ERIC at school in Africa

Eric walked along the dusty track, a stick in his hand.  He was pushing a ball along in front of him, using the bent and gnarled piece of wood. His
movements were quick and deft. He was in control of the ball. His bare feet moved steadily, avoiding any sharp obstacles along the way. If the ball hit a stone and bounced to one side, he quickly drew it back in front of him, rolling it along the track. He had some hard thinking to do.

Eric’s African life was tough compared to many children in the world. He was eleven years of age and was lucky enough to go to school. Many of the children in his area did not get an education. Eric thought that he was fortunate. He decided to make the most of his life. He was wise for his years.

As he was the eldest boy in his family and his mother and father were both dead, he felt responsible for the care of his brothers and sisters. His grandmother looked after the family, but she could not do everything. The children had to help themselves and each other, or the family would not survive. Luckily they had a piece of ground large enough to grow enough food to feed them all, as long as there was enough rain to water the crops. There was little time for play. Even the small ones had jobs to do to help their grandma prepare their food, or looking after the few animals that they kept.

Eric’s sister, Tete, helped to grind the maize to make mealy meal. This is the porridge that was their main food every day. They could have eggs once a week. The extra eggs were sold to help to pay for Eric’s schooling.

Tete and the twins, who were only six, did all sorts of little jobs for grandma. She wasn’t very strong herself, but she could tell the children what to do and show them how to do it, and somehow the family got by. They were very proud of Eric. He would be the one who would be able to earn money for the family because he was going to school.  His class was held underneath a canopy on a verandah next to the school house. Another class took lessons inside the school. There were fifty children under the canopy, all trying hard to learn to read and write. The teacher was very good. He told them interesting stories and made them laugh. He was also very strict. There were very few books in the school, and hardly any paper and pencils. All the work was done on slates which were scraped with soft stones to make letters or numbers. Then they were wiped with a damp cloth to erase the work.

Eric could read and write better than anybody in his class. He found he was very good with number work too. He had a quick mind. One of the teachers said she  would like Eric to help in the market on a Saturday. She promised to pay him well so that he could help his family to buy clothes.

Eric went home to tell his grandmother what the teacher had asked him to do. Grandmother looked sad. “Who will hoe the ground and plant the maize seeds if you are away all week at school, and on Saturdays too? You know your sisters are not strong enough to lift the hoe. Your teacher does not realise that we must have food before we can think about new clothes.”

Eric was angry and upset. He had been very pleased when the teacher had asked him to work at the market. Now his grandma was refusing to let him go. He needed to have a long think about the situation. He picked up his gnarled old stick and his ball and, keeping it carefully under his control, he went to the river bank.

Eric sat on a log. He could hear the hippos grunting and grumbling in the distance. He picked up a stone and flung it as hard as he could across the water. It bounced sixteen times. That was a record for him. Suddenly his anger melted away. He realised that it was good to be wanted and needed. It was good that he could help his family and there would be time enough for earning money when his brothers and sisters were old enough to do the kind of work that he had to do now. He loved his family and did not want them to go hungry just because he wanted to work at the market. After all, he was top of the class. When he was old enough he would get a much better job altogether.

Eric walked home as the sun began to set. His bad temper had gone and he felt contented with his life. He decided to apologise to his grandma for being thoughtless and rude and to tell her he loved her for taking care of all of them.

QUESTIONS:

1.    How did you feel when you heard this story?

2.    Did it remind you of anything in your own life?

3.    What kind of a person do you think Eric was?

4.    How did his brothers and sisters help the family?

5.    In Africa there are many schools like Eric’s. How do you think the teacher would deal with bad behaviour, such as bullying, in a class of 50 pupils?

6.    How did Eric control his temper?

7.    What do you do if you are angry?

8.    Eric was contented with his life. Are you contented with your life?

Red Robbie

Many years ago, in the time when your great grandmother was young, there lived in Scotland a young man called Fergus MacTavish and his brother, Robert.  They lived in Glasgow in an area called the Gorbals. It was infamous for its poverty and violence. Fergus had a large family – three brothers and two sisters. His father worked in the shipyards and his mother worked as a cleaner for some ladies in Bearsden.

