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Part 1: Ancient Wisdom Roots | A Kitchen Table Talk
134 Plays9 months ago
In this Kitchen Table Talk style episode of The Ripple Affect, Cheech and Nibby delve into ancient wisdom as they explore themes of identity and spiritual heritage. The episode thoughtfully navigates the complexities of mixed heritage and the experience of growing up in the Native American Church. They reflect on the profound influence of cultural and spiritual practices in their lives, underscoring the value of honoring indigenous traditions. Sharing their personal insights, the sisters articulate how these experiences have intricately shaped their sense of self, belonging, and deep connection to their roots...and how it helps them to avoid joining (or becoming) a cult. Join them for an insightful and soulful conversation around the ancient wisdom that guides us in understanding who we are.
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Transcript
Introduction and Theme Overview
00:00:04
Speaker
You're listening to The Ripple Affect with your hosts Cheech and Nippy, a podcast that explores how individual change has the capacity to affect the whole. From neuroscience to donuts, we're two sisters with a deep curiosity for ancient wisdom and modern knowledge, and we're obsessed with learning alongside you because we don't know. Let's dive in.
00:00:27
Speaker
Welcome to another episode of the Ripple Effect podcast. I'm your host, Kiara Cheech, and today my sister and co-host, Isa Nibi, and I will be sharing a kitchen table talk with you. These are candid combos as a part of our series where my sis and I get to explore what's been going on with us and sharing our views, perspectives, and experiences on change. What you're about to hear is us conversing on a very important theme we want to continue to touch on in this project.
00:00:56
Speaker
ancient wisdom and how we have personally experienced and gained from these teachings.
Setting the Scene: Fireside Atmosphere
00:01:02
Speaker
Enjoy. Yeah, we did it. We're back. And we got our fancy cups. He's got wine glasses for us to pour our spritzer into. Cheers. Happy Lunar New Year.
00:01:21
Speaker
Happy Lunar New Year. We are recording today not from the kitchen table.
00:01:28
Speaker
We're fireside tonight. So you might hear a few of the little pops coming from the beautiful fire Isa made. Some snap crackle pops. Thank you for making a fire, by the way. You're welcome. It's a little chilly, which is a joke in Southern California. Everyone else has like serious weather and I'm like, it's cold. Yeah. I saw Casey's shoes in this huge jacket and like so bundled up, I think it was 23 degrees and
00:01:57
Speaker
New York. Oh, New York.
Exploring Ancient Wisdom and Spiritual Authenticity
00:02:00
Speaker
I don't know how people, I don't know if people live in that kind of weather, man.
00:02:06
Speaker
It doesn't seem, and I mean, I know that sounds like a dumb statement, but it's like, it doesn't seem inhabitable to me to like, try like Canada or Norway. Same thing. I'm like, I don't think you're supposed to live there. People have lived there for a long time. So you have people living for a long time. That is something I wanted to fireside chat with you about tonight that we talked about is ancestors and
00:02:28
Speaker
that ancient knowledge part that we've mentioned we want to talk about on the podcast. Yeah. Ancient wisdom. I think that that's a great topic for tonight. We've talked about this a few times. Most recently we were watching a show about a cult. I think it was Twin Flame Cult.
00:02:49
Speaker
And both Yara and I were like, how do people think that this guy is a real deal?
Cults and Personal Growth
00:02:58
Speaker
This doesn't seem authentic at all. And then we recognize, oh, well, if you've never been in the presence of somebody who truly is spiritually connected,
00:03:12
Speaker
you may not know what that feels like and you wouldn't know the difference between somebody who's authentically connected or not. Yeah, and I want to preface that by saying I'm fascinated by cults and I educate myself on them because I seem to have the build and the framework to be sucked into them.
00:03:32
Speaker
I've said that to you. I really appreciate that most cult documentaries are talking about how like, oh no, you, it can happen to anyone because it's true. And I, I recognize that in myself of the deep want to, you know, I used to frame it and to improve myself, which was a very helpful framework to let go of.
Reflections on Native American Church Upbringing
00:03:55
Speaker
Because for me, when you're looking to improve yourself, there's a certain type of desperation and a certain kind of pointing at yourself, like something's wrong with me. I need to improve this. And I don't think that now I realize that's not a very effective way, but it can be taken advantage of because it puts something outside of you of like, hey, do you have the answers to me? Do you have the answers to me? Do you have the answers to me? I know I need help, which is valid. So in seeking that, I think I'm susceptible.
00:04:25
Speaker
I have, I was saying to you, I feel like I've successfully not gotten sucked into a cult because as a young person, I was exposed to native elders who really had their shit together, like really had ancient wisdom.
00:04:46
Speaker
And that was what you and I, one of the things that when we started this podcast, we're like, where do we feel like we have roots that can help ourselves? And it was high interests of intrigue was ancient wisdom and
Cultural Significance of Native American Rituals
00:05:00
Speaker
modern knowledge. And we haven't really got to talk about the ancient wisdom part of us. And as always on this podcast, we're not experts by any means, but we're very curious learners.
00:05:11
Speaker
And I think we have, you know, because of our parents choice to raise us in the native American church. And that was the community we religiously were involved in. And do you call it a religion? I've never used that word when I think about.
