Many nations · Many languages · One sacred hoop
Native American Wisdom
Not one religion but many — teachings woven from land, ancestors, community, and the sacred balance of all living things.
What this is
There is no single "Native American religion." There are hundreds of distinct nations across Turtle Island — Lakota, Diné, Haudenosaunee, Hopi, Cherokee, Cree, Anishinaabe, Tlingit, and many more — each with its own languages, ceremonies, stories, and protocols. Generalizations betray that diversity.
Still, threads recur. A relational view of reality: every being is kin. A long time-horizon: the seven generations behind and ahead of this moment. A reverence for place: the land is not background but teacher. A practice of giving thanks: not as ritual politeness, but as the basic posture of being alive.
On Banyan, the Indigenous voices we draw on are public writers and elders who chose to share their teachings in books, lectures, and recorded talks. They speak from their own nations, in their own voices. The work is offered with respect for what is shared, and for what is properly kept within the communities of origin.
Six teachings to sit with
The language of the tradition
The Sacred Hoop
The image, central in many Plains traditions, of life as a great circle in which all beings belong. To live well is to keep the hoop unbroken — between people, between people and the land, between the living and the ancestors.
The Great Mystery
Wakȟáŋ Tȟáŋka in Lakota; many other names in many other languages. The sacred that pervades everything, that we are not separate from, that is too vast to name. Not a god to be argued about. A presence to be in right relation with.
The Seven Generations
From the Haudenosaunee Great Law of Peace. Consider, in any major decision, the seven generations who will follow you. A scale of responsibility most modern decisions never reach.
The Medicine Wheel
A teaching tool found in many forms — four directions, four colors, four stages of life, four kinds of medicine — that orients body, mind, emotion, and spirit in a single living pattern.
All My Relations
Mitákuye Oyás'iŋ in Lakota — "all my relations." The closing of many prayers and the basic insight: trees, rivers, animals, weather, ancestors, the unborn — all are kin. Decisions are made on behalf of the whole web.
Reciprocity with the Land
The land is not a resource. It is a being and a relative. What is taken is returned, in attention, in care, in gratitude. Robin Wall Kimmerer calls this "the grammar of animacy."
The voices
Who speaks in this tradition
Public writers and elders from several nations, who chose to share their teachings widely. Each speaks from their own people and place.
- Black Elk
19th–20th century · Oglala Lakota · Lakota holy man (recorded by John Neihardt)
"Everything the Power of the World does is done in a circle. The sky is round, and I have heard that the earth is round like a ball, and so are all the stars."
- Chief Seattle
19th century · Suquamish and Duwamish · Pacific Northwest leader
"All things are connected. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the children of the earth. Man did not weave the web of life; he is merely a strand in it."
- Vine Deloria Jr.
20th century · Standing Rock Sioux · Scholar, theologian, activist
"When American Indians were dancing on the plains, the Indians were trying to teach us how to live with the land."
- Robin Wall Kimmerer
Contemporary · Citizen Potawatomi · Botanist, writer (Braiding Sweetgrass)
"In some Native languages the term for plants translates to "those who take care of us.""
- Joseph Bruchac
Contemporary · Abenaki · Storyteller, poet, educator
"The story is alive. It is breathing. And as long as it is told, it will keep on living."
How a session works
Bring the question. Hear it answered.
You bring the question
Plain words. The Indigenous voices will often gently widen the frame — to land, to ancestors, to the generations ahead.
The voices answer
Each from within their own nation and tradition. Stories more often than commandments. Specifics about place, season, relation.
A teaching is named
One short paragraph at the end. Often the offering is gratitude — a thing to thank, a relation to mend, an attention to give.
Take it outside
Much of what these voices teach lands only when feet are on ground. Walk somewhere outside today, slowly, and let the answer settle.
Questions people bring
The kind of question this is for
- "How do I make a decision that respects more than just my own lifetime?"
- "I have lost my sense of belonging to a place. How do I find it again?"
- "I am estranged from someone in my family. What is the teaching about repair?"
- "I am grieving and the modern world doesn't know what to do with grief. What do I do?"
Frequently asked
Questions about Native American Wisdom
- Is there a single Native American religion?
- No. There are hundreds of distinct nations on Turtle Island, each with its own languages, ceremonies, and cosmologies. Lakota, Diné, Hopi, Haudenosaunee, Cherokee, and many others are profoundly different from each other. Speaking of one "Native American religion" flattens that reality.
- Why don't you teach ceremonies or specific rituals?
- Many ceremonies are properly held within their communities of origin — initiated, protected, not for outsiders to imitate. The voices on Banyan share what they themselves chose to share publicly. Direct ceremonial knowledge belongs in the hands of the elders and teachers of each nation.
- Is it appropriate for non-Native people to bring questions here?
- Yes — to listen, to learn, and to be changed. What is not appropriate is to take ceremony, regalia, or identity. Listening with respect is the work this page invites.
- What does "All My Relations" mean?
- Mitákuye Oyás'iŋ in Lakota; similar phrases exist in many other languages. The recognition that every being — human and more-than-human, living and ancestral — is kin, and that one's actions are taken on behalf of the whole web.
- Is the conversation private?
- Yes. What you bring and what the voices answer is yours. You can erase any session.
"We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children."
— Often attributed to Indigenous teachings
Related traditions