Indigenous meets metaphysical: Elements of Ritual

Indigenous medicine helps humans relate to the spirit world by using a point of entry into time. This point of entry maintains the spiritual connection to source. One point of entry used by indigenous communities is the medicine wheel. A medicine wheel is a sacred space which simultaneously references the physical and spiritual realm. A wheel connects to an energy grid which connects to everything, everywhere concurrently.

Medicine wheels support the practice of both metaphysics and Akashic record divination. Below are brief explanations of Akashic records and an African medicine wheel followed by ideas for their ritual application.

“The Akashic Records are the individual records of a soul from the time it leaves its point of origin until its return. At the time we make the decision to experience life as an independent entity, there is a field of energy created to record every thought, word, emotion, and action generated by that experience. That field of energy is the Akashic Records. Akashic, because it is composed of Akasha (the energetic substance from which all life is formed) and Records, because its objective is to record all life experience. The information in the Akashic Records helps us bring our past and our future, present in the “now”. By accessing the Akashic records, we can identify and release anything that we have created, that has become a block to our present realization of our oneness with God/source.”

(For more information: http://arc-akashicrecords.org/)

A diviner of the records can open someone’s records and channel his/her information. As these are his/her records, he/she can engage the energy at will. There is no right or wrong question as long as the question belongs to his/her energy alone. For example a wife cannot ask about her husband’s healing work, instead she must ask about her own and perhaps how she can best support someone else.

The Dagara Medicine Wheel, from Burkina Faso, West Africa is used to understand certain shamanic practices. Like many medicine wheels around the world, the Dagara wheel is divided into five elements, Fire, Water, Earth, Mineral, and Nature. Each element on the wheel is assigned attributes. The element you are born into indicates the role you will have in the present life of the community. Each role provides support to an individual to enable him/her to fulfill contracts made prior to birth.

The dominate element is based on a person’s birth. The system uses the last number of an individual’s birth year. For example, if someone were born in 1957, he/she would look at the element that connects to seven.

Earth year ends in 0 or 5
Water year ends in 1 or 6
Fire year ends in 2 or 7
Nature year ends in 3 or 8
Mineral year ends in 4 or 9

Here is a brief explanation of the meaning of each element. (For more detail visit the following site.
www.schoolofwisdom.com/Malidoma/africanwheel.html)