00:00.00 archpodnet Go go. 00:04.00 alan Welcome back gang. We're in the second segment of our rock art podcast episode one seventeen with Johnny Vasquez from the pueblo and yute tribe talking about his personal experiences. 00:05.00 alan Welcome back gang. We're in the second segment of our rock art podcast episode one seventeen with Johnny Vasquez from the pueblo and yute tribe talking about his personal experiences. 00:23.40 alan On a vision quest we were right at the ah apex the ah heights at the precipice there and face to face with a bighorn sheep. You could go. You can continue now. Johnny. 00:24.40 alan On a vision quest we were right at the ah apex the ah heights at the precipice there and face to face with a bighorn sheep. You could go. You can continue now. Johnny. 00:37.70 Johnny valdez Yes, So we we hiked up to the top of saw the River peak and started fixing our trails all day Long. We got to a beautiful meadow out as we started down the Hill our last chance to get a little bit of water but both of us really. Wanted to finish the day and get it done and we knew the challenge it was going to be so we just pressed on instead of going out of our way a mile or so to get Water. We just continued down the down the Hill and when we did it started getting rougher. There was a lot more in the way. A lot more clearing that need to be done so it was really physical it really you know didn't have much in the way of anything up there if we wanted to get something to eat Anyway. So We just kept working our way through and as we started to get down in the evening. We'd we'd started well before. Before light but in the evening as the sun was starting to set your bodies just started consuming Itself. You can feel that you're you're starting to eat into your own fat. Your. Getting a little bit Delirious. You're trying to stay right on the trail you're trying to get the job done at the same time trying to concentrate and then and then your body and your mind take over and there's this strength and this understanding that you have that you. 02:06.40 Johnny valdez Keep pressing forward. You keep moving forward and there's kind of ah a thumping with every step that you take It's like the beating of a drum and you stay in a very very rhythmic state and we we stopped and talked to each other and said man it feels like there's. Drums Beating. He's like yeah I know every time I step like yeah and then you just he'd step once and I'd step and pretty soon we were in sync stepping and the drums were beating and as we were getting down to the bottom of the Hill I was starting to see all of these animals. Flashing by me watching a bear walk past hearing his name and ute hearing my dad say it over and over again and then an elk passing by and then deer off to the side. All of these things happening and then as we were getting all the way to the end so tired and. I Don't think I can make it I've got to get to my knees I've got to stop and there's that big horn sheep coming right to us slamming on the brakes in front of us. It was the exact scene from the morning it was the exact scene but it was but it was somehow mystical Like. Dust was flying all around I mean it was sparkling and and beautiful and it said so much about what I needed to do with my life try to try and do things in ah in a good way and start you know not being so full of myself and trying to figure out the importance of. 03:42.79 Johnny valdez Of others's views and others' thoughts that that there are these these signs these spirits these things that you can see that are so much more valuable in a more important than your very narrow-minded life and we kind of. Stumbled our way the last mile or so and we got down to a creek near the near the bottom and slammed our faces into the water and we both sat there and kind of told the stories that we each had about what we were seeing and what we were feeling and what we were thinking and. It was just a powerful thing to have done that to have to have walked across the sky as our ancestors had done was just so beautiful to to think of the moments you know that that they had probably done those hundreds if not thousands of times in their life. We had just done it that once and and I've subsequently done it a few more times but but that was just so powerful to think of how strong all of these people that came before us were and I mean I'm talking back to the prehistoric times and. You know in the archaic periods all of these areas these people just had an importance and a value to everything that was done and that we have that within us too. We we have that shamanistic ability to to reach. Um. 05:14.18 Johnny valdez But altered state to to get that vision quest to have that that future that past run by us in the forms of of animals and thoughts and it was just so beautiful and powerful. It is one of the greatest things I think that has ever happened to me. 05:47.36 Johnny valdez Doc Can you hear me. 05:49.90 alan No I can yeah I couldn't I I had lost you for a little bit. Yeah, we're we're back that was very yeah, no that yeah no I have ah that that's rather a mystical and remarkable story. 05:50.60 archpodnet Ah, okay I thought I'd lost Johnny yes, stop. 05:50.90 alan No I can yeah I couldn't I I had lost you for a little bit. Yeah, we're we're back that was very yeah, no that yeah no I have ah that that's rather a mystical and remarkable story. 05:58.44 Johnny valdez Um, okay. 06:06.52 alan Johnny and I I have to process that and think about it. But it's fabulous that you shared that with our audience because I think it gave them a glimpse a glimmer of the motivation and the sense and the function and the purpose of ah. 06:07.52 alan Johnny and I I have to process that and think about it. But it's fabulous that you shared that with our audience because I think it gave them a glimpse a glimmer of the motivation and the sense and the function and the purpose of ah. 06:24.11 alan Such vision quest experiences um based on your experience working with and knowing the ah cultures of native people in your area. How does that relate back to any of the rock paintings or rock drawings. 06:25.11 alan Such vision quest experiences um based on your experience working with and knowing the ah cultures of native people in your area. How does that relate back to any of the rock paintings or rock drawings. 06:43.10 alan That you're aware of what do the native peoples think or feel or sense or know about those pictures are those too intrusive a question or is that okay to be asking. Okay. 06:44.10 alan That you're aware of what do the native peoples think or feel or sense or know about those pictures are those too intrusive a question or is that okay to be asking. Okay. 06:53.61 Johnny valdez Well I can give you an example that I think is very powerful. No no I think that's fine I mean um, you know I'm not giving a specific tribe's perspective or a specific person's perspective. So I'm trying to take. 07:01.67 alan Please. 