To read Odyssey of the 8th Fire, click here.
To read Odyssey of the 8th Fire, click here.
True Saga Commemorates an Epic American Spiritual Quest
Twenty years have come and gone, and thus I am moved to acknowledge and commemorate a great adventure for our era, and the telling of the true tale of that adventure as Odyssey of the 8th Fire.
The 8th Fire saga tells the real story of a great, long prayer walk in 1995-96 from the Atlantic to the Pacific. The story arises from the deepest roots of our land, but takes place in the present and the future. In it, circles upon circles, spiritual elders make a great and generous giveaway of the teachings they carry.
The actual writing of this epic-length, nonfiction story of the 2,500 mile prayer pilgrimage for the earth took place some 11 years after the final steps of the walk. I wrote Odyssey of the 8th Fire over the course of 225 consecutive days beginning in early summer 2007 and finishing in the deep of winter 2008.
Elizabeth- 2015
At the time my wife Elizabeth Wolf and I were living on Calle Contento in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Over those intensely demanding 225 days, Elizabeth provided intellectual, emotional, creative and spiritual support in a thousand ways, and thereby made possible the writing and online publication of the epic, nonfiction saga Odyssey of the 8th Fire. While holding down a fulltime job at Blessingway Authors Services, she remained close to this project as my Muse, critic, and companion from the first word through the last. Her multitude of contributions made an enormous and enduring difference.
Thank you darling Elizabeth for making it possible to spin out in words this ambitious spiritual saga along the Beauty Way, and to make of it a great giveaway for the people. ~ S.M.
Here’s just a short take from the 8th Fire account of the final day of the long Walk for the Earth:
Day 225 – TWENTY YEARS AGO TODAY – February 2, 1996 – Odyssey of the 8th Fire
“We are a part of all that we have met. Yet, experience is an arch wherethro gleams that untravl’d world whose margin fades forever and forever when we move.” ~ Odysseus to Athena, at the end of The Odyssey
Whirling Rainbow Skysign & Sandpainting
…Evelyn Commanda, representing the Algonquin peoples, held one end of the Seven Fires Wampum Belt, and Liz Dominguez, representing Chumash peoples, held the other end. Together, slowly and solemnly, they walked the belt out into the Pacific Ocean, where in a sacred manner they washed it with the waves…
…we were a circle of nearly 80 people representing all the colors of humanity, and many of its spiritual traditions.
We began to express ourselves, to pray. One of the things we gave thanks for on the beach was the tremendous support we enjoyed as we walked. So many wonderful people stopped, or went out of their way somehow to ensure that we succeeded as best we could. So many people responded, and helped us along.
Some people became very interested in the depth and specificity of the prophecies we carried, while others didn’t care very much about that kind of information at all. They just felt we were doing something worthwhile by walking, and that’s all they needed to know. They acted out of basic human goodness. Now in our final ceremony, we sent our gratitude and good feelings to Creator and all the helpers with our song and prayer for all…
Link to the full account of Day 225 of the Odyssey of the 8th Fire.
What they greatly thought, they nobly dared
2015 – This year marks the 20th anniversary of the start of the great prophetic, multicultural Sunbow pilgrimage from the Atlantic to the Pacific in 1995 under guidance of traditional native wisdom keepers and the skysign of the Whirling Rainbow.
The journey began — and remains — the Odyssey of the 8th Fire. I’m honored to have had the opportunity to tell this epic tale freely on the web, and grateful for the help that came to support me in doing it.
As the meme below attests, I’m moved this 20th anniversary year to beat upon the drum, to write, and to otherwise let people know about the journey that took place and that in my mind remains unfinished. That’s a key. Via the Odyssey of the 8th Fire everyone has an opportunity to make a parallel literary and spiritual pilgrimage across Turtle Island (North America). From that journey, I feel, much is to be gained.
Do you have the wisdom necessary for the journey?
This year marks the 20th anniversary of the start of the great multicultural pilgrimage from the Atlantic to the Pacific in 1995 under guidance of traditional native wisdom keepers. The journey was — and is — the Odyssey of the 8th Fire.
As the meme below attests, I’m moved this year to continue letting people know about the epic saga I authored back in 2007 to tell the tale. As time passes the story becomes increasingly relevant.
Begin the journey: Odyssey of the 8th Fire
The year 2015 marks the 20th Anniversary of a great journey that took place over the course of 8 months as a band of pilgrims guided by traditional elders of North America walked from the Atlantic to the Pacific under the sky sign of the Whirling Rainbow.
To help commemorate that walk, I am creating a series of memes letting people know where they can learn the whole of of the true, epic saga Odyssey of the 8th Fire. Here’s is yet another sample meme that I plan send out on it’s own digital odyssey:
I invite you also to begin the journey. Explore what the odyssey of the 8th fire is about, and consider making an 8-month spiritual-literary journey, reading one journal entry each day from the start of the odyssey onward.