00:05:30
Speaker
No, no, and I don't think of it that way, but the framework of church, that was our church. We would go to teepees and we would sit up in meetings and it's ritual. I think it's more of a ritual. Well, and the history of that's interesting, right? Because the reason it's called a church was to be able to save the ceremonies, save the ways of these ancestral people and their healing ways.
00:05:57
Speaker
in the modern framework of our constitution, it was a way we could, they could say, we have rights to practice our religion, literally saving them from the US government. Yeah, they had to classify themselves as this thing called a church, which isn't in the framework of, let's say, comparing it to like a Christian church. It's not
00:06:20
Speaker
It's not the same and I think that that was something I always feel uneasy when I say I grew up in the Native American church I don't go into it more, but I always have funny like hesitation To say that word church because I guess it's the control thing I I don't want people to think in their mind what they think of when they think church And I I do sometimes if I feel trusted or safe enough with someone I'll explain and
00:06:44
Speaker
And usually the words I use is it's a prayer service, an all night prayer service inside of a teepee.
00:06:52
Speaker
And I had someone recently ask me questions about it and I was kind of going in and... That's interesting, what did they ask you? They were like, well, is there structure to it? I was like, oh yeah, absolutely. You know, you go in after the sun goes down, which was another part of not always what those ceremonies look like, but became a part of trying to not be persecuted again.
00:07:16
Speaker
by the US government and before that like settlers so they would go in at night and go through all night and before the dawn or right at the dawn wrap up the service so that it wouldn't be as obvious it was like a way of protection I didn't know that yeah this was a long time ago obviously but it stays current now at least that's my understanding could be wrong with that but um but yeah so
00:07:44
Speaker
it being an all night service in the teepee and they were asking like, well, is there music
Secrecy and Societal Pressures
00:07:50
Speaker
or is there, cause that was like a, that's a framework for churches. And I was like, oh yeah, yeah, there's instruments that do get passed around. Anyone in the circle can utilize them. And so they asked like, oh, there are other songs. Yeah. Yep. There's songs that are, you know, saying at different times for different things in the native tongue.
00:08:11
Speaker
And she was like, do you know them? And I was like, yeah, I know some songs. When you first start, in order to sing, you need four songs. That's how it works. You have to have four every time. Four is a significant number because of the four directions. And at some point I realized, oh, there's someone running the service. There's a road man and his four officers that conduct kind of guide the different parts of the service that
00:08:40
Speaker
have to go down a certain way and it is its ceremony and its ritual and then I explained that inside of it there's a purpose to it usually someone will sponsor a meeting and they're called meetings I think he said
00:08:54
Speaker
set up a meeting time and everybody shows up to the meeting and that there's a sponsor. Someone usually puts it up like this is what I want to have a meeting for. Sometimes it's for a birthday or sometimes it's for going through a hard time or sometimes it's, I mean, any reason. Appreciation meetings. Yeah. Holiday meetings can be healing.
00:09:15
Speaker
a doctoring meeting, someone's not well. And I explained like that was what's cool too is that it wasn't necessarily a set time. It's not like every Sunday, although you could probably find a service happening almost all the time, depending on how connected you are. And that was another question she asked was like, well, how do you find them? Because I had explained that it's kind of
00:09:38
Speaker
Secret, you know, it's not secret, but yeah, there's there is an element of that that was because of the peyote and Technically if you're not native your that is a schedule one drug still and so classification of that Did keep it under wraps as well because it's not fully legal Which is interesting because a lot of our childhood being raised in Hubble County cannabis so much
00:10:07
Speaker
secrecy in all of that, that it's kind of, um, still feels a little bit uncomfortable for me. I don't know about you to talk about the Native American church in a public forum or talk about, you know, what it was like growing up, not being able to talk about what your parents did. And, you know, knowing as a young child that there was a level of secrecy, you were
00:10:30
Speaker
required and to uphold for the safety of the family in our ways.
Family Integration into Native American Church
00:10:37
Speaker
That definitely is, you know, it was an interesting way to grow up.
00:10:43
Speaker
Yeah, like outlaw life and then inside the most sacred part of supportive community and spirituality, also having a level of, yeah, you don't just go out and talk about it. Um, and I don't even know if that was ever, I was kind of, I don't remember anyone ever telling me, don't talk about this, but it was inherent and like it was sacred and it's, you keep it to yourself. And so when this person asked, well, how would I find one? I was like,
00:11:08
Speaker
I don't know because inside of the community you we were a well-connected family I guess meaning like we always knew who to ask to find them they were a community our relatives are whatever and that way you if you wanted to go to a meeting you could find where one was yeah
00:11:30
Speaker
And I think to our father was very leaned on in that community and adopted strongly in that in the Native American community. So he would be asked to come help in the service of a lot of meetings, which grew his connection in the Native American church exponentially because he would travel and go to services and and offer his services as a as a fireman. And so I think that definitely. And that story is really interesting, too, how
00:12:00
Speaker
Our father was having a really hard time in the United States because the United States and Guatemala are two very different places and he kept feeling like there was something he said our father is an immigrant from Guatemala and he thank you and he felt like there was a spirituality component missing in his life and he talked to our Tio Carlos who has now passed away and You know just expressing that he was having a hard time then he felt like he wanted to go home
00:12:30
Speaker
And Carlos was like, brother, come with me this weekend. He's like, and if after you come with me, if you still want to go home, go home. And I'll take care of Kate and I'll watch out for the kids. Go home, but come with me this weekend. And so Carlos took him to his first meeting.
