I sit at Grandfather Wolf’s fire, surrounded by the forest. He tells me stories of Creation – of Earth below and Sky above, of Father Sun and Mother Moon, of First Man and First Woman, and how the animals came together to provide for and protect them. He speaks of Grandmothers Willow and Pine, Grandfather Mountain, and the Great Mystery of the stars.
I listen, captivated, as he speaks of the Seventh Generation, of renewal, hope, and awakenings. He reminds me that prophecy is a means of teaching and learning about how all life is intertwined – prophecy, he says, is not a certainty of things to come.
Grandfather Wolf tells me how all men and women – the Red, the White, the Yellow and the Black – are all brothers and sisters, to each other as well as to the animals. We all hold powerful Medicine, he says, though none of it is exactly alike, and we should all seek our own way to use that Medicine to heal and honor the Earth and each other. He tells me that the name Shaman is not given only to one people. There are Shaman of every people, every animal, and even in the Spirit.
As he grows silent for a while, his golden eyes on the fire and his silver fur gleaming in the light, I ponder what he’s told me, and I know he waits for me to ask. He knows I have come with a question that burdens my heart, yet I remain reluctant to speak it.
He waits patiently until, with a sigh of defeat, I ask. “What is my part? Why do I suffer, now?”
His golden eyes meet mine, and I feel the shimmer of his Medicine, his power, before he quietly begins. He tells me that I, like him, am one of a pack – that our instinct is borne of Spirit. Lone wolves do not survive long. A wolf-spirit withers and dies without its pack, and once a pack is chosen, a wolf is loyal to the death. While I nurture Medicine to help the world, my true Medicine, he says, is in family, community, and Spirit of the place. Like most wolves, I am a child of the forest, and once I define my territory, being separate from it is like withering my soul. He tells me this is why I suffer, but that I had to leave to understand, to learn and grow within my own skin.
Then, rising to his feet, he looks to the darkened wood around us, and I know. It is time to go, to think on what has been revealed to me, and to make the changes necessary – both within my own life, and the world.
