Animá Lifeways & Herbal School

Intro: I never fail to be impressed by and grateful for the folks in our lives who honor and tend their commitments… to us, but especially to themselves, their studies, processes and dreams.  They are made special by their rarity, for staying focused in face of distractions, remembering the reasons for their promises and then unfailingly keeping them.  In Anima we teach that any pledge worth making is worth keeping, and that anything not worthy of that effort and devotion shouldn’t be promised to in the first place.  While relatively few may actually donate to the School’s needs or commit to a Sponsorship, you do so with unerring faith and follow-through.  And while none of us are flawless in this way, among the most dedicated and dependable are the Anima students devoted to their studies and practice, and the allies who support this work.

Commitment & FollowThrough

by Jesse Wolf Hardin

www.AnimaCenter.org

What in the world, is this world coming to?  Increasingly we are becoming a one-world society made up of city-states, where neither individuality, privacy or honor have any real significance.  We’re taught to compromise our beliefs, whatever the heck they are.  We’re fed salvational technologist lies, as personal responsibility is replaced by avoidance, compromise and obedience.  Instead of a code of honesty and compassion, we have a million and one complex new laws on the books regulating every element of our lives.  Rather than seek out what are at times unpleasant truths, a growing majority of people would rather pay for the paddings of comfort with their precious mortal hours, and trade in their native rights in exchange for the illusion of safety.  Outside of the cranky, archaic and highly opinionated rural towns of the West and South, it’s getting progressively harder to find anyone willing to “tell it like it is” no matter what the consequences, folks who live up to their oral contracts as well as the binding written ones, who make it a point to keep their word once given.  Rare indeed, is anyone willing to commit… even to the very people, ideas and things they themselves most care for and believe in, let alone to fully follow through on those commitments.

I spent some of my teen years hanging around rowdy, socially deplorable outlaw bikers who – in spite of their numerous and indefensible bad habits – curiously demonstrated a considerably greater degree of commitment and loyalty than the average citizen, including those politically correct and particularly sweet Peaceniks who nonetheless tended to look down their noses at my greasy-jeaned, saddle-sore buddies.  And of all the truly deeply caring, alternative type folks I have known since, sadly only a much smaller percentage seem to have taken in what it means to commit to a relationship or a project, or to follow it through on something to completion no matter what the obstacles or reasons.

Maybe it’s living in close proximity to the land that does it, setting the example with nature’s intense determination, extracting or inspiring a greater degree of authenticity and response, but I know far more cowboys and farmers that actually do what needs to be done, manifest their ideas in the real world and real activities, or bring to a finish what they once set their minds to.   My rural neighbors from Montana to the Mexican border often set the example when it comes to living their dreams, holding a marriage together, keeping a promise or completing a self-assigned task.  As it was in the days of the pioneers and before, if someone says that they’ll cover a debt later, they usually do.  If they tell you that they’re going to punch you, it’s time get out the rag for the inevitable bloody nose.  But when they pledge their friendship, we can generally count on their help and support no matter how odd we were at the time, or how unpleasant we might have since proven to be.

There are some basic tenets or beliefs that both the intense Anima teachings and the West’s largely conservative rural population generally hold to be true, that:

• A commitment is an unbroken promise.  And a pledge, deliberately and continuously fulfilled.
• Commitment is the full investment of the self – with no provision for default, no requirement of success, and no room for regret.
• Commitment binds us to that which we are committed to.
• Taken together, commitments form the foundation for relationship.
• It is better to fulfill commitments to a very few things, than to commit to many and fully honor none.
• We earn credit for the depth of our intentions, the degree of our commitment, and the extent of our follow-through.
• Commitment requires regular attendance: For example, one cannot claim to be committed to a buddy or spouse, unless we are there for them when we’re needed.  Or to a goal or practice, that we only honor one day a week.
• Commitment requires hands-on effort.
• Commitment begs for completion: We can’t say we’re truly committed to a process, unless we’re braced to stick with it through the very end.
• Commitment requires insistence: One isn’t truly committed, unless that commitment survives every distraction, challenge and test.
• It can take a hundred promises kept, to balance out a single commitment failed.

When folks are called on to define what’s best about “old-timey” or “country ways,” they often mention the qualities of gumption and completion, commitment and follow-through.  In the real world anywhere, one is measured not so much by what we think or say as by what we actually do.

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A flurry of activity leading up to the big TWH Conference,  flurries of emotion and weather, as we honor the quaking changes, the earthen cycles, the balance and blessings.

The Face of Turbulence

by Jesse Wolf Hardin

(for my daughter Marriah, and all storms of love)

And the monsoons continue,
their swelling dark promise
bursting forth as searing lightning and crashing thunder,
setting an example some afternoons
by pouring their stormy hearts out.

Pouring down the cliff sides,
and deepening the river.
Pouring down our cabin roofs,
and overflowing the gutters.
Overflowing our barrels
with a deafening din,
overflowing the carefully dug ditches that
like many projects and missions in life,
we know must be dug again
and again, and again.

Pouring down on us as we rush to tend
what needs tending and covering,
rivulets down our faces indistinguishable
from life’s clearly unavoidable tears.
Pouring rain, and then pouring
hard
and unforgiving hail.

I look straight up
into the blinding white face of turbulence,
squint and then smile…
remembering well
what it’s like to be dry and thirsty,
even as the many little frozen balls
shoulder against the trail’s edge
in piles.

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Late Night Prioritizing

by Jesse Wolf Hardin

Anima Lifeways and Herbal School

Intro: The following is an excerpt from a recent letter to an understanding friend, summoned forth by the knowledge that my feelings as well as song of purpose would be truly heard.  As personal as this missive is, I have decided to share it here, in part in order to aid my readers’ comprehension of what our healing cause requires and our creative surges put us through.  Such late night or pre-dawn contemplation need not be perceived as torment, however.  By following the cycle of considerations through to a point of clarity, we come not only to acceptance and resolution but excitement and renewed vigor!  From these thoughts below, came an action list of change and development for Anima and our sites, approaches and means, which we may also share with you in a month or two.  We appreciate your company and support, in this life and work inseparable.

The days have finally gotten to the sweltering, with the dimming of the sun each afternoon a comforting relief.  Comforting, but a graying as well, in which the colors of my world seem a little more subdued, the facts of society and politic even more ominous.  The thunder is a relief in contrast, a dismembering of the gray sameness with a stroke of a lightning cutlass.  We could use more rain actually, and less build up, warning and hesitance, fewer intermediate shades.

I’ve woken up at night a few times lately, occasions where my mind has stirred itself in search of some new or enhanced recipe.  During such periods, it feels good to know those I am responsible are sound asleep as the hours of darkness pass into light, but I am also pleased not to have missed the sounds of the elk on the river sands below, the cries of rabbits at the clutch of an owl, the whispered lapping of the river’s waves… nor to have missed the ideas and insights that may arise only at such deep and undistracted times, or missed out on even the darkest of worries or heaviest of considerations that revolve like ghosts in the dark.

At such times, I may think of my wishes for the land and the threats to it, the sadness in certain special people that I can bring some balance to but never affect a cure, falling old growth redwoods and the FEMA regulations passed in part to control Americans with their own military, and every other detail of the sometimes pernicious web of human dictates and distress.  But what I most consider whenever I am awake in the predawn, is how to best utilize my gifts and knowledge, and further my purpose.  Such could well be one’s focus no matter how young, and certainly as one gets old enough to contemplate the truly finite nature and number of mortal moments in this form.  Not a second to waste, whether set to great tasks or given to rest and enjoyment, and again all the more so when there’s a sense of mission.  The question for me, of course, is never what my reason for existence is, or where I belong, nor even the essential elements of liberty and land restoration, teaching and writing, but rather the audiences, venues and means.  When writing, would I touch the hearts and lives of the most people by self publishing my essays, expanding course curricula, or writing fiction so that more people can be reached and my talents in that area utilized?  Historical or speculative and mythical?  How much time to the promotion and distribution of each, that might otherwise go to creating ever more new works?  Which audiences, the nature lovers, homesteaders, urban activists and wise herbalists who are already determined to live lives close to the earth, or the folks furthest from the land’s truths and values, who might do the mast damage or need our message most?  And what about oral, audio tapes and blogs or feeds, since it takes less time than typing and can be heard better with the inflection, rhythm and tone?  If so, how and working with what or whom?  And video, which is the way that most people today get their information, a series of YouTube and subscription stories, tales, lessons?

