Native American Spirits — Scout Guides and Runners
So many people living in North and South America report experiences with the spirits of Native Americans, or “Indians.” My clients often include background information about what they know of their spirit guides and guardian angels, or have been told by other mediums; I generally receive tons of correspondence with questions about archangelic emissaries and Native American spirits.
Ancestor Spirits
I can’t even count how many times I’ve personally been told by psychics, mediums, or spiritually “sensitive” individuals that I “have a Native American woman who comes around” me. My first thought is always that they are picking up on an ancestor spirit — my grandmothers were both of strong Cherokee descent; I’ve been told that my maternal great-grandmother, who was a seer and a healer, was so obviously Native American that she looked like an extra who had walked off a Hollywood film set. One of my earliest memories of a spirit encounter as a child was seeing a Cherokee woman who I identified as my grandmother.
I’m not that kind of medium — one who specifically connects with the souls of departed family members — not with any kind of regularity or precision, anyway. My mixed heritage is also not unusual; Southeastern Indian tribes like the Cherokee were among the earliest assimilated by European settlers, and I’ve met very few people with family trees rooted in the American Southeast who do not have at least some mixed Indian blood.
I do feel, at least intuitively, that there is a biological, cellular history at work in the physical — it does seem that individuals with Native American blood are even more likely to report personal experiences with spirit guides in totem animal form. This may be preserved as or at least compounded by a cultural awareness.
Like your past life in Atlantis
Still, for many years, there was a part of me that wanted to roll my eyes a bit at this statement of the obvious; something about the “there’s an Indian woman who comes around you” reading sounded a bit like the person who undergoes past-life regressive hypnosis and reports memories of Atlantis… or Ancient Egypt… or they were “a soldier during World War II” (who wasn’t?) or they were royalty in a by-gone era.
I’ve always wondered why more past-life regressions don’t produce the less glamorous “I was a peasant farmer” — considering the overwhelming statistical likelihood. Right?
Okay, I digress…
What’s going on with all these Native American spirit guides?
For those living in the Western Hemisphere/ the United States (the overwhelming majority of people I encounter personally or for whom I do readings) I have a few theories about these Indian Spirits:
- they are ancestor spirits
- they are ghosts or soul echoes — technically hauntings, as opposed to spirit guides
- they are literally members of your personal spirit guide team, who just happen to identify strongly with a particular place, culture, and life time
- some, or all, of the above
Scouts & Runners
The most likely explanation for spirits that identify with indigenous cultures is the enormous amount of local entities who come in and out, not necessarily one particular individual attending you, but more like this big collective population that responds to your requests. They’re everywhere and respond briefly, in rotation; they’re close by and handy at the instant of your request. They are also experts.
The amount of souls who exist in spirit — who have lived on the earth — is huge compared to the number who are incarnate in the physical in the present moment.
Depending on where you currently live, there are vast populations of human souls who originate in cultures that worshiped the earth. Native Americans were highly environmentalist in many aspects of their society, but they are by no means the only ancient peoples who were strongly identified with the land where they lived. The same is true all over the world — Druids and Celts, Norse and Germanic tribes, happen to be prevalent in the same mixed lineage of contemporary Americans.
There are types of spirit guides that some mediums call “runners” — if I remember correctly, Sonia Choquette talks about runners and how great they are at finding you parking spaces. I tend to call them “scouts” because nearly 100% of the ones I encounter (as well as you and just about anyone I work with who’s living in North America) are indigenous spirits… scout seems an appropriate title for them.
Basically, scouts are tied to the local land; they are experts in the physical place where you live. These guides are especially adept at assisting you when you drive, travel, go hiking, work with plants, or encounter wild animals. They scout the best paths to physically take; they are also very good “bloodhounds” — they find lost items for you.
Essentially, whenever you need a helper, fast, with a smaller daily activity in the physical, these indigenous spirits are most likely to answer your call for help.
When you go about your everyday life and you see an opportunity for someone to “give you a hand” with a quick task, think to yourself “Who’s literally near by? Who’s most likely present in spirit, in the largest numbers? Who has ancient knowledge and wisdom about this physical place?”
