THE LEGEND OF THE DREAM CATCHER. Long ago when the world was young, an old man sat on a high mountain and had a vision. In his vision, Iktomi, the great teacher of wisdom, appeared in the form of a spider. Iktomi spoke to him in a sacred language that only the old man could understand. As he spoke, Iktomi the spider took the elder’s willow hoop which had feathers, horse hairs, beads and offerings on it and began to spin a web. He spoke to the elder about the cycles of life and how we begin our lives as infants, so that we complete the cycle. Iktomi said, “In each time of life there are many forces and different directions that can help or hurt the harmony of nature, and the Great Spirit and all of his teaching. Iktomi gave the web to the elder and said, ”The web is a perfect circle but there is a hole in the center of the circle. If you believe in the Great Spirit, the web will catch your bad dreams and the good ones will go through the hole. Use the web to help your people make good use of their dreams and visions. The elder passed on his vision to his people and even today, many of us use the dream catcher as the web of life. It is hung above our home to sift dreams and visions. The good dreams and visions will go through but the bad ones will be caught and will melt away with the morning sun. |  |
