I recorded this video a quarter of a century ago, in 1996, during the International AIDS Conference in Vancouver. This is Leonard George speaking and singing at the opening of the event. Leo is a former shaman of the Tsleil-Waututh, a First Nation that has lived in what is now the Canadian province of British Columbia since time immemorial.
A few days after the conference, I met him unexpectedly and heard him say the following: “We are in balance when the spirit lives in the heart. Disease strikes you when the spirit leaves its natural home, the heart. You’ll be healed when the spirit – like an eagle flying overhead – returns to its home, the heart.”