Life was hard for the family. There was little money in spite of their parents’ hard work. They never had new clothes. Sometimes the ladies who Mrs. MacTavish worked for would give her clothes they no longer wanted. They were always far too big for her children and they had to be cut down to size.  Some of the women were very good at making new clothes out of old ones, but Fergus’s mother had never really mastered the art of sewing. She was quite handy with the scissors though. She would snip away at a pair of trousers until they were the right length for her ‘biggest lad’ as she called Fergus. When he grew out of them, they would fit the second boy, and so on, down the line of four boys.  The youngest boy, Robbie, was always a sight – a real scruffy lad.  It wasn’t his fault that he was so untidy.

Robbie had a crop of red curly hair and a real temper to go with it. People called him Red Robbie and woe betide anyone who teased him about his appearance or anything else.  Hid dad used to say to him, “You have to stand up for yourself, laddie, because nobody else will.”

Being so small and scruffy, Red Robbie did find himself the target of other lads jokes and remarks, especially at the beginning of the school year when many of the boys had new schools uniforms or at least, clothes that fitted them properly, but not Robbie. He held his oversized trousers up with a belt pulled in to his narrow little waist making lots of pleats where they should have fitted and been smooth. The trousers always looked as if they had half a dozen extra pockets in them.

Many an unsuspecting bigger boy would taunt him “What d’ye have in yer pocket, laddie?” and reaching into one of the pockets in the material to pinch Robbie, he would have a shock. It would be the last time the boy ever tried that trick on Robbie. Robbie would not take any nonsense. He had hard little fists and he was not afraid to use them.

As he grew older he had hard big fists and he began to enjoy using them. He had an expression, “Fists first, ask questions later.” People were afraid of Robbie. They kept their distance from him.

He noticed how his brothers always had friends, and girlfriends too. They got Saturday jobs and earned pocket money and went out to the pictures with their pals. They always seemed to be joking and laughing – whereas Robbie was always cross, always looking for trouble and ready for a fight.

Robbie’s elder brother, Fergus, had a girlfriend called Kathy. She was a lovely girl. She too had lots of red curls. Sometimes when she was waiting for Fergus to come home from his Saturday job, she would chat to Robbie. She was the only girl Robbie ever spoke to. Somehow his rough manner put the girls off and boys too, for that matter. Kathy could see that Robbie was unhappy.  One day she asked him why he was always scowling and angry.

Robbie blushed. He jumped to his feet and held out his fists as if he was going to hit Kathy. “Fists first, ask questions later,” he said.

Kathy knew he would never hit her. They were friends. Suddenly she understood. She knew how poor the family had been when the kids were small. She looked at Robbie and noticed how scruffy he was, and yet his family had enough money these days. Robbie had got into the habit of defending himself so fiercely that he had learnt to attack even before he had good reason to – just in case. In the same way he had got into the habit of always wearing old clothes and looking scruffy.

Robbie’s chats with Kathy helped him to understand that violence was no way to make friends. He needed to learn to give people a chance and not to think they were all out to get at him. He also learned to start to take pride in his appearance. Being neat and clean helped him to look more approachable to other people. He learnt to make friends and he became a much happier person.

QUESTIONS:

1.       How did you feel when you heard this story?

2.       Did it remind you of anything in your own life?

3.       How many people had worn the trousers before Robbie got them?

4.       Why did Robbie get teased?

5.       What did Robbie’s father advise him to do?

6.       How did Robbie stand up for himself?

7.       Could Robbie have done it in a better way?

8.       What did Kathy teach him?

This story was written for the Education in Human Values scheme (bisse.org.uk)

When I was a young man I had a family – my mother and father, my wife and two sons and a little daughter.  My wife’s parents also lived nearby.  We were what you might call ‘close knit’.  Our house was not very large and it was hard to get away from other people.  Indeed if one tried to do that others might ask:

“What is wrong with you today?  You are not talking to anyone.  You are looking grim.” And so on.

I have always been a person who enjoys my own space.  Certainly I wanted my children to be happy.  Of course I wanted to please my wife, but I would find the pressures of all these conversations expected of me too great.  I needed time for myself.