If the lifetimes were available, I would simply and gladly do it all, every way and means of communicating truths and tools, inciting as well as providing insight, entertaining in the ways that plant seeds of ideas and feelings, rock boats, rattle cages, heal wounds, promote wildness and heal separative wounds both physical and psychological.  I would do it if it won me no recognition or credit, if I did the work under a pseudonym or anonymously, if it cost me income or threatened my freedom or survival.  But there are only so many moments in a lifetime, and no matter how much or how little one sleeps there is a limit on what we can experience, create, affect or accomplish.  To do one thing, means that we are not doing others.  If I am giving much of my day to organizing a healing conference or writing a book, the result is however many hours of not drawing or painting, playing drums or making love, gathering medicinal plants or planting food, frolicking in the river or tracking the outlaw wolves, hours not given to fighting the system more blatantly, not demonstrating under threat of fines and jail, not being filmed or recorded in some nature-lover’s music studio.  The questions for me and those like me, are always “what is the priority this very second, what serves my spirit and purpose best, what ways will I be most powerful, helpful and effective?”  What audience, what article topic, what voice and information?

“Listen to your heart,” I might counsel others, but when I hear mine it is fully convinced in the value of whatever project it is I am working on at the time… as well as an uncloaked desire to still do everything.  It is how I learned, combining school and street life, reading and doing, martial arts and anti-war protests, making them all work together.  And it is how I most like to teach, connecting the myriad dots, the social and ecological, artistic and polemic, political and personal, soil depletion and the oppression of women, fungal communication and the power of prayer, historical events and future possibilities.  So when I am not actively doing, when I am listening the night’s quiet and the kindly silencing of my mind, there still seems to be a subconscious sorting of criteria and potentials, a weighing and measuring, assessing and apportioning.  It needs no words, measuring the way an old woman at an outdoor market might, by feel and not sound or sight.

I look around me, like a hunter-gatherer, seeing what rocks have the best shape for tools, what tasks and lessons await my attention, watching for new connections and helpers that might signal time for a shift to a new medium or media, an editor anxious for my next Medicine Woman short story, a film maker ready to roll.  But getting up with the dawn’s bright bird songs, there is no waiting, only some number one task that I am equipped to complete, and a sense of ever re-prioritized elements and redirected moments in my being more than head.

It is this, that I wake to, morning or nigh, and celebrate.

And it is mostly for this purpose, that I ever rest.

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The Southwest Monsoons:
The Gifting of Storms and Value of Extremes

by Jesse Wolf Hardin

Anima School & Sanctuary

Introduction: I find myself writing about the gift and lessons of our local monsoons, at the same time as villagers in Pakistan are dying by the hundreds in monsoon swollen floods.  All the more reason, to measure not only the ferocity and cost of these patterns, but the depth of their lessons, the value of their example, and the blessings of their life giving side.

The latter part of every Summer, the Southwest United States is host to what even the weather forecasters call the “Monsoons,” a series of thunderous daily showers that have more in common with the weather patterns of flood and drought ravaged Bangladesh than the remaining three quadrants of this country we belong to.  And sorry, friends, there are no monsoons in Oregon or east of Texas, no matter how strong your storms might ever be.  This particular weather dynamic often involves a seasonal speeding up and reversing of predominate wind direction, and on the North American continent always involves powerful winds blowing Northeastwards, powered by the extreme disparity between the Summer heating of land and ocean.  The resulting lower air pressure above the land acts as a siphon, drawing immense volumes of evaporated seawater high into the atmosphere and then releasing it in heavy concentrations on specific if seemingly random targets along its path.

They announce their start with the faint scent of salty ocean swells in deserts and mountains lying hundreds of Mexican desert miles from the Pacific coastline, and are characterized by dramatic dumps rather than slow and steady soakers.  Whereas the Winter monsoon patterns are dispersive and often contribute to drought, their Summer counterparts can result in flash floods in otherwise dry arroyos, and rivers swollen beyond their bed’s capacity.

It is perhaps that which I relate to most, the consistent embrace of wild extremes instead, the roaring and quaking over the calm and quiet storm, full sun followed by darkest imaginable clouds, the chance to thirst as well as to gorge and stretch.  There’s none of the uncertainty or equivocation of softer systems here, delivered on ever so gentle of winds.  And none of the kinder if monotonous storms that subtly inundate other places, settling in over the land and mind like great gray sheets.  Unlike with so many things in life from people’s characters to personal decisions, there are essentially no “gray areas” when it comes to the monsoons of the Southwest.  The boundaries between dense cloud and clarified sky are stark and easily referenced, and natural shape and fanciful form result from the delineation and contrast.  Sudden and severe fluctuations make boredom and desensitization nearly impossible, and contrasts and choices all the more obvious.  Indeed, if storms had minds, these would no doubt come with strongly formed opinions, forcefully argued in thunder’s rumble, and with pointed lightning bolts for impossible to ignore exclamation marks.  As a writer ultimately dealing with complexities and twists, I get relief from their certitude, feel gratefully affirmed by their make-no-bones-about-it honesty.  I find inspiration in their example of not hinging their act on audience response, “doing their thing” regardless of whether the human throngs either dread or adore it.  I only wish I could say as few lines as these storms, and understood as clearly.

I can intimately relate… to the monsoons’ immense energy, dedicated to what is in the end a life saving mission of bringing water to animals, people and plants that would otherwise perish without. To what feels to me like the freedom of the winds, of a great but guileless power answering to no authority other than its own true nature.  To the myth-worthy act of rushing in, accomplishing a goal and literally “making a big splash”, then slipping out before the applause like the Lone Ranger, while the gringo’s scratch their head and ask “Who was that masked man – masked writer, masked activist, masked healer?”

What I can’t relate to, and seem to have resistance to emulating, is the monsoon’s often absurdly consistent schedule, punching in like clockwork and almost always checking out on time.  Like a dinner date, these storms can usually be expected to arrive no later than 2 PM in the afternoon, and to pack up and leave that same night at a reasonable hour.  In the Northwestern sections of the country, folks often wake up to find a laid-back storm still asleep on their couch.  Not so in good ol’ New Mexico, where the Summer fronts storm in, perform a raucous rock n’ roll set for all assembled creation, and then get back on the road before before either their groupies or their detractors know they are gone.

Our monsoons begin after the July temps get up into the 80s.  And in the same way, their clouds seem to wait each day until the the afternoon’s heat is nearly unbearable before rushing in to darken, dampen and delightfully cool the Southwest’s fabled air.  It’s as if it were set up that way, so that we’d first have to really crave – and thus learn to better appreciate – the gift and relief of cooling moisture, before being subjected to what is often a discomforting deluge.

The clouds don’t roll in around here, they’re sucked in, on winds set to send fierce torrents splashing in great waves against the cliffs, bending over the tops of trees an hour before the first rain drop.  The thunder calls from a distance at first, then tumbles closer and louder, causing birds to launch and flutter, and leading a number of insects to take shelter on the protective undersides of leaves.  Magnificent white thunderheads suddenly rise up from behind the mountains like proudly unbeatable warriors, poised to overwhelm our bastion of relative tranquility and peace, a moment that arrests the prattle of the mind and bares the quaking heart.   The lightning arcs just overhead, illuminating both our inescapable mortality and the immanence of resilient life.  And with each thunderclap’s mighty roar, come the rains that pour, and pour, and pour.

