Welcome.
In many Native American cultures,
There are seven grandfather teachings or seven sacred teachings.
These teachings are a way for us to live in peace and harmony with all of our relations,
Not just humans,
But plants,
Animals,
Fish,
Birds,
And all living things so that we may live an enriched life,
A good life.
Creator breathed life into all,
And the animal kingdom was tasked with teaching the two-legged to live in harmony with all living beings.
But the humans had choice,
Will,
And desire.
And when that desire became fueled by ego,
By separation,
They began to live in disharmony,
And all life was unbalanced.
The cry of the children was heard,
And spirit came in the form of white buffalo calf-lemen.
She taught the people sacred ceremony,
Songs,
Dances.
And among these teachings were the teachings of the medicine wheel and the seven grandfathers.
This meditation scratches the surface of the seven grandfather teachings and is designed to help you discover where you are balanced and imbalanced as you walk the red road of life.
Let us begin.
Lie comfortably on your back and take the time to use props to support parts of your body that need support,
Such as your head,
Your lower back,
And maybe under the knees.
Cover yourself with a blanket,
Use an eye pillow,
Whatever you need to do to make yourself completely comfortable.
Listen to my voice,
Guiding you through breathing exercises and prompts,
And experience the sacred teachings that will provide you the framework to live a balanced,
Harmonious life.
Close your eyes.
Focus on your breath.
Listen intently to your inhalation and exhalation.
Hear the breath as it passes in and out of your nostrils or your partly opened lips.
Hear it as it passes along the back of the throat and into the lungs.
Feel how your breath moves the body as you inhale and exhale,
Noticing that some breaths are short and shallow while some breaths are long and deep.
Try not to control the breath.
There is nothing to do but to listen and to feel.
The breath breathes you.
Relax any pauses between the breath,
And let the breath enter and exit on its own.
No need to control,
Just observe.
When you can allow yourself to relax enough to allow the breath to breathe you,
You are allowing something much bigger than you,
Something unforeseeable,
Unseen,
Unknown,
To be a part of you.
You do not force the breath.
You do not exalt yourself above the act of breathing.
You allow the breath to flow.
Breaths may enter your mind and you bow humbly to them,
Acknowledge that they are there.
No judgement,
No thoughts about them,
Just observe and then go back to watching and feeling and hearing the breath.
In Out In Out You find yourself humbled by the ability to observe that you are not in control,
That you are simply bearing witness to something larger than you.
You bow your head in reverence to the Almighty Creator that breathed life into you and you offer humble appreciation.
You are you,
No better,
No worse than any one or any thing that you encounter on a daily basis.
You imagine yourself sharing with others.
What is it you want to share?
Is it wisdom?
Sharing knowledge?
Food?
Shelter?
Kind words?
A helping hand?
What charities do you give to or are a part of?
The byproduct of being humble is to share.
Drop your awareness to that place in your heart center and be humble.
As humble as the earth you live on,
The Mother that gives life to all of us yet asks nothing in return.
To be humble is to do things unconditionally.
Think of the ways you give back to society,
To others,
To the earth,
To those around you and ask yourself,
Am I giving with my palm up,
Expecting something in return?
Or am I giving with my palm down unconditionally?
And if you give with your palm up,
Then go into your imagination and picture yourself doing that act of kindness without accolades,
Without acknowledgement,
With the palm down.
See yourself sharing with unconditional love.
And if you are in that place of unconditional love already,
Then stay with your attention on your heart and send that loving kindness out without expecting anything in return.
Not any better,
Not any worse.
You just are.
Bring your awareness to your heart center once again.
Notice how you feel when you allow humility into your heart.
To live with humility is to have courage.
Courage means to have a strong heart.
Quiet your breath enough now to hear the beat of your own heart.
Notice how the breath slows slower,
Slower.
Listen.
Can you hear it?
The thump thump.
It is your heartbeat,
Like the sound of a drum.
What does it mean to have a strong heart?
Does it mean acting fearlessly?
Does it mean helping those next to you without condition,
Without any thought about yourself?
As you walk through life with humility,
You begin to embrace the teachings of courage.
Courage means to have faith and faith cannot exist when there is fear.
What are you afraid of?
Right now,
In this moment in time,
What are you afraid of?
Let that fear show itself either as a word,
A color,
A feeling,
Or even an image.
See that fear before you now.
Now focus on your heart space.
Reconnect with the silence in your mind so that you can hear your own heartbeat.
Allow yourself to feel excited and ready.
