Hai Reflections in Spring

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The agaves and ocotillo have been blooming here in the desert. I love seasons changing! I have written that before here on Grownup Navajo. But its magic never fails in amazing me. I am completely taken away as I run, hike and simply be in the desert.

At the heart of the transition of seasons is a movement from an ending of one period to the start of another. While these shifts are gradual they can be in retrospect monumental. The past six months have been one of the most intense periods of my life. It has taught me so many lessons and truly dared me to rise like a mountain in the desert.

As a celebration of my favorite season, winter or Hai in Navajo, I challenged myself to not only continue my gratitude practice but incorporate a visual element. The daughter of a photographer, I love taking photos. I love capturing a moment. Through my Instagram account, and in this last season of my life, I made a conscious effort to share a photo each day of a moment that made me incredibly happy and grateful.

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Using the hashtag #HappyHaiJac, I shared a photo each day. The result is a collection of 88 photos of my winter moments. I am one photo short. It’s the day I lost my best friend Jet, my fur baby – dog. I looked but could not find anything in that day that brought me joy. One of my best friends pointed out to me that Jet remained in my life through my hard moments on purpose and now that I was stronger, she thought he realized he could leave me. Though my heart still hurts for his steady companionship, I think she was right.

I often hear from people how they hate winter. I try to understand this but it always misses me. I am at home, in my element, in the winter. In my culture, winter is focused on healing. It’s when we rebuild ourselves through our ceremonies. When I look at this past fall and winter, this truly was the focus. I learned to risk, say goodbye and hello, I reconnected with my soul’s needs, and I began to see all of my power and fell unapologetically in love with it.

FullSizeRender (5)On the Winter Solstice, I climbed Piestewa Peak, here in the desert, my favorite mountain to hike. My spirit was heavy but I was hopeful as I watched the sunrise that morning. What has happened since then has been full of so much power, I don’t have words to describe it all. All I have is gratitude.

There is a saying I often repeat, when I find myself speechless at the universe’s outpouring of love for me – “Ahé’hee…more please”. It’s my small, mindful prayer to the Holy People. My way of accepting my life as it is in this moment. I find so much, especially in the time of the seasons change, in this month with so much earthen energy to be grateful for. From the vibrant yellow of the Palo Verde trees, to the fire in the Ocotillo blooms, life is everywhere and the desert’s beauty leaves me with a full heart and today, now, all I have to say is…

Ahé’hee…more please.

 

Hello Spring

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I vibe at those higher frequencies…

Where love meets light, where spring renews

and is reborn in the cool breeze, in the fire of the ocotillo blooms…

In the place where the sun shines,

at the point of the season’s change

there is the heart of my vibration,

dancing like a hummingbird.

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Sending each of you positive thoughts, love & light as you start this new season. Spring is the time for renewing, replenishing and nourishing the crops we’ve planted.

What seeds have you planted in your soul and what do they need to bloom?

Yá’at’eeh Dąą/Hello Spring!

 

Dear Girl-Made-of-Honey

Dear Girl-Made-of-Honey,

Please remember everyone will be drawn to the vivacity of your sweetness. Take note of who loves you without wanting more than you can be. Remember, especially, the ones who know you are still growing and leave room for you to be all your beautiful forms at once, as you choose.

Dear Girl-Made-of-Honey,

Watch for those whose words align so beautifully with their actions that you lose track of what is said and what is done because the lines of distinction have been erased with intention, attention and devotion.

Dear Girl-Made-of-Honey,

Live your promise to be the giant of your dreams, the queen who is king, never bowing down, submitting to anything less than you deserve.

Dear Girl-Made-of-Honey,

Your light can brighten the darkest places but don’t fear reaching out for a hand to hold. It’s in the darkness where touch can feel the warmest, where kisses can go deep and love of your true self can reach back into the cave within.

Dear Girl-Made-of-Honey,

Remember you come from the heavens. You are not solely stardust but the core of its brightness, your shine will at times be too bright for those around you. Look for the ones who instead of walking away or turn their back on you, sit in your presence with heart-shaped sunglasses so they can continue to stand in your love light.

Dear Girl-Made-of-Honey,

You are the goodness of the nectar, the sweetness of the fruit, the genesis of the bloom…you, dearheart, are a gift, hold that truth close.

Dear Girl-Made-of-Honey,

Remember you are beautiful and are the strength of your people, your mother, her mother and her mother. You are the pulse of a bloodline that traces the circle we walk around the fire in the Hogan. You are the antidote, the medicine that cures.