Even with the lightning cause fires and the storms’ eroding of precious soils, the monsoons are still a sweep of the arm that bestows blessings.  The land is not just watered but graced.  The dusty greens of area trees and grass instantly brighten as if lit up from inside.  Normally dull pastel rocks shine like polished gemstones.  The seeps flow in serpentine patterns more beautiful than any artist’s design.  And everywhere a rejoicing!  Every person, plant and creature and even the soils themselves seem to give a glad shout!  A resounding “Yes!” to the rains that spur growth, the winds that test, exercise and thus make us strong, to the thunder that awakens and the water and spirit that sates our thirst.

As the monsoons pass over our cabins and Sanctuary, we do our best to gather every drop that pours off the metal roofs, transferring the life-giving liquid from barrel to barrel in what must look to an observer like a ballet of buckets.  We strive to make the most of these seasonal storms when they’re happening, to have our vessel emptied and waiting… and to be gladly willing to do the work of taking it all in.

As quickly as it starts, each monsoon storm stops.  The pummeling wind quickly dissipates, no doubt.  And what looks like a whole new set of stars soon pop back out.

—————————-

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BEAR TRUTH REALITY

and Montana Grizzly Encounter Sanctuary

Trust me, the photo above is not a photoshop composite, but an actual photograph of Brutus the 800 pound grizzly bear joining the family for lunch.  Brutus is one of several bears saved from being euthanized by impassioned naturalist Casey Anderson, and displayed in natural environs at the Montana Grizzly Encounter Sanctuary.  The sanctuary serves not only as a home for cage-raised animals that could never survive being released, but also as an educational facility to help dispel the stereotype of the grizz as always being a blood thirsty man eater.  Busloads of school children regularly get fairly close to these admittedly exceptional tempered examples of bruinhood, thrilled to watch these giant critters interact in relatively natural surroundings.

As Casey well knows, there is danger in making all big bears seems as docile and approachable, which is why he teaches about caution in bear habitat as well.  For balance and perspective, it is important to take to heart not only the gregariousness of friendly and faithful Brutus, but also the case of bear activist Timothy Treadwell who insinuated himself into a wild group each year in Alaska.  As the excellent documentary film Grizzly Man describes, most of the animals were indeed accepting.  He used his films of these often playful animals to help win support for their protection, putting their images to work for the cause of improved public relations.  One such furry browed individual, however – the one that decided to kill and eat the well intentioned Treadwell – apparently couldn’t care less how his behavior reflected on the species.

The bottom line is that bears, especially wild ones, are potentially unpredictable and dangerous.  On the other hand, they are not and never were the exaggerated threat that civilized humans have made them out to be.  We evolved with them, not in spite of them, coinhabitants of a wild and magical world where we are not the top of the food chain, but a conscious link… finding not only nobility and beauty in the great grizzly but also inspiration for healing.

To read more about Casey’s sanctuary or to support its work, go to the BrutusTheBear.com For further bear reading I invite you to enjoy my piece below, a rather lengthy article entitled “The Medicine Bear”.

-Jesse Wolf Hardin – www.AnimaCenter.org

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BEAR MEDICINE:
The Grizzly as Healer Archetype and Agent of Heightened Awareness

By Jesse Wolf Hardin

Anima School – www.AnimaCenter.org

beartooth set in silver
heavy at my throat
I wander into the morning
carrying a basket of flowers
and roots
barefoot in the remnants
of a heavy dew

and I am singing an old song
the blood song
of animal and woman
bound together
into one body, one spirit
-flesh, fur and bone-
-Kiva Rose

A heavy presence pads through the forest primeval, heavy like nightfall, heavy like the weighty body of the universe.  We feel its approach, even as we swim the glare of the midday sun— its corporeal mass slowly moving towards us, intent on enveloping us.  It is the spirit of a giant that survived the Ice Age, tearing apart the fallen trunks of ancient trees, knocking flailing salmon and furry golden marmots high into the air, continuing to stalk the darkly hidden caves of our dreams: the bear.

It comes not to silence but to awaken.  To consume distraction and illusion, to put an end to the irrelevant and trivial, to draw our attention to what matters most in us and around us.  To lead us to the ways and plants that can help us heal.  To deliver us back to our whole, primal, magical, responsive selves.  Some of us may feel the bear inside, raising up and helping us stand strong and straight, driving our hungers and feeding the growth of our insight and wisdom.  Some may claim the bear totem as their own, as though the bear had claimed and inhabited them.  And for all of us, it is a potential teacher that we would be unwise to ignore.

–#–

Grizzly!  The sound of their name is enough to pass a charge, like electricity through our bones,  enough to cast a long and deep shadow across our rapidly shrinking arrogance, illusory sense of omnipotence and fragile certainty.  One glance at a grizz’s unmistakable claw marks eight foot up the side of his scratching-tree and every nerve comes instantly to attention.  Every sense is alerted, every light turned on at once in the mortal housing of the soul.  Enlivened!  Every cell open-eyed and open-mouthed, every molecule on tip-toes, straining to perceive.

Awakeness.  Intensified perception.  These are the first gifts of the great bear.  With their slow lumbering thunder, comes the excitement and clarity of lightning bolts: sudden, penetrating, en-lightening!  Truly, one perceives more in grizzly country.  Sees further.  Hears more acutely.  Smells deeper.  Notices more.  Our senses honed to a fine, irreconcilable edge.  Without ever actually seeing a bear, the mere thought of it is as a claw stripping the opaque film from our perceptual lens.  The civilized traits of inattention and indifference are swiftly gutted like fish, and left to curl and dry on hot river rocks.  Sloth joins nonchalance, pawed into a carrion pile beneath a layer of sticks and dirt.

More people are hurt in California shower stalls each year than are hurt by wild animals in the entire country.  The fact is that there’s a greater probability of being hit by lightning than attacked by a bear.  Our heightened awareness in grizzly country results from the possibility of a bear attack, not by its likelihood.  Systematic and almost complete removal of this wilderness potential allows for us to sleep-walk through most wilderness experiences on “automatic pilot,” the way we may be used to functioning in the “work-a-day” world.  Reduction in any wilderness potential reduces our own ability to experience.

Since our Paleolithic ancestors first contested proprietorship of a cave, the great bear has been a reminder that humans are not at the top of the “food chain.”  Ask any grizzly you meet.  Or, if you’re below a certain size, ask a starving mountain lion.  If anything, soil is at the top, since it gets to eat everybody .  Civilized cultures fear dirt for this very reason, fighting back with soaps, detergents, and above-ground mausoleums.  But they fear the bear most of all.

At its worst, civilized human existence can be unnatural, reduced, confined, insulated like a padded cell, buffered from danger and thus from adventure, heightened sensation, spontaneity and awe.  A great effort is made to ensure the urban environment is the opposite of grizzly country: constrained, predictable, metered, pacified, and inflexibly scheduled.  There’s a singular lucidity to grizzly country, a brilliance and clarity like sunlight dancing on a curved tooth. Time spent in grizzly country is infinitely and necessarily flexible.  Spontaneity and attentiveness are traits that contribute to both our capacity to survive and to enjoy.
But the grizzly, and in fact all species of bear, have more to teach us than merely being alert.  They are intuitives, seers, shamans, travelers of the soul and instinctual healers that have influenced our development and psychology for ages.  Our species evolved in close relationship with Ursus, serving alternately as the bears’ food and prey, as their destroyers, their fawning bards… and their rapt students.

–#–

The earliest physical evidence of human reverence for animal spirits was discovered in various  grottoes high in the mountains of Franconia, Switzerland and Germany.  Along with numerous tools and fauna remains, they discovered purposeful collections of cave bear skulls stacked neatly on shelves, or protected inside stone cabinets protected by slab “doors.”  Some were encircled by a formation of small rocks, while another held a leg bone in its mouth.  Here were not only the tools for killing and fleshing these powerful animals, but proof of their veneration by what must have been a bear cult.  It seems that from earliest times the bear was seen as the “Animal Master,” the strongest of all.  Right relationship with the bear, however each tribe defined that, would determine what other animals made themselves available.

