Indigo Raffel: "If we love and trust one another, things get better"

Indigo was on the last 400 miles on the U.S. walk and on the last part of the European walk through Greece. She is Water's sister in Pittsburgh. In giving us a tour of their home, we were enthralled by a family of beavers who had made their home along the Allegheny River not far from downtown, a sign that water quality had improved. The air quality had also significantly improved in the past 20-30 years. Pittsburgh is now a leader in green building. During a quiet moment, I had a chance to talk with Indigo about the walks and her life.

“The U.S. walk was a major marker in my life," she said. "It came at a time when my whole life changed in 1984. By the time I made the decision to go on the walk at the end of September, my sister had died and my marriage had ended, so it was perfect timing. It was an empowerment exercise for me. I could walk by my own steam any place. I needed to change, to move, and the fact that I could walk 400 miles was empowering me, putting wind in my sails. Every day that I walked strengthened that. I had been familiarized with community through my visit to Findhorn in 1982, and I had been involved in a sweat lodge circle in Philadelphia, so all those components had me ready for the walk. It was an easy transition—I had a brother on the walk and the walk was pretty together by then. The walkers were all individuals, but they challenged themselves to work together.”

Highlights for Indigo after the walk included traveling to the Soviet Union with a group of artists in 1990 as part of a vision by Raisa Gorbachev and finding a flyer on the street in South Philly that advertised a sacred dancing event before the Great Pyramid in Egypt. “The dance opened a gateway that will remain open until 2011,” she said. “Eleven dances are supposed to occur by then and eight have been done so far. Each one has a certain tone associated with them. Had 130 people from 35 countries participate in the last dance. It’s been my spiritual driver. In the meantime, there were missions like with Water’s spiritual teacher. His mission was to have this peace dance. He saw what I was doing. Did a dance in 1993 and had people native to Ecuador come to do a dance. Purpose—opens a gateway to consciousness either evolutionary or to lay in certain energies. Each gate has a certain tone and energy. What attracts me is its movement with people from all over the world and we come together and work together and it seems like things change. If we love and trust one another, things get better. This group makes this be a focus. It’s not like it’s a religion or a movement, more a way of being.” For more information on the dances, log onto www.nvisible.com.

For her day job, Indigo works as an environmental educator focusing on responsible energy use in homes and businesses. She creates and implements education programs for grades 4 through 12.

To end the East Coast tour, we had a wonderful event at the Quest Bookshop in Charlottesville, Virginia. Our hosts were my adopted sister Ana Aegis (formerly Ann Clothiaux) and her partner Paul. Ana had participated in our 3-week walk in the Pacific Northwest in the late 1990s. It was great to see them and to roam around this progressive and attractive small city in the shadow of the Shenandoahs.