***Important Note: Be sure to complete Part 2, Weaving the Basket, before beginning this portion of the learning exercise. It just won’t work very well if you haven’t engaged with the ideas in that other section first.***
In this third part of the exercise, you will work through a much shorter and final set of exercises that can bring you home to a paradigm of relationship with the Land. The paradigm shift you’ve been seeking may take place while you’re working through these pages, but it could also come many days or even months from now, after the Knowledge you’ve received has had more time to interact with you and with experiences you haven’t had yet. The speed with which your perception reorients will be variable too — almost instantaneous for some of you, but like the slow-growing light of sunrise for others. Paradigm shifts, like most of the other truly important things in life, are not under our control. And knowing and accepting this is a big step on the path to getting where you want to go.
But no matter how, why, when, or if the paradigm shift happens for you, remember that this experience is just the beginning. There’s a lot left to learn. The fourth and final section of this exercise outlines how to move forward with what you’ve learned, and how to apply it to the purpose that brought you to the pages of this exercise to begin with: mitigating natural hazards.
The two paths that we’ll more deeply explore are on the Circle: West and North. Yes, you have met these directions of the Circle before. But now you will learn a level of wisdom from each that you probably weren’t ready to receive before.
East and South are directions that Western culture values. It has historically cherished the time of plenteous and abundant food, of comfortable warmth, of returned flowers and birds, of lambs and calves and other farm animals being born, and the promise of health and well-being that all these things brought with them for centuries. This affinity for spring and summer are preserved in many ancient stories of Western culture, and much of its art.
West and North are directions that often trouble and frighten people of Western culture, who therefore turn away from the wisdom these directions provide. Yet these paths lead us to a powerful place of life, whereas avoiding them leads to an equally powerful place of death. The astonishing truth is that the things we’re afraid to look at in West and in North liberate what’s been imprisoned for generations. They weave you back into the fabric of Reality itself, in places that have grown so frayed and tattered they’re starting to fall apart. It is these tattered places that have to be put right for reality to be mended. So if you insist on being right, instead, you will simply tear things loose all over again. So think carefully before you refuse or deny the opportunity you have, that you asked for. Any change that’s big enough to “save the day” feels very uncomfortable at first.
The pages are all in a linear sequence this time and should be read that way, because the weaving process itself is different this time. Just follow the link at the bottom of each page to get to the next one. I’ve listed a short table of contents at the bottom of this page, just so you can have a sense of where you’re heading, and linked each to the appropriate page so you can find your place again after a break. But please do not skip any pages or do them out of order. The pedagogical design won’t support that, so you’ll lose much or all of the potential power that’s coming together to fuel the emergence of Knowledge.
A link on the last page of Part 3 will take you to Part 4, Indigenous Mitigation of Natural Hazards.
Start the final leg of your journey by visiting the page West, here.
Table of Contents for Part 3, Final Steps:
West
Edge Effects
Smoke
Fire
Burning Prairie Paradigm
The Larger Paradigm
Unexpected Consequences
Healing
North
CO2 Solutions
Mining the Land
Mining the Sun
Mining the Wind
Winter
The Gift of North