I was just thinking about an indian sweat lodge I went to in Passedena, before I moved back from LA. This might help If you're not familiar with what one is. And this takes you to the woman's site who organized our lodge.)It was an eye-opening experience. It was a sensory deprivation, mixed with intense heat, combined with very little room to move. I really wasn't sure if I could make it through the entire ritual. I had a flashing glimpse of a future where our dead bodies are found all piled up inside the tent with the whole thing being written off as some Jonestown suicide pact.
It's funny, right before we arrived at the lodge, my friend Sean was commenting on how annoying it is that I tend to make things all about me. (He's right, and I'm trying to break that pattern.) Okay, now back to me. At one point, I felt like I just couldn't take it anymore and I would have to exit the lodge. Doing this would have disrupted the spiritual ritual of the other 12-15 people in there, and would have certainly drawn attention away from the journey, and on to me. That thought helped me stay put while I endured the, what must have been, triple-digit temperature.
The shaman who led the quest said she had the energy to receive an indian spirit name for only one of us inside the lodge. I was the one who would be receiving the honor. So, at one point, she asks me "Are you ready to accept your spirit name?" "Yes," I said. Then, in a solemn voice she tells me the spirits have named me Dream Beaver."Excuse me, Dream What?"
The solemn voice repeats, "Dream Beaver."
So there you have it. I'm a Dream Beaver, which I was told, means I'm a builder of dreams. But beavers also make dams to block stuff out too, don't they?
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