UNGRIP Boot Camp

We are pleased to announce our first retreat, a boot camp held on the land in Northern Ontario. The camp will run for 5 days from August 9th to 13th which gives people the weekends for travel. People who attend the camp will be introduced to and fully submersed in off grid living. We will be holding ceremonies, harvesting food, using the solar dehydrator, smoke house, building shelters, stewarding animals, preparing for winter and all other types of activities associated with late summer off grid living. Come prepared for all types of weather. We have space for eight people to sleep in campers. We will not be asking for any energy exchange. Instead we are asking people to pay it forward. If you have food or materials that can help people attending the boot camp in the future, bring it along.

Summer in the bush is full of bugs, so we recommend netting to keep the flies and mosquitoes at bay. There are also bears in the area, so bring bear spray. We will teach you how to connect with the animals here so that the use of the spray will be unnecessary. You will need to bring bedding, cloths for all weather (dress in layers), good foot ware, gloves, hat, food to contribute to meals, mess kit (plate, silverware, cup, bowl), water bottle, folding chair and a willingness to participate and learn.

There is room for only eight (8) people. Please book a space ONLY if you are fully committed to attending. Further details and instructions will be sent to you when you contact me with your intent to participate. We are located just south of Larder Lake Ontario. Further details will follow.

Choosing A Path – Part 6

This entry took a while for me to figure out because it involves complex relationships, tribe and healing on my part. As many of you know, I’ve been working on tribe building for years and each time we ran into issues with unhealed shadows sabotaging relationships and violating boundaries. But something goes far deeper than that, figuring out how to integrate masculine and feminine energy in a healthy way and within a tribe structure that goes beyond the intimacy of a relationship between two people.

New wood stove for my home. Needs a burn to clear the paint. Cost: $10

I don’t trust easily, so it took me a long time, but I am now building a layer of trust with this tribe that makes tribe building easier. How was that done? Through Sacred Heart Circles. I’ve witnessed the power of emotional intimacy within the context of the school when a tribe manifested as if by magic. I’ve tried to get circles going when I was in Alberta, but unintegrated shadows and false ego sabotaged the process. This time around I found a group of people who are not only interested in living off grid and doing the work to decolonize, but are also interested in doing the shadow work as well, being vulnerable and working on healing.

Over the past few months we have held many circles and due to confidentiality, I will not disclose or discuss what we talked about. But what I can share is that healing and intimacy is growing at an astounding rate. It also helps that my own healing continues to unfold as well. My latest realization goes directly into tribe building as it addresses the role of divine masculine in a relationship but also in a tribe.

I recently realized that back in 2007 / 2008, I was about to confront an abusive individual within the tribe but was asked to stand down in order to maintain the friendship and status quo. This request emasculated me as I am responsible for the protection and safety of my family and tribe. There was fear involved in the request as the individual who made the request did not like confrontation and did not want to rock the boat. This set off a chain reaction as a result of me being unable to express divine masculine energy; mainly to protect and provide. I did not realize it at the time, but this triggered some deep and profound feelings that I was not consciously aware of and triggered me slipping into depression. As the relationship deteriorated and ended, it was replaced with others who were abusive as well. This went on till I left the land in February 2020. I experienced feelings of being trapped, violated, trespassed upon and complete frustration because I was not allowed to protect myself or others from the abuse.

Smoke house, made from old hot water tank and spare tin. Cost: $10

Here, in this tribe, I make sure that I have the support of all involved for me to express my full sacred masculinity. As a result of this work, my strength and health has returned with a vengeance. We have build an extraordinary amount of infrastructure for the tribe in a very short period of time. My own build continues to progress beautifully as well. As we over come challenges, whether that be physical or even in our relationships, this tribe continues to grow stronger and stronger. We anchor that strength in performing ceremonies as well and acknowledging the gifts and contributions of each member of the tribe. Everyone has a place, is valued, has something to provide and is willing to receive support as well.

As we move into the summer build, the gardens are growing, food is being dehydrated and we fired up the smoke house for the first time a few days ago. The greenhouse plans are in progress and we secured our source of water, establishing water and food sovereignty. Shelter and energy sovereignty is the next priority for the summer. We have also secured waste sovereignty as we are now in a position where we can deal with all waste without hauling anything out to the dump or putting the burden on somebody else. Amazing accomplishments for just two months worth of work.

Incinerator. Barrel bottom cut out, placed on a grate over a hole. Cost: zero!

We will be opening ourselves up for visitors this summer and fall as we contemplate establishing a Spiritual Boot Camp where people can come and participate in our ceremonies, learn from the tribe and UNGRIP from the grid to start the decolonization process. If this interests you, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me and we will make arrangements for you to visit. We have campers here for people to stay in, but will ask that you bring your own food to contribute to meals. Given the temperature of politics out there, now is the time to come up to speed on what is required to navigate the coming times. Sign up in White Walking Feather’s School for the Pacem Arts and join our circles and decolonization classes. There is plenty of videos, audios, posts, blogs and documents to keep one busy for weeks or even months. Connect with our groups on Telegram so that we can connect and communicate with like minded individuals.

Needs / Barter List

With the new approach we are taking with the website, having a list that people can access will help with those who want to barter with or gift to me or the tribe. So I’ve put together this list and I’ll update when I can so that people have an idea of what we need as we continue working on rebuilding tribe and sharing the journey with all those who are interested. Please contact me before sending anything to make sure we don’t end up with duplicates. I’m also going to keep items that we have on the bottom of the list so that if people want to make a similar leap of faith, you will know what tools we used to make it work. Thank you to everyone who is helping with this journey.

