Vision Quest - A Rite of Passage

In a time not so long ago young boys when through a"rite of passage" to signify the crossing over to manhood. This is something that most young people in America will never experience and do not really understand. As a father of four daughters and two grand-children I know for a fact that kids just grow up all of a sudden. There is very little teaching/learning that goes between parent and kids as in the past. It seems that most parents depend on other entities to raise their kids up in the ways of the world. Young girls in their early teens are dressing up like porn queens and young boys are involved with drug and gang activity just to fit in. No longer is there a set time in one's life when they went from a child to a grownup, they just come home from another party that went too far and their all grown up.

There comes a time when you must grow up and leave family, friends and work behind and go off alone, looking within to discover your changes in the wheel of life. The Hanbleceya, translated from Lakota means "Vision Quest" is the name of this rite of passage. The Vision Quest has been followed by humans for thousands of years. When you are brave enough o listen you can hear it calling to you. Life questions are pushing you to do something, "Who am I?", "Why am I here?" and "How can I heal my wounds?" Something's in life are required, this is one of them.

The first thing to do is found someone that will teach and guide you through this ceremony in a respectful manner for all the ones that have gone before and the thousands that gave their lives for us to continue. You begin by learning the simplest of ways to open your eyes and admit there is some kind of higher power out there that is in control. All the while, your group is becoming a community, offering support and love.

Vision Quests have been important by enabling individuals to negotiate their maturity/transitions with purpose and meaning, discovering gifts to be brought back for the whole community. Without them, people have no way to mark and celebrate their life-changes, unable to complete the old or begin the new. The Vision Quest allows a person to engage an age-old ceremonial pattern: completion of an old life, movement through the threshold of the unknown, and return to the world reborn. People in any life stage or transition can find meaning in this powerful process. Young people will find particular meaning in the challenges the program presents.

Your teacher and your group will serve to mirror and support visioneers by helping them first to prepare for their Vision Quest and then to understand and interpret their experience. The vision quester returns to the "real world" powerfully moved by having lived close to the source power and the Higher Power in their understanding.

During the four days and nights you will enact the Vision Quest, living by yourself in the wildness of nature holding your Chanupa and facing each direction to pray daily. In the weakness of fasting, you become more open and transparent. You live between the inner world of dreams, feelings, fantasies and the outer world of cold night air, the warming sun, the sound of a coyote howling, the sight of mole digging mounds just outside of your area. You will be visited by dragons, whose names are loneliness, boredom, fear, and regret--among others. You engage them with your heart and spirit, recognizing them as worthwhile opponents. They push you into your depths.

Time can slow down on a Vision Quest, and the stillness of being alone can be very powerful. As your thoughts begin to empty out, you can look into the pool of your own being, noticing how you are, what your dreams are made of, what you need to let go of. The medicine wheel is present there, and you can enter it naturally. It is possible to feel connected to everything, to the small fly dragonfly, to the giant oak tree, to the limitless expanse of the cosmos.

On the way in, just as on the way out you will enter the Inipi lodge to transition out from the spirit world back into reality. You have been witness to your own death and rebirth. What is important to carry into your new life, and what needs to be left behind? You ask the Spirit to help you find your way. Your prayers are answered as the first rays of sunlight pierce the darkness. It's time now to come down off the mountain and begin the journey back.

There are numerous things I left out about the ceremony in this article I just wanted to say certain things about the Hanbleceya. The Inipi Ceremony is critical in the Vision Quest, just like many other ceremonial rights are important, however one truly only needs a supporter and fire for a Vision Quest. One day in the future I might decide to write my story about the things that have gone on in the Vision Quest that I have been privileged to be a part of including my own.

Aho, Mitakuye Ayasin

Ricky Ellis

McKinney TX

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Odin's Teenage Rites of Passage Vision Quest Ritual

A Mountain Vision Quest Alone

SUMMER SOLSTICE TEENAGE ODIN VISION QUEST

Here is a Rites of Passage for any teenage Viking who wants to make contact with Odin and the gods/goddesses of the North.

I was given this ritual 15 years ago and I, not being a teenager, performed it partially with great results.

Always keep in mind that I, Ragnar Storyteller, having been outlawed by the Asatru Alliance and the self imposed godis and leaders, have been given permission by Odin to place some very powerful rituals on my website.

He and I are in accord,

if not in actual physical contact, then in mental atunement.

I need to update Odin and the runes and the gods/goddesses of our ancestors into the 21st century. To free Odin from the limitations of the Viking Age.

I was given this ritual while I was writing my first book with and for Odin.

Have you ever woke in the middle of the night with the urge to write something? Took pen and paper in hand and wrote as fast as you could. Then, when you were finished, read it to see what you had written?

That book being Odin's Return.