Dear Girl-Made-of-Honey,

You are a vision prayed into existence, the gift to a people, the leader of the next generation, a vessel of solutions to your people’s heartache. Continue to shine your prismatic rays as you uncover the treasure in the womb of your soul.

Dear Girl-Made-of-Honey,

You are not simply a universe…your existence is the past, present and future. You are a resilient multiverse brimming with the light of millions of ancestors and descendants. So rest in the simplicity of your greatness knowing deep within you there is only complexity of the love of the people you are from.

Soliloquy of Hozhó

I challenge you to find new ways to describe my essence because

I’m beyond beautiful…

I am the strength of a mother who pushed hard to bring her daughter into this world when her heart stopped.

I am more than incredible…

As I am the resilience of my great-great-great grandmother who escaped from Hweełdí to return to Diné Bikeyáh.

 

My insight runs deep, as my heart beats to the rhythm of prayers sung by the medicine women in my life.

My light is the fire in the home, it’s omnipresent, wrapping itself around you until the chill dissipates.

I am light.

I am love.

Together this force is strong.

My force is strong and I unapologetically stand in its power throughout the day and long into the night.

I won’t submit to anything, I lived that way before and that kind of tiny life hurts.

I’m freer

Like this

I honor myself in this life by being the woman I’m meant to be.

I will grow. I will morph into my next form. I will become more woman.

 

Understand, I am always becoming.

Not because I’m not enough but because I am everything.

 

I am the trees, the sun, the flowers, the earth under your feet

I am the vivacity of flowing water as it caresses the embankment

 

I am a baby’s laugh, the First Laugh. Because this laugh reminds us we are meant for this earth

I am meant for this earth. Just like this laugh, I resonate in your soul

Reverberate and shake your being awake

 

I share this not as an excuse or warning but as a promise

I am molded in the image of Changing Woman and my power is something I share, flaunt and protect. It radiates from me slowly burning away the darkness and exposing love. This prismatic energy will make you want to love me more. I know this because I love me more with each step and effort to be more free, to be more me.

I constantly woo myself

My being is an endless love song, a soliloquy of Hozhó, sung like a prayer in a Hogan offering thanks and humbly requesting more blessings so this light can

Continue to shine

Continue to exude

Continue to radiate

 

Understand, I am always becoming.

Not because I’m not enough but because I am everything

 

Shíkeyáh, My Love

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My people came from the earth and because of this, I believe, every story I have ever been told by my parents, grandparents, aunties or uncles, always starts with place. There is always a reference to a specific point in the land to set a story. Whether it’s where a family lives, “Remember where the Kinsels home is? The ridge there…” “Remember the mountain from the stories about the Diyin Diné (Holy People) and how Ma’ii (Coyote) wasn’t supposed to climb the hill? That is the hill.”

Some of my favorite conversations are ones that have happened as I have traveled across my homelands. From early morning discussions shared while commuting with my dad to late night drives with my mom returning from town. The land I come from is the not necessarily the backdrop but is me, the heroine in the story, the temple where my story and my people’s story is written.

I’ve danced across the earth. I’ve played in the dirt. When I was home for Christmas, I woke to a snow draped landscape. Waking up with my family and striping down to little cloths so I could take a bath in the first snow I was home to enjoy. All in an effort to bless myself with a life that leads into “old age”.

I believe I can feel the power of the earth move in me. I can feel the stars’ energy and the lunar shifts in my life. I was taught to be humble. To understand my place in the world. But tonight when I think of the beauty of this winter, the lessons the cold air is teaching me each time it washes over me, I don’t feel small, I feel I am giant.

When I was home in the snow at Christmas and my bare feet began to ache from the shivering cold of the snow underneath me, I felt strong. When I watch a sunrise and see the genesis of the day the Holy People are creating I can feel my ancestors.

I think often of my great-great-great grandmother who was removed from our homelands during The Long Walk, the government’s forcible removal of my people and imprisonment at Hweeldi (Place of Suffering) or Ft. Sumner in New Mexico. I think of her escaping this horrific place and her journey home. I wonder what it must have felt like to see the land again. I ponder how it compares to the joy I feel when I return to Diné Bikeyáh every month.

My day dreams while I am in the city are of the places my heart has found solace in from mountains to springs and washes where flowing water runs. All of these memories are my fuel. Touchstones that create motivation for me to grow, touchstones to help me own my power as an asdzaan Diné (Navajo lady).