Consumables – Always a need

  • Fuel & Jerry cans
  • Chain saw bar oil
  • Chain saw chain (I’ll get the specs)
  • Food – takes time to build up stocks and re-establish
  • Nails, Screws, hoses, clamps, fittings, etc

Needed for construction to prepare for winter (temp shelter)

  • Tarps – Water collection, keep fire wood dry, making hunters tents for visitors
  • Wood shed – will make a lean-to to start, pallet shed later.
  • Tarp Garage / Shelter Logic to keep tools dry until shelters are built
  • 6 mil poly
  • cement
  • Cement Mixer – mixing adobe for greenhouse and my home fire build
  • Labour
  • Stove – I have a barrel that I’ll turn into a stove. (need hinges, self tapping metal screws)
  • Stove piping – 6”
  • Nails, screws, hoses, clamps and other misc ‘stuff’ – can always use to barter with as well.
  • 1 – 7/8” hitch ball

Needed for the house

  • first aid kit
  • Solar panel. I already have one 85W panel, could use a couple more.
  • 12V / 10A Charge controller
  • 12 or 2 – 6 Volt Deep Cycle battery for solar system
  • 2000W portable / hand luggable Generator
  • Water jugs
  • Water Barrels (water storage plus one will be turned into a fridge)
  • Wash Tub (for laundry / bathing)
  • Sink
  • Single Bed
  • Laptop – this one is starting to have hardware issues
  • Rope
  • Small table & a couple chairs
  • Counter
  • 5 Gal pails (toilet, hauling water, etc)
  • Water pump – hand drawn
  • DC lighting and switches. I have wire.
  • Jars for canning. Pails and other storage for dehydrating, smoking, etc

Greenhouse build

  • Cinder blocks
  • cement
  • Woven greenhouse fabric
  • Windows (I think we have what we need)
  • Doors
  • Rebar

Misc

  • Wood pallets – can always use pallets to build fences, wood sheds, etc
  • 4×4 truck – eventually I would like to be an independent traveler again
  • Cordless Drill

Items already acquired or built

  • Cell booster – made one out of an old satellite dish.
  • 85W solar panel – gifted. Thank you!!!
  • 12V deep cycle battery – gifted. Thank you!!!
  • 600W inverter – gifted. Thank you!!!
  • dry goods bins – gifted. Thank you!!!
  • Chainsaw – fixed an old one that was going to be thrown away
  • Quad – Mine that I brought from Alberta.
  • Tools – Mine that I brought from Alberta.
  • Solar Dehydrator – built out of stuff laying around here
  • Incinerator – materials here, just need to build it
  • Cold smoker – old hot water tank here, will convert it into a smoker

Choosing A Path – Part 5

Taking a step like this does require being aware of the natural ebbs and flows of Mother Earth. I am fortunate to land here when there was still snow on the ground. The timing is beautiful as I can then make plans for spring and it is easy to get back into the swing of the seasons. My challenge involved figuring out how and where to make a garden. I decided to put my garden on both sides of the path that runs between the house and the medicine wheel. I also took the leaves and peat moss that I collected while working on the house and medicine wheel and dumped it on the cleared spot for the garden. I instantly had about four inches of material for my garden. I needed trees for the house and sunlight for the garden, so I cleared trees south of the garden to let the sunshine in. Those trees will be a part of my house.

Garden on the left, foot path on the right, house in the background.

The laborious work brought out some more healing for me and reminded me of when we were pounding tires in 2007 & 2008. When we work our bodies, they can no longer hold onto all the “stuff” we bury. I noticed that when I first started training in the martial arts as well. I remember sitting in class, weeping uncontrollably as the emotions come flooding out of me. It took months to work all of that out so that I could make room for the actual training. For me, the last month has been the same. Working on my site brought out a lot of emotions and I worked hard to process them.

While my garden plot starts to develop, I am starting to feel good about the process. The strawberries are doing well and I’ve now planted tobacco, potatoes (200 hills), onions and a single tomato plant. I still have plans to put much more in, but I need to expand it to fit more in. But it does show that people can grow gardens. We may have to do gorilla gardening for a while, but it can be done.

Work with the tribe continues to grow. We are now discussing building a greenhouse based on the one that we built years ago. However, there will be some changes to accommodate the learning process we went through. Root cellar, incinerator and smoke house are also on the list of things to build this summer. I am noticing that we are doing in a single season, what took us 10+ years to do. I’m confident that these projects will help everyone as I have lots of experience with them already.

I have also continued working on my relationships with everyone here, but especially with Tammy. She has held space for me to heal for years, but in the last month it has been particularly important. Our ability to share openly is critical and recently I had another healing journey which helped solidify our relationship. It is not one of romance, but rather brother and sister working together with respect, honour, peace and freedom. Many of my needs are being met now, which has developed a space of peace, tranquility and freedom. I am finding that my healing is progressing very quickly as a result.

My need for companionship, touch and intimacy is still not being met, but I can confidently say that many of my other needs are. If I was doing this all by myself, it would have been ten fold more difficult. Being as sick as I was, I suspect I would not have made it. This journey from being a feudal serf, through hyper individualism to then settle down within the healthy constructs of a tribe is a daunting but extremely rewarding journey. I can confidently say that I am WELL on my way to good health; physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually!

We are also exploring the idea of welcoming people to this land to learn and heal. Through apprenticeship, healing retreats and other programs, this tribe can help and be of service to those who want to learn and embrace these ideals. We are working hard to restore the spirit of our ancient white tribes from Europe while we honour the spirit of the treaties signed years ago with our brothers and sisters ancestors. That spirit is about living off the land, being stewards of the land, protecting the land, being one with the land and ensuring ALL life prosper. We are having discussions about building our own lodge too. Powerful medicine unfolding when we start asking our ancestors to help us remember the old songs and ceremonies. But we must also build new ceremonies as the decolonization process is new. Very few people have gone through the decolonization process, so we now build ceremonies and protocols to help with the healing and reconciliation journey that is required.

As the world is only now starting to acknowledge the genocide associated with the Residential Schools, this tribe continues to dive deeper into the spiritual journey, power and authority of ancient custom and usage. It is this foundation upon which I will continue to work to free the land from the demesne of the crown. To me, planting the garden, creating the medicine wheel and starting the house is a critical aspect of this work. Spirit asked me to do this in a certain order, so that is what I did. I now realize how important the medicine wheel and garden is as I continue my efforts to free the land and my people from the grips of feudalism and colonization.

Garter snake visit

I am also grateful that the website is now live and active. I will be working on a list of materials that I will need. I pray it helps people who want to support the work that we are doing here. Some are materials that I need, some are things the tribe is looking for. All I ask is that people check in with me so that we don’t end up with duplicates.

Mean while, the snake spirit came to visit me at my garden. The spirit of the snake represents healing, transformations and connection to primal, life force energy. Then a bear walked right in front of my door last night. The spirit of the bear also represents healing, which I find is not a coincidence at all. But it also represents strong grounding forces, strength, confidence and leadership against adversaries. I will try to talk to the bear the next time he visits. This is the second visit he has paid me in the last few weeks. I will ask for friendship and connection so that I can explore what a relationship with the bear would look like as an equal among the trees and northern boreal forest.

