In this session, Cree Knowledge Keeper Marilyn Dykstra invites visitors who have completed the two years of Full Moon teachings to rejoin again to continue their commitment.

The Cree people are connected in human life cycles like our earthly family members, the trees. We spent an extended amount of time in introspection during the winter months where we focused on the teachings of the generations that came before. Now it’s time to make natural changes so we can move forward with the next three generations, those that may be here and those yet to come.

The most important path that we follow is our responsibility to pass on our Indigeneity to the ones seeking knowledge so they can grow strong like the original medicine tree, the cedar. Like the cedar, our medicine persists as each generation adapts to our original mothers’ cycles. Though these cycles may look different from one another, like tree rings, they have no beginning and no end.

Our sacred knowledge, stories and values are continuously renewed through generations of teachings and memory. Our inner mirror connects us to our parallels — how each generation relies on the ones before and after it. The phases of life connect us together so that, like cedar, we can bring healing to one another because we ARE the unbroken generations of medicine and our generational roots provide us with a path.

The method of teaching will utilize Indigenous pedagogy as well as incorporate traditional tea and burning of traditional medicines. Participants will discover their relatedness and interconnection with human rights and balance.

This workshop is part of a monthly Wahkowtowin and Ways of Being series led by Knowledge Keeper Marilyn Dykstra. Each month, we will explore a variety of moon, pole and tea teachings in the Inninewak (Cree) tradition.

Wahkowtowin – which translates to kinship – highlights how relationships, communities and the natural world are all interconnected.

Participants will discover and reflect on their connections with each other, with balance and with human rights through teachings and a traditional tea.

Traditional Helper Peyton will support the teachings while she continues her learning journey within Wahkowtowin.

Marilyn Dykstra is a status Bill C31 First Nations woman from northern Manitoba. She has been immersed in a working matriarchal system that practised Indigenous ways of thinking and being since she was born. Alongside her family, she has participated in many peaceful social justice movements.

Marilyn uses her matriarchal knowledge as a foundation for her work in the Indigenous community, which has been ongoing for over thirty years. She still follows her matriarchal teachings, but she has also spent her life learning traditional knowledge and passing the teachings on.

She is a pow wow dancer, knowledge keeper, and she carries the responsibility of a bundle. She happily participates in naming ceremonies, sweats, pipe ceremonies, moon teachings and more.