On my drive to Nevada a few weeks ago, I was zipping down I-15 south with just a few hours to go on my 16-hour drive when I was suddenly hit with a huge wave of emotion.
I kind of looked around, thinking there might somehow be an explanation for this feeling, but before I could really tune in, I started to get nauseous. Then was hit with a sharp, stabbing pain in the side of my head.
I was quite literally in the middle of nowhere in southern Utah.
What kind of energy could I be picking up?
So I turned the radio off, tried my best to ground my energy, but kept driving. It's not like there was anywhere to pull over. As I tried to get any information about what was happening, the lightning bolt-like shocks kept hitting me in the head.
And suddenly, a very angry cloud spirit came to me.
I took a moment to double check that the information I was receiving was correct, since I tend to sense things more than I see them. I told him how he was appearing to me (a big angry cloud spirit) and asked if that was how he had intended to show himself.
Because on occasion a spirit won't quite realize how they look or feel to us.
But no.
This dude definitely wanted to intimidate me.
And he wanted me to leave.
I let him know I was just passing through and would be gone soon. But the nausea and head zapping continued.
The spirit seemed to want me to simultaneously get the heck outta there and also pull over and stop the car. But there were no exits for a few more miles.
So I kept driving while drenching myself in White Angelica essential oil, which eased the discomfort a bit. Thank goodness I'd had it handy in my cup holder.
This blend literally calls in the angels for protection…it's the BEST for protecting yourself against icky energy.
As soon as I saw an exit I pulled over, closed my eyes and took some deep breaths. I drank a bunch of water and tried to get more information, but there was nothing.
Seriously cloud spirit…what do you want?!
Nothing.
Huh.
Alrighty then.
I started feeling just a bit better so I hopped back on the interstate and hurried down the road. Within about 20 minutes or so, I felt perfectly fine.
And then I could sense it behind me.
It looked like an energetic curtain or wall. Almost like a security system that I had triggered when I drove through. I really wasn't sure what the deal was, but it also didn't really feel like it was any of my business and the spirits there hadn't asked me to do anything, so I didn't give it much thought for the next week.
When I returned through the area on my way home, I could see it coming.
There was the most ominous black wall of clouds straight ahead of me.
And I realized I was right back in the same area.
Scipio, Utah.
I took some video on my Instagram Stories (you can see it in my highlights) and I'll be darned if there wasn't an ACTUAL angry cloud spirit that I could see as I drove closer.
And it let me know how it felt about my presence.
Not. Happy.
It was one of the most intense storms I've ever driven through. The wind was blowing so hard, it was all I could do to stay on the road.
And the nausea and headache returned.
But I still couldn't get any specific messages about what was happening with the energy there.
So I called for protection to carry me through safely and suddenly there they were…
Two hawks circling overhead in this crazy wind and hail storm.
THANK YOU SPIRIT!
I decided that I would keep driving until I felt okay, and then pull off at the first exit I saw after that.
It turned out to be Exit 222.
Whew!
Thank you angels…
While I stopped to catch my breath, I posted some additional Instagram Stories and asked if anyone else wanted to tune into the cloud spirit to see if they could get any messages because I wasn't getting much of anything.
Later that evening I got the most remarkable email from a blog reader and client named Heather who saw my stories.
Her dad grew up in this area and she had lived there for a few years as a child. And did she have some stories to tell!
Scipio, Manti and Sanpete County in general were significant sites during the Black Hawk War between the Mormon settlers and as many as 16 different native tribes between 1865 and 1872. These native tribes were led by a local Ute war chief named Antonga Black Hawk.
Okayyyyyy….
I guess that could explain the hawk escort in the storm??
There were over 150 battles, skirmishes and raids in this area before the federal government intervened to end the war.
In the years leading up to the war, the settlers built forts to protect themselves and often attacked any native person they encountered, uncertain if they were hostile or friendly.
The tribes retaliated against settlement in their ancestral hunting and foraging areas by often taking thousands of head of livestock that were out to graze as “payment” for use of their land.
These activities lasted for 15 years with many smaller raids and casualties on both sides.
The actual war began on April 8, 1865 when Ute representatives, including Black Hawk, met with settlers in the town of Manti in an attempt to settle a variety of differences.
But they could not come to an agreement, tempers flared, Chief Arapeen put an arrow in his bow and one of the settlers grabbed him by the hair and dragged him from his horse.
The Chief was badly beaten before the two men were pulled apart. Two days later, the Utes retaliated by ambushing a small group of settlers outside Manti, killing one man.
Over the next seven years, many men, women and children on both sides died in a series of massacres and battles throughout the area. Black Hawk himself was shot in the stomach during the Scipio Raid and the Battle of Gravelly Ford in 1866 – an injury that never fully healed before his death a few years later.
