Lakota Prayer
Great Mystery,
Teach me how to trust
My Heart,
My Mind,
My Intuition,
My Inner Knowing,
The Senses of My Body,
The Blessings of My Spirit.
Teach me to trust these things
So that I may enter my Sacred Space
and love beyond my fear,
and this Walk in Balance
with the passing of each glorious Sun.
I came across this prayer, and it touched me. I am going to dissect this prayer and see what it brings out of me.
It is called a Lakota Prayer. I have no idea if this is true. At some point, I will research the origins of this prayer to see if it is actually a Lakota Prayer. For now, there is too much inside me to spend any time on that." and love beyond my fear."
I will post my thoughts on this prayer every day. I hope you will join me on this adventure to uncover our hidden self, which is hidden from ourselves by fear.
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As I was saying the prayer this morning, I realized the importance of knowing where my heart, mind, intuition, and inner knowing originate in my body.
My mind and intuition are in my head. Sometimes my heart infuses intuition with emotion, and this can lead me to distrust intuition without it.
I will need to be more aware of where the inner knowing comes from. This will build a stronger trust in it.
The senses of the body will keep me safe and lead me to new adventures.
As a roofer, when I hired a new person, I would tell them what was required to do the job. Two things were mentioned: first, give it two weeks before deciding if this is for you. You are going to use muscles that you have never used before. You will likely experience soreness and aches for the first two weeks as these muscles adjust and develop.
Second, you need to develop the ability to see with your feet. It takes your whole body and mind to do this job. Your eyes will play a significant role in the performance of your job. You will need to be able to see with your feet to stay safe on the roof.
I can see how I have been saying this prayer my whole life without knowing I was.
The senses of the body will keep me safe allow me have new adventures. This is where I wish to live too.
This is a tricky one for me. I taught myself to block out physical pain. While it allows me to complete any task no matter how much pain I am in it is a hinderance to recieving messages from my body.
I need to consciously monitor my body and the messages it sends me. Otherwise, I will minimize them.
Del Que, in the movie Jeremiah Johnson, shaves his head because he thinks the Indians will not value his scalp for the lack of hair. Native Americans valued long hair as a symbol of masculinity, honor, strength, and spiritual connection.
Later in the movie, he changes his mind and grows his hair out. Jeremiah asks him why he left his hair grow? Del Que said, "I decided that when I depart from this life, I'd like to leave something. At least to be remembered on some man's lodge pole."
When I think about "this Walk in Balance with the passing of each glorious Sun," I think about how I leave the places I pass through. Do I leave these places better than when I arrived? How will I be remembered? On my way out of this life will I reflect and have regrets or will I leave in peace?
The first line in the prayer is how I am to approach the rest of the prayer. If there were any other words used I would have already known what is being asked of me to seek.
Yes, we ask for the wisdom of ages, leaving our preconceived ideas behind.
"Wakan Tanka" is Lakota for Great Mystery or Great Spirit.
"With the passing of each glorious day"
This stood out to me this morning. John's words, "If you want to live life to its fullest, meditate on death.' This prayer closes with the same thought.
For me to let the Great Mystery teach me, I must know how I want to die.
Yesterday, I found out that a friend of mine died on Wednesday. I went to the florist to send his wife flowers. This is the note I sent.
I am sorry for your loss.
I knew Ted for about 10 years from the lumber company. We laughed about something every time I saw him. I have great respect for him in the way he lived his life right up till the end. In the last year, I watched him come to work, and it was obvious that his health was declining. He never complained. In the last couple of months, you could see it took everything he had to go to work.
I hope to be able to conduct myself with such dignity.
Lefty
A group of us have been meeting and discussing Emmet Fox's essay "Yoga of Love." I pay attention to the words I say to eliminate repetitive prayer. That way, saying the same words does not become robotic.
Most of the words and concepts in this prayer are contained in other prayers; the phrase "And love beyond my fear" was novel to me. I could not shake those words.
That is why I decided to explore this prayer.
In our group, we have talked about our blocks to love. Past and present wrongs done to us are a major block that prevents us from loving all the people and events that we meet throughout our day.
This helps me to stop judging a person, action, or place.
Love beyond my fear. This morning, I intentionally set out to pray with someone knowing when I started -they could’ve rejected it. That would’ve put a little more ache in my heart. I stepped out, we prayed. My heart heals a little more today.
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