The insights that have emerged from the Gathering of our Vision Keepers & Bundle Keepers will help inform and strengthen our dance community 
Jeff Westphal writes:
The 2026 Leadership Gathering was a meaningful opportunity to come together, reconnect, listen deeply, and look toward the future of the dance. Throughout the weekend, one message continued throughout, “No one wins alone. No one does it alone”.
We gathered not only as Bundle Keepers and Vision Keepers, but as people with shared histories, shared responsibilities, and a shared love for the dance. The weekend invited us to step beyond our habitual roles, thinking, and communication styles to look at where the dance is today and to use that to guide us.
Strengthening the Foundation
Our SWOT conversation offered an honest and powerful reflection on where we are today. We named the tremendous strengths within our community: love and care for the dance and one another, history, openness, reverence, prayer, community and ancestor work, intergenerational connection, diverse skills, generosity, deep ceremony, elders’ wisdom, welcoming newcomers, and the beauty of the dance itself.
We also had the courage to name the places where we need to grow. Communication, mentorship, leadership transitions, connection between dances, conflict resolution, infrastructure, and transparency were among the challenges identified. Naming these things gives us an opportunity to become more conscious, more connected, and more capable of carrying this work forward.
Perhaps most importantly, the gathering reminded us that within every challenge is an invitation.
There are tremendous opportunities before us: mentorship, youth engagement, build stronger relationships between communities, deeper listening and compassion, more teachings, stronger connections with elders. We were reminded to ask for help, to be willing to receive help, to dream again, and to take care of the legacy we have been entrusted with.
Gatekeeping and Mentorship
Two areas emerged as clear priorities for the greater dance: Gatekeeping and Mentoring.
Our conversations around gatekeeping focused on strengthening the process while honoring its purpose. The goal is not simply to decide who is ready. It is to create a thoughtful pathway—one grounded in listening, intention, accountability, sensitivity, and care.
A group of four people will continue this work and return with an upgraded gatekeeping process for the group to review within 30 days.
Mentorship emerged alongside gatekeeping as another essential piece of our future. This is an evolving conversation that belongs both to the dance as a whole and to each individual dance. We will continue that conversation at the November zoom meeting.
Carrying It Forward
The work now moves from conversation into action.
Over the coming months, we will continue strengthening the connections between Vision Keepers and Bundle Keepers, advancing the gatekeeping process, and diving into mentorship.
We all have a responsibility to keep listening
To keep learning.
To keep inviting.
To keep trusting.
To keep making room.
And above all, to keep caring for this extraordinary gift we have been given.
The future of the dance will be shaped by how generously we share the work, how courageously we face what needs to change, and how faithfully we carry forward what matters most.