THE WAY OF THE SPIRIT

Chapter 2 Part 4
If you have not already done so, please read the beginning parts of this book before reading this part.
SHADOWS
The man looks into the bushes and sees a rabbit. Slowly, so as not to startle it, he reaches for the throwing stick tucked into his loincloth. With a snap of his arm and wrist he throws. His aim is true and he steps over and picks up - - - a stone.
His sister looks into a pnd and deep within it sees a fish. She eases her hand slowly into the water, fingers widely spread. Quick as she can she grasps and lifts from the water - - - a leaf.
They return home and around the hearth that night they tell of the magic rabbit that turned to stone and the fish that became a leaf.
The people touch the stone and lift the leaf and murmur in wonder.
But the stone was always a stone and the leaf was blown into the pond by the wind.
The eyes saw truly and only in the mind did the stone become a rabbit and the leaf a fish. The eyes look and see a piece of wood, sinew and a bundle of reeds. The mind looks through the eyes and says,"Ah. A bow and a bundle of fine bird arrows."
But the bow IS wood. Is it really a bow or part of a tree? Is the sinew really a bowstring or part of a deers leg? Are the reeds arrows or the stems of water plants?
And IS the tree really just a tree? Is it not part of the earth on which it stands? Is the Earth part of the sky through which it moves? Is the sky part of - WHAT?
So the eyes of the soul see and perceive truly, but the mind makes what they see into something else. As the hunter wished to see a rabbit and his sister a fish, so the mind wishes to see what can be touched by the hands.
But the hands can touch only the tree. They cannot touch the soul of the tree, and so the mind pretends that it is not there - and yet it is.
The eyes of your soul perceive the soul of the tree and know it as a part of itself since the beginning of time.
It is good to look outward and see the physical world, but it is sometimes good to look inward and see with the eyes of the soul.
I tell you now. Unless you sometimes turn your eyes within you will see stones as rabbits and leaves as fish.
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As children, we were constantly told to stop daydreaming and see things as they really are. If we take this advice however, we will find ourselves seeing only a small part, the physical part, of things. Since the physical is only temporary and the spiritual eternal, I leave it to you to judge what is real.`
The tendency to translate spiritual truths into physical terms is an all too human failing. We must learn that even as our ohysical eyes have spiritual counterparts, so does our mind, operating through the brain, have a spiritual counterpart operating through the soul. Few of us have much experience in its use, but perhaps it is time we learned.
Logic will serve you well in the everyday world and I certainly am not telling you to abandon it. You will find however, that if you try to use it in matters of the soul, it will lead you so far astra that you will, as did those in the tale, see stones as rabbits and leaves as fish.
Try phrasing spiritual questions very strongly. Direct the question inward with all the emotion you can muster, then dismiss it from your mind. In the midst of your everyday activity, you will suddenly KNOW. If you are alert to it, this sort of direct knowledge will often come to you, even when you are not consciously aware that you had sought it.
Trust such knowledge. It may have an immediate application in physical life, then again it may be ,"wishta hei", cloud like knowledge. Wishta hei knowledge will, when you try to translate it with the part of your mind devoted to every day activity, change shape. Twisting and turning, constantly showing different faces wisps of it drifting here and there. It will be as difficult to translate as it would be to grasp a cloud. Play with it if you wish. Our spiritual activity needs playfulness in it. Don't fret. Our spiritual mind sees it clearly and knows well what to do with it. It will, insofar as possibel, translate those parts of it that are useful to the physical mind.
Please allow me a personal observation here. Whenever someone presents an idea to me about which I am doubtful, I apply my own test. Make a joke about it. If it puffs up like a toad and appears pompous and indignant, stick a pin in it and cast it aside. The deflated idea is useless at best and harful at the worst. I am firmly convinced that the Creator loves a joke. His being grows in our joy and laughter.
Be forever alert however, not to use humor as a weapon to hurt others. Punch someones nose and it will heal. Harm someones sense of worth or pride in self and you may well warp their lives.
The Nanina always took care, especially in the case of children, not to harm anothers pride. The next tale will illustrate this.
TO BE CONTINUED.

