The Turning Point
(or The Warrior Dance)

​

She's at the Warrior Dance on First Nations land north of Lake Superior, at the invitation of a white-guy wildman drum-maker from down south who is a friend of the People. Their brief winter fling has shifted into a comfortable spring friendship, and the twenty hour drive from the south has been filled with rich conversation. Arriving now at the camp, at the end of a rutted dirt track, deep in the spiky boreal forest, the camp seems both makeshift and well-worn, steeped with the presence of the local Anishinabe. She says goodbye to her friend, not expecting to talk with him again until after the four days of introspection are complete. This would not be her choice but she has been informed that the camp is divided into men's and women's sides, and there is little or no inter-mingling. A rickety little fence separates the two areas. That's ok with her. She's here for her own experience anyway. Six months out of a long and difficult marriage, she needs the time to herself.

 

Relieved to be single again, she can finally do her own healing, make her own decisions, take charge of her own destiny. She feels a deep need and commitment to change herself, evolve, develop parts that were dropped long ago. She has had some surprisingly effective healing and therapy sessions, and feels a little better, but adding the traumas of her married years to the residue of an unhappy childhood, her wounds are heavy, and she knows she is a mess. She has started reading spiritual books, attending workshops and meditation groups, and is rooted in a weekly women's circle. She tries to meditate daily, but is not very good at it. She has also realized the university environment is too mental for her, devoid of heart or soul, and she can't imagine being a professor all her life. But what she might do instead is a big mystery. As a child she wanted to be a church minister, but took a different track in life. Now she can feel the pull of spirit calling her again. Her love of nature has her gravitating to the ways of First Nations spirituality. At her first-ever sweat-lodge, she met the drum-maker and they have become good friends. When he invited her to join him in the four day ritual of the Warrior Dance, she jumped at the chance. Her kids are with their Dad so she has the freedom to really explore this opportunity. She doesn't know what the Dance will entail or what it might bring, but she is more than willing to do the work to find out.

 

As she lugs her camping gear into a clearing, two women wandering by show her where to set up. There is no welcoming committee. These people have lived together on the nearby reservation all their lives and already know. She is acutely aware of her white outsider, newly spiritual, urban southerner status. But the unspoken feeling from the women is welcoming and curious as they point out different areas of the camp. Although prone to overwhelm in new situations, she can feel her resolute willingness moving her forward, and she thanks them genuinely. Seeing others moving around, setting up tents throughout the glen, she finds a good spot near the edge. Eventually she climbs in to her little tent, her oasis of privacy and comfort, complete with a rug and candle, books, journal, and photo of her kids. This will be her home for the next four days and she wants it to be cozy. She loves camping, sleeping on the ground, her dreams free to roam. She feels at home in the deep woods, unencumbered by urban density and controlled urban nature. Looking forward to the unknown to come, she is both excited and nervous.

 

As the afternoon wanes, she dresses in her new, special clothes. To attend the Dance, her friend instructed her to ask for a Vision, and then to hand-make whatever she is shown. As an earnest seeker, she has faithfully followed the instructions, going into meditation, at least as well as she could, and asking for a vision. To her surprise, she did see an image, or at least an impression of what the outfit should look like and how it should feel to wear it. It needed to be natural, comfortable, modest. She shopped carefully for the right fabric and pattern, and hand sewed the dress over many days, trying to stay in a meditative mind while doing so. It is a simple shift, made of dense raw silk, deep red, knee length. Around her neck and on her arms she wears an assortment of necklaces and bracelets, each the keeper of a specific intention or bit of guidance.

 

A distant drumbeat begins to thrum through the encampment, calling the people forth. Emerging from her tent at twilight she sees dozens of other people, all dressed in their special clothes of meaning and inspiration. Many men are bare-breasted, the women in flowing skirts, colourful and unique. They all slowly move toward a large open area across the clearing by the lake. They are beautiful and quiet. She feels very shy with the newness of it all, her lack of familiarity. She scans for her friend, hoping to be able to join him, but can't spot him anywhere. The drumbeat calls them toward a large circular open-air structure, like an arbour rim, made of saplings and evergreen branches. She joins the end of the queue but is told to go to the front where the women are. Of course, women and men will enter the sacred zone separately. Women go first so they will stand in the east and south, men to the north and west. The ingrained gender differences are palpable and she recognizes that in that respect, she is glad to live in the transforming urban south.

