Tag Archives: Membertou

Hosting Ceremony

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What happens when what you are called into host is not actually what you’ve been called into host and every thing you think you know or have to offer of value is not what is needed? When knowledge and experience of methods, processes, theories and frameworks, though asked for, is not what will actually serve the situation or community you are hosting?

These questions, alive and vibrant, were lived into this past week in Membertou, a First Nations Community in Nova Scotia, that a team of us had been invited to, as part of an emerging leadership program for youth, to offer a three day Art of Hosting and Warrior of the Heart training. We were invited by Pawa Haiyupis from the National Centre for First Nations Governance and a team at Membertou to contribute to a program Pawa has been envisioning for 10 years, since attending her first Open Space Technology session.  We were to work with youth, elders and members of the Governance Committee.

When the Canadian Government cut funding to the NCFNG in the middle of the four week emerging leadership program the plan was thrown into chaos and the shape of our time together shifted frequently and rapidly.  Would there even be an AoH/WoH training and, if so, how many days and with whom?  Financial and energetic support was invited from a circle of eagles from around the world and from the larger Art of Hosting community to fund expenses and to be at our backs  as we hosted this work, the hosting team clearly called to be in it no matter the circumstance.

The hosting team – Bob Wing, Pawa, Sarah MacLaren, Ryan, myself and one other – convened on the beach at Mira Gut to begin our check-in in ceremony and with a little Warrior of the Heart.  Sense of spirit was strong with us and blood memories were being activated.  We asked for guidance from Creator in this work.

We did all the usual preparation for a training, including cracking our overall design and the design for day one.

Then we entered day one.  We knew as soon as we entered the space that we needed to be prepared to let go of much of what we planned as we waited the arrival of elders to begin our time together with a pipe ceremony.  The pipe ceremony was beautiful and powerful, inviting spirit and Creator to guide our path.  It had the full attention of everyone in the room no matter their age.

We followed it with Warrior of the Heart and, yes, a teaching on the chaordic path and some time in triad conversations.  In this day, we became aware of some disruptions in the field.  At the end of this day, we met with the full hosting and calling team and explored what people were sensing and what their concerns were.  We did a little teaching on divergence and convergence for this team.  We invited all questions and all concerns and also celebrated a little bit the successes of the day.  We left feeling a bit of convergence in this team and a willingness to be open to what wanted to happen the next day.

Dinner with an elder showed us that what wanted to happen the next day was ceremony and, specifically a sacred fire.  We all knew it was the right thing and in that moment the hosting team stopped designing process and shifted the most completely and fully I have ever experienced into hosting what wanted and needed to happen in this field and this community.  It wasn’t process, methods, frameworks.  It was ceremony.  Ceremony in service of this community, hosted by the elders.  Ceremony to activate blood memories. We trusted we would know in the moments following ceremony what else could be offered that would serve the community and the intention of this work well and we knew absolutely we were working with the principles of spaciousness and simplicity.

Host team check-ins are always an integral part of any Art of Hosting training and usually serve the design process.  In some ways, they became the design process.  Deep check in.  Clearing and understanding our field.  Strong pull to meditation and other ceremony morning and night to keep intention and presence clear and strong.

We know we were hosted in ceremony by this beautiful community.  We know we also hosted, but exactly what is a little less clear.  We know something happened in this community that would not have happened if we had not been there.  We know something happened in us – individually and collectively – that would not have happened if we had not been there.

I find myself in contemplation of ceremony and the guidance of Creator.  I find myself in a deeper exploration of the non-physical world and the allowing of my gifts to emerge and flourish with new knowing and fuller surrender to what wants to be guided through me.  In the letting go of expectations and any need to show “expertise” in this group and this community, I know we were more fully available in the co-hosting and co-creating of the space.  Sometimes simply being allows things to emerge that might not otherwise.  I am wondering how that informs all my hosting work and feel the invitation to work more and more from this place of surrender, trust and “just” holding space.

As Pawa said, “the teachings are still percolating and the brew smells delicious. More to report on as the teachings are digested.”
A deep bow to the community, the team and the field that held us so well in this journey.

The Power of Vision, Activating Blood Memories and an Ask for What’s Needed

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Ten years ago, while in her mid-twenties, Pawa Haiyupis attended her first Open Space Technology training, meeting for the first time good friend and colleague Chris Corrigan who became a mentor. Unbeknownst to Pawa at the time, a vision began to take root: a vision of First Nations youth connecting back to elders and the land, bringing back ceremonies like rites of passage, naming and grieving ceremonies, language; essentially activating blood memories.  We know when blood memories have been activated because we get little energy shivers in our bodies; the more powerful the activation, the stronger the shiver but even subtle little activations can have profound impact that reverberate in our awareness.

