Sacred Circle/ Medicine Wheel/ 4 Shields

Spirit, here I am
All with one, one with all
Circle returning
--Onandagan chant

The Earth, the Water, the Fire, the Air

Return, return, return, return
--Chant

Introduction

Preparation for the Vision Quest takes place on many levels. The material
presented here is intended to add richness and depth to your understanding,
supplementing information found in the handbook. While it’s just a
beginning, we hope that it will stir you to begin dreaming, imagining,
connecting the natural world to yourself and yourself to the natural world.
Remember that as you study the Sacred Circle, you are also studying
yourself and your own sacred mysteries. As you read through these pages,
ask yourself: Where would you place yourself on the Wheel? Which Direction
or Shield seems to be your natural home, and which seems the least
accessible? Where would you place yourself at this time? Which Powers
speak to you? Which Shields are you wearing at this moment? Where are
you stuck on the Wheel? When you meet with your guides, they will be
pleased to help you to further understand these teachings and their
application to the quest.

The Circle of Self

Let us begin with the Circle, an ancient symbol of wholeness, unity,

completeness, and continuation, having no beginning and no end. This
Circle goes by many different names, including Mandala, Circle of Self,
Medicine Wheel and Universe Wheel, and appears in widely diverse cultures.
The Circle teaches us of the unity and equality of all things within Creation.
As expressed by the fifth century B.C. Greek philosopher Empedocles, “God
is a Circle whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is
nowhere.”

"The Circle is our Way of Touching, and of experiencing Harmony with every
other thing around us, " writes Hyemeyosts Storm, a Native American who
first brought these teachings to Rites of Passage.

All the things of the Universe Wheel have spirit and life,
including the rivers, rocks, earth, sky, plants and animals. But it
is only man, of all the beings on the Wheel, who is a determiner.
 Our determining spirit can be made whole only through the
learning of our harmony with all our brothers and sisters, and
with all the other spirits of the Universe. To do this we must
learn to seek and to perceive. We must do this to find our place
within the Medicine Wheel....
The Vision Quest, or perceiving quest, is the way we must
begin this search. We must all follow our Vision Quest to
discover ourselves, to learn how we perceive of ourselves, and to
find our relationship with the world around us.

The Four Directions

The Circle can be divided into four quadrants, in which representation—as a

cross within a circle--it is found within many cultures. The four directions of
the compass can serve as a good starting point for understanding the Wheel.
Each direction carries qualities of heart and mind that are rooted in the
natural world, and which can be expressed through such aspects as color,
season, and animal totems (see the section below on Four Shields for
mapping more of these aspects). The essence of each cardinal direction can
be described in a few keywords:

South—Innocence and trust

West—Looking within, introspection
North—Give-away, adulthood, wisdom
East—Vision, inspiration, spirit

“Everything is my mirror,” states the old Vision Quest teaching. The Powers
of the Four Directions, which we find in stones and sky, wind and sun, are
also within each of us. The Direction of North, for example, becomes the
North of me, reflecting those qualities within myself that can be associated
with this Direction: adulthood, rationality, work, giving for the sake of the
community.

Steven Foster and Meredith Little wrote the following for Rites of Passage,
focusing on the fundamental quality or essence of each direction. We will
move around the Wheel sunwise (clockwise), following the natural movement
of the sun through the day, beginning in the South.

South (color: Red or Green)

South is the place of summer. Remember your childhood, the green,

growing days, when you were filled with the warm, red sap building your
bones, determining your gifts and your path? South is the place of
innocence and trust. The truth is that we are always children, and the world
we have been born into is filled with danger and unknowing. We trust
ourselves and continue, one step at a time, touching with our hearts.

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 In the South the quality of our heart is tried. We grow into our passions
and emotions. We learn by touching and being touched. Through the
expression of our feelings and emotions we begin to acquire the innate
wisdom of our ancestors.
Like the little mouse we poke our noses among the roots of things and
learn what is and is not. One day we hear a roaring in our ears. We cannot
be content until we find out what is causing the roaring. We go to
investigate. When we stand trembling at the edge of the Sacred River our
Vision Quest begins.

West (color: Black)

The sun sets in the West. Mother Earth veils her face. Radiance fades
from the horizon and we begin to steer by inner light. The moon arises and
spreads our dreams with quicksilver. The illumination of the day is
transformed into the reflected illumination of night. Look into an obsidian
mirror. The darkness drinks in the light, yet an image is seen "as in a glass
darkly."
The West is woman, mother and Grandmother Earth. The owl, the
bear, and the rattlesnake live here. All living beings must come to the West,
to the womb, to the placenta of change, to wait in the stillness of the eye of
the hurricane for manna, the sign, the knowing--for the thing in the seed to
break its cover of decay.
The West is the bitter-sweet of fall. The West is the maturing, the
harvest, the decaying. In the West we learn to introspect, to look within, with
insight to fact the monsters of our little sleeps, our little deaths. The West is
our inwardness, our half-yearning to fall away from the flesh toward the gulf
of spirit and eternity.
There is a light that shines in the darkness, a tiny spring of cool water
hidden in the desert. This is the secret mystery of the West.

