36. Bambi Dawn I - Talking with Spirit

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37. Bambi Dawn I - Talking with Spirit

Bambi and I chat about her Indigenous Granny and talking with Spirit. We share stories of Dads, Celtic reconnecting, Dumb Supper and love for our dog families. Also witchcraft.

This was a long and interesting ride and is split into 3 parts. Links below.

Click below for more episodes with Bambi:

▶︎ Bambi I - Talking with Spirit

▶︎ Bambi II - Ancestral Healing

▶︎ Bambi III - The Body Connection

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Transcript

Bambi (00:01):

Humans worry about a lot of stuff. I had no idea when I was there that you worried so much about money or

Lezley (00:24):

The reason why I asked you on is because I had a significant connection to you through TikTok starting with Dumb Supper, which really opened up a whole new literal world to me, and literally was part of changing my life. I'm living in a different world now than I was two years ago or whenever that was. I feel a connection to you through that and just through being on TikTok, watching what you're doing, and you have a very specific and interesting perspective being both Indigenous and Celtic, and I don't know if you're interested in speaking on that, but I am investigating and sharing and wanting to hear from people like you, what your experience is with Living Spirit in the world of form and what that's like for you and what you would say to me or to anyone else about that, what I'm here for. That's what I want to know. I want to immerse my life in that completely.

Bambi (01:42):

Yeah. I don't even know how exactly I got here. It just sort of started during the pandemic when we just all had not a lot to do because I was off work for 16 months and I don't know, I just ended up joining TikTok and then my kids actually that were saying that I should look at native TikTok. So I started doing that and I started adding people and there was this Black Lives Matter thing going on, and we went to a local protest for that, and I just realized, oh, you know what? I'm pretty white centric in spite of having a lot of indigenous family. I wouldn't say I was raised indigenously or on the res or anything like that. So what do I know about actually being indigenous, even though I, so then I started to explore that and I start to realize I'm really white centric and the algorithm pushes things to me that I can relate to, which is pretty white centric. So I started actually intentionally following black gardeners and indigenous gardeners and things that I was interested in. I would intentionally subscribe to channels that were people of color from different countries just because I wanted my mind to be exposed to other things. And then I just thought I should actually explore more of the indigenous side of things because I'm indigenous, I'm Cree. So I started looking into that, and what I started to do was, this picture right here is my great-grandmother. This is her residential school graduation picture.

Lezley (03:37):

Oh, wow. Okay. That's fantastic.

Bambi (03:40):

That's

Lezley (03:41):

Fantastic.

Bambi (03:42):

I'm so lucky to have it. There's so many people in the family that would've wanted it. And my grandfather looked after my granny until she passed away, and then he gave this to my mom because she's the oldest of his kids. And then when things happened or whatever, and then she's like, you know what? You should take care of this. And so now I have it. So I do take photos of it and pass it on to family, but I'm taking really good care of it. But my kids, they're like, they said, does that actually accurately represent who Granny is though? Because that's her residential school picture. Her hair is shorter and she's wearing residential school clothing and stuff,

Bambi (04:30):

But it's what I have and it was important for them to keep it. So I'm continuing that. But what I had was a tall vase in front of that on this little table, and so I put a plate on there and I would burn sage. That's how I started. I got myself some sage, even though I didn't know that burning white sage was like, there were some badness about it because of closed practices and all of that. I do know that now, but I started there and started burning sage. I'm like, Hey, here's some sage. I'd like to learn how to communicate with you. I hear that ancestor communication is a thing. There's no special way to do things other than just being your authentic self at all times

Lezley (05:23):

And connecting with that spirit, with that feeling and trusting that. That's been a big thing for me is trust. What's happening, trust what's coming through. There's no proof. There's no proof. There's no proof in this. That's it. Just trust.

Bambi (05:41):

Exactly. And so I'm like, if this is a thing, something will happen. So when I thought of it, and then I ended up getting some sweet grass, so then I started burning bad and just like, Hey, granny, how's it going? I did know her in real. She passed away when I was 13. And so yeah, it was just really kind of weird, but interesting to talk to someone who isn't on this side of the grass anymore. Oh,

Lezley (06:10):

That's a great way to phrase it. This side of the grass. I love that.