So, the easiest way for me to present this ritual to you is to copy it, abridged from the book.

Here goes from Odin's Return:

"The summer solstice was fast approaching and Thorolfr had reached his thirteenth year. His year of manhood. The blood of his ancestors pumped furiously through his veins. His size though not yet full in stature, was bigger than any of the other boys in the village. He almost stood as tall as a full grown man. His muscles bulged pridefully through his thin clothes.

"... Thorolfr started towards the mountains the next morning to start his Odin ritual

"He must remember all the steps that the hooded-one had told him upon their last meeting.

"As he walked through the forest towards the mountains, his eyes scoured the area for a tree. It had to be a special tree. A tree that had been struck by lightening. He needed to gather wood from it for his Odin ritual.

"... there it was, a giant ash stripped of all branches and split in the middle.

"It had been hit by Thor's lightening. It was just what he needed for Odins ritual.

"He pulled some ropes from his backpack and tied the wood into a neat bundle.

"He could still feel the heat in the wood. But how could that be? There hadn't been a storm in a week.

"He smiled and recalled the stories told by his father around the campfire about how Odin and the other gods/goddesses could intervene and perform miraculous and magical things to prepare for certain rituals.

"... he started again towards the mountain and the words that Odin had spoke to him ringed through his head. '...like a god you must live and like a god you must die ...'"

"He climbed the mountain slowly and steadily. The weight of the bundle of wood on his back chafed him and he had to shift the load from time to time.

"It was getting towards late afternoon and he finally spotted what looked like an opening between a bunch of bushes.

"... he pushed the bushes aside and saw a small cave. It would be perfect for his three night Odin's vigil .

"That night he made a fire of the sacred wood and all alone with his thoughts he kept a vigil in the cave. He had nothing to eat nor drink except bread and water.

"The hooded-one had told him that he must purge himself by fasting with bread and water.

"That night as he sat by his fire he felt a strangeness that he never felt before. He felt the presence of beings, of higher ones, of gods.

"He could not see them but he felt them. He shuddered in fear as he thought of their closeness.

"... for three days and three nights Thorolfr remained in the cave sustaining himself on nothing but the bread and water.

"Then on midnight of the third day, Thorolfr rebuilt the fire with the last of the sacred wood.

"He sat in front of the fire in a trance-like state. The three days of silence and fasting had raised his level of consciousness and his mind was sharp and eager to learn.

"The fire in front of him danced back and forth and swayed to a hidden rhythm. He watched it in quiet fascination.

"Little faces appeared in the flames and Thorolfr instinctively knew that the fire was alive.

"... he stood up and looked deeply into the flames. The flames parted and he could see a god-like man standing at the entrance to a bridge. The bridge glowed with all the radiant colors of the rainbow.

"... the god-like man, in full battle dress and winged helm stared sternly at Thorolfr.

I did not perform the following part of the ritual farther than pricking my thumb with my dagger to draw a little blood. Any teenager performing this ritual can do the same. I only present it to you as it was given to me.)

Ragnar Storyteller

"... he remembered what the hooded-one told him he must do. He took his dagger from his waist band.

"... he then said 'may this sacrifice of my blood help bring forth the gods of my Fathers back into my world. May my blood help rejuvenate the ancestral soul of the kindred.

"... then using the dagger he made three incisions of his chest and let the blood flow freely.

"He held the tip of the dagger so that the blood flowed onto it.

"He said, 'with this blood, I devote myself to Odin and the gods/goddesses of my ancestors.

"... He let the blood drop into the flames.

"When he had finished he raised his hand into the air and said, 'in the name of Oidn, Thor and Tyr, I dedicate my life to the protection of our ancestral soul.

"... he waited till the last vestige of life went out of the fire. Then he gathered his things and started back down the mountain to the village."

This is indeed a very powerful teenage rites of passage.

One of the reasons we as a Northern European Peoples are losing our country and are being forced out of the cities is because the other cultures all have maintained rites of passages for their children.

The Native Americans have theirs; the Asians have theirs, the Jews have theirs, even the black gangs in the inner cities have theirs

Time for us to build independent one-on-one relationships with Odin and the gods/goddesses of our ancestors.

But most of all we must free them from the confining limits of the viking age, and bring them into the 21st century where we can empower them.

Ragnar Sroryteller

Ellis Peterson AKA Ragnar Storyteller (earned Viking name) is 72 and a skald and runemaster. He is a retired math professor and electrical engineer. He brings his scientific knowledge of Quantum Physics into his Runic Information Website. He offers a unique approach to Runes and Quantum Physcis. He offers free Runic and Quantum Physics essays and articles plus a free newsletter. To take advantage of his uniquely interesting stuff check out his website at http://www.runes-for-health-wealth-love-now.com

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