00:12:46
Speaker
And from then on, he was like, no, I got it. It's here too. Because I think that's what was missing. I think back to the knowing of the felt sense of true spiritually connected people, places, things, you know, it can be so many different things. But knowing that felt sense, I think he was able to recognize, oh, it exists here too.
Impact of Childhood Indigenous Experiences
00:13:11
Speaker
And I want to clarify, I think what you're talking about, let me see if this is what you're saying, our dad had very much ran into different serious spiritual people, meaning like real brujos, real witch doctors, real, you call it real, it's weird to say that, but you kind of do need to make this distinction when everyone and their mother is calling themselves a ayahuasca master, or, you know, you mean nothing against those people, but
00:13:39
Speaker
being in Central America traveling a lot through Guatemala, Nicaragua, Colombia, like Panama, Honduras, like Mexico, all of the Mayan rooted modern countries.
00:13:54
Speaker
that Mesoamerican roots and with many indigenous people. I think that's the distinction that I realize I might have not an upper hand, but a different edge because I have through the Native American church community been able to interact and have deep relationships with many indigenous people of this country.
00:14:17
Speaker
And through my father being able to hear stories of him interacting with many indigenous people of all of Central America. I was recently saw something or read something that said some outstanding percentage of modern Americans have never met an indigenous American person or never looked into them as a people.
00:14:43
Speaker
Like, but if you think about it, if I wasn't involved in the Native American church as a child and I just lived my life without that.
00:14:51
Speaker
I don't think I would know any Native Americans. I will challenge you on that only to say you would know Derek. And because, well, and also in the area we grew up in, there were Native, the reservations were close by. That's right. And we played sports against the reservations. We would be in proximity to some Native Californian Native Americans. Yeah, but that, I mean, yes. And outstanding to think.
00:15:18
Speaker
there are places where that doesn't exist, where there isn't a reservation close by and there isn't, you know. That is, that's, that made my jaw drop when you just said that. I just realized that through the Native American church and for whatever reason in that area, maybe it was the redwoods, the rural part of it, or just people wanting ceremonies, that we also interacted with many different types of Native. So it wasn't just the Native Klamath people or the Wiyot or the
00:15:46
Speaker
Yurok. Yurok people that are native to Humboldt County area. But we met Cheyenne, Arapahoe, Sioux. Kiowa. Kiowa. I mean, the list goes on and had many interactions and sat up in their services because that was the other thing I was making a distinction with this friend was how different services from the different tribes are ran slightly differently.
00:16:12
Speaker
Yeah, they have different fireplaces. It's what we call them as fireplaces. And that means a whole setup of the way the ritual goes down. Overall, there's a general way, you know, there's four rounds of music, four rounds of the medicine going around, four rounds of smokes, sacred tobacco, you have your morning breakfast, your cedar and everything in night water, you have your tools, your sacred tools, like we were talking about in the other episode of cedar and sage and
00:16:40
Speaker
your fans, your core, your drum. The instruments of protection, the staff. And there's a half moon made out of certain material, depending clay or white sand made around the fireplace. So there's a fire. So it's all these elements, right? You know, it's funny, Teach. So Papa said when he was running a lot of meetings for a lot of different
Roles and Learning within Ceremonies
00:17:03
Speaker
fireplaces. Not running. Sorry. When Papa was helping do fire for all the different fireplaces,
00:17:10
Speaker
he would get confused and so he was like, I have to write this down.
00:17:14
Speaker
And they were like, no, no. You can't write it down. He was like, no, you guys, if you're going to keep asking me to do this in all these different places, with all these different fireplaces and different rules, like, you have to let me write it down. Like, I can't. I'm not going to get it right. And so they let him write it down. Really? Yeah. Yeah. I think I can't remember who he was talking to. I think maybe it was Daddy Rutherford. But yeah, because it was really cute when I was talking to him about that. He was like, I couldn't keep it straight.
00:17:45
Speaker
That's really endearing because he wanted to get it right and it was a lot and I really it's interesting I want to talk to our dad more especially with him getting older because there's so many synchronicities and so much so many beautiful prayers laid down and so many beautiful stories of how services went down and I
00:18:07
Speaker
who was there what they were praying for and what came out of it and The people that he met in his in his time and he still sits up, you know, he still goes to meetings. He's really
00:18:19
Speaker
connected in that way and I think it really really helped him to get through a lot of stuff that God bless him. I don't think he'll ever get through everything but I think it really did help his journey in this lifetime and what he had to process from childhood to adulthood to where he is now.
00:18:39
Speaker
that subject matter is just really it always intrigues me and kind of like puts a smile in my heart and kind of makes me feel like a little bit of like flutter in my system because I think about how much magic there is and all of that and how much like you said real but how intentional and the power of
00:19:02
Speaker
ceremony and the power of this indigenous knowledge and the power of all of these elements coming together and working with the natural world and working with the spiritual side and working in connection and in tandem and in co-creation and acknowledging that there's this huge thing that's there to help. You know, that's the biggest thing that they say. The door's always open to anybody and this is here to help you. It's here for you. You know, it's like that
00:19:32
Speaker
openness and that help that's available is really powerful. And I think I'm so grateful that I got to just marinate in that as a child. Like I can remember laying behind because you have to sit up all night. Traditionally on your knees, you would sit up all night when you weren't supposed to go out of the teepee. And there has been many accommodations for white people, Westerners.
