Maine Lawyer and Indigenous/Human Rights Activist urges “Healing Wounds” to heal the world in new book: "Sacred Instructions"

Sacred Instructions: Indigenous Wisdom for Living Spirit-Based Change Review

The Old Ones say the Native American women will lead the healing among the tribes. Inside them are the powers of love and strength given by the Moon and the Earth. When everyone else gives up, it is the women who sings the songs of strength. She is the backbone of the people. So, to our women we say, sing your songs of strength; pray for your special powers; keep our people strong; be respectful, gentle, and modest.

–Village Wise Man, Lakota

Sherri Mitchell’s new book, Sacred Instructions, couldn’t have been released at a more relevant time in our nation’s history.  A massive shakeup in the White House has led to the latest round of firings. National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster is out, so is Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, the person charged with keeping the peace, brokering peace agreements, and creating good relations with our neighbors in foreign countries, near and far. It is this urging for peace brokering, opening the door to global healing, that Sherri Mitchell so eloquently delves into with Sacred Instructions, reaching back into history and, at the same time, forward into the great unknown, using metaphors beautifully to dance from paragraph to page.

The product of two First Nations, the Passamaquoddy and the Penobscot tribe, a “small island nation that floats in the Penobscot River”, Sherri Mitchell’s bloodline translates into “the place where the white rocks come out of the water”. In Sacred Instructions, Mitchell expertly weaves the stories of centuries of wounds inflicted upon her people; wounds that she and her people carry in their DNA today. She writes, “In my family, we carry our own traumatic wounding that goes back generations…our people were hunted like animals, with a bounty on our heads”. Indeed, the Spencer Phips Proclamation of 1755 ordered the “killing of Penobscot people..(offering) varying prices for the killing of adult men, women, children and infants”. Mitchell says the impact of that now 263- year old proclamation is held in the form of deep wounds for the Penobscot people. “There’s a type of despair,” Mitchell writes, “that is unique to those who are exiled on their own lands…when your home is taken and you are hunted and executed on your own land, there is no home for you to dream about. This causes deep wounding to the hearts and minds of the people who are subjected to such treatment.” 

And, although Maine broke free from Massachusetts, becoming a state on March 15, 1820, it has never, according to Mitchell, recognized the pain and suffering inflicted upon the entire Wabanaki (Wahponahki---comprised of Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, Maliseet and Mi’kmaq tribes) people. “They chose to make that history invisible. To this day, the State of Maine is still denying its obligations to the tribes and it is still attacking the rights of tribal people. Thus,” Mitchell concludes, “the pain of that long-standing wound remains”. 

Mitchell’s vision, though personal, is also achingly inclusive, recognizing the wounds of all mankind. From the holocaust Native Americans endured, to the Holocaust of Jews, and the deep wounds experienced by Irish, Italian, polish immigrants who reached mother liberty only to find disdain and heart-break, treated as ‘less than’ and on which many wounds were inflicted, verbal and physical. And the modern day immigrants, those seeking asylum under mother liberty’s promise to protect and welcome, only to face wounding in their new country. Each of us, Mitchell argues, is carrying present day wounds and the wounds of our forebears. Wounds, that unless tended to, will fester and crack open, infecting the entire globe. She writes, “In order to achieve a shift in direction, people are going to have to be willing to be uncomfortable and face the many conflicts that are coming up, with intent towards healing.” A key component, Mitchells says, of transforming conflict is “a willingness to sit with those who disagree with your position. To listen closely to what they are saying…to try to find a point where your needs converge, so you can work together to harmonize those needs into some form of decisive action”. 

Throughout Sacred Instructions, Mitchell reflects on the critical importance of finding ways to create a global circle of healing, mending fences during a time in which there is great upheaval in all corners. “Achieving peace requires more than the absence of war. It requires us to transform our hearts and minds and then our relationships with one another and the natural world.” 

Winter of 2018 has marked a time of global upheaval; perhaps nature’s retaliation for the wounds inflicted in the past year, decade, century. Major fires, record rainfall, landslides, heat waves; in Europe, rare snowfall in Rome and in warmer climates, and in the U.S. northeast, snowstorms and blizzards, rocking Americans’ stability. Climate change appears to be circling all of us.

In her book, Sherri Mitchell creates opportunities for us to examine the changes; inspiring us to engage rather than stand by as spectators, merely watching the changes in the environment, in the government, in social upheaval. Mitchell encourages that we jump in and take action in the mending, to work toward healing.  She proffers, “we could spend a lifetime debating how a problem might be solved, examining it and describing it from every angle, or we could get to work simply resolving it. If someone is hungry, we feed them; if they are sick, we heal them; if they need shelter, we provide it; if someone is destroying the Earth, we stop them; if someone is harming another, we intervene”.  The native approach, as Mitchell beautifully explains is “cooperation versus competition”; “patience versus aggression”; “listen versus speak” and “harmony versus conquest”. Finding that level of harmony is critical right now, and according to Mitchell, must be led by women.

The Penobscot nation calls itself “the people of the dawn land; the keepers of the eastern gate”. It is from this eastern gate, Mitchell explains, that the healing of the world will begin. 

“In order for that healing to take root, the people must return to the place where the initial wounding took place and join together with one heart and one mind to heal the wounds that they carry within them, and those carried by Mother Earth.” Mitchell continues, “when they do, the Eastern Door will open and the Creator will begin to renew the land. The opening of the Eastern Door will usher in a new beginning and a new way of life for the people of the Earth.” 

Mitchell’s words are like that teacher who is at once warm but firm. She sees the mesmerizing possibility as well as the ugly, unforgiving outcome if the wounds don’t heal.