THE WAY OF THE SPIRIT Chapter 2- part 3

The following tale is perhaps my favorite of all Story Tellers tales and, as with all of them, it is deceptively simple, carrying a lot of wisdom in only a few words. If you haven't already read the first parts of this book, please scroll down and do so before reading this

AWARENESS

The foot walks. It knows itself but it does not know why it walks or where it walks. It knows the earth on which it walks, but only the part where it presently stands. It knows that it sometimes steps high but it does not know why. It is unaware of the branch lying on the ground which it steps over. It turns this way or that but knows nothing of the rocks and brush it walks around. It bears a burden but does not know that this burden is the body, of which it is a part. It is good to walk, and that is enough. It walks to the hearthstone.
The hand reaches out for the food lying on the hearth. It knows nothing of food and does not know how it came to the hearthstone or why it reaches out.. It is good to reach out and pick up. That is enough.
The mouth tastes the food with its tongue and chews it with its teeth. It knows nothing of the foot which brought it here, or the hand which places the food within it. It does not know where the food came from or where it goes when it is swallowed. It is good to taste and chew. That is enough.
The eye sees all these things but does not know how it sees, or what the things it sees mean. It sees the branch and rocks but cannot direct the foot around them. It sees the food, but cannot direct the hand to pick it up and place it in the mouth. It is good to see. That is enough.
The mind feels the earth beneath the foot and sees the obstacles before it. It directs the foot to step over and walk around. It sees the food and knows what it is. It tells the hand to reach out. It tastes the food with the tongue and chews it with the teeth. It knows where the food goes and why it eats that food. It knows all these thing but - somehow - it is not enough.
For when the foot rests and the tongue lies softly in the bed of the mouth; when the hand rests gently on the thigh of your beloved and all the body lies on the soft fragrant grass of your bed, the mind does not rest. It looks this way and that, seeking something more.
Like a coyote on the trail of a rabbit, it twists and turns this way and that, in and out of the bushes of its thoughts; and as it seeks, the very object of its search walks behind it, whispering softly, " I am here. I am here".
I tell you now; Turn the eyes of your mind away from the branch and the hearth. See not the foot, or the hand, or the mouth. Turn and look within. Look into the eyes of your soul, for there you will find You.

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The words of these tales are the words I remember at the hearthstone of Story Teller. They are not my words - or are they? How can I remember when I was not there - or was I? Like Story Teller I leave spaces between the lines of my thoughts. Fill them in as you will.
One word however is my own and that is the title, for Story Tellers tales have no titles of their own. If you do not approve of my choices, feel free to substitute your own.
Remember that these tales are oral because the Nanina had no written language. Tribal history and genealogy were carried in the head of the Story Teller. "Story Teller" served as both name and title and there was a new one each generation.
Being oral, the tales are meant for the ear. Read them aloud. Try getting a few friends or family member together and take turns reading them. I think you will enjoy them more that way. Use your own gestures and vocal effects. Story Teller will approve. They were meant to be passed on in that way.
The previous tale pointed out some of the problems of physical perceptions. The following tale warns of the interpretation of those perceptions in the mind.

TO BE CONTNUED.

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THE WAY OF THE SPIRIT - Chapter 2 - part 2

Know your Soul - part 2
As promised, here are my comments on the foregoing tale as given in my book. If you haven't already read the first parts of the book, please scroll down and do so now.

Before commenting, let me set up the "ground rules". It would be tedious indeed to preface every remark with "The Nanina believe" or " I think", therefore I will state each thing as though it were a fact. Whether you accept it as such or only as something to think about is up to you. Let me however as you not to think it to death. Just sort of try it on for size. See if it feels right. Learn to know what you know without knowing how you know.
Your soul is not only immortal in the future, as many already believe, but in both directions. You not only always will be but always were. Your soul exists within the Creator and always has. Your soul, and thus you, are a very real part of the Creators being. We are immortal indeed!
Then what do we (in the sense the word is usually used) represent? We are the eyes and ears of the Creator in the physical world. Our task is to create in flesh and matter, thereby adding to the being of the Creator, for he becomes greater and will never cease growing. (Note. The Creator is neither male nor female but a perfect balance of both. Seperation of the sexes was adopted as one of the laws of physical reality and does not exist in the spiritual realm. I find, however, that the English language has no personal pronoun to express this other that it, which I find completely inappropriate. Reluctantly I follow tradition and use the masculine he)
We need have no fear of being destroyed by the Creator at some hypotheticl end of the world or swallowed up, thereby losing our individuality, for we always were and always will be, even after the end of time.
Time itself (at least as we know it) was a creation in order to make physical existence easier to handle. Imagine trying to juggle past, present and future, with all the meriad choices, actions, joys and sorrows in some eternal "now" and you will see the necessity of "our" time.
The physical earth was not created out of thin air like some cellestial magic trick but constructed through us, out of our collective souls; which, don't forget, are part of the Creators very being. It seems somehow fitting that the eath, which was to be our home, was constructed of our very substance. The earth, thus made physical, in turn gave birth to the bodies which we wear, so that we may directly experience physical reality rather than being merely observers. If we are to create in flesh and matter it follows that we must be flesh and matter during our time here.
Everything that we see is essentially a part of our souls made physical and therefore sentient and aware of itself and of its source - us. The idea that the earth itself is alive has been adopted by many people, not a few of whom are scientists.
How are we to determine the truth or falsity of these ideas? We already do know. We have only to remember by temporarily removing our attention from our physical surroundings and returning to the knowledge of our souls. I do not refer to faith but to knowing because we remember.
Story Tellers next tale may help you understand. It will be posted next week.

