Cajete's Words
on Breath and Spirit

"American Indians believe it is the breath that represents the most tangible expression of the spirit in all living things. Language is an expression of the spirit because it contains the power to move people and to express human thought and feeling. It is also the breath, along with water and thought, that connects all living things in direct relationship. The interrelationship of water, thought (wind), and breath personifies the elemental relationship emanating from 'that place that the Indians talk about,' that place of the Center where all things are created" (p. 34).

"Hah oh is a Tewa word sometimes used to connote the process of learning. Its closest English translation is to 'breathe in.' Hah oh is a shared metaphor describing the perception of traditional Tribal teaching - a process of breathing in - that was creatively and ingeniously applied by all tribes" (p. 34).

It is also important to note that Cajete outlines 7 directions, not just 4: East, West, North, South, Zenith, Nadir, and Center (p. 37). I take Cajete's outline of directions to be far more accurate in understanding the Breath / Spirit pictography, partly because he is Native American and partly because his directions create a multi-dimensional universe in which humans live, whereas the explanations outlined by studiers of pictography feel limited by the two-dimensionality of the medium.