 

Taking her place in line, she slowly moves forward. There are maybe a hundred people. She smells the fragrance of burning sweet-grass, sage and cedar, sees billowing smoke emanating from a place close to the front of the line. As she approaches the entry to the arbour, she sees a pit dug in the ground, the burning medicines in the bottom, dense smoke swirling up and around each person as they step slowly through, cleansing their entire body and field, setting their intention for the days to come. She has to work to collect her thoughts, to bring her focus inward, to close off her curiosity and stimulation from the new environment. She needs to remember herself, why she is here, the Journey she is on. Reflecting briefly on all that has brought her here, the damaging marriage, looking for new meaning, new direction, healing wounds, putting Spirit first, she steps through the smoke, willing to explore and embrace whatever is to come.

 

Entering the arbour, she follows the line of women, slowly circling toward the south. The structure is very open with no floor. It is made of freshly cut saplings stuck in the ground, a roof and back-wall of boughs enough to create shade or shed light rain, but not much more. A single railing separates the outer dancing circle from the vast, open centre, with openings to allow movement through. There are four fires burning in rock-edged circles in the four directions with old lawn chairs at each. A light smoke drifts in the air, lifting up into the dusky evening sky. The first stars are beginning to blaze in the clear northern air. A loon calls in the distance. In the centre of the open area stands another round open-air structure with a more solid roof, and under it the circle of singers sit, slowly beating a rhythm on a massive drum she knows her friend made for them. The effect could be mesmerizing, entrancing. Maybe she can follow this beat inward, the heart-beat of the land thrumming up through the men's connection. She sincerely hopes so.

 

The trail of women slowly comes to a stop and she has her place. She will stand here, under the full moon, from sun-down to sun-up for the next four nights, moving to the drum beat and cries of the native singers, looking for guidance, open to learning. It is not dancing as a southerner would know, but a rhythmic stamping and circling arising from within. No one looks at each other. The arbour is wide enough she can't see much across and the front half-wall creates a privacy. Her neighbours are about five feet away on either side. There is little or no talking.

 

As the last men file in and organizers tend to the final details, the group begins to coalesce into one listening body. The wise elder of the local people begins by introducing the invited spiritual teacher, a middle-aged man from the Prairies. The teacher welcomes, encourages, admonishes, as all preachers do. He acknowledges the roles of all participants, beginning with the land and Ancestors, then lays out the plan for the days to come. From sun-down to sun-up there will be drumming cycles with rests in between for the singers to tend to their needs and the people to smoke their sacred pipes and be given water to drink. He or the elder will talk during some of the breaks. He invites and encourages anyone needing personal guidance or healing to seek him or the assistants out during the breaks. A few elderly or sick people are ushered tenderly into chairs by the fires as he says it is always acceptable to sit out a cycle if need be. He reminds everyone it is a four-day fast, with no food or water except what is offered by the group. There will be a cleansing sweat-lodge each afternoon before dressing for the night. The group is encouraged to hold the sacred space during their private time in their tents and during the day. Finally he introduces the singers individually from youngest to oldest. There is a murmur of appreciation for the mighty task these men are taking on in what is to come. Finally, it all begins. She is ready, open, willing, shy, an outsider, in need of direction, unaware of both her gifts and limitations. She begins to dance.

 

The first night is fascinating, but not much happens for her spiritually. Her highly trained, academic mind is too active, her spiritual practices too new to be able to fully release and enter communion with Spirit. She is a little disappointed, but knows it is her own block, not the experience's fault. She loves the cries of the native singers, the feeling of their hearts piercing veils through their voices. She enjoys the teachings, of both the invited teacher and the wise elder. The teacher is middle-aged, handsome, charismatic, but seemingly with ego. He is wordy, full of gesture, chastizing as well as supporting, reinforcing ideas of discipline and effort, you can't change if you don't do the work. It seems to her he is preaching to the choir since all these people have left their lives, some travelling great distances, to fast and dance for four days. At this point, she sees him as cushioned from facing his limitations by the admiration of his followers. His teachings are valid, useful, but not moving, not profound. She much prefers the wise elder. He is old, small, leathery with life's challenges, quiet, perceptive, and humorous. He doesn't speak often and uses few words, but each sentence resonates with love, connection and insight. He encourages people to go deep into their hearts where they will discover The Creator's love for them and for all Creation. He is inspiring and she can feel a rich presence emanating from him.