One day I took myself for a walk just to get a bit of peace.  With all the hustle and bustle of the city this is somewhat hard to do.  However there is always peace to be had at the Temple.  As I was taking my shoes off before entering, I noticed a man sitting cross legged and looking very peaceful beside the line of shoes.  He was not paying any attention to all the comings and goings.  I could see that his eyes were open but that he was looking at nothing.  He looked perfectly contented.  I have occasionally had my shoes stolen from outside the temple so I wondered if I dared to disturb him to ask him to watch my shoes.  I became quite agitated trying to make the decision.  He continued to look ahead, a benign, peaceful expression on his face.  His eyes did not turn to me although it must have been clear to him that I was there and that I wanted to speak.  I decided to risk leaving my shoes without his protection.

I entered the temple.  It was calm and quiet inside, but my mind was still in turmoil.  How long could I allow myself the luxury of this quiet place?  Would my shoes be stolen?  Would my wife be cross with me when I got home?  Had I forgotten to do some little chore for her?  Would my mother chide me on my return for some act of omission on my part? And so on. After twenty minutes or so I went out into the busy street again.  The sounds of the traffic and the people assailed my ears.

The meditating gentleman was still there, looking calm and beneficent as before.  I found my shoes and left.

On my way home I hatched a plan.  I would tell my family that I was going to become a yogi.  Not in a big way.  I was not going to strip down to a loin cloth and go and live in the mountains.  I was going to become a yogi for twenty minutes a day, at home in my own bedroom.  No-one must speak to me during that time.  Whatever they wanted it would have to wait.  I was going to learn to sit still and quiet until I could feel on the inside what that old yogi at the temple showed on the outside.

My family thought it rather a strange that I would want to do this, but as it is not unheard of in our country, they accepted my desire to meditate.  It took me a while to learn how to do it.  I did take some advice on the subject.  I just thought about my breath and the ‘prana’ or energy flowing into my body every time I breathed in. Gradually I learnt to notice when I was not thinking about my breath.  I began to recognise ‘other’ or distracting thoughts, and having recognised them, I stopped thinking them.  My mind gradually became calmer.  This calmness overflowed into my daily life.  I felt less pressured by all the people and the demands of life and work.  My sense of humour returned.  My wife said I wasn’t bad tempered any more.  My boys started to have proper conversations with me instead of always whining and asking for things.  Even my mother in law smiled indulgently at me and called me ‘our guru’.

It wasn’t until much later in my life that I started thinking about the state of my body, and how yoga could address that problem as well.  But at least working on my mind through meditation had given me a sense of peace and balance, and in fact my wife decided to meditate too and our family life was immeasurably improved.

A story about “Changes” (SEAL topic) illustrating the value of LOVE (6mins)

Dotty has to leave her home

Everyone calls me Dotty, but actually I am ‘Miranda Saint Edmunds the Second’.  I am a Dalmatian.  I come from a long line of famous dogs.  I am sure you know my breed; we are white, spotted all over with black dots.  We are considered to be very pretty and a little stupid – hard to train – you know the sort of thing; we don’t like to ‘fetch’ or to ‘sit’.  We just like to do our own thing.

When I was born, my owners had plenty of money.  The husband worked in the city, in ‘The Bank’, and the wife had no job as such.  She bred us Dalmatians and spent of lot of time walking us on Hampstead Heath.  She had lots of friends who were all ‘doggy’ people.  They used to arrive in their big ‘four by four’ vehicles, usually with at least two dogs for us to play with.  My brothers and sisters all disappeared one by one usually in one of the big cars that arrived.  My mother and I were the ones that our owners wanted to keep. They were very fond of us.  We made them laugh and they never tired of telling stories about us to their ‘doggy’ friends.

One day the husband returned home looking very pale and worried.  I might not be very clever but I knew I should not jump up to greet him that day.  He didn’t even look at me.  He came in and collapsed on the sofa, his head in his hands.  I lay quietly and waited. When his wife came into the room she took one look at him and went white. “Has it happened?” she asked. He nodded his head.  They both sat on the sofa and wept.