Meanwhile, we prepare for the solar eclipse on the 10th as the tribe goes into special ceremony. Here, the eclipse hits 90% of totality at 5:46am, so we will be up early to connect with the powerful energy of the event. A pin hole camera and welders mask will help the kids take a look at what is going on in the sky above. Powerful medicine.

Choosing A Path – Part 4

Two days ago I was scheduled to speak at “The Greater Reset” event, a week long series of speakers providing alternatives to the globalist plans under “The Great Reset”. I was excited and honoured for the invitation to speak. About ten days prior to my talk, we were invited to connect and test our equipment for video and audio quality, which I did and everything checked out just fine. However, on the day of my talk, my equipment went all buggy. The app kept resetting and I could barely hear the host, let along interact with him or present my topic for discussion. Despite my extensive background and experience in the IT industry, I could not get my connection to work. I ended up unable to speak at the event and it was upsetting and troublesome for me. I felt tremendous sadness as a result as I felt I had an important contribution to make to the discussions.

This spawned deep reflection within myself and other members of my tribe. It was important to me to figure out why I was prevented from speaking. I figured that it was one of three reasons: My energy was off and I sabotaged my participation, Spirit changed it’s mind and no longer wanted me participating, or somebody else did not want me there.

Through several hours of reflection and discussion, we had to conclude that Spirit was protecting me as something changed over the last few days that would put me in jeopardy. What people don’t know is that prior to the event, I put down tobacco and smudged myself while praying for Spirit to guide me and provide me with the words to best serve the message. I am protected but I cannot “see” everything that is going on. In fact, I can only “see” a very small percentage of what is actually going on. So I depend on Spirit to guide and protect me, which is exactly what happened this week. The problem is that it was hard for me to “let go” and surrender to what Spirit needed to do. I felt sad and deep pain as I felt I was letting people down. In some ways it was also my false ego wanting to be heard too.

Pig pen built by the tribe. Pigs are happy!

Through the night, I come to terms with what happened and I’ve now accepted that Spirit is going to intervene to keep me safe, even if it is highly inconvenient. I’m being confronted by Spirit to surrender more deeply than I’ve done before, to trust in the guidance of Spirit to help me navigate this path. I’ve done many surrenders in the past, but this one is a bit unnerving as it also puts at risk my work to provide for myself and trust that Spirit will provide for me.

The message that I’ve received, confirmed by my tribe members, is that my time for planting seeds is now over. People have made their choices and now it is time for us all to explore why we made those choices and work out the consequences of them all. As such, my work to bring awareness and information to help people make good choices is done. I’m now responsible for tending the garden!

What does that mean? Well, I’m still trying to figure that out, however, I do know that it involves people traveling here to interact with me, spirit and Mother Earth directly for further development and training. This is a spiritual boot camp of sorts so that people can then take what they learn here and start their own tribes, build their home fires and hold space for others in their area. I see people traveling here to immerse themselves in a way of life that will facilitate further surrenders to Spirit and develop Spiritual Braves in the process.

I have the support here of Divine Feminine and a tribe to do this work. This is a physical, emotional, mental and spiritual journey, all four being addressed here through ceremony, connection, work, play, rest and circles. My time on social media will be significantly restricted as I focus on this school and building programs for people when they arrive. I will continue to surrender to Spirit and trust that those who need to be here, will come. I also trust that Spirit will orchestrate my life so that all my needs are met, at a physical, emotional, mental and spiritual level. I can testify that my latest surrenders over the past month have proven to be extremely healing for me. I continue to report that I’m growing stronger and healthier. Lou, the lump on my neck, continues to soften and shrink. I can work a full day now, sleep through the night without having to wake up to go to the bathroom and I don’t feel aches or pains in my joints. Having a low stress, supportive, encouraging environment is indeed healthy and good for me. For that I am grateful!

Choosing A Path – Part 3

May 24, 2021

One of our tribe members has been breeding Mastiffs for 30 years and one of the dogs was returned because he was biting and being aggressive. I’ve never had to ‘train’ a dog before. In fact, animals are naturally attracted to me. Drove me crazy for most of my life, but now I’m starting to appreciate it as I now acknowledge what it means to me and them. But dealing with aggression is something I’ve not had to do, so I wanted to learn as much as I could to help this dog.

Within a pack, there are the alphas and they demand obedience from the others in the pack. What I found out though, is that the signs and ways of showing the dominance of the alphas and the submission of the others is often subtle but always present. Ensuring that the humans are the alphas requires work and awareness. If we have dogs in our families, it is dangerous to have them be the alpha. People and dogs get hurt when that happens. So I’m now on a huge learning curve to learn about these subtle signs and the techniques to ensure the humans are alpha within the pack.

Dogs will fight to establish who the alpha is and if the dog lays down and exposes their belly or neck, that is a sign of submission to the alpha. I’ve now learned how to train a dog to be submissive to humans without resorting to fighting, violence or bloodshed. It is interesting and astounding to witness a peaceful and gentle, yet firm approach to training.

Spirit moves in mysterious ways as this whole experience has brought something to my attention. The modern social structures that people have between one another follows this same model as a pack. However, we are not pack animals, our nature is tribal. The feudal system has a number of alphas that rule the pack and demands that everyone else be obedient, just as dogs do within their packs. That obedience is often re-enforced through threats, intimidation or even violence, much as dogs do. Submission to the alpha is mandatory if one belongs to the pack.

If we tried this within a tribe, it would cause all kinds of problems. If we don’t approach our tribes differently, we will end up with big problems, resentment, conflict and chaos. Feelings get hurt and we fail to establish the profoundly intimate relationships we required for tribal life. I get the sense that this is a key point to be aware of if trying to build tribes. I’ve seen people use pack behaviours of intimidation and other passive / aggressive behaviours to manipulate the tribe. That does not work. I left tribes as a result of this pack behaviour.

