Ken’s Reviews > Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants > Status Update

Our elders say that we live in the time of the seventh fire. We are the ones our ancestors spoke of, the ones who will bend to the task of putting things back together...gathering the fragments of sustainable culture.

The seventh fire prophecy... tells that all people of the Earth will see that the path ahead is divided. One is soft and green with new grass, the other scorched black. We indeed stand at a crossroads.

"...the relationship between self and the world is reciprocal, it is not a question of first getting enlightened or saved and then acting. As we work to heal the earth, the earth heals us." – Joanna Macy

What we contemplate here is more than ecological restoration; it is the restoration of relationship between plants and people.

"Ceremony focuses attention, so that attention becomes intention. If you stand together and profess a thing before your community, it holds you accountable."

"Many Indigenous traditions still recognize the place of ceremony and often focus their celebrations on other species and events in the cycle of seasons. In a colonist society, the ceremonies that endure are not about land; they're about family and culture..."

When she asked her students what we owe nature in return for what it provides us, she was humbled by the creativity of their answers. The gifts they might return to nature are as diverse as those nature gives to us. This is our work, to discover what we can give. Isn't this the purpose of education, to learn the nature of your own gifts and how to use them for good in the world?

Being naturalized to place means to live as if this is the land that feeds you, as if these are the streams from which you drink, that build your body and fill your spirit. To become naturalized is to know that your ancestors lie in this ground. Here you will give your gifts and meet your responsibilities. Live as if your children's future matters, take care of the land as if our lives depend on it. Because they do.