I once came upon some Pueblo Indian friends of mine way back on a dirt road, north of Taos.  Hung upside down next to them was a young black bear carcass.  I’d read how human they look with their baggy hide removed, but nothing prepared me for what looked like a skinned man with his chest opened, the pink muscles layered like a teen wrestler with a size #18 neck.  They salted and rolled up the skin, fur side in, while I watched the flies probe the exposed body.  The hide would be carefully tanned, and the meat left for the coyotes.  For them, eating a bear would be like cannibalism.  For they are the creatures most like us.

The bear’s fierce maternal devotion helps explain her role as the Mother of All Animals.  In her book Gods and Goddesses Marija Gimbutas contemplates the hundreds of ancient terracotta “bear nurses” that have been excavated from various Euro-neolithic sites.  Many are enthroned female bears, or women with bear masks on, and most are nursing a cub.  She sees these as the primordial animal goddess, the Great Mother, nurturing the new gods and goddesses of vegetation and agriculture.  The cub, then, becomes Zeus on the bear’s nipple, Zalmoxis and Dionysus, Artemis and Diana.

Our ancestors in both the “Old” and “New World”  watched the bear go into its den every winter and emerge every Spring— an obvious herald of rebirth, the return of life to a hungry land and hungry people.  The people of civilizing Europe harnessed the bear, and the bear’s mythology, to the purposes of the field and plow.  In England they had the “strawbear,” while in Germany he was called the Fastnachtshar: a man dressed up in a straw bear costume who would be led in early Spring to each house of the village.  There the man-bear would dance with all the women.  The more enthusiastically they danced, the richer the coming crop would be.  Pieces of the straw costume would be snatched by the young girls, and placed beneath their pillows to insure fertility, or placed in the nests of their chickens to encourage the laying of eggs.  The bear has forever represented as going into the self, into the Earth in order to be refreshed, revitalized and reborn again.  Those who would be students of the bear travel the discomforting trail into their inner self, only later returning to the busy surface with the strength and secrets found within.  They know that out of the icy sleep of winter comes the regeneration of life.

Entering into an initiation rite is often like going into hibernation.  The initiate is likely placed in the dark and isolation of a secluded hut, pit or cave.  They may be further wrapped up, blindfolded, or otherwise have their senses and mobility limited as it would be in the womb.  As with hibernation, the initiate would seem to die inside, giving up one persona and climbing out in a new, empowered form.  For this reason, the Dakota refer to a boy’s rite of passage as “to make a bear.”  The coastal Pomo included both boys and girls in an initiation where the children are symbolically “killed” by the kuksu  spirit, with the help of a costumed grizzly bear.  They were then removed to the forest for four days and nights.  When they were “reborn” into the tribe, they brought with them the secret medicine songs and plant knowledge learned in their travels to the middle world.
For the Ainu of northernmost Japan, the bear was “The Divine One Who Rules the Mountains.”  To the Cree they are the “Angry One” and “Chief’s Son.”  The Sami translation is roughly “Old Man With Fur Clothes,” while the nearby Finns say “Old Lightfoot” or “Pride of the Woods.”  Most often, wherever they are found they’re called “Grandmother” and “Grandfather” out of respect.  Long after the adoption of firearms in both Europe and America the indigenous people continued to hunt bears with their most primitive weapons, insisting on honoring their quarry with the personal engagement and inherent fairness of hand to hand combat.
The totemic energy of the bear was invoked by both men and women of one of the select warrior classes of “barbaric” Europe.  They got their name “Berserkers” from the bear (“ber”) skins (“serks”) they wore instead of the uniforms and armor of their more civilized antagonists.  Men and women are said to have fought together, biting at their shields, and raising such a tumultuous animal roar that the earliest Roman invaders fled in a total panic.  They were famous for their ability to ignore pain, facing unfair odds with uncompromised ferocity.  Their characteristic ability to continue fighting in spite of numerous wounds may have been assisted by the consumption of certain psychoactive mushrooms, no doubt showed to them by their rambling bear guides.  Among the Great Plains tribes of America they were called “Bear Dreamers” and “Bear Warriors.”  Known for running head long at their foes, at times with no more than a bear-jaw knife.  They believed the bear spirit would protect them, inspiring incredible feats of courage.

The Pueblo name for bear is often the same as for doctor.  The bear not only ushers in the spring vegetation, but then shows those who watch close enough which plants and roots to eat, and which herbal medicines to gather for their people.  In this country the bear showed the people where to find the kinnickinnick (also called Uva Ursi, or “bearberry”), the yarrow and osha root.  The Lakota emergence myth describes the people being tricked into leaving the middle earth by the Trickster Iktomi.  For leaving the embrace of the Earth Mother the people were subjected to disease, cold and hunger for the first time—  possibly an allegory for humanity’s progressive disenfranchisement from the rest of the living planet.  It was the bear, the doctor, that felt sorry for the wayward humans and showed them the plant remedies they would need to ease their self-inflicted suffering.
In both America and Europe the bear spirit was considered to be the ally of the shaman.  Like the medicine man, the bear could both heal you and kill you.  Both are solitary travelers, garnering their power from the lessons of Nature and the experience of solitude.  Both are feared at the same time they are revered.  Like bears, those with bears for guiding totems, typically make people uncomfortable.

And to be fair, bears can be hard to live with!  People with bear energies or traits are not just strong willed but stubborn, sometimes to their own detriment.  Uncooperative, unless something happens to please them.  Able to withdraw into themselves, to the exclusion of others.  Distant and inaccessible, when they’re feeling either melancholy or bored.  Impatient about anything that matters.  Dangerous when they are crossed.  They are hardest on themselves when they lack a purpose, and hardest on others when they are judged and misunderstood.

Unless and until they develop self discipline, such people may gravitate to extremes of mood and behavior, giddy and playful one moment and perturbed the next.  They may find themselves eating more sweets than are healthy, and sleeping more than they need.  They are not lazy people, only extremely particular about what they commit their interest and energies to.

On the other hand, these bear-folk have the ability to search the inner labyrinths of their creature beings and wild souls, resulting in a deep understanding of self that they can make use of if and when they decide to come back out.  They have the inherent strength and determination to accomplish great things, moving aside immense boulders in order to get to a self-assigned goal.  They are self motivated and function well at solitary work of any kind.  At the same time, they can make incredible mates, so long as they live with someone who not only truly knows and understands them, but who also shares their preferences, desires, intentions, missions, destinations and designs.  They are capable of being some of the very best teachers, authors and parents… and the most dependable guardians of integrity and truth, spirit and magic, land and home.  They make the most powerful healers, whenever they have first done the work of healing themselves.  Those who marry the bear, never want to go back.

It’s not a matter of physical size or shape.  Being bear is in the way one walks flat-footed, and swings their head from side to side.  In the deliberateness of motion, and the absence of frivolity.  In great persistence and high intelligence.  In playfulness that is as intense and focused as hunting or sex.  In the father’s force of purpose, and the mother’s protectiveness.  In the earth-warrior’s devotion, and the inimitable bear-hug.  In the Medicine Woman’s affinity with plants and intuitive relationship to medicinal herbs.  In their huge hearts and berry-chomping smiles.  It’s in the way that they dream of the bear… and the way that bear, in turn, dreamed them into being.

