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I’ll break open the story and tell you what is there. Then, like the others that have fallen out onto the sand, I will finish with it, and the wind will take it away.22 – Nisa, a !Kung San woman, 1969 JuST LIKe THe WIND, a story can bring the chill of foreboding clouds or the warmth of a familiar essence. Its seductive touch might entice one on a Journey of Discovery. As with the wind, a story travels from one region to another, its origins often remaining wrapped in a veil of mystery. And as with the wind, a story has a voice of its own, no matter what its source or who is telling it. This voice lures us away from the familiarities of our world so that we may come to know our innate selves. This experience is implied in many Native terms for story, such as the Gaelic sgeul23 and the term kukumi,24 once used by the now extinct Xam Bushmen of South Africa. Stories transport us to dreamscapes where we observe ourselves enacting the dramas of our lives. Think of a story as a play with nameless, faceless actors, where each person in the “audience” observes himself as the main character on the stage. From this vantage point, each of us can more easily find the reality within our own illusions and the trust within our own fears, along with the personal guidance intended for us. Chapter One The Role of Stories k 3 THe GLOBAL STORY Stories reflect universal themes common to the human experience. No matter what the continent, culture, era, or belief system, the same stories surface, as there is only one storytelling tradition. variations in language, climate, and lifestyle are no more than ripples on the reservoir from which our stories flow. An Arctic Inuit legend of a boy on his first hunt differs little from the !Kung San legend that comes from the African Kalahari. Robin Hood, Zorro, and Han Solo are all the same person. Bugs Bunny was brought to us by African slaves in their ancient stories of Zomo, the trickster rabbit, who in America met his cousin Nanabozho, the legendary Native American trickster who would transform into a rabbit.25 Storytelling, whether it be in the guise of speech, dance, song, or symbolic art, is probably the oldest of teaching methods. The sharing of stories was undoubtedly a favorite pastime of our distant ancestors as they gathered around the fire. Their stories chronicled their history, amused their young, and instructed them in the ways of life. Ota K’te (Chief Luther Standing Bear), an Oglala Lakota who lived in the 1800s, expressed it in this way: “Long before the Indian was skillful enough to make musical instruments, he composed and sang songs in which he put the history of his tribe. He told of his wars, his ceremonies, and his travels. There were brave songs, medicine songs, war songs, songs of reverence to the Great Mystery, and love songs. Then the lodges had their songs which only lodge members sang. Even the individual had songs which he composed for himself alone . . . no matter what event in life the Indian faced—he sang.”26 To this day, storytelling plays a central role in people’s lives. We congregate in front of projection screens rather than gather around hearths, and the storyteller’s voice reaches us indirectly through a speaker. Other stories come in the form of songs, books, plays, and prayers. WeAReR OF MANY HATS The role of stories ranges as far and wide as the spectrum of human life and culture. Some hand down a people’s traditions and prophecies, others preserve knowledge of hunting, food preparation, and crafting skills. There are stories explaining the forces of nature such as storms, floods, and eclipses. Healing stories offer relationship and emotional guidance, and awareness-raising stories help people open to their greater potential as they learn to see with different eyes. Maps depicting travel and animal migration routes are sometimes conveyed in story form, as with this recollection of Ohiyesa’s from his Santee Dakota boyhood in the1800s: “It is customary with the hunters and warriors to tell their stories of adventure most minutely, omitting no geographical and topographical details, so that the boy who has listened to such stories from babyhood can readily identify places he has never before seen. This kind of knowledge is simple, and, like the everyday k 4 Whispers of the...

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