journey, combining the natural world of the four elements and compass points may be just what you need to regain that sense of direction you are looking for. Happy travels!
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Posted on Jul 17, 2014
“Old paint on canvas, as it ages, sometimes becomes transparent. When that happens it is possible, in some pictures, to see the original lines: a tree will show through a woman’s dress, a child makes way for a dog, a large boat is no longer on an open sea. That is called pentimento because the painter “repented,” changed his mind. Perhaps it would be as well to say that the old conception, replaced by a later choice, is a way of seeing and then seeing again. That is all I mean about the people in this book. The paint has aged now and I wanted to see what was there for me once, what is there for me now.”
~playwright Lillian Hellman in her memoir Pentimento.
I love this concept of pentimento that I came across reading a book that I’ve now since forgotten. Given time, it would come back to me; but I will resist the temptation to use my limited brain resources to hunt and search every nook and cranny of my mind for that bit of information. The point is not where I discovered it, but the discovery itself.
The paint of one’s life canvas having aged and wanting to see “what was there for me once, what is there for me now.”
In an interesting blend of the very old with the fairly new phenomena of social media, my mind thinks of Facebook and all the connections we make and remake. From elementary school friends to college chums, former co-workers to current colleagues. All the intersections of our lives mapped out virtually. If we peel back the layers, what do we see?
Having moved a lot and traveled a bit, it can be said that I have global connections—not all mapped on Facebook, as some connections have not been maintained or refurbished. But it does make me wonder about the relationships that there were there for me once, what is there for me now, and what prompts a person to re-engage with people after long disconnections. Some people I remember well, others resemble a figment of my imagination, and sadly some are completely forgotten. And then there are the awkward moments of someone remembering me well, but I cannot recall them at all or only vaguely; and the crushing blow of a poignant remembrance of a person only to be lost from their memory. Layers of a painted canvas.
We never do completely grasp the imprint we leave behind after an interaction with a fellow human being. Some are shallow, like footprints in the sand, easily washed away. Others are deeply imbedded—like fossils in bedrock. But all are significant.
My mind goes back to road trips we have taken and the wonderful (and some less-than wonderful) people we have met—brief encounters on hiking trails, at road stops, in interpretive centres, the driver of a shuttle bus, the hosts of a campground. I recall my best friends from kindergarten, contact lost after Grade One due to a move; the summer birthday parties of the farming community of elementary school years; the solid friendships of secondary and post-secondary education.
Layers of interactions repeatedly being painted over for a dark rich story—the vivid artwork of a life. I wonder what my canvas would look like if it were displayed prominently in my home? Which faces would be imbedded? Which ones would blend into others? What about you? What would your artwork look like? What stories would your layers of painted canvas reveal?
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Posted on Jun 17, 2014
Last month was quite remarkable in how a few themes wove together into the tapestry of my life story. For book club, I was reading Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline (2008). This novel is a beautiful and transforming blend of two stories of two different orphans from two different eras in two different “Children’s Aid” systems. These two main characters’ lives cross paths through unusual circumstances and find healing through the sharing of their stories.
At the risk of generating a spoiler for a book that is well worth the read, the parallels to my own life were somewhat uncanny and even disturbing in that the author was able to write so profoundly about a subject she spent hours researching—including interviewing young and old. It is not a story of her personal experience, yet she writes like she lived it—or at least crawled inside the minds of abandoned children and wrote from their thoughts and feelings.
The novel dovetailed with my own story upon the arrival of a cherished item from my childhood—my birth mom’s antique, upright piano. It has survived many prairie moves, but none so far as to cross all the Prairie Provinces in one go. This aged piano does not have an illustrious pedigree or background story—other than it was gifted to my mother by her piano teacher who had it shipped from Kingston, ON to Western Manitoba somewhere around the turn of the last century. I do not know when it came into my mother’s possession—before marriage or after. It has certainly been part of the living room furniture as long as I can remember. She learned to play on this piano, as did I, and my younger half-sister.
I was a bit nervous about the arrival of this piano. It has so much unexplainable significance to me. I was concerned I might crumble into a puddle of tears. So I was much surprised when the opposite happened: I felt a door had opened and reinserted a piece of my soul; or as if I had finally awaken from a two-year nightmare. A lost piece of me was back.
So how does this connect with the Orphan Train? Well, a thread woven through the narrative was the significance of symbols that connect us to blood family. The older woman had a Claddagh (the hands represent friendship, the heart represents love, and the crown represents loyalty) pendant on a silver chain from her beloved Irish grandmother. The only connection this older orphan had left were her memories and that pendant. The teenager in the story had also received charms for a bracelet from her father, for her eighth birthday, before he died. These charms were in the shapes of animals with symbolic meaning from his Native Indian culture: a bird for protection, a bear for courage, and a fish for resisting the negative influence of others. These symbolic treasures went with these orphans to every place they ever called home—even when what little they did have had to be left behind on occasion.
Intersecting with the symbols were narrative threads about what we can carry with us through life depending on our circumstances (such as portaging one’s canoe of belongings from one body of water to another). Once I wove together the significance of my piano as a connection to my blood family, I had to chuckle at the thought of portaging my piano in a canoe! However, I am fortunate that the many moves my family did make were not limited to canoe-loads. I have not had to transport my treasures in trunks across the ocean, in canoes, or even backpacks. My piano remains a connection to my past because of the amenities of the present—such as transport trucks—and not being completely separated from family.
Symbols are significant. What treasures in your life lift you up or weigh you down? Do they trip you up or enable you to move on? Do you have to make huge adjustments to accommodate your symbolic treasures? Or are most of them carried in your soul without tangible reminders?
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