 

The singers drum and sing for cycles of about an hour, then break for a while. During some of the breaks, a young man walks her stretch of the dancing circle, his arms laden with a collection of long wooden pipes, hand-carved, unique, some with beads or feathers hanging by lengths of leather or thread. They are beautiful, and feel very important. She sees the women on either side accept their pipe from the youth, already filled with tobacco. He helps them light it, then moves on as they sit on the ground, leaning on the back wall to smoke. It feels like an ancient ritual that cements the experience for them. She wishes she could participate, if that would be appropriate, but knows nothing about how one comes to be a pipe-smoker. At other times the youth comes by lugging a big bucket of water with a kitchen ladle. There are bits of cedar and other plants floating in the clear water and he tells her the plants are medicines to support her journey. He fills the ladle once for her to drink, then moves on. As the night sky begins to fade toward blue, the cycles of dancing and teaching are brought to completion, and as the sun begins to break through the trees, the people leave the circle in reverse order to which they entered.

 

She heads for her tent as the sun comes up, the experience of the night swirling through her. She undresses, climbs into her sleeping bag and falls into a deep, dreamless sleep. Exhaustion from the long drive, the dancing and the newness of it all catch up with her and she sleeps long into the day. In the late afternoon, she finally leaves her tent in time for the sweat lodge, which she has been looking forward to. It is in the women's side of the camp, the men having their own. But the leader is a cranky, distracted young woman, daughter of a local leader, who rushes through the ritual with stones barely hot and prayers spoken by rote. The women are all fully clothed in t-shirts and shorts or skirts. There is no talking, no sharing of insights or experience. This is not like the sweat lodge she attended in the south where there was meaningful conversation and connection among the participants and she feels disappointed. There seems to be little opportunity for introspection or insight. Emerging, there is a bustle as all head to their tents to prepare for the night.

 

Again she lines up, finds her place in the grand circle, and dances to the spiralling songs and drum beats of the singers. Again, the spiritual teacher speaks, and again her mind is too active, a bear-trap of a brain, too intellectual, too detail-oriented to be able to make much of the opportunity. She can stay focused in her intention, but is not able to enter any altered state of awareness, even with the lack of food. Her mind is too busy. This is the inner world she is accustomed to, repetitive thoughts swirling of her mean ex-husband, her controlling mother, painful stories from her childhood and marriage, her new dreams of finding Mr Right and her obsession with any man who crosses her path, her amazement at her glorious children and the joy of mothering them, ultimately, her need and desire for a new life. Caught on the hamster wheel of these emotional thoughts, she can't switch off long enough to truly open to something new. Her receptivity is blocked by her mental activity. She knows she needs stillness, but cannot find her way to it. A meditation teacher has said to 'put the thought down,' or to let thoughts 'pass like clouds outside an airplane', but try as she might, she hasn't figured out how to do that. Thinking about not thinking is useless, frustrating. Another author has said that 'trying negates itself', and although she doesn't understand the details, she knows what he means. She is frustrated and annoyed at her own inner workings, but that is what she came here to learn about, so even the heightened awareness and witnessing of her bad habits is helpful.

 

In the sweat lodge the next day, she feels the limitation her mind places on possible insights through it's incessant chattering. She wants this lodge to be like the lodge she was in before, but it is not. Yesterday, instead of opening to the new experience, she was plagued by her mind comparing and criticizing. Now she forces herself to think beyond this reaction. Maybe she is missing something here. Maybe the other women are getting something from the prayers that she has not understood. Their lack of talking and sharing may not represent a lack of insight, but merely a silent, private process. She begins to observe them more closely and immediately sees they are more deeply engaged than she had realized, sometimes their lips moving silently with their prayers, their hands resting in stillness. Looking for outward signs of their inner process, she has missed the clues. Humbled by her realization she feels embarrassed at how inappropriate her outsider criticism was and offers a sincere, silent apology to the young leader. She makes sure to thank her on the way out.

