Because 80% of the World’s population cannot afford Western
high-tech medicine, indigenous traditions still collectively play an important
global health-care role - so much so that the World Health Organization recommended
that they be integrated into national health-care policies and programs.
☥ Wholistic Supernal ☥
considers indigenous healing
traditions.
Common themes, such as spirituality and nature’s key roles,
often exist in many of the world’s geographically diverse traditions,
especially among those with more ancient origins. Ancient wisdom often has much
contemporary validity.
Indigenous Medicine: Much of the world’s foods and
medicines have Indigenous origins. For example, more than 200 Native-American
herbal medicines have been listed at one time or another in the US
Pharmacopoeia; many modern drugs have botanical origins in these medicines.
Spiritual Connections: A major difference between traditional Indigenous and
conventional medicine concerns the role of spirit and connection. Indigenous
medicine considers spirit an inseparable element of healing. Not only is the
patient’s spirit important but the spirit of the healer, the patient’s family,
community, and environment, and the medicine, itself. More importantly, healing
must take in account the dynamics between these spiritual forces as a part of
the universal spirit.
Instead of modern medicine’s view of separation that focuses
on fixing unique body parts in distinct individuals separate from each other
and the environment, the traditions of Indigenous People believe we are all
synergistically part of a whole that is greater than the sum of the parts;
healing must be considered within this context.
Basically, the fundamental goal of all indigenous healing is
to establish a better spiritual equilibrium between patients and their
universe, which, in turn, translates into physical and mental health. In the
case of a traumatic injury, re-establishing this spiritual equilibrium is often
much more challenging.
Disability: The idea of wholeness is paramount in
understanding Indigenous perception of disability. Unlike many cultures that
shun people with disabilities, Indigenous People honor and respect them. They
believe that a person weak in body is often blessed by the Creator as being
especially strong in mind and spirit. By reducing our emphasis on the physical,
which promotes our view of separation from our fellow man and all that is, a
greater sense of connection with the whole is created, the ultimate source of
strength.
Distinguishing Features: In addition to these overarching
philosophical differences, there are many other features that distinguish Indigenous
from Western medicine.
In Honoring the Medicine: The Essential Guide to Native
American Healing, recently selected as the National Multiple Sclerosis
Society’s Wellness Book of the Year, Kenneth “Bear Hawk” Cohen summarizes some
of theses features.
Healing Approaches
Plants: Because of the Indigenous Peoples’ intimate
relationship with nature, many therapies emphasize plants, including: many herbal remedies; tobacco, the herb of prayer used to communicate with the spiritual world and
nature; and smudge, a purification procedure in which a plant’s aromatic smoke cleanses
an area of negative energies, thoughts, feelings, and spirits.
Prayer: Wholistic Indigenous prayer concentrates the mind on healing,
promotes health-enhancing emotions and feelings, and connects people to sacred
healing forces.
Ceremony: Indigenous ceremonies incorporate a variety of
healing modalities into a ritualized context for seeking spiritual guidance.
“...at one time in their history, all cultures have had
beneficial healing ceremonies; unfortunately, most modern, white-culture
ceremonies have become so sterile they are not conducive for healing.”
~ Dr. Mehl-Madrona
Self-Identificaion
Instead of offering a definition, Article 33 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples underlines the importance of self-identification- that Indigenous Peoples themselves definte their own identity as indigenous.
Article 33 of the United Nations Declation of the RIghts of Indigenous Peoples
1. Indigenous Peoples have the right to determine their own identity or membership in accordance with their customs and traditions. This does not impair the right of indigenous individuals to obtain citizenship of the States in which they live.
2. Indigenous Peoples have the right to determine the structures and to select the membership of their institutions in accordance with their own procedures.
It is sometimes argued that all Africans are indigenous to Africa and that by separating Africa into indigenous and non-indigenous groups, separate classes of citizens are being created with different rights. The same argument is made in many parts of Asia.
In these regions the focus should be more on recent approaches focusing on self-definition as indigenous and on being distinctly different from other groups within a state; on a special attachment to and use of their traditional land whereby ancestral and cultural survival as peoples; on an experience of subjugation, marginalization, dispossession, exclusion or discrimination because these peoples have different cultures,m ways of life or modes of production than the national hegemonic and dominant model.
Earth, Teach Me
Earth teach me quiet ~
as the grasses are still with new light.
Earth teach me suffering ~
as old stones suffer with memory.
Earth teach me humility ~
as blossoms are humble with beginning.
Earth teach me caring ~
as mothers nurture their young.
Earth teach me courage ~
as the tree that stands alone.
Earth teach me limitation ~
as the ant that crawls on the ground.
Earth teach me freedom ~
as the eagle that soars in the sky.
Earth teach me acceptance ~
as the leaves that die each fall.
Earth teach me renewal ~
as the seed that rises in the spring.
Earth teach me to forget myself ~
as melted snow forgets its life.
Earth teach me to remember kindness ~
as dry fields weep with rain.
- An Ute Prayer
☥ SUPERNAL ALLIANCE ☥
A union of wholistic health practitioners
committed to assist in the elevation
of collective awareness globally.
♥ I Am You Are And Love IS...! ♥
