<\/p>\n
Alex Mar<\/a> has produced American Mystic<\/a><\/i>, a beautiful and most unusual film, one I hope receives many viewers, for many <\/p>\n Three things impressed me as If these Americans differ from the Second, all felt “different” all Third is the film’s subtle message The film does not say much about I think this is one of the film’s Our experiences, the experiences Talking at length about these inner I think for those of us who walk I have had some degree of I think Pagans will benefit from An interesting interview<\/a> with Mar about You can find the trailer here<\/a> and future information on where it is being screened on its Facebook page.<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Alex Mar has produced American Mystic, a beautiful and most unusual film, one I hope receives many viewers, for many will be the better off for having seen it. In her film Mar describes the lives of spiritually committed people living outside the American spiritual mainstream. She does so sensitively and entirely in their own…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,106,105,108],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-743","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art","category-pagan-culture","category-pagan-spirituality","category-spirituality"],"yoast_head":"\n
\nwill be the better off for having seen it. In her film Mar describes the lives of spiritually committed people living outside the American spiritual mainstream. She does so sensitively and entirely in their own words. <\/span>Her film revolves around three “American Mystics,” Kubai, a
\nman deeply involved in America’s Spiritualist<\/a> tradition, Chuck, who practices traditional Lakota religion whose culminating
\nritual is the Sun Dance<\/a>, and Morpheus a Witch. <\/p>\n
\n<\/p>\n
\nparticularly well done in her film.
\n<\/span>First, she remains faithful to the people whose stories she tells. <\/span>There is never an attempt at making her
\nsubjects exotic or weird. <\/span>In fact,
\none thing which stands out is their very ordinariness in the midst of the
\nextraordinary. <\/span>They have each
\nsought and found a spiritual path in accordance with their own heart and
\ncalling. Kublai, Chuck, Morpheus and the community around them walk their talk,
\nbut do so quietly. The viewer gets a sense of what these communities are like,
\nand again, what stands out is the smooth integration of these spiritual paths
\nwith ordinary relationships and life.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n
\nAmerican Dream, it is because they seek it in their relation to Spirit in the
\nways it has come to them, and in integrating that relationship with their daily
\nlife. Kublai and Chuck live what on the surface appear to be ordinary lives,
\nwhich if they stand out at all do so because they are materially poor. <\/span>Morpheus and her partner live on their
\nown land in northern California, but it is wild rough land that is not good for
\nagriculture, land where they lived at first in a trailer without power as she
\npursued her dream of creating a Pagan sanctuary. <\/span>All willingly set aside the more commonly sought signs of
\nsuccess: a good financial income and lots of stuff but would all agree with Chuck’s
\ncomment: “Family life, Spiritual life. <\/span>I’m pretty rich.”<\/p>\n
\ntheir lives from the secular materialist society around them. <\/span>They had powerful youthful experiences
\nthat only later proved significant in focusing them on spiritual priorities. <\/span>Each had early lives that gave them
\nsome toe hold on alternative views.
\n<\/span>Kublai’s family is also spiritualist, Chuck was initially separated from
\ntraditional Lakota practice, but with the revival of Native American religion
\nhe was able to attend a sweat in Indiana, far from the reservation, that set
\nhim on his path. <\/span>Morpheus had been
\nraised by parents who had themselves always walked to their own drummer. But
\neven so it required strength to turn away from modernity’s blandishments. <\/span>As Morpheus the Witch observed, “We are
\nin many ways limited only by our courage.” <\/span>All these people are people of courage and integrity.<\/p>\n
\nthat spirit is everywhere. <\/span>In the
\nland itself, and just beyond a veil that is sometimes thinner than at others,
\nbut never impenetrable if the seeker will only look. <\/span>The lush green fields and woods of upstate New York, vast
\nspaces of South Dakota’s Pine Ridge Reservation and digger pine and chaparral
\ncovered hills of inland northern California are very different places, but all
\nbreath spirit, and Mar’s film captures this. <\/span>This centeredness also comes through in the warm relations
\nwithin the spiritual communities, of these people and their teachers, and in
\nthe tasks of daily life. <\/span>All of
\nthis is for the most part marvelously understated (though a little less
\nemphasis on Sun Dance scars would have strengthened her story, I think.) <\/span><\/p>\n
\neach spiritual tradition. <\/span>Nor does
\nit show a Sun Dance or the more ecstatic forms of spiritual trance. <\/span>Sun Dances are never filmed. <\/span>Period. <\/span>And the bits of Pagan ritual we see are not over done with
\nweirdness. <\/span>For the most part
\neverything comes across as both Sacred and ordinary. Spiritual voyeurs will be
\ndisappointed and the skeptic will see nothing that attempts to shake their
\nskepticism.<\/p>\n
\nstrengths. <\/span><\/p>\n
\nthat make us who we are, and willing to pay a sometimes considerable price for
\nour practices, are inner <\/i>experiences. <\/span>A deity does not show up on film. <\/span>A vision is just that, a vision. <\/span>Healing energy can sometimes be seen by
\nthe human eye, but again, does not show up on film. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n
\nexperiences to me is usually a mistake.
\n<\/span>When we describe them we distance ourselves from them, and so I think it
\nis unwise to describe them too much.
\n<\/span>As for the listener, if they are not personal friends (and even
\nsometimes when they are) to my mind such accounts usually come across as tall
\ntales or signs of nuttiness or attempts to appear more-spiritual-than-Thou. <\/span>Not that this is the teller’s intent,
\nbut for the listener it is hard not to be wishful or skeptical or envious. <\/span>And too much focus on what looks
\nstrange to outsiders is simply cheap thrills. <\/span>Thrills that inevitably mislead by making us seem far
\nstranger to the ignorant than we are.<\/p>\n
\nthese and similar paths, American Mystic will leave a warmer appreciation for
\nhow many ways there are by which good people can live a spiritually rich life,
\na life that focuses on their own relationship with the Sacred, and leaves
\nsimilar respect to everyone else. I particularly liked the way that towards the
\nfilm’s end the voices of her subjects began to bleed over into visuals of the
\nothers. <\/span>It demonstrated very
\nnicely how these paths, so different on the surface, were deeply complementary.<\/p>\n
\nacquaintance with all three paths. Obviously I am a Witch myself, but I helped
\nbuild a Sun Dance arbor on the Crow Reservation in Montana and been blessed with
\nthe opportunity to do sweats there as well as make offerings at the Medicine
\nWheel high in the Bighorns. <\/span>For
\nsix years I worked weekly and more often within a Brazilian variant of
\nSpiritualism, in some ways different but fascinatingly similar. <\/span>That work was as hard as getting a
\nPh.D. from Berkeley, though very different. <\/span>I think Mar captures all three paths, at least to the degree
\nI can comment knowledgeably, and does so very sensitively and with great respect
\nfor all concerned.<\/p>\n
\nAlex Mar’s artistry and I hope her efforts receive much support from within our
\ncommunity.<\/p>\n
\nAmerican Mystic can be found at Film Maker Magazine. <\/p>\n