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THE WAY OF THE SPIRIT Chapter 2 Part 1

This part of the book contains the first actual communication I received from Story Teller. I am always struck by the poetic nature of his stories. Several of the Nanina beliefs about how the world was created do not fit any mold I know of yet they fit in so well with modern Quantum Physics which states that nothing exists without a perception of it, that it is startling. In my book, my comments follow immediately after the tale but I believe I will hold them off till the following post so that the reader may form their own oppinions before hearing mine. Remember, I welcome questions and comments and will post any that seem appropriate.
IF YOU HAVE NOT ALREADY READ THE FIRST PARTS OF THIS BOOK, PLEASE DO SO NOW.


The Way of the Spirit - Chapter 2 Know Your Soul part 1
These are the tales told at the hearthstone of Story Teller. How do I know? I know because I remember. I remember as you would remember something that happened when you were very young.
When I feel the memories stirring I put pen to paper and write them as I remember tham, never knowing where the stories will end and often not even what the next word will be.
His stories mean whatever they mean to you. In the Nanina manner he leaves room between the lines for you to fill in; but to har them prperly you must learn, as I did, to know what you know without knowing how you know.
CREATION
You are eternal. Before time was, you were, and when time ends you still shall be. You were with the Creator at the beginning of time, dancing with joy and clapping your hands in delight as the shiny new toy came into being. Our mother the earth HIYEI HYASU, mother of all. Your spiritual hands helped the Creator to draw up the hills and mountains just so and placed the grass and trees to clothe and beautify her body.
Your spiritual fingers poked into the earth here and there and traced the lines that ran between the hills, and water filled them and flowed. You scooped out great depresions and water flowed into them and became the sea.
Then the Creator taught you to draw water from the sea and put it into the air as clouds, and to make the air move as wind to move the clouds about so that the water would fall on the grass and trees and flow into the rivers, ponds and lakes, and they would run forever and the earth and her children would have food and drink.
All of these things came out of your soul and knew themselves and knew their source; and HIYEI HYASU, mother of all, was alive and bore children. Fish swam in the water and birds flew in the air. Animals walked the surface of the earth and even deep within the Earth was life, and it knew itself and found joy in its being.
And you, engrossed in your new plaything, drew closer and closer untill a part of your soul became physical; and the earth, which you helped to create, gave you birth.
The larger part of your soul remained with and in the Creator and now looks out through your physical eyes as you walk and create in flesh and matter.
As a child playing in the sand forgets itself in the patterns it is creating with shells and shiny pebbles, so do you forget yourselves in the patterns of your physical existence.
But the child will soon enough remember. Then it will abandon its playthings and turn homeward till tomorrows play brings new patterns and new delights.
I tell you now. REMEMBER. Return to your soul for it is who you are.

THE WAY OF THE SPIRIT - First contact, part 3

If any of my readers care to comment on this book from this point on I will post selected comments to be read here. I reserve the right to choose which to publish in order to keep the discusion on track. I also reserve the right to shorten them if necessay but I will not change any words. If you haven't already read the first two parts of this book please do so now.