Have you had a personal experience that you would attribute to scouts? Please share your story in the comments below.
Contacting Your Spirit Guides - 101
Free resources for Shift Your Spirits readers:
- Read the ebook by Slade Roberson especially for beginners who want to know who/what spirit guides are and how to communicate with them
- Listen to the mp3 preview of the Spirit Guide Attunement portion of the Talking to Your Spirit Guides class by Slade Roberson
- Try the meditation to Meet a Guide contributed by Jeff Lilly of Druid Journal
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Sonia introduced me once to “helper angels.”
At first I was a little skeptical - but if I lose my car keys - or anything else - I call on them.
THE ITEM ALWAYS TURNS UP!
My elderly aunts alwasys depended on St. Anthony. But they also always owed him money for his poor. (and they were always in debt to him!)
I’ll take all the help I can get. Runners - angels - saints. Bring ‘em on!
Haha Slade, when I opened my shifts your spirits email for the new blog post and read the title, I had to laugh, it is so hilariously uncanny how many times your posts correlate to what is happening in my life. After completing my reiki 2 I had some past life tribal issues that I needed to let go of, and then I had an intuitive medium tell me that he sensed in me a very stong pull back toward my Native American roots again, kind of a get back in touch with Spirit and earth. THEN! My nana found some pictures of my great grandmothers who were Papago Indian healers, Its crazy how everything falls into place one after the other, Ha and there you were with your blog, just in time. It was a fantastic post slade, thank you for the additional clarity and info, always appreciated
x
Wow. My maternal great grandmother was a Navajo squaw. Not until recently did I even know this as for some reason this is not talked about often. However, about 2 years ago I had my first experience in recognizing (or rather, ‘meeting’ ) my totem animal- the owl. it was a profound experience and we literally has an interaction not common as owls tend to be people shy. Furthermore, they are tough to see as they are known for their stealth and they are out early or late- dawn and dusk.
My owl was near our porch. When I spotted him he looked at me, hopped closer to me and did some little movements with his head. I mimicked it and it went back and forth:) But the sighting came at a time when I has asked for help. It did reassure me and the feeling I had afterwards convinced me I had meet my totem.
Since then, whenever I am going through a particularly tough time or even need to know if I am the right path, I seem to see owl imagery if I am indeed on the right tack. For example, I might take a different route on a walk and pass an owl sculpture. Or I might see a sign, logo, and yes, even a real owl as hard as they are to spot. It’s really exciting and so comforting that I know my totem and get to run across it often.
Reading this confirmed that. I was always spiritually receptive even before I discovered my bit of Native American ancestry but it’s nice to feel a connection.
Thanks for this article. As always, the timing is impeccable.
One more bit here- re: the scouts- I hike every day in a lovely trail here in Texas. The Commanches used to populate the area I believe. There are signs up about the area and there is a lot of history there. General Lee and his army even encamped there at one point. Anyway.. there is such energy there and aside from the path being just beautiful I am very drawn to it.
The other day I had to stop and tie my shoe. I got back up, a little dizzy (it IS Texas, so it was really hot) and rounded the trail. I had seen no one on the trail for an hour but as I rounded the corner I saw 2 bikers speeding along right at me. Rather than stick to the side of the path they were more in the middle (perhaps, like me they thought hey, the trail is quiet we can ride freely) and I was sure I was going to collide head on. They were not riding they were RACING. I was scared I would get a head injury., all this flashed in my head and then somehow they passed me and I felt the whoosh of wind. Some miracle I was ok. I was so shaken I stood there and yeah, I curse a little. They ruined my beautiful zen mode! So I kept walking then thought, ok, someone had to have helped me so…thanks (scout guide, perhaps?). I tried to be appreciative of that and not focus on being upset. Minutes later I came upon a gorgeous heron just sitting on a stone in the creek. I stopped, stared at it and just enjoyed it’s beauty. It was like I was being told to relax and get back to being calm. Stop being upset and enjoy you are still here:)
Very neat. It turned out to be much more than just a hike. Sorry this is so long.. j
I have a great story to tell, quite long though, that I think addresses exactly what you have been talking about Slade. A few years ago I was driving to NYC from Long Island. For some reason I had to pull off the LI expressway to the service road but when I got back on the LIE I did something really dumb, I managed to leave my handbrake on and not notice it. I got onto the Brooklyn/Queens Expressway and then went to exit off that onto the Williamsburg Bridge. As I got onto the ramp and went to slow down my brake pedal went to the floor - no brakes and no service lane and I was about to traverse the bridge and head into traffic in Manhattan. I prayed out load and asked for help - big time! I used my gears to slow down but there was nowhere to pull over and there was a traffic light ahead. I had been learning about asking for help from my guides and about learning to be specific so I prayed that I would navigate safely, that I would not be involved in an accident, that I would manage to find someplace nearby to take the car to in order to fix it - cheaply (I had very little money), make the appointment for my interview on time ( I was interviewing a professor at NYU for an article I was writing) and get home safely. …….