 

Night three unfolds much the same as nights one and two, although each evening there are fewer people entering the arbour. She can understand the choice to leave, though she knows with certainty she is there for the duration. Although she has not experienced any altered states, she is still glad she has come, knows she is learning and growing in self-awareness and spiritual devotion. Her mind is still too strong, grabbing at passing thoughts too quickly, yanking her into the past, but she is starting to see the players in her stories with more compassion. When she is able to stay present, her analytical mind wants to turn to boring, objective reality: where did they cut the saplings, what kind of trees are they, why don't they drink more water... She does occasionally feel fleeting moments of great peace and presence, but as soon as she recognizes something is happening, her mind grabs hold of the experience, wanting to analyze and understand it according to its own perspective, so the feeling vanishes. In truth, she is exhausted by her own magnetic mind, bouncing from one irrelevant thought to another like an old pinball machine. She prays that someday she finds a way to truly quiet her mind, for how is she to make a new future if she keeps repopulating each moment with the past? This insight carries her through the night and into her tent for sleep.

 

Day four finds her wandering the camp in the early afternoon, aware it is her last day, and open to new experience. For the first time she enters the arbour during the day and discovers that one of the four sacred fires is kept lit during the day, a small group of men and women sitting quietly talking. They welcome her to join them, curious about what led her to their Dance. As they all share, she settles in. This feels good, like the circles she knows from home. These are kind, loving people, open to her as a fellow human on the path. It turns out two of the group are brother and sister, and they tease and joke with each other as siblings do. She feels included and embraced. The conversation is quiet and meaningful while still light-hearted and jocular. This feels like home for her soul. When the sister mentions a bad headache, she jumps up to offer a back rub. She's been giving back-rubs all her life and thinks nothing of it. She seems able to lift a headache out of a person's body without much ado. It just comes naturally. Sometimes she sees images from the person's life, has insights as to the origins of the tension. She shares these openly with the person, and it helps the tension release. In her university department she has gained some notoriety for being able to remove headaches, and colleagues sometimes arrive unexpectedly at her office door asking for her help. She has never paid much attention to it. It's just something she does.

 

Standing behind the chair, she places her hands on the sister's neck and shoulders, feeling for tension and pain. Eyes closed, she lets the body guide her, sending tendrils in to explore and dislodge stuck places. When she feels movement, she magnetically draws the tension up and out, releasing whatever pattern is creating the pain. As she works her way into the tissues, feelings and images from the sister's life begin to show up, and she leans down to quietly share them. They work together in whispers, slowly entering the revealing memories, bringing some peace and understanding to them. There is a deep, agonizing shame, from alcohol, the feel of the bottle clutched in hand; from striking children, the sting across the palm and their innocent faces stricken with shock and pain. Together the women offer sincere apology and ask for forgiveness, and as the energies feel soothed and comforted, much of the tension is released. As the layers shed, they move quietly together into a deeper agony, a terror, a violent wrenching of the sister's arm by her drunken, raging ex-husband, dislocating the joints, tearing inner tissues.

 

At that very moment the old wise elder walks into the arbour and slowly moves toward the group. He observes quietly, then gently asks, “What is happening here?” Without opening her eyes, she habitually blurts out, “I'm giving her a back rub,” but simultaneously the brother murmurs, “It's a healing,” and as she hears these simple words spoken aloud, presented as a neutral fact from one man to another, she is struck to her core with astonishment, realizing,

"It IS a healing!!!"

"I AM A HEALER !!!!"

As she opens herself to that truth, some floodgate way above her opens and a massive torrent of blinding white light cascades down, flooding through her body, mind, soul, affecting her entire being. It feels like Niagara Falls of powerful white energy opening her cells, smashing through her patterns, wave upon wave of surging radiant  light thundering in her ears. She can feel the truth that she is a healer altering her, lifting her, pushing her through all limits she previously knew. She feels her hands expanding, taking up more space, as though the light becomes a living part of them. She feels as though she is expanding, no longer bound by her physical body, but filling a much larger space, with a bigger presence, and a much bigger purpose. Her old, ever-ready mind has no idea what is happening and becomes silent, witnessing, blown open by a force of light and energy beyond its wildest imaginings. Surrendered, awed, humbled, she receives and absorbs.

 

As the torrent slowly subsides, she feels transformed, connected in a new way, wildly alive... huge both inside and out. Her body feels taller, more radiant, more present. Her hands feel massive, and her heart feels expanded far beyond its painful old cage. Her mind is quiet, still curious, but witnessing rather than leading. Simultaneously she feels both brand new and ancient, purposeful and a raw beginner, driven and still. As the experience settles further she can still feel the flow of the white light running straight down through her, like a central column that actually is her core, and she feels the natural alignment of self it brings with it. She feels she somehow knows herself for the first time.