Bambi (06:15):

And so then things just kind of started happening. So I went to high school with a number of Cree people back in the day, and so they just started messaging me out the blue, he Bambi, did you know that white sage is closed practice, blah, blah, blah. Right. I talked about, Hey, I burned some sage today. I just mentioned it on Facebook. And they're like, Hey. And so I'm like, oh, okay. I might have to find a different way to do this or a more respectful way or the proper way. But the education started coming and I started posting pictures of her when she was a mom of three kids and some of my other indigenous friends I went to high school with. They're like, that's your granny. She looks pretty indigenous. I'm like, yeah, that's because, and then people started kind of opening up to me, and there were moments where they would tell me something and I would just know, oh, that was from Granny, so Oh,

Lezley (07:27):

Cool. Yeah.

Bambi (07:29):

And so things like that started coming up. And then it took an interesting turn because I felt like she was telling me to look into witchcraft. Now, I was a Christian for many years and I also went to Bible college in my adult life. And I mean,

Lezley (07:48):

I love this. I love this about you. Honestly. I just, I love that. I love it. Just the decolonization of Christianization of yourself. I get it. I wasn't even in church or whatever. It's just absorbed by osmosis through this culture. It's awful.

Bambi (08:11):

Totally, totally. And

Lezley (08:13):

No shade on anyone who really has a deep heart connection to Christ. I'm not down on Christ, but it's the institution, literally

Bambi (08:23):

The structure. Jesus has shown up. Jesus has shown up in my stuff because of my history with Christianity, which I can talk about later, but it's kind of funny.

Lezley (08:34):

I'm so excited about this, honestly.

Bambi (08:38):

So then when the idea of witchcraft came up and I was like this, we don't do that. I just felt like Ronnie was saying to me, but who told you that? And I was like, oh, good.

Lezley (08:55):

Same. I had the same exact response to it. Same. And it's not necessarily even implicit, or sorry, explicit. Sometimes it's just the implicit. You'll say just a thing associated, and the response is like, no. And so, okay, continue. Sorry, I'm just all excited with my emotional outbursts.

Bambi (09:19):

That's okay. I love it. It's good. It's how we connect, right? Yeah, true. So yeah, then I went on Facebook. I wasn't on TikTok yet. I went on Facebook and I just started, I followed a few witchy groups just so I could learn more about it. And the main gist that I got from that was connecting with plant spirits, animal spirits, the spirit of the four directions. It was all of that stuff. And I still didn't know the indigenous stuff very much yet. So I was exploring the witchy stuff, and then the pandemic was rolling on, and there was a gentleman online who was, well, I had joined this group because it was a local Manitoba indigenous group that was giving Covid stats for indigenous communities and the province, and it just felt more, I guess, authentic than what I was hearing from the government updates. So I was gravitating towards that, and there was a man that came on there talking about indigenous medicine for things like lung medicine and calls him flu medicines and stuff. So I'm like, Ooh, I'm going to message him. He had opened himself up to say, yes, please message me. So I did. And I'm like, okay, tell me how to harvest this medicine properly.

Bambi (10:51):

And he basically gave me all the same instructions that the witchcraft community was giving me, which was

Lezley (11:00):

Interesting

Bambi (11:01):

To approach, for example, making cedar tea. So you approach cedar and you just say, Hey, I'd like to take some cedar. Is it okay? Is

Lezley (11:11):

It okay? Permission, consent. Consent, mind blowing,

Bambi (11:19):

And then only taking what you need. And then off making an offering. So if you don't have tobacco, which is the traditional way of doing it here, you can do a song or you can just even just say thank you or

Lezley (11:36):

Give water, give fertilizer, or give.

Bambi (11:40):

If you have a drum, you can just play your drum for a bit. There's lots of ways to offer and express your gratitude. I

Lezley (11:49):

Found that asking is good. What? What

Bambi (11:53):

Can I give you return? Yeah, that's a really, yeah, for sure. And so when he told me that, I was like, this is why Granny led me to witchcraft, because she maybe could see that I was struggling to find those connections. And she's like, oh, just check out witchcraft and you'll basically get the gist of it, right? Yeah.

