Unba//anced

so, i've been reading up on the trickster. i've always been interested in this concept, but it's been making way more sense to me lately. if you don't know, the trickster in native american beliefs is a deity or sacred entity who play pranks and disobeys norms in order to get people to question their beliefs and the things about themselves they normally don't want to confront:

The Heyoka (from the Lakota) symbolize and portray many aspects of the sacred, the Wakan, in a rather unique way. Their satire presents important questions by fooling around. They ask difficult questions, and say things others are too afraid to say. By reading between the lines, the audience is able to think about things not usually thought about, or to look at things in a different way.

Principally, the Heyoka functions both as a mirror and a teacher, using extreme behaviors to mirror others, thereby forcing them to examine their own doubts, fears, hatreds, and weaknesses. Heyokas also have the power to heal emotional pain; such power comes from the experience of shame--they sing of shameful events in their lives, beg for food, and live as clowns. They provoke laughter in distressing situations of despair and provoke fear and chaos when people feel complacent and overly secure, to keep them from taking themselves too seriously or believing they are more powerful than they are.

In addition, sacred clowns also serve an important role in shaping tribal codes. Heyokas don’t seem to care about taboos, rules, regulations, social norms, or boundaries. Paradoxically, however, it is by violating these norms and taboos that they help to define the accepted boundaries, rules, and societal guidelines for ethical and moral behavior. This is because they are the only ones who can ask "Why?" about sensitive topics and employ satire to question the specialists and carriers of sacred knowledge or those in positions of power and authority. In doing so, they demonstrate concretely the theories of balance and imbalance. Their role is to penetrate deception, turn over rocks, and create a deeper awareness. [w1]

This speaks to me more than ever. If you spend enough time with me, you know there's two things i will do without provocation...(1)i will question something if it doesn't make sense to me, if it doesn't make sense in the bigger scheme, and i won't back down until i get an answer i'm satisfied with or the person changes their mind. and i don't care what kind of power role/trip you've got going, because that's so temporal and doesn't matter, really. (2)i tend to burst into laughter over things most people wouldn't laugh at - usually something that strikes me as profound or something i understand on a deeper level and the only way to convey that is by laughter (for me). Check this out:

Many native traditions held clowns and tricksters as essential to any contact with the sacred. People could not pray until they had laughed, because laughter opens and frees from rigid preconception. Humans had to have tricksters within the most sacred ceremonies for fear that they forget the sacred comes through upset, reversal, surprise. The trickster in most native traditions is essential to creation, to birth. [w2]

get it? you have to laugh to be completely open. Now, I'm not saying i'm a trickster, but i dig the whole idea of it and i've met a person or two that fit that description for me and push me into my discomfort zone (which is good b/c i've been too comfortable for too long), and i hope i can do the same for others in my life who i care about and could use a good laugh and shove.

current mood: laughing
current noise: "waterfall" by jimi hendrix