00:19:59
Speaker
For white people and for elders, you know people that can't sit on their knees and but still you know have have a place there But as a child you can sleep, you know They so our parents would bring sleeping bags in and they would put us behind them And we would sit up as long as we could or wanted to and then when we were ready to go to sleep we would just crawl in our sleeping bags and go to sleep and I can remember so many nights being soothed by
00:20:25
Speaker
peyote music and being in the ultimate safe place that now whenever I do any somatic work or when I'm working on regulating my nervous system and I need a safe place to embody, I'll go back to that
00:20:43
Speaker
sleeping bag in the teepee you know because for what it's worth I mean I think there was resonance that soaked into me through all of that and and I want to be like really transparent that I haven't sat up in a service in quite some time you know in my adult life it hasn't it hasn't been as consistent or part of
00:21:05
Speaker
my community and every day as it was as children, but I feel like the benefits will never stop coming from that. Oh yeah, I agree and thank you for sharing all that. I think a few things that as you shared came up for me was same thing for me, the somatic practices of a safe place often go back to the teepee.
00:21:27
Speaker
I think of being in there as a safe, a really safe place. And I think the thing that I wanted to first touch on, cause we talked about this, like how to not become a cult, you know, and how to not join one and why, why are so many people led astray? And I think that what you just shared is a good example of the experience of being communally led through a sacred service that has been unchanged for the most part.
Spirituality vs. Scientific Thinking
00:21:57
Speaker
for a very very long time pass down through oral tradition right and the accuracy of oral tradition somehow gets thrown like oh it can't be as good as written down but i think the proof of how manipulatable manuscripts can be i'll just throw out that book and change this word that you know so the reliability of that and the power as you said about
00:22:19
Speaker
experientially, like you can't get around sitting up on your knees all night going through a ceremony physically with your body. It's like you go through something and every single person that teepee does it with you. There's an equality there that I think is so valuable. It's the opposite of a trauma bond, you know? And like you said, the purpose, so much magic was what I wanted to bring it back to because
00:22:44
Speaker
Magic can also have a weird connotation as being, you know, the mystical for a lot, many, many, many eons was something that was taken very seriously. Still is, you know, India. Exactly. Exactly. And in the Western culture, it seems to be there's this fight between the logic of Greek, the Greek logic and sciences and technology versus this battle of dismissing each other.
00:23:10
Speaker
Yeah, one or the other. One or the other. Either you're a scientist or you're spiritual. Yeah. And I think there are many people and the astrophysicist I know and the different like the quantum physicists I know like they're very spiritual. They come around, you know, they all say like it comes full circle comes full circle. And I think that that experience inside the TV and inside prayer services for me has has allowed me to have a guiding sense within me of what
00:23:40
Speaker
what that sense of peace, I don't think you use that word, but I will for myself of like going through that and the benefits of it. And like you said, like that flutter in your heart, I too feel so much resonance with the positivity and the lightness that you really can release in there. When you earnestly sit up on your knees on the ground and you pray for yourself and you learn how to there, there's such a,
00:24:10
Speaker
There's such a benefit to that. And the other thing I wanted to distinguish was, and this came from another person a long time ago asking me about the Native American church and the prayer services, because they hadn't been and they were wanting to go. And I said something about prayer and they were like, well, what do you mean? And I was like, you know, you pray for yourself. And they asked again, I don't know what you mean. And they said the only prayer I know of is memorized, recited Bible phrases.
Prayer and Community Ceremonies
00:24:37
Speaker
And I was like, whoa, oh, no, no, that's not what I meant. You know, that's not what I mean when I say prayer. I mean, you learn how to talk to your talk to creator directly. You learn how to open your heart and and establish a connection to ask for help, you know, to say thank you, to give gratitude.
00:25:01
Speaker
to center yourself, to align yourself, align yourself and then give that focus and that attention to another, you know, whoever it's you're praying for your family or you're laying down prayers for the person that the meeting was for collectively trying to stay focused.
00:25:20
Speaker
And that's something I know because when you're tired and your body hurts, it's really easy to get distracted. And then the learning I learned was like how to, I mean, it's really like meditation. I think both of us have had the experience where we can sit and meditate for a very long time.
00:25:38
Speaker
And I know this of you, I'd love you to tell the story of like the monastery you went to. But I'll just wrap this up by saying that ability to open yourself and stay focused in a pure way, you know?
00:25:53
Speaker
And your thoughts get invasive and you get uncomfortable and you get irritable, but but you try to return back to that fire You try to return back to the elements you try to return back to the innocence of that Intention of why you're there the good part of it, you know the vibrational Goodness what you want for that person for yourself for your family Whatever it is and that that ability to bring yourself back over and over and over again I think it's a skill set Harvey bear track is as a person who we also know is a native
00:26:23
Speaker
And he talks about it like that, like it's a practice, it's
Peyote's Cultural Importance
00:26:28
Speaker
a classroom. And this is the way we teach. We don't know how any other way to teach, you gotta come in.
