The Vision Quest
Told by ~ John Fire Lame Deer ~

        Visions are important to the plains people.  A man or woman trying to find the right way on their road of life, or trying to find the answer to a problem, might want to go on a vision quest to find knowledge and enlightenment.  This often means staying on top of a lonely hill, or inside a vision pit, alone, without food or water, for as long as four days and nights.  This is a hard thing to do, but if you hear the spirit voices telling you what to do, showing you a path out of your troubles, giving you a vision that will determine your life, then the quest is worth all the suffering you might endure.
        The story is told of a young man who wanted to go on such a hanbleceya, or vision seeking, in order to cry out for a dream that would give him the power to be a great medicine man.  This young fellow had a very high opinion of himself, thinking that he had been created to become great among his people and that the only thing lacking was a vision to bestow power upon him.
        His relatives had faith in him, too.  All through the winter they were busy getting him ready, feeding him wasna - pemmican - corn, and plenty of good meat to make him strong for his ordeal.  At every meal they set aside something for the spirits so that they would help this young man to get a great vision.  He was daring and brave, eager to go up to the mountaintop.  He was brought up by good, honest people who were wise in the ancient ways and who prayed for him.  They thought he had the power even before he went up, but that was putting the cart before the horse - or rather, the travois before the horse, as this is an Indian legend.
        When he started out, it was a beautiful day in late spring.  The grass was up, the leaves were out - nature was at its best that morning. Two medicine men were with this young man to help him.  They put up a sweatlodge for him, purifying him in the hot, white breath of the sacred steam.  They sanctified the boy with incense of sweetgrass, rubbing his body with sage, fanning it with an eagle's wing.  They went to the hilltop with him, preparing the vision pit, making an offering of tobacco bundles. The medicine men told the young man to cry, to humble himself; they said to ask for holiness, to cry for power, for a sign from the Great Spirit, for a gift that would make him into a medicine man.  After they had done all they could, they left him there alone.
        He spent the first night in the hole that the medicine men had dug for him, trembling, crying out loudly, fear keeping him awake - yet he was cocky, ready to wrestle with the spirits for the vision, the power he wanted.  But no dreams came to him to ease his mind.  Toward morning, before the sun came up, in swirling white mists of dawn he heard a voice speaking to him from no particular direction, as if it came from several different places, "See here, young man, there are other spots you could have picked, there are other hills around here.  Why don't you go there to cry for a dream?  You were disturing us all night, all us creatures, animals and birds - you even kept the trees awake.  We couldn't sleep. Why should you cry here?  You are a brash young man and not ready or worthy to recieve a vision yet."  But the young man just clenched his teeth, determined to stick it out, resolved to force that vision to come to him.
        He spent another day in the pit, begging for enlightenment that would not come, and then another night of fear and cold and hunger.  When dawn arrived once more, he heard the voices again, " Stop this !  Go away ! "  And the same thing happened to him on the third morning.  By this time he was faint with hunger, thirst, and anxiety.  Even the air seemed to oppress him, to fight him.  He was panting.  His stomach felt shriveled up, shrunk tight against his backbone.  But he was determined to endure one more night, the fourth and last.  Surely the vision would come during it.  Again he cried for it out of the dark and loneliness until he was hoarse - and still no dream came.
        Just before daybreak he heard the same voices again, sounding angry, asking, " Why are you still here? " He knew then that he had suffered in vain, and that hurt him, because now he would have to go back to his people telling them that he had gained no knowledge and no power.  The only thing he could tell them was that he got bawled out every morning and that made him sad and cross.  So  he talked back to those voices.  " I cannot help myself, this is my last day and I am crying my eyes out.  I know you told me to go home, but who are you to tell me?  I don't know you.  I am going to stay here until my uncles come later to fetch me.  Till then, I am staying whether you like it or not. "
        All at once there was a big rumble. Now, behind this hill there was a larger mountain, and the rumble came from there.  It turned into a mighty frightening roar.  The whole hill trembled.  The wind started to blow.  The young man looked up and saw a big boulder poised on the mountain's summit.  He saw lightning hit it, saw it sway.  Slowly the boulder moved, slowly at first and then faster and faster.  It came tumbling down the mountainside, churning up the earth, snapping huge trees in two as if they were little twigs.  And the boulder was coming right down on him !
        The young man cried out in terror.  He was paralyzed with fear, unable to move.  The boulder dwarfed everything in view - it towered over the vision pit - but just as it was about to crush him, a mere arm's length away, it suddenly stopped.  Then, as the young man stared open - mouthed, the hair on his head standing up, his eyes starting out of his head, the boulder rolled up the mountain, all the way to the top.  The young man could hardly believe what he saw.  He was still cowering motionless when he heard the roar and rumble again and saw that immense boulder coming down at him once more.  This time he managed to jump out of his vision pit at the last moment as the boulder crushed and obliterated it, grinding into dust the peace pipe and gourd rattle which the young man had brought for his vision quest.
        Again the boulder rolled up the mountain and again it came down.  " I am leaving, I am leaving ! " hollered the young man, who had finally regained his power of motion and was scrambling down the hill as well and as fast as he could.  This time the boulder actually leap - frogged over him, bouncing down the slope, crushing and pulverizing everything in its way.  The young man ran and ran, unseeing, stumbling, falling, getting up again.  He did not even notice the boulder rolling up once more and coming down finally for the fourth and last time.  On this last and most fearful descent, the boulder leaped through the air in a giant bounce, bedding itself deeply in the earth so that only its top was visible, right in front of the young man.  The whole hill and the ground all around shook itself like a wet dog coming out of a stream, flinging the young man this way and that.
        He stumbled into his village gaunt, bruised, and shaken.  To the medicine men he said, " I have received no vision and gained no knowledge.  I have made the spirits angry.  It was all for nothing. "
        "Well, you did find out one thing, " said the older of the two medicine men, and uncle.  " You went after your vision like a hunter after buffalo, or a warrior after scalps.  You were fighting the spirits.  You thought they owed you a vision.  Suffering alone brings no vision, nor does courage or sheer will power.  A vision comes as a gift born from humility, from wisdom, and from patience.  If from your vision quest you have learned nothing but this, then you have already learned much.  Think about it. "

THIS STORY WAS TAKEN FROM  "The Sounds of Flutes and other Indian Legends"   Transcribed and edited by RICHARD ERDOES
Pictures by PAUL GOBLE

         I would like to add my personal thanks to Josephine Fire Lame Deer for her permission to reproduce these wonderful teaching stories of her Grandfathers, and for the loan of the book which is now out of print.