The Land is Calling for your Rite of Return in 2021
Throughout history, indigenous peoples and warfighting cultures across the globe have long recognized and practiced rites of passage and purification for returning warriors that fully honor the ruptures of the soul endured as a result of suiting up in war mode and preparing to die, including the Lakota, Maasai, Crusaders, Druids, Celts, Hebrews of the Pentateuch, Pre-Socratic Greeks, Mayans, Vikings, Romans, and Mongols, just to name a few. Despite nearly 8,000 veteran non-profits and billions of dollars on veteran health care, we are not making a dent in veteran suicide. Why are we just holding the line?
Whole Identity, Purpose, and Belonging after Military Service
Vietnam Veteran and Author, Karl Marlantes, in What It is Like to Go to War…“Killing someone without splitting oneself from the feeling that the act engenders requires an effort of supreme consciousness that, quite frankly, is beyond most humans. Killing is what warriors do for society. Yet when they return home, society doesn’t generally acknowledge that the act it asked them to do created a deep split in their psyches, or a psychological and spiritual weight most of them will stumble beneath the rest of their lives. Warriors must learn how to integrate the experience of killing, to put the pieces of their psyches back together again. For the most part, they have been left to do this on their own.”
In modern society, we have relinquished non-medicated rites of passage and purification for solutions that provide relief to “trauma” but fail to get to the heart of what veterans need to heal and grow into the fullness of their being; sacred ceremonies and rituals that offer transcendent meaning, communal validation, and visceral freedom from the weight our soul’s carry from service. A rite of passage is an all-senses alchemy of internal wisdom connecting to the source to deploy the healing powers of nature. Through this ancient remembering of self-generated ceremony and practice of wholeness, we activate the latent mysteries within to give form to invisible demons so they can be faced. When we square the shoulders of our soul up with what is buried deep within, the shadows within can be excavated, named, felt, grieved, given meaning, released, and transformed. What pained us then goes to work for us on new assignment to bring us into balance with all aspects of ourselves that have gone unfed through no fault of our own. As Richard Rohr says plainly, “we transform our pain so we do not transmit it.”
The Whole Warrior can then emerge fully nourished in body, psyche, mind, and spirit, in service to our true identity, loved ones, ancestors, and community. It is a journey of unfathomable courage, strength, and vulnerability. Every one of these journeys to the belly of the whale is the true warrior’s Rite of Return and completion of the hero’s and heroine’s journey. Every one of these stories is the greatest story ever told. It is our mission to create the conditions for this return and hold these stories with the love and honor worthy of our warrior’s sacrifice.
The Ceremony
Veteran Rites exists to provide The Rite of Return for any warrior seeking to answer the soul’s call for deep healing in the wilderness in order to lay down what longer serves and step into who you are truly called to be after military service. Separated from society, in solidarity and solitude, to cross the threshold as a Whole Warrior to “put the pieces of our psyches back together again” and answer Who Am I? What’s My Purpose? Where do I Belong?
This ancient, cross-cultural ceremony has proven to drastically reduce the symptoms of post-traumatic stress, compassion fatigue, moral injury, and suicidal ideation by embracing the wholeness of our human experience and true nature, with continued evaluation in partnership with Mark Van Ryzin of the University of Oregon Research Institute. It is a bare-bones, universal container that deeply honors any warrior’s unique abilities, values, belief system, culture, and identity so they can do what and do what is theirs is to do and sing the songs that are theirs to sing.
The 11-day ceremony is held in the wilderness of Eastern Washington with trained veteran and non-veteran guides. Participants experience time in community with other vets, four days of solo time, fasting in the wilderness, and a marked return where their stories are shared and witnessed in a“council of elders”. This return marks the beginning of a veteran’s process of incorporating that which they have gained and learned during their time in service and explored in the context of time alone in the wilderness, so they may bring their gifts home, able to participate more fully in service of their families and their community. Initiates will be supported throughout their incorporation year by Veteran Rites and the circle of whole warriors they are initiated with. The ceremony is not a silver bullet. It is an initiation and rebirth into your whole identity, purpose, and belonging. Learning to walk with shaky legs on your true path of wholeness, AS NATURE, is a day to day ritual and adventure of a lifetime.
I should know. I am living testimony to that truth every sunrise since arriving barefoot on the earth for my ceremony in 2017 at the invitation of Larry and Mark. A decade removed from three tours to Iraq, it was my claiming within the coulees and beneath the swallows that truly marked my soul’s transition from a life of slow suicide into healing, wholeness, and sobriety. As a Seabee who got a taste of the action but never got the worst of it, my heart never truly felt that I was worthy of having survived. I knew it, but didn’t have the feeling in my bones.
In that fast the darting swallows arrived suddenly at my most desperate lament like a flock of angels around me, and I was able to finally lay down my armor and cry. I released the anger and love I had for the world. For the terror my people above and below ground have endured. For those I’d hurt or could have. I cried for all the times I had acted out of true integrity. For the wounded kid and the snot-nosed adolescent within me. For my addictions, dependencies, and reckless nights trying to escape the pain. For the whole adult man I knew I truly was and needed to become. For all the people have not had the privilege to heal. I started to remember. I saw their faces. We smiled and had a cup of tea together with our reflections in the water.
Nearly four years later, I see what was claimed on that land and the opening of the soul’s blatter as the beginning, not the end, of my homecoming. Things did not get easier. I often stumbled and got lost in the wrong direction. I fell in and out of my true self. I had alot of growing up to do, listening to elders, and leaning into others with wild honesty. Today and all days. But I have always been able to come back to my truth and wholeness of WHO I AM and HOW I SERVE when the defecation hits the rotary oscillator. And the best part is I can’t help but see and love that wholeness in others no matter what.
The Rite of Return was my training ground to take whatever was inside of me to the land, and she always delivers. I have to do it every day as a practice and a prescription for healing, joy, focus, and awe. I need it to purify this greasy filter constantly so I can show up with a peaceful heart in service to my people. For a lucky kid that grew up in the shadows of the Las Vegas strip this was not in Ryan’s perfectly planned vision for himself.
I thank God every day that the swallows carried me to my true path. But I had to answer the call from the land and claim my seat in ceremony first.
I pray that you claim yours. For your true self and your loved ones. For all of us.
Love and Honor,
R. Mielcarek “I Am a blessed, peaceful, sober brother bear crying and dancing with his people by the river.”
Here are your opportunities to Answer the Call for renewed meaning and purpose in 2021. You can claim your seat by clicking on the events below.
