Looking after our wairua

(Background music: Soft, serene. The narrator, Tau Huirama, is walking on a grassy path towards a body of water. He is in the Ngāti Toa Reserve, a Tapu Site.) 

We know that when we're by the sea, you can feel the wairua. We know that when we're in the urupā, we can feel the wairua. We know when our wairua is being nurtured by how people... if they listen to us, it upholds our mana, which also strengthens our wairua.

They say tapu: 'ta' is the greatest of anything and the 'pū' is the source, so that's your greatest source. So 'tapu' is the thing that acknowledges your wairua and your mana.

(Tau reaches the beach. He dips his hands into the water and places his hand on his head, symbolically cleansing by removing tapu.)

So when you look after your tapu, and when you look after your mana and your wairua, that's your tapu-ness.

Tapu is a huge element, tapu will look after everything else if you treat yourself as being tapu.

It also happened like when COVID was on. And we were saying then, you know, your greatest source is yourself. Look after your own tapu. The main thing is that whatever you do, you look after yourself.

(Tau looks across the beach. A rainbow appears in the distance.)

You look after people. That's your karakia. You look after the environment.

(Background music continues, and is now layered with soft guitars. Tau is in his home. He walks towards a mantlepiece, where there is a large piece of pounamu placed on a rack. Beneath it is a tub of water. He dips his hands into the tub and drops some water on the pounamu.)

Karakia helps you to bring the taiao into your world, to be part of it. And a lot of the time, like I said, you'd never lose your wairua.

But sometimes, the addiction can over cloud it or you can make lots of decisions based from addictions. And sometimes your wairua suffers for it. If you get off your addictions, your wairua will flourish and will brighten up again.

(Background music: soft piano. Tau is in a building located in a city. He is standing up at the front of a meeting room, presenting to are about ten people sitting at a long table, listening attentively.)

How can we normalise the conversations around wairua?

It'd be lovely to start with that in the home with all our marae, where everyone is able to participate in this kōrero. [To] dispel a lot of the fear around it, you know, and build the encouragement around it.

Our tūpuna, from my understanding, are your first port of call if you can call it that. They are the ones that look after you. They will never let you be hurt.