“Set the dark clouds at your back and step forward into the light. Take my hand and I will lead you. I am very good at watching people’s backs. So set the dark clouds to your back.
“People always say ‘What is past is past,’ but what that means is that you are not responsible for changing what is past. You are only responsible for finding your footing in the present. But finding that footing means finding your balance atop the past. Time is not a linear vector, it is vertical. The past supports you. So get on top of it. Find your footing atop the past. I will help you find that surefootedness.
“When you speak your truth, tapping against the silence with the small hammer of your voice, you perform an action that calls forth all of those Earth voices, those ancestral voices from your past, just like the germination of a seed in the ground.
“Just as the seed calls forth all that is within the soil—moisture, nutrients, wisdom, and memory—and then draws all that up through itself and breaks the surface of the ground, you must call forth the voice of truth from within your life.
“A seed is like a small hammer that cracks the silence of the soil with its voice. It speaks green, purple, white. It speaks with scent. Most people have forgotten that their true voice comes up through them from the soles of their feet. When you speak, you can call on the many voices from that past that lie below you. It is in speaking your truth that you will find your footing.”