–#–

what is sacred, and
who walks with  naked foot.
the earth below and the mind’s echo in
the long night, the body turns
on poles of cold wind and fire.
what the dream can touch
and the heart hear
(the cracking of gray ice
like a mirror in her eyes)
give yourself to the star, give
yourself to the last bear
-Barbara Mor

Acceptance of the wild bear is tantamount to acceptance of the untamed wilderness, of the untamed energies of womanhood, of an untamed life.  It means acceptance of the dualities of nature, of all sides of the Earth Mother.
I am reminded of Artemis, Greek daughter of the original Animal Mother, grown into the Lady of The Beasts, the Lady of Wild Nature, priestess of the moon.  She was Diana the huntress, but also served as the defender of wildlife.  Her companion was a bear, and together they ruled the plant kingdom and thus determined feast or fast.  She served as protectress of thieves, slaves and outlaws.  She was at once the destructive, all consuming “terrible mother” and the defender of the children, guardian spirit of all pregnant women and “Opener of the Womb.”  Artemis helps us understand how our difficult embrace of the bear is actually an acceptance of the death that must precede any planetary rebirth.

For many thousands of years humankind has looked to the bear as both reality and symbol, seeing many different things in both.  A few land-based tribes in Siberia and North America continue to actively revere the mighty grizzly as a worthy rival and invaluable guide.  Conservationists and nature lovers may continue to see them as important aspects of a healthy ecosystem, and some still draw on them for inspiration, example and power.  But for most people, the relationship has progressed to one of estrangement, with all wildlife becoming distant curiosities or televised entertainment.  They are no longer even trophies to “bag,” let alone threats to avoid at all cost.  To them, the bears are veritable historical artifacts, barely breathing throwbacks to a wilder and more intensely realized time.  They’re magic, and they are indeed disappearing.  But they’re also as real as we are.  And in another way, they’re always here.

Primal humans found something distinctly familiar in the great bear.  In the way the mother gently plays with her cubs, and stiffly defends them against all comers.  The way she gently sniffs the beckoning blossoms, or stretches in the sun.  The bear appeals to that part of the human psyche still pondering its own untamed nature— with perked ears and raised hackles!  It strokes the Paleolithic sensibility that even now revolts against enforced civility.

There is something like destiny, climbing inexorably over the nearby ridge, heading unhurriedly but deliberately our way.  It is a playful dream, a sensual overture, a fur-covered agent of the wild.  It is awakeness, and it is healing.  It promises, in silence, to take us into itself… into its very center!

It is the great bear.

And it is us.

Go ahead
turn around
see the shape
of your footprints
in the sand
-Leslie Marmon Silko

–#–

(The above essay is from an upcoming book by Wolf Hardin.  Feel free to share and link.)

(Beautiful painting “Medicine Bear” is by Dark Natasha)

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Tales of a Runaway:
The Problem With Lines, and the Makings of a Proud Misfit

by Jesse Wolf Hardin

Anima School  www.AnimaCenter.org

I’m often asked for the story of my first leaving home at age 13 and again at 15, as the first peach fuzz began to form above my lips.  Their queries are usually a response to the way I present my teaching credentials, offhandedly describing myself as nought but a self taught, onetime 7th grade runaway with a certain talent for detecting bullshit and intuiting truths, connecting the dots and rocking the proverbial boat.  I would never have used such an expression in the day, however, being far more focused on those things I was running towards than anything I might have been hoping to escape.

That said, I was without question running – not walking – in what often seemed the opposite direction of my family, fellow students and neighbors, supposedly representative government and the vast majority of humankind.  For whatever strange reasons, I could somehow relate better to principled oddballs like Quaker pacifists and gun toting guerilla soldiers, to socially stigmatized bookworms, bookies and bootleggers, troublesome juvenile delinquents and maverick hard-spurring adults than to the well behaved who blindly toed the line.

It was the toeing that I had least use for, growing up a witness to all the fearful folks remaining rigidly within the boundaries that others proclaim, the children ordered to line up and fly straight, the teens told to get their futures lined out, the wives who never speak up because they might sound out of line.  I blatantly disrespected and stepped over established economic lines and race lines, national borders and social boundaries, ceilings and caps, lanes and limits.  I eschewed using lined paper and avoided any people who seemed to strictly follow party lines.  I snuck into theaters, or else waited until the long line of movie goers were seated before making my way inside, and I would have rather eaten out of a dumpster any old day than to have stood for even an hour in a welfare line.  I had – and still have – a problem with any person or agency trying to line me up or line me out.  While youngsters I knew were trying to get on a football squad or nail down their first job at the phone company, I found I had no desire to become either a linebacker or a lineman.  Nor did it matter if my ideas and direction were aligned with either special interests or the common-sense trumping majority.  I ignored the so called fine line of the law, in favor of doing what seemed right, avoiding hurting people because of either inherent compassion or the usual absence of a pressing need, rather than because some instrument of law chose to proclaim it illegal.  I made plans early to one day be buried under a tree, and not planted in a root-resistant coffin in some cemetery’s grim grid of lines.

Not even sitting in a line of school desks was easy for the wild-card boy looking for freedom, experience and adventure.  I inevitably scooted mine back or forwards just a little, in allegiance to my sense of aesthetic and order even as – from the first grade on – I alternately got into trouble for either asking too many challenging questions or slipping out the window to wander and play.

It was in military school at age 12, that the full extent of my aversion to straight, unwavering lines came to light.  I was enrolled there not as punishment for home infractions but at my own request, in preference to the noodley anarchy of “progressive” schools as well as the paradigm reinforcing public campuses with their often low benchmarks and even lower expectations.  I asked for that opportunity to prove myself and to excel, to study the classics and learn to shoot, in spite of being subjected to a degree of regimentation that I knew from the get-go was going to drive me up the proverbial wall.

Or, rather, drive me up a tree… specifically, the thick gnarly limbs of a giant avocado at the edge of the school’s marching field.  I was content enough during lengthy classes since the teachers let me progress through the material as fast as I was able.  Unfortunately, every afternoon we were compelled to march like trained ants in the heat of the sun, something I couldn’t seem to tolerate.  By taking the position of guidon at the rear of a squad, I was able to drop out at just the right moment and quietly clamber up the avocado’s trunk without ever being noticed, so fixed were the eyes of my fellow students on the placement of their feet, and so unwavering their attention to orders!

This fortuitous tree was situated adjacent to one of the ten feet high concrete walls, built to both provide privacy and effectively contain the academy’s spirited young cadets.  From my vantage point, I was able to view the straight-arrow students – marching in straight lines on a perfectly flat and well-mowed plane – in contrast to the scene on the opposite side of the wall, with its dirty faced street kids wildly wrestling and reveling there, with its overgrown and highly uneven terrain.

These days I am far more likely to think of rivers when making an analogy about lines, such as how unhealthy they are when deforestation has them running fast and straight, flooding often and carrying away their precious burden of finite soil, or how the healthiest watercourse is usually the one with slowing curves and restful meanders.  Back then, though, it was boxes and cages that I visualized as the marchers traced repetitive squares with their measured steps and abrupt ninety degree turns, while it was the sirens of liberty and magic that I believed called to me from the other side.

My inevitable emancipation was gradual and incremental, beginning with my waiting until the rest of the cadets were snoring before tip-toeing out of the barracks and into the streetlamp glow of an urban night, stuffing the uncomfortable metal bunk each time to make it look to the officer on watch as if were securely asleep.  In time there could be no more returning, of course, a moment when risky sojourning would take ultimate precedence over finishing the semester, graduating with a high school diploma, going on to college, getting a good paying job or being able to afford insurance.  This I knew even then, and freely chose.

Dropping out worried my mom, of course, but not because she wanted to push me into becoming anything in life except other than what I myself wanted.  Nor could she realistically expect me to be concerned about a future steady income, given the archaic emphasis on honor and adventure that I’d so often professed.  What worried her most was that her “baby” would end up unhappy, due to never having learned how to fit in.  After all, what employer, sports team, association or club would ever have me, when I rejected not only uniforms but uniformity, took pride not in likeness and team cooperation so much as in individual initiative and dramatized dissimilarity?  If I’d gone into the army, it would have had to special forces doing self directed recon.  If I’d been cut out to be a doctor, it would have had been in the field or jungle and not the harsh lined cubicles of a modern hospital.  Fit was, quite frankly, one of the very last things on my mind.  Too snug a fit, I realized, could be like a fashionable garment whose design restricts movement.   Too comfortable of a fit, and one could end up less inclined to try out either new venues or vessels.