Choosing a path less traveled

But I am also experiencing being in a tribe where those behaviours don’t cut it and to be frank, I resonate with this approach much better. Tribal life is about honour, peace, consensus, freedom, gifting, receiving, gratitude, caring and building profoundly intimate relationships on a physical, emotional, mental and spiritual level. We cannot do that using pack methodologies. We must learn the tribal methods in order for this to work. I’ve witnessed this unfolding here in natural ways, but also through meaningful and conscious efforts as well. As I experience and explore these ideas, I will share more.

As I spend time in my healing journey, I also find that I am willing to give of my time and efforts to others without expectation of payment or return. My needs are met and I have plenty of time to help others. I want to do this work. It feels important to me. Then I noticed a shift within myself. I’m able to work the whole day again. I’ve not been able to work a full day since at least 2017, when I got very ill. Healing for me is not just the emotional aspects, but has to involve all four parts of me. Bringing them all into balance is what I need for good health and now that I am in an environment that supports that type of Christ Level Consciousness, I’m able to find my way back to that level of health. My environment is just as important to my health as my own body, mind, feelings and spirit.

I’ve not contemplated how important my environment is to my own health before. Sure, I was aware of how important food, water and shelter is, but not the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual environment. Being around people who ‘get it’ AND are on similar journeys towards being good stewards and working on building healthy tribe is a huge part of the environment upon which I am now seeing. In the past, I really struggled finding people who ‘sees’ what I see and work towards this holistic way of life. It is not about ownership or control, it is about relationships and stewardship. I’ve spoken about these principles for years and now have an opportunity to work with others who sees tribal life in similar ways as I do. Bringing the ‘city’ or the colonial ways into this environment does NOT work.

My healing is progressing so quickly that I’m shocked at how well I’m doing. My lump on the back of my neck is shrinking too, which is a profound sign for me. My strength and memory is returning and I now have the energy to do more. My independence is returning and for that I am grateful as I now have the strength and stamina to work on my inter-independent relationships.

Choosing A Path – Part 2

Since this is the second time around in my efforts to establish a home fire, I thought I would share my thoughts, experiences and feelings along the way. The last time I did this was in 2007 and it was so long ago that I have little memory, just vague reflections. This time around it is different as I’m doing this with the support of a tribe, which I did not have before. I also showed up needing a lot of healing. I am happy to say that over the past month, I dedicated my time to my own healing. I don’t need institutions to do this healing any more. I have the knowledge, skills and experience to heal myself now, I just need the sacred space to get it done. Space that feels safe and allows me to do my work.

It may seem like I’m not productive, but I love myself too much to succumb to colonial pressures to be productive all the time. Within a tribe, the support is there which allowed me to rest, wander, reflect and connect with myself and Mother Earth. I read a book for fun, which is something I’ve not done in years. I do lots of reading, but it is usually research for the work that I do. I gave myself permission this time to have fun and that was amazing.

Where my future home fire will burn

I started clearing the spot for my home a few weeks ago and I’m excited to start the build. It will be about 200 square feet with stacked log roof and I’ll dig down for the living space. This gives me access to the thermal mass of the earth. It will help keep me cool in the summer and warm in the winter. I’m up high, so I don’t have much worry about the water table. The roof is plenty strong to hold the huge snow loads and I will use cob to finish it and the walls. I’m looking to use plastic water barrels to store water in the floor, but also turn one into a fridge as well. Lean-to will hold my fire wood outside and also help keep the wind off the house.

I also spent time helping the others too. I built a solar food dehydrator for the tribe to use and started working in the garden, helping to prepare for this years crop. I started building my own garden at my home fire. I gathered up the peat moss and leaves from the house and medicine wheel, where I then start piling it up along my path. The strawberries are in and the potatoes will soon go in as well.

Solar Food dehydrator

I also decided to repair a bunch of things that were broken. I’m not looking for payment but rather felt moved to tinker with simple things that helps me feel that I’m contributing. I’m good at doing that sort of thing, so it is a skill that I can contribute to the tribe. Sitting down to a meal once a day with people is also healing for me as I miss doing that a lot. It provides an opportunity to share with others what I plan on doing for the day and others to do the same. It is times like this where people feel open to share that they need help with tasks and have those needs met right away. Powerful process being around people who like to function in similar ways.

When I got here, I was completely dependent and was invited to not worry about that as I was going through my healing process. I’ve found that the more I heal, the strong I feel. This resulted in efforts to re-establish my independence. Working on my home is one aspect, but I also started preparing my own meals, living in my own space and looking after my own needs. Having the space to do this on my own was amazing and powerful. Few places I’ve been that knows how to hold space for others in this way. For that I am grateful.

My work towards self forgiveness is coming along. I had a recent experience where I was clearing some trees and two of them fell on my medicine wheel. At first I was very upset over this, but I realized this morning that the reason it happened is because I’m in a healing journey of self forgiveness. So I forgive myself and I’ll clean up the mess. I’m not immune to the consequences of what happened, so I’ll do my due diligence and clean the mess. The big part now is the self-forgiveness. That I will work on today as I clean up what happened. No harm was actually done to the medicine wheel, I was being overly critical of myself. So I’ll continue the work to forgive myself.

My connection to Mother Earth continues to grow stronger, especially now as spring has arrived. The spirit of the garter snake and bear have said hello. The black bear was a yearling male and he startled me as I walked around the corner of the yard and he jumped out from behind a buffalo hide strung out on a frame. I spoke to his spirit and asked him to leave, which he did. The dogs got his scent and convinced him even more.

Choosing A Path – Part 1

May 12, 2021

I’ve done this before and I find myself doing it again; starting over. This time though, I’m doing it all at the same time and I’m doing it with experience, knowledge and wisdom. So what better way to be of service to others and myself than to share my journey while it is fresh in my mind & heart. What I speak about is multi-faceted as I am not only talking about recovery from another round of mental illness, but I’m also returning to the land once again to rebuild after profound disruption in my life over the past few years.

I found myself homeless, hopping from couch to couch 10 times over the past 15 months. This drifting about did not help my efforts to heal from the trauma of profound loss as I mourned my marriage of 25 years, friends, family and a relationship with the land that I spent 13 years working hard to connect and steward peacefully. My struggles with my own mental health deteriorated as this uncertainty and disconnect challenged my resolve and ability to hold space for myself.

