Honoring the Spirits of the Home

Shamanism is a way of perceiving the nature of the universe in a way that incorporates the normally invisible world where the spirits of all material things dwell. Shamans have different terms and phrases for the unseen world, but most of them clearly imply that it is the realm where the spirits of the land, animals, ancestors, and other spiritual entities dwell. Spirit encompasses all the immaterial forms of life energy that surround us. We are woven together into a net of life energies that are all around us. These energies can appear to us in different forms, such as spirits of the land or spirits of the home. Spirits of the home are the spirits that inhabit our place of refuge: where we live, where we work and where we play. These kinds of spirits share our homes with us and help us in our times of need.
 

Honoring the spirits that share our homes is important for our well-being. House spirits in many ways are the heart of the house itself and can affect the home's atmosphere as well as influencing the occupant’s moods and physical health. All homes have spirits, and in many cases there are layers of spirits. Spirits of the home are the echoes of people, of events, of ideas which have become imprinted upon a location, for better or for worse. House spirits may manifest as vague feelings or impressions associated with an area, but more often they appear with a clear physical form. Spirits of the home may be the manifestation of a home's spirit or they may be a spirit that is strongly tied to a home, but either way they have the ability to influence a person or family's luck, health, and mood. Most homes will have several different spirits associated with them, usually at least one with the home itself and in homes with an attached yard possibly more.
 

Honoring the spirits of a home is much easier than most people realize. It requires being open and aware of their presence without judgment or expectation. Know that the spirits are there and acknowledge their presence. Be respectful of them in word and action. Here are some good ways to honor the spirits of your home:
 

Cleanse Your Home
 

Honoring the spirits of your home begins with cleansing your abode. Your house holds the energies of all your emotional ups and downs. It collects the energies of all of your houseguests, domestic disputes, family emergencies, holidays, and so on. Picking up negative energy that is not ours can make us less balanced and can cause blockages to the natural flow of energy in our body. We may feel tired, unbalanced, anxious, depressed or even sick. The most important thing you can do is to smudge yourself and your home each day. Smudging is a method of using smoke from burning herbs to dispel negative energy. Sage, cedar and sweetgrass are traditionally used for smudging. To smudge, light the dried herbs in a fire-resistant receptacle, and then blow out the flames. Then use a feather or your hands to fan the smoke around your body and home. I recommend cracking a window or door for ventilation and for releasing unwanted energies.
 

Bless Your Home
 

Blessing a home, similar to cleansing one, is merely working to keep certain energies flowing within the house. We perform blessings on our homes to attract harmony, happiness, and prosperity to our dwelling and that can be done as often as we feel the need to. Many shamanic practitioners recommend the use of holy or consecrated water for blessing a home. The practice of charging water with intention, words, and sound is widely practiced in indigenous cultures throughout the world. In fact, people have believed in our ability to influence water since the days of antiquity. The Christian tradition is the obvious example, with the ongoing performing of rituals that turn regular water into holy water. Essentially, holy water is water with salt added during a rite of blessing. Learn how to make your own consecrated water, and use it for cleansing, protection and blessing. Pour some holy water into a spray bottle. To bless and protect your home, spray holy water around the perimeter of your dwelling and yard. You can also incorporate an incantation or spoken prayer into your blessing. This can be as simple as saying, "I bless this home with happiness. I bless this home with love. I bless this home with prosperity…"
 

Make Offerings to the Spirits
 

Offerings are a beautiful way to acknowledge and honor your household spirits. Giving and receiving are an essential part of any relationship. Anything can be used as an offering, but food is common in many cultures across the world. A simple way to incorporate food as an offering is to simply leave a portion of your meal for the spirits near the hearth or on an altar. An altar is any structure upon which we place offerings and sacred objects that have spiritual or cosmological significance. It represents the center and axis of your sacred space. A simple altar can be created with a cloth, a candle and other symbols that mean something to you. Offerings can be made weekly, monthly or annually and might include fresh flowers, herbs, incense, fruits, milk, or wine. The offerings serve as an acknowledgement and sign of gratitude for the spirits presence and beneficial activity.
 

Listen to the Spirits
 

Developing a relationship with your house and its spirit is very important for your home is your sanctuary; it keeps you safe and warm and protected from the elements. Let your home speak to you. As shamanic practitioners, we are often able to hear things that others cannot. And we know that it is not uncommon for spirits to speak up when they want something specific. Our houses can be the same way. Take some time to sit quietly in your house and listen to it. Be open to communication and let it tell you what color walls it was happiest with, what kind of music it prefers, or what holiday traditions it was fondest of; and let these messages guide your offerings.

 

As with any relationship it takes time and effort to build a connection with your house spirit, but it is worthwhile. Most home spirits are more open to human connection than the spirits of the land. Keep in mind that spirits choose to come into relationship with the person seeking. You can seek a connection, but the spirits must choose. Respect and connection to spirits is what makes for an authentic relationship, which is what the shamanic practitioner yearns for in a society that has severed itself from nature and spirit. Humans have lost touch with the spirit world and the wisdom of inner knowing. The spirits, however, have not forgotten us. They are calling us to a path of environmental sanity, to rejoining the miraculous cycle of nature.

Healing with Acoustic Resonance

Drumming is a profound way to promote healing. Through acoustic resonance, drumming helps restore the vibrational integrity of body, mind, and spirit. Acoustic resonance is the ability of a sound wave to impart its energy to a substance such as air, wood, metal, or the human body, making it vibrate in sympathy. For example, when you tap a tuning fork in proximity to another one of the same tone, both will vibrate. Acoustic resonance is an important consideration for instrument builders, as most acoustic instruments use resonators, such as the strings and body of a violin, the length of tube in a flute, and the shape of a drum membrane. A single-headed frame or hoop drum works best for acoustic resonance healing--the larger the drum, the greater the resonance.
 

