I was born and grew up in Sydney, and have deep personal connections to the sandstone scrub of my home soil. As a child, I lived on the edge of a state reserve, and the great expanse of bushland at my doorstep was both my playground and the ground of my being. The glorious colours of the sandstone cliffs and caves filled me with wonder that made me want to shout and sing; the intricate patterns on the scribbly gums filled me with wonder that hushed all words.
I was brought up Christian in a very Anglo-oriented milieu, and yet there were things about the bush that never quite fitted within that context. Growing up during the dying years of the White Australia Policy we were taught almost nothing of indigenous spirituality, yet I always had a sense that I belonged to the land rather than it belonging to me. I belonged to that land, and somehow my ancestors were in that place despite my family being white newcomers. (All whites are newcomers, although with ancestors who arrived on the Second Fleet my roots here go back further than many.) More than that, there were particular locations in the bush where I sensed there were many people from the past. I had no words to describe this knowledge at the time – it was only in adulthood that I learnt enough to say that they were places of the Dreaming; places where the elders congregated and watched over me as they had watched over children since the dawn of time.
Some 40 years after that captivating childhood, when doing some inner work on self-empowerment, I sought to visualise my Higher Power. In my mind I went back to that bushland where I had been most open to spiritual illumination, and asked my Higher Power to come to me. My expectation of what that Power might look like was nebulous, but I half-expected it to appear as an older version of myself, or perhaps (since I have in the past been comforted and strengthened by grandfatherly souls) a sage man. Imagine my astonishment when my Higher Power appeared as an indigenous woman! I, in whom (as far as I know) runs no indigenous blood at all, was being welcomed and empowered by one who belonged here in the beginning.
For some 20 years previously, I had been exploring the universal myths of cultures across the world, and placing my child-learnt Christian beliefs within that framework. There is, of course, a tremendous overlap. All around the world, people hold similarly-high ideals of behaviour, and seek similar means of encouraging themselves to live up to their ideals, although they express this through a variety of faiths. Acknowledging this variety is the key to counteracting dogma, for when all people acknowledge that Love is the aim, what does it matter whether they speak of Jehovah, or Christ, or Buddha, or Gaia, or the Rainbow Serpent? How can anyone assert that their manifestation of Love is more right than anyone else’s, for is not such an assertion in itself a failure to love?
Faith, the highs and lows of human existence, fears – these are some of the melodies of life. Openness to the universality of life’s melodies allows me the freedom to express the melodies I hear in (if I may extend the metaphor) a variety of keys, including counselling, tarot and song.
Dadirri Life Melodies 