00:26:32
Speaker
and experience and that open door policy thing it's there for everybody. And I know that more recently the community of natives are wanting to make the distinction between peyote being classified with like psilocybin with cannabis in legalization because they're a little bit concerned that if the word gets out
00:27:02
Speaker
I don't know if the word gets out of how helpful it is and the experiences you can have while taking peyote that there'll be a rush on the gardens. And can you explain what the gardens are? Peyote only grows in like only one place.
00:27:19
Speaker
Yeah, and it's like the southern part of the United States and down into Mexico, and they're called the gardens. I've never been or dad's been multiple times, but it's where peyote grows and peyote is a cactus. It's a psychedelic cactus that the Native Americans have used for
00:27:38
Speaker
a very long time to commune with spirit. I think there is that open door policy and there is something that's very trustable about if you find yourself in that situation, you're supposed to be there, you know, like there's not another way around it. But I do want to make the distinction to say this is native medicine and natives need this medicine.
00:28:02
Speaker
And so if you are not native, which applies to Kyara and I, you know, respect it as medicine. And if you don't need medicine, if you don't need help or you have your own modalities to help yourself and they're working, that's okay. You know, you don't have to keep seeking more and deeper and different for yourself if you don't feel called to it or you don't really feel like that's something you need, you know. Uh-huh.
00:28:31
Speaker
I don't have this podcast and talk so highly. I make it trendy to where people are like, oh, I want to try that. If you want the high, get some mescaline. Mescaline is the synthetic manmade version of peyote. That's what that is. And I think that that is such a, it is such an important thing because I can say this for psilocybin, for instance, I experienced psilocybin many times in my twenties growing up.
00:28:56
Speaker
growing, you know, as a young person, experimenting recreationally. And I will say, I felt so connected to that medicine. Like I didn't call it medicine at the time. It was definitely like a drug. I was using it, but it helped me spiritually and mentally every single time I took a macro dose.
00:29:13
Speaker
even if I was doing it just, you know, with friends to kind of party or whatever, but it really did help me. But it wasn't until I took a Mesa journey when I turned 30, somewhere around there. I can't really remember how old I was, but the experience of using that medicine, using that psilocybin in the format,
00:29:36
Speaker
of an organized ceremony that had ritual, all kinds of steps to it. And then having the experience that, sorry, having the history of being in ritual with the Native American church and that overlay was so profound and so different that it was, it was a journey that, that once in a lifetime, I will never forget that.
Plant Medicine: Traditional vs. Recreational Use
00:30:02
Speaker
It changed my life. For me, since I've had that benefit of growing up with a medicine, a plant medicine, ceremonially, and then using a different plant medicine, but recreationally, and then using that second one, the psilocybin, in the ceremony and really having the difference,
00:30:24
Speaker
I'm a huge advocate for leaning on the traditional ways to assist further what it really is meant for. This crossover with psilocybin coming into therapies, using it in therapeutic settings now with licensed people, I think is a positive crossover for sure, because Maria Sabia, the woman who really exposed the Western world to psilocybin,
00:30:53
Speaker
she's gone and a lot of it's, like you're saying, it's like a rush and that was what happened in the 70s with her. She was, I think she's from, God, where are they from? Where is she from? I'll have to look that up, but the mad rush of people who saw this article from this guy who had went and visited her and then just started like bum rushing her village and she got completely ostracized from her village because it was just ruined by essentially
00:31:22
Speaker
white Westerners coming down and bombarding them wanting to get this, the magic of the mushroom. And I think there's stories like that enough where we don't stop to think about the indigenous ways and what it's meant for. It's this, like you said, a mad dash.
00:31:40
Speaker
And it's, it's interesting. It makes me think of there's, they were doing psilocybin therapy in Costa Rica and some of the locals indigenous were saying, telling the therapist, no, this is a medicine. You use it when you're sick and.
00:31:59
Speaker
They kept having people come down from the United States and go through therapeutics with psilocybin.
Modern Applications of Indigenous Medicine
00:32:08
Speaker
And the natives quickly recognized, oh, we didn't know that the Western sickness is disconnection from themselves.
00:32:18
Speaker
That's what you're doing here. That's how this medicine is helping them. We, as indigenous people from that area, they didn't have that reference because that was not their ailment. So they utilized it in different ways. And I think that that can be true for a lot of indigenous medicines to non-indigenous people. We have different
00:32:43
Speaker
problems and and not to say that like if you have indigenous blood that you're not disconnected from yourself as well you know i think that's kind of can be a universal thing and that we go in and out of in our lives no matter what our heritage is but i just thought that that brought that point up to me that it's it's just it's medicine
00:33:03
Speaker
It is. And so that's what it's called. That was also so many frameworks I realized as an adult. Going back to what I experienced as a kid, that was my world, just the native people. That was my reference, utilizing specifically peyote as a medicine. It wasn't ever referred not to as that.
00:33:23
Speaker
I personally would, I never even thought ever to use it recreationally outside of that setting. Set and setting is what they say a lot for psychedelic experiences, but this set and setting inside a ritual and organized ceremony was just taken for granted for me. My understanding of plant medicine was from the time I can remember.
00:33:52
Speaker
Yeah, I mean pre remembering for me. Yeah. Yeah. So that's the plant and then the people teaching you about it, right? The people running these services having had their grandfathers do the same thing to them, bring them into the tipi when they're really little and their grandfather and their grandfather had the same experience.
