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All things are our relatives what we do to everything, we do to ourselves. All is really One.

Black Elk

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Black Elk
Age: 86 †
Born: 1863
Born: December 1
Died: 1950
Died: August 19
Heyoka
Medicine Man
Tribal Chief
Relatives
Everything
Really
Things
Ahimsa

More quotes by Black Elk

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Everything an Indian does is in a circle, and that is because the power of the world always works in circles, and everything tries to be round. In the old days when we were a strong and happy people, all our power came to us from the sacred hoop of the nation, and so long as the hoop was unbroken the people flourished.
Black Elk
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The center of the universe is everywhere.
Black Elk
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I had a vision with which I might have saved my people, but I had not the strength to do it.
Black Elk
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Know the Power that is Peace.
Black Elk
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After the horse dance was over, it seemed that I was above the ground and did not touch it when I walked.
Black Elk
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You see, I had been riding with the storm clouds, and had come to earth as rain, and it was drought that I had killed with the power that the Six Grandfathers gave me.
Black Elk
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And if the great fear had not come upon me, as it did, and forced me to do my duty, I might have been less good to the people than some man who had never dreamed at all, even with the memory of so great a vision in me.
Black Elk
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It may be that some little root of the sacred tree still lives. Nourish it then, that it may leaf and bloom and fill with singing birds.
Black Elk
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Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back again to where they were. The life of a person is a circle from childhood to childhood, and so it is in everything where power moves.
Black Elk
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Also, as I lay there thinking of my vision, I could see it all again and feel the meaning with a part of me like a strange power glowing in my body but when the part of me that talks would try to make words for the meaning, it would be like fog and get away from me.
Black Elk
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The boys of my people began very young to learn the ways of men, and no one taught us we just learned by doing what we saw, and we were warriors at a time when boys now are like girls.
Black Elk
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And I saw that the sacred hoop of my people as one of many hoops that made one circle.
Black Elk
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Grown men may learn from very little children, for the hearts of little children are pure, and, therefore, the Great Spirit may show to them many things which older people miss.
Black Elk
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When I got back to my father and mother and was sitting up there in our tepee, my face was still all puffed and my legs and arms were badly swollen but I felt good all over and wanted to get right up and run around.
Black Elk
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Behold this day. It is yours to make.
Black Elk
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There can never be peace between nations until there is first known that true peace which is within the souls of men.
Black Elk
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It's in the darkness of men's eyes that they get lost.
Black Elk
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Any man who is attached to things of this world is one who lives in ignorance and is being consumed by the snakes of his own passions
Black Elk
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It is good to have a reminder of death before us, for it helps us to understand the impermanence of life on this earth, and this understanding may aid us in preparing for our own death. He who is well prepared is he who knows that he is nothing compared with Wakan-Tanka, who is everything then he knows that world which is real.
Black Elk
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To use the power of the bison, I had to perform that part of my vision for the people to see.
Black Elk