“The Gates of Paradise: Shamanic Memories from an Indian Visionary” – in Parabola (Summer 2022)

Posted on May 8, 2022 by davidrkopacz

Thanks to Parabola Magazine for excerpting a passage from our latest book, Becoming Who You Are: Beautiful Painted Arrow’s Life & Lessons for Children Ages 10-100.

The excerpt is entitled “The Gates of Paradise: Shamanic Memories from an Indian Visionary,” and is availabe online in Parabola Summer 2022 Edition with the theme of Ancestors. It is currently available online, but the whole issue is worth reading, with an articles on P. L. Travers, Vaclav Havel, Nelson Mandela, and many different topics on the theme of Ancestors.

The article also features two of Joseph Rael’s paintings, “Sage Woman becomes visible to – bless “the People,” and “Crystal Chamber,” which I’ll include below.

We are very happy that this book is getting some notice as it is an autobiography of Joseph’s life specifically aimed at passing on wisdom to the next generation, how fitting that it is in the Ancestors issue of Parabola: The Search for Meaning. The book was also recognized as a winner of the Paterson Prize for Books for Young People.

Becoming Who You Are: Beautiful Painted Arrow’s Life & Lessons for Children ages 10-100

Posted on November 26, 2021 by davidrkopacz

Our next book has released! Becoming Who You Are: Beautiful Painted Arrow’s Life & Lessons for Children ages 10-100 is 130 pages of Joseph’s lessons for the people of the Earth. The book has 43 art works by Joseph and 14 photographs. We decided on the “ages 10-100” because we’ve also thought about writing a book for younger children. Also, this is our first book for children and it was challenging to bridge Joseph’s ideas and create a story that kids of all ages could enjoy.

The book is available through:

Itasca Books

Barnes & Noble

Amazon

Here is the back cover of the book:

Joseph Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow) was born on the Southern Ute Reservation in 1935 and grew up at Picuris Pueblo in New Mexico. Joseph’s life took him across the country and around the world. After a vision in 1983, he built a Sound Peace Chamber, and then worked on building over 60 chambers around the world — leading to recognition by the United Nations for his work for world peace. Through his friend and co-author, David Kopacz MD, Joseph shares his life and lessons for people, young and old, growing through the transition from childhood into adulthood.

Joseph says that when he was sent to the Santa Fe Indian boarding school, they were trying to make American kids out of Indian kids, in this book, Joseph tells us, “I am trying to make Indian kids out of American kids.” Joseph passes on his wisdom and artwork to the next generations who will inherit the many problems that we have created in breaking the medicine wheel. Joseph tells us, “Let’s not leave the next generations in so much mystery about the physical and spiritual worlds. Let’s educate them from the beginning about the way of the shaman.” We are already born with everything we need, we just need to make sure that as we grow up, we don’t forget who we are.

Here are the generous endorsements we’ve received for the book:

―LEWIS MEHL-MADRONA MD, PhD

Psychiatry Residency Training Director, Northern Light Eastern Maine Medical Center Executive Director, Coyote Institute Associate Professor of Family Medicine, University of New England Author, Coyote Medicine, Coyote Healing, Narrative Medicine, and Healing the Mind through the Power of Story

―USHA AKELLA MSt
Co-founder of Matwaala: South Asian Diaspora Poets’ Collective, Poet and Author, “I Thought a Thought,” Ek An English Musical on the life of Shirdi Sai Baba, The Way of the Storm: An English Musical on the life of Meera Bai, I Will Not Bear You Sons, The Waiting, and A Face that Does Not Bear the Footprints of the World

This story of two very different men with common visions, may serve as a guide for all who seek to continually learn about themselves through the lenses of their own history and the cultures of those around us.

―SHUYUN DAVID LO MD

Psychiatrist, University of California Santa Cruz Student Health Center

Becoming Who You Are: Beautiful Painted Arrow’s Life and Lessons for Children by Joseph E. Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow) and David Kopacz MD is a book that shows us there are other important ways to teach that can speak to us all. Through storytelling, Beautiful Painted Arrow lays out many of life’s core values. We learn that the Tiwa word for God is Wah-Mah-Chi, which is also everything, and is the core to the love of learning which is the secret to being human. This lovely book is written for children, but the authors freely admit that it was written for those in the middle between the two worlds of childhood and adulthood, so it really applies to us all.

―BRADFORD FELKER MD

Psychiatrist, Seattle VA, Professor University of Washington, Captain United States Navy Reserve

―MAGDALINE DeSOUSA
Author, The Forgotten Mourners: Sibling Survivors of Suicide, What’s Real, Mama?, What’s Brave, Mama?, and coming soon, What’s Wrong With My Family? Growing Up in an Alcoholic Home

The inspiring story and wise words of the elder, Beautiful Painted Arrow (Joseph Rael), speak to the heart of the child within all of us. His life’s journey and teachings give us hope for a better world, one where we live in peace and harmony with our fellow humans and the natural world.

