Medicine Wheels

The majority of pre-Christian and Earth Based traditions speak of the Wheel of the Year. Early in my life I was fascinated by and began to study the ancient Celtic and Nordic traditions which eventually led me to study the new traditions of Wicce and the Unitarians in the early 80's. I also studied the wheels presented in Eastern Philosophy and through the martial arts, Tai Chi Chuan, Chinese medicine, and Feng Shui.

In each variant tradition the cardinal directions, East, South, West and North (and each point in between), have colors, elements, animals and cultural archetypes or deities associated with them as well as Seasons, holidays, and Sun and Moon phases. The obvious need to connect our human experience with the environment and earth changes going on around us made these traditions so strong, so compelling and necessary, that the Christian Church and other later religions placed their holy days over these astronomical events. The directions and their attributes live within the collective mind of each individual, the community, and humanity at large. They speak to us through dreams, visions and rituals.

In 1987 I began to study a variety of traditional Native American Medicine Wheels as part of my undergraduate experience through the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, MN. The Native interpretations of life as a wheel resonated in my core and moved my studies to a new level. The characters of the Lakota Wheel were especially compelling as in my practice of Jungian psychology (particularly in dream work) and in my ritual work within the other traditions, I had already spoken with a few of my internal characters. My Lakota teacher introduced me to the Sweat Lodge ceremony which forever altered my Sauna experiences. The medicine of the wheel is in balancing our many selves and discovering our true right path or Red Road. My grand uncle would call this "God's highes will and purpose for our life" and it is a good way to live our daily lives.

The archetypes, spirit guides, angels and internal fragments of each human individual are alive and grow through our relationships with them. Maintaining a relationship with them through dream work, ritual and prayer means our inner balance is also maintained. Ignore or dishonor them and they seek us out - not always in gentle ways. The Discovering Origins/Building Traditions (DOBT) Ritual Shows seek to uncover, honor, and create ritual around the wheel of the year transitions - providing medicine for healing on so many levels.

Popular modern thinkers and authors such as Joseph Campbell, carl Jung, Robert Johnson, Merlin Stone, Starhawk and Shinoda Bolin have explored these archetypes of the collective unconscious mind of humanity and have found that Earth based traditions share these archetypal figures across the diversity of the globe.

The importance of modern humans to re-allign themselves with the cycles of Earth and the seasons could mean our very survival as a species or even as a planet.

My Scholarly Autobiography