 

The group, who have stayed silent, witnessing, now lovingly acknowledge the potency of the moment. All smiles, they congratulate her, wish her well, shake her hand, pat her shoulder. The wise elder takes her hands in his, and gently blesses her in his language. She hugs the sister, they all say goodbye, then go their separate ways to prepare for the night.

 

Slowly making her way to her tent, she begins to integrate all that has happened. She is a healer! It seems so obvious now. So many pieces of her life make sense in this new context. Her favourite part of being a professor is office-hours when she meets with students individually and helps them with their lives. They may start with talking about class work or an assignment, but as she inquires deeply, they almost always diverge to whatever is really going on in their young and complicated lives. She has an innate ability to listen deeply, to put herself in their shoes, to meet them where they are without judgment or criticism, and to offer advice or guidance that seems to just pop into her head out of the blue. Sometimes she even knows things about them without knowing how she knows. She has always chalked it up to intuition, and now that makes sense, intuition seeming to be an important tool for a healer. The students know her for her loving attention and seek her out for it, sometimes returning to visit and share the news of their lives years after they were enrolled on campus.

 

And her hands! They have always had a mind of their own, knowing instinctively how to work the energies of a person's body, drawing pain out, manipulating underlying patterns of tension, following lines of meaning. She has never really thought about it before, but now she realizes that what she has been offering all these years aren't back-rubs but healings! She really is a healer! She has a gift! And now she knows, deep in her deepest core that this is her calling. This is right, this is true; and she feels a deep and truly humble need to learn, to clear, to grow, to become worthy of the gift and the responsibility it brings.

 

As she prepares for the last night of dancing, she seems to be looking through new eyes. She sees her belongings differently. The necklace she bought with her daughter represents her children. It is complex, made of bone, beads and wire, and feels radiant with the souls of her babies. The beaded bracelet her sister gave her now resonates with their mutual love and appreciation for their life-long friendship. She feels awakened, transformed, made real in a way she had always longed for without knowing what it was she was missing. A line from a movie comes to mind. “It's everything I never knew I always wanted.” For once, her mind is quiet, observing, not offering a sportscaster play-by-play analysis of her moment-to-moment existence. Instead, it is absorbing, learning, receptive, witnessing.

 

Later, in the sweat lodge, she can feel the circle of silent women, each praying in her own heart. There is a profound quiet she hadn't noticed before. She hopes her noisy mind hadn't disturbed them in the earlier days. A few of the older women greet her silently, looking her in the eye, making a small nod of their heads, a tiny smile winking in the corners of their mouths. She feels seen, recognized, included. She bows her head and sits quietly, allowing the soft words to swirl through her while consciously absorbing the white light in her core. The lodge lasts longer, has more space for silence, more integration time, and she is grateful for the opportunity it offers her to absorb and embody.

 

This final night as she dances to the ancient songs, she can feel the history of the People and their relationship with the land in their sung stories, even though she doesn't understand the words. She feels the sincerity with which the remaining participants engage their final night. This night goes deep for all. The invited teacher is brilliant, taking them into places only discipline can unlock, of surrender by the small human self to the Creator, of obedience to guidance, of receptivity and a deep, inner stillness. He teaches them to observe the world from the center of their heads, not from their eyes, to locate in the deep, inner quiet, to perceive through the eyes of Spirit. This feels very useful for her, the noisy thoughts seeming to sit out in front of her forehead. That core stream of white light is seated deep within her, and watching life from back there keeps her connected to the big spiritual presence. Finally, this is a way to put her thoughts down, to let them pass. When she anchors her awareness in this different location, the thoughts naturally quiet. Awareness replaces thinking. It is a huge relief.

 

As she looks out at the world from deep behind her eyes, she perceives much more; more beauty, more connection, more truth. She can understand now why the teacher has a devoted following and feels foolish for her rash judgments of the first night. She can also feel how ingrained her mental habits are, and how much effort it will take to transform, to live from the spiritual perspective. Tonight her mind is quiet, blown away by all she has experienced this day, but she fears it will reassert itself when she gets back to her life. This will be her work, to explore and undo a lifetime of painful conditioning that has resulted in her mental gymnastics.

 

When it is the turn of the wise elder, he shimmers with love, cracking jokes that shatter ego and false premises of what it means to be human. Mere cells in the body of the Creator, how silly to think we know much of anything. Why would we believe our own tiny quirky minds with our own warped perceptions instead of seeing through the Creator's eyes to the vast beauty, grace and benevolence that is Life? Love is the password, the code for entry into Truth. She is reminded of the Sunday-school lesson that God is Love. So that must mean that Love is God! Oh! She gets it! And is moved to tears by the perfect simplicity and glory of it all.

