Wind Children

Wind is an important concpet in the belief system of many traditional cultures. Wind is considered the basis for a person’s temperament and behavior and the reason a person is animated and alive. Within this understanding of wind as an animating agent, there is also the notion of wind as a holy breeze, which, in Navajo, is also known as Little Wind or Wind's Child (Nilch'i biyázhi). The Little Wind, the force that gives people the ability to breathe and “stand erect," is initiated during conception, when a man lies with a woman and they share breath. At birth, with the infant's first breath, wind is given to the child again, and it is this wind that will guide the child’s life.

According to Navajo belief, Little Wind people are seen as benevolent deities and offer advice to people in danger. Wind puts himself in the folds of the ears, and whatever it speaks for advice is true. This ties the individual strongly to the natural world, with the notion that a person's thoughts and actions do not belong exclusively to the individual but also to the holy air.