“The Anishinaabeg world undulated between material and spiritual shadows, never clear which was more prominent at any time. It was as if the world rested in those periods rather than in the light of day. Dawn and dusk, biidaaban, mooka’ang. The gray of sky and earth was just the same, and the distinction between the worlds was barely discernible.”
― Winona LaDuke, Last Standing Woman
“Lakes that you can still drink from. That’s where I live. And that’s what this battle is about. It’s about, you know: Can we protect that?”
-Winona LaDuke interviewed on Democracy Now 2018
“what it needs to be about in this millennia, is: restoring our relationship to our relatives who have roots.”
-Wionna LaDuke
“Recognition for us is about presence, about profound listening, and about recognizing and affirming the light in each other as a mechanism for nurturing and strengthening internal relationships to our Nishnaabeg worlds. It is a core part of our political systems because they are rooted in our bodies and our bodies are not just informed by but created and maintained by relationships of deep reciprocity.”
-Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, As We Have Always Done: Indigenous Freedom through Radical Resistance
KEEP SCROLLING DOWN FOR SHORT & LONG EXPLAINATION
IN SHORT:
UPRIGHT: Hope, purpose, resilience, renewal, spirituality. Make offerings. Ancestral & cross generational dialogues and development.
REVERSED: Despair, self-trust, disconnection, Loss of faith. Physical or mental illness resulting from terrible living conditions. Beware bad-faith participants.
IN DEPTH:The Star card shows up as a group in protest, a group in ceremony. A group that has travelled great distances across time and space. Their leader embarks upon a a hunger strike, a ritual of immense self-control, commitment, and physical vulnerability. She offers her body, her pain, her visible suffering as a bridge between worlds—between colonial state and tribal nation, between people and earth, between indigenous and non-indigenous, between seen and unseen. She calls us to her bridge to negotiate a better future, a decolonized future, a future where we can be in direct relationship to our world, where we can all drink the water, and where we can access sustainable housing, and nutritious food. It is profound wager made with the universe, to call the future forward, by means of calling the crisis of the present into her body. Throughout this fasting, she is held with love by her community, she is prayed for, she becomes a conduit between past, present and future generations. The Star card calls you across space, time and consciousness, it calls you to consider what is your highest calling in this moment? What gifts or offerings can you bring to this exact moment in history? Allow yourself to listen to your inner and ancestral guidances, and put practice into your inspiration, and practice inspired action.
AT LENGTH: Our Star takes inspiration from Theresa Spence (born 1963) who was a prominent figure in the ongoing Idle No More movement, founded in 2012 in Canada. She was chief of the Attawapiskat First Nation in Canada, and she was an important voice bringing the attention of Canadians towards the housing and infrastructure crisis in in the Attawapiskat, Idle No More, and other First Nations issues.
On 11 December 2012 Spence declared a hunger strike, in which her diet consisted of only liquids such as lemon water, medicinal teas, and fish broth— a historical survival diet for Indigenous communities facing poverty and food shortages due to past colonial policies. From a tipi on Victoria Island, near Parliament Hill in Ottawa, she issued a call for First Nation traditional women healers and other women, including Laureen Harper, the wife of the Prime Minister, to come and join her “to pray for Canada.” Her protest attracted worldwide attention to the Idle No More movement, however it drew controversy from some, describing her tactic as ‘a dangerous precedent’ and ‘nearly blackmail’, and the government issued audits against Chief Spence as part of a blatant smear campaign. However, for many her quiet bravery, and the incredible resilience and creativity of her and Attawapiskat First Nation, serve as an immense inspiration of awe and respect.
FURTHER READING:
monthlysmokeandmirrors.com 