For Diné (Navajo) people pride is not a characteristic that is encouraged. But when I think about what has created me. It is the land. I am the red sandstone formations, I am mountains I have hiked, camped and played in. I am the stars’ brilliance, the moon’s shine. I am sunrays that spill through the clouds during every season of the year. So I don’t ever feel insignificant because I come from a people who have learned the sacredness of the earth, the blessedness of the heavens and the medicines of the land.

The feeling I harness most as I reflect on these teachings is pride. It is not boastful but it is a whisper. Like the small voice I use in the morning when I pray at dawn. The quietness of my breath as I wait for the sun to kiss the land goodbye at night. It is that quiver of pride that I hold because it is one grounded in respect for the small amount of teachings I hold and the vast amount of curiosity I try to not to let overwhelm me because there are still so many things I do not yet know. So tonight as I go to bed I will think, dream of shíkeyáh (my land), my love, and pray for more clarity and strength. I will ask with a humble heart that I can continue to have more conversations with sunrises, serenades in my favorite places and offer prayers out of respect for the grandeur of place that is the beginning, middle and end of my story.

My Antidote: Light

Positivity and “shine love” mantras have always been my way to cope, encourage and motivate myself to keep striving for excellence in my life. The thing about being a sparkly, light-filled lovetarian is, people sometimes mistakenly think you have never felt the darkness. The truth about the light I carry, is it not only lights my path but acts as my antidote.

There are many lives, friendships and relationships in my life that have been negatively impacted by alcohol abuse. In some tragic cases, my siblings and I have suffered the fatal loss of childhood friends. Growing up in a tight-knit community you are never numb to these instances. You feel each blow and that heaviness of grief is hard to carry because you know there are better choices.

When I moved off the reservation for college and the option to imbibe legally was presented, I entered this with caution and excitement. While I was responsible and careful, there began to be a cycle that would perpetuate, I’d always have a moral battle and consistently feel guilty, so I would stop, not engage and carry on with school. Until the next invitation to birthday party, work event or happy hour and I’d try again taking part, cautiously but the same result would rise up. I understood later, that because my reservation was “dry”, meaning the sale and consumption of alcohol was illegal, alcohol was always going to be bad.

While drinking was never important to my identity, it was easy for it to fall away. But after much consideration, I began to consider what life would be like if I committed to not drink socially. What would my world look like? What more could I do if I didn’t partake anymore? The answer to all of these questions was it’d be the same.

So a year ago today, I unceremoniously, started not consuming alcohol. Having never struggled with addiction or suffered from any legal issues because of recklessness, the choice was seamless. But it was full of meaning. My decision has become a commitment to a way of life and journey on a path I am privileged to walk.

In the process, I have dramatically minimized the impact of the worry about this powerful thief of a substance. Since starting Grownup Navajo, over three years ago, I have challenged myself to align more and more with my cultural teachings. To seek answers and teachers to the questions I have about how I, as a Diné (Navajo) person, should live.

This choice in lifestyle allows me to live in closer harmony with my traditional teachings as a modern Navajo woman. Through my commitment I have created a powerful shift in my life and I share this personal journey because I am proud of this milestone. I am empowered by this decision and feel able to seize the hold alcohol has had on my life. There are many people who have had a tremendous impact on me and yet I will never see them again because of this substance. While that realization angers me still today, I aim for my action to be a tribute to them but rooted in my love of self. By reclaiming the power of my choices, I am grounded. Through this commitment I weaken the impact alcohol will have on my life and that sense of ownership of choice has added to the force of light shining from me today.

The Power of Presence – A Lesson Discovered as I Made My Bed

During a late night drive across my homeland, I jokingly told a close friend how I often feel the “most Navajo” in the mornings when I am making my bed. Instead of laughing as I expected he would, he shared how it made sense. Noting how even this modern act of starting the day could be beautifully traditional. I had never articulated this thought until this moment. But the more I shared the more I understood how much this one teaching infused not just my day, but my life.

Growing up shímasaní (my maternal grandmother) would always instruct me how it was very important that I made my bed. She would indicate how it was a way to show respect for my belongings but also a way for me to show I wasn’t lazy. As I made my bed in the morning when I was little she’d share with me that fixing my bed allowed me to start my day with positive thoughts and intentions.

Shímasaní stayed with us a lot when we were little. She would always be caring for us as my parents traveled and worked. It was her care that showed me how cooking can be a rich love language as she always asked my brothers what they wanted for dinner. They’d respond with either potato soup or her dumpling stew. It’s her recipes for these dishes that are my measure for all others. It is her tortillas that I miss now as her hands are too old flap bread and she is not able to stand very long to cook. But it is also her I think of every morning.

