HeART of Healing

www.firetender.org www.thestoryofthis.net
www.artforhealers.com www.mauihealingartist.com

a firetender?

(Most images you see on this website can be found in larger format in the Galleries or Slide Shows. If you'd like one or more for your own, e-mail me.)

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thestoryofthis...

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a firetender's blog

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Wopila Cepa!
(in Lakota; A Big Fat Thank You!)
for being part of the journey.
I'm glad you're here!

My name is Russ Reina, and I refer to myself as "a firetender."
I really hope this "firetender" thing catches on. Here's my Vision:

It's a hot, midday on a crowded Boulevard teeming with pedestrians. A distressed cry goes out: "firetender!" From each of the four directions comes a person to the stricken one, each saying, "How can I help?"

This web site is my way of sharing my experience in the healing arts. It began when I was 17, in 1969, working as an Orderly in a nursing home. "firetender" is my way of reminding me of who I wish to be; my stance to the world. The intent to be a vehicle through which healing energy flows began there. This is where it
got me!

So there's no confusion, I'm a Brooklyn born Italian and have no Native American blood -- though my spiritual Unci (Grandmother) has called me a WOPaho!

This whole firetender thing is based on my experiences living and working with her traditional Oglala medicine family on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota at various times during the 1990's: Chips (a truncated geneology is here.) I tended fire for their sacred ceremonies.

(Quoting John Lame Deer, from the book "Lame Deer - Seeker of Visons" :
"One of our greatest Souix holy men was old Chips. Without him, maybe our religion would have died out. During the darkest years he kept his vision alive, worked it for the good of the people. He was a real wicaasa wakan. If he hadn't taught us, there would be no be medicine men left among us now. He did it almost all by himself. Well he passed the power on to his son, Ellis Chips, and he is a good man. But the real power of the old holy man went to his grandson Godfrey.")

I was graced with a glimpse into indigenous ways of healing, passed down from Elder to Younger over perhaps hundreds of generations. Through these times, I learned some of the ways that connection plays a role in transformation of illness into health. Within it, I had an elemental experience of preparing sacred space so that others may live. The lessons learned there were ancient concepts with very real applications in today's world!

The family I worked with modeled the art of building "One Mind, One Heart" for everyone involved in the healing process. Healing was never presented out of the context of community. It was a potent revelation of how far away we have travelled from the ways healing was practiced for millennia before it got "Westernized".

This, by the way, is essentially no different than what I'm learning about the ways of Hawaii's Kahuna (expert class, healers included). But even more indicative was the emphasis that (paraphrasing Godfrey Chipps, the Yuwipi Man): it's not about you being healed, it's about you deciding to live. Through them, I learned that to be a healer is to be a vehicle, NOT a Director with a Capital "D", and the will of the person seeking healing is paramount to the end result!

For a better understanding of my relationship with my teachers, please read my article A firetender's Lesson (Part I). You can easily get to the full series from there. I respect and credit my influences, and DO NOT in any way present myself as an authority in ANY indigenous people's medicine. I only have my own to offer.

Working with fire is all about working with both the seen and the unseen. It's working with a primal force that moves freely, affecting everything it touches. Most important, it's all about the moment. And within the context of sacred ceremony, each moment is focused on strengthening intent.

In sacred ceremonies, the firetender is that chips chipps oglala medicine

person who prepares a sacred, safe and nurturing space for forces of guidance and healing to visit. That's what this site's about; that's what I've prepared for all of us.

I am a firetender. I'm not THE, or MR. Firetender. When I'm tending fire for an Inipi (commonly, but inaccurately described as "sweat lodge") and someone calls out "firetender!" my attention immediately moves to the moment and seeks the place that I can contribute. I know I'm being called upon to do Something, but my purpose as firetender means that my focus becomes, "Where do I fit in, as only I can, in service to healing?"

It's a "What will you have me do?" sort of thing.

This site is meant to reach firetenders like myself -- of whom there are many! No, there's not a course, diploma, secret handshake or these days that secret little tatoo. You know who you are. Maybe you'll find a part of yourself here.

So, let us who express ourselves as vehicles through which healing energy flows, no matter how that manifests, come together in community so we can learn from each other!

Mitakuye Oyasin!
Mahalo.

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