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Some Lakota teaches on the Nagi, "the soul"
Picture two circles one inside the other. The outside circle is the nagi, or individual soul and the inner circle is the nagi la, divine spirit immanent in each being.
A baby's nagi, especially during sleep, faces inward to the nagi la, "the indwelling divine spirit".
The nagi la, the "little spirit" is "little" only in relation and contrast to the tanscendent Wakan Tanka, one of whose other names is Nagi Tanka, the "Great Spirit".
Now imagine 3 circles like a target, the outer is body, niya, then nagi, and innermost circle nagi la.
If a baby is mistreated or rejected, some Elder women tell, the baby's nagi may choose to withdraw from the body, turn back fully re-unite with the nagi la, and then, the baby dies.
Said, in everyday life the child's nagi needs to be "called back". A number of people have told us that when they were kids, after playing outside in the woods or wherever their grandma's would stop them outside their cabin or tent when they returned. They would then be told to call their nagi back, and grandma would often join in the calling.
The nagi of a child is susceptible to many influences, and can easily wander off, even playfully. And thus it needs to be called back even in the most positive family situations.
However, where there is abuse, rejection, neglect, etc. the nagi may detach and not come back. That child is suffering from "soul loss". Sometimes, ceremonies are done by a medicine man to find the child's nagi and bring it back. Elders say there are many people now who are living with only bodies and minds, but their souls are gone; lost.
"Blue Woman" or "Birth Woman" is a spirit who dwells in the area of the bowl of the Big Dipper constellation. She aids midwives in delivering babies; as she guides the baby's nagi into this world, and eases the pains of the mother and child during labor.
Sometimes after the baby is born, its umbilical cord was placed in a pouch shaped like a "turtle"(keya)(for girls), or "salamander"(agleska)(for boys). This helped anchor the baby through attachment to both the material and the spirit worlds. Although the physical connection between mother and child is severed at birth, placing the cord in the turtle or salamander pouch was intended to bestow on children their first sicun "acquired power". This ritualized action connected them to the salamander or turtle constellation and gave them the qualities of those animals.
Since sicun refers to "intellect" in general, acquiring the salamander's or turtle's sicun symbolizes activating a human's mental and moral capacities, establishing good character qualities. Then, there is the niya, "the vital breath", which commences the circulation of the blood and the breathing processes, and gives life to the body.
So imagine the outer most circle is niya/vital breath, then sicun/intellect circle, then nagi/individual soul, then nagi la/divine spirit.
-Lakota Star Knowledge by Ronald Goodman
Suns journey
To be lost and found is seasonal way
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