Speaker 1: Hey, thanks for being a part of the conversation. This
is for stories. I am the Poet in the Forest,
a children's series that I pinned out in the nineteen nineties. Now,
none of it would be possible if it wasn't for
this forest right here in South Charlotte, North Carolina. I
talk about it so much that I thought maybe it's
time that you get to know what has inspired me
for thirty years. Thanks for being a part of the conversation. Hey,
thanks for coming back to the forest. The prayer stick.
It's been with me since nineteen ninety three. Articles from
this forest, particles from the universe, the spiritual feeling, as
well as learning from everything that these trees have shared
with me these many, many decades. The prayer stick. What
happened was I was walking through the forest and I
saw this stick. Most people would walk by and think, Ah,
that's just a fallen branch. No, I felt something. It
spoke to me, and it not only invited me to
pick it up, but it invited me to listen to it.
So I kept walking through the forest and one by
one I would pick up these little particles and articles
of items, and I would say, this is going to
be part of the prayer stick, and so I found
very creative ways to connect them to the stick, which
still sits with me every single day inside the podcast studio.
So what was it used for, right, Well, my sacred circle,
which is next to or was next to the slow
moving stream. We had that big storm last year and
it totally wiped out the area where I would go
in and meditate and I would pray, and I would
take the prayer stick with me to open up the
four different gates north, south, east, and west. Now, sit
down and just listen, to feel, to be guided by,
to become part of That's what the prayer stick was
all about. Now, why did I walk away from using
the prayer stick inside the sacred circle? Well, a number one.
The area doesn't exist anymore because the water washed it
all away. But I stopped going out into the force
long before that, because, like anything else that's aging, things
begin to thin out. Every time that I would step
into the sacred circle and raise my arms with the
prayer stick, people saw me and they started asking a
lot of questions and I would share with them my
spirituality that connected to Native American spirituality, the great mystery,
the sky, the universe, and then they would question me
as in judging me. Well, that's not a normal way
to live, that's not a great way to do different things.
You know, why don't you just get into a real
religious group and study the one word. You know, it
doesn't work that way, right. We all are very spiritual
in our own walk and way. But the prayer stick
is still with me. It's in the studio every single day.
Everything that has created it and that I picked up
that day inside the forest is still making it one
single set of energy. I trust it, I have faith,
I have a hope. Sure thou shalt not have false idols.
It's not an idol. It's a prayer stick. Hey, thanks
for being a part of the conversation.