The concept of Tribe has become synonymous with simple mindedness and savagery. It is, in truth, the ultimate in civilized behavior.I am filled with this concept of the Tribal Soul, the part of us that longs for community, knows it’s deep level importance and carries the blueprint for making it work.
Within us we all carry something called The Tribal Soul.
It is the part of us that protects all children because we know that an injury of any kind to any child injures all children ...
- the part of us that respects those of same gender because we see our own beauty, our weakness, our own experience of living in our sister’s or brother’s eyes, the part that knows that betrayal of our same sex is a betrayal of self in a very real way and impacts those of opposite gender as well...
- the part of us that respects those of opposite gender as great mysterious beings on a road we will never travel in this lifetime...
- the part of us that respects our elders because we know that the real heroes are those who have lived a full and good life without hesitation, who have learned patience, acceptance and how to live in inner stillness, who have learned to lose and win with grace, who have learned to guide without manipulation or force and whether or not our old ones have mastered these arts, we respect them for a lifetime of trying, we respect them because we are trying and know the challenge...
- the part of us that celebrates both the triumphs and mistakes made by ourselves and others with equal hilarity and equal attention because we honor the process of living and know ourselves as one people, one entity within which each and every action impacts the whole...
The great ache that we feel, that we hear in love songs and see in films is not for one other perfect mate but for the Tribal Soul. The disappointment that we find, as marriage settles in to living and the age of 40something rolls upon us, is not just in ourselves, our jobs or our compromised vision but also for the lack of Tribal Soul. There is no one Being, job or static opinion that can fill that place.
Many say knowledge is the enemy. Knowledge is not the enemy - ignorance is. It is the intellectualization of experience that makes us weak and unable to connect to the Tribal Self.
When the seasons reign and people live, dream, make love, birth, grow and die in each other’s presence, when each day we see each other and face ourselves in the eyes of our tribe the connecting web is strong and sensitive. It enables the people to respond to crisis, to revel in celebration, to mourn when needed . . . . to turn together like a flock of birds.
When any event happens the people must gather to hear the stories. Each must see it through the eyes of the children, the old, the mothers, the warriors, the teachers, the healers and the artists.
We must make time to hear the stories.
The Mother Lodge awakens the Tribal Soul. I remember . . .
Lady Guardian Deer said...
ReplyDeleteMany years ago, I thought I knew what 'community' was. Through experiencing the teachings of The Mother Lodge, I have begun to experience real community. I now am blessed to experience what it feels like, no, what it IS, to be part of the human web.
To truly begin to SEE every person as a Sacred Human, to begin to LEARN that Compassion for all humans doesn't mean that I even have to like them, and to KNOW that every thing I do or say travels outward from me like the ripples from a stone dropped in a pond and has IMPACT on all that it has contact with and that I am impacted by others. To me that is part of what community and the Tribal Soul is.