—TWIN SISTERS, JANE LISTER REIS & MARGIE LISTER MUENZER co-authors of the children’s books, Si’ahl and the Council of Animals: A Story of Our Changing Climate for Children and Their Parents; Si’ahl & Friends Coloring and Activity Book; and Margie’s Nature’s Gifts: A Poetry Coloring Book.

Available through:

Itasca Books

Barnes & Noble

Amazon

The Art of Joseph Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow)

Posted on January 29, 2021 by davidrkopacz

I have been working with Joseph Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow) since October of 2014. I’ve written about how I was working on a Hero’s Journey class for veterans, based on the concept of Joseph Campbell. I happened to find a copy of The Visionary: Entering the Mystic Universe of Joseph Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow) by the late Kurt Wilt. Kurt had mentioned several times in his book that Joseph’s life’s path was like the Hero’s Journey. I wrote to Kurt, told him what I was doing with the veterans’ group and he thought Joseph might want to hear about what I was doing. Kurt gave me Joseph’s email address. We emailed back and forth a couple times and Joseph invited me to visit him at the Southern Ute Reservation in southern Colorado. On the way down there I was thinking maybe I could include a chapter in the Hero’s Journey work on indigenous approaches to healing. As I wrote up my notes that first night, I realized there was more than a chapter – it was a whole book! The next day I mentioned the idea of a book to Joseph, what to me was an epiphany must have already been obvious to Joseph, as he just off-handedly said, “That’s what I was thinking.”

This led to the publication of Walking the Medicine Wheel: Healing Trauma & PTSD. Actually, in working on that book, we turned in our first draft to Paulette Millichap, our publisher with Pointer Oak and Millichap Books. Her reaction was, “This is interesting, but where is the book for veterans?” Oh, no, I realized, Joseph took me down the rabbit hole and I chased his thoughts like birds and we ended up writing a book that went up, down, and all around, but we lost track of what we started writing. So we split the book into two books and I quickly wrote in more veteran specific chapters. The second book also expanded and expanded and became Becoming Medicine: Pathways of Initiation into a Living Spirituality. However, even that book – at 500 pages – still had things we cut out and that could go in other books!

One of the other book ideas that grew out of the other writing was a book on Joseph’s art. I had the idea of a book called Art Medicine (which is actually the sub-title of the Becoming Medicine color edition) that would focus specifically on art and visions.

To this end, with the idea of doing a book on art, vision, healing, and featuring Joseph’s art work, I’ve put out a call to anyone who has an original art work by Joseph. Joseph is very generous with his work and has given away the bulk of it. At some point, he did start getting digital copies of some of his work, for books, or for printing out posters that he would give away. He also gave me a set of 35 mm slide photos of some older work and I’ve had those digitalized to preserve.

If you have an art work by Joseph, please just take a camera photo of it and email it to me at davidkopacz369@gmail.com

I’ve gone through each of Joseph’s books and listed the art work that has been published and we have all or most of these on digital.

For anyone intersted, here is a list of art work by book with the page number in parenthesis.

Sound: Native Teachings & Visionary Art

New Awareness, Old Awareness

An Epiphany

Seekers of Divine Guidance (0)

Blessing for All Life (4)

Mother Earth and the Flowering of Life (8)

Voice of Silence (10)

Song of Singing Bowl (14)

Sky Father covers Mother Earth with SPIRIT Leaves for new trees just planted after the summer fires (18)

The Infinite Vast Self (21)

The Fun Makers (23)

The Grandfathers (26)

Rainbow man and rainbow woman make first Double Rainbow on Turtle Island (29)

Oceanus vents beneath the Earthly crust, circles of epiphanies for the two Leggeds on Mother Earth in July (32)

Untitled (Early Horn of Plenty) (34)

Summer nights with Mother Earth and her children (38)

Morning Prayer for a new dawn (43)

Spirits of Red Rock (44)

CLEAN AIR Sacred Offering for the People of Mother Earth (47)

The moon arrives near the Earth to seed abundance in the Oceans (50)

Dance Chief calling the Sun-Moon People from the Spirit World to come and Dance (54)

Song of the Baskets (61)

Beautiful Painted Arrow song before Painting: “Oh Grandmother help us to see.” (65)

27 Feather Blessings (66)

Ancient Mysteries tell us that the Mother of fires lives inside the roots of grass, the roots of trees or in the brightest star in any night sky (69)

The Cosmos dreaming us in and out of perceptual realities (70)