For when we pledge our highest love,
We face our deepest fear.
Imagine yourself facing that fear.
It's right in front of you.
You invite it into your heart and you thank it for showing up.
Thank all those conditions that led you here,
Whether it be circumstances,
People,
Things,
And invite them into your heart.
Show gratitude and forgiveness for all the lessons and then go quiet.
Hear your heartbeat.
Let the beat of your heart grow stronger and stronger,
Louder and louder.
Now call courage into your heart for courage is a spiritual energy and fear is spiritual lack.
Notice your breath and the sound of your own heartbeat to grow courage.
Hear your heartbeat getting louder and louder and have faith that within the sound of your own heartbeat is the sound of love.
And when we can tap into that love and it is strong enough in us,
We can build faith enough to face life with courage.
Slow down the breath.
Allow your exhale to be longer than your inhale.
Breathing in deeply and exhaling.
Bring your awareness to your heart space once again and breathe.
And now drop your awareness down to your feet,
Past your feet and into the earth.
Feel your feet upon the earth and know that the earth mother has a heartbeat just the same as you and I do.
She lives and breathes and provides life for others just as you and I do.
She gives us food,
Shelter,
Medicines.
She sustains us.
Now imagine what it would be like if she did not have the ability to grow things.
If her vast landscapes were now covered in concrete,
Brick and mortar.
And for miles and miles and miles,
All you could see was grey buildings,
Black asphalt covered roads and grey sky.
No longer are there animals,
Fish or plants for food.
No flowers and herbs for medicine.
No trees for shelter.
No water to drink.
Our ego-driven fantasies,
Fueled by lack and desire and separation,
Has destroyed the one thing that sustains us all,
Mother Earth.
How will you fix it?
What will you do?
Would you stop hoarding fish from the sea until the sea could replenish?
Would you stop building concrete structures over top of agricultural lands and allow the food to grow?
Allow animals to eat?
Would you stop industry long enough to allow the skies and air to clear,
To clear enough so we could see the sun and breathe freely?
What would you do?
Drop your awareness now to your feet and feel the earth below you.
Pause your breath.
As you inhale,
Draw the earth's energy from your feet up the front of the body to your head.
And as you exhale,
Feel that energy,
That breath,
Go down the back of the body.
Inhale up the front.
Exhale down the back.
Continue to breathe this way.
In up the front and down the back,
Creating a circle of energy.
A circle is never ending and it teaches us that we are all related.
We are all one.
As you continue to breathe this circular breath,
Be reminded of the circle of life.
Your actions directly affect all your relations,
Seen and unseen.
When we take too much,
We are not living in harmony.
To go easy on someone or something is to show respect.
Respect is acting in a way that would cause no harm and it comes from our relationship with others.
How we treat other living things.
How we honour their sacredness.
If you could not experience your inhalation,
You could not have an exhalation and the breath would cease to exist.
You would cease to exist.
So as you focus on the inhalation,
Feel it as an energy of respect that you have for yourself,
Raising up within you,
In front of you,
Where you can see your actions.
And as you exhale down your back,
You connect with all that is unseen.
Inhaling up the front,
The seen,
The knowing.
Exhaling down the back,
All that is unseen.
Having respect for the self in others is the teaching we experience when we look after all our relations with great care and great love and the utmost respect for the seen and the unseen.
Drop your awareness to your heart once again.
Allow your inhalation to be longer than your exhalation.
Each time you inhale,
Feel a divine spark in your heart space growing brighter and brighter.
Imagine it as a pink colored rose with vibrant green leaves.
Allow the petals to open wide with each inhalation.
And with each exhalation,
Soak up the brightness from the sun above you.
See the rose bloom open into its full capacity as it greets the dawn of a new day.
As you sit with the image of the rose blooming,
Be aware of the honesty it takes to be who you truly are.
Without courage or respect,
We would not know honesty,
For it takes courage to be honest with the self.
Focus on the rose and allow its fragrance to flow from the center of its being,
The center of your heart space.
Let it flow out into the world as a reminder that when we are honest with ourselves,
We can grow and carry that honesty into the world.
Where can you be more honest?
Where can you open your heart more to speak and act with honesty?
Where does honesty show up for you?
How does honesty teach you to be who you truly are?
Focus on the image of the pink rose and vibrant green leaves once again and smile.
Drop your awareness to your heart.
Focus on the space at the center of the chest level with your heart.
This is where truth resides.
Being honest also means being truthful.
Bring your awareness to the throat area.
