Sacred stories are ultimately sacred dreams you have carried within you across lifetimes; dreams that come from deep within your soul that have guided you in the darkest nights like flickering candles in the dark. Sacred stories emerge from the depths of the soul but need nurturing to fully bloom in our lives. They stand patiently behind the veil, waiting for us to cultivate them, nurture them, and manifest them into this dimension. These stories are sacred precisely because they echo our ancestors’ stories, passed on and inherited through our bloodlines and immemorial lineages, from generation to generation.

In fact, our sacred stories and dreams mirror the vibrant lives of our ancestors when the Ancestral Family Tree was grounded in rich, fertile soil. This is why we cannot dream alone or fulfill our dreams in isolation. When we understand that our ancestors worked together to build, rise, and heal, we realize we must also unite in the present and relearn how to dream together. When we stand united, we can better organize, innovate with new solutions, and reimagine our futures for collective and intergenerational healing. When people come together to write new stories and to dream new dreams, the community changes for the better. Yoko Ono realized this fundamental truth when she stated: “A dream you dream alone is only a dream. A dream you dream together is reality.” 

Dreaming is not a solitary act but a revolutionary endeavor best nurtured and nourished in safe spaces where we can collectively dream new dreams and write new stories that dismantle the harsh ‘realities’ and systemic ‘narratives’ of the world we live in today. We need to dream of new stories that will usher in a new era of restorative justice and collective change where we will all feel responsible for the wellbeing of the Earth and the wellbeing of our fellow humans journeying on Earth.

But where can we gain inspiration for these new stories? Well, the Sankofa principle from the Akan people reminds us that we can only move into new futures when we take time to learn from our past. This means reaching back in time to find the medicinal stories and storytelling rituals our ancestors lived by to experience wholeness with self, community, and the land. Even though many of us have been physically and psychically displaced from our ancestral terrains, dreams act as rich and fertile psychic terrains for our new stories. We too can experience wholeness and rebirth in the present when we reclaim the stories passed down in our lineage.

That is why Brandan “BMike” Odums famously declared, “we are our ancestors’ wildest dreams.” We are constantly writing and re-writing our (hi)stories and dreams within our larger ancestral timelines. In a way, sacred stories are like neon signs that point to the exit doors we can take to escape the harsh scripts of violence, war, and conflict we see all around the world. UCLA law professor Latoya Baldwin Clark goes a step further by saying that “we are not our ancestors’ dreams but rather, we are our ancestors.” Indeed, in Indigenous traditions, we do not see time as a linear construct but as a cylical phenomenon, and cyclical conceptualizations of time remind us that we can always reconnect with the medicinal wisdom of those who came before us. In learning to embody our ancestral stories, we begin to understand how far our sacred stories reach into our past, and how far our sacred stories seek to lead us into new futures.

Thus, the path of transformation is not about “enduring” past sufferings or remaining stuck in narratives that no longer serve us. Instead, we experience true rebirth when:

1. We recognize the sacred nature of our stories (and dreams)
2. We do the inner work of defining and redefining our stories based on our authentic values 
3. We do the outer work of bringing our sacred stories to life. 
4. We visualize and concretize the new stories and realities we yearn to embody. 
5. We allow ourselves to reexamine our history first, so we can rewrite our personal stories within a much healthier framework. 
6. We explore new timelines and new versions of ourselves, off the beaten path.
7. We seek out new (ancestral) ways of being and new (ancestral) ways of knowing. 
8. We practice ritual embodiment of our higher calling by cultivating daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly routines that honor our body, mind, and soul. 
9. We ‘flesh’ out the new truths (new stories) we seek to live out one day at a time.  

In embracing our sacred stories and dreams, we honor our life path, we develop strategic plans, and we heal ourselves. If you are ready to start your journey into sacred storywork, feel free to reach out today. Together, we will work on refining your dreams and turning them into concrete, tangible action steps, so you can progressively transform your life—one story at a time.