THE WAY OF THE SPIRIT - First Contact part 2
The harsh dry wind had turned gentle, carrying the fragrance of lush growth. I was standing in waist high grass, some sort of wild grain. All around me the hills were covered in vegetation, waving in the breeze like a verdant sea. Brooks bubbled in the tiny valleys between the hills, marked by bands of trees along their banks. The parched depresions had become ponds and small lakes, flashing and sparkling in the sun.
Scattered about these ponds in groups of three to half a dozen were rounded huts made of willow hoops and thatched with grass. The nearest group was at the foot of the hill on which I stood. Each hut had its own firepit with a neatly swept stone hearth next to it. Some were in use and wisps of smoke rose from these as women dressed only in leather skirts knelt beside them cooking. Men and women squatted here and there talking and laughing, and around and between them in splendid confusion ran laughing children and barking dogs.
Never had I seen skin the tone of theirs; not the coppery brown of the American Indian, nor the lighter brown of the Oriental and certainly not the color of the deeply tanned Caucasian. These people had skin that could only be called golden. I thought, incongruously, that this was what the rich "beautiful people" tried so hard for but never quite achieved. The hair of these golden people ranged from dark brown to almost blond.
As I stood there in wonder and bewilderment, my eyes were drawn to one man in particular. Medium in height, he wore only a loincloth and leather headband to keep his shoulder length hair under control. All in all, he appeared no different from any of the others.
Storyteller (how did I know his name?) kept the oral history of his tribe in his head and at night entertained any who cared to come to his hearth with stories both traditional and made up on the spot. How did I know that?
As I looked, he turned toward me, palm uplifted in greeting. With a shock I realized that even as I looked at him with my eyes I was somehow seeing myself through his.
The I was again standing, grasping the gouged picnic table top and staring at a salt pan full of alkali. - the bare bones of what had moments before been a lake.
Most of the rest of that day I sat there, my thoughts buzzing like gnats - never quite lighting, ,just going around in aimless circles. I remember thinkig ruefully that whatever the store put in that coffee it could bring a fortune in certain circles.
Eventually I pushed the experience to the back of my mind, as we will with things we can't understand, and in time it became a sort of secret treasure to be taken out and examined from time to time and then packed carefully away again.
When the sun sank low I resumed my journey to Oklahoma to visit my sister. Soon after I arrived I found myself looking at land for sale, something I had not considered before (at least consciously)
Well, I thought, it would be a pleasant place to live once a house was up. My son was grown and happily married with a life of his own, and I had a small income from my Navy retirement. I supposed I had as much right to be a middle aged crazy as the next man. So I became the proud owner of 40 acres on Goats Bluff in the beautiful green hills of Eastern Oklahoma.
My conscious plan was to grow as much as possible of my own food on some cleared land and become one of the growing number of self sufficient homesteaders, but it soon becme apparent that more was going on here than I had bargained for.
The first year was given to clearing brush and stumps and building a small, house that I changed e few years later for a log cabin.
Half way down the North slope of my ridge is a sandstone outcropping, and I found myself drawn there often to sit and daydream. I know now the importance the Nanina place on dreaming, but at the time it just seemed a good place to relax. Often I thought of my experience in New Mexico and wondered what it meant. There is a natural seat on the stone and it seems to have the peculiar property of easing aches and pains with what I presumed was the stored heat from the sun. As I sat there one day, easing a back aching from pulling stumps, my thoughts turned to Storyteller and that peculiar double vision. Almost immediately I felt a jolt where my back rested against the stone as though I had touched a bare electric wire but there is no electricity anywhere near my North slope.
In the same instant a voice spoke loudly. I am certain that the voice was in my ears and not in my mind. The words were strange and had no meaning for me at the time
"Nanina ishtahei". I had heard my first words in the language of the Nanina - a language that had not been heard on Earth in three thousand years, though I did not know it then.
Now I had two experiences to worry over and I chewed at them like a dog with a bone.
Weeks went by with no further happenings. On the one hand I was relieved, but on the other I felt as though I were in quicksand and the only way out was to go farther in, hoping to feel solid ground under my feet.
Then one day as I was working in my new field, I heard the voice again, this time less dramatically for I knew that it came from somewhere in the deep recesses of my own mind. It was Storytellers voice, this time in strangely accented English. "The people are like stone". I knew this was a translation of "Nanina ishtahei" and I also knew, don't ask how, that it signified, "The people are one".
This knowing without knowing how I know was strange to me at the time. It became more frequent, though never commonplace, as time went on.
One more word the voice spoke, "REMEMBER", and now it is my task to remember so that you may remember. REMEMBER the Nanina.
TO BE CONTINUED

THE WAY OF THE SPIRIT - continued

My original title for this book was, The Way of the Nanina but my editor insisted on the present title, even though there were already several books by that name. I wish now I had stuck to my guns but I had never been published and felt it was important to get this book into circulation. My publisher ran off a large batch of copies and promptly went bankrupt. I like to think it wasn't my fault ;-) so I never collected a penny in royalties but that doesn't bother me. Those who are supposed to read it will find a copy somehow.