I am grateful that I started the school as my work built some core relationships with key people that helped me in ways I never expected. While they are spread across this land, the relationships were exactly what I needed. Specific individuals knew how to support me even when I was down or even a danger to myself. The work that we did in the school built a true tribe and that was something I did not plan to do, or expect to manifest. But it happened and it saved my life. Without these people I would most likely be living on the streets right now.

Instead, I received an invitation to return to the land with the support and encouragement of the tribe. I now find myself on the land in what many commonly call Northern Ontario, where I am starting a new adventure to return to the land as a steward of Mother Earth. I’ve done this before, so I know I can do it again. Except this time I’m doing it with a much different intent. From 2006 to 2020, my intent was to live off grid and be free. Little did I know that I was still trapped by colonial constructs, specifically ideas of ownership and false precepts of tribe.

My experience over the past 15 months gave me permission to let go of all those constructs and to decolonize myself even further. For this lesson and opportunity, I am grateful to Creator for giving me the push that I needed to take this path that I never saw before. I now willingly choose this path and is why I decided to name this blog series ‘Choosing a Path’.

I took a leap of faith and accepted an invitation to travel to Ontario. The past few weeks have been challenging as I mourn and say good bye to the land that I’ve lived upon for over 50 years. Since I landed here on April 29th, I’ve spent a lot of time healing and looking after myself. I’ve been immersing myself in the bush as much as possible and talking to people so that I can work through the profound feelings of sadness, pain, sorrow and fear. I spent this time fully dedicated to looking after myself.

One of the most profound lessons through this was the realization that people don’t typically forgive me when I make mistakes, or at least I don’t recall people using words to express forgiveness. When I am ill, I struggle with relationships due to an overwhelming desire to flee, hide and isolate myself. I work hard not to do that, but at times when I experience great, overwhelming pain, I find myself miles away from where I sleep. Sadly, people take this personally and that causes great rifts in relationships, hard feelings and even complete breakdown in relationships.

There are times where I wished that my illness resulted in the spilling of blood. It seems that seeing red fluid oozing out of a body spawns great concern and people jump into action to preserve life, but tears are not viewed with such urgency or concern. In my view, tears are spiritual blood and needs to be address with equally as much care and urgency as the red blood from our vessels. Until that happens, mental illness will continue to anguish as a dark and misunderstood condition of life that many avoid at all costs.

In the past few days I came to the realization that if people cannot or will not forgive me, then I must do that myself. This is what I’ve been reflecting on since I got here and I am working hard to do this work. I get flashbacks from events in my life where I made mistakes that cost me relationships because we all failed to navigate the situation in a healthy way. I accept my part in all of that and is why I’m doing this work now. I’ll say the words, but still struggle to implement the feelings and protocol into my spirit.

I forgive myself.

I will continue to repeat those words until I believe them profoundly. I work hard to learn the lessons from the mistakes that I’ve made, now it is time to end the haunting of my mind and heart. I am worthy of being forgiven, even if others don’t see it that way. This is my path to walk and I choose it willingly.

My Medicine Wheel

When I visited the land here, I took my time to connect with her, listen to her spirit and introduce myself. I was welcomed and found this land to be very similar to the land I was stewarding in Alberta. I asked for help and was told that I needed to setup a medicine wheel first before I do anything else. So I spent hours building my medicine wheel. I needed this wheel to help me heal and it is this effort that helped me realize that it is time to forgive myself. Ceremony was performed with divine masculine and feminine working together to establish this sacred healing space. I see many people coming to sit around this fire to heal and connect so that they can find their path as well.

I feel home, safe and peaceful in my heart. I still have lots of healing to do, but I am confident in saying that I am no longer in danger. My healing has progressed quickly as I confront myself. Over the coming weeks and months, I will provide further insight into my journey, share pictures of the work that I’m doing and consolidate 20 years of experience into a few short months as I have learned many lessons over the years, made many mistakes and will do my best to share the path that I’ve chosen with those interested in doing something similar.

We live in challenging times and I have no doubt that connecting with Mother Earth and Creator in such an intimate way will provide for our physical, emotional, mental and spiritual health, growth and evolution. I have a tribe around me that supports me, understands how to talk with me when I have episodes and that I trust. That is what I got out of starting and running this school for the Pacem Arts. I pray that others can get something similar out of it as well. It is not an easy path and we are all confronted with the shadow work. But for those willing to do that work, the rewards are amazing and astounding. I testify to that first hand as I’ve been blessed with such gifts of spirit through angels that are among me.

I will sign off with this: I forgive all those who have made mistakes in their lives. I will do what I can to hold space for healing as I can relate first hand to what it feels like, the challenges and pitfalls.

I forgive you.

I forgive me!

Decolonizing Money

Over the past few weeks a few of us have been working hard to develop a website for White Walking Feather’s School of the Pacem Arts. Figuring out how to deal with energy exchange through the new website has been challenging, especially considering I don’t have a person to interact within the ‘system’. In my meditation this morning, Spirit instructed me that my idea of money has to be decolonized as well. I’ve been working for years to remove my dependency on Fiat Currency, but met with frustration as I could only get so far before hitting a wall. I was missing a key component, you!

Silver coins

Within the feudal system, the King would dictate what form of ‘currency’ he needed in order to satisfy the serf’s duty to pay service to him. Hundreds of years ago, that service was paid in the form of wood, military service, food, silver and gold. The silver and gold was then struck into coins to make interactions between the King and the serfs more standard. Everyone knew the ‘value’ of a gold coin, so it became the standard upon which to evaluate the value of other commodities, including the serf’s time. Yes, time is now a commodity and people sell it in order to pay their service to the king.

Then the banksters took over and replaced the commodities (wood, time, food, silver, gold) with their own fiat currency. I speak at length about this process within the school. The king then passed ‘laws’ to make this fiat currency the only ‘legal’ way to pay taxes, essentially turning it into a monopoly. Over the decades, people have become so accustomed to using the fiat currency, we lost connection with the old ways.

But it goes even further as I only described currency within a feudal system. What did our ancestors do within their tribes, prior to being serfs to the king? They helped one another to ensure everyone’s needs were met. There was no interest in wealth, power or conquest. Those are colonial constructs. They were interested in finding a balance of energy within the tribe. Some people were completely or partially dependent, like the sick, old and young, while the others could produce more than what they need, a fact that is now being exploited by the greedy and rich today. How do we decolonize our relationship with energy exchange so that we can return to ensuring the needs of all are met?

