Who evolves spiritually? Is it up to old, wise men in caves, preachers in mega churches, or the best-selling new age authors? All of the world's religions are converging on our shores for the first time: Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism, Christianity, Judaism, and more. Maybe, just maybe, it's the young people who are waking up? In this culture, people's spiritual lives tend to be either very public or very private and rarely do they share the inner, guiding parts of life. So, here are stories of seeking, confusion and discovery as experienced by us. You know, the ones plugged into smartphones and meeting friends for drinks. Listen as we open our hearts. See for yourself. Are we lost to the well entertained and superficial, or is there a secret life of deeper longing and curiosity that may just help save us all?
If you are a young adult (18-35 years old) interested in sharing your spiritual story of discovery, send an email to wakingyouth@gmail.com
When I was 14-years-old, my family and I began creating my buckskin dress. For the Lakota people, a buckskin dress has two main purposes: the first is for traditional ceremonies or large events, such as graduation and the second is for the powwow season. The basic construction consists of four white brain-tanned deer hides: two for the front and back panels of the skirt, one for the top and one for the fringe, which hangs from both arms and reaches the floor. My family honors this ancient, time consuming process with persistent focus and attention to detail. Bead by bead, stitch by stitch; the work is tedious and progress can be agonizingly slow.
My dress-making was hindered further by my general discomfort with my ethnicity. Wanting to fit in at school, I felt like the traditions of my heritage alienated me from my classmates. I had very little interest in owning or wearing buckskin. Don't get me wrong, I am proud to be half-Lakota and a member of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe but I also had issues with the idea of culture. At the time, cultural identity seemed an overwhelming force -- one separate from myself. I was worried that others would only see the buckskin dress, not the person wearing it.
My aunt Shirley asked me to think of a theme and design for my dress. Since powwows mix elements from Wild West shows, beauty contests and dance-offs, the dress needed to be ornate, vivid and visually striking. I was told that while my family would guide me, the images and patterns on my dress were my decision. I was responsible for the content since the dress represented not only my current personality, but my family history and the woman I wanted to become.
This concept overwhelmed me. What kind of person was I? Who did I want to be? How could I pick designs or symbols that could represent me at the age of 25, 40 and 80? What would I want others to see me as? I had no idea.
Concepts like deadlines, due dates, or A.S.A.P. do not exist for Lakotas. My father always says, when in doubt, wait. So no one rushed my decision. My family told me that I would wake up one day and know. It would be that simple. Just "know." I agonized internally for months, trying to force an image and identity onto a bare hide. I asked friends at school, read fashion magazines and listened to my favorite bands trying to force inspiration.
Then one night I had a dream. In my dream I was walking around an unpaved running track at my high school. It was twilight in the summer. The air in the dream was the perfect temperature. I stopped walking and looked up to the sky. The moon appeared as a thin crescent and below it to the right was Venus, shining brightly. Then my perspective shifted so that I could see my own eye. I watched as my pupil dilated and I saw the sun lingering behind the moon. And beyond that, the planets, and the asteroid belt, then the end of our universe and the end of the stars. Countless stars, as diverse as my ancestors must have been, all sharing this cosmic void. Some danced, others shown with a yellow brightness. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted a pair of faint stars, almost invisible that seemed to reach out and touch each other. The diversity was phenomenal. The sky beyond the sun and moon felt like a place that I belonged. I was afraid to blink, worried this might all disappear. At once I felt the urge to walk again. I forced myself to look down at the gravel and when I looked back up the vision persisted. My dream ended with me walking around the track in the calm summer.
When I woke up, I did not give the dream much thought. Then a few days later, I was in the bathroom shaving my legs, when it occurred to me: the dream was meant to be the theme of my dress. My hands began to shake and my heart raced. I started to cry. The recognition had come so simply, exactly as my family predicted. I had struggled for about seven months to simply wake up one morning and understand.
I know that it seems predictable for a young native girl to have a spiritual vision during a dream. If you push the stereotype, you can almost see me adorned with a feather in my braided hair and bare feet sprinting through a forest. Yet still, I cannot distort the truth and for Lakota, dreams are significant. Visions are regarded as the supernatural world advising or contacting our natural one.
A decade later the finished dress is as familiar as my sister. Like a perfume, I can smell the buckskin leather and smoke now combined with my sweat. My muscles can feel the weight of the fringe that sweeps the floor. My mind knows the beading; starting at the neck and continuing down my arms and chest are neat rows of blue periwinkle beads. Yellow and white stars, suspended in this sky encircle my neck and hang off my shoulders. Each star is beaded differently because my aunt says that is how stars are. In the middle of all this is a horse running, a horse that 10 years later would also be tattooed on my body; it sits on buckskin above my heart. Our family name is Shunka Nicha, meaning 'Has No Horses,' but it's my dream sky, so I have one.
My bathroom realization was the first moment in my life that I understood something intimate about myself. I had touched a part of my personality and my soul that I knew without any doubt my older selves would recognize and appreciate. It was the first time I understood that culture and personal identity are not opposing forces, rather one cannot exist without the other. My buckskin dress is the first representation, both spiritually and artistically, of the person I not only saw myself as at the time, but the person I am 12 years later, and no doubt the person I will be several decades from now.
Click through to see photos of my dress:
