With thanks to the writer Albert Camus for the terrific title, we need to do a bit of Fall house cleaning, as time, groups and positive events come and pass so quickly here. As stated, October’s crisp, colorful days, cool nights, and gold, clean, maple-flavored air, make it a delicious time to come out and do some deep contemplation. We ran a great Way of the Contrary Ceremonial Purification Retreat Weekend and completed a modified version of our Noble Silence Meditation Retreat (NSMR) Weekend, the next Spring 2027 NSMR happening early June 2027. We’ll be building out the 2027 schedule, with Ceremony planned for April 3rd, May 15th, and June 12th, 2027, along with our Spring Hanblecha/Vision Quest Weekend.

Late Spring, Tunkashila willing, we’ll be departing for another trip to southeast Montana, hoping to engage with our favorite hostile and guide Battlefield Rose, on another tour, this visit focused on the Battle of the Rosebud, occurring days before the Battle of the Little Big Horn aka Greasy grass, on Saturday, June 17th, 1876. The band of Sicangu Lakota’s, the Burnt Thighs or Brulé People, My teacher Phil’s tribe, played a more prominent role in that fight.

All that said, we’ve threatened to wrap it up with Rose properly, but two great retreats occurred since we started closing that circle. And speaking of threats, we even made good on turning our whole western US experience and LIBI fascination into an actual November Workshop - WWSBD - What Would Sitting Bull Do? For now, let’s revisit our October Ceremony weekend, a group made up of old and new THH patrons, with feedback from the board of our Sunday Morning Song Class. As a group, we turned around some of our personal and collective pain to form a new truth. Even though there was some lingering sadness, a new opening appeared, with space around some of our difficult feelings. There was a sense of equanimity with Don’t Know Mind, a realization that life flows and unfolds (hopefully) like a river, revealing itself moment by moment. Do we have to know and be assured of the end!? No, we don’t. We just abide in the Tipi of the present moment, dwelling more deeply in the Now, rather than the Know. There was a shared compassion, easy connections, new paths presented themselves, and an energized community found fresh clarity. Pretty cool. Here’s our new friend Adrien to illuminate his first experience of Ceremony & visit to The Higher Haven:

“I’m grateful for all the years that Paul put into the hours that we spent together. Reflecting on Ceremony, I come away with a sense that although I didn’t arrive with a big agenda - or a specific idea about the work that I have to do in order to become who I’de like to be - the Ceremony reminded and reembodied me of the gifts that I hold as I continue to move through the world. Some of those gifts are developing ease with my limitations, which was the subject of so much of our Ceremony. The ubiquity of the central prayer allowed me to remain in, or to regain alignment, with the way things are. That it would be a blessing to live more fully into that reality. Part of how that idea was transmitted was through the genuine conversation and sincere feelings so beautifully expressed by the Ceremony participants. Part of it was the gorgeous, easy energy that Paul invited us into, amplifying our ability to feel and be ourselves. And it appears as if Paul cannot do otherwise. I know how hard Paul worked to become that, and it’s a quality that I appreciate and cherish. May it be enough.”

It’s certainly enough right here, right now, and I thank Adiren sincerely, as well as our other October attendees. The next Way of The Contrary Weekend, as stated, is November 21st, then Saturday, December 5th, then our beloved Winter Break, and then we’ll begin again and again Saturday, April 3rd, 2027. Look for our final ode to Battlefield Rose, and an in-depth, spiritual study of Sitting Bull in some of our upcoming posts. Aho Matakuye O’yasin (All My Relations)!