If anything, it was precisely the fitting into predictable and acceptable norms that I was running away from.  Even as I looked to what I ran so purposefully toward, I clearly also sought distance from the normality of passive acceptance, placation and resignation, restrictive customs and rigid rules, from linear process and mechanization, predictability and conformity, stock solutions and any certified assistance.  On a quest for the unusual and exceptional, I did all that I could to leave behind my rote personal habits as well as the controlling regulations of both the academy and of society in general.  I sought to emulate the twisty individuation of artistic root structures, the insistent growth of the outlaw bamboo busting its way out of every yard’s confines, and the rascally dandelion poking up through the subversive cracks of predictable sidewalks, unstoppable by herbicides, absolutely determined to do its dandelion thing.

Unlike many another urchin who’s ever slept under a freeway bridge to the hum of passing traffic, I certainly didn’t run away from home due as a result of neglect or abuse.  I had parental support in taking art lessons, martial arts lessons, and lessons in motocross racing.  Heck, on the day I announced my departure my dear father offered to buy me a car to take my leave in!  I gave it some consideration, but clearly accepting such help would have been contrary to my aim of opening up to and facing the test of a chancy, difficult, and ever changing real world.  What I sought to escape from was not violence or deprivation but security and sameness, the trap of everything being taken care of for me.  I ran from what I’d come to see as the oppression of the sterile suburbs, the matching white stucco walls in every cookie-cutter tract home, the painfully bright and nearly incessant incandescent lights.  Shallow conversation, faux woodgrain, mass trends.  The artificial, the replicated and the horrendously generic.  The contrived events, faked satisfaction and often phony “I’m okay” smiles.  The trained politeness, masking honest dislike and obfuscating our caring intent.  The gerbil-like rush to consonance and accomodation, even at the cost of personal tastes and opinions.  Just getting along and accepting things the way they are, when it is exploration, investigation and alteration that is needed most.  Tolerating what should be intolerable.  Sacrificing excellence and distinction for refuge in feigned sameness.

Feigned, I say, not because people have some self destructive desire to be phony, but because the premise and goal are impossibilities.  Humans can be pleasantly or painfully similar, but we are never exactly the same.  Not even twins with apparently duplicate DNA are truly indifferentiable.  Nor is sameness anything to strive for, as individuals with very distinct manifestations and blends of potentials and unique collections of experiences, varied natural abilities and propensities, personally defined and expressed purpose and seemingly customized calling.

I subsequently spent many years on the streets hustling to get by, and on a chopped Harley acting wild, cooking on low fires in the wooded corners of remote public parks well past the age of 18 when the youth authorities no longer cared where I was or what I was doing after dark.  This was followed by more years on a long and windy road, in a search for my self and what it might mean to feel totally at home in not only my place but my purpose.

In the ensuing decades my image and designs have evolved, my horizons widened and means increased.  I’ve even grown to the point of valuing natural and personal boundaries, the defining and sometimes protective perimeters sketched around my healthy being, known truths and what most matters most.  That said, any boundary of mine will always be an infinitely adaptive and highly uneven one, and not an irrevocably straight line… proof there are at least some things in the universe which change little over time.

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Mulberry Wise

Garnering Lessons For Humans From a Tree

By Jesse Wolf Hardin

www.AnimaCenter.org

One of the most sacred places to either ponder or pray has got to be outside, under a temple of overhanging ponderosa pines, surrounded by the beauty of creation.  And some of the best places to learn about life are far from school, in swim holes and Indian caves, on secretive hunting trails, and in patches of edible plants as you harvest them for a Southwestern meal.  The two best teachers of all time are experience, and the natural world.  We can learn a whole lot about life from hard work on the family farm, from sailing a small boat through choppy seas, or from spending the day picking sweet red candies off a wild mulberry tree.

My “edible plants” book claims that the one’s we find scatted around this area are “Texas Mulberries,” but it simply can’t be so… after all, this is New Mexico!  So let us call them Gila Mulberries instead, native to this county where I’ve long lived, cherished as well by the ancient Mogollon tribes that fed on them, and a treat still to any cowboys or backpackers lucky enough to stumble on one on a hot day in June.  And there is so much to learn climbing around in their giving green boughs, our mouths and fingers stained with berry juice.

Here are some typical silvan insights, and the potential implications for our personal lives, informed by the Earth, mulberry wise!:

1) Well managed orchards are impressive, but the rareness of wild mulberry trees make them the most special of all…

The lesson: Seek friends and lovers, causes and careers, places and moments full of character and meaning — rather than those that conform best, or produce the most.

2) Hikers that are too busy talking, can walk right under a tree’s branches without noticing its berries…

The lesson: The entire natural world is constantly trying to teach and nourish us. There are lessons, gifts and miracles all around, if only we’d wake up and open to them.

3) Turn or duck your head even the slightest bit, and you may spot berries you hadn’t previously seen…

The lesson: In life, the slightest change in our perspective often bears fruit.

4) The sweetest berries nest high in the tree, and it can be dangerous getting to them…

The lesson: Special rewards come to folks who are willing to risk a fall.

5) At the same time, we often we reach out far for what looks like a special berry, only to find sweeter ones right under our nose…

The lesson: Things tend to look more exotic and appealing at a distance, but don’t forget that the greatest treasures in life are those close at hand.

6) When high in the tree, the careful gatherer keeps a firm hold with whichever hand isn’t busy picking…

The lesson: When taking risks and making changes, it’s important to keep a grip on the here and now, the certain, the reliable, the true.

7) Carefully sample the strength of any branch, before putting all your weight into it…

The lesson: It’s smart to test any options– any forks or branches in the trail of life– before we fully commit to them.

If the tree gets no rain it’ll die.  Yet if over watered, its fruits turn out colorless and bland….

The lesson: We need sustenance and attention.  But those who are fussed over and smothered, who never learn to do without, are often the least interesting and effective people of all.

9) Some wild foods spoil more quickly than others.  This is why ground squirrels carry most of the acorns they gather home to their nest, but eat any mulberries they find right away…

The lesson: The wise person knows when to store and save, and when to just take it all in and enjoy.

10) The softer the berry, the sweeter it usually is…

The lesson: We may pride ourselves on our toughness, but it can leave a bitter taste.

11) It takes a lot of roots to hold a tree upright during the windy days of Spring…

The lesson: Family, community, history, tradition and relationship to place are what keep us grounded in the face of disruption and change.  If we’re to avoid being toppled, we’d better hang tightly to our roots.

12) Some of the tastiest berries can be found lying on the ground…

The lesson: Along with the sugar of life, comes a little grit and dirt.  And for some of the greatest gifts of all, we have to be willing to get down on our knees.

13) A wild mulberry tree only has fruit for a few short weeks each year, and the committed berry lover will make sure not to miss a single day…

The lesson: Sweet life, at its best, is relatively short.  Be there for it– eyes wide, mouth watering, heart willing… and fully thankful.