Lezley (12:13):

Oh God, that's awesome.

Bambi (12:17):

So weirdly enough, my cousin Sylvia lives out on the west coast and I haven't seen her her for 18 years, and she just, out of the blue started calling me, and she's always been one to connect with animals and do this spiritual thing, whereas I stayed away from it because my mom stayed away from it, and so I just didn't go down that path. But she was like, nah, she would go and see psychics and talk to angels and things like that. And I was like, yeah, that's probably witchcraft, and I shouldn't do that. So while I'm in this process, she starts calling me and she's like, I would really like to come visit you. So she came to visit, flew out here. We spent, I don't know, four or five days together. It was awesome. But she's like, I want to go to some metaphysical stores.

Bambi (13:17):

And I was like, okay, I'm in that place of the process of opening up to new ideas and things that I would've rejected before. I'm like, sure, let's do it. So we go there and she buys these tarot cards. We're going to do tarot tonight. And I'm like, okay. So we did that and she also ended up picking up some Oracle cards In the end, she ended up leaving them with me. She's like, oh, these are for you. She just knew they were for me, actually. But she also carries a pendulum with her. And it was before I got my dog, Tuffy. I was in that in-between stage where my dad had passed away, but people were resisting me getting this dog, and I didn't know what to do. I was just tired of the bullshit over there. There's a reason I don't hang out with that part of my family. And I just thought, well, I don't know what to do. And she goes, let's ask the cards.

Lezley (14:18):

Nice. Yeah,

Bambi (14:19):

Let's get some direction from the cards. And then we also use the pendulum to ask specific questions. And what I got out of that time with her was that the universe did want me to have this dog, but my dad was like, no. At that time. And I was like, you mean you can cross over and still be a, I didn't know that. Isn't

Lezley (14:47):

That amazing? Isn't that the is free will goes on. You don't have to learn a fucking thing. You don't have to grow. You don't have to accept or nothing. Continue being an ass or whatever.

Bambi (15:07):

So we asked the pendulum twice and got the same answer both times, yes, the universe wants me to have the dog, but my dad is saying no. And I'm like, okay, well, you know what? If the universe wants me to have her, then I'm going to fight for her. So I did that. I got her with me. You see all my videos.

Lezley (15:28):

I know. I love her. I love her.

Bambi (15:30):

She's the best. She's here right now with her head on my lap, actually sitting by

Lezley (15:34):

My chair. Beautiful. Beautiful.

Bambi (15:37):

So this was in the spring, and I had another dog named Chance, and she was a black lab with one blue eye. So she had a little bit of Border Collie in her. I think that's what the vet assumed. And I had found out that she was going to die from Cushing's disease. And so it just made it really important to me to get toughy because I was going to lose my best friend. I just knew that I needed this dog. So anyways,

Lezley (16:14):

It's easier to lose. It's easier to lose a loved one when you have another one there that you can pour all that grief into loving them.

Bambi (16:24):

And yeah, the interesting thing was that Tuffy was really good with chance. Chance was on the road to crossing over and I don't know, she wasn't doing great. But then Tuffy came and then she kind of perked up. She couldn't do stairs for a while because the Cushings damaged her tendons. And then they did end up healing a bit because I was giving her these supplements. And then one day they're sitting on the bench in my dining room together. I'm like, how did you get up there? But it was inspired by Tuffy. They were just little buds. It was awesome. So she passed away middle of October, almost a full year after my dad passed away, and I had gotten Tuffy and everything. So it was around that time that I was still looking further and further into witchcraft and indigenous spirituality. And what are the differences? What are the similarities? There's a lot of similarities, right? Because it's all about plant and animal spirits and connecting with source and

Lezley (17:40):

Land-based teaching land is the first teacher love and connection for the land. It's all there. Did you know that ua danin, the Irish gods? Tua means people of danu, but Tua means land and people. So I'm like, yeah, there's

Bambi (18:07):

So much that has been ripped away from humans when it comes to stuff like that and stuff that is just so good for us.