Well as I came off the bridge and I was worrying how I was going to stop at the traffic light it changed to green just as I reached it. I entered the flow of traffic and decided to just keep heading in the direction I originally decided on and see if I could find a place near NYU where I could get it fixed. About 3 blocks from my destination I spotted a brake shop, all the bays filled. Someone pulled out of a bay just as I pulled up to it and I drove right in and by then my brakes had cooled enough that by pumping them I could get the car to stop. The guy got to work on it and said he would have it done within 3 hours. I arrived for my interview on time, returned after that to my car to find out the brakes were not damaged - just over heated, he bled them, adjusted them, charged me $70 and I drove home safely!
I no longer doubt the power of asking for help or that it is there and available to all of us once we learn how to ask. I now routinely ask for help in finding a parking spot, usually making a request when I am about 3 or 4 blocks way from my destination. I refer to the being that helps me as the deva of parking. I rarely have a problem parking anywhere.
Slade,
Thanks again for your insights. I have a bit of Choctaw in me (great-great-however-many-great-grandfather was a full-blooded Chief). I’ve always attributed my “hightened sense of intuition” to this heritage, as well as my fascination with the culture itself (particularly their Storytellers). It is also true that I sometimes feel their spirits around me, especially when I’m alone in the garden in my backyard.
Interestingly, the streets in my neighborhood are all named after famous Native American Chiefs. This land (So-Cal) was once part of Mexico, with strong Native American ties.
Now that you’ve brought the role of these spirits to my attention, I’m going to enlist some help with a sickly baby avocado tree I’ve been nursing in my yard! And who couldn’t use a little traffic/parking help?
Love & Light,
Jewels
P.S. Linda & Sabine — great stories; thanks for sharing!!
Hi Slade –
Great post (as always)! And I have a couple of long-ish comments…
First, on the “why is everyone a queen in Egypt/Atlantis/Rome” issue regarding other lifetimes… I’ve noticed that, in most of the other lifetimes I’ve tapped into for clients and friends, the majority have indeed been peasant farmers! On the other hand, I did a reading on Friday for a friend and the other lifetime personality that came through was an African priest. Probably from an area in what is now Mali around the 9th century AD or so.
But I’ve met quite a few farmers and laborers. These are usually connected to people who do the current version of farming — instead of living in a hut on a few acres of land that they till every day, they live in an apartment and work in a cube farm tilling through some large company’s computer system or call center.
As for runners (or scouts) — I love them. I first heard of them through Sonia Choquette. She is very clear about being respectful and to acknowledge them when they work for you. They’ve found me many parking spaces, among other things but my favorite example is when they helped me in a cemetery.
I went to a small town in West Texas last June, about 100 miles from Fort Worth, to find where my paternal grandparents are buried. This is also the town where my father went to high school and also where a tornado in the 50s picked up their house (a la the Wizard of Oz) and dropped it on a hill about a mile away while leaving all the ones nearby without a scratch. So, after going to the library and reading all about the tornado from the archives of the local paper, I went out to the cemetery.
