My path to live a spiritual life greatly influenced by the stories of Tom Brown Jr.

‘’The earth can no longer be healed on a physical level. Only a spiritual healing can change the course of the probable futures of mankind...’’ – Tom Brown, Jr., The quest

The meaning of religion to me as a child
Raised as a Christian not understanding its believe
I’ve been raised as a Christian. As a baby I’ve been baptized, we went to church on Sunday’s and for multiple occasions we prayed to God. As a child I’ve been told a lot of biblical stories over and over again. However, at that time I didn’t really understand what was the underlying message of the stories. It was also hard for me to understand as a child why you had to go to a place called church in order to be able to exercise faith and why faith meant there were lots of rules you had to comply to. To me then it felt as though you had to live according to the rules which had been drawn up, in order to be entitled to believe.

As a child already a believe in animism
Not aware at a child’s age, looking back now, I see that as a child I already believed in animism.

What is Animism? Animism is the belief that all things have a spirit or soul, including animals, plants, rivers, mountains, stars, the moon, and the sun. Each being is considered a spirit that can offer help or harm to humans. As such, spirits must either be worshiped or appeased. Animists offer sacrifices, prayers, dances, or other forms of devotions to these spirits in hopes of blessing upon areas of life (crops, health, fertility, etc.) or for protection from harm.

Some small examples to illustrate this. As a child every year I had to fight my tears when my father, after the Christmas days, sawed the pine tree into pieces and put it in the container. To me it felt as though a living and feeling creature was being killed. Another example is that, when for instance during the holidays we used to walk across the mountains in France and where we were surrounded by pure nature, it felt to me that everything is alive and everything is connected. At that age I was not able to give words to the feelings I felt when walking through nature, but magical it was!
At the age of 8 I had the vivid thought of living with a tribe in the rainforests of South America. Being in nature, away from all materialism was a dream I then already had in mind.

‘’…Do you understand that you cannot drink the waters that you do not honor, each time no matter how much your thirst burns? If you do not honor and cherish the waters, than how can you ever expect others to? How can you hope to safe something you take for granted, something you do not honor and cherish, and something you do not really know? How could you ever hope to reach others when you yourself do not set the example, the same example that your spiritual grandfather has set for you?’’ – Tom Brown, Jr., The Journey (p. 213)

Listening to my inner voice led me back to nature
At the age of 16 I went to Surinam with my family. This trip was really magical to me: the sounds you hear when walking through a centuries old forest, the smells and vibrations, the touch of the air, plants and soil on your skin and the feeling of wholeness.
Being in puberty, insecure and easily influenced, this part of me who wanted to be in touch with nature, was pushed far away in the back of my mind, to instead spent a lot of time on my appearance and do as what society is expecting from me. So I went to study social sciences. In my final year I had become so unhappy that I could no longer listen to what other people thought was good for me, but instead had to listen to my own inner voice. My inner voice was screaming ‘nature’. I could no longer ignore and supress this urge that I wanted to be able to work with nature, that I finally took the leap and chose a study that made me happy, regardless of what other people had to say about it.
This study enabled me to get back in touch with nature again and with my own being as well! Very slowly and step by step I started to transform and was once again able to walk my own walk on this planet.

How I integrated Animism into my life
One day someone told me about a story that had been written by Tom Brown Jr. I could not let this story go and went on buying some of his books. I could write a whole book now about the journey that followed for me after reading about the stories of Tom Brown Jr. But that is something for another article to write about 😊
In very short reading the books of Tom Brown Jr. led to a big shift in my life and made me want to explore myself and my spirituality even more.

‘’…Grandfather continued, ‘that creation will provide for you. I have shown to you that possessions are not important, just the things of the spirit. Jesus then taught the same things when he told his people not to be concerned with what they will eat, or how they will clothe themselves. He said that the Creator will provide all of these things for us. Jesus went on to teach that the most important things in life were not of the flesh, for the true riches in life can only be found in our hearts and spirits.’’ – Tom Brown, Jr., The quest (p. 106)

I can really recommend you to watch the documentary ‘The Great Dance’. A story of three San (Bushman) hunters at their most extreme limits of endurance, culminating in "the Chasing Hunt" - a ritual. Marvel at the incredible wealth of knowledge of the San people about the world around them:

http://www.cultureunplugged.com/documentary/watch-online/filmedia/play/2419/The-Great-Dance