North (color: White)

It is winter. All things are enveloped in snow. The wind blows cold,
piling up the snow in drifts. Here in the North there is a dance all things
must learn. It is the dance of the hammer of winter. Dancing in rhythm to
the dance hammer we learn the steps of survival. Here we learn how to give
so our people may live.
What we give is flesh, sinew, bone, brain, will, love and wisdom. We
nourish others, by our lives and by our deaths. Whatever insights we attain,
whatever gifts we bear, we shape into a living force of mind and purpose.
Whatever visions we see on the sacred mountains of our Vision Quest are not
for self alone, but for all the people.
North is the place of wisdom, rational thought and natural sense. The
fruits of the mind grow here: science, philosophy, metaphysics, language,
mathematics. The soil is nourished by discipline. The crop is grown by

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knowledge of natural law. North is a shield with white feathers on which are
painted symbols of the hunter, the planter and the builder.
North is the adult in all of us. The buffalo and the bighorn sheep live
here. They gave themselves with courage and abandon to the flint arrow,
dying and giving away so that the people might live.

East (color: Gold)

High in the East the golden eagle sheds a feather on the winds of
dawn. Something that was rigid and frozen in the seed breaks apart. It is
the root. As the sun feather drifts across the sky, the root takes hold. The
name of the root is spring.
The spirit tugs at substance, saying "Come with me. Lift free from the
black, frozen earth." We are drawn toward the blue distance of the sky,
where the eagle flies high and sees far, where we can see into the obscured
future. Aloft on the wings of morning, we are illumined, inspired.
The East is the spark, the flame, lightning. It is the fire of creativity in
all of us. It is the artist, the poet, the visionary. In the East a little girl is
born, a little girl with golden hair, a mirror image of the dark woman of the
West. Her name is Muse. The song she sings goes: "Everything that dies is
reborn."

The Four Shields

If we follow the Four Directions into the specific realm of the human being,
we arrive at the Four Shields. A shield serves dual purposes: to defend the
bearer from harm, and to express, through its design and themes, the
individual who stands behind it—the unique “medicine” of this person. The
Four Shields represent the four archetypal components of a human being:
Body, Soul, Mind and Spirit. The Shields can serve as a map of human
development, reflected in the turning seasons: Childhood (the
South/Summer shield) gives way to Adolescence (West/Fall), which yields to
Adulthood (North/Winter), which gives birth to Elderhood (East/Spring). They
can work as a diagnostic tool: which of your Shields is overdeveloped, and
which underdeveloped? Are you stuck in one Shield, to the impoverishment
of others? We need access to all four Shields in order to discover and claim
our wholeness within the Circle of Self.

The Shields allow inner being to be represented as mask or persona. Steven

Foster and Meredith Little write:

The four seasons, faces, personas, shields of human self-thus*

correspond to and consist of the four seasons, faces, personas—
shields of the earth. In humans, the four faces are: summer (the
emotional, instinctive, physical, reactive body-child), fall (the

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 inward, self-conscious, psychological soul of transition), winter
(the rational, responsible, controlled, interdependent mind of
maturity) and spring (the regenerating, healing, creative spirit of
that which is born from death). Body, psyche, mind, and spirit.
The same four faces are worn by all living forms of self-thus*:
the physical, the psychological, the rational, and the spiritual.

From The Four Shields: The Initiatory Seasons of Human

Nature.

(*Note: the term “self-thus” refers to essential nature, existing in/as each
thing)

The following descriptions present images, concepts and metaphors for each
Shield, taking the universal archetypes further into the realm of the human.
You’ll notice that these descriptions contain aspects of the shadow/negative
(stuck) capacity for each direction: The innocence of the Child of the South
includes a capacity for cruelty. The introspection of the Adolescent of the
West includes the capacity for extreme self-absorption and depression. The
rationality of the Adult of the North includes the capacity for hyper-
rationalism or workaholism. The illumination of the Elder of the East includes
the capacity for spacey, ungrounded “mysticism.”

South/Summer Shield

Trust in our physical connection with the world around us, and the direct
experience of it, are necessary for wholeness. This is the place of emotion.
If we grow up in a family where it is unsafe to feel or show emotions, we start
to shut them down or mistrust them. If we are to become whole, we will
have to learn about them later. The South/Summer Shield is about self-
power, life force, abundance, and innate growth, reflecting the qualities of
Summer. “I want what I want,” says the child. The body’s needs demand
immediate gratification. It’s the place of erotic love, of hunger, of fear and
aggression. The playground bully lives here, and the scared child. Violence
and war are possible expressions of this Shield. The paradox is that, if we
are to become whole, the innate innocence and trust of the child must
survive in a world that contains violence. There are no feelings of guilt here.
Following our curiosity like the mouse, we learn by “poking our nose in.”

