Dear Forum,
I'm not Native, I am German-born of Cuban/German heritage, and grew up mostly in the United States. My mother's family goes back generations on Cuba and Haiti; my great-grandmother definitely appeared to be a mixed-race woman of possibly indigenous (Taino?), African and Spanish descent. But this is unconfirmed. My father's side of the family is German going back hundreds of years, and Jewish. In any case, I am white-presenting and claim no indigenous heritage.
I was directed here by an Indigenous woman who is in the same women's circle as I am (and has been for the past 3 years). A number of people got involved recently in a discussion about the common ways the word shamanism is misused/misunderstood, about cultural appropriation, spiritual theft, and much more. As I've looked through some of the posts here, I've discovered people whose books I've read, or heard about, for years now.
I thought they were legitimate and now it's apparent they are not. I'm here to learn. I'm here to support decolonization however I can. I can see, looking back, I've definitely lifted and appropriated things that were not mine to take, and gotten pulled into the Nuage paradigm of take what you want from any corner of the world and mash it together to shape your own spiritual path. I'm here to unveil and discard my own tendencies toward cultural imperialism/euro-centrism and whatever else might be lurking in my unconscious. I'd like to get very skilled at having dialogues with other white people around these topics to I can do my part to alleviate the burden off of BIPOC to have these necessary conversations.
