The Blessingway
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[edit] A Navajo Right of Passage
The Blessingway is one half of the Navajo song ceremonial complexes, the other half being the Enemyway. The rites and prayers in the Blessingway are concerned with healing, creation, harmony and peace. The song cycles recount the elaborate Navajo mythology related to the rites contained within the Blessingway.
Perhaps the most important of all these rituals is the Kinaaldá ceremony, in which a young girl makes the transition to womanhood upon her menarche. During the course of the ceremony, the girl enacts the part of Changing Woman, the deity responsible for fertility entering the world.
Ceremonies regarding expectant mothers are also part of the Blessingway. However, these are not to be confused with some ceremonies held by other cultures for expectant mothers, which may also be called blessingway ceremonies regardless of their actual connection with the Blessingway.(see below)
[edit] A varation on the American tradition of a baby shower
A blessingway can also indicate a variation on the standard baby shower in which a gathering is held before the birth of a baby to provide support and encouragement to the expectant mother. This form of blessingway shares no cultural connected to the Navajo tradition, and shares only the name.
One form that a blessingway can take is common in coastal northern california is as a non-consumerest adaptation of the more traditional baby shower in which close friends and family, sometimes all women, and sometimes both men and women, gather to show support, coordinate postnatal meal plans, sing, and bless the mother. Often a ball of yarn is passed around the circle with each person present wrapping the yarn around a wrist (or ankle if having yarn around their wrist would interfere in their lives, i.e. if they work as a nurse) to symbolize being tied together as a community in support of the mother. When the circle is disbanded the yarn is broken and participants tie the yarn onto themselves as a bracelet or anklet, and it is worn until after the baby is born.