Mitchel is emphatic that women, the “water bearers of the universe”, will be critical in the healing process. Mitchell draws a seamless line between women and the divine. “As women, we are able to call forth life from the other side, and cultivate that life in the quiet space below our hearts. Within our bodies, we hold an opening to the divine, a portal that allows souls to enter into this world”. And, because of that connection below the heart, Mitchell says women are “also the keepers of divine intuition and heart-based wisdom”. She points to those teachings as the lynchpin for keeping our different cultures and societies “spiritually healthy and emotionally balanced”. 

Mitchell’s own intuition and wisdom came to life in dreams. One, which she has had she says since she was a four year old, involves a seed ceremony. She describes a giant seed, pulled from a dark hole and tunnels below “cracked and withered , and in the center a black tar-like substance was leaking out”. She describes native elders praying over the seed, “a stream of light began to appear from the East…a wound was visible inside the seed , and it was bleeding. Eventually the bleeding stopped and the wound began to heal. Then the seed began to capture all of the colors from the stream of light and it started to repair itself”. Mitchell says once completely healed, the elders had her return the seed to the earth, where it could sprout with new life.  “When I was in my mid-twenties I told a group of elders about the dream,” Mitchell shares in her book, “and they told me that this was a vision connected to the opening of the Eastern Door. Then they each told me the stories that they had heard about this healing from their elders.”   

In 2016, Mitchell mentioned the dreams and the seed ceremony prophesy to an elder woman who “told me it’s now time for the ceremony to begin”. Mitchell says she was told to “bring in all of the elders that I had worked with over the years, and invited people from all corners of the Earth”. Mitchell describes a cycle of healing ceremonies—four years in the East (the first, on Turtle Island, the Penobscot Indian Reservation, in July, 2017, drew thousands of women from around the globe); the ceremony heads to the South for four years “to open the Southern Door. The south carries the medicine for deep mental and emotional healing and allows for the release of old ways of thinking , and freedom from oppression”. The next four years, the ceremony travels to the Western Door , which “carries the energy of hibernation. It is here where we go into the cave to dream our dreams for the future”, Mitchell explains. The ceremony then heads to the Northern Door for four years, which “teaches us patience and endurance. It is the direction of the cold winter. Here we learn how to overcome hardships with grace and dignity”.  These ceremonies acknowledge the common wound that each person carries, the wounds of historical trauma within us. 

Through her own dreams and meditations, Mitchell shares a vision of a land of harmony that can be the planet Earth if humankind is willing to step in, step up and embrace the whole. 

Sacred Instructions is a manual, of sorts that will have the reader going back to re-read, even read aloud the words, descriptions and explanations of the wounds that grip each person who is currently walking on this planet. In the final chapter, Mitchell speaks of the “new people” learning to trust the “ways of the circle” and if they trained themselves to “hear their inner voice, wisdom would return to them in waking and sleeping dreams, and the sacred fire would be lit once again”.   That fire, she describes as the “Eighth Fire, which would be a lasting fire of unity and peace”.

Mitchell delves into what it means to live “in the time of prophecy”, sharing the Wabanaki Prophecy, the Hopi Rainbow Warrior Prophecy, the Mohawk Seventh Generation Prophecy, the Anishinaabe Prophecy of the Seven Fires, and the Crazy Horse Prophesy, which as Mitchell writes was “delivered seven generations ago (and) came to fruition during the stand at Standing Rock. There, the Lakota people, understanding the unity of all living things, took a vital stand for the continuation of life by protecting the very source of life, our sacred waters. And, during that stand the young white ones, along with countless others from all age groups and all corners of the Earth, came to stand with the Lakota to seek their wisdom”. 

Mitchell leaves us with this thought: “we are now at the fork in the road. It is now up to the light-skinned people to decide which path they will choose. Will they choose the path of unity and peace, or will they stay on their current path and destroy themselves and countless others with them?” 

Sacred Instructions achieves what it sets out to do. Sherri Mitchell expertly beckons all of us to get the conversation going, and with the prospect of follow up books, she promises to lead the “what’s next?” for Indigenous and members of every other tribe, awakening them to “work together to restore the health and well-being of Mother Earth”.  As the invitation to the Healing the Wounds of Turtle Island explains: “we are all related, one family, one living system, one creation, one love”. 

Sherri Mitchell’s book, Sacred Instructions: Indigenous Wisdom for Living Spirit-Based Change is available at Bull Moose, Barnes & Noble, and local Target and Walmart stores.

Mitchell is a Native American attorney, activist, teacher and the founder of the Land Peace Foundation, www.landpeacefoundation.net, an organization dedicated to the global protection of Indigenous rights and the preservation of the Indigenous way of life.

Mitchell is the 2015 recipient of the Spirit of Maine Award for commitment and excellence in the field of International Human Rights.

She currently serves as an advisor to the Indigenous Elders and Medicine People’s Council of North and South America.

You can read more about how to participate in the “Healing Turtle Island 2018” event on Facebook, it is scheduled for July 13-16, 2018 in Maine.

Tory Ryden is a journalist of more than 30 years who is currently reporting at News Center Maine (www.newscentermaine.com). She is the creator and host of the radio show Positively Maine with Tory Ryden, which airs each Sunday morning at 11am on www.wgan.com. Her interview with Sherri Mitchell airs March 18, 2018. Every interview is posted on Ryden’s Facebook page: Positively Maine with Tory Ryden. 

Listen to Sherri Mitchell’s interview on Positively Maine Sunday, March 18, 2018 at 11am on www.wgan.com

The link will be available on the Facebook page March 19th.