EVERYONE WHO WORKS IN ANY KIND OF HEALING WORK SHOULD READ THIS FOUR TIMES

"We are called to become hollow bones for our people, and anyone else we can help.

.....We are not supposed to seek power for our personal use and honor..........

... What we bones really become is the pipeline that connects Wakan Tanka, the helpers and the community together. This tells us the direction our curing and healing work must follow, and establishes the kind of life we must live. We have to be strong and committed, otherwise we will get very little spiritual power and will probably give up the curing and healing work. The lessons we are taught by our human teachers, as Stirrup was for me, stressed that the traditional way of performing a ritual is more important than curing someone. Curing a single individual is only important in terms of what this teaches the entire community. This community must continue to know that Wakan Tanka, and the Helpers are always with it, and that it need not be afraid."

---- Frank Fools Crow

Fools Crow was taught that while we are each given natural power at birth, we are also surrounded by spiritual or supernatural power. This spiritual knowledge includes the knowledge needed to obtain power and to set it in motion.

If we wish to go beyond the natural power we were born with, we must entrust ourselves to Wakan Tanka, Grandmother Earth, and the Spirits of the Four Directions (Helpers) and then call in spiritual power from them.

When we have made contact, we can ask them to send to us their individual spiritual powers to be added to our natural powers. We then receive the knowledge we need to understand what we have been given and the directions for changing this power into motion.

"One thing to remember is to talk to the animals. If you do, they will talk back to you. But if you don't talk to the animals, they won't talk back to you, then you won't understand, and when you don't understand you will fear and when you fear you will destroy the animals, and if you destroy the animals, you will destroy yourself."

--- Chief Dan George

The beauty of the trees,
the softness of the air,
the fragrance of the grass,
speaks to me.

The summit of the mountain,
the thunder of the sky,
the rhythm of the sea,
speaks to me.

The strength of the fire,
the taste of salmon,
the trail of the sun,
and the life that never goes away,
they speak to me.

And my heart soars."

---- Chief Dan George

ORIGIN OF THE THUNDERBIRD ---- Passamaquoddy


This is a legend of long, long ago times. Two Indians desired to find the origin of thunder. They traveled north and came to a high mountain. These mountains performed magically. They drew apart, back and forth, then closed together very quickly.

One Indian said, "I will leap through the cleft before it closes. If I am caught, you continue to find the origin of thunder." The first one succeeded in going through the cleft before it closed, but the second one was caught and squashed.

On the other side, the first Indian saw a large plain with a group of wigwams, and a number of Indians playing a ball game. After a little while, these players said to each other, "It is time to go." They disappeared into their wigwams to put on wings, and came out with their bows and arrows and flew away over the mountains to the south. This was how the Passamaquoddy Indian discovered the homes of the thunderbirds.

The remaining old men of that tribe asked the Passamaquoddy Indian, "What do you want? Who are you?" He replied with the story of his mission. The old men deliberated how they could help him.

They decided to put the lone Indian into a large mortar, and they pounded him until all of his bones were broken. They molded him into a new body with wings like thunderbird, and gave him a bow and some arrows and sent him away in flight. They warned him not to fly close to trees, as he would fly so fast he could not stop in time to avoid them, and he would be killed.

The lone Indian could not reach his home because the huge enemy bird, Wochowsen, at that time made such a damaging wind. Thunderbird is an Indian and he or his lightning would never harm another Indian. But Wochowsen, great bird from the south, tried hard to rival Thunderbird. So Passamaquoddies feared Wochowsen, whose wings Glooscap once had broken, because he used too much power.

A result was that for a long time air became stagnant, the sea was full of slime, and all of the fish died. But Glooscap saw what was happening to his people and repaired the wings of Wochowsen to the extent of controlling and alternating strong winds with calm.

"Sometimes it feels like energy or electricity when it is moving in and through us, but spiritual power is really a distinctive kind of knowledge that is like the key that opens the door or the switch that starts the energy moving."

---- Frank Fools Crow

"Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it.

Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves.

All things are bound together. All things connect."��

---- Chief Seattle

"The earth does not belong to us. We belong to the earth."

---- Chief Seattle, (Chief Seattle's Speech)

"May the stars carry your sadness away,
May the flowers fill your heart with beauty,
May hope forever wipe away your tears,
And, above all, may silence make you strong."

---- Chief Dan George

"When Christ said that man does not live by bread alone, he spoke of a hunger. This hunger was not the hunger of the body. It was not the hunger for bread. He spoke of a hunger that begins deep down in the very depths of our being. He spoke of a need as vital as breath. He spoke of our hunger for love.

Love is something you and I must have. We must have it because our spirit feeds upon it. We must have it because without it we become weak and faint. Without love our self-esteem weakens. Without it our courage fails. Without love we can no longer look out confidently at the world...

But with love, we are creative. With it, we march tirelessly. With it, and with it alone, we are able to sacrifice for others."

---- Chief Dan George

"We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children."

---- �� Chief Seattle

"The earth is our mother. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons and daughters of the earth. This we know. All things are connected like the blood which unites one family. All things are connected.

Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons and daughters of the earth. We did not weave the web of life, we are merely strands in it. Whatever we do to the web we do to ourselves."

---- Chief Seattle

"If all the beasts were gone,
men would die
from a great loneliness of spirit,
for whatever happens to the beasts
also happens to the man.
All things are connected.
Whatever befalls the Earth
befalls the sons of the Earth."

---- Chief Seattle

"Take nothing but memories..., leave nothing but footprints!"

---- Chief Seattle

"There is no death. . . Only a change of worlds."

---- Chief Seattle

Show respect to all people, but grovel to none.

---- Tecumseh

"So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart. Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view, and demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life. Seek to make your life long and its purpose in the service of your people. Prepare a noble death song for the day when you go over the great divide.

Always give a word or a sign of salute when meeting or passing a friend, even a stranger, when in a lonely place. Show respect to all people and grovel to none.

When you arise in the morning give thanks for the food and for the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies only in yourself. Abuse no one and no thing, for abuse turns the wise ones to fools and robs the spirit of its vision.

When it comes your time to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with the fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song and die like a hero going home."

~ Chief Tecumseh

Tecumseh was a Native American chief, who led the Shawnee tribe and a large tribal confederacy known as Tecumseh's Confederacy. Tecumseh grew up in the Ohio Country during the American Revolutionary War and the Northwest Indian War and based on his war heriocs and leadership,

Tecumseh has an iconic folk hero status in American, Indian and Canadian history. He also was a poet and has some beautiful poems about life, war, attitude, death and dying and bravery. His famous poem titled 'live your life' was the theme song for the movie 'Act of Valor' which gained huge popularity.

Chief Tecumseh's quotes, poems and sayings a wide variety of subjects including bravery and valor, American Indian life and politics, wars, attitude towards life and death and the wars against Americans.

"They claim this mother of ours, the Earth, for their own use, and fence their neighbors away from her, and deface her with their buildings and their refuse."

--- Sitting Bull

"Is it wrong for me to love my own? Is it wicked for me because my skin is red? Because I am Sioux? Because I was born where my father lived? Because I would die for my people and my country?"

---- Sitting Bull