October 9th, 2024
By Bonnie Tarantino
When I was 24, I began studying with a medicine woman who lived in Woodstock, NY. Each year, a Lakota shaman would visit her, and she would rent a house and hold a workshop for a long weekend. There, we would build a sweat lodge, meditate, walk the woods, and facilitate the healing of what we carried in our “baggage.”
One afternoon, we were sitting on the deck, and a mug was on the edge of the table. I went to push the cup onto the table so that it would not fall, and I found the shaman taking my arm and pulling me back. He said, “Sit.. don’t move.”
He then got up and walked right by the mug, and knocked it off the table with his leg.
People all around jumped up to clean up the mess. It took all of me to sit still. The Shaman did nothing to clean it up. He just sat down again next to me.
He leaned in and said, “Do you know the difference between a Shaman and an Angel?”
“No.” I answered.
“An angel like yourself will push the cup away from the edge. Keep it safe. Try not to disrupt. Keep the peace.”
I looked into his dark crow, playful eyes. He smelled of fresh tobacco, coffee and forest.
“A shaman on the other hand will knock the cup off the table and watch how everyone reacts. That part of you that wants to jump up and fix it is kind and considerate, but to be the healer you are on track to becoming, you have to be just as comfortable with the mess. Let people clean up their own mess.”
That night, I ended up in a field. It was a new moon, and completely dark. The Shaman had a son who wanted to show me how to walk in the dark. There was the edge of whisky on his breath, and the cool night captured it, making it smell natural and warm. Normally the smell of alcohol was a trigger for me, but I knew I was safe because the Shaman had given me a nod that I was good before we walked off.
The Shaman’s son had me stand still in the field and close my eyes. He burned a safe stick and danced around me, the glow from the burning sage illuminating the night. He had me ground down and feel my bones, my feet, the space just under the arch of my foot. He then cupped his hands over my eyes and told me he was taking my eyes from my head and placing them in my feet. He bent down and held my feet, chanting an ancient song. He told me to look deep into the earth with my feet. He told me to drop down and let my eyes see the ground like a small creature. Suddenly, everything seemed large, lit in soft blues and purples. The Shaman stood behind me and told me to follow my feet. I could see nothing but yet something knew where everything was. My feet began to walk through the field, happy to guide me and show me the way. He said, “Don’t look down, just feel. Every part of your body is part of the earth. To see in the dark, all we need to do is let our light guide us.”
At the end of the workshop, we gathered in the basement to wrap up. A basket was passed around with household chores so we could prepare the house for our departure. The Shaman announced to the group. “Bonnie, you will not be taking a chore from the basket. While we all clean up, you will remain here and meditate.”
My face grew red. I immediately felt the shame of being banished. I felt I had done something wrong. One by one, everyone left the room. The Shaman waited for all of them to leave. He then got up and said, “Coffee or tea?”
I said, “No, no.. I don’t want anything. I would rather go help clean up.”
He said, “I would like for you to stay here.”
He then left. Up above me, I could hear the bustle. They vacuum ran and the suitcases rolled out. The sound of water ran clean through the pipes while the sun warmed the windows to the faint smell of Windex. The women laughed and some even sang. It felt like hours that I was left in that basement. I wondered if the Shaman forgot me. I started to hear car doors and imagined that everyone had left.
Then the shaman came back downstairs carrying with him a cup of coffee. “Here.” he said,
I took it and put it before me on the verge of tears.
“I know this was hard for you.” He said.”
“I just don’t know what I did to be excluded,” I said, trying not to cry.
“All weekend, I watched you. You were so attentive to everyone, so giving. You served. You jumped up. You anticipated. You are a very generous person, and you don’t miss anything. On every level, you are present and generous. You did nothing wrong.” He paused. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Sure,” I said.
“When I asked you if you wanted coffee or tea, how did you feel?”
“Awful. I don’t need you to get me anything. You are my teacher.”
“Ahha….tell me…what is humility? “ he asked
I thought about it, “Humility is knowing that something greater is at play. That you are not all-knowing. You are not God. That you know your place.”
“Yes… yes…but Bonnie,” he said, “If you can’t receive a cup of coffee, how will you ever receive the gifts the great one has for you? “ He let that land. I could feel my body filling up with something I had never allowed before: the feeling of being considered, known, and paid attention to by the divine.
“That is humility.” He said, “The creator has a big plan for you. The creator will use you and you will have many blessings in your life. You will reach and help many people. But first, you must allow. You must sit back sometimes and watch and learn to receive. You must open your hands up and say “Yes!””
He picked up the coffee mug and handed it to me again. I took it, took a sip and held it to my heart. That weekend I learned three things about humility.
-One is that humility is letting someone clean up their own mess.
-Two, humility is being willing to drop out of your head and trust your body to guide you in the dark and allow your light to shine.
-Three, humility is opening and allowing the great gifts your spirit has in store for you to come into your life and show you the way.
In a compelling and essential interview on the “Not you Daddy” podcast, Vice President Harris said “Not every woman aspires to be humble.” When I heard that a charge went through me as if I was placed back in that basement in Woodstock. I totally got it. Humility needs to be reframed. It takes great humility to be open to your potential and greatness. It takes great humility to take center stage and say, “I can change this.” It takes great humility to walk through the dark and trust that your light will lead the way. You cannot do any of that alone. And I believe Harris knows this. I believe that at some point someone sat her down and said, “You will need to learn how to fly in the dark.”
And I believe it’s time for women to do more of that and that time is of the essence.
Before I left the shaman offered to train me more. He told me to put tobacco out on my windowsill at night. He said that when I did, I would dream of a large crow coming and pecking on my bedroom window. So I went and bought my first pack of cigarettes from the corner bodega, opened the paper and placed a pinch of the tobacco on my window sill at night. In my dreams, a large crow would come and peck on my window. I would open the window and fly out into the night sky with wings and eyes that could see in the dark. I would follow the crow and learn about the layers of life that cloak the planet. About 6 months into this training, I met Scott. A month into dating him, the shaman called me.
He said, “You can no longer dream me. Stop putting the tobacco out. You will be with him now and build a beautiful life. One day, when you are much older, and you stop bleeding, and your children are grown, you will know it is time again to put the tobacco out.”
I do not have any tobacco to put out and know it is not quite time. But something is shifting. The crows are calling me from the dead tree on the yard’s edge; the water is rising, and the wind is picking up. Wings have been clipped. One day soon, it may be time for me to fly again, and when I do, you may hear me pecking on your window. Until then and to prepare, open your hands and accept the warm mug that is being offered because we are going to need every gift that is being offered.
