Tahiti – Realizing a Childhood Dream
In my early teens, I saw a group of photos from Tahiti. They showed deeply contoured lush island peaks surrounded by emerald blue ocean lagoons. It was the South Pacific, French Polynesia; the very islands that some say their Hawaiian neighbors originated from, traveling across vast expanses of ocean from one paradise to another. In those first moments lost in the pictures in the magazine in front of me, I hoped that some day I’d be able to make the journey to Tahiti to see such amazing beauty with my own eyes.
But the years ticked away, one decade then another. Life has its own timeline, and although I’d had a number of opportunities to go there over the years, it just never panned out. Fortunately, the window opened this year and I boarded an Air Tahiti Nui plane bound for Papeete, the largest city in the islands and the capital of Tahiti. Unfortunately the flight landed well past sunset, forcing me to wait another night on top of the 40+ years I’d already spent dreaming of seeing the islands first hand.
Sunset in Tahiti • photo by Mark Allen
It was worth the wait. Sunrise was a flush pink and golden sky that met the powdery blue ocean. Moorea in the near distance had each of its sharp jungle-covered peaks capped in cottony clouds. How could it get any better!
I soaked it in, way in. The experience was new. The process was familiar. You see as a young boy I had another dream, which was to find a teacher, a real teacher. Those weren’t quite the words I had for it at the time, but it was a yearning to be guided and learn from someone who knows the workings of the universe beyond the ordinary constraints of life. Someone who could help me connect with the greatness of all life in a way that only a person who had dedicated their life to knowing the Great Spirit could bring. That dream was answered twenty-five years ago when I met Brant Secunda in Mexico and began to study with him.
Intense Cloudy Sky in Tahiti • photo by Mark Allen
Over the past two and a half decades I’ve heard him emphasize again and again that shamanism is about developing a relationship with nature: with the light, the plants and rocks, the trees and flowers and all the animals, and Mother Earth.
In those first moments breathing in the beauty all around me in Tahiti I realized this is what I do every day. All around me no matter where I am, there is some aspect of nature that I become aware of; that I connect with, that I can draw perspective from and be reminded of how I’m a part of nature’s greatness. It takes away isolation, stress; it resets my trust in the bigger picture of life. It’s priceless, and I realized that although I’d waited over forty years to experience the beauty of Tahiti, that I’d been experiencing beauty in a deep and profound way with Brant and through his teachings since 1990.
He speaks about how a flower is no more or less important than a rock, and that a lake or ocean is no more or less important than a mountain peak or vast endless grasslands. I’m blessed to make it to Tahiti. I’m also blessed to be seeing every day as a chance to experience the “Tahiti” in my own backyard.