This decolonization process will require moving away from the monopoly established by the King and return to a spiritual expression of energy exchange. The challenge with this process is that the bankster families are pushing to further consolidate their control of money because it is THE one tool that allows them to control the whole entire world. Why? Because we have abandoned our spiritual power and authority to share with one another, instead choosing to participate in their energy vampire system. This system forces people to be feudal serfs in order to participate in it. They also designed it to cut out anybody who would try to bypass it, claiming that they are engaged in money laundering, illegal activities, fraud, tax evasion and other acts against the king. This is classic intimidation by a bully because the bully knows that spiritual authority trumps his and he desperately wants to ensure that does not happen.

A few of us have been exploring these concepts for years and there are still ways to exchange energy with one another so that we can get our needs met without being a slave to the system. To get there requires that we design a way for people to transition from fiat currency to spiritual energy exchange. The addiction to fiat currency is more invasive than alcohol or drugs, but I’m confident that by slowly making changes, we can make this transition happen. It will require patience, time, education and healing as it will most likely trigger us all until we get to the other side.

When we move towards freedom outside of the system, we end up being anonymous as the system requires identification to keep track of transactions. This anonymity makes energy exchange challenging but not impossible as the system moves quickly towards implementing the mark of the beast. There will come a day where people will not be able to ‘buy’ or ‘sell’ without the mark. That is why it is important we learn how to connect to spiritual energy exchange and move away from the idea of engaging in commerce and having to ‘buy’ or ‘sell’ anything, whether it be food, clothing or even land itself.

I’m going to outline the transition options that we have, along with the pros and cons of each. If people have ideas to add to this list, I’m open to adding them as it will help us all.

Precious Metals: Gold, silver, copper

Most people instinctively recognize the value of precious metals as they have been used for thousands of years. There is a difference between having the physical metal in one’s pocket vs paper certificates on account. There are many times more paper certificates than actual physical metal. I don’t trust the banksters at all on their promise that they will turn over actual metal upon demand. During political and economic chaos, it is best that the metal is in your possession.

Don’t forget that the metal has been used in many ways. Here in Canada, coins from 1967 and older contain silver, as does some cutlery, dishes, electronics, etc. The government is clamping down on physical metal purchases by requiring ID so that they can keep track of who has the gold. The downside of using metals as a currency is that moving metal around can be challenging and expensive. There is a reason why people put their metal in a vault and used the vault receipt instead. That is what started paper money to begin with. (money as debt videos)

Cryptocurrency

While Bitcoin is the most famous, there are thousands of other cryptocurrencies in the world. Mass adoption is still a challenge as governments around the world scramble to try and figure out how to control this new, anonymous, decentralized tool that completely bypasses their centralized money control systems. As a result, cryptocurrencies have been demonized for years, but now the banks are seeing an opportunity to get into the game and convert their fiat currencies into crypto’s as the blockchain keeps track of ALL transactions. This is exactly what governments want, so now they are working hard to implement the idea through their central banks.

Governments cannot control the decentralized network, but they can control the corporations that setup exchanges to help facilitate the process of purchasing or selling crypto with fiat currencies. The exchanges act as a broker between the parties, which requires that everyone have government issued id. However, people can still trade, buy or sell crypto outside of the exchanges. The downside is that there is no broker, so people will need to trust one another, but it can be done. Outside of the exchanges, anonymity is much easier to maintain and allows people to exchange energy with one another outside of the controls of the system.

Anonymous Gift Card / Credit Card

The system still has a few straggling tools available for people who are looking to exchange energy outside of the system. Anonymous gift cards and credit cards can still be purchased and then shipped to other people. In fact, that is what they are designed to do. It still requires that the individual filling the cards have fiat currency, but for the time being, cash still works. There will come a time where the system will move to a cashless society at which point, an individual will need the mark of the beast in order to fill the cards. At this point, this option will fall away and should be removed from the list. There is also a risk of having the cards frozen by the corporation who issued the cards, ceased by authorities or the potential of being lost or stolen in the mail.

Cash transactions physically or by Snail Mail

There was an old saying that “Cash is king”, but that saying is quickly going away. With the recent events, people are now scared to touch cash in fear of getting sick. Does not matter whether it is a rational fear or not, this is having a huge impact on how many people will accept cash in exchange for goods and services. Cash is the king of anonymity and is why most governments are working hard to get ride of it. They cannot track transactions or control people if they use cash instead of debit or credit cards. Reward cards were invented to help elevate this issue as not only can stores track what was purchased, but it did not matter if it was paid with cash or electronic transfer. The transaction was captured and tied to the individual. Anonymity only works when the cash is used by itself. Cash also has risks as it can be ceased, lost or stolen as well.

Bank Transfers

The world revolves around the infrastructure that banks have developed for all to use. While it may seem like it is a convenient service, it requires being a feudal serf in order to participate and to keeps track of everything. Banks now control how much money you can move per day, must report larger transactions to the government, can cease funds from accounts without due process of law and the banksters steal ‘value’ without people realizing it, through a tool called inflation. Government issued ID is heavily used to validate that the individual is a serf in good standing with the state. Anybody outside of that system is not welcome to enjoy the benefits of their services and are often labeled as terrorists or criminals.

PayPal and other online transaction services

Years ago, I could get a paypal account with just an e-mail address. Now it requires phone numbers and connecting accounts to existing bank accounts. This is their way of validating their customer as phones and bank accounts require that your identification has been validated by an authority. So these services are becoming more and more challenging to use. A work around is to ‘borrow’ somebody’s paypal account, but that requires trust.

The Challenge with websites

Automation and convenience has been one tool that the banksters and government puppets depend on in order to implement tighter and tighter controls. I’ve found through this website development project that it matters not what I want to do, in order to automate the process of collecting energy from people in exchange for participating in the school, I need to use their tools. Those tools dictate the protocols that I can use, which requires that I have a person, government issued ID and other proof that I’m a slave.

In order for me to keep this school going, I will need to find an alternative and that requires some inconvenience, manual record keeping, flexibility, communication and other protocols to make this work. It also requires that others can ‘see’ the value of this decolonization process and are willing to participate. The Pacem Arts website will be setup to help people make that transition by implementing ALL of the above protocols, while acknowledging that over time, some of these protocols will be removed as the system slowly clamps down and makes these alternatives no longer viable.