It was a very warm day. And the cemetery was much larger than I would have imagined. It covered about 10 acres. After poking around (and finding a hand-painted marker from the 30s for an outlaw killed in a shoot-out during the town’s oil boom), I finally asked the runners for help.
I got the intuition to follow the breeze by walking into it. After 5 minutes or so, I was in the middle of the cemetery. Then the wind died. I turned to my left and suddenly wanted to go stand under the only tree in the whole place. But I dismissed this out of hand, thinking I was just hot.
I guess because I got a little huffy, the runners seemed to disappear. I had felt them leading me but when I nixed the tree, they just up and left. So, I wandered around a bit more and then started walking up and down the lines. Which went on and on.
After an HOUR, I found the markers. They were the only Butterfields there. I started taking photos and as I walked around, I noticed that the tree was in the direct line of site from where I had stood when the wind died earlier. If I had followed the runners, I would have had a nice break from the sun and then would have been looking right at the marker. So, I started laughing and thanked them profusely, and out loud. Apparently they were mollified since they have never failed me since then.
Corinne,
Thanks for drawing the parallel to Saint Anthony among the Catholic pantheon of spirit guides, helper souls, etc. Anthony does share that specialty.
I’m with you on asking for help from whomever delivers!
Angelic,
How fortunate to have those family photos — very cool! It seems to me that energy healing such as Reiki would coincide nicely with your Native American ancestors. As you follow your sense of purpose, you’re becoming an opening for the intersection of what runs in your family, is in your blood, and the lightworker you are at the level of All Humanity.
In this day and age, we are more enabled than ever before to weave these details together in a way that transcends time and place.
Sabine,
I loved your story - thank you for sharing it! (This post seems to have solicited a very different response in the comments that some others. I really love it when the posts become prompts for these rich personal stories — it’s like you guys are writing the blog with me. I totally dig that!)
I must tell you that my totem is also the Owl. I have tons of lifelong owl stories and experiences, too many for a comment, but I’m sure I’ll write something more about it someday. There is rarely a day that goes by that I do not encounter them or at least hear them. I moved back very close to where I grew up, so for the past few years I have been literally next door to the same patch of woods…
Owl families are quite territorial and will stick to small areas for generations and generations. So I love knowing that my own life mirrors this connection to home; I comforted with an awareness that these are literally, physically the same owls that I heard/ saw growing up.
Also, I must tell you that more rarely I see blue herons in the creek in that same patch of woods. Herons are themselves associated with home, domestic energy.
Linda,
Wow! You had an army of guardians just orchestrating every detail for you. That is such a great story and an amazing experience. In my circle group this past Sunday, I was talking about how I take entire days off to practice this kind of Flow Hunting. It’s like a Scavenger Hunt, or a trek where you just follow the signs and allow yourself to be physically carried through the day.
I find that the more I engage my guides in this way for fun, when everything is just hunky-dory, the easier it is to allow this dance to work for you in a pinch.
Thank you for sharing your story.
Julie,
Your instincts about the sense of your Chiefs and Storytellers is definitely in keeping with my theories. What you’ll discover when you start consciously engaging them is that the way they respond and the degree to which they interact with you increases in a mind-blowing way.
I maintain my mother’s landscaping for her — I like to do it because it forces me to keep that earth-centered activity in my work week. My mother is flabbergasted by my “green thumb” and my “ability to predict the weather.”
I take absolutely no credit for intellectually “knowing” much about the plants and trees I tend. I couldn’t tell you what 95% of their names are, but what I CAN do is listen to elementals and other indigenous spirits. I just ask them what to do and when to do it, and I’m often aware when I’m transplanting something at the right time, or doing something at the “right part of the season” that I am NO Martha Stewart. There’s no “book-learnin” involved at all. I actually do NOT “know” what I’m doing…
I’ll hear simple things like “Wait two days” or “plant it before noon” … If the “instructions” say to water it afterwards, I’m always blessed with a thunderstorm, right on cue.
I must tell you, of all the magical activities I amuse myself with, absolutely nothing puts a smile on my face like this “plant tending.” I totally get why so many monks were gardeners.