Biosphere Stratosphere Energy Sphere (75)

Ceremony for severe cyclones with strong winds (76)

Woman of the Mountain Lakes calling for Mountain Rains – in Ceremony for the water moon (79)

Blessing place for school books (84)

Entrance to TREE of Life (87)

The Winter Summer People (90)

From the Clay of Life “the people” became visible (93)

From the hand of Great Spirit comes all Blessings (99)

Galactic Dance (102)

Flowering of new insights (104)

Untitled (eight-lobed inner flower, colored faces, Old Medicine Wheel) (108)

Rainbow Makers (110)

Story Tellers say that Ancient Ancestors traveled through time looking for new places to live and were known as “Those that fly like blowing wind” (113)

Angels of Light (114)

Harvest Belt Dance (117)

Climbing and Crossing Between Worlds Ceremony (121)

Dream Catcher (124)

Four Winds, Elders of the Sacred Blessing Way (128)

Ah-who (131)

Mother Nature of fields and Streams A child of innocence is born in every moment (137)

Watermelon plant people making food for the children of Mother Earth (141)

Creator of Ocean mists always brings new wisdom to learn (147)

Sage Woman becomes visible to bless “the People” (150)

From the Spirit World comes Eagle Wing to heal the people (159)

The Dreams of the Right Hand (168)

A cup of Silence (170-171)

Ocean Places of Oceanus (172-173)

Cradleboard Blessing Great Bear is the Big Dipper and the seven stars (174-175)

A Geological Formation: A Fault Line vision quest site a place to look for something that prevents perfection (176)

Flowering of Divinity (receiving sending) (181)

Weh-mu – 1 (191)

Weh-seh – 2 (196)

Pah-chu – 3 (199)

Wiii – 4 (202)

Pah-nu – 5 (206)

Mah-tschlay – 6 (209)

Cho-oh – 7 (212)

Wheh-leh – 8 (219)

Whiii – 9 (222)

Tehn-ku-teh – 10 (226)

Sun-Moon Dance, for our Galaxy (na-ku-tha-ke) We’re Dancing (229)

Creation Singing for all Artists (232)

Being & Vibration:

Entering the New World

Climbing and Crossing between worlds Ceremony (duplicate)

Untitled (Hands Weaving Mocassins)

Little Rainbows of Light home of a Beaver dam of water…Of Enlightenment (x)

The Land Spirit after it returned to Mother Earth, she drinks the thunder of Light at the new home of the Corn People (xii)

Planet Earth (Mother Earth) for Paulette & Kelly (Angel bringing child) (7)

Lava Rock is connected to time (10)

Born into the being of vibration the prehistoric farmer demonstrates how multi-verses were made with the sound of “Taah-que”…(12)

Broken Pots (20)

Birthing the Corn Mothers (24)

Coil Pottery Stew (28)

Deer Mother Feeds Her People (31)

Breath Matter and Movement, Being and Vibration, Life is the road of Goodness Grandfather walks with us (34)

Medicine (go forth for the people) for the four directions medicine bag, Grandfather, creator Dreaming into Life, all of the universes (Tiwa World) pa-aah-neh (40)

Untitled (Medicine Wheel) (48)

The Red Road (51)

Corn hair woman (64)

Singing for the Little People who bring the autumn light t0 (key-yah-ney) Mother of Planet Earth (67)

Mother of Time (74)

Untitled (corn plant, emotional, physical, spiritual, mental body – left, south, west, north, east on right) (79)

Drum Dance Wa-Chee-Chee-Who at Where God Lives and Walks on Planet Earth (99)

Being and Vibration of the Brother and Sister stars (102)

Creator of the Five Worlds (111)

Holy Water (113)

Untitled (5 worlds) (119)

Rain water droplets, sun flower, drink (124)

The Rain makers at Long beaver tail pond (131)

Ancestors bring rain to the desert (135)

Heart Path Spirit (137)

The Being of the feather Dance (139)

Altar of Mountain lion – mossa-neh (144)

Walking the Medicine Wheel: Healing Trauma & PTSD

Breath Matter and Movement (three feathers pointing to sun) (xxix)

Offering of the Heart (xiv)

Planting the Seed of the Heart (DRK xvii)

People of the West-East be Blessed (xviii)

People of the North-South be Blessed (xxiii)

The Cardinal Directions are created (xxxi)

The Ancient Role of the Sentry of sentient perceptive consciousness for seeing long distances, etc. (15)

A Geologic formation A fault line vision quest site – a place to look for something that prevents perfection (20)

Trapped Warrior (DRK 34)

Untitled (corn plant, emotional, physical, spiritual, mental body – left, south, west, north, east on right) (44)

