SilentFeathers Sacred Pathways

The message to me from Raven to share with others this morning is:

There is no such thing as a challenge without a struggle, we struggle everyday working through these challenges, such is life. Raven tells us that we create our own darkness ...or light in our lives by the choices we make meeting these challenges. Raven tells us that we, through our own works are the cause of almost all of the light or darkness in our own lives.

Raven is also laughing out loud about how people think of him as the bringer of death and destruction. Raven tells me that we are the bringers of our own death and destruction, that he is only a helper to teach us how to change the error of our ways, how to use the tools available to us to better our lives, and that Creator sent him here, not MR DEATH! Raven is here to protect, not to harm!

Raven also uses our silly beliefs and behaviors for his own amusement and plays innocent and harmless tricks with us, Raven loves to laugh....

SilentFeathers 12-6-2010

You can not choose your animal totem; your totem must choose you!

Many people choose/desire certain totems and "some people" spend their whole life believing that a certain animal is their true totem and ignore the medicine that has chosen them. This can cause people to be out of balance and overlook things that they should be noticing.

A person’s totem is something you carry with you for guidance and protection, among other things, and may not always be an animal, but may also be a plant(s) and/or a stone(s): even a human Spirit Guide may be a totem for some people.....we are all different and each of us has unique medicine in which we carry.

Pertaining to our animal totems, we must focus on the messages that we have received throughout our lives pertaining to certain animals, ones that seem to pop up most of the time in our lives, the ones that repeatedly come to us in our dreams, and the ones that we feel most strongly connected to on a spiritual and physical level. For these are the one's that have chosen us. Many ignore the obvious and thus miss the message.

Sometimes a certain animal will show itself to you briefly (one time) and even that could be an important message. It's the ones that are constant in your lives though that are your "steady" guides/protectors and offer much wisdom and medicine. Awareness is the key to understanding and learning why a certain totem has chosen to walk with you along your journey.

Once during a vision/spirit/totem quest, a friend of mine was all excited and wanted to see an eagle, wolf, or bear etc., and he said "I want one of these to be my totem". I didn't say much and to make a long story short, well, none of these animals came to this person and I sensed much frustration and disappointment from this person. What he did mention though was that he must have been near a bee hive because bees were flying around him all day. Hmmm?

Anyways, when it comes to learning more about the totem that has chosen you, even the little things are significant and shouldn't be ignored. Sometimes small is big!

SilentFeathers 3-8-2010

The spiders web is a creation of the spiders own truth, not only innocent, beautiful, and perfect when you first closely look at it, but a deadly trap for anyone that gets caught in it......spread across a well traveled path, deception is its invisible power. Very few escape the spiders web.

Once caught in the web, escape seems easy, yet when attempted, escape most often becomes impossible and one becomes more entangled by even the slightest movement.

The spider sits in the middle of the web showing all that it is safe to go around him through deception, only the very wise and very perceptive ones are safe from the spiders agenda.

The spider only wants to eat and live and has no other motives, it is the only way that it knows how to survive, it is its instinct to do what it does.

The spider has no knowledge of evil.

Spider medicine reminds us that we have the power to weave our own web in life and are the architechs and creators of our own destiny.

The web we weave in our life is our own truth, regardless if we do right or wrong.

Since we are human and know evil, spider reminds us that if we choose to lie and deceive others, we will become entangled in our own web. Once trapped in our own web, all will see our foolishness at trying to deceive others by watching us struggle at freeing ourselves from our own wrong-doings.

No liar or deceiver can escape the web, they can only be removed and set free by another through forgiveness, and the broken link in the web must then be repaired.

The spider reminds us that it is alright to be different and unique from all others, yet also reminds us that being different does not make us separate from all others. Spider tells us to go after and capture our dreams and desires with honor and integrity, not with lies and deception.

The web of the spider reminds us that all things are joined together in a sacred circle and that the Creator is in the center of all things.

SilentFeathers 8-13-2010

Note: My father gave me this prayer when I was a small child, I don't know where he got it or if he actually wrote it himself or not. I have never seen it anywhere else....yet.

I used it for many years.....

Cherokee Hunter's Prayer

"Oh Great Spirit, let your winds be gentle and your skies be heavy; let there be a blanket of fresh snow to track the Antlered One as done by my forefathers; And grant that I find him with Antlers like tree branches - wide and mighty. And grant that my hand be steady....My aim be true....and my drag, short. But most of all, oh Great Spirit, grant that my children and their children and their children's children have the wisdom to preserve your work in forests, fields and streams....so that they too can one day hunt the Antlered One in the footsteps of their forefathers."

About 15 years ago a friend of mine in Wisconsin found an albino fawn laying along side the road after the mother was hit and killed by a car. The mother was also an albino deer. My friend took these pictures and sent them to me while she had this fawn in her care and was nursing it back to health. She eventually took this fawn to an animal refuge/reserve and it was released back into the wild and lived the rest of its life out.

