Breath of Mystery

It’s difficult to give a workshop on the topic of mystery mainly because mystery isn’t supposed to be defined.  Still this past week, we were in Grande Prairie, Alberta exploring, experiencing and learning about the Mysteries. With the help of the Medicine Wheel, ritual and dreaming we not only got a good understanding of the mysteries but also an empirical impression of them. 

There’s nothing more tangible then balance when we are struggling with imbalance; the same way that silence is easier to understand when our mind is exploding with noise.  One of the great things about Mystery is that it plays around with duality and paradox.  The Universe seems to always know how to communicate with us.  Synchronicity and repetitions are definitely the basis of the cosmic language.  This past week we were lucky enough to observe duality, paradox, synchronicity and repetition in action.  Mystery is often link with invisibility or anonymity; and yet, when invited to play Mystery quickly jumps at the chance to be incredibly visible, obvious and clear. 

The Alberta workshop counted 17 participants, the majority men.  Gérard and I have been tenaciously working at getting more and more men to our workshop since the late1990’s.   We noticed that women primarily get attracted to workshops; which elaborate on self-discovery and spirituality.  In the last 5 years, we’ve seen a shift where more and more men are looking to develop skills; which will help them reach more functional relationships.  No doubt feminine and masculine energy attracts different experiences and manifestations.  Having an equal number of men and women at our workshop allowed a balance that both G and I wouldn’t mind getting used to. 

At some point during the workshop one of the men mentioned that it was now time for “the liberation of men.”  Some of the women jumped at the statement picturing moments in history where women were treated like property, livestock and even as creatures with no souls. 

“It just seems right that women should seek out liberation because of these kinds of horrible human conditions,” said one of the women at the workshop.  Many of the other female participants seem to agree. 

“Why would men seek out “liberation” and what does this mean really?” was the kind of question many of the girls were asking themselves.

Personally, I thought it was the kind of statement that “inspires.”  Liberation for me implies: Breaking out of limitations.  I believe that even though women were abused by the patriarchal order through the last few millenniums; men too were somewhat caught up in a system that wasn’t totally of their making.  Liberation makes sense for all members of society.  Whether we are talking about racial minorities; homosexuals; transgender individuals; and even people dealing with mental illness and disease – liberation is about breaking the chains; which keep us tied down to disempowerment.  So why not men?

What I found amazing about this particular Mystery Workshop was how it brought up all kinds of questions, insights and perspectives on human conditions.  There was no way to predict the appearance of a meteorite; but even its presence in the workshop allowed us to touch the notion of “humans as conquerors.”  As we dreamt in the presence of the meteorite it asked us point blank: “What do you want from me?”  I guess we remained quite surprised when after all of our good intentions the meteorite called us “liars and conquerors.”  In the end she was right; revealing to all of us how our modern scientists are already trying to find a way to go mining into space.

Shamanism is about natural and cosmological realities.  All of our workshops are related to some natural or cosmological situation.  It’s easy to connect the workshops to the Equinox / Solstice, the Full Moon or even Blue Moon; but it’s not as easy to predict the presence of meteorites orbiting close to the Earth.  Some may say “we got lucky;” but I tend to believe the Wheel picked up on it; and with the help of the dreaming we picked up on it through the Wheel. 

I told G last week that a meteorite would hit the ground. 

“Somewhere in Russia,” I said.

G shook his head and told me: “As far as experts are concerned it isn’t supposed to hit the Earth.”

I often find myself battling against the word of science and the word of the media.  It’s great when I can bring back the notion of “prophecy” and the way of the past – to the modern world. 

Just as we started the workshop a meteorite hit Russia.  We had the television on as soon as we heard and watched direct accounts of the event. There was lots of excitement in the air and G just gave me that look that said: “Right again – shit!” 

Something had to happen because as far as we knew there were no natural or cosmological link to our weekend in Alberta.

In our modern world science is everything but we often tend to forget that there were 96,000 years + where humans depended on other means to survive and to understand the World around them.  In fact, when we explore human history we discover civilizations; which were visibly more advanced then we are today.   I often give predictions with the help of the dreaming and I’m always impressed with its accuracy. This particular phenomenon just showed me how the dreamers of yesterday had a harder job.  They were responsible for collecting and transmitting sacred knowledge; and keeping their People strong… 

I realized this weekend that no unlike the dreamers of yesterday, I too use the same skills, the same tools, and take the same actions to bring my people forward.  It was quite wonderful to see many of the workshop participants not only acknowledge the value of dreaming; but also work hard at developing it as well.  I don’t remember ever dreaming as well as a group as we did this past week.  I tend to believe the presence of the meteorite helped along with the Mayan prophecy for 2012:  Transformation.

There is definitely a lot of change and movement around us since the Blue Moon of August.  It so many ways we’re seeing subtle details moving and mutating.  This past week seemed to be about “taking a moment to see.”  We often go about our business without considering the 36 different perspectives to every experience, every issue, every potentiality …  It seemed to me that the events of last week were asking us to change and to pay attention to the World around us and the change it was triggering. 

“Where are we going next?” seemed to be the question in the minds of every dreamer. 

“The Tree of Knowledge; the Cave of the Ancients; the past and its ancestral stories; or perhaps in the future where mystery calls our name.”