Grandfathers in the dreamtime traveling into multiple realities on strings of light (47)

Sweat Lodge (55)

Medicine Circle of Mother Earth home of two leggeds (65)

The Medicine in the Medicine Wheel (DRK 70)

Untitled (Medicine Wheel 1995) (71)

Ideas (74)

Father facing sun rise blessing for the people (77)

The Grandfathers (90)

Before the Gourd Dance the spirit of time came to bless the people she was wearing sixteen medicine wheels (124)

Awakening at an AA Meeting (135)

Darkness Seekers of Wisdom (137)

Awaken from sleep to a state of grace (142)

Sacred Heart (DRK 149)

The Sacred Heart of the Madonna (DRK 150)

The Enlightenment of the Horn of Plenty (153)

Medicine Wheel of the Darkened Heart (DRK 157)

Center of the Heart Become Aware Carry Divine Consciousness find and live states of Grace (163)

The Ordinary and the non-ordinary learning how to play or paint, follow the Red Road (169)

Ideas – Reflections (171)

Madonna over Sound Peace Chamber (189)

Cosmic Medicine Wheel (DRK 191)

The Grandfathers (217)

Breath Matter and Movement (Sacred Offering for Humans) (222)

Summer Rains a basket People of the Earth receive It is full of Beauty and delight is dancing (Angels of Divinity) (225)

Fan Spirit Ceremony (Lord of the Winds) (228)

Wind Keeper – Breath of Life Spirit (230)

Three Feathers dancing to the light of Divine Song (232)

The People in Ceremonial Bliss (238)

Dreaming a New Future Cat People symbol of the visionary (250)

Warrior Healing (DRK 264)

Divine Healing (Eagle wing) (268)

Becoming Medicine

Available in Art Medicine Edition (color) and Standard Edition (b&w)

Creator of Worlds (ix)

Breath, Matter, Movement (xxiii)

Enlightenment (DRK xxv)

Conception (DRK xxvi)

The Hero’s Journey (DRK 7)

Medicine Wheel of the Heart (DRK 12)

A Rainbow Medicine Wheel (DRK 19)

Night Eyes of the Direction Finder (22)

Eagle Dancing Feather Medicine (33)

Lunar Stand-still at Chimney Rock (37)

Creation (DRK 46)

Sun and Dancing Moonlight on the People of Mother Earth (61)

Dove of Peace (72)

Where God and Humans Meet (79)

‘Alam al-mithal (DRK 86)

At Vision Questing with Dandelion (90)

Puuh-Tea Bringer of New Knowledge (96)

Vision of the Blessed Virgin (100)

Shamanic Vision (DRK 109)

Blessings for Drinking from Morning Star w/ JR dictation to DRK (117)

Sacred Offering of the five-fingered (130)

Elders Gathering at Winter Solstice (139)

Drinking Universal Spirit Starts Light (156)

Dove of the Holy Spirit (DRK 160)

Crow Flying Through Cosmos (DRK 166)

The Blowing Breath of Dark Energy (171)

The Underside of a Far Larger Ship (184)

Heart Meditation (DRK 206)

Heart at the Center of Dark Matter (DRK 220)

When the People Went into the Cave of Existence and Returned as Made People Ceremony (228)

The Vase of Love and Light (235)

Blue Feather (DRK 238)

Candle of the World #1 – Ordinary and Non-ordinary Realities (249)

Crystal Chamber Taken up into the Sky (256)

Ordinary, and Non-Ordinary Reality Offering Bowl (258)

Spirits of Chimney Rock (263)
Crow Flying Through Dark Matter (DRK 281)

Of Many Windows in the Dream Time of Mother Earth (283)

Puma Giver of the Visionary Life to the People of Mother Earth (293)

The Hunter Puts Cornmeal in the Deer (297)

Dark Matter Deer Medicine (300)

Planet Earth (Our Mother) Offering to the Sky and All Our Relations Wa-Ma-Chi (311)

Returning Home for Mending (316)

Grandfather God Creates All the Universes (328)

Drinking from the Flowering Light of Mother Nature (344)

Good Bye Dr. Dave (356)

Out of One, Many (364)

Rain Cloud and Oceanus (371)

Earth Child of Spiritual Democracy (380)

Peace Makers of the Rainbow Light (396)

Candle of the World #2 – People of the Sand Place – Stars Who Live in the Heavens – They Travel to Planet Earth (406)

Holy Woman (412)

Mother Earth Dreaming All the Two Leggeds into Beauty (423)

In the Currents of Time (433)

Breath and Space Time (446)

Rainbow Bird and Blue Star Woman (460)

Up to 2000 Songs per Day of Bird Song Chiuu-cho-cchaa-aah-neh (473)

Heart Radiation (DRK 482)

One Sun and Four Moons (486)

The Art of Becoming Medicine.30

Posted on January 16, 2021 by davidrkopacz

This is the final installment in the Art of Becoming Medicine. Joseph Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow) and I have been featuring our artwork from our book, Becoming Medicine: Pathways of Initiation into a Living Spirituality. These are the last two paintings in our book, and fittingly one is by me and one is by Joseph.