With respect, SM
The Walk Humanity is Taking
Twenty Years Ago – Thanksgiving Day, 1995
November 24, 1995 – A band of pilgrims gathered at First Encounter Beach on Cape Cod Massachsetts with Grandfather William Commanda and Frank Decontie of the Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg, and Jose’ Lucero of the Santa Clara Pueblo.
In a circle around the roaring ceremonial fire on the beach, the pilgrims vowed to begin a prayer walk in June of 1995 from the Eastern Door at the Atlantic Ocean to the Western Gate at the Pacific.
“Moses made pilgrimages to the mountain, and Jesus spent forty days in the desert. All throughout history, people have made sacred journeys.” – don Jose’ Matsuwa
The rest of the story… http://www.8thfire.net/Day_0.html
Reunion: Eagle-Quetzal-Condor
In this brief video clip, Chief Phil Lane shares his understanding of a key ancient teaching of the Americas: the reunion of the Eagle, Quetzal and Condor.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IDOFyv9Zdw
Remembering an Epic Walk for the Earth
Walking under the sign of the Whirling Rainbow
Nineteen years ago today – June 23, 1995 – a small band of pilgrims set out walking from the Atlantic to the Pacific on an epic journey that I have come to regard, and to write about, as the Odyssey of the 8th Fire.
The saga of their journey is well worth knowing, for it remains critically relevant to the journey all of us are making now through an era of profound change upon our Earth.
As well as the tale of the pilgrims’ travels on foot across Turtle Island (North America), Odyssey of the 8th Fire is the essential story of their meetings with dozens of traditional, learned elders of North America. They gifted the pilgrims with messages to deliver to all the people.
Reading Odyssey of the 8th Fire online is a demanding quest. The story is exceedingly long. Because of this, and because many of the elders who are part of the story noted that their teachings take both time and attention to understand, I recommend this literary pilgrimage be undertaken step by step, over a span of eight months or so.
Odyssey consists of a lengthy Prologue, and then 225 accounts, one for each day of travel. Those journal entries are ordered chronologically.
By engaging this online account of the epic walk one day at a time, a reader can make a steady eight-month literary and spiritual pilgrimage from East to West across Turtle Island (North America). The journey proceeds place to place, elder to elder, teaching to teaching.
“I ask you to listen not just with your minds. I ask you to listen with your hearts, because that is the only way you can receive what it is — what we are giving. These are the teachings of our hearts.
“This walk is going to take eight or nine months. There are lots of elders out there across Turtle Island, and they have many beautiful teachings, many teachings that all the people need now. It is our hope, it is our prayer that they will come forward now that the Eastern Door is open
“It is our prayer that they will meet us as we walk; that they will teach and share what they understand from their hearts. Be patient. Listen to the elders. You need patience to receive these teachings. It doesn’t all come at once. You need patience.”
– Frank Decontie, Algonquin – June 23, 1995 – First Encounter Beach, Massachusetts
Spring 2014 – Falling into a Supermassive Black Hole
Note Well: A news story from The New York Times (2.18.2014) reports: “A gas cloud named G2 is about to collide with Sagittarius A*, the supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy…”
Our galaxy, which we know as the Milky Way, is known as Hunab Ku in Mayan Cosmology.
The noteworthy galactic event that the Times reported on is on track to play out in March or April of this year, at Sagittarius A, which astrologers reckon as located at about 27 degrees of Mutable sign Sagittarius. This degree of the sign of the Archer is at the very center of our Milky Way Galaxy – Hunab Ku), and it will unfold this Spring just as the much-heralded Grand Cross of 2014 is manifest in the Cardinal signs of the Zodiac.
Metaphysicians regard these planetary and stellar events as noteworthy and significant in accord with the ancient astrological dictum of correspondence: As above, so below.
Hunab Ku – image by Jose Arguelles, is a Mayan-inspired symbol for our galaxy.
To quote again from the Times article: “…(this) black hole lies just 26,000 light-years from Earth. (The actual event, of course, took place 26,000 years ago.)” This means that the gas cloud G2 was drawn into the center of our galaxy (Hunab Ku), some 26,000 years ago, but it has taken the light from that event that long to reach earth.
This 26,000-year span matches the cyclic period of time defined in the Mesoamerican (Mayan) Long Count Calendar.
The Long Count calendar was famously forecast to complete, and then to roll over into the start of a new cycle (5th World) at or near the date of December 21, 2012, just a year and three months ago.
Click here to read the rest of the Times article about the impending Black Hole event of 2014. Click here to watch a Youtube video clip simulation of the Gas Cloud being drawn into Hunab Ku – the center of our galaxy.
- Artist’s impression of the event (image from www.eso.org)