Could that be the reason I had felt so nauseous driving through the area?
Nearly 50 years after Black Hawk died, his grave was robbed and the remains given to the LDS church who displayed them in their museum until 1996, at which point an act of Congress, an archaeologist and a Boy Scout worked to return him to the area where he'd originally been buried.
So to say that there had been significant trauma and conflict in this area would be an understatement.
But here's the even crazier coincidence…
The location of this fateful meet up in Manti that started the war?
It's the exact location of my client Heather's father's childhood home.
Yeah.
She is a descendent of those Mormon settlers and when her father was a child, his family home was still within the walls of the old fort.
At some point, the local school district purchased it from his parents and it's now the site of the elementary school in Manti.
What's even more strange is that my friend (and fellow healer) Amar and I had teamed up to work with Heather on her current home and land in Colorado where there were many layers of energies present that needed healing work.
One of the messages Amar received during a session was that there was some ancestral karma related to Native Americans that was still connected to, and causing issues for, Heather and her extended family.
We didn't have any details as to the specifics, but we worked on doing our part of the healing work and then gave her family instructions on how to continue clearing this karma going forward.
And two weeks after we finished working with them, I just happened to drive right through Sanpete County completely unaware of the significance to Heather and her family.
I mean…whoa.
But this is EXACTLY why doing ancestral healing work is so important, not only to our day to day lives now, but also to the energies present in the land.
The pain and trauma of those years is still so clearly present in that location, just driving down the interstate in the area was painful to me.
And I'm sure I'm not the only one who's had that experience there.
Heather gave me permission to share this story with you and, while I won't share any personal details, I can say that her family has experienced some significant shifts as a result of the work we all did together.
It's so incredible that we had the opportunity to learn about this additional puzzle piece.
Heather's father had no idea of the significance of where he'd grown up until she discussed it with him – although he does recall seeing native spirits roaming the town as a child.
She's also repeatedly had dreams of a house she'd never visited and has now confirmed through discussions with her father that it was the home he grew up in.
The memories have been passed down through the generations and were still present today, in the family and in the land, even though the family members had never heard the stories from their ancestors who'd likely had direct experience with the Black Hawk War.
But what did this all have to do with me?
I mean, I LOVE getting confirmation after doing energy work, but I never expect it. It's just super cool when it happens.
However, this seemed like a bit more than just confirmation from spirit.
So, after I got back home and rested a bit, I sat down to tune into this area to see what I could find out.
I lit some sage to clear my space and then looked over my essential oils in my office to see which one(s) I should work with and it immediately jumped out at me.
Forgiveness.
Yep, in case you're wondering… there's an oil for that.
So I sat down, put a drop in my hands, rubbed them together and inhaled deeply. I opened my eyes, wrote Scipio, Utah at the top of my notebook page, and suddenly…
It started hailing.
Hard.
It seemed the cloud spirit wanted to participate.
LOL
Once I settled back in, a native man on a horse approached me. I don't know if it was Black Hawk… he didn't give me a name and I'm not sure that it was important.
He motioned for me and my Bigfoot guide to sit down in ceremony with him and acknowledged the amount of pain still present in the area.
He then lit a ceremonial pipe and passed it to each of us.
I asked how I could be of service and he said that the he and the other spirits present were doing their best to get my attention.
Yeah, okay.
It worked!
He explained that the pain in the area is so intense that it would be difficult to do the work necessary while I was physically present there and that the native people and the Mormon settlers have now had this collective trauma woven together into a fabric that's embedded into land.
It can't just be removed.
Their stories are forever entwined and the ancestors of that time have carried the trauma forward into many generations, now spread far and wide.
It's different than a curse on the land. It's layers upon layers of anger and hurt. The clouds and the weather have been called upon to help hold this energy in place.
He then asked me to call an ancestor of the Mormon settlers forward.
When he appeared, the two men embraced and shared the ceremonial pipe and then he joined our circle.
It felt like the first step in reconciling the energy in the area.
But then they turned their attention back to me (which is pretty unusual when I do this work). They explained that they called on me specifically because I have done this work for many generations.
They say that I know the land and I know the people, and I can bring everyone together to help broker peace.
And I suddenly saw a vision of myself…looking nothing like I do in this lifetime…walking with a little leather bag from town to town. Going where I am asked to do this work.
Hmm.
The spirits have never shared this information with me before. But I can say that I have had similar experiences in many of the property readings I've done where I simply hold space for healing work between the native people, the land and the settlers.
So maybe they're right.
And if so, I'm deeply honored to have the ability to continue this work in this lifetime.
