The Legacy Of
Kà Neè Pa Wit Makwa
Indigenous Leader, US National Swimming Champion, Author, Healer, Musician.
Wayne William Snellgrove
April 9, 1971 to July 2, 2026
Anishinaabe / Nakawē (Saulteaux)
Fishing Lake First Nation · Saskatchewan, Canada
“In the end, love will be what saves us all.”
His Words
Standing Bears' writing carries the same medicine as his teaching: daily meditations for healing, return, and walking the Medicine Wheel.
A spiritual prayer book of 366 meditations on Indigenous healing and spirit. He communicated directly with Spirit and interpreted what he heard for the rest of us.
His second collection of daily meditations. Another course around the sun, this time walking the Medicine Wheel through its seasons and directions.
“We do what we need to do until we can make a better decision.” Meditations on Spirit, humanity, and walking a sacred path with love, humility and prayer.
Translated into French as Leçons tirées des cendres, published by Presses Universitaires de France. In French, he is l’Ours Debout.
His fourth and last book. “In the realm of the Spirit, Life begins when courage takes hold.” A return to the Red Road. Walk softly. Breathe deeply. Come home.
The Fifth
He completed his fifth book only weeks before his crossing.
His Unfinished Work
Standing Bears wanted to make sure that all of the water on Indigenous lands is safe to drink.
Anishinaabe / Nakawē (Saulteaux) · Fishing Lake First Nation
Standing Bears, Wayne William Snellgrove, rejoined the ancestors on July 2, 2026, in Sedona, Arizona, at 55. His life began with a disappearance, taken from his mother during Canada's Sixties Scoop and raised nearly 800 miles from home, not knowing his own name for over three decades.
Even after being diagnosed with a rare heart condition and warned never to swim competitively again, Wayne refused to surrender the water. The child once taken from his people became the first and only Native American ever to hold a U.S. national open-water swimming title. He did it twice.
At 32, having discovered his original name, Duane Ivan Smoke, hidden in his adoption records, Wayne stepped off a plane in Wadena, Saskatchewan, where his mother, Nora Smoke, held her son for the first time since infancy. He had never been abandoned. He had been taken.
Guided for more than 30 years by his spiritual grandfather, Elder Tony StoneHawk, he became a healer, fire keeper, and ceremony leader, carrying prayer into Florida's state and federal prisons and addiction centers, and founding We Are the Medicine, the circle that still gathers nearly fifty thousand strong.
He was also a musician, author of four published books, and a Native American flute player whose music won Best Music Video Narrative at the 2025 Native American Music Awards. In Japan in 2024, at UNITY EARTH's Peace Week, he met Zenka Caro; at the time of his crossing they were living together in Sedona, Arizona.
The Circle He Founded
49.4K strong
We Are the Medicine is a Circle Meditation group, an Indigenous-inspired spiritual gathering that welcomes medicine from all directions: love, humility, truth, respect, wisdom, courage, and honesty. Standing Bears was its founding leader. What began as his circle grew into a gathering of nearly fifty thousand people.
The circle still meets. It carries on in support of his healing mission, under the leadership of Jenny Jones.
His Celebration of Life
Song for Standing Bears
Kristin Hoffmann
Written live at his Graduation / Celebration of Life, July 21, 2026.
Celebration of Life, Online
Graduation / Celebration of Life, July 21, 2026
With words from Drs. JJ and Desiree Hurtak, Zenka Caro, Kristin Hoffmann, Tara Deliberto, Alan Steinfeld, Grandfather GrayWolf, Rhiannon Catalyst, Matthew James Bailey, Big Bear, Gary Walthers, Melissa Jolly Graves, Gwen, Coffee Rain, Carole Groh, Tara Ashton, and Tom Snellgrove.
Read the transcriptCelebration of Life, In Person, Sedona
Sedona, Arizona, July 12, 2026
With Adam Yellow Bird, Zenka Caro, Grandfather Jim GrayWolf, Lisa Rosenbloom, and others.
Read the transcriptCelebration of Life, Tibet
With Ben Bowler, Tracy Potter, Daryl Henderson, Becky Suzik, Robert, and Nora.
You Knew Him Too
A hallway conversation. A sweat lodge. A song. One sentence he said that you never forgot. Send it, this page grows with whatever the circle brings to it.
Share a memoryor write to team@lightnet.org
News & Comments
Read comments & news →“He embodied what it means to become, in the deepest sense, a man of all nations.”
His Music
Native American Flute music album
Max Wind Cameo × Wayne Standing Bear Snellgrove
He was a musician as much as he was a writer. The songs carry the same medicine the words do.
The album, documented
The Seven Grandfather Teachings
These Anishinaabe teachings, each carried by an animal, were the way Standing Bears lived. They invite us to bring our beliefs, our words, and our actions into relationship with one another.
We are part of creation, not above creation.
Humility reminds us that no one walks alone and no one holds all the answers. We listen to the Elders, the ancestors, the Earth, the waters, the animals, and one another. We remember that every living being carries something worthy of our attention.
Love is the medicine that connects all life.
Love asks us to care beyond ourselves. It is expressed in how we treat our families, our communities, the Earth, and those who will come after us. Love is not only something we feel. It is something we choose and practice.
Respect is how we recognize the spirit and dignity within all beings.
Respect lives in our words, our listening, our boundaries, and our actions. It asks us to honor what has been entrusted to us and to leave people, places, and relationships with greater dignity than we found them.
Bravery is carrying love into the places where fear has been making the decisions.
Bears are known for their courage and determination, facing challenges with strength and resilience. The Bear inspires us to face our fears, overcome obstacles, and stand for what we believe in. To protect what is sacred and take the next right step even when the path is difficult.
Honesty begins when we stop hiding from ourselves.
Honesty aligns our inner and outer lives. It asks us to speak truthfully, take responsibility for our choices, and become people whose words can be trusted.
Wisdom is knowledge placed in service to life.
Wisdom grows through experience, reflection, mistakes, ceremony, and deep listening. It is not measured only by what we know, but by how we use what we know for the benefit of others.
Truth is all seven teachings walking together.
Truth is not simply something we say. It is something we become. It appears when humility, love, respect, bravery, honesty, and wisdom are woven into the way we live.
“To honor him is not only to remember his words. It is to continue walking the path he carried.”
Download the teachings
If his story sits heavily with you
You don't have to carry it alone. That was the whole of what he taught. We Are the Medicine still gathers, and all are welcome.
We Are the Medicine →
Follow His Path
Where he shared his medicine
Kept here as an archive of the reach he built, not actively posted to, but still his, and still worth seeing.