Below are a couple pictures of the fawn that my friend sent me right after she found the fawn and had it at her home....

Today someone sent me this video news clip of a PBS special about a whole herd of albino deer in Wisconsin that are known as the Ghost Deer of Wisconsin. I found it quite fascinating and wanted to share this with everyone!

I couldn't embed the video as this site doesn't support the format, but the link will take you straight to the webpage where you can play the video. Enjoy!

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/video/flv/generic.html?s=inwi10s22a3q81f

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The really strange thing about this is that I was born in Wisconsin and remember seeing an albino buck where I was staying when I couldn't of been 18 to 24 months old. My mother died when I was 18 months old and my father had a friend of his taking care of me when he was at work. They lived in the woods of northern Wisconsin and I actually remember watching this huge ablino buck eating at their bird feeder. I used to stand behind a curtain on a low window ledge and watch this deer. I even remember the deer coming up to the window and looking at me and actually licking the window near my face.

Years later when I was 10 or 12 years old I asked my dad about this deer, thinking that this memory was just a dream or some form of creation in my own mind. My dad told me that this old buck was well known in the area and that the people that were taking care of me were basically it's parents and always fed it and protected it since it was a fawn. It was well known to all the hunters in the area at the time and an agreement was made by everyone not to ever shoot it.

My dad also told me that when he used to come and pick me up after work, there were several instances when they couldn't find me right away, but always knew where to look. He said I basically stayed on that window ledge most of the time waiting for or watching that deer! He couldn't believe that I remembered that deer considering I was so young at the time.

My dad also told me that his friends watching me told him on several occasions that this deer would come up to the window and bump the window with its nose trying to get me too move, I don't remember this, but I am sure it is quite possible.

My dads friends nickname was actually "Whity" due to this deer. I actually remember Whity's wife more than whity himself, actually I remember the deer more than either of them......isn't it strange how this could be?????

Talk about some big and strange medicine at an early age!

Personally Owl has been a blessing to me, and also a very close friend to me throughout my life, more specifically the Barred Owl. I very seldom ever see any other species of Owl other than the Barred Owl. I remember several occasions even as a little child having "close encounters" with this beautiful and mysterious bird. It's one of the few species in the animal world that has always been a constant animal guide/totem throughout my life. The last thought I have about Owl is fear, I cherish Owl for what it has meant and done for me over the years. I honestly do not mean to offend anyone by "wearing" my Owl friend so to speak.

Many of us do not realize that there are over 100 species of Owls. All Owls are nocturnal for the most part and that may be why fear or death is associated with them so much due to people being afraid of the "dark" and of the "unseen" or the "unknown". The same goes for some of the other animals of the night such as the Bat and Jaguar. Many cultures of the world associate these night creatures with fear and/or death.

I highly respect other Native Cultural beliefs and traditions about the Owl, but at the same time I do not understand how one of the Creators beautiful gifts could be so feared by so many. Even a feather from an Owl can cause tremendous fear in some and many won't even speak of the Owl. Many tribes associate Owl with witchcraft or sorcery, ghosts, and some even consider them omens of death. I see them quite differently possibly due to almost 50 years of being acquainted very closely with them. Since Owl is such a mysterious and feared bird, many "bad" people have used them in sorcery or witchcraft to harm others and cause trouble. This is an abuse of power and also an abuse of the Creators gifts in more ways than one. Our Creator gave us all these animals to love and cherish, not to hate, fear, and abuse! Fortunately many times these witches or sorcerers evil deeds will backfire on them and they get what they were doing to others done to them 10 or even 100 times worse.

Some tribes consider the Owl as a gift of protection and/or wisdom and have been known to use Owl feathers in certain ceremony or rituals. The majority though associate them with superstition, fear, and/or death, hence, ill omens.

The Owl has on several occasions for me been a messenger of warnings and/or troubles, but never the cause. Not having fear of them for me has given me an ability to understand them better and use their medicine in positive and productive ways. Owl is a messenger of omens, good omens and sometimes-bad omens. Even when bad omens arise, positive outcomes can result.

Many associate Owl with prophecy, wisdom, and secrecy, revealing unseen things, messenger of omens, clairvoyance, and many other things mysterious and often misunderstood. We must also remember that considering there are over 100 species of Owl, they each carry their own specific medicine and traits. All Owl species carry a commonality, yet at the same time each species has different specific gifts or abilities.

It has taken me a lifetime to become fluent "so to speak" with Owl, and remind you, it is basically just one species of Owl that I have become the most "fluent" with. This medicine as with many others is not a medicine that one can just jump into and expect to work and understand it over a short period of time. There is a big difference between having one or a few secluded close encounters with an Owl and walking with Owl as a constant throughout life. Rare encounters are messages for the moment or for an event at that particular time in your life, constant encounters throughout life are a reminder that you both carry a part of each other and constantly recognize it in each other. Also remember, Owl must choose you, not the other way around.

SilentFeathers 3-8-2010