But what are we truly valuing? Is it the token itself, like gold, money, cryptocurrency, etc, or is it the energy and contribution of the individual? The true value rests with the energy and intent of the individual. When the big money crunch comes, and it will, the economy will stop. Why? Because people don’t acknowledge or recognize that they energy that money represents is their own creative power and influence. People stop creating when the money flow stops, when the solution is to continue creating despite of it. This is the ultimate decolonization of our minds when it comes to money. Money was only ever meant to be a store of energy so that we can do an energy exchange sometime in the future. Well, the greedy figured this out and ended up with all of it. But all of that energy is work already done. It is in the past. We are still standing here capable of adding value to people’s lives despite the greedy stealing all of the past.

The School for the Pacem Arts will also explore community-exchange.org as a way to exchange energy with people around the world as we transition to even more spiritually grounded methods such as gifting, trusting and healing. Since everyone is at a different place in their lives, we will implement all of these different methods of trading energy for energy. My goal is to have my own needs met and at that point, my request for energy will drop. As more people join the school, that will also result in lowering my request for energy in exchange for participating in the school. I already have some very generous individuals helping out and that in turn helps us all. This may feel confusing at first, but with some time, I’m confident that we can work it out and help us all decolonize ourselves from the money system.

Addressing Pervasive Violence

We live in a world that has criminalized certain types of violence, but very much normalized or even legalized vast amounts of covert and overt violence.  Through colonization, it is now socially acceptable and even encouraged to engage in violent behaviour while many would argue that it is not violent at all.  Rather than dispute the semantics of where people draw the line, I want to share the work that I’ve done over the last 20 years to not only navigate this mine field, but also how I set boundaries to protect myself from slipping back into a covert violent life.

I’ve found over the years that there seems to be a lot of confusion and disagreement with my approach, so I pray that exploring this protocol helps bring clarity to those that struggle with my approach in life.  It is also important that I highlight my work to identify violent behaviour that many would consider socially acceptable.  It is my view that we challenges these perceptions at every turn of our lives.

Identifying Violence

There is a lot of information out there that covers this topic very well.  Aside from the obvious overt violent behaviours, exploring the covert abusive relationships is where it gets a bit more tricky.  An individual could easily research the behaviours of psychopaths, sociopaths, narcissists or even drill down into gaslighting, blame-shifting, word twisting and a whole host of other techniques.  It matters not whether this is done consciously or not.  The trick is to be consciously aware of these techniques when they come to bear in conversations or relationships.  The scope of this post will not cover these in detail, but rather leave it up to the reader to do their own research.

For me, it required that I go through extensive painful life experiences and training to acknowledge that I engaged in this type of behaviour and that I surrender to be willing to learn the techniques on how I could change my behaviour in order to end the violence and have healthy relationships instead.  It also made me intimately aware of others around me who do engage in these techniques.  When presented, I see these behaviours like bright flashing neon signs.  While it takes practice, over time we can all learn how to see and feel the signs of covert violence and then take appropriate steps to address the violence.

It matters not whether the individual is your self, an intimate partner, family, friends, co-workers, neighbours or even people wearing uniforms of authority.  What I’m about to share applies to everyone and this is where great discomfort comes in for some who study the Pacem Arts with me.

Setting Boundaries

I acknowledge that the colonial trauma that we all experience and are working hard to heal, has resulted in multiple generations passing along trauma for thousands of years.  We are ALL confronted with trauma but some deal with it in different ways.  People naturally would respond to trauma by fighting, fleeing, fawning or freezing.  Two of these responses result in a withdrawing into ones self, while the other two results in turning the trauma around and lashing out at others.  It is the fighting and fawning people that end up being the primary abusers and engaging in all kinds of violence.  Also keep in mind that many of us may fall into more than one category depending on the situation and the other two groups often empower the others, contributing to the problem.

www.publicdomainpictures.net (CC0 public domain)

As a result of all these challenges, our feelings, communications, thoughts, assumptions, life experiences, etc all influence how we see the world and interact with it.  As I explore relationships from this new paradigm, I acknowledge that everyone has trauma to heal.  However, I also acknowledge that free will dictates whether one is willing to do the work or not.  So I look for a few things when dealing with people, while also acknowledging that most everyone will engage in some sort of violence in one form or another throughout my relationship with them.  What I look for is whether they are willing to learn and willing to change.  The attached graphic will highlight this to help with what I’m about to explain.

If an individual has a high willingness to learn and a high willingness to change, chances are high that these individuals are fairly conscious, aware of their shadows, willing to discuss relationship issues openly and explore alternatives or even engage in dispute resolution processes.  With these individuals, when a behaviour manifests that causes harm to another, they are the most flexible and also willing to identify the problem, brainstorm solutions and implement them, triggering changed behaviour, growth and further conscious awareness and insight.  It is these individuals with whom I like to have in my inner circle, who I call elders and I trust greatly to help me with my own journey.  When we engage with one another in an Elders Circle, it is magical, respectful, inspiring, beautiful and amazing.  We may slip up from time to time, but everyone involved is quick to gather together to remedy the situation as all involved recognize the value of addressing issues right away as the relationship is far too valuable to let mistakes or errors jeopardize it.

If an individual has a medium willingness to learn and a medium willingness to change, what I look for is their willingness to do the work, to explore, show up, ask questions, put effort in and do their best to figure out life.  Let me be very clear on this point:  Even though they may engage in violent behaviour from time to time, I tolerate it as they are still open to learning, being confronted and exploring the lessons that those opportunities present for all involved.  I forgive them and pray that the experience provides growth and learning through these experiences.  This is the spirit of the work that we do in Sacred Heart Circle.

However, if an individual has a low willingness to learn and a low willingness to change, things become dangerous as the will to acknowledge mistakes, work through issues or even hear what others are sharing becomes significantly diminished.  When an individual slips into this area, their abuse becomes even more toxic as there is typically nothing anyone can do to stop the violence as it often escalates as a protective mechanism.  They have made up their mind and will live their life the way they see fit and if they are violent, there is no way to stop it.  There are plenty of articles written about Battered Spouse Syndrome and I’ve even written an article about Battered Citizen Syndrome to highlight how our love for these individuals is not enough to trigger healing within them.  Hope, interventions and other extreme activities often don’t result in a shift as free will is a reality of this realm.  In my own experience, what I needed to break free from this false ego black hole was to have a life crises which forced me to surrender and make a choice:  change or die.  I pray people don’t need to go that far in order to make the choice, but I’ve found this to be far more common than not.

