Adopting another culture

Not sure if this is in the right forum. I never thought my life might be turning in this direction, but here I am. I decided a few months ago to begin exploring Indigenous First Nations culture mostly out of interest and to help me become a better teacher at my school which has a majority students of First Nations, Inuit, Metis background. It began as shall I say conventional professional development. But it really has struck something deep within me. I feel like I’m buying in personally. It’s vibing me. The cultural traditions I find human and healing. It’s been something I really never thought I’d feel. I was raised catholic, ended up rejecting it and becoming an atheist. I’ve done yoga (which vibes me, but not in the same way), and have often gone to our Unitarian Centre. I enjoy the centre more on an intellectual plane than a soulful one.

In the past few months, I have went to a pipe ceremony, seasonal sweat, pow wow, been part of our weekly morning smudge, have been given stones as a gift, and have smoked from the pipe, and even sang with our boys drumming group and attended a protest round dance. It’s been powerful. I find that it’s been filling a hole inside myself, that I didn’t know was there. For example, if I’ve had a bad day smudging myself with Sage actually helps me to let it go. And the sweat felt like me running a long race…but instead of physical and mental toughness, it was like an emotional purging.

I’m still a man of science…but I can’t get over this. What’s happening? What’s going on? I feel like I’ve been swept up into something I don’t understand. Can someone give me advice? Should I be second guessing this?

Many people who discover religion as an adult express these kinds of feelings. I’ll reserve comment on what they actually represent except to say that most adults who become religious (from atheism or extended weak belief in the family/ancestral religion) tend to fall hard for things far outside their cultural norm - Buddhism being common and “Native American religion” being a close second. It becomes difficult to differentiate fascination with the intimate details of another culture’s beliefs, and anything like epiphany.

I have had things “fill a hole” in me, but never anything religious. It’s an individual thing.

Is it the community that does it for you? Or the more liberal, egalitarian views in contrast to the comparatively oppressive and repressive Catholic’s? Both?

Personally, I’m cool with anyone adopting anothers culture as long as they have a informed understanding of said culture and aren’t wearing it as a fad like a shithead hipster.

That’s exactly what I don’t want to do. I’m trying to find the balance and figure out what’s really going on. But I have actually cried at one event. I’m definitely feeling something different.

Right now the practices are just feeling “real” to me. And as it’s described more as spiritual than religious that means something too. If catholicism seems contrived to me, this seems natural and true. It’s similar to some of the vibes I get when dancing, like I’m doing something that is 100% authentic and true.

A culture has to adopt you. You can certainly admire and respect a culture, you can associate with it. I don’t care about cultural appropriation because it’s actually respectful and complementary do to so based on positive qualities of a cultural. But you can’t really adopt a culture if the culture doesn’t want you. I don’t think that’s what you mean exactly though. You can’t just become a Native American because you want to be, but Native Americans have adopted many into their cultures.

That sounds right to me. I don’t want to be disrespectful. I am just feeling resonated and am wondering what if anything is wrong with me? Am I just easily manipulated or influenced? My science brain should be warning me off but it isn’t.

Religion can fulfil emotional needs that science does not. That’s what’s happening to you. Something about all this is filling an emotional need. That’s fine, as long as you’re not hurting anyone else by doing it.

I think you said it yourself, “I feel like I’ve been swept up into something I don’t understand.” Enjoy it the same way you would if you were falling in love.

Cultural adaptation happens in predictable steps.

The first step is the honeymoon stage, when everything seems fascinating and exciting. Then, if you are immersed, will come a period of hostility and irritation. Finally, it turns into gradual adaptation and finally a sense of “feeling at home”.

I’m not sure how this works when you are not fully immersed, but I’d guess you are squarely in the honeymoon stage. That’s fine-- it’s an enjoyable place to be. Just be respectful and realize you are seeing things through a certain lens for now.

When working with a new culture, I make a habit of immediately reading 5-7 books. I draw widely-- some history, some anthropology, some cultural studies, and some fiction. The more lenses you look through, the more nuance you will uncover.

I am of Irish descent, and when I broke away from the organized religion I was raised with, I immersed myself in reading about all of the “taboo” old, pre-Christian traditions I had not been allowed to learn about for fear of my soul burning for eternity inside of Lucifer’s butthole, or some such propaganda…but anyway I digress.

I went through sort of a honeymoon phase with each one. I enjoyed mixing in with friends from India, participating in Hindu rituals, and then Pagan and Wicca were my vibe for awhile. Buddhism fascinated me for a time, too. But I felt a lot like I really didn’t belong…like these traditions could teach me much, but weren’t my destined path.

Then a friend of mine told me a story about his spiritual journey that sounds very like yours and what you seem to be feeling right now. He is a typical white American guy, but he got very into the Lakota tribe and their rituals. He was attending sweat lodges, etc…going up there all the time, and was always welcome, but one day the elders pulled him aside and told him, “You are always welcome here, but this is not your people. You need to find your people. You are coming here empty.” Of course, he was crest-fallen. But he told me it forced him to look to his own roots, and he began to study the tribal cultures of Ancient Europe, and what he found there was so similar to what resonated within him in Native American spirituality, that he understood exactly what the Lakota elders meant he was supposed to do. All the elements were there, the Earth-based practices, the inner journey, etc… He went back and met with them again and thanked them for setting him on the right journey. He said they told him they could tell he was just using their traditions to fill a hole, and he shouldn’t do that, it is bad for the spirit. When he parted, the elders told him something to the effect of now he truly was welcome anytime since he is not coming in empty anymore.

His opinion (and it is just his opinion) that Native American Practices resonate so much with white people because they are so similar to our own Ancient Practices, but we are just mostly ignorant about our own spiritual roots.

For myself, I have just adopted a cafeteria approach at the present. It is a hodge-podge mish-mash, but it works for me. I have adopted various practices that felt right and rejected the ones that don’t. But I am glad I took the time to journey slowly through each one.

This is my thought right now as well.