Lezley (18:16):

Hundred percents

Bambi (18:17):

Sad. So yeah, that was when I happened to come across the whole dumb supper idea. I found the website about it, and I had heard here and there where people would set out an extra place setting for a relative, even at just their regular dinners. So I took the dumb supper concept and I decided to test it out. And I didn't have any light bulbs on. I had all candles all around and different incenses and different options in case I wanted to do other things while things were happening. I had my pad of paper and my pen, and it was weird because it was the first time I ever did it, and I didn't know what to expect or what I would feel. And part of it was like, oh, this is probably just my imagination. And then messages would come saying, right, imagination is the key. That's where, that's exactly what it's for. It's not make believe, it's not fake. And we're taught that it's dismissed. Oh, it's just your imagination. Yeah. Yeah. That's an important tool.

Lezley (19:39):

The part of the western kind of worldview is dismiss and devalue spirit and emotion. Like, oh, raise up this idea of logic and just the physical world. And so our entire experience of reality has been cut in half, and all these ways of knowing have been denied to us. And actually we've been punished for them.

Bambi (20:06):

Yeah, exactly. I mean, they put indigenous people into institutions and called them schizophrenic. If they were like medicine men and women,

Lezley (20:18):

Well and burned, which is

Bambi (20:21):

Exactly

Lezley (20:23):

All of that.

Bambi (20:24):

It's amazing the ability for humans to come up with these really sadistic ways of dealing with stuff like that. It's just like they're limitless. And I dunno, it just kind of blows my mind how limitless people's imaginations can be on that side of things, but we can be limitless on the other side as well. It's

Lezley (20:54):

True. I'm starting to, oh,

Bambi (20:58):

Sorry, go ahead.

Lezley (20:59):

No, I'm just on that line. I'm starting to understand how terrible it is though, to live as if you're alone in the universe. And that's where it all comes from, is this belief that they're alone and unloved and unwanted. I mean, it's not an excuse, but that's awful. That's awful to believe it's true.

Bambi (21:27):

So at this dumb supper that I had, I didn't know how to really connect. So I started just kind of making categories. So I tore a page out of my book and I wrote Granny at the top, and then another one for my grandma, my grandpa. And I even put my dad on there, even though I was still angry about a lot of stuff. There's so much negative history there. But even that, he would still be a jerk after he crossed over. I know you have the ability to know everything about everything now from that perspective, and you still want to be an asshole. Wow.

Lezley (22:07):

Yeah. Hundred percent. I know. So fucking funny, right? That's your choice. Super.

Bambi (22:15):

So it was just interesting. Granny gave me lots of advice about growing medicines. So I do that now. My grandmother was a gardener. She's where the Celtic things come from. And I found out through my mom that, oh, actually side note, your grandma also was a practicing witch. I'm like, what?

Lezley (22:37):

Wow.

Bambi (22:39):

So it kind of makes sense why she gravitated towards my grandfather, because he was the indigenous culture, and even though he probably didn't do a ton of practicing it or whatever, there were probably understandings there that where common ground. So yeah, she gave me some, they were both kind of telling me, plant herbs and medicines and vegetables are secondary. These are the more important ones. And I was like, okay, interesting. So I do both. And oddly enough, I ended up, this was right before the pandemic, and so I had purchased seeds like marshmallow and was learning about foraging things like Mullin, these are lung medicines.

Lezley (23:30):

Interesting.

Bambi (23:31):

So when I realized that these were lung medicines, and I realized that during the pandemic I was, oh, I was trying to connect with my dad and I was struggling because there's a lot of pain and a lot of anger. And I finally,

Lezley (23:58):

I do find it difficult to connect to my dad. There's just too much living. There's too much living emotional stuff there for me to get clear.

Bambi (24:09):

That's

Lezley (24:09):

Fair.

Bambi (24:11):

And so I just said to him kind of out loud, well, I mean connect with me or don't connect with me, but really, who is connecting with you from this side right now? Besides me? Hello Eller.

