These are the values weʻve learned in Honuaʻula by traveling with groups like the Protect Kahoʻolawe ʻOhana - pay attention and watch each other. Although when uttered on Kahoʻolawe, the phrases often come out sounding a little closer to "pay-ten-shen" and "watch-eech-chadda." At once avenues for personal and group safety, as well, pathways into the soul. In a Hawaiʻi worldview, there is no separation between the soul of the human and the soul of honua, the earth. The Hawaiian practice of Kilo, "to watch or look earnestly at for the purpose of discovering something," is to pay attention to how life is expressing itself in your landscape. When we watch and look carefully at the external environment, and return to this practice often, you just might realize that the external ecosystem beyond your skin is not separate from whatʻs happening inside your skin. Simply, no more difference. 

Art invites us back into a more permeable soul-to-soul relationship with our environment - humans and ecosystems paying attention to and watching each other.

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Through the Lau Ke Aloha: Kinolau art experiences, we invite community into a space of paying attention to and watching native species for the purpose of remembering our soul-to-soul connection. Kinolau (many body forms) remind us to pay attention to the names of native species, to look closely at their patterns, colors, how and where they grow, their life cycle, to celebrate their super powers in our ecosystem. 

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And then to take the next step - to allow the medium of art to express what about that native species resonates for you. This next step of paying attention, of resonance, is to listen and feel for what is super interesting to you about the native species, what gives you chicken skin or a little rush of energy, what stirs your insides, what touches your heart, what quickens your spirit. A fancy word for this soul-to-soul communication is numinosity (go look ʻem go). In kaʻao Hawaiʻi (timeless myths) we see it in the tear of a hero or akua and in references to the connection of our personal Wailua-iki to the larger Wailua-nui of the world.

 

And so we invite you back to the Hālau Waʻa, to a place known for the kilo practices of its fisherman, to become pili again to the practice of paying attention and watching each other.

 

Mahalo to Dr. Kalei Nuʻuhiwa, Kānaenae Together, and Mauliola Endowment for the lessons on paying attention and watching each other. Mahalo to Dr. Susan Cordell of the Hawaii US Forest Service and Hālau ʻŌhiʻa for the lessons on native species superpowers.