I read a poem recently called “Chorus of Cells” about making a bed. Written by a 100-plus year old poet, the poem illustrated the lyrical simplicity of life found only in seemingly mundane acts. It was this poem and the conversation with my friend that reminded me of the power of being present and how my morning ritual was a conduit to this sense of being.

I always make my bed in the morning. Each day I rise, I hear her teachings urging me to carry openness to the possibilities the day may present. As I smooth the sheets, fluff the pillows and lay the duvet over my bed, I am thinking of my day ahead. Preparing my spirit as I think of the work the Holy People will have me do. It is often the first point in my day, even before I run or pray, when I articulate my gratitude for simply being awake and able to show my dedication to this practice.

I was able to visit shímasaní on my last trip home. I sat with her on her favorite corner of the couch and held her hand. She shared how she was proud of the work I am doing which always means the most to me coming from her because she is one of the strongest people I know. When I look at her life and all that she created, I am left speechless. Her ability to hold onto her traditional knowledge evening after attending boarding school, raising a family of six on her own after shícheíí (my paternal grandfather) died. I don’t always feel worthy of her praise especially when I battle the guilt of being away from her now as she’s older. But when I think about my life and how I live it. I am most proud of having realized how much her many teachings have become my center for the mindful way I aim to live my life. I am grateful now for a beautiful late night conversation which helped me to see the power of my presence – rather, the power of shímasaní’s presence and how it continues to shape me.

In the Desert a Mountain Rises

When I am looking for strength, I picture my strongholds, the places where I have found respite, calm and clarity. Each place I visualize, often in the middle of an anxious bout, are places grounded by mountains. From Black Mesa, the Lukachukai Mountains to the San Francisco Peaks, the Sandias in New Mexico and Piestewa Peak here in Phoenix. All are places where I have seen the sun rise and set on their crests. It is that dependable cyclical force – knowing the sun will rise and fall over their majestic forms, that soothes me.

I find refuge in land, both in mine homeland and those of others. The power of place is a guiding principle of my faith and one I was reminded of this week. I attended an event where an elder Akimel O’otham man shared a traditional song. The beautiful melody was sung to the rhythm of a hand rattle made from a gourd. It was called “in the desert a mountain rises” and as I do not speak O’otham, I can only expand on the meaning of the song to me as a Navajo woman with a fondness for mountains. Every feeling I had while listening to the song was a feeling of reconnection. The peace that comes from returning to yourself and harnessing the power of your being. It is in the mountains where I have discovered, found and regained peace in my heart countless times. Each time I feel this homecoming I understand I am the mountain and the mountain is me.

Listening to the song reminded of my late Nalí hastiin (paternal grandfather) and one of his favorite psalms that I carry with me. “I life up mine eyes unto the hills. From whence cometh my help?” (Psalm 121:1).  I don’t remember where he shared this with me first. Today I visualize our conversation taking place in his “Oasis” in Round Rock as we looked east toward the Lukachukai Mountains, in a moment, I am sure, where my heart was filled with uncertainty.

I love that together the psalm and this beautiful song create a dichotomy. On the one hand, to be filled with doubt and wondering in the middle of a trial where and when help will come and on the other having the delivery of faith so forceful that it rises with audacity in the desert. My people believe in the power of mountains. We find protection in them spiritually and so I love the translation of the O’odham song – “in the desert a mountain rises”. I think about this phrase as a great reminder to not only respect the land but to recognize we are the land. We are the mountains.

I am far away from my beautiful mountains tonight but I can feel their pull. I can close my eyes and see multiple sunrises illuminate the sky with glorious light and their warmth filling my soul. I am thankful for a new connection to the desert through this O’otham song. In a city that identifies with a bird who rises from the ashes, I love that I can now visualize myself rising up in the desert not as a bird but a mountain. It is this image that I will carry with me while I am away from my mountains. This realization brings me peace. As I lift up my eyes unto the mountains, I understand that by the grace of the Holy People, I am my own help and no matter my placement, I can harness mountains of strength from wherever I stand and choose to rise.

Earthen Powers

The leaves are changing. From the high country in Mescalero Apacheland to the gorgeous towering crests of the Sandias in New Mexico to the belt of aspens around the San Francisco Peaks the colors of Aa’kęę (fall) are washing over the mountain ranges in the southwest.

In the past month, we marked the autumnal equinox, a Super Blood Moon, lunar eclipse, new moon and full moon alike. I recently commented to a friend how I can feel the power of the earth, moon and stars move in me. This omnipresent force is guiding me lately to turn inward thinking about the ways to cultivate more practices of self-love.

