Healing Through Ceremony: Indigenous Pathways through Beauty and Trauma with Roman Guaraguaorix Perez & Jonathan Gonzalez

$150

Healing Through Ceremony: Indigenous Pathways through Beauty and Trauma with Roman Guaraguaorix Perez & Jonathan Gonzalez

Course
2 Lessons

People from all walks of life may at some point choose a spiritual path for healing some form of trauma in their lives, be it historical or lived experience (the two are not mutually exclusive).

Oftentimes people find their way to the spirit of healing through Indigenous ceremonies especially here on Turtle Island. We believe this to be a good thing as more and more these ceremonies are open indigenous and non-indigenous alike and these ceremonies can offer powerful opportunities for healing.

Without awareness or the presence of strong elders in their lives however, folks find that there are many unexpected challenges along this path that they are surprised to discover and then find themselves in the same circumstance from which they turned to these ceremonies in the first place or worse. Even with awareness and having the support of elders there are still bound to be moments of beauty as well as trauma (current and/or historical).

Without being grounded, humbled and compassionate an individual who choses this path may find that not only do they remain stuck in their patterns they also begin to cause harm to others especially those indigenous elders, visionaries, healers, medicine people as well as whole groups and cultures.

Some of the specific ways that this harm shows up are:

Claiming “ownership” of ceremonies that are not of your cultural lineage
Failing to understand the difference between ‘owning’ and ‘honoring’
Ceremonial tourism: Dipping your toe in the proverbial pool of ceremony while not uplifting the elders and supporting the real work that exists not ‘In’ the ceremony but ‘in between’ ceremonies where the real integration lives
Failing to connect to one’s own ancestral lineage and claiming some indigenous lineage due to proximity to an indigenous culture

In this discussion we hope to share stories of our lived experience about why we feel it is important for folks of ALL walks of life to get on the pathway to healing as well as how to be on this journey with integrity and start to integrate the teachings in your life in a Good Way! We also want to share how strongly we feel that it’s essential to find your way back to your own ancestors. Finally we want to share some ways that we and others have begun making this journey that will expose you to some trauma but that ultimately we may find the beauty in the balance.

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NCN has partnered with our conference presenters to make these powerful recordings accessible to a larger audience. All profits go exclusively to the Nature Connection Network's BIPOC Reparations Fund and the presentations are being offered with sliding, pay-what-you-can pricing.

Overseen by the NCN’s Black, Indigenous, and People of Color Circle, this fund directly supports BIPOC leadership within the field of nature connection. Areas of funding include:

Reparations Awards to support BIPOC participation in NCN programs.
Compensation for BIPOC leadership within NCN’s Shared Leadership.
Fair exchange for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color presenters at NCN programming.
Support for BIPOC-led initiatives within NCN membership as well as in the broader community.

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Roman Guaraguaorix Perez

Roman Guaraguaorix (Redhawk) Perez was born in the mountains of Kiskeya, Dominican Republic and presently resides in Brooklyn, New York. He is a respected community/spiritual leader and accomplished indigenous Taino artist, lecturer, storyteller, drummer and singer. He is the Kacike (chief) for Maisiti Yukayeke Taino; a tribe of the Taino Nation. Since 1990 Redhawk has participated in Vision Quest, Sundance, Sweat Lodges and Taino ceremonies.

Roman Guaraguaorix comes from a long linage of farmers and healers in his family. Roman works with the sacred tobacco to help people with there own healing physical , emotional, spiritual and mental, helping open their own consciousness to various sacred plant medicines.

Roman Redhawk facilitates and leads such ceremonies as; Vision Quest, Lodges ,Taino ceremonies as well as healing Retreats , he continues to use his indigenous teachings to help the people. Redhawk has done presentations on Northern and Taino native teachings at notable institutions, including major universities, public schools, The Peabody Museum, Brooklyn Museum of Art, and The Smithsonian Native American Museum and a certified fire starter for the White Bison recovery program, a program to help Native people deal with the grips of addiction.

Inspired by the beautiful sounds of Taino instruments (log drums, shell, gourd rattles and conch shells) he also does presentations through song and dance. Roman is also an End of Life counselor and doula . He enjoys doing art work such as; working with feathers and painting with acrylics and other mediums, creating Taino and other Native works. Roman Redhawk is a curator and artist.

Jonathan Gonzalez

Jonathan has been on the Vision Quest path since 2010 and has sat in Vision Quest circle 7 times. He is also committed to reconnecting to his ancestry and now working with a Taino elder and Kasike from Kiskeya, Roman Guaraguaorix, who has been guiding him through a 4 year commitment to complete 4 Vision Quests. He has done 2 years with 2 to go. When completed he will have sat up 9 times but knows that completing the commitment is not the end of the journey but rather another beginning. He works with Wild Earth Wilderness School and folds in the spirit and the energy into the physical skills of living with the earth that he shares with the students of all ages that cross his path.

Session Recording

(1h 31m 51s)
487 MB

Chat Transcript

1.02 KB