Lezley (24:28):

That's funny.

Bambi (24:30):

It's me. So it's up to you. But in that moment, once I put that out there, my dog chance came back to me and I saw her just galloping towards me. And it had only been two weeks since she passed away.

Bambi (24:57):

And so I'm like, oh my God, whatcha doing here? It's still so fresh. And she's like, oh, this incense, I remember when I was here, you burned that incense. It's just so interesting. And then she said things to me like, wow, humans worry about a lot of stuff. I had no idea when I was there that you worried so much about money or relationships or she's just like, I was happy to be a dog, but wow, people really worry about a lot of stuff. And so we're having sort of this inner dialogue and I'm just like, I can't believe it's you. And I'm looking at her and then I see, and I look up and it's, and then I realized, oh, that anger and pain was in the way, but she was able to bring me through that. And so that was amazing. He didn't look mad. What he said was told me all about you.

Lezley (26:11):

Isn't that amazing?

Bambi (26:15):

And I was like, what? And see, when my dad passed away, he died in the bush. He lived on a trap line and he was doing the off grid thing in his seventies. It kind of crazy him. And were on the sled and over to his, I know what ended up happening, but he ended up having a widow's heart attack. And this was in the evening, probably seven at night. And so when he didn't arrive at his friend, his friend knew he was coming, so he wasn't there long, but they found him the next morning and T stayed with him the whole time. We heard all about that at the funeral and stuff. And then when was passing away, I was laying with her on the floor. I took the couch cushions and made a bed for myself and laid next to her. The other dogs were with us, the cats were there, everybody was all surrounding. And she passed away. And my dad, when I'm talking to him in the spirit realm, he said, you and t are safe. Right? Because we had both that vigil with the person as they were passing away. I was with chance that way, and she was with my dad that way. My dad said, this is what makes us, all family needs to be with you because you're from the same. And I don't think that I would've put that together in my own head. That came from my dad and the fact that Chance told him everything about me, and he was like, I dunno. I guess he had his aha moment over there about it. And

Lezley (28:37):

Yeah,

Bambi (28:39):

My father,

Lezley (28:40):

Sorry,

Bambi (28:41):

Go ahead. Sorry, go ahead.

Lezley (28:43):

I'm just saying my dad didn't really know me until he died. He didn't really know who I was until he died. And then he saw everything that, Hey, I didn't show him everything. Right? It's not his own fault, but yeah, he knows who I am now.

Bambi (29:01):

Yeah. And I've had a few meditations where I've just intentionally disconnected with my dad. Sometimes I'll do it on the anniversary of his death or on his birthday. And he's told me things like, relatives have said things to me, shouldn't talk badly about the dead. He's dead. I'm like, so I shouldn't tell the truth.

Lezley (29:32):

Right? Thank you. 100%. What the hell? Just because people have died doesn't make them suddenly Saints are untouchable or they just gave up the body. What the fuck do you think happened? Sorry, by the way, do you mind that I curse and swear? No,

Bambi (29:48):

I curse all the time. I was like, it's just putting this publicly. Should I be careful?

Lezley (29:54):

Well do whatever you're comfortable with. This is an all words acceptable. Well, you agree?

Bambi (30:03):

So yeah. So then my dad has told me things like, don't worry about that. That's bullshit. I'm fine over here. Everything's good. Now you do whatever you need to do to get further along in your healing so you can unburden yourself because I can see how much luggage you're carrying and I actually want you to be free. And that just set me free to just know I don't have to, every time I say, I still sometimes hear those echoes of the relatives, like, you shouldn't say things like that. And my dad is right there going, no, it's fine. Just tell the truth.

Lezley (30:48):

Yeah. And as you call it, unburden yourself. And I love that phrase, you, whatever you heal in yourself, you heal all the way back. And it's amazing how connected we all are and how we're all still working together. It's not like it's separate and they go off into another world and live some sort of paradise life over there. It's all just here, and we're all still communicating and connected together, and all the healing here flows through. And they also can have realizations and healings that then flow down through to us. It's dynamic and beautiful.

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