The next thing I remember was men arriving in a big van and taking all their expensive furniture away.  Soon the house was empty.  A ‘For Sale’ sign went up outside the front gate.  My owners put us into a van with wire mesh on the windows.  They patted us sadly and the wife said: “Be good dogs, you’ll be all right.  Someone nice will find you.” We didn’t understand why we were being sent away.  We knew our owners loved us.  We felt very sad.  We didn’t wag our tails, but barked anxiously until we were too tired to bark.

We were taken to a long building.  Inside it were rows of cages.  It was cold and smelly.  There were lots of dogs, one or two in each cage.  Many were barking.  We were afraid.  Some dogs lay looking sad or asleep at the backs of their cages.  We were put into a cage together, my mother and I.  I sat very close to her.

Now you may not think that dogs talk to each other but believe me, they do.  My mother was a dog of few words, but when she did speak she was always wise.  She said to me: “Someone new is going to come along and choose you, or me.  We will go to different families.  You must do your best, keep cheerful, and don’t be sad and miserable.  Changes are difficult, but they are easier if you do the right thing. The right thing is to show your owner that you are willing to love them and to be a good pet for them, then you will be happy and so will they.”

I had been feeling sad, missing our old owners and thinking I could never love anyone else, nor be happy in a different home, but I saw that my mum was right. Sure enough, when a family chose me, I wagged my tail and made an effort to be happy.  There were children in the family and I could tell they were not used to dogs.  I had to be very patient with them, though sometimes I felt like biting them.  When they pulled my tail I would just growl a little and their mother would tell them not to do it.

My new house was quite small and instead of having my own room I just had a basket in the living room, but I made the best of it.  I didn’t sulk and whine.  I remembered what my mum had said, and I felt proud of myself that I had remembered.  The best bit was when my new owner said: “She’s not ‘Dotty’ at all, except to look at.  She’s a very clever Dalmatian!

Questions

1. What would you call this story?

2. Does it remind you of anything in your life?

3. What do you think might have happened to Dotty’s first owners to make them send Dotty away?

4. Sometimes difficult things happen in our lives and we have to find ways to deal with them.

Put a tick against the best things to do when we are in difficulty, and put a cross against those ways of behaving which are not helpful to anyone:

Screaming and shouting

Looking for someone to blame

Talking to someone you trust about how you feel

Sulking and not speaking to anyone

Letting yourself cry a bit and getting over it

Hitting or hurting other people

Taking it out on your family or friends

Making the best of it

Finding good ways of looking at it

Which of these did Dotty do?  She was only a dog.  Think how much more a person could do…..

If you would like to send me your picture of Dotty I might use it for this story!

In the days when men and women roamed the plains and young people had to go through an initiation ceremony before they were accepted as adults, there was a young man. He was Grey Wolf. Now this young man was a gentle person who never wanted to hurt anyone or anything. This made life rather difficult for him, because the Red Man survives by cooperating with animal life, respectfully asking permission to kill, and then killing for food and clothing.

The time came for Grey Wolf to perform his initiation. He had to kill a buffalo. There were many ways to tackle this challenge and Grey Wolf decided that he would get us, his family, to dig a pit on the edge of the forest. His plan was to drive the buffalo into the pit. We dug, all of us. It was a huge pit. My father said it was big enough to catch the whole herd, but he was exaggerating somewhat. We covered the pit with branches and leaves so that it looked just like the rest of the forest floor. It was time for my brother to go. Now he was a very fine horseman. He and his horse moved as one. The horse could tell from the angle and the slightest pressure from his body where he was required to go.

A few hours later we heard a great crashing through the trees. It was Grey Wolf. He was driving two buffalo towards the pit! We looked on in amazement. Certainly and surely they neared the hole in the ground, and one after another they fell into it .

The buffalo charged into the pit.

The first one died instantly, the second he quickly dispatched. Pale and shaking he emerged from the pit. We were all very proud of him. The Chief came to inspect his work:

“I see you were not content to prove you were as strong as one man, you have completed the work of two here, on this day. Well done! You are indeed fit to join the ranks of the men in the tribe.”

