The Gentle Revolutionary

When life serves up tumult, the wisest path is moving from your center of gravity -elephant medicine offers wisdom for breaking through false limitations.

Spirit Elephant in Watercolor, 2025 by Nona Jordan

The Crossing

The air was heavy with heat and dust as the golden hour arrived in South Luangwa. We sat motionless by the side of the river, breath held, watching a family of elephants approach the swollen Luangwa River. The water churned, carrying debris, not to mention the ever-present crocodiles.

The matriarch – ancient with tusks nearly touching the ground – paused at the water's edge. I could feel the weight of her deliberation as she extended her trunk, testing the air, sensing the current. Would she and her herd (with babies in tow, mind you) really cross the river?

Without fanfare, she stepped into the rushing water, her massive form somehow finding purchase as her body sank into the water nearly to her shoulders. One by one, her family followed, each elephant grasping the tail of the one in front with their trunk, creating a living chain of determination and support. No trumpeting, no drama – just the quiet certainty that this river would be crossed.

When we think of elephants, we often think of their gentle nature or impressive size. But as I learned in the dust and drama of the Zambian bush, elephant is more than just those things – she is a quiet revolutionary. She is the boundary breaker of the African bush, the unassuming dismantler of limitations. The elephant moves through the world with a bone-deep certainty that the false limits in her path simply do not apply to her.

Elephant, your medicine is welcome.

Rivers are no obstacle to these majestic beings, and the fences and walls we construct fare even worse. Across Zambia, farmers and businesses lament the elephants' disregard for our artificial boundaries. A twelve-foot fence installed to defend a boundary? To an elephant, it's nothing.

We humans are peculiar architects of division. We erect our boundaries – physical, social, political, personal – with such conviction, such faith in their permanence. We draw lines on maps, in boardrooms, around hearts, and declare "this far, no further." But it takes our collective agreement to respect those boundaries for them to hold, doesn't it?

To an elephant, our carefully constructed limitations are merely suggestions, easily dismissed when they stand between the herd and where they know – in the marrow of their massive bones – they need to go.

With deliberate purpose, elephants waste no energy fighting against meaningless constraints. There's no theatrical rebellion, no trumpeting resistance when encountering our barriers. The elephant recognizes her sovereignty, her rightful path, and proceeds accordingly. The fence falls not as an act of destruction – simply as the natural consequence of elephant being elephant, following wisdom that came long before we were hell-bent on these arbitrary boundaries.

How many essential pathways remain unwalked because we've agreed to honor limitations that serve someone else's design but not our own freedom and voice? The elephant reminds us not to surrender to false limitations. She teaches that some fences are meant to fall.

Sister, I know it's easy to feel trapped by proverbial fences – those limitations that exist only because it seems we must honor them. I am acutely aware of this as I watch the threat to our democracy and our freedoms in the United States. I’ve even wondered if it’s better to just quietly stop doing the work I do given the chaos and uncertainty we are facing, until I remember elephant medicine. The damage that is being done is real, and yet - I know my voice and my work are essential. I will not be prevented from speaking out, doing my work, and living in joy. Nor should you.

Lean into the wisdom of elephant to guide you.

Question False Limits

Which fences in your life are actually necessary, and which are fictions? Look around at the walls we accept: the artificial separations between communities or countries, the imaginary lines between our professional and spiritual selves or, even more insidious, a regime that is actively silencing voices of dissent, or bullying people into submission. These are controlling, fence-building tactics. Now is not the time to be contained by limitations that make you smaller. Like the elephant approaching the river, discern which boundaries deserve your respect and which you should simply move through with quiet certainty.

Rosa Parks embodied this elephant wisdom when she refused to accept the boundary of segregation. She didn't fight the boundary – she simply didn't recognize its legitimacy and kept her seat. Her quiet certainty eventually brought down walls that violence could not.

Honor Your Ancient Knowing

Elephant follows paths carved by ancestors over generations, remembering water sources and migration routes long after human settlements have built over them. Their memory is embodied.

You, too, carry deep wisdom. Your body knows truths your mind has been trained to forget. Yes, respect necessary boundaries that protect and serve life, but listen more deeply to that internal knowing that tells you when a limitation is false.

I think of the women who've been told that leadership, authority, or certain fields of knowledge aren't "for them," yet who feel a calling that transcends these cultural fences. What ancestral knowing runs through your veins that contradicts the boundaries others may have placed around your potential?

Please remember that challenging false boundaries isn't about rebellion or destruction—it's about moving with such calm certainty that artificial limitations fall away naturally, like the elephant who doesn't fight the fence but simply doesn't recognize its authority to redirect her.

Stay Grounded While Moving Forward

What is happening in our world requires rootedness and right action. The elephants cross rivers by maintaining their connection – each holding the tail of another – while moving toward the other side of the river. Their massive feet stay in contact with the earth, feeling vibrations, sensing danger and opportunity through the ground itself.

Give yourself the stability of connection to earth and to what's real and essential. Feel the ache of anger and grief at the proverbial fences being erected, and feel your power to move through constraints with quiet determination.

When I find myself accepting limitations that don't serve life – whether in my creative work, my relationships, or my understanding of what's possible in our collective healing – I place my bare feet on the ground. I imagine standing in the presence of elephant, massive and certain. I ask: "What wall needs gentle dismantling today? What boundary exists only because I've agreed to its power?"

Remember: not all fences are false, but many are. Elephant teaches us to know the difference.

The most powerful boundaries to challenge may be the ones in your own mind – the invisible electric fences of "I could never," "I should," or "People like me don't." These are the walls most in need of an elephant's gentle pressure.

What river are you not crossing because you've decided it's too dangerous? What wall are you not questioning because you've accepted someone else's declaration that it's permanent?

The elephants of Luangwa didn't ask permission to follow their ancient pathways. They didn't rage against the river or the fences. They simply moved forward with the quiet revolutionary power of beings who know in their bones that some boundaries are real, and some are fleeting, human suggestions.

Find your herd. Link tails. Cross the river.

With the boundless wisdom of elephant,

Nona

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