It is in this reverence I find myself tonight. Having spent the afternoon with a group of empowering women reflecting on ways we can cultivate more practices of self care. A critical conversation as waiting and sitting are extraordinarily difficult for this asdzaan Diné (Navajo woman) with a hummingbird spirit. I am forever on the go and rarely make time to be still.

I recently learned that a common practice of Diné prior to ceremonies would involve the person having a prayer or ceremony spend the four days before a ceremony preparing for the practice. They then would take the time to have the ceremony and then spend the four days after being reverent, observing taboos and keeping close in prayer.

Corresponding to this palpable presence of earthen energy, my life has been full of changes. In this period of flux, I am thinking of the power of preparing to take action. Thinking of the heavenly bodies moving outside and around me, the changing temperatures of the Navajo New Year (the month of October), a natural time used by my people to set intentions for the cold weather coming in the winter months. Amidst all of this, I am urged by a whisper to be still and wait in active preparation.

We falsely assume grand revelations to be scarce as “the waiting” occurs. In actuality, we need to remind ourselves to prepare with an open heart. It is with this grace of heart that revolutions of greater self-acceptance, grand self-realizations, and monumental moments of healing can commence. I believe this is why we take time to prepare in ceremony for our ceremonies. One cannot act brashly hoping to heal but must act thoughtfully knowing greater healing can come from waiting in thoughtful motion. To be still in action and “run with patience” understanding more blessings can be received if we not only set intentions but prepare for healing and blessings with an open, humble heart. So this is where I rest tonight, thinking of the many changes in my life, not fully understanding them but also knowing in my waiting, I am at the epicenter of many earthen powers which will guide my heart as it continues its radical venture.

She said go to the water and pray…

Water is life, image adapted by Jared Yazzie.
Water is life, image adapted by Jared Yazzie.

I watched a video of a fierce asdzaan Diné on Friday shed tears at the bank of the Animas River as she watched gallons of waste from a mine blowout in Colorado kill her beloved river. I read her posts via social media of the yellow-orange water leach its way deeper into Diné Bikeyáh. With each post, newspaper article or account, my heart caved.

It’s taken me days to process, believe, begin to understand how fast the water from the mine oozed into the waterway. I remembered in one post this same woman pleaded for her K’é (relatives) to “go to the water and pray”.

I carried those words around until tonight, when I was able to run along the canal here in the desert. With each step I prayed for restoration of the water’s spirit and the strength of people who fight for the water we have. As I ran I thought about how when I’m old I will remember the time the river turned yellow. In the same way people talk about the rock slide on Black Mesa before the Long Walk began, the way people talk about the rocks that have fallen from Monument Valley. Each of these events have communicated to us how out of sync we are with our mother earth, teachings and practices. But are we ready to listen? When will we be brave enough to act?

These rivers are not the ones I played in when I grew up but I have those memories, in my community, on the other side of the mountain. I know the joy of being able to sink my feet into the shore of the river and feel the coolness of the earth in the heat of summer. I understand how refreshing it can feel to pray at the water and be reminded of the center of your being. I understand how safe being near the water can be.

I thought of my recent trip home and how happy I was having found freshly cooked kneel down bread along the San Juan River. I thought about the water that gave life to the corn and how I found it on a day my soul needed to nourish itself with the tastes of the land. I thought of how when Ghąąjį’ (October) comes this fall, the harvest will be quiet. I thought of how my cousin will not be sharing in the crops of squash or even pumpkins for my home in Phoenix. I think of my close family friend who had memories of playing in the river with his cousins and whose animals will be thirsty now.

Shí eí Táchiinii. I am of the Red Running into the Water people and tonight my heart aches for a river whose life has been taken because of recklessness. As a community we call ourselves Diné meaning “the People” and when we speak of humans – Bila ashlaííi or “five-fingered people”. Not only are we all connected by the curves of fingers but also by the foundation of water that allows the blood to flow through our veins. We are the water and it is us. If you can look at the photos of the damage and not feel anything then tonight I will not only pray for the water beings, the animals and plants, the people whose lives have been intertwined with these beautiful bodies of water for generations, but I will also pray for you. I will pray that you may find your way back to yourself.

She said go to the water and pray…it is at the water where I found so much heart ache, where I was able cry but also give thanks because I can still hear the rushing water. I have hope we will rise in our awareness to protect the water’s preciousness. Tó’ éí’ iiná, water is life, let us carry this in our hearts because this truth flows through us.

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