THE WAY OF THE SPIRIT -First Contact part 1
Some years ago I found myself driving across New Mexico on my way from San Diego to Oklahoma.
As I neared the high plains, I felt the urge to turn off onto a small road. Checking the road atlas I saw that a series of small country roads would lead me in the right direction. I told myself I was bored with the easy but monotonous interstate highway I had been travelling. Ah how we twist and stretch to make the promptings of our soul fit the practical, no-nonsense attitude of modern humanity. Now I need no such excuses. This much at least the Nanina have taught me.
After over 50 miles of travel with no sign of a town, or even sight of a house, and with my gas gauge too close to empty for comfort, I came into a small settlement consisting of one gas station, a dusty store, and perhaps a dozen houses. Gratefully I filled my tank. I bought a loaf of bread, some lunch meat and filled my thermos with coffee. There was a three stool counter where I could have had a bowl of that wonderfully spicy New Mexico chile, but something prompted me to stop somehere at the side of the road to eat. Had I ignored those promptings, my life would never have taken the turn it has.
A few miles from town I found a picnic table, seemingly set up in the middle of nowhere.
As I turned off the engine the silence struck me with a shock. No birds sang or flew in the sky. No horses or cattle cropped the sparse buffalo grass. The sigh of the ever present high plains wind accentuated rather than broke the silence.
A strange prickling sensation made the hair on my arms and the back of my neck stand up, but I reassured myself that it was only the unaccustomed desolation.
As I sat there eating, I read the inevitable graffiti scratched and carved into the table top - Paco 78 - Harry and Alice were here - the common persons one shot at immortality.
Sipping the last of my coffee I looked about me. As far as the eye could see were low, rolling hills; bare brown earth with here and there a dusting of buffalo grass. In the small valleys between the hills deep gullies had been gouged by the infrequent but violent rains. Many of them terminated in shallow depresions crusted with the salt and alkali left behind when the thirsty winds sucked out the water.
I twisted the top onto my thermos and got to my feet. Suddenly dizzy, I grasped the edge of the table for support. I heard the thermos thud to the ground. Everything seemed dim and hazy, as though the sun was slowly going out. I seemed unable to focus on anything. I remember thinking,"Oh great. I'm about to pass out and there hasn't been a car along since I got here".
Children laughing? Dogs barking? Was I hallucinating? Then as my vision cleared I thought I had lost my mind.
TO BE CONTINUED If you haven't read the first part of this book please do so before reading this part.

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THE WAY OF THE SPIRIT - introduction

Those who have read some of my wacky humor and (I hope) enjoyed it may find this book quite a departure. I take no credit for the wisdom it contains as you will see if you continue to read it. It was a given book. Somehow a connection was made which enabled it to be passed on from a Story Teller of a tribe that lived on the North American continent three thousand years ago. I was merely the scribe. I truly believe you will find comfort in reading and discussing it.


THE WAY OF THE SPIRIT - Billy Whiskers
Copyright 1990
I am Nan. A word which means a person apart. The very concept of a loner was bewildering to the people I remember; the gentle Nanina. It was to them as though a foot were to live and walk about without being part of a body.
Yet, strangely, I must be Nan in order to properly remember them, for a memory 3,000 years old can stand few distractions.
They were a beautiful, wise and gentle people with a natural grace that the world hungers for today. I see their dust blow past in the wind and know that their legacy is a memory in one mind alone. This must not be!
So now I give their memory into your keeping. Do with it as you will, but remember the Nanina.
I weep as I write these words but not for the Nanina, for their lives were full and their days were joyful. The were ishtahei (like a stone) and complete in a way the world has forgotten. Their lives poured from their very souls and the words of their souls were uttered by their mortal mouths.
TO BE CONTINUED

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