“Heart Radiation” is from a series in 2014 I did when we were working on our book, Walking the Medicine Wheel: Healing Trauma & PTSD.

This painting is accompanying the text of the “Entering the Heart Ceremony” that we close the book with. This exercise, or ceremony, takes you through a series of doorways through your physical heart, the heart of humanity, the heart of life, the heart of creation, and finally into the heart of the Creator and the heart of the medicine wheel. At this point, the journey that we started in walking around the medicine wheel in our first book together is complete as we progress through initiations into being a shaman, a mystic, and a visionary and end in the center of the heart of the medicine wheel. We’ll offer this ceremony to you here:

Entering the Heart Ceremony

Find a quiet place where you will be able to sit for a while, either inside or outside. Find the center of the space where you will be sitting. Orient yourself to the North and take one step in that direction, honoring the place of innocence. Turn around, facing South, and step back into the Center of your medicine wheel, honoring the place of carrying. Take a step to the South, honoring the place of placement. Turn around, facing North and step back into the Center, again honoring the place of carrying. Turn to the East, and take one step forward, honoring the place of purity. Turn around, facing West, and step back into Center, honoring the place of carrying. Take one step to the West, honoring the place of awareness. Turn around and step back into Center, once again honoring the heart of carrying.

Now you will walk the medicine wheel. Face the East and take one step forward, intone the sound of the letter A_aaahhhhhhhhh, drawing out the sound as long as you can as you step around the perimeter of the circle to the South and then intone the sound of the letter E_eeehhhhhhhhh. Follow the wheel around to the West and intone the letter I_eeeeeeeee. Follow the wheel to the North and intone the sound of O_ooooooooo. Now step to the Center and intone the sound of the letter U_uuuuuuuuu.

Now you can sit comfortably in the center of the medicine wheel, this is the place of carrying and it is the heart of the medicine wheel. As Joseph reminds us, the microcosm is the macrocosm, thus this is the heart of the medicine wheel, it is your heart, it is the heart of the Earth, it is the heart of the Universe, and it is even the Heart of God—Wah Mah Chi—if you can walk deep enough into the heart.

We will now be going through a series of doorways. First we will enter your personal heart and trace the flow of blood through the medicine wheel of the heart. Venous blood, after giving its oxygen to the body, returns to the heart from the Northwest, the place of connecting spirit and body, entering into the right atrium. Next follow the flow of blood into your right ventricle in the Southwest, the place of the connecting body and emotion. From here the blood is pumped to the North, the place of Spirit and Innocence. Here the blood enters into the lungs and is transformed as the inner venous blood connects with the outer oxygen- rich environment coming into the lungs. The venous blood now turns from dark to bright red arterial blood as it carries more oxygen as the physical matter of the body creates a container in which the movement of the blood connects with the movement of the breath—thus we have Breath, Matter, Movement, thus we have Wah-Mah-Chi entering at this point. Next, follow the blood as it comes back into the heart from the Northeast, the place of connecting spirit and the mind, as it enters into the doorway of the left atrium. From here the blood travels to the Southeast, the place of connecting mind and emotion in the left ventricle. From here the arterial blood travels North, to the spirit again, and then travels throughout the body, revitalizing it and carrying the breath into matter through the movement of the blood.

The atria and ventricles of the heart are empty chambers that can fill with blood and then empty, a continual process of accepting what life has to give, allowing transformation, and then giving goodness away to the rest of the body. These empty chambers might remind you of the word that Abhishiktananda used—guhā: the cave of the heart. Now that you have circulated through your own personal heart, the time has come to enter into the center of your heart, for it is here that you will find the doorway into the deepest chambers of the cave of the heart, which we can also call the secret garden. Move into the center of the heart, this is the still point at the center of all the circulating movement of the burning fire of the blood. In this still center-point, look around for a doorway. It is dark here in the center of the heart, despite the burning of the blood, you can look with your eyes, but you need to see with your inner, non-ordinary vision. You must feel into it with your non-ordinary senses. Locate the doorway—it might be on the wall, or the ceiling, but it could possibly be on the floor as it leads deeper into the heart. Open the door of your heart and step through the threshold into this next larger space of your heart, feeling the opening of stillness and space within your center. You are now in the heart of humanity. Feel your way into this heart of humanity where your heart and the heart of humanity are one.