07:02.67 alan Please. 07:06.20 alan Right? yeah. 07:07.20 alan Right? yeah. 07:12.26 Johnny valdez Everything that you're saying and and give you a general idea of of the process of thinking and and some of it yes is involved with with one tribe or another um I'll give you an example. That's that's really clear with with rock art. Um, you see those little spirals that that are always there right? that. But go clockwise or counterclockwise and and those spirals mean something very valuable but to certain tribes they're they're ah they're a viewpoint in a perspective problem and I'll tell you why you go up to 1 If. You're a you person?? um and you go to a round dance.. For example, we only walk around that circle in a positive direction right? So we're working. We're standing holding hands and we're working to the left. We're always going clockwise right? And. You'll get elders who really will get upset if somebody wants to do an interior circle and go the opposite direction because other tribes do their roundouts as the opposite Direction. So in the rock art if you see one that's Going. Counter or Clockwise. There's usually to some of our people. There's this vision that maybe there's something wrong. There. There's something that we need to be aware of or be afraid of or our beliefs you have. 08:44.11 Johnny valdez Concern on something going counterclockwise right? but other people other people see that so much differently I know that I do because I have to live in multiple cultures. One of the most powerful things for you know Az tech in people is the underworld. So. 08:47.34 alan Right. 08:48.34 alan Right. 09:03.31 Johnny valdez If an elder tells you well you know you got to go positive. You got to go this way and that way and do whatever. Actually if you're underneath that picture and you're looking at it from below those people are going counterclockwise they're not going clockwise and that's a problem for our belief system right? And so. It's not a negative thing. It's just like oh the underworld is seeing that going the opposite way. The sky world is seeing that going in a clockwise way if you're in it. You're going in a clockwise way and and people are like well you know yeah you can. See thing from just 2 perspectives. Well I'll give you another example and relates to the rock art because you see this happening you see like um, an animal jumping or moving and the motion appears to be positive or going forward. Whatever's happening. Well. If you roll a log down a hill it rolls forward it rolls forward like that animal is going forward. It's not going backwards is not backing up. It's going forward because when you push it down the hill it can only go down the hill and when you're standing over it. It's going in a clockwise motion. If you're down below it. It's coming at you in a clockwise motion if you're standing to the right? It's going in a clockwise motion but all you have to do is take 2 steps to the left and you'll see that thing going counterclockwise down the hill right. 10:32.99 alan Um, ah right. 10:33.79 Johnny valdez And that is something when I'm explaining this in other countries and in our country to different native people. They finally kind of get it Sometimes that's like you know that's what my grandpa was trying to explain to me I didn't get it. You know and it wasn't because they didn't really understand what he was saying in the metaphor or the conversation or whatever. 10:33.99 alan Um, ah right. 10:53.19 Johnny valdez But they're like ah this is why um native people see it may be different than other people. You know my wife is from Maine Wendy she's one of the greatest people you'd ever meet in your life. she's she's white she was living in a good way. From the time I met her for all of her life. She helps people in and out of cancers. She does all kinds of wonderful things. Um, well she helps them with with life coaching and life teaching. It's kind of energy work that she does and what's amazing is. She is constantly looking at it from multiple views in and out of these different views and that's really incredible because when you're able to get into somebody else's thought process. You don't have to agree with them. You just have to be able to see it from their perspective. And I think so many people um who have animosity in in tribal groups are upset because um, people who come you know european type that have come here and and dominated this continent. They feel like. Well I I just need to see it from my perspective. Why can't you just see it from the way I see it and that's fine. But if you're going to have an shared experience in the world. You're going to look at things deeper shameistically or as a medicine person or anything you have to be able to see it from multiple viewpoints. 12:23.28 Johnny valdez Multiple perspectives and recognize that Maybe we're not always right? Maybe it's maybe it's that we need to take a deeper look at what is provided because there's probably a reason that people are doing what they do. Um, there's some people that are just you know. Not nice or they're bad or whatever you want to say but in general people are trying to move forward. Positively they're trying to to go forward. They're trying to do something from what they've learned and and move into a better way live in a good Way. Um I don't say great way right. Because great implies that somebody is better than somebody else. A good way is somebody who's taking everyone's perspective. Elders Ancestors people that will come in the future they're looking at it from a bunch of different perspectives and and that's really powerful I think it's um. That's the way that the best people seem to live and I'm just I'm just glad that I I have a family and a wife a couple of sons and a daughter who are in that way they um have always looked at things in a good way I hope that I've I've helped with it. But I I think that they. Have have learned it from their family and their friends I mean we have such a wonderful, beautiful family on on on both sides of my family and of course my wife's as Well. That really try to um, recognize the value of of others. 13:56.46 Johnny valdez And it's not just in religion or beliefs. It's it's in in that spirituality of of living a good life. 14:07.20 alan Thanks Johnny think that's ah, a good place to stop for a moment if for segment 2 see in the flip flop gang. 14:08.20 alan Thanks Johnny think that's ah, a good place to stop for a moment if for segment 2 see in the flip flop gang.