Frank,
You obviously traffic in a lot more past life exploration than I do — I am very glad to know that you “get a lot of peasants.” It’s probably my few and far between experiences with these stories that leaves me with this Another Queen of Atlantis bias.
LOVED all the storm, wind, tornado imagery in your story. I think it’s also noteworthy that you engaged runners and scouts in the midst of a cemetery, as opposed to calling on the deceased directly.
You and I both know that cemeteries are NOT likely to be “haunted” at all — no human energy/activity to draw on — and who are the most likely spirit entities to be present in a big, park-like graveyard? Runners and indigenous local spirits.
Makes a lot of sense.
Have you noticed how seemingly easy it always turns out to be when you go looking for names in cemeteries? I can’t think of a single experience where I’ve ever failed to locate a headstone, even when I thought the chances were slim.
Thanks for the great personal story!
Hi Slade,
I have a kinda bizarre story to share. When I was twelve my friend and I were found of sneaking into our elementary school after it had closed. We’d climb a tree and get in through a window that her teacher always left open.
On these excursions we liked to go to the teachers lounge and buy pop (soda) and candy from the vending machines…it was a blast to have free run of the school.
If the act of getting into the school wasn’t naughty in and of itself, some of our other activities certainly were… as we liked to crawl under the desks of the second grade classes and listen to the conversations of the middle schoolers who were gathered outside through the open windows. We’d get to laughing so hard at their attempts to be cool that we would have to throw in the occasional taunt to be certain that their image of themselves didn’t get out of hand!
One time after just this kind of activity, we decided to see if we could get into the library…we went down the passage only to find it locked. It was at this precise moment, trapped between the hall and the locked door, that we realized we were not alone in the school. The Janitor’s footsteps rang out against the tiled floor and they were coming in our direction!
Pressing ourselves flat against the wall and as close into the shadows as we could, I started chanting a mantra to myself…invisible, invisible, invisible. I said over and over with intense concentration. I felt the presence of an entity near by just as the Janitor rounded the hall corner.
He looked straight at us, peering into the darkened hall. We felt the energy of his gaze literally pass through our bodies and then he shrugged his shoulders and turning on his heel, he returned to his duties.
Shaking, we heaved a huge sigh of relief and as soon as we were able to make our wobbling legs work again, we found the quickest way out of the building. The entity accompanied us until we were safely off the school grounds.
Funny, what can happen when you ask for help!!! We certainly didn’t expect that!
Paula,
That is a great story! It reminds me of an incident my instructor just told me a couple weeks ago. I am taking a class in some energy work and his explanation for the invisible is a little different.
He was in his car moving across three lanes of traffic on a service road to get to a major intersection. All of a sudden another vehicle came out of nowhere on that same service road, he watched the woman not paying attention, talking on a cell phone. She was speeding, coming right toward him. He knew he did not have time to get out of the way, felt it was inevitable he was going to be hit. He decided to move forward as far as possible out of her way and relax to avoid injury.
At that moment of surrender, he watched the car pass right thru his and continue on thru the intersection they both had been trying to reach. Neither car was damaged, no accident!. His guides later told him he had made himself invisible, the other driver never even saw him. The guides further explained this by telling him he was vibrating at a much higher level which is how this occurred.
During that weekend of class I had been suffering a headache for the entire four days. But at one point as we worked, I was able to laugh and truly enjoy for a few hours. What I realized was I had a similar, if less dramatic experience of a car passing thru mine! I was vibrating at a much higher level so the headache wasn’t affecting me for a time. It wasn’t gone, my body still had the headache, but I had effectively removed myself from that vibrational level. Once I could no longer maintain it, I was well aware of the headache. Not it’s return, but my return to experiencing it.
Hi Barbara!
Thank you for that insight! That is absolutely what it felt like! I can remember being very exposed, there wasn’t enough shadow for the two of us, so I was hanging out, fully visible, having given my friend the best cover, my thought being that at least one of us could stay hidden and out of trouble!
I also specifically recall looking all around. I was searching for someone or something while I said the words…and the feeling of being passed through (as the Janitor has heard something and the energy of his searching was very surreal) was the most bizarre sensation!
