Lessons from the wheel of life: bridging the gap between then and now, between Native and non-Native, Maria Yraceburu updates a Quero Apache tradition - Native Intelligence

Natural Health, April, 2004 by Frances Lefkowitz

When you first meet Maria Yraceburu, as I did recently on an overcast afternoon in Oakland, Calif., she does not shake your hand. Instead, she cuts through the superficial by opening her arms and wrapping them around you. "I prefer to hug because that puts us heart-center to heart-center," she explains.

A small woman with long dark hair and a generous mouth frequently open in laughter, Yraceburu (pronounced "yayse-buru"; the first "r" is silent) embodies a combination of directness and compassion that announces itself with that first hug. The granddaughter of a Quero Apache holy man of the Snake Clan (Tlish Dyan), she has dedicated her life to sharing the wisdom handed down to her. As a storyteller, healer, ceremonial leader and author of several books, Yraceburu, now a grandmother herself, is on a mission to spread the word about the earth-centered Quero Apache way of life.

"The basis of the philosophy is that we are all interconnected," she says, summing up a cosmology that can be, to the newcomer, quite intimidating in its complexity. "We all have a need to connect, not just to human beings, but to natural and spiritual beings as well."

symbolic road map

Like many Native American peoples, the Quero use a medicine wheel to represent and harness spiritual and healing energies. The Tutuskya, or Great Wheel of Life, is a set of three spirals representing the past, the present and the future. The wheel also acts as a kind of calendar, based on the 24 lunar cycles of the year (12 new-moon and 12 full-moon cycles). Each lunar cycle is associated with a totem animal that embodies its own power and personality.

"It can be looked at as a road map of the cyclic life in harmony with earth rhythms," Yraceburu says. In addition, each point on the spirals corresponds to a directional line of energy. The south, for example, is associated with emotional energy, the west with physical healing. In ceremonial and healing rituals, a person walks the wheel, asking for guidance from any and all of these forces: the directional energies, the totem animals, and the spirits of the past, present and future.

To help people connect daily with the worlds of spirit and nature, Yraceburu has written a series of prayers that speak directly to each of the forces represented on the Tutuskya. Her new book, Prayers and Meditations of the Quero Apache, offers a way for people to discover a renewed and deeper relationship with the earth, other people and animals, spirits and themselves. Yraceburu recommends saying one set of prayers every morning to establish an inner sense of peace, centeredness and openness "to the energy of the day, to what spirit has in store for you." (See "Morning Alignment," page 57.)

The book offers a year's worth of prayers, assuming readers recite one daily. "Usually after a year of doing this," says Yraceburu, "a person can form their own articulation with spirit, because they've felt the connection."

If the prayers sound a bit like self-help affirmations, it's only Yraceburu's background showing through. She came of age with the women's circles of the 1970s and the personal healing techniques of more recent years. Terms like "active listening," "inner child" and "personal truth" are as much a part of her vocabulary as references to spirit guides and other Quero concepts. "I want to present the stories of evolution as I was taught them, but I want to translate them into the language of now," she says. "Language evolves. This is something that has always been recognized in Native oratory. Language changes to encompass the energetic paradigm of the time."

bridging cultures and philosophies

Raised by Ten Bears, her paternal grandfather, On Arizona's White Mountain Apache reservation, Yraceburu seems uniquely suited to the job of updating the old ways. With Apache heritage from her father and European blood from her mother, Yraceburu believes that her status as a "half-breed" places her in a position of strength for carrying the message of the Quero to people of other races. In many ways, she acts as a bridge--not just between cultures, but also between traditional earth-based philosophies and the more psychologically based healing approaches of contemporary times.

Having one foot on and one foot off the reservation, Yraceburu is like an emissary for her ancestors, reminding people in this age of chaos to reconnect with spirit and nature. Brooke Medicine Eagle, author of Buffalo Woman Comes Singing, has called Yraceburu's teachings "mystical poetry" and said that the erosion of the traditional connections between elders and youth is one of the reasons why "what Maria has received from her grandfather Ten Bears and her Quero Apache culture is so rich and valuable. It is rare and beautiful, and she has devoted her life to its development and sharing."

Yet many times when Maria Yraceburu speaks of Ten Bears, she doesn't seem like a harbinger of messages at all. Her face lights up into a broad smile, and she looks like a young girl who's the apple of her granddaddy's eye. Perhaps it is his warmth and compassion, as much as his wisdom, that she is destined to pass on to future generations.