Feel the breath coming in through the nostrils and down the back of the throat.
Hear the breath in the throat.
Hear it sound as though you are fogging off your glasses or a mirror.
Can you hear this breath on the inhalation and the exhalation?
Inhaling.
.
.
Exhaling.
.
.
Notice how the breath travels down the back of the throat and into the lungs.
If honesty lives in the heart,
Then truth is spoken through the throat.
Listen to your breath.
What is your truth?
What lies deep within your heart that you wish to express and share with others?
How can you speak with truth while still being true to yourself?
What are your beliefs?
Can you separate them from the beliefs of others?
Can you speak and act truthfully without causing harm to your relations?
Can you be honest enough with yourself to know what your truth is?
Hear your breath now as if it were speaking your truth.
Let your inhalation be longer and louder than your exhalation and feel the truth build inside you.
Be true to yourself and truthful with others.
Now bring your awareness back to your heart space.
Let your breath return to its natural rhythm.
It knows what to do.
Focus on the space between your eyebrows,
The middle of your forehead.
Listen to the silent ebb and flow of your breath.
Now as you inhale,
Hear the word ah and as you exhale,
Hear the word ki.
Keep your focus on the words as you hear the inhale ah and the exhale ki.
F Continue with this breath.
Aha ki is the Anishinaabe word for Earth.
The Earth has no thoughts,
No ego.
It teaches us that we are all one.
The Earth provides us with everything we need and it teaches us about harmony and balance.
It teaches us to use and seek knowledge,
Not for power but for peace.
To know right from wrong based on those feelings deep within our hearts.
That place we call love.
It teaches us to share this knowledge so that others may live in harmony and balance.
It teaches us to know the difference between right and wrong.
And it teaches us to have knowledge.
And to have knowledge is to know love.
Love is the energy that heals all.
To know love is to know peace.
To extend love is to extend peace.
So now bring your awareness to your heart space.
Feel the love created here from the teachings of the seven grandfathers and feel that love grow.
Inhale the love around you into your heart.
And as you exhale,
Send that love to every cell,
Every bone,
Every muscle,
Every structure of your body.
Let that love grow beyond your physical body.
Picture it as a pulse.
The pulse of light emanating from your very core and out past your body.
Filling up the room that you're in.
Let that love grow bigger.
Let it fill your house.
Let that love fill the street that you live on.
Grow and pulse that love with every breath.
Send it out into your community.
Send it further into your town or city.
Send that love out into the country,
Your country.
And see that love now reaching all ends of the earth.
Feel it reaching out to all your relations,
Flowing freely,
Giving freely to all the plants,
All the animals,
The fish,
The winged ones and the people that inhabit this great earth.
Imagine everything and everyone shining brightly with this energy of love and light emanating from your heart to theirs.
Feel all the love and all the joy in you,
Around you and through you.
Let it grow until all beings,
All your relations are full of love just as you are.
Let that love out through all of your senses and feel it come back just as strongly so that all you see,
All you say,
All you hear,
All you think and all you feel and all that you do comes from this place of love.
You are not separate from your neighbors,
From your relations,
The animals,
The fish,
The birds and the plants.
We are all one.
We are all love,
Pulsing with the same vibrant energy.
We are all one.
We are all love.
When we live our life with this love strong in our heart,
Then we know that our actions are right.
We are honest and truthful in the way we present ourselves.
We have respect for those that inhabit the earth and it takes a lot of courage to walk humbly upon the earth.
And all of these teachings stem deep within us,
In our hearts,
In this place where love resides.
Imagine a world full of love.
Now slowly bring your awareness closer to you,
From the ends of the earth back to your country.
Your awareness is into your city,
Your town,
Your community,
Your street.
Bring your awareness into your house,
Your room,
Your body.
Feel your heart space.
Feel your breath.
Feel your body.
Bring your awareness to your feet and feel your feet upon the earth once again.
Feel your body resting on the surface of whatever it is you're lying on.
Feel your toes.
Move your toes.
Feel your feet.
Move your feet.
Feel your legs,
Pelvis,
Back and rock the pelvis.
Move the hands,
The fingers and the arms.
Move your head from side to side.
Your awareness is fully back to your body to this present moment.
And you realize that to live a good life is to live in harmony,
Balance and peace with all our relations through this vehicle called love.
Our meditation is now complete.
Please share this meditation with those who would like to learn more about the teachings of the seven grandfathers.
May you live in light,
Love,
Peace and harmony with all your relations.
Namaste.
