Ley Greywolf

[my side of the street]

I was wondering about this person: "Ley Greywolf is 100% Lakota Indian and was appointed as a Shaman by the Lakota Sovereign Nation Greywolf is her family name."  Her website is http://inthelightofone.com. The site also says: Ley does energy healing and is a Shaman trained from a long linage of Medicine men, Shamans and chiefs. This tradition of healing is highly honored, and powerful medicine in it's self, often coupled with crystals and healing oils as needed for each specific treatment given." She is teaching a class on using sage at an occult bookstore. "Sage 101 Basic of Sage and there Purpose January 25, 2014 Class starts at 1:00 pm to 3:00 pm
Essential Oils 101 Homeopathic Medicine Cabinet in your Home Heal yourself, family and pets without western medicine"

[earthw7]

sorry but i would ask whose her family? which Lakota band? Which Tiospaye?

[Epiphany]

Ley Greywolf
Location:
Plant City, FL
Member since:
January 12, 2014
Introduction
My name is Ley Greywolf and I am from the Oglala Sioux Nation from Pine Ridge SD. I had the great honor of studying under various Lakota spiritual leaders. My partner and I now live in Plant City we are looking for likeminded individuals

http://www.meetup.com/Master-Fitness-Tampa/members/127311362/

[Epiphany]

On her Facebook page she says she went to high school in Brooklyn, NY and studied business admin at NYU. She lists a former job at Greywolf Enterprises Inc.

Ley Torres http://www.linkedin.com/pub/ley-torres/14/981/a05 at Greywolf Enterprises

FB photo and this photo look to be the same woman.

Greywolf Enterprises Inc. http://search.sunbiz.org/Inquiry/CorporationSearch/SearchResultDetail/EntityName/domp-p03000012840-40e5b588-74fa-4554-944a-f6d1d49a6da3/greywolf/Page1 Rebekah L Torres

http://www.fedvendor.com/contractor/CRR00000000000170901/profile.htm Greywolf Enterprises Inc. - Ley Torres

[Ingeborg]

Having had a look at their site, Greywolf and her business partner offer a bit of what they claim is ndn spirituality mixed with a lot of Nuage garbage and alternative healing, like e.g. healing stones, 'essential' oils, plus animal communication. Their website also announces that Reiki courses were "coming soon". Reiki is an alternative healing method from Japan, its effectiveness has never been proven as of yet and as far as claims have been examined, they were not confirmed.
Here's an English language article on Reiki: http://www.ncahf.org/articles/o-r/reiki.html

Business partner Dona Strong claims to have received her "Indian name" [sigh....] from a person called Skye Greywolf whom she calls a chief [sigh....]. The only "Skye Greywolf" to be found happens to be an actor, as far as Google is concerned, he should be living in Arizona.

Their links recommend e.g. Eckart Tolle (they're misspelling his first name), Gregg Braden, and Louise Hay who all were mentioned in threads before, although not necessarily for exploiting ndn ceremonies; Braden seems to have been into "2012":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eckhart_Tolle

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregg_Braden
http://www.newagefraud.org/smf/index.php?topic=2414
http://www.newagefraud.org/smf/index.php?topic=2732.msg25603#msg25603

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louise_Hay

It seems Greywolf and Strong are using the ndn connection as a sales pitch to further sales of their seminars and courses, but are largely into alternative medicine:

We are an Alternative Healing Center that uses healing energy, therapeutic oils, and crystals. We are called on to do healings where traditional medicine has failed and/or by those that know and would prefer to be heal naturally. We've worked with people in coma's, people who have had radical surgeries, and for spiritual intervention as well as well being.

In other words: they are targeting a) desperate persons grasping for every straw and b) uninformed and gullible persons who e.g. believe that 'healing stones' etc were 'natural' remedies. In their section "Services", they also announce they do "Guided Meditation" which in reality is more of a hypnosis than meditation. It is not hard to see that this may be quite useful an addition in such a 'healing' practice,

In the section "Testimonials", they publish four - two by clients, two by their teachers. The first testimonials happens to be from a woman who had breast cancer - if indeed it is a real testimonial by a real client. The second one is by the alleged director of the Panther Ridge Conservation Center who claims that Greywolf and Strong did "amazing work" with the 18 cats they've got on their premises. I just hope this centre is not funded with public money... Oh yes, and the animal communication apparently is done "long distance", a 4 hours drive away from the centre. Well, I also found this report on the premises: http://bigcatrescue.org/judy-berens-third-big-cat-incident-since-2005-jaguar-bites-off-thumb/ . Apparently, she's had three dangerous incidents in only five years. Perhaps remote control does not work all that well in big cats, after all....

[Epiphany]

Public records info on Rebekah Ley Torres https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/KGCB-CNN

Don't know if Torres is her birth surname, or a married one.