00:34:14
Speaker
as a child, right? And that idea of that passing down, that connection being passed down, those old ways, those native ways, being family passed down, you know, in their native tongue, which is being lost. That being passed down, it's like a direct connection to the past is really what it is. Yeah. And I think
00:34:38
Speaker
you and I have both made the distinction of what those people feel like. Yes, you know, I've never met somebody who is in a position
00:34:48
Speaker
of power in the Native American church, which sounds even strange to say. That doesn't exist, really. Yeah, you have the roadman who runs the service, but they are in service. I've never met one roadman who said they were doing anything.
00:35:09
Speaker
Yeah, that's okay. You know, like, and we talked about that before, like, I've never met a holy person that says I'm a holy person. Ever. That was the first time when we watched, when Ethan and I watched this, this doc and the guy, the Twin Flame leader of this group is called Twin Flame. If you haven't seen it, I think it's on Netflix. Yeah, I think it's on Netflix. And they literally were on a Zoom call saying, I am the reincarnation of Jesus Christ.
00:35:36
Speaker
I am your spiritual guru and or spiritual leader.
Interpreting Spiritual Experiences
00:35:41
Speaker
And I was we both stopped after that episode and we were like.
00:35:45
Speaker
I would be the number one sign immediately for me to be like, that's not it. Because what you just said, I have never, ever, and I've been reading more yogi, um, philosophy and yogi books. And even the gurus, even when people are, are connected and find their gurus, I haven't read any accounts of the guru saying I'm your guru ever.
00:36:13
Speaker
I've never read, I mean, maybe it happens, but I've never read it, you know? And the people that I know that I consider to be, and it's not even like they're, it's like just tuned in enough to pace themselves with creator and to open their senses to this wider divine. The people that truly have practiced that and
00:36:40
Speaker
live in that way are not at any way I don't they're they're not too humorous and they're they don't take themselves serious too seriously and they're like going about their days and doing their thing in trust there's not a look at me and there's any of them I was gonna say there's not this I haven't experienced them taking credit like I did this there's a there's a we there's a gratitude there's a all the native
00:37:10
Speaker
road men that I have sat down and talked to or wanted to learn from, they all talk about, look at that peyote. He's going to direct. Or these ways. There's verbiage, important language purposely shared to direct the attention
00:37:32
Speaker
to either into yourself or how you can help using the peyote, how you can, how you can ask, how you can ask for help, how you can conduct yourself in a way that won't get you all twisted up so you can be clear to help, how you can use these tools to help yourself, how you can take it outside. So taking it from that inside of that ceremony out into your life. Yeah. Walk. Don't walk on your prayers. Walk behind them. Yeah. Those,
00:38:00
Speaker
those sayings and those wording, those teachings, it isn't, it isn't in my experience, hasn't been dogmatic. Like that's been my experience. There's not a, if you don't do this, then you're not going to, you know, you're not going to, I don't
Lessons from Native American Church Practices
00:38:18
Speaker
know, nothing. There was never threat either. There was never like, um,
00:38:23
Speaker
like uh repent yeah that kind of almost said violence but shame yeah this kind of a punishment system there's no hell yeah there there wasn't any kind of reference to these circumstantial it's like can you help you come in it's a practice
00:38:41
Speaker
I don't know why, but I was just thinking, you know, it's interesting. You and I obviously grew up in this and we did have the privilege of going through many, many ceremonies and meeting so many wonderful people that were dedicated to their faith, you know, in Creator and living those ways.
00:39:03
Speaker
But I don't personally have much intellectual knowledge about the Native American ways. You know what I mean? Intellectually, when I looked up, I Googled the Native American Church and I read about it and I was like, what? Like, this is not what I know. This is not.
00:39:21
Speaker
Okay, I can say I've only read maybe one book, which was really nice and actually really refreshing. It was Black Elk. I read his book and it was really, really nice to see written and hear the stories
00:39:41
Speaker
that I have lived and seen as a kid but they're not it's all oral like you said so you don't hear about the stories about people getting healed and miraculous things happening and that happened in our own home you know as a kid we didn't that stuff just happened that was just part of our story and part of our lives
00:40:02
Speaker
Yeah, we didn't you know, I've never Studied it studied it. So I think like, you know indigenous studies and Native American studies is really fascinating to me I'd love to educate myself more about it because I sit here and I talk about it, but I'm it's from an Experiential place it's from just my heart. It's not you know at all intellectualized and I think that's an that's an important element to to be able to bridge the gap for people and
00:40:33
Speaker
because like if you and I hadn't grown up in the Native American church and we went to look for information about it right now. Oh yeah, I've done that same thing. I've googled it and been like, what? This is very Christian. Like this is the layover of Christian
00:40:50
Speaker
church inside of a native what I was so confused I was like this isn't this is this does exist I know in different parts of the country but it wasn't what I experienced in terms of that and just to be really honest we didn't experience meetings that were all native people you know we I didn't go to it maybe one or two meetings on a reservation in Oklahoma
00:41:14
Speaker
I didn't go to Standing Rock. I had the privilege of having a sacred site on our property, on our land and people, natives coming to us and running services on our land. So we were very privileged in the way that it came
Cultural Identity and Mixed Heritage
00:41:35
Speaker
to us. It literally came to our home and we got a version and the people that were
00:41:41
Speaker
you know, open minded enough to travel to these places and sit up with white people. And, you know, we got that version. I know that there are different types of services that are stricter, very much so, you know, that we don't know anything about. So
00:41:57
Speaker
I just want to put in true context of like, this is our experience of this way, of these ways. And it was very impact, it is very impactful to us. It's very important to us. It's very sacred to us. And we are very proud of our heritage in that way, even though, you know, we're native to the Americas. Our father is Mayan Indian in Guatemalan.