It is the violence from this group of people that I’ve chosen to take a zero tolerance approach.  The yellow line on the graph is my boundary and also happens to be the threshold between having the will to change or not.  If I feel they have lost the will to learn or change, that means there is no way I could have a reasonable chance of being able to resolve disputes or confront them on their behaviour in order to find healing and remedy when they lash out or make a mistake.  With all the others, I’ve found that I am willing to tolerate mistakes or some abuse as there are ways to resolve them, heal and strengthen the relationship as a result.  But with the people that find themselves in that bottom red square, there is no remedy within my sphere of influence.  Instead I’ve usually been met with abuse, gaslighting and other violent responses.

This is where the controversy comes to play as my boundary is to end that relationship.  I’ve set that boundary because I love myself and I was not put on this earth to be abused or treated in such deplorable ways.  If there is no chance for remedy, then I have no duty or obligation to interact with that individual, no matter what role they have played in my life.  It matters not whether they were my spouse, mother, brother, sister, relative, friend or neighbour.

Let me repeat this point:  I LOVE MYSELF AND NOBODY HAS THE RIGHT TO VIOLATE ME IN ANY WAY.  My boundary is firm on this point and it should be for each and every single individual on this planet!

I acknowledge that this is very difficult for some people to do because setting this type of boundary requires that we have the ability to process sadness, mourning, loss and other profound feelings that comes from cutting abusive relationships from our lives.  It also requires that I accept and embrace change as these decisions often manifest great disturbance in my life.  By embracing change, I have found that I can navigate life easier and with more fluidity.  Trusting that Creator will help look after me along this journey also helps tremendously.  Many refuse to do this, so they will hold onto those abusive relationships because their willingness to change is low and they struggle as any learning they do conflicts with their unwillingness to change.  This, in turn, drives themselves towards the red square.

In my experience there is also a threshold that people go through as they drop down into the red low learning, low change zone.  Prior to crossing that threshold, there is still some willingness to hear what people are saying and they are willing to make changes, but it is tough.  I’ve used blunt language with these people in the hopes that they can avoid crossing over that threshold.  There are many within the tribe that this has helped and I am grateful.  It is also my experience that once they cross that threshold, there is no way that I can rationalize with them.  By setting the boundary and refusing to spend time with them, I pray that Creator will soften their heart and help them surrender and choose to learn and change once again.  This has happened before in my life as well, where I set boundaries, removing myself from their life and they returned years later, apologizing and asking for reconciliation.

The message I work hard to send is clear:  violence will no longer be tolerated.  Period.  Either an individual embraces the work with the will to learn and change or they don’t.  This approach is supported by Christ’s teachings, specifically Matthew 18:15-17.  Some struggle as they were taught blood is thicker than water, but these are colonial constructs that only perpetuate multi-generational trauma.

Don’t Shoot the Messenger

I’ve also noticed over the years that when I or others stand up to be a witness to the abuser, this ends up being disturbing to all the people associated with the abuser.  It is an interesting phenomenon that people don’t like change and when abusers are confronted, it risks GREAT change within the social relationships of the group, whether it be a family, tribe, corporation or even a government.  People don’t like change and to some degree, they are willing to tolerate violence so that the social order is not disturbed.  I find this actually quit disturbing as it only perpetuates violence and gives violent abusers a sanctuary to continue their abusive ways.  It also discourages people from standing up to be a witness to the abuse of others as they are often judged or attacked for their testimony.  As a result, the witness ends up receiving the vast majority of the attention which is opposite of what should actually be happening.  This happens in the micro as much as it happens in the macro.

In my experience, standing up as a witness to somebodies violence, while they are in a high willingness to learn and a high willingness to change is often met with gratitude, appreciation and full participation to resolve the behaviour.  This makes it very easy to tolerate the violence as it often results in growth.  For the middle group, I’ve found the ground rules and sacred space of the Sacred Heart Circle to be the most effective means of confronting violence.  I do it with gentleness and questions to help guide the individual through the journey of healing, learning, change and growth.  Because of this, I am also willing to tolerate violence.  In my view, I feel this is a manifestation of my own work on violent behaviour, a testimony to the 20 years of work, growth and healing that I’ve done.

I acknowledge that many still struggle with my zero tolerance with people in the red zone, but this should never be interpreted as me being callus, insensitive, uncaring or unloving.  I trust that Creator will help them through their journey and I make it very clear that if they want me as a part of that journey, there is a minimum standard of behaviour that is expected from everyone around me.  I’ve worked hard to maintain that minimum standard and it is something that I think we ALL should be establishing.  The message to be sent throughout the world is this:Abusive behaviour, whether overt or covert in nature, is no longer tolerated; by anybody.

This is the premise and standards set for the Pacem Arts and ALL my relationships.  I acknowledge that I live in a rather abusive and violent world and as such my social circle is really small.  However, it is growing because I know in my heart that the people around me acknowledge, appreciate and honour those standards that I’ve set for myself and those that I interact with.  These are my standards and boundaries.  Nobody has the right to convince or intimidate me to move off of those standards, to do so is a violent act.  But for those that honour and respect those boundaries, I have witnessed great love, compassion, growth, empathy, friendship, trust and profound intimacy; exactly what I’m looking for in my life.This all takes a tremendous amount of hard work, profound changes and a willingness to learn new ways of communicating, resolving disputes, having profound conscious awareness, honesty and courage to stand up to those that we love most.  This journey produces a tremendous amount of disturbance, but there is no way to get to this peaceful place without going through the pain, turmoil and profound disruption.  I pray this helps people process the consequences of my actions as I set boundaries that impacts all those around me.  I pray that this helps explain where I am coming from when I do this work.

By holding those in the red zone accountable for their actions, we can help make life uncomfortable enough to surrender and chose to learn and change instead of sitting in a place that is familiar and engage in inappropriate behaviour.  That is, in my view, the most loving act we can express to the violent offenders.  They deserve healing as well; but it must start with them.  We can help by calling them on their shit.What are your thoughts on this topic?  Feel free to comment below.