 

As part of her preparation for this journey, she had acquired some pure tobacco, intending to offer it if she ever got up the courage to ask for healing or guidance. This final night she feels called to search out an assistant at one of the breaks, gifting the tobacco with a vague request for guidance, and waiting anxiously to find out what will happen. She is ushered to wait in a chair by a fire, and very surprised when it is the invited spiritual teacher himself who comes to stand behind her, to dance this cycle on her behalf. He is accompanied by a very old man she has not seen before, stooped with age, in buckskin trousers, bare chested except for some beads, silent in his movement. As the music lifts and swirls, the old man opens a huge, black bird wing and begins to brush her body with it. Starting at her shoulders and back, his movements grow until he is brushing her whole body and energy field, from above her head to the ground below her feet. Over and over again, with increasing intensity, he brushes her with the wing, washing sound and power through her, cleansing her, whisking old energies out, creating space for new. She hears the two men's voices rising together behind her, feels the immense power of the wing beating through her, the wind and noise it creates touching every cell, every thought, every aspect of her being. When the drumming cycle finally comes to an end, the old man silently moves off before she can thank him. The teacher helps her to stand, then quietly says, “You have Wolf and Hawk as your guides, with Eagle coming in soon. This is very rare for a woman. Women more often have Turtle or Otter. You must take this calling seriously. You are a leader in your world. ” She feels utterly stunned. The whole experience has shifted something profoundly in her, cleaning her out, realigning her, pointing her in a new and accurate direction. Bowing her head, she thanks him quietly and they go their separate ways.

 

As she returns to the final rounds of dancing, she feels herself moving from a place deep inside her body she has never accessed before. She can feel the movements arising from somewhere her little mind didn't know existed. It feels so absolutely right, surrendering to this authentic movement. Her mind is relieved not to have to know any answers, more able to stay quiet, to witness and learn. When random thoughts pop in, she finds them less interesting, no longer as magnetic, much easier to set aside. As she communes through dancing with the music, the land, the Creator, she continues to experience old patterns of thought arise and dissipate, creating space for something new and unknown to begin. She feels cleansed, renewed, reborn... and very young. Like a brand new human, needing to figure life out in a brand new way; open to learn, grow, evolve, and glean from the past only what is worth taking forward. She is truly humbled and prays she can grow to fill these big shoes she has been given.

 

Late in the night, the sky above the trees suddenly shimmers with a wave of colour as the Northern Lights appear. At first there is just a glimmer, a small ripple in the sky, but as the people watch, the sky too begins dancing, swirling majestic trails of other-worldly magic. The teacher points and says, “The Ancestors are happy with us tonight. You are being thanked for your dedication. This is a blessing. This night is good.”

 

As dawn begins to break, she heads to her tent for her last sleep, the day and night swirling through her whole being. She sets a profound intention to live up to whatever the Creator is asking of her. She is willing to commit herself and her life to the work of becoming a healer. She knows she will need to learn, to find teachers, to travel, to spend time, money and inner resources on this great call. She will have to share the news with her children, friends and family. She realizes some people will think she is crazy, but also knows it will have the ring of truth, so those who know her best will rejoice with her that she has finally found her true calling and life purpose.

 

In the late afternoon, her tent and belongings packed away, she is stretched out on an old grey picnic table by the lake, staring up into the brilliant blue sky, sharing stories of the four days with her friend. He too has had a profound experience and as he tells his tales, she is happy for him. When it is her turn, she has so much to say it is hard to know where to start. First she shares how important the learning was to live from inside her head, quieting her mind and becoming part of a much bigger reality. Then she shares how she came to appreciate the quiet sweat lodge and her chagrin at her own criticisms. Eventually she talks of the old man brushing her field and the teacher reading her guides, although she keeps the part about being a leader to herself, not knowing how to carry that yet. Finally she shares the most important part of her story, the moment of her mighty experience, her revelation, her rebirth as a healer. Her friend is transfixed, listening, nodding and silently smiling. He says she looks different, softer, quieter, more present, more real. Holding out her huge new hands that feel like catchers mitts, she says, “Now these are God's hands, and I have to grow to fit them.”

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