And the Chief bestowed an eagle feather head dress upon him. We all looked on in admiration. My brother may not have enjoyed killing, but he knew what had to be done for the survival of the tribe. We must eat, and buffalo is our main source of food. My brother, after that, used to be chosen to do the chasing, and left the killing to the others, but it is all one really. He who eats meat is acknowledging that it is part of Gods plan both in the animal kingdom and in man’s domain.

The base energy centre is situated at  the bottom of the spine.  It is associated with survival, bravery, hunting to feed oneself etc.  To learn more about this centre go to  yogastories.co.uk and look at information on the base chakra in the contents page.

Rainbow Dancer Finds Her Man

There was a young girl in my tribe, she was known as Rainbow Dancer.  A beautiful girl, popular with everyone, several young braves hoped that she would choose one of them.

She always wore the finest leathers. She plaited her hair so neatly and tightly and interwove it with ribbons of cloth that she had dyed different colours.  Rainbow Dancer was waiting.  She knew she must wait for the right man, as none of the young men in the tribe appealed to her.  Her mother had told her that when the right man came she would feel it in her belly.  She did not understand her mother’s words, but she was happy to believe her.

At tribal gatherings when the dances were in full swing, Rainbow Dancer was aloof.  Unlike her name suggested, she never wished to dance.  As a young child she had danced a lot, but somehow it had lost its appeal to her.  Perhaps because when she showed that she was willing to dance she had the problem of dealing with all the young braves who wished to be chosen by her.  She had decided it was easier not to bother.

Several years went by.  All of the girls of a similar age found husbands amongst the tribe, but Rainbow Dancer was adamant.  She felt nothing in her heart and nothing in her belly.

One day two young men stumbled into the camp.  One of them was wounded.  He had been trampled by buffalo in a stampede.  Somehow they had lost their way and their companions had gone on, not realising that Standing Tree was wounded.  Rainbow Dancer’s mother was first to see the young man.  She dressed his wounds and made him a comfortable place to rest in a tepee adjacent to her own.

Rainbow Dancer helped her mother to look after the young man.  He was in a lot of pain and developed a raging fever.  It took a lot of skilled use of herbs and patient watching and waiting before Standing Tree was able to speak.  Every movement was painful to him.  Rainbow Dancer mopped his brow and dabbed his wounds with the herbal medicine.

After four days the young man came out of his delirium.  He turned towards Rainbow Dancer who had hardly left his side.  He smiled the most beautiful smile and whispered “Thank you.”

Rainbow Dancer felt her heart lurch.  She knew that the thing she most wanted in the world was for Standing Tree to recover.

Gradually he became strong again.  Rainbow Dancer helped him to walk around the camp to get used to using his limbs again.  She noticed that when she touched him she could feel a current of energy flow through her body.  She began to feel warmth in her heart, and just as her mother had told her, she felt the stirring of excitement in her belly.  This was the man for her, her body told her so.  Standing Tree felt the same way.  When he had completely recovered he told Rainbow Dancer that he must return to his tribe, but that he would come back for her very soon, which he did.

A love token

He brought with him a token of his love for her and asked her father if he could take her to join his own tribe.  Rainbow dancer’s father agreed and the couple had a happy life together.

A STORY FROM CALLING HORSE TO ILLUSTRATE THE SOLAR PLEXUS CENTRE

The solar plexus is below the ribs and above the naval.  It is the main energy distributor in the body, it helps in the thinking processes (gut feelings) and it connects us to others.

White Owl and the Bear

In times when men and women lived in teepees on the plains and in the forests of North America, there was a young warrior, we shall call him White Owl. He was a brave young man, never afraid to get others out of trouble, whether he had to fight off adversaries or wild animals. One day this young man and his friend Grey Wolf were deep in the forest. They were hunting for the wild bears who roamed freely in those days. These are very fierce animals. They were required for their coats for the winter bedding especially for young children. Winters were very cold indeed and the animals had to be sacrificed to keep us humans alive.

On this occasion Grey wolf was climbing a tree having disturbed a bear, thinking that the bear would not dare to climb as high as he could. He hoped the bear would use his solar centre –  his mind centre, and realise that he would not be safe on the fine, high branches. However the bear continued up and up and Grey wolf began to think that he would soon run out of tree!