Once you have acclimated to the heart of humanity, begin looking for the next doorway that opens into an even deeper stillness of heart. Using your non-ordinary senses, locate the door, open it, and step through, entering into the heart of life. Open up into the heart of life where the heart of every living thing is one. Even things that don’t have an obvious heart like plants have their center here. Open up into this greater spaciousness, feeling more space open up within your heart and feeling a vastness that you are entering. Take some time getting comfortable in the heart of life.

Start to look around for the next doorway, looking all around with your non-ordinary vision. Find the door, open it, and step through into the heart of creation—this is the heart of every physical thing, all biological beings and rocks, water, soil, and even space. Feel this space open up within the center of your heart as you step forward into this vast space. Spend some time enjoying being one with creation.

There is still another doorway as you begin looking around again with your non-ordinary vision. In this realm, you get used to letting go of your identity—moving from the personal, to humanity, to life, to creation. Find the door, open it, and step through, entering into the Heart of God,

the Heart of Wah-Mah-Chi—the Heart of the Creator. Here you are One with everything, resting peacefully in the light of the Heart of the Creator. You have taken four steps through four caves of the heart. You have been practicing heart medicine as you have been circling deeper into the heart medicine wheel.

Now it is time to go into the heart of the heart medicine wheel, taking a step into the center of the heart of the heart medicine wheel. By now you should be used to using your non-ordinary vision to find the door, open it, and walk through, as you do so. You now are entering into what Joseph calls Vast Self. This is the place of non-duality. There is not even oneness, because it is before the counting even began. Feel the peace of Vast Self, the place before Creation, the place that watches Creation being created out of itself and yet remaining the same. Be still, be still . . . still . . .

The last painting by Joseph is “One Sun and Four Moons” from 2018. It also features black holes. Joseph has told me, in the past, that the black eyes of his spiritual figures in paintings are black holes.

Although this is the ending of our The Art of Becoming Medicine series, working with Joseph is like always opening new doors. We are already nearing the end of a draft of our next book, Becoming Who You Are: Beautiful Painted Arrow’s Life & Lessons – a book for children of all ages, but particularly those in the transition from childhood into the teenage years. We have a rougher draft of a book for younger children called A Bowl Full of Ideas for Inventive Minds: Learning How to Count to Ten in Tiwa. We have also started the talking and idea stage of a book on Art Medicine, which will focus on Joseph’s visual art and the healing properties of artwork. There is always more to do with Joseph! The ending is just the beginning…

The Art of Becoming Medicine.29

Posted on January 8, 2021 by davidrkopacz

We are nearing the end of this series on the art from our book, Becoming Medicine: Pathways of Initiation into a Living Spirituality. These next two art pieces are by Joseph Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow).

The first is “Rainbow Bird and Blue Star Woman,” a vibrant painting from 2009. Joseph’s Tiwa name, Tsluu-teh-koh-ay means Beautiful Painted Arrow, it can also mean Double Rainbow. At the lower left of the painting is “entrance to Oceanus’ cave.” Joseph often describes a vision he had of going to the bottom of the sea to meet Oceanus, the Lord of the Waters. This vision and Joseph’s relation to the ocean, even though he lives in the high desert, is important to him and he has advocated a ceremony on the 7th of each month for the purification of the oceans.

Rainbow Bird and Blue Star Woman, J. Rael (2009)

The next painting is another favorite of mine, “Up to 2000 Songs per Day of Bird Song Chiuu-Cho-Cha-Aah-Neh.” This section of the book these paintings are found in includes chapter 17 Returning to the Garden of Paradise and 18 Secret Journey to the Secret Garden.

Up to 2000 Songs per Day of Birdson, Chiuu-Cho-Cha-Aah-Neh, J. Rael (2005)

We are separated from the Garden by a paper thin space. It is a parallel reality. You are there without going there. We don’t have to walk there or even have to travel there. You travel with thought, not with physical energy and it pulls you there rather than you having to put effort on your part to get there. (Joseph Rael)

The Art of Becoming Medicine.28

Posted on December 19, 2020 by davidrkopacz

We continue featuring the artwork from Becoming Medicine: Pathways of Initiation into a Living Spirituality. The next two art works are by Joseph Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow).

The first piece is “In the Currents of Time,” from 2005. We see a medicine wheel of the seasons moving sun-wise (clockwise) and two fish, one swimming upstream and one swimming downstream. Although time flows forward in ordinary reality, Joseph says that time can flow backward in non-ordinary reality. Everything is circular – if you don’t get something right the first time, you will circle back around to it and some point. Similarly, the past of the country and the past of the land continues to exert an influence.

