Dreaming in Australia—the Living Legacy of the Aborigines
Simply humbling. There is no other way to put it.
Despite skyscrapers, theme parks, and other monuments of technological progress, Australia is still deeply rooted in its aboriginal culture and myths. In fact, Australia owes much of its charm and mystique to the daring aborigines who first settled in the land more than 40,000 years ago.
And thus Dreamtime began. As they explored the new land, the aborigines wove a set of beliefs about the origin of things around them. For them, humans, plants, animals, everything on earth is part of a complex network of relationship, all pointing to a bigger existence. We are all interconnected, and the littlest of our actions have an effect on everything. Sounds like heavy stuff, but it gets better.
An interesting aspect of Dreamtime is its “all-at-onceness”; to Dream is to simultaneously exist in the past, present, and future. Linear time disappears, and what replaces it is a freer version of existence. If all these talk starts to become baffling, try thinking of Dreamtime as a guideline for living that the aborigines follow to maintain the web of life.
What’s amazing about all these is that Dreamtime is still here, kept alive and ticking by the aboriginal citizens. It is one of the oldest continuous myth in our planet.
It’s time to think of Australia as something deeper than just plain beaches and surf.
Despite skyscrapers, theme parks, and other monuments of technological progress, Australia is still deeply rooted in its aboriginal culture and myths. In fact, Australia owes much of its charm and mystique to the daring aborigines who first settled in the land more than 40,000 years ago.
And thus Dreamtime began. As they explored the new land, the aborigines wove a set of beliefs about the origin of things around them. For them, humans, plants, animals, everything on earth is part of a complex network of relationship, all pointing to a bigger existence. We are all interconnected, and the littlest of our actions have an effect on everything. Sounds like heavy stuff, but it gets better.
An interesting aspect of Dreamtime is its “all-at-onceness”; to Dream is to simultaneously exist in the past, present, and future. Linear time disappears, and what replaces it is a freer version of existence. If all these talk starts to become baffling, try thinking of Dreamtime as a guideline for living that the aborigines follow to maintain the web of life.
What’s amazing about all these is that Dreamtime is still here, kept alive and ticking by the aboriginal citizens. It is one of the oldest continuous myth in our planet.
It’s time to think of Australia as something deeper than just plain beaches and surf.
posted by Ryan at Tuesday, September 12, 2006
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