Following is information about today’s Pachamama Alliance Zoom presentation, Honoring the Equinox with Arkan Lushwala, a Peruvian ceremonialist and healer.
He is a rare indigenous bridge of the global north and south, carrying spiritual traditions from the Andes in his native Peru as well as being adopted and initiated by the Lakota people of North America.
The equinox is a time of transition, both of the seasons and of our internal journey, moving towards rebirth in the Northern Hemisphere and harvest in the Southern Hemisphere. Day and night are in equal balance, reminding us to seek balance in our own lives. Society is immersed in transition at this time as well, as the systems of modernity are increasingly out of balance. In this conversation, Arkan will share his thoughts on the significance of this moment in the year and in history, and will respond to questions from the audience.
Pachamama Alliance
This equinox observation will take place from 3:00 – 4:00 p.m. PT (UTC-8) on Friday, March 19.
Register here
I have been blessed to have been able to hear Arkan speak on several occasions. May 9, 2018, he spoke about “What Can I Do?” I was excited when I heard the title of his talk. As I’ve been saying the solutions for our environmental chaos must come from a spiritual center.
The root of our unfolding environmental disaster is the dominant view that natural resources are commodities that can be owned and consumed without regard to the consequences. That is fed by an economic model that requires continuous grow, and therefore, consumption of resources, even those that are nonrenewable. That could only have happened by a disconnect from Mother Earth.
The answer to “what can I do?”
Speaking about what is happening on Earth right now, many of the conditions of life that we used to take for granted, now are really out of balance. Hopefully we still have time to get back into balance so life may continue.
Arkan Lushwala
I travel around the world and meet people and talk to people from all different cultures.
And everywhere people ask, “what can we do?”
The question, “what can we do?”, is the second question.
The first question is “what can we be?”
Because what you can do is a consequence of who you are.
Once you know what you can be, you know what you can do, and we cannot afford wasting time;
We have little time.
We need to be precise now.
When someone sincerely asks, “what can I do?”
my humble answer, the only answer that I find in my heart to be sincere is,
“First find out what you can be.”
Action is extremely necessary at this time.
This is not a time just to talk about it.
The most spiritual thing now is action.
To do something about what’s happening.
To go help where help is needed.
To stand up when we need to stand up, and protect what is being damaged.
And still, this action needs to be born from a place in ourselves that has real talent,
real intelligence, real power, real connection to the heart of the Earth, to universal wisdom, so our actions are not a waste of time.
So our actions are precise, our actions are in harmony with the movement, the sacred movement, of that force that wants to renew life here on Earth and make it better for the following generations.
Following are notes I took from Arkan’s presentation that night.
You start praying while you are also listening. I become aware of, remembering, what I pray about at that moment. We need to rely on our own ancient indigenous memory. Stop being isolated. Fully become part of the earth and water and plants and air. This is an immense source of knowledge about these problems.
I am in front of the sacred fire of all who are listening. Let’s say that I am thinking now. I am remembering. The notion of intelligence and to understand refers to memory. Intelligence means learning, but also achieving that state in your mind when you are remembering. The air that we are breathing carries the memories of the ages, the movement of energy. Deepest intelligence in our culture is memory. There are always memories of the ages in all that surrounds us.
The state of being, the prayer, makes us open to receiving. If we are really open, and not blocking ourselves, and connected to what is around us, with our eyes, breath, sensations, and feeling that arrive in our heart, through our antenna, if we are open in this way while we are doing something, our action is being infused with guidance or instructions. There is something there that is watching what you are doing and helping guide you. Sometimes we need the help of the elders or others to understand these experiences.
We ask for help. When we put ourselves in that elevated space, that makes it much easier for us to receive help. Help is always there but we often miss the messages.
If I am open and receptive to other frequencies and the higher state of my being, I’ll have much more help in my work.
The correct way is not to take credit, but the joy is the moment itself, by feeling integrated to life while you are doing the action.
When we sit with others in a circle, when we all change the state of our being together, we move up to the sacred together. Working with others in community, much, much more can be accomplished.
If a person expresses an experience that is from a sacred space of high resonance, I am activated by that. It resonates in my own heart and mind and spirit, and it triggers my memory, too. by the presence of something sacred.
We sit in a circle and witness someone remembering. We receive the same spirit together. Our individual self and agenda slips away. Joining our hearts. Mother Earth is the One, all of us become the One together. A lot of wisdom comes south. We are all impressed by the presence of something sacred.
Throughout my life, it has been an honor to watch my elders make medicine in their mouths and feed the world with their tender sacred speech. Following their example, I want to share the words that make waterfalls, lakes and rivers, and offer some medicine to those who are wondering how we will continue living when the Earth that sustains our lives is so damaged. What I share here, far from being my own creation, is ancient memory that belongs to all of us.
My intention is to share the spiritual depths of a culture that creates individuals like my tayta, ones with a real capacity to have an influence on the health of the Earth. I am one of those who believe all of humanity can regain an ancient way of being that allows us to talk to our Mother Earth to resolve dangerous imbalances of the environment under her guidance. The state of humans and the state of the Earth are completely intertwined, and the full recovery of the best of our human nature will be the healing of Nature.
In the thick of the current environmental crisis, it is useful to know there are still people who have the power to call rain or to move clouds when there is too much rain.
Deer and Thunder, Indigenous Ways of Restoring the World by Arkan Lushwala
My brother talks of a word haywaricuy – which means to hand someone something with tenderness. I hand you this book with tenderness as a loving gesture to mankind, as sacred movement towards that which seems hopeless but is so easy to heal. We can come back together as one loving heartbeat for the good of all living things on this planet. For this, we need to recover our spirit. In spirit, there are no judgments, no words like hate or greed or mine or war. There are no guns; there is no destruction! Spirit will live on even if our precious Earth does not!
We are spirit, and my brother asks you to remember who you are, to wake up to the beauty that is, and to honor the beauty of life at all times just as your ancestors once did a very long time ago.
I stand next to my brother just as I support you in love! As Arkan says over and over: the essence of humanity can be one heartbeat, one movement of sacred direction! When we go against this direction we destroy. When we open to the spirit that we are and surrender to the sacred motion, then we prosper, we thrive, we love, and we live!
Foreward by Jeannie Kerrigan for the book The Time of The Black Jaguar by Arkan Lushwala, Booksurge. Kindle Edition
Quakers, social justice and revolution 
Arkan is such a gift in this life. If you feel inspired by his message, please offer a donation to his ceremonial organization supporting indigenous wisdom here: https://www.yanakuna.org/donate