I must have taken my friend with me (we were holding hands) as she had that same haunting experience of not physically being there
Very cool correlation!
Love and Light,
PK
Slade & Barbara,
I have to thank you again because I never really took a look at this memory until now. So I am formulating a theory on this:
I feel that Barbara’s ideas about raising vibration level are spot on…and it I think it also ties in with scouts as well because when I started looking around, I was seeking help from something right there in the environment.
My sense is that this scout was not of the third dimension and that it was an expert on my subject of choice…invisibility (as I felt the presence but got no visual.)
I also distinctly remember the moment of surrender (that Barbara mentioned earlier) while listening to the footsteps approaching from down the hall. It happened when I threw my head back against the wall for a moment before being flooded with light. Then I watched the Janitor round the corner and it was obvious that he could not see us.
Slade, in your experience are runners or scouts multi-dimensional? This is the first I’ve heard of this term and so I’m working on a conscious understanding of what kinds of beings they are…and of course get a feel for the types of experiences can have with them
Love and Light,
PK
Paula,
Now that you say experts, that makes a bunch of sense to me. In my case, joy guides. I laughed with one woman like I would have laughed as a giddy seven year old, over virtually nothing. I actually said that to her, as our laughing was a bit disruptive at points, we just couldn’t stop, but we were having fun. I pictured the 2nd grade teacher (nun) having to separate us to try and keep us quiet!
Eventually our laughter became infectious, no one had any other choice but to join in.
Can’t wait to hear what Mr R has to say to all this….
Just a brief note directed to Linda Law, re: her experience with having left the hand brake on and the truly marvelous way in which she was guided and helped. It occurred to me to wonder about WHY you’d left the hand brake on. So many of us tend to say we do “dumb” things, but I usually try to understand why. Very often, I remain convinced that I wasn’t really dumb at all, even if that’s how we label ourselves. May I humbly suggest that perhaps you were telling yourself something? Like, you’d been “putting the brakes on” somewhere in your life?
People will tell you they sense certain kinds of spirit guides or animal totems around you. As a person moves to sense energy within and around them, their perception and self-understanding moves to a new level. It is astounding. It defies words or explanations, and yet, you sense it is there. This is faith and trust.
HI Slade,
I had a guide when I was a child. He was an indian chief that sat upon a mound with a black hat with a feather in it and he smoked a peacepipe. I would sense him on an old dirt road that had now become a path, where I walked and played as a child. I also had dreams of him in my youth. He seemed to stay present throughout my life.
In 1992, I was with two girlfriends and we took the jeep to a place of hollow ground which has been in my family for many years. I had hiked there with friends on several ocasions. It was a place of mystery to my parents and theirs. They would have outings with family and kids, picnic, garden and end the day with dynamite trying to find the ‘opening’. They never did.
By now I had an understanding that this was a power spot and not to be exploited but left alone. My Indian Chief originated here in my dreams as a very young child of 4 or 5 yrs old when I was brought here by my parents.
When my 2 friends and I drove up as far as you could by 4×4, there in front of us was a very large mound of sawdust from timber being milled on a part of the land. We went on about our hike and when we returned to the jeep we were just resting, reflecting on the day… and my Indian Chief comes to mind and I tell them my story about him. My friend whose jeep it is starts laughing when i say something about climbing the mound of sawdust because she just happens to have an Indian head dress under the seat that is her sons. So here I am sitting in lotus on top of this mound with head dress and peacepipe! I had become him or he had become me? I have a picture of this somewhere!
I have not been back since.
I have a question about this sort of “spirit”. well two or three. first, if you were to leave the area in which they were “tied” to, would they follow you or stay behind, do you think. Second, would this be a spirit who you would send out to gather information for you or would you have to do that yourself? (long personal story involving a friend of mine that I am having trouble contacting right now.) OK, that was only two.
As far as the peasant farmer thing goes, I think I was a peasant farmer. And a poet. And, although I think this is someone else’s memory, i do have one about some soldier. But i was deeply worried about aforementioned personal story at the time, which could have caused me to see a memory that wasn’t mine. Enough asking, time I started waiting for someone to read this.