“When we can heal ourselves, we also heal our ancestors, our grandmothers, our grandfathers and our children. When we heal ourselves, we heal Mother Earth.”

- Rita Pitka Blumenstein
Yup’ik Great Grandmother

For the Next 7 Generations is well on its way to becoming a full-length documentary for initial theatrical release.
The movie tells the story of 13 Indigenous Grandmothers from around the globe - the Arctic Circle, North, Central and South America, Asia and Africa - who have come together because they were told in prophecy that their ancestral ways of prayer, peace-making and healing are vitally needed in the world today.

They were also told that they must speak in one united voice to awaken the people of the world to the catastrophic consequences we face if we don’t change the way we relate to each other and our Mother Earth. Accomplished shamans and medicine women, their prayers create a powerful vision of a sacred way of life in which we can all participate.

We began filming the Grandmothers in 2004 as they met for the first time at the Menla Mountain Retreat in Phoenicia, New York. While there, they discovered they had a common mission and formed a global alliance to carry it out. As the International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers, they planned to gather every six months at the homeplace of one of their members, to work their communal magic.

Our cameras have accompanied them, as they’ve become a strong presence on the world stage. We were with them in Pojoaque, New Mexico, current home of Mayan Grandmother Flordemayo; in the Brazilian Rainforest where Grandmothers Clara Shinobu Iura and Maria Alice Campos Freire live; in the mountaintop village of Huautla de Jimenez, Mexico, home of Julieta Casimiro; and in the Black Hills of South Dakota to gather with Lakota Grandmothers Rita and Beatrice Long Visitor Holy Dance.

In October, 2006, we filmed them in Dharamsala, India, the second home of our Tibetan Grandmother, Tsering Dolma Gyaltong, where they were welcomed and embraced in an extraordinary meeting with His Holiness the Dalai Lama.

Wherever the Grandmothers go, they nurture people and open their hearts. For the Next 7 Generations: the Grandmothers Speak will bring the Grandmothers to the places in the world where they can’t be in person. Their presence on screen is as alive and powerful and authentic as they are. Being with them on film, we don’t just hear their prayers and watch their ceremonies ... we experience them. The Grandmothers transport us into their spiritual realm. From there, we can see, not how bad the world has become, but how beautiful it can be if we find the will to make it so. The Grandmothers will light the way.