Please let them keep it

Thanks to New Agers, Native Americans are becoming more guarded about their culture, spirituality and religions, which I believe is a good thing.

When it comes to Native American cultures professional New Agers steal it; they corrupt it and change it to fit the New Agers ways. Professional New Agers always want something to sell and they like to sell spirituality. You can have spirituality but you don’t own spirituality and you cannot sell what you do not own.

Native Americans are just people like anyone, same strengths and weaknesses with many of the same worries and concerns and problems like family, health, economics, jobs, alcoholism/drug addiction and many others things that we are worried about. The biggest concerns they have that we don’t, is survival of a tribal culture and having to walk between two worlds/cultures. I heard an Indian woman explain her daily difficulty she had going from her life on the Rez to her job off the Rez in the city and at the end of her work day going back to Rez life. The difficulty of going from Indian time to non-Indian time and then back. She described it as being a very difficult transition on a daily bases and having to learn to walk in two worlds.

American Indians are not a mystical people they just people, but people of a different culture. Their spirituality is what gets them through things. But many American Indians do lose their way just like non-Indians. They get lost in drugs and alcohol just like non-Indians and yes some lose their spirituality just like non-Indians.

Some Indians practice a traditional Indian spirituality, some practice a Christian based spirituality and some mix the two. Spirituality is about your relationship with God. Everyone can have a Spirituality without religion it make no difference whether it be Christian or Indian. Truth is there is no one “Indian spirituality” it varies from tribe to tribe. As Natives Americans vary from tribe to tribe so does their spirituality and rituals. It’s a culture thing, a tribe thing. It’s what makes them who they are. It’s sacred and must be kept that way. It’s their heritage.

The non-Indians who want to embrace Native American spirituality tend to reject Christianity for some reason, perhaps it’s the praying or rituals or maybe the rules or the bible. Well Indians do pray. Indians tend to pray for others or their people. Typically rituals are used for specific purposes to gain understanding of themselves. In some cases to discover what purpose the Creator has for the individual and they have to fulfill that purpose if they don’t bad things can happen to the individual. Even Indians and their God have rules. These are not things to be taken lightly. I would never recommend doing it under a New Ager it can harm or even kill you. Even though a New Ager would be easier because you just have to pay to do it. It’s different with Indians.

I’ve met New Agers who claim to practice a Native American culture or should I say lifestyle but yet they were vegetarians, against hunting, against guns, are pacifists and have anti-military tendencies. But the Indians I’ve met seem to love meat, many like to hunt, many have guns, not afraid to fight and not anti-military, either they were in the military or had a relative in the military. Indians did fight over territory, food and even for revenge. Most tribes had its allies and enemies. Even before the Europeans arrival war was part of American Indian lives. Indians had a very complex culture. New Agers try to simplify it, which is dishonest and degrading. New Agers like to try to make people believe America was one big peaceful commune and all Indians got along. Indians did war with each other but from what I can tell they did not have religious wars. Win or lose it was what was meant to be. If one tribe beat another tribe it was because they had better warriors or it just was their day. Sometimes you eat the bear and sometimes the bear eats you. It’s the way of nature.

If you learn a way of spirituality you should treat it like a gift and either keep it or give it away. But no worries, professional New Agers are very good at changing and charging. It’s all about what feels good and providing others at a price to feel good. I remember one Indian referred to New Agers as the “Doe Nation” which was a play on words for “Donation” because they almost always want finical “donation”. But for Indians it’s all about life, culture and heritage. Please let them keep it and if they want to share it they will.

UR