Four years ago, Pawa began working for the National Centre for First Nations Governance (NCFNG) out of British Columbia, with a focus on youth leadership.  During this time she also stepped more deeply into her own leadership journey through Art of Hosting and Warrior of the Heart, including a journey a year ago to Kufunda Learning Village in Zimbabwe.

Her vision grew and began to take tangible form with the development of a Nation Rebuilding project piloted in the First Nations community of Membertou in Nova Scotia this summer focused on helping young people, ages 14-19, learn about identity and belonging, reactivating their creation stories, inviting the ancestors through ceremony and a traditional territories tour to guide this process. A combined Warrior of the Heart/Art of Hosting training was identified as an essential component of this work because it cultivates the conditions for emergence based on what each Nation knows.

A hosting team of Pawa, myself, Bob Wing and Sarah MacLaren converged for this exciting work with 50 youth from Membertou, actively supported by up to 20 elders in the community as well as the young team from NCFNG.  In the middle of the 4 week Nation Rebuilding project, NCFNG’s funding was cut by the Harper government, potentially putting this work in jeopardy.  Except for the questions asked by the Membertou Governance Committee about how to make this work despite the funding cuts.  Except for the hosting team deepening their dedication to this work by agreeing to volunteer these four days of their time.  Except for the strong vision that Pawa and her team have been cultivating for years that refuses to be drowned out by resistance that shows up in the form of funding cuts and seems to now have taken on its own force independent of the individuals who first dreamt what was possible.  As one member of the team said, “The work will continue because the ancestors are strong and we are strong… we can make it work because its in our hearts.”

Pawa turned to a circle of “Eagles”,  stewards of the Art of Hosting, who are at our backs holding the rim of our circle with us, to ask for help.  She wrote:

“I email you all with a heart request to help financially to keep the movement going and help bring this work to Indigenous youth in Membertou, Cape Breton Island NS.  I know that financially at this time the world is in chaos. It is easier to give up which is precisely why I want to move this work forward. It is these practices (art of hosting and warrior of the heart) that help us lead in complex times with courage. It’s what is needed most. If the only thing the Emerging Leadership team does this year is finish this PILOT to be inclusive of art of hosting and warrior of the heart, it sets this work up to happen again in the future.

“It is crucial that the art of hosting and warrior of the heart be included in the Emerging Leadership Program for reasons that you all know, it works when changing systems. The government cut NCFNG’s funding drastically days before the scheduled training was to take place. Training that I have been waiting years to happen. Either the art of hosting gets cut from the program or we find alternative resources to make it happen. This is where you come in. Eagles, with vision. We honour you by asking for help.”  Pawa also made the initial personal contribution offer of $450 toward expenses of about $3,000 which includes Bob’s travel from Colorado.

The Eagles have been responding with small and large offers of financial support and adding their individual and collective consciousness to this work which may set a pattern for what is possible in First Nations communities across Canada.  We are broadening the call for support to the larger community.  If you feel called, if you sense the power and possibility of activating blood memories, you could offer financial support here WiseActions.net and whether you can offer financial support or not, your holding this work from where you are and adding your conscious powerful intention for the highest good of the work, the people and the hosting team are all meaningful contributions.

In the words of one of the eagles:

“Pawa, yes certainly, to offer what I can here.  When the revolution comes ( and it wont be televised) we will go kindly to Ottawa, sit the treasury board in a circle and pass the feather til the wisdom of mutual stewardship becomes our national fiscal policy….  ….until then I take this an an investment in the leadership needed to see that day…”

The last 2 weeks of this program are being combined into one.  We will incorporate hosting and Warrior of the Heart with a traditional territories tour, naming ceremonies and community celebration.  We will host and be hosted.  As a hosting team, the work we have been pulled into is shifting literally by the minute.  We will be called upon to be highly present, tapped in, resilient and resourceful to the fullness of our capacity as we hold this space with the people of Membertou.

The response of the Eagles has already astounded the good people of NCFNG and of Membertou who are interested by and curious about this generosity of spirit from people they do not know.  The response is also showing pathways to what’s possible when we think we don’t have money or other resources to do what is calling to be done.  We are more resilient and powerful than that and we have abundant resources available when we turn to look and when we continually offer prayers to the ancestors and ourselves in service of their bidding.

This work of and in Membertou is another of the illustrations of how resilient we are as human beings, responding to the vision of what’s possible in the world.  It is a time of quiet revolution and we are shifting the shape of the world as we know it.