Connectedness
“We never saw ourselves as separate from anything living. The old people used to tell us that we belonged to everything that was around us and everything that was around us belonged to us. We were all connected through life, living in total equality with every living thing. My old people used to say, “That tree, he no different from you. You get cut, you bleed. He get cut, he bleed.” We were taught to understand that he has feelings, just like us humans, and you have to consider the feelings and the rights of the tree and everything in nature. You’re only allowed to take so much of a tree when making a windbreak, no more. This is one of the ways we learned responsibility.”
Uncle Bob
Love and Responsibility
“The way of my people is to raise every child with the continual teachings of connectedness, responsibility, and love. That is the foundation of our education from the time we were born. The sense of belonging is your birthright, reinforced in every child and throughout life by the culture and family. It is so much a part of you that you trust you are always looked after.
I went into education with a deep appreciation for the vital importance of our cultural knowledge and spiritual understanding of the responsibilities we have as humans to live with integrity, compassion, reverence, humility, morality, and respect, in order to fit into the oneness of life. I was always taught that knowledge is responsibility, and that whilst no one can own knowledge, it’s the responsibility of elders to be keepers of knowledge, judiciously passing it down for the benefit of all who come after us. It’s clear today that it is my responsibility to share what was handed down to me from my old people as wisdom ways and spiritual teachings of living well in a world that seems to have forgotten how to live with love. It’s the birthright of all humanity to know the sacredness of all creation starting with the inner knowing of the sacredness within self.“
Uncle Bob
Kanyini Principles
Learn about the foundational principles of Kanyini that guide our relationship to life and all living things.
Tjukurrpa
Philosophy, Law and Religion. Creation and the right way to live.
Kurunpa
Love, Spirit or Soul
Walytja
Family and Connection with Life
Ngura
Land, Home, and Belonging
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