The bear looked down and saw White Owl

Now White Owl his friend saw the dilemma and decided to act as a decoy for Grey Wolf.  He shouted and threw sticks at the bear who looked down and saw a second adversary at the base of the tree.  The bear had been starting to get a gut feeling that it was about time to turn round and go down again.  Now he had even more reason to do exactly that.  With a huge bellowing roar he reversed down the tree.  This was a slightly slower process than climbing up. White Owl looked at his weapons, he had a tomahawk and a bow and arrows. He and Grey Wolf had spent many a long evening practising their tomahawk throwing by the light of the moon, and he was very accurate. He decided to risk throwing the small axe, which is what it was, planning the throw to coincide with a difficult part of the descent of the bear. He did not have time to think of any other solutions. That he would leave to the Great Spirit.
The tomahawk made a direct hit, straight through the skull of the enraged bear which fell like a stone to the base of the tree trunk. Grey Wolf descended carefully, trembling somewhat and surveyed the dead animal. He clutched his belly and said:

“Well, I think one bear is quite enough for one day, don’t you? Probably enough for one year for me. It’s going to take me a while to recover from this!”

The young men skinned the bear on the spot, leaving the carcass for the wild beasts which would surely find it. They carried the skin home to their families, proudly presenting it to be shared by their mothers for the youngest children in each family. They had been happy to risk their lives in this way for those with whom they had close ties, another solar plexus connection.

For a fuller description of the functions of the solar plexus energy centre go to www.yogastories.co.uk and click on the contents list.  Go down to the last chapter and click on ‘information on the solar plexus chakra’.

This story comes from a Native American Indian Chief named Calling Horse.  He speaks about the importance of the Heart Centre to the people of his tribe.  The heart centre can be felt when we experience strong feelings of love, and in a negative way when we lose a person or an animal that we love.

Making a heart connection to a new camp

In the days when we, a nomadic people, traversed the plains, we found it very easy to set up camp and make a home where-ever we found ourselves. Sometimes it would be in a beautiful valley with river running and plenty of trees for shade. Sometimes it was in the wide open plains. We were very aware of our energy centres in those days, and when a place felt good to stay at for a while, the chief would gather the tribe around him. He would place his hand on his heart, look up to the heavens and then stamp his feet on the earth and say:

“In this place we are well connected. I feel the energy running from my head through my heart. I feel the energy running from the earth through my feet to my heart. This place I love. It will be good for us. Let us stay a while.”  Then we would stay.

In such places where the energies felt good, we would all feel happy and settled. Our hearts would warm to each other and to our animals. Our hearts would warm to the place we were in, to the trees and the plants and animals. The song masters in the tribe would meditate and make up songs about the place we were in. They were actually listening to folk who had lived there before and who had happy memories of those places, whose heart centres had opened and glowed in those self same places.

When it was time to move on (as we were a restless people), we would sing those songs to remind us of the lovely times we had had, and again we would feel the glow in our hearts.
That is the job of the heart centre: to connect us with our surroundings that God has provided; to connect us to each other and to the Great Spirit himself who is always with us, watching and caring. His almighty heart centre must be bigger than the earth and sky itself!

To find an explanation of the Heart Centre  and other energy centres

or ‘chakras’, click on this link

http://yogastories.co.uk and go to the contents page and find ‘guidance on chakras’ at the end of the contents section.

This is one of a series of 7 stories on the human energy centres, given to me in meditation by Calling Horse, an American Indian Chief of days gone by. This one illustrates the use of the ‘Throat centre’

The Young Brave Chants to the Great Spirit by CALLING HORSE

In the days when men hunted for food and women harvested leaves to add to the value of the flesh, sometimes it was difficult to find enough wild plants. This was certainly the case if the season was poor or the weather inclement. At these times we would appreciate the stores of dried plants which had been gathered and preserved for the winter by the older women in the tribe. On one occasion I remember times were particularly hard. I was a small boy and I was very hungry; we all were. The winter had only just started and the elders knew that they must eke out their stores for several months to come. The men had not had a lot of luck with the hunting. They had only managed to catch a few small animals; the buffalo were nowhere to be found.