The drum is a powerful tool for healing. As we play the drum, the drum then plays our bodies. The various frequencies of the drum interact with our own resonant frequencies, forming new harmonic alignments. Through the natural law of resonance, the sound waves produced by the drum impart their energy to the resonating systems of the body, mind and spirit, making them vibrate in sympathy. When we drum, our living flesh, brainwaves and spiritual energy centers entrain or synchronize to the sound waves and rhythms. This sympathetic resonance has the following key effects:
 

1. It produces deeper self-awareness by inducing synchronous brain activity. Research has demonstrated that the physical transmission of rhythmic energy to the brain synchronizes the two cerebral hemispheres. When the logical left hemisphere and the intuitive right hemisphere begin to pulsate in harmony, the inner guidance of intuitive knowing can then flow unimpeded into conscious awareness. The ability to access unconscious information through symbols and imagery facilitates psychological integration and a reintegration of self. Drumming also synchronizes the frontal and lower areas of the brain, integrating nonverbal information from lower brain structures into the frontal cortex, producing feelings of insight, understanding, integration, certainty, conviction, and truth, which surpass ordinary understandings and tend to persist long after the experience, often providing foundational insights for religious and cultural traditions.
 

2. It releases negative feelings, blockages, and emotional trauma. Drumming can help people express and address emotional issues. Unexpressed feelings and emotions can form energy blockages. The physical stimulation of drumming removes blockages and produces emotional release. Sound vibrations resonate through every cell in the body, stimulating the release of negative cellular memories.
 

3. It accesses the entire brain. The reason rhythm is such a powerful tool is that it permeates the entire brain. Vision for example is in one part of the brain, speech another, but acoustic resonance penetrates the whole brain. The sound of drumming generates dynamic neuronal connections in all parts of the brain even where there is significant damage or impairment such as in Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD). According to Michael Thaut, director of Colorado State University's Center for Biomedical Research in Music, "Rhythmic cues can help retrain the brain after a stroke or other neurological impairment, as with Parkinson’s patients...." The more connections that can be made within the brain, the more integrated our experiences become.
 

4. It induces natural altered states of consciousness. Rhythmic drumming induces altered states, which have a wide range of therapeutic applications. A landmark study by Barry Quinn, Ph.D. demonstrates that even a brief drumming session can double alpha brain wave activity, dramatically reducing stress. The brain changes from Beta waves (focused concentration and activity) to Alpha waves (calm and relaxed), producing feelings of euphoria and well-being. Alpha activity is associated with meditation, shamanic trance, and integrative modes of consciousness.
 

5. It helps us to experience being in resonance with the natural rhythms of life. Rhythm and resonance order the natural world. Dissonance and disharmony arise only when we limit our capacity to resonate totally and completely with the rhythms of life. The origin of the word rhythm is Greek meaning "to flow." We can learn to flow with the rhythms of life by simply learning to feel the beat, pulse, or groove while drumming. When drummers feel this rhythmic flow, especially at a slower, steady beat, they can shift into a state of deep relaxation and expanded awareness. It is a way of bringing the essential self into accord with the flow of a dynamic, interrelated universe, helping us feel connected rather than isolated and estranged.

Climate-Endangered Tribe Sues Louisiana

By now, you're likely well aware of the climate crisis and its significant dangers to Indigenous communities the world over. The problem is especially magnified on islands and in coastal regions, where sea level rise can wipe away traditional homelands and make climate refugees of those who have been displaced. That's true even right here in the United States, where hundreds of Native communities -- in South Dakota, Alaska, Florida, Hawai'i, Washington, and Louisiana -- face existential threats.
 

And now, the first community to supposedly be moved from harm's way -- the Jean Charles Choctaw Nation -- is facing a new set of problems. Just before the new year, the tribe filed a landmark civil rights complaint with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) against the state of Louisiana. In 2016, HUD granted Louisiana $48 million in aid to resettle the tribe. But, its complaint asserts, Louisiana failed to properly implement the grant and has ethnically and racially discriminated, violated tribal sovereignty, excluded cultural components central to a proper relocation program, and provided poor replacement housing.
 

The Jean Charles Choctaw Nation has resided on the Isle de Jean Charles for five generations, since the ancestors of its citizens escaped the Trail of Tears in the early 1830s amid President Andrew Jackson's Indian Removal Act. Its homelands and burial grounds are located in a region facing perpetual devastation and erosion by storms and sea level rise. Since 1955, the Jean Charles Choctaw Nation has lost over 98 percent of its lands to the encroaching ocean.
 

It's also worth noting that the tribe is located in Terrebonne Parish, a region notorious for oil extraction, high pollution rates, and environmental justice violations. The Parish and over 90 percent of its property are largely controlled by non-local fossil fuel and chemical companies. The infamous "Cancer Alley" is just upstream.
 

By filing its complaint with HUD, the Jean Charles Choctaw Nation is looking to the federal agency to investigate the grant-funded resettlement program, currently run by Louisiana's Office of Community Development (OCD). The tribe hopes HUD will order OCD to respect tribal needs and authority as the program's implementation proceeds. The lawsuit is also significant in that, while the tribe has state recognition from Louisiana, it does not have federal recognition, which would extend access to more grants, disaster assistance, and various legal powers -- including constitutional protections and self-governance recognized by the United States.