A Spiritual Warrior is one that stands in the gap between ordinary reality and Spirit. A Spiritual Warrior is armed with self knowledge, truth, prayer, discernment, and the ability to know truth from fiction. Often times Spiritual Warriors are reviled because they refuse to compromise truth to tickle people's ears with what they want to hear. They are lone voices crying in a wilderness of self deception, false prophets, and false teachings. These are people who walk alone, and are often misunderstood. They are charismatic and intense with a passion for truth and self discipline. They are the surgeons of the spiritual world often perceiving truth with a clarity that is often disconcerting. They get to the heart of the matter with a precision of mind that can at times be difficult to hear. They rarely mince words, but their purpose is not to wound with those words. While it may seem cold and harsh their words are often prophetic in their warning to abandon a certain path or mindset. Many Spiritual Warriors are often beset themselves with issues socially, spiritually and emotionally. They are people that have walked through the fires of purging themselves and have often had their own egos broken and then rebuilt and resurrected into a vessel fit for spiritual warring. They are our teachers, our beacons, our consciences and the connection between the seen and the unseen. Spiritual Warriors are the voices of prayer in the wee hours, the constant reminder to Creator of the frailty of human existence and the need for Creator's assistance. They are on the front lines of the battle between our shadow selves and our higher selves. Their calling is not an easy one, but essential, and even more essential in the times we live in today.

When we are wounded we want to demand vindication.  Often we tend to harp on the wound, demanding our justice.  The truth is that harping on old wounds only further alienates us.  It serves no purpose.  Forgiveness means letting it go, and not demand vindication.  We do not demand our "rights".  Rather we reach out in love and healing realizing that yesterday is gone and all we have left are the tomorrows.

The future belongs to those who can truly channel the Light.  Sometimes that means letting go of ideas even when we believe we are right.  It means forgiveness in the face  of the unforgivable, and channeling Agape Love.  It means that relationships are more important than being "right", or justifying oneself.  The future belongs to those who understand that ego is the first thing that has to die.  That means that our ideas, our conceptions of justice are going to be shattered.  Who we are, what we are what we believe will be put to the fire.  Our perceptions of ourselves, what others perceive of us, all will be challenged and put to the fire until nothing is left except the submission to Creator and the desire to serve.

Sitting in Stillness

In our modern day world we have forgotten how to sit in absolute stillness, breathe and meditate waiting for Spirit.  From our conception we are surrounded by a cacophony of noise.   We have music, television, car noise, crowds, all clamoring for our attention.  We've grown so used to this hectic pace and way of life that sitting still becomes not only very difficult but for some impossible and frightening. 

Our Elders before us in the Cherokee way knew not only how to sit still, they knew how to ground themselves into the Earth and wait quietly.  They knew how to take a deep breath and sit in the stillness and revel in the quiet calm they created.   This stillness created health in body, soul and spirit.  It was in this place of calm and solitude that they could regenerate, communicate with Spirit, and receive the wisdom they so needed for their lives.

Many Europeans who had a different mindset misunderstood this mindset of the Native American and mistook it for stoicism.  In fact it became a stereotype to see a Chief or a Native American leader portrayed on television with no more than a frown and a grunt.  What was not understood is that our people saw words as power, and as manifestation.  Feelings and thoughts were not to be shared lightly simply because the spoken word has power, and power brings manifestation.   It was not so much stoicism as it was wisdom.   

In this day and there are many different courses in breath or breathing.  Imagine, we have even forgotten how to breathe in the madcap insanity that we have created of our world.  There are courses in meditation because our minds have become so cluttered we cannot remember how to relax and let go.  We have strayed so far from stillness and mother earth that the abnormal seems normal.  We live in glass and concrete cities, and we breathe in polluted air.   We rush in and out of subways, cabs, buses, and planes harried and frazzled.  We do not put our feet in Mother Earth, or feel her grass beneath our feet any more.  We have disconnected ourselves spirit, soul, and body, and now there is a restoration and a new movement that is trying to reconnect us with ourselves and with the Earth who is our Mother.

 There is a call back to sitting in stillness, calmness and grounding back to Mother Earth.  What was once ridiculed has now been found to be not only wise but necessary for our health spiritually, physically, and mentally.    We must once again reacquaint ourselves with stillness and calm.  We must not allow the distractions of our present day to keep us from learning this.  It's time to remember the simple things such as breathing, or feeling the grass beneath our feet.  It's time to plant, to sow, to remember the earth is our treasure, our sustenance and our Mother.  It's time to learn to control our tongues and remember the sanctity of words and the power of them.  We need to learn respect for ourselves once more and the wisdom of sitting in stillness.  More importantly we need to be unafraid of facing ourselves in this new stillness.  Spirit wants to do a new work but as long as we deafen ourselves with mental spiritual or physical noise we will not move forward in this new beginning.