[educatedindian]

Basically she was an accountant before. My Side, you might not realize, that Sovereign Nation she talks about being a medicine woman for likely was Russell Means' Republic of Lakotah, not any actual rez or tribe. This is the first I've heard of someone claiming to bevtheir spiritual leader. I didn't find any mention of her at their site.

[milehighsalute]

when contacting the both oglala and sicangu tribes both of them confirmed there is no lakota families with last name of graywolf or greywolf

it sounds NDN and maybe some tribes have  family of greywolfs, but chances are they are frauds if claiming to be lakota

by the way i learned this when researching elijah tewahade aka "eliase graywolf"

[earthw7]

agree there are no grey wolf on pine ridge or rosebud

[my side of the street]

agree there are no grey wolf on pine ridge or rosebud

That's interesting, because somewhere else on the internet (forget where I saw it) she says she grew up on the Pine Ridge reservation.

[my side of the street]

Here is one place she says she is from Pine Ridge

  http://www.meetup.com/Master-Fitness-Tampa/member/127311362/

  "My name is Ley Greywolf and I am from the Oglala Sioux Nation from Pine Ridge SD."

[ShadowDancer]

Here is one place she says she is from Pine Ridge

  http://www.meetup.com/Master-Fitness-Tampa/member/127311362/

  "My name is Ley Greywolf and I am from the Oglala Sioux Nation from Pine Ridge SD."

A clever bit of tricksy word play.

One way to interpret is that she was born or raised there.  Another way is as a claim to be descended from the Oglala Sioux Nation which is located in Pine Ridge SD. 

If anyone would know, it is definitely earthw7 who says there are no Greywolf at Pine Ridge or Rosebud. 

[Defend the Sacred]

"my side" - ShadowDancer is correct about what EarthW7 said - she is the tribal historian in her community and handles the tribes' family records. If she says there are no people in the tribe with that name, there are no people in the tribe with that name.

What you may not know is that these names, even though they may sound chosen or made-up to outsiders, are actually family names - just like a "Smith" or "Jones" on a non-Native's birth certificate. Traditional Natives don't choose these names for themselves, the way nuagers do; they have to be born into that family.

The reservations and satellite communities are small and close-knit. It only takes a phone call or two to check people out.

If you haven't yet read the pinned threads, please do. This may seem like an anonymous board, but it really isn't. The longstanding members here know one another outside these forums. So we're not just taking someone's word for it when they give us information; we know who knows what they're talking about.

[Epiphany]

On her Ley Greywolf Facebook page she says she graduated New Utrecht High School, Class of 1982 · Brooklyn, New York. And here she is on an alumni site, New Utrecht High School, 1982,  Rebekah Torres, photo included. Same person.

http://newutrechthighschool.org/alumni/649428/rebekah-torres.html

On her FB she and a person named Raven Singing Wind claim each other as cousins. Raven says they attended Red Cloud High School
Class of 1988 · Pine Ridge, South Dakota. But there is no sign of who this person actually is, or whether this cousin relationship is by blood or chosen.

So Ley Greywolf was Rebekah Torres in high school, that makes it a safe bet that her birth surname is Torres.

On Ley's Facebook:

Retired: Now a Practicing Shaman
Shaman · Plant City, Florida · Nov 19, 1990 to present

She says her hometown is Pine Ridge, South Dakota

[my side of the street]

   I have indeed read the pinned threads and many other threads here. I realize the respect all here hold for earthw7. When I go back and look at my post, I see that the brevity made it ambiguous. I'm sorry if my wording made it sound like I was questioning Earth's knowledge of her own people. I do not at all question the accuracy of her statement and I appreciate Earth sharing information and advice. I understand that she lives with her people, knows their history, and is very respected on this board and in her own community. I respect her knowledge as well

  I also understand that these are family names  (and in fact, Ley Greywolf claims "Greywolf" is her family name). I was saying that her claim to have grown up on Pine Ridge and to also have the family name "Greywolf" seemed even more improbable now that Earth had shared this information. That was what I meant by "interesting." I posted the question because her website made me highly dubious. No North American indigenous tribe uses the title "Shaman," and if she was in some position of healing to the traditional Lakota community, she probably wouldn't be advertising on the web looking for random clients and charging fees.
 
    As I explained in my intro, I have been guilty of some misappropriation in my past. I have also been hurt by "spirchul" groups that I made the mistake of joining, and I placed the question on the board so that people in my area searching her name would have a flag pointing them here that would encourage them to question her claims and to educate themselves. If she was just honest about crystals and Reiki, possible clients could decide for themselves whether they think those things are baloney or whether they want to try them.  But Ley is dressing them up with a veneer of indigenous authenticity, which is confusing at best and misleading at worst. I also had a very tiny hope that my suspicions might be unfounded, but that seems less and less likely. My motives are around protecting others and making up to a tiny degree for my own behavior. I'm sorry I was not clear about this.