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(For more nature-informed insights, got the Anima website, and consider committing to an Anima Home Study Course)

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Rhiannon’s Wild Turkey:
A Lesson in the Gift of Death and Resilience of Life

by Jesse Wolf Hardin

www.AnimaCenter.org

Life is neither as fragile nor as tenuous as we are led to believe.  Women are not generally in danger if they give birth at home, not all health conditions require pharmaceutical intervention, and the loss of liberty is more of a threat than any terrorist.  We are bombarded with stories and images of violence and illness in part because the medical and insurance industries profit from and work hard to heighten the fear of death, and most or perhaps all governments depend on a constantly aroused sense of insecurity and vulnerability to win either our acquiescence or support for their amassing of power and the abridging of our rights.  Even the natural world, increasingly tested by every manner of extraction, pollution and abuse, is not brittle and morbid but adaptive and resolute.  A marvelous force, life is defined not by each individual’s eventual demise but by the inherent preoccupation with living.  Harm it, and – like our physical bodies – it seeks to heal.  All we need to do to help in most situations, is to step back and leave it alone.  Suppressed in one way or place, life will seek to burst up and through, new species arriving to fill in any emptied niche, coyotes having more pups during periods where they are being hunted hardest, plants developing resistance to herbicides, and people filled with the energy of life whenever not manipulated into focusing on risk and end.

We are, however, endangered by ailments, and responsible for our health.  The health of the natural world that we are part and extension of, is to a degree our responsibility too, as we act to help make whole what has been put asunder, to mend what’s been damaged, to heal what’s been dismembered.  We tend body and land through blatant activism, educating, protesting, organizing and agitating, but also through the growing or gathering of food, healthy nourishment and caring for ourselves, through care-taking and stewardship and trying our best to learn to do what’s most right.  Fragile it isn’t, but when it comes to the continuance and quality of life, we do in many ways hold both its potential and its fate in our hands.

This was driven home for our young daughter Rhiannon recently, in a canyon given lesson that she is not likely to forget.  When she was five we had a wonderful white rat named Lydia that she apparently wasn’t old enough yet to have much interest in, but in the years since she has increasingly wished she had a pet.  The Anima Sanctuary’s protective land covenants prohibit dogs and cats here, due to their substantial impact on the local wildlife that we’re committed to restoring.  Not that Rhiannon would even be satisfied by a domestic dog.  “I don’t want a pet to be caged or have to be with me all the time,” she explained.  ‘I want a fox that will play with me but have its own mate and den, or a raven that will come be my friend and let me pet it each day before flying off with it’s friends again.”  We’ve known it was just a matter of time before she would show up one day with a juvenile packrat or cuddly skunk, approaching us with the Otter Girl’s most imploring look.

Rhiannon had it with her for two days before feeling ready to tell us about it, a baby wild turkey that she had run and caught as a hen’s brood scrambled to keep up with her.  The reason we hadn’t seen it, and that it had been so content and quiet, was that she had been keeping it warm in her hat… on her head.

Our emotional response was mixed, first of all touched by her love for it, then proud she could catch one, and finally concern over what we would do with it.  We gave up trying to raise chickens long ago, when no amount of fencing could keep out the chicken munching owls, hawks, coyotes and raccoons, and we could just picture what would one day be a 30 pound bird holed up with her in her 8X10 treehouse.  Kiva did research and discovered that unlike other species, the mother turkey would likely not kick the baby out over the human smells left by handling, but the chances weren’t good for getting that close to the flock soon enough.

There was something so beautiful about the many expressions passing across Rhiannon’s face, as she kissed and petted her feathered charge.  Apprehension over our reaction, and its needs.   Uncertainty over what to do, and wondering if she had done the best thing.  A desire to keep it as her canyon companion, and a burning desire to somehow tend then set it free.

As she fed her baby with ground up acorns and water from an eye-dropper, it proved impossible for us not to imagine her attended by the grown turkey, defensive of her and distrustful of strangers, not large enough to ride like Princess Mononoke’s wolf but a faithful and brave compatriot even if not the smartest bird on the block.  It would come when she made a low clucking sound in her throat, or when she called its name… something both mythical and noble sounding but a unique Rhiannon creation, such as Sigfeather or Theobold.

“We’re sorry,” I had to tell her, even as it burrowed into her hat nest and petitioned to be put back on her head.  “Its chances of survival away from its mother when it’s this young are very slim,” I had to be honest, “you’d better love and enjoy it while you can.”  The consequences of her decision to bring the bird home sunk in the next morning, when she awoke the next morning to find her beloved stiffened and cold.

Other chicks from the same brood will die from other causes, a freak malady or the expected closing of a peregrine’s claws or canyon fox’s jaws.  But others will live on, dodging predation and growing to raise their own hopeful young, part of life’s relentless surge, life’s demonstrative will to be alive.  Though not fragile, it is of course mortal, and in that mortality lies the weight of our fateful choices as humans.  It is the price of consequence and the certainty of death that brings the tension and excitement to each being’s personal act of living… and that makes so precious and powerful, the sight of her other chicks growing in awareness and strength, celebrating what are all consequential moments on the river beach below.

(For more writings by Wolf Hardin, go to the Writings Page on the Anima Lifeways and Herbal School Site)

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Herbal Conformism and the Illusion of Normalcy:

A Response to Charles W. Kane
from the ‘Freak-Show Field’

by Jesse Wolf Hardin

Intro:
Charles W. Kane is an experienced clinical herbalist and self described “veteran of the war against terrorism.”  Unlike the majority of modern day herbalists, he would not be likely to describe our field as “alternative medicine”, and brings from a military and Western background a refreshing degree of old fashioned common sense and down-home candor.  We often refer to his book when looking for what is increasingly rare experience based information and competent materia medica.  That said, he is also someone whose pronouncements I occasionally find simultaneously disturbing and strangely enjoyable to disagree with.  A recent rant of his is titled “Image Herbal Medicine”, calling attention to various concerns that Kiva and I share, while featuring some assumptions and conclusions that surely call for a response.  It seems somewhat karmic (just kidding!) that such a response come not just from metropolitan, cappuccino swilling, politically correct crystal douser and Obama apologists, but from a long-haired cactus-hugging Gaian ecosopher who not only an animal middle name but also wears cowboy hats, stretches a mean barb wire fence, writes about Old West firearms and teaches personal defense.  The bulk of Kane’s article appears below in quotation marks.  Any blame or praise for the words between, falls fairly on me.

“This short essay may come across as snarky or even unpopular,” Mr. Kane starts.  And let me begin in turn by saying there’s no apology called for in either case.  Snarky can be insightful and incite-ful – and darkly entertaining – so long as we avoid the patronizing airs of elitism, are reasonably clever and truly right.  As for ideas being unpopular, in our screwed up society the writing or doing of what’s popular is one of the surest means of being wrong.

“Image herbal medicine or herbal medicine as a fashion statement is easily the most practiced form within the field today. The indicators that suggest an individual is image or fashion oriented are numerous:

1. Identity crisis: name changes to Root, Weed, or Green for example; middleclass whites (the majority of herbalists) wishing they were Hispanic, American Indian, or other “ethnic” races, as if some groups are more ‘connected’ to the plants/planet – a form of reverse racism really.”

Here, Kane has hit on an important issue regarding the lionization and adulation of particular ethnic groups, especially among guilt ridden herbalists and environmentalists… though a far more common and dangerous error in this society is imagining that we all, even EuroAmerican anglophones, are anything other than the descendants of land based peoples, heirs to our own traditions of natural healing and lifeways that were passed down from equally tribal, resilient, plant-wise folks whether whether they be Celts, Vikings or Visigoths.  That said, there is much to both learn from and respect in some of the ways of remaining indigenous peoples of Africa and Asia, Australia and the Americas, and little of honor and value to emulate in the current, modern, so called ‘civilized’ dominant cultural paradigm.

As for fledgeling herbalists changing their names to Root or Weed, it’s stereotypical enough that his observation earned some belly laughs.  Such names likely come closer to representing their characters, interests and allegiance of these plant loving people, however, just as nicknames like “Ace” or “Cowboy” might do a better job of describing certain rodeo regulars or U.S. Army tank crews than “John” or “Bob” like their parents picked.  Our ex New World Order neocon president goes by the respect demanding “George W. Bush”, but that alone wasn’t enough to win him any respect.  History shows that when people need help with their health problems, they cease to care if the person is referred to as Mike or Moss, as ‘Witch’ or even “Leonard Singh III, esq., Proctologist, PhD, DDT”  Just as it should be.

