Indigenous ways of knowing revolves around spirit, defined as the energy or "force" (that is neither a wave or a particle) that connects us with all that is around us!
Everything, and therefore this energy is in constant motion and flux and changes depending on what it connects with, like the energy of a room when someone new enters, a moment of aha or déjà vu, or a seemingly unexplainable connection you may have to a person, tree, animal, song or rock.
Quantum, or energy/spirit, connects everything on Mother Earth with the cosmos, and when better understood, sometimes through ceremony, expands our understanding.
"Through ceremony and deep relationships, Indigenous people have been able to access understandings beyond human perception.”
- Dr. Leroy Little Bear and Rob Cardinal
The Northern Lights can be interpreted as a visible energy field of charged particles interacting with the Earth’s magnetic field. Many Indigenous cultures interpret them as spirits or the ancestors. To measure this field requires taking a snapshot of a moment. But, this snapshot does not and cannot accurately represent the constant flux of the field.
“Belief is irrelevant. Belief will alter your interpretation of reality, but cannot alter reality.”
-Rob Cardinal (Siksika)