00:42:23
Speaker
But we're not native to any of these northern tribes. We're not First Nations. We're not First Nations people, which is interesting. I don't know if you've ever explored that, Kyara, because I have of being mixed race and our mom is Irish and Welsh.
00:42:40
Speaker
I've never felt because of, you know, me being more tan. People don't ever look at me and think I'm Irish by any means. And you get that joke of like everyone's Irish on St. Patrick's Day. I say that and people are like, yeah, sure. I'm like, no, really, I am. But and I don't feel super connected to my heritage on that side. I haven't been to Ireland yet.
00:43:03
Speaker
I don't, you know, my grandparents were elder elders when I was, came into this world. So I didn't have, you know, much connection to their stories. And then my dad being from Guatemala, but he never taught us Spanish. So I kind of am like, whitewashed is what I've been called. When you have mixed heritage, you live in that between land of, you know, you're too white for your Guatemalan side and to Guatemalan for your white side. And then having that third
00:43:31
Speaker
element of being raised in a Native American church. So really feeling very connected to those ways and those people, but not being from them is really an interesting place to sit is between all of that. Oh, yeah. Here I am.
00:43:48
Speaker
finding your identity and that can be challenging and I'm glad you said identity because that's exactly what I was flashing on when I have had the conversations with myself and especially strangely enough because of acting acting is such a weird world and casting getting cast for roles right um technically or like I'm ethnically ambiguous
00:44:11
Speaker
That's the term that is just thrown around and it's so fucked up. I mean, all of the casting has been historically so fucked up, right? But the embrace of like, oh, ethnically ambiguous, okay, at least that's a terminology that does classify me. Like I've been mistaken for Hawaiian, I've been mistaken for, you know, Asian, like all kinds of different things. Turkish. Yeah. What's the other one? People often think I'm, what is it? Arabic?
00:44:40
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, or Persian or Persian. Yeah, yeah. For me, when I started to is actually when I started to explore my sexual identity, where do I land? And that made me think about identity as well in terms of this that you're talking about, which is
00:44:56
Speaker
me very much identifying as native more than anything else, as indigenous, more than anything else. And I was reflecting on why that is. And it's because of sitting up in the native services, because that's where my heart is. That's where my center is. That's the biggest influence on my life.
00:45:22
Speaker
because I care so much about my spiritual life because I'm a spiritual person just because I think it's what helps me the most and I'm connected in that way and that's it's a loop because it's because I was in there when I was really young it was so powerful and helpful and influential and you saw these magical
00:45:42
Speaker
and very, very real practical healings, like half the power of it is undeniable. And so it had great power and influence over me. That identification with those people, meaning natives, Native American First Nations, and then their ways, that's my adopted.
Belonging within Mixed Cultural Heritage
00:46:04
Speaker
I mean, we literally had an entire Native American family live with us a good chunk of our childhood. The Magpies lived with us for how many years? I was little, so I don't really track like four or five in our home and him being our adopted brother.
00:46:20
Speaker
that the relationship, being young, being young enough and having that relationship and impressionable enough where they're like, this is your family, you know, we're adopted. This is how this works. Not on paper, legal, you know, US legal system adopted, but native adopted. And it meant something to me. That was as real of a brother. He was
00:46:45
Speaker
40 45 or something you know older I was a young child but that was the relationship and that's how we treated each other it was it was my brother my brother Kelvin and you mentioned earlier daddy Rutherford that was my dad that was a person who I looked at and identified as a father you know and those were real bonds yeah Jimmy Blackburn he's my uncle uncle
00:47:08
Speaker
He always called me Nisi. I can still hear his voice. Not only did we get exposed to it, but they were our family. You know, that connection and sweet and loving, because we had a pretty dysfunctional family. We did. And the dysfunction of even, you know, a family living with us, it causes even more dysfunction. We're not sugarcoating that.
00:47:31
Speaker
But my point was just that influence. And so yeah, when I sit down with it, it's conflicting maybe outside. Because if I'm, you know, I wouldn't obviously would never go try to get First Nation status because I don't have that I don't have the blood, you know, but in terms of respect and identity and embracing and wanting to help.