“2. Anti-establishment appearance/association: fits in at a rainbow gathering.”

That’s far too simplistic.  Not all anti-establishment types fit into Rainbow Gatherings, witness the radical Quakers with their archaic bonnets and men’s suspenders, the Michigan Militia and Wyoming Freemen in their cowboy boots and surplus camo fatigues, pissed off college professors wearing knitted vests that would have any Rainbow chuckling!  What is there to be preferred in pro-establishment business suits, blue collared polyester work shirts or corporate-logo baseball caps?  And what value would there be in dressing like everyone else, unless we were in a military uniform or 1950’s doo-wop band?  Most importantly, herbalists and village healers have never fully fit into or been embraced by the status quo.  As with shamans and medicine men, in earliest times the herb-wielding healer was often thought of as divinely mad or dangerously possessed, an affiliate of the unknown, agents of inexplicable powers who were sought out and rewarded when there was a personal or group needed but perhaps kept at a distance between.  As the language of science increasingly replaced that of magic, being conventional looking didn’t keep herbalists from being sidelined, trivialized and slandered.  Mr. Kane is and always will be an alternative practitioner, working outside of the accepted forms an protocols of the drug pushing, high-tech, high dollar medical industry.  He is as fringe as the jacket on David Hopper’s character in the cult film ‘Easy Rider’, if as uncomfortable with the fact as the beer chugging Jack Nicholson was in that same movie.

Herbal enthusiasts and healers are the alternative because we think outside of their box and hopefully outside of our own, because we look to nature for the knowledge, resources and examples we need, because we may see healing as a return to wholeness and vitality rather than a quick fix, as the treatment of causes and imbalances rather than the suppression of symptoms, with a goal not of living longer so much as living more authentic, healthy, vital, rich, meaningful, and purpose-full lives.  And we are alternative because we do not base our value on degrees or the letters after our names so much as on what we know, how willing we are to learn, and how effective we are in our practice.  Because we possibly do not require the approval of any segment of society, official or not, to believe in ourselves and our growing abilities, to act on what we know and assume a responsible role.

“3. Social orientation: anti-individual, group or collective oriented.”

No one is more of an individualist than myself, and I have always paid a high cost because of that.  I grew up individuating myself even if it took me rejecting ideas and ways of being that I’ve since found valuable.  While I teach groups of hundreds, I tend to quickly grow restless in a crowd larger than three!  And yet, we would at best be herb takers and not herbalists, if we only treated ourselves.  By its very definition, healing is other-oriented, a service to our collective kind whether that be an ecosystem, a community, a neighborhood or simply our own family.

“4. Politics: radical left, green socialism.”

There is predictably a majority of Progressives in the herbalism field, just as most environmental activists are Caucasian.  That is not an indictment of either herbalism or ecoactivism, however, but a questioning of and call for more diverse participation, for greater black and asian involvement in ecosystem restoration… with Republicans considering the treatment of more than their own cirrhosis, and contributing to the balance of more than their allopathic specialists’ bank accounts.

“5. ‘Spirituality’: gaia, plant spirit medicine, animism, Buddhism, or the “pick what feels good” self-styled path; anything non Judeo-Christian.”

I recognize that a certain shallow New Age, style oriented approach to herbalism has hurt the credibility and slowed the revival of herbalism in general, but not nearly so much as the slanderous statements released in industry and regulatory agency papers, nor any more than an internecine post such as Kane’s.

An understanding of the earth as a living totality whose health we depend on, can be found in nearly every religious tradition.  Recognition of a spirit or force in plants was characteristic of Christian mystics as well as Gnostics and alchemists, and new science is affording us a model and vocabulary for natural forces and healing processes are still nothing less than magical in their ways and ramifications.  How referencing the Greek word for Mother Earth – ‘Gaia’ – could discredit nature-inspired herbalism is beyond me, and it concerns me to imagine having a preponderance of Judeo-Christian practitioners could ensure the acceptance of and respect for the field of herbalism, when we should insist on being measured by intent and accomplishment, rather then prejudged and pre-approved due to any personal spiritual or philosophic bent.

“6. Modality crisis: embracing TCM, Ayurveda, Unani, or any other foreign system with the thought that they are more enlightened than western approaches, or equally common, the smorgasbord approach: cherry picking from an array of cultural approaches, ending up with a big pile of muddle.”

Eclecticism is indeed a pitfall on the path, leading us to select only what we like or find easy about an approach instead of facing the aspects that are more discomforting or challenging, creating a self-satisfying hybrid without the backbone of tradition, the test of experience, or the benefit of focus and devotion.  Still, even Mr. Kane’s system of Western Herbalism is a conglomerate, drawing from mix of different people’s ideas and approaches, an amalgam even if he were to try to resist all change and influence, and an evolving body of knowledge if not.  The Western world adopted the plants and adapted the healing techniques of the East, Greece was the meeting point of the two.  Roman medicine was highly informed by what they learned from North African healers.

“The catch-22 is when an individual matures to the point of dropping this exterior, moving on to adult life, herbal interest often gets dropped as well: this occurs to most in the field between the ages of 25 to 35. The ones that stay are often in a state of arrested development (75% of ‘older’ herbalists are still children).”

Actually, Mr. Kane is at least as concerned with exterior appearance as any cloak conscious pagan herbalist, and perhaps more so since he deemed it a topic worthy of writing an article.  His entire piece is given to describing how important he finds conventional appearance in the search for personal acceptance and professional credibility.  It matters a lot to him that he not look like a hippie, Democrat, Moslem or Mexican, nor be confused with flower-sniffing, plant communing herbalists whose look he believes undermine the practice.

But yes, most herbalists, plant lovers and nature nuts that I know are still childlike, stopping the most adult activities at the sight of an unnamed plant at the side of the road or trail, grinning and hopping up and down when they finally key it out, anxious to make others feel better, crestfallen when unable to do so.  The are delightfully free of the fear of being seen in public adoring another life form, free of concern over getting their knees dirty when a fragile sprout or shiny bug calls for close attention, inclined to act on their impulses and convictions, likely to foolishly but wondrously work to heed an inner calling or fulfill their dreams.

People trapped in what Calvin (of Calvin and Hobbes) might call premature adulthood, are stuck  with concealing their excitement over even the rarest of plants under a veneer of machismo or maturity, and worry needless if someone is watching when it comes time to crawl around for skullcap or jump into a swimming hole.

“If you look like you just steeped off the bus from the local primitive skills gathering, you will raise doubts in the minds of the people you are treating. I can’t tell you the number of times I have been thanked by patients, who appreciate my normality within an otherwise freak-show field.”

Looking like what the average, normal person considers to be a freak can be counterproductive if you want to be able to treat folks of all kinds, from all walks of life.  On the other hand, there is nothing about a conservative’s crew cut or doctor’s starched white doctor’s coat that universally communicates wisdom, let alone accessibility, a capacity for empathy, deep concern or human warmth.  And by being comfortable with their selves, their bodies, mortal processes and physical looks, healers help their clients to do the same.

Normal is too often the refuge of the fearful and average, the self doubting and those who are scarily well adjusted to situations and environments they should naturally be finding intolerable and unacceptable.  It is normal to obey every new law that is passed no matter how unconstitutional or intrusive, to pay thousands of dollars for health insurance without spending anything to learn how to care for ourselves and our loved ones or tend even the most simple to treat family ailments, to take steroids for allergies and antibiotics for nearly everything else.  It’s all too normal for practiced nurses to defer to book learned doctors, for health practitioners to ignore their instincts and observations and blindly employ the pharmaceutical-centric approach, and for herbalist to worry they can’t do any good unless they are certified and have an office.

What’s not normal, Charlie W. Kane, is someone like yourself caring so much about plants and natural healing at the same time you’re so concerned about appearing normal.  Just a little bit freaky, you have to admit.

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