Stage Childhood
Season Summer
Animal Mouse
Color Red (for blood, emotion), or Green (for growth in summer)
Element Water
4 Aspects Body, Fear, Ego, Eros
Activity Play

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Love Erotic
Identity Ego, the “I”
Indicators Automatic reaction
Survival instinct
Fear, fight or flight reaction
Flow of emotions
Athletic prowess
Instant gratification
Sensuality
Body focus
Inner image Little boy (for a man), little girl (for a woman); child of
same gender
Function Sensation
Archetype The Child; the Lover
Stuck in South Caught in the whirl of emotions; helpless; immature;
egotistical

West/Fall Shield

The innocence of South/Summer must be lost if we are to grow up. Here we

enter the labyrinth of dark interiority, to discover ourselves and our relations
to others. The “fall from childhood” is mirrored by the season of Fall.
Depression—as grief, as memory, as entering our depths—is necessary for
growth. The father/mother, the opposite of our own gender, is the first
teacher of how we feel about ourselves. This Shield holds the power to look
within, to find oneself, resulting in the ability to accept and love oneself.
Here we learn to steer by our inner light, intuition or inner feeling. This is the
shield we must pass through to enter into adulthood. Here we ask for a
vision for our life, praying for the strength to make it through the long dark
night. Despite the darkness, this is where the personal treasure, the
priceless gift, lies. This is also where inner strength and tenacity come from.

Stage Adolescence
Season Fall
Animal Rattlesnake, Bear, Owl
Color Black
Element Earth
4 Aspects Death, Memory, Soul, Dream
Activity Rest
Love Of self
Identity Soul, psyche, “I am”
Indicators Becoming aware of, and taking in, emotions and
sensations; becoming aware of oneself and others; relating
to others; passing on myths and values; introspection;
presence of unconscious urges; “poor me” / victim
attitude.

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Inner image Woman (for a man), man (for a woman); parent of opposite
gender
Function Feeling
Archetype Shadow (unaccepted parts of ourselves)
Stuck in West Victim mentality; anxiety; chronic depression; addictions

North/Winter Shield

We express ourselves by bringing our abilities—the gifts we found in the

West/Fall Shield—into the North/Winter. Here we bring them forth. Having
gone through the rite of passage, we bring forth the vision that was obtained
for all to see, for the benefit of the people. This is the place of the initiated
ones, those adults that recognize their responsibility in loving and nourishing
the whole community. Community life is rooted in interdependence, and
cannot be sustained when individuals carry the illusion of separation from
the whole.

Stage Adulthood
Season Winter
Animal Buffalo, bighorn sheep, tule elk
Color White
Element Air
4 Aspects Work, Discipline, Mind, Community
Activity Work
Love Of others
Identity Mind, “We are”
Indicators Self-discipline, self-control, ability to take
responsibility; ability to do, to act, to plan, to
prepare, to get ready; mind power, ability to
organize rational thought; delay of gratification;
personal value system; diplomacy, peacemaking.
Inner image Man (for a man), Woman (for a woman); parent of
same gender
Function Thinking
Archetype King; Queen; Emperor
Stuck in North Workaholic, lack of emotions, difficulty being playful,
aloofness, hyper-rational, brilliant mind but self-
centered, lacking soul or psychological depth

East/Spring Shield

We have learned about ourselves, and about life, by direct experience of

each of the Shields. Now we are ready to pass on that information, to share
the wisdom we have found. We are able to step back, to step outside of
ourselves and see the bigger picture, to look with “eagle eyes.” As a result,
we begin to think in bigger, more visionary ways, considering the impact of

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actions not only on ourselves and our immediate
family/community/country/nation, but also on a global level and on future
generations.

Stage Elderhood, infancy

Season Spring
Animal Eagle, hawk
Color Gold
Element Fire
4 Aspects Birth, Inspiration, Spirit, Vision
Activity Prayer
Love Of Spirit, or God
Identity Spirit, “Thou art”
Indicators Illumination, mystical experience, spirituality,
connection with things, transformation, creativity,
rebirth
Inner image Little boy (for a woman), little girl (for a man)
Function Intuition
Archetype Spirit; the Muse; Angels
Stuck in East Airy fairy, wanting to stay in the light, no shadow,
magical thinking, “flying boy/girl” (puer aeternus)

Two further directions: Above and Below

We are surrounded by six directions: the four cardinal points, the Sky
above, and the Earth below. The Skyward direction touches the heavens, the
realm of Spirit, spirit guides and sacred ancestors. The Earthward direction
touches the the ground, the source of all life (everything is made from the
body of the Mother Earth), the bones of our ancestors, and our own bodies.
The sacred center of our Medicine Wheel is always here, just where we are
standing/sitting/walking. We are like a gyroscope, surrounded by a living
sphere represented by the six directions.

When you claim your circle, you symbolically take

your place at the center of the total universe, at the
center of your purpose. You acknowledge the
ancient truth: “I am what I perceive, and I am what
perceives me.”
--Steven Foster and Meredith Little