Member-only story
Can We Win It Back?
“My people see land ownership as being totally different to the English. We lived on the land as people of the land. To us it was a natural way of being, being part of all that there is. You didn’t see anything as different from you. If you’re alive, you connect to everything else that’s alive. You can never feel lonely in that situation. All around you are family members from the ground up; the trees around you, the clouds, birds flying by, the animals and reptiles. That’s the beauty of oneness, it doesn’t push anyone out, but it brings everybody in. It stretches from horizon to horizon where the clouds are your ceiling at daytime and the stars at night. But that ‘oneness’ has been shrunk down to the ‘mineness’ of this little box, ‘my house’, ‘my car’. So small in comparison. You’re part of the oneness and you can feel that. You feel good when you’re in that space.”
~ Bob Randall (Aboriginal elder)
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…Anyone who looks at the animals in the Paleolithic cave paintings in southern France with a receptive awareness can see that the physical and spirit world are infused together. Those early artists were imaging not just physical animals but spirit beings, shamanic, magical. This is part of their mystery and intensity. And this knowing continued for thousands of years, whether experienced in relation with the powerful beings that for the Native Americans are…
