About Balo...

Balo is the love of my generation, it is her that makes this site promising. I am just a wordsmith; it is her flair for perfection that created that which makes me shine. I needed an anvil to pound my words out on so she found the anvil. The anvil was useless to me for I did not know how to use it. She learned and taught me. My work became a voluminous stack of papers so she bound it into a book. We created many things together selling books along the way with our creations. My work became a ministry of change so she produced a web site for me to have as a classroom. In her perfection she found a better way to execute the site and maintain it. She labored again unto perfection then taught me to do the updates. Balo as you might guess is left-handed and I am right-handed, together we are ambidextrous. My teachings are of the woman being first before the man, for my heritage sees the woman as the keeper of the seed. Without the seed the generations would come to an end. Without Balo, you would know little of my work or myself. My efforts move around the world, as on this site you will see because of the creativity of Balo. As it should be, you read initially of her hard work and then a small history of mysef, that you may know whom it is that smiths the lessons and stories you read.

About Yogi...


Born in 1954 into a family only two generations removed from native life and no reservation roots at all I am able to claim my native roots from the work of my aunt. In my household it was not acceptable to say you were Indian. My father’s father was full blood Seminole from a family hoop that chose the swamps of south Georgia and north Florida over the infamous trail of tears. My pap paw was a principled man who learned not to speak of native things as a means of protection from a prejudice society that thought they had learned to live on the Turtle Island without the help of the indigenous peoples who were already here. If he tried to practice his heritage in any public way he would have been moved to a reservation, in fact all of his generation faced brutal changes to eliminate any competition to the theology that conquered his people. As one of two brothers, he was orphaned at age four when his mother died and his father's wife would not accept half blood children. Relations of his mother who were actually Timucua, a name their people were given by Ponce De Leon before the Seminole Alliance was formed, took them in. At ten, the Timucua family could no longer afford to raise them so another family of the Seminole Alliance took them in. They were from the Ashanti Nation, once proud Africans who had escaped slavery to associate themselves with the Seminole Alliance. At age sixteen, he migrated north to Tennessee to begin a life where his was native was not known. The most telling part of his heritage were the lessons he taught, for they were of respect no conqueror comes to by means of their hereditary nature. He taught his family to live as a part of the environment you moved into rather than destroying all that's there then rebuilding it to suit your ego. He also taught when you leave a spot, you should leave no footprints. Which is to say, leave no destruction in your wake. He toiled to survive in the world we find ourselves surrounded by today while teaching the ways of the past as a means to hunt and live with the Island Planet of our birth. They were the lessons that he as a boy had been taught but learned not to identify the heritage of. His generation of reservation counterparts lived in constant fear and chastisement.  

It was my generation that rose up in the internment camps, called reservations, to win the rights of heritage from the occupying government of today. I am the beneficiary of this fight, not the warrior. I thank my reservation brothers for the victories that bring wholeness to my life and honor their proud struggle in my prayers. My pap paw’s wife, my mam maw, was one of two sister’s orphaned into the white world from a full blood Catawban father and a white mother so that they might have a chance in the harsh world of their birth. They favored their mother, appearing to be white, thus they were accepted among the whites as equals. This was the sacrifice of many mixed native families that were shunned by their relations from both sides. They made such a scarifice for the sake of their little ones, that the little ones might experience life without prejudice. Respect for their surrender is a part of my daily existence, although as a young mind I was very bitter when first told. My mother’s roots from her natural father, my granddaddy, were of double fisted Scottish drinking. Her mother, my grandmother I never knew was of full Cherokee heritage. This family hoop, as so many others, survived by becoming a part of rather than fighting against the people of their era. It is my belief that my Creator is always with me. Respecting the challenges of my ancestors, in and out of the internment camps, causes me to write in the third person using we instead of I many times. Without their struggles I would have nothing to write nor an earth walk. 

I dedicate this website to all who came for before me, all who have walked with me and all who will follow me in the continuation we call life.  For though the lessons of my youth were not taught as native, I now know that they were.

I received my medicine shields from my Seminole and Abenaki teachers. I have been given many native bequests to pass forward that so they might continue to be appreciated. Each gift that was given to pass, was passed and in doing so I gained the trust of guides that work with me daily. The trust was granted because the gifts that were given were of significant value and by releasing them to their highest good I passed a test that I did not know I was taking. 
My life story is one of survival. Through childhood and adolescence I passed through trials that built a soul immovable from my Creator's side once sobriety took hold and memories were healed. Without the help of my Creator and the Earthbound Angels , there are many times my body would have been laid to rest. Yet, in the present day, I walk in no more pain than most and much less than many. I have learned to journey inside to find answers to passage of outside struggles and in my writings I try to pass a little of that forward.
I now live in Georgia with my wife who is my life and business partner as well as my best friend. Our life is complemented by my wife's mother whom enhances our lives greatly. We also share our live's with our two children, Harley the dog and Randi the cat. In our home love is abundant. Our natural children all have lives of their own and live eslewhere.  

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