The next piece is “Breath Matter Movement and Space Time,” from 2014. Breath Matter Movement is how Joseph translates the word for God in the Tiwa language, Wah-Mah-Chi.

Breath Matter Movement and Space Time, J. Rael (2014)

We only have four more art works to feature and we will bring this Art of Becoming Medicine series to a close.

Joseph and I have been working on our next book together. He wants it to be for 10-12 year olds and it will include Joseph’s life & lessons from when he was growing up and what he thinks kids today should learn. I think kids of all ages (meaning adults, too) would find this interesting because we are always learning and growing. We started out with a working title of Journey of the Holy Beings, then moved to A Bowl Full of Ideas for Inventive Minds (we might still keep that for a younger kids book), currently the working title is Becoming Who You Are: Beautiful Painted Arrow’s Life & Lessons.

We are starting to look for publishers – young adult books are a whole different category from our past work. Let us know if you have ideas for publishers! Maybe we will get the book out within 2021!

The Art of Becoming Medicine.27

Posted on December 12, 2020 by davidrkopacz

These two pieces of art work by Joseph Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow) come from Becoming Medicine: Pathways of Initiation into a Living Spirituality, chapter 15, “Refounding.” The concept of refounding comes from Gerald Arbuckle’s work on how individuals periodically help guide institutions back to their founding values while updating the institution to the current situation.

“By refounding I mean the process of returning to the founding experience of an organization or group in order to rediscover and re-own the vision and driving energy of the pioneers. . . . To refound formation is to re-enter the sacred time of the founding of religious life itself. . . . This model of symbolic death and rebirth, which is made up of three stages – separation, transition/liminality and reaggregation – also has a powerful scriptural foundation,” (Gerald Arbuckle, From Chaos to Mission: Refounding Religious Life Formation, 3–5).

These two art pieces are from the section of the chapter entitled “Refounding Mothers of Democracy.” As I was reading background material for this chapter, I kept coming across the phrase, “founding fathers,” and I wondered why there was not more emphasis on founding and refounding Mothers of Democracy and so focused on several women artists and writers whose work has been to refound principles of democracy – musician Anoushka Shankar, writer Rebecca Solnit, and, then of course, the original founder of spiritual democracy, Mother Earth.

Anoushka Shankar wrote about her album, Land of Gold:

“Everyone is, in some way or another, searching for their own “Land of Gold”: a journey to a place of security, connectedness and tranquillity, which they can call home. This journey also represents the interior quest that we all take to find a sense of inner peace, truth and acceptance – a universal desire that unites humanity…Land of Gold is the culmination of my journey to the interior, channelling my distress at the situation in a constructive way, exploring the stories of the voiceless and dispossessed. I believe that art can make a difference – it connects us to our hearts, bringing us back to what really matters. Music has the power to speak to the soul,” (AnoushkaShankar.com).

Rebecca Solnit stands out to me in any of my thinking about the United States, as I felt reading her work, particularly A Field Guide to Becoming Lost, helped me reimagine the best of the United States and to re-become an American after living abroad in New Zealand. In Hope in the Dark, she wrote,

“To hope is to gamble. It’s to bet on the future, on your desires, on
the possibility that an open heart and uncertainty are better than gloom
and safety…We all have to place a bet, but we have no reassurance of
how it will turn out. Solnit writes that the “future is dark, with a darkness
as much of the womb as of the grave,” (Solnit, Hope in the Dark, 4, 6).

Solnit also writes about activism – not as something you do once to put things right, but more as a kind of recurrent ceremony that you do to try to correct the coarse of history that is always going off track. I have been thinking a lot about medical activism being a foundational aspect of medical professionalism and Solnit’s writing on activism has been a great influence on me.

“I use the term activist to mean a particular kind of engagement—and a specific politic: one that seeks to democratize the world, to share power, to protect difference and complexity, human and otherwise,” (Solnit, Hope in the Dark, 18).

“The question, then, is not so much how to create a world as how to keep alive that moment of creation, how to realize that Coyote world in which creation never ends and people participate in the power of being creators, a world whose hopefulness lies in its unfinishedness, its openness to improvisation and participation,” (Solnit, Hope in the Dark, 108).

Joseph’s first art work in this series is “Holy Woman” from 1995

His next piece is “Mother Earth Dreaming All the Two Leggeds into Beauty,” from 2006.

“Mother Earth Dreaming all of the two Leggeds into Beauty,” Joseph Rael (2006)

Here is what Joseph wrote about our current time and Mother Earth:

“I believe that it is now time for the elders all over the world to talk to their people and instruct them. As elders we have more responsibility . . . a responsibility to talk about the sacredness of the Earth, and the sacredness of the people on the Earth. One of our journeys is to help the people as they walk on Mother Earth. Mother Earth is our land and she belongs to us because we are her children. She belongs to us and we belong to her. So we can take care of her the way she has been taking care of us,” (Joseph Rael, Sound, 256).

