Sacred Ceremony

So this week Omega has the honor
of hosting Carl Big Heart who is a spiritual teacher and medicine keeper in the Turtle Clan branch of tradition
He "focuses on building bridges between the worlds wisdom traditions and on healing the relationship between humankind and all living beings"
Yesterday I had the honor of attending my first
Traditional Sweat Lodge
I signed up for it last week during my flying bravery
and didn't remember I was going to do it until the night before
Truth be told I was terrified
mostly because of my history as a young girl with asthma
feeling like I cannot breath has always been a fear for me, as well as closed spaces with a lot of people in them. I haven't analyzed that "fear" yet but I just know that it sucks and I hate it. Enough analyzation about that.
My friend who did it last year told me the space usually is very cramped, with like fourty people
but it was something I really wanted to do
and I had a good friend with me to hold my hand
Amy has been such a dear and inspiration to me
I am very thankful she encouraged me to do this

If you didn't know, we are having terrible storms in NY
everything soaking, rain like I have never seen before
Huge blundery swarms of thunder and lightening
Just like I like it
The rain poured down on us as soon as we entered the lodge
It couldn't have been choreographed more perfectly

What I experienced in the Lodge was one of my most sacred acts of communing that I have ever experienced.
I can't really give it justice to explain it, except to say that I am thrilled to have been a part of it and
honored to have witnessed the prayers and wishes and healing that were the result of a really sacred man conducting an ancient healing ritual with a group of seekers. He cut right to the chase and cut out all of the bullshit with the shamalamadingdongs. We did four rounds of time around fourty minutes long, and it got progressively hotter. At the end we had the pipe ceremony which made me a little nervous because of my abstinence from tobacco but it was, as he explained, the way we connect breath to God. We sang. We prayed. We cried. We laughed. And we sweat, sweat, sweat, all the shit outta our bodies and spirits and mind. The hot stones are beautiful, we welcomed each one of them in, and then he sprayed them with herbs and they sparkled like stars in the sky. It was so dark and hot at some points I was overwhelmed, had to keep my head to the ground so I could breathe. At some point you push yourself so hard physically that you have no choice but to leave your body. And lets just say I was flying. Praying my heart out. Crying my eyes out. And then the calm comes. The air comes. The rain beats down. You take a break and do your water cycle and remember what is like to not be that hot and dark. And then, just a feeling of clean, purification. A new promise. A new commitment. A rebirth for lack of a better term.

Carl Big Heart is the real deal. I am always weary of people who consider themselves this or that, hooey phooey, and there is a lot of it.Especially here. Especially for someone from San Francisco who has been witness to people who consider themselves healer or "yogi'er than though" or Guru because they signed up for something on the internet and took a weekend class in it. I had witness to a real man with a real healing tradition in an amazing ceremony, and it is something I will always be so grateful for.

The picture above is an idea of what we usually think contemporary sweat lodges look like, but the one below is what they usually do look like. Not the romantic Tee Pee visions of Fantastical history, but more rustic structures with big woolen blankets that look like huts. I did not photgraph our lodge out of respect, but instead googled one because stealing pictures is much more in my moral code!