00:47:53
Speaker
Belonging and belonging. That's a big thing. That's what you know, the belonging part and We were raised by our father who taught didn't always have the most positive things to say about Americans and the United States Rightfully, so, you know, he grew up in the era of the United Fruit Company in Guatemala, which if you
00:48:17
Speaker
I definitely encourage you to look into the history of that if you're listening to this because it's atrocious and needs to be known. But it's tough for me to reconcile being like you've expressed a proud American being American and being proud to be American and also having this deep connection to the Native Americans and knowing what
00:48:39
Speaker
past American governments did to these people and what continue to do and continue to do it's a conflicting place to be and I think holding contradictions is one of the superpowers of people that function well and have acceptance and can can cultivate peace in themselves because these are big issues and you know
00:49:03
Speaker
think about it, I was talking to my friend Tina the other day who is Congolese and her mom left the Congo, her mom and dad left the Congo and they started their life in America and the rest of her family is all spread out over Europe because they were displaced and we're having a really good conversation about
00:49:25
Speaker
you know just the feelings of her parents do a lot of refugee work and they volunteer and they travel a lot and they're very giving people and very my sense I have not met them but my sense of them is that they are boots on the ground let me help because somebody helped me and
00:49:46
Speaker
having that conversation with Tina and then recognizing the solace and the connection that we both felt for one another and the outrage at what was done to the Native American people in this country and what is still being done to them and how it's never been reconciled and that our First Nations history is not taught in the majority of schools anywhere in the United States and just
00:50:15
Speaker
all this stuff, it made me recognize how much more connected to the indigenous side of me I feel.
Connecting with Ancestral Heritage
00:50:24
Speaker
And then, you know, because it's not colonialism.
00:50:30
Speaker
It's not. It's not. I mean, no, no, no, because the indigenous ways are not colonialism. Yeah, you know, it's pre-colonial. Decolonialized. Exactly. Yeah. Because that's like when I learned about I took a class on Latin American colonialization and that was heavy. So heavy. Yeah. And you know, reading books about Hawaiian people, you know, what happened there. It's like.
00:51:02
Speaker
It's heavy. It's a really heavy history. And and what's so it's heavy to be on both sides of it. I have both sides of that. The interesting thing is we have the Irish in us, which is like also pretty badly done to as far as the the screwed over of the white people. Irish had it pretty bad. Mom would always say like they're the only they were the only developing nation that was white. Oh, yeah. Yeah, for real for a long time.
00:51:31
Speaker
And to be fair, like, so going, going to ancient wisdom, right? There's a part of me that I don't know why, I don't know how, but I fully, I fully can connect to ancestors, like that idea of ancestors and the idea of ancestral lineage, like feels so readily available to me.
00:51:57
Speaker
you know, to when I've done meditations about my ancestral lineage, like it feels so vibrant and available and like I can reach out and touch that Mayan indigenous part of me, that Gaelic, you know, Celtic part of me. Um, and I don't know if that's common for everyone, you know, and, and it's sad for like black people in this country that they can't track their lineage to the kings and queens that they
00:52:27
Speaker
were, you know, and that's, but they can, because there is some, for me, what I'm just saying is a belief I have about ancient wisdom is like, there is a way, and it does exist in you.
Conclusion: Connection and Change
00:52:39
Speaker
And scientifically, your DNA has that, you know? And so when I have experienced those meditations, though, I do recognize that our, me and you, are indigenous part of us.
00:52:53
Speaker
is on that level, right? It's not this particular lands indigenous, but we have that bloodline of that Mesoamerican, of that Mayan.
00:53:05
Speaker
bloodline you know and I think that that doesn't I'm not saying that because that makes it better I'm saying it like better than anybody else that's all construct that means nothing but I just mean it's in our our heritage to understand these things to want to understand these things you know and I think you want to take a break yes sip on our drink drink power drink
00:53:31
Speaker
To be continued, Kia ora here, please join us next week for the continuation and completion of this sister fireside chat. We trust this gave you a window into our background and upbringing and allowed you to join us in this journey of discovering what's anchoring and helpful when trying to change for the better. Okay, I think we did it. Listen.
00:53:53
Speaker
I don't know what we did, but we did it. Look, unattainable ideals are overrated. We're way more connected and deserving than society's false sense of separation dictates us to be. You're not just one person, you're enough. Your effort is enough and change is possible. Question the standard that says otherwise, because what if almost is good enough? Just by tuning in, you're a part of our clan.
00:54:22
Speaker
Not in a call-to-way, though. We don't know how far this ripple can go, but we're going to keep showing up. And we'll never get to perfection, but we're all going to be okay if we let the process be the solution and we see the value in the attempt.
00:54:37
Speaker
Thanks for listening to another episode of The Ripple Effect. We're looking forward to exploring a different facet of change with you next Tuesday. Same time, same place, next week. For show notes and additional resources, check out our website at rippleeffectpod.com. That's affect with an A. Kia ora has worked diligently to make our website interactive.
00:54:59
Speaker
Please visit it so it wasn't all for nothing. In all seriousness though, there's a ton of resources there. DM us directly at rippleeffectpod on Instagram and let us know what you liked about our show or any of your own ideas. We're really excited to hear from you. We value your feedback because it helps us make the pod better and it's our way of including you in our process.
00:55:22
Speaker
Okay, so ratings aren't the point of why we do this. We really want to make a change in the world. But in the matrix, there are algorithms. So yeah, every single review we get helps the ripple go farther. To help us out, please take two seconds, find the ratings and review section on whatever platform you're listening from, click five stars, wink, wink.
00:55:45
Speaker
and leave a review. We know you're busy, so just saying hello or literally hi as the review helps us hack the matrix. We sincerely appreciate it. If you want to become officially initiated into our clan, again, not in a cult-y way, hit the subscribe button wherever you get your podcasts. And as always, we're in it with you. Keep questioning. Stay curious. You got this, clan.
00:56:14
Speaker
A special thank you, love and credit to the magnificent Mia Casasanta for this beautiful music you're listening to right now.