The Art of Becoming Medicine.26

Posted on November 29, 2020 by davidrkopacz

The next two art pieces from Becoming Medicine: Pathways of Initiation into a Living Spirituality are by Joseph Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow).

The first is “Rainbow Makers of the (tutah) Rainbow Light,” a colorful burst that reminds us that Beautiful Painted Arrow can also mean Double Rainbow.

“Peace Makers of the (tutah) Rainbow Light, J. Rael (2005)

The next piece is the second in a series, “Candle of the World #2 – People of the Sand Place – Stars Who Live in the Heavens – They Travel to Planet Earth.” This painting reminds us of the Picuris Elders telling young Joseph that there is an equivalency between the stars in the sky and the sand on the ground. There was a movement of peoples from the stars to the sands of Earth and the destiny of the people of Earth is to return to the stars.

The Art of Becoming Medicine.25

Posted on November 14, 2020 by davidrkopacz

The next two art works we are featuring from Becoming Medicine: Pathways of Initiation into a Living Spirituality are by Joseph Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow).

The first work is “Rain Cloud and Oceanus.” Although Joseph grew up in the high desert of southern Colorado and northern New Mexico, he has a special relationship with the oceans. One of his formative visions was of meeting Oceanus, the Lord of the Oceans. At the Sound Peace Chambers around the world, a fire ceremony is done on the 7th of each month for the purification of the oceans.

The next painting stands at the doorway of a very important chapter of the book, which we offer as a free pdf download – Chapter 14 Spiritual Democracy. I found this concept of Spiritual Democracy in Steven Herrmann’s book, Spiritual Democracy: The Wisdom of Early American Visionaries for the Journey Forward, and he had found it in the work of Walt Whitman. This concept resonated with me and for Joseph also. The painting below is an older one from 1997 that was called Earth Child, but Joseph added to the painting, making it “Earth Child of Spiritual Democracy.” I think of this fellow as the heart of our book, a seed to planted in the soil of the soul of the human being that blooms as spiritual democracy.

Earth Child of Spiritual Democracy, J. Rael (1997)

Here is what Joseph has to say about Spiritual Democracy:

“Religious liberty happens to every single human baby child when the human being swallows and drinks the milk from its mother’s breast at feeding time. Thus the American soul is in the making stage.

“What I am saying is we have to start at the foundation of what makes a human being to grow up in that religious liberty. That is the only way it is going to work if we are really going to follow the real way that we become individuals. If we don’t start at the beginning. . . .

“So I am telling you now as I am reading your paper that the idea of religious freedom was already being educated through the sound, and the being and vibration of every single swallow of swallowing-ness every time the baby was drinking its mother’s milk. This is my contribution to the idea of spiritual democracy and religious freedom,” (Joseph Rael, Becoming Medicine, 382).

The Art of Becoming Medicine.24

Posted on November 6, 2020 by davidrkopacz

We continue on with the Art of Becoming Medicine, featuring the artwork from Becoming Medicine: Pathways of Initiation into a Living Spirituality written by Joseph Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow) and myself.

The first painting was a gift given to me when I was leaving New Zealand. There is a story of the cultural Māori hero, Maui, catching the sun and holding it close to the Earth to bring it out of darkness.

Here is the text from the back of the painting:

Dr. Dave’s moment of Satori at Takapuna Beach in the middle of the night. Ranginui the sky father is present giving you his blessings of a safe trip home. Papatuanuku the Earth goddess is praying to Ranginui hoping you will visit Aotearoa’s shores some time again in your future. Maui has caught the sun slowing down its course across the sky so there is enough daylight for life to be reborn again.

The next painting is one I did. It had the feeling of many little circles emanating outward from one large circle. I made a play on words with the motto of the USA, e pluribus unum – out of many, one. I thought of creation as having an emanation and then a re-absorption, like the in-breath and out-breath, diversity arising out of unity and then diversity returning to unity.

With the second painting from The Art of Becoming Medicine.23 (Drinking from the Flowering Light of Mother Nature), we have entered into the final section of the book, Part III Return, Chapter 12, “Returning to the Land.” Out of One, Many is from Chapter 14, “We Are All Pangeans – We Are All Related.”

“When anything is occurring, in any moment in time, it is occurring not only to the individual, but it is also occurring to that geography—to that physical geography. What is happening to me is also happening to this place, this continent, this Planet Earth, this galaxy. I am giving and I am receiving energy back from the Earth, and so are we all. We are receiving it, each according to what he needs, and translating the energies we are receiving according to what we think is happening right now.”

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