The chief was on the point of deciding to move camp. He wanted to consult the Great Spirit and he wanted us all to pray to make sure we got the right answer about whether and where to go. The adults all sat in a circle around the camp fire. The chief stood by the totem pole holding his staff in his hand. It was very impressive to me as a small child. This staff had great plumed feathers tied to it in several places and a bunch of eagle feathers was attached to the top. The chief would stamp the ground with his feet and then pound the staff onto the earth.

In response we would chant “Aa ee ee ohh” again and again. Now I was disturbed by the urgency of these cries to God. I recognised that we all felt that we were in trouble and I started to cry. My mother held me to her breast and smoothed my head. She said I should not waste my voice in selfish pity, but I should use it to ask for Gods help which would be for all of us. I joined in with the chanting. The chief stamped around the circle facing each member in turn. When he came to me he almost smiled and he lowered the eagle’s feathers to the level of my head. He touched me with them to encourage my efforts at chanting. I felt very proud. My father called me his good brave and I chanted louder and louder. At the end of the ceremony the chief announced that we would move on the next day. The gods had shown him where to find the buffalo. Indeed after two days travelling we found traces of them and set up camp.

My brother was the first to find and kill a buffalo on that occasion. There was much celebration and again we gathered round the camp fire to chant, this time in joyful thanks. The sound was different, it had a happier quality and every one was smiling, even the chief. This time he had a different staff. It had the horns of a buffalo attached to it. Again he brought it round the circle as we chanted. When he came to me I was sure I saw him wink at me. He was certainly smiling and we all felt very proud of my brother ‘Fleet of foot’ who had lived up to his name yet again.

The Chief's staff had the horns of a buffalo

I am writing a series of stories which illustrate the uses of the seven main energy centres of the body. The subject of this story is the Brow centre or Third Eye. The stories have come to me from Calling Horse, a Spirit Guide.

Grey Wolf is Given a Bride

Many years ago when my people were settled on the plains, during a quiet period when there was peace between all the tribes and it was a land of plenty, there was a wise old chief. You may not believe this but his name was Chief Thunderbird! He had the name before your people got hold of it!

Now Chief Thunderbird was a very astute old man. Whenever he wanted someone to do something for him or for the tribe, he would somehow make that person feel as if it was his own idea in the first place. He would arrange his request in such a way that the person would find themselves suggesting what he, the chief wanted, as an answer to a problem.
However after many years of doing this, people got wise to the wiley old man, not that anything he ever asked for was out of order, or in any way harmful to the giver or to the tribe. It was just that people began to resist this manipulation, almost like a game.

On one occasion he asked a young brave, Grey Wolf by name, if he would take care of a certain family whose father had been killed in a hunting expedition. Now Grey Wolf, although he saw the need for a protector for this young family, was not so sure if he wanted to become a substitute father so early on in his life. Although he had no particular young lady to whom he was attached, he had given no thought to the young widow in the past, naturally as she was already spoken for. However the chief could see that it would be an ideal match and wanted Grey Wolf to see this too.

Chief Thunderbird prayed to the Great Spirit to give Grey Wolf a vision which would convince him that Morning Star would be a good wife for him and that he could care for the two little boys like a good father. The next evening as Grey Wolf was sitting by the camp fire after the others had retired to sleep, as he stared into the flames, he saw a picture of himself with his arm around Morning Star and the two little boys sitting one on each of his knees. It was a very happy scene. Above the little family he saw the Great Spirit radiating light over the group.

Grey Wolf sat until the vision faded and then walked over to the teepee where Thunderbird’s family was based. He asked to see the old man and told him of his vision, and said he would be very honoured to take on the young family. The next day there was much celebrating. Grey wolf took the little boys swimming in the lake and Morning Star watched confidently, knowing that now all would be well again, both for her children and for herself.

Grey Wolf has a vision

It is through the third eye which is situated in the centre of the forehead that we can receive visions.  This ability has been lost or ignored by most people in modern times but it was very important to many ancient peoples.  It can be activated by meditation in appropriate circumstances and indeed many people today are learning to use this natural human ability.