Ways", by
http://www.redwindcouncils.org/HTML/shamans.htm
As white people begin to decolonize there is a strong tendency amongst some to seek out alternative spiritual paths that feel more real and authentic. Some of these are "new age" and now - the new New Age - "Shamanism".
To me what is interesting here is the way that so many of these practices become used by white folks to simply continue living their life without questioning any of their privileges or their lifestyle to any significant level.
Also interesting is the belief that "everyone can be a shaman." Though - if most people really understood what most shamans had to go through to become one they'd opt out fast.
In truth, most people, deep down, aren't shamans. Not really. But, perhaps out of the need for significance, people clutch to this. It is seeming to me that more important for most of us is the simple common wisdom of right living.
I received this article from a dear friend of mine Frank MacEowen (author of "The Spiral of Memory and Belonging"). These were his reflections:
Having gotten my start with shamanic experiences
specifically within an indigenous context -- sometimes
called "the long way around" -- there is something
about the way she words things here that captures or
expresses some of my own trepidation about shamanism
in the modern milieu. As many of you know, I've never
felt quite right about *some* of *certain* elements of
the Harner trainings, and other popular training
programs in shamanism, and this is just another
perspective from someone truly practicing as a shaman,
day in and day out, in an indigenous context -- not to
mention one that is under serious threat as we speak.
Her article does not address directly what Westerners
should do in lieu of such popular shamanic programs,
or in lieu of receiving quick weekend transmissions of
"shamanic techniques," but I, at least, thought it
might promote some good inner reflection, for those of
who practice, and those of you who teach.
I've shared this with two friends, one of whom had a
very strong reaction in the negative, and the other
(an indigenous person) a strong reaction to the
positive. So, I think there is something to it worthy
of reading.
On my own path, at present, I would have to describe
myself as 99.5% focused on mindfulness practice and
the artist's journey (poemcraft and visionary
painting).
Nearly a year ago now, on Brighid's Day 2005, I set
aside the practice of shamanic journeying. In part
this was because I began to grow suspicious that my
own ego, with its psychologically savvy way of
co-opting ANYTHING to serve itself, was starting to
lead my journeys...rather than my gaining authentic,
untarnished, or pure guidance from wisdom sources
beyond myself. From talking with several people I've
come to the conclusion that this happens for everyone,
and those who are unaware of this feature, or who say
it doesn't happen for them, are most likely the most
profoundly hooked in under the ego's sway.
I also began to have the sneaking suspicion that with
the sheer amount of shamanic journeying I had been
doing that this was one of the reasons my dream life
had practically gone away. So, in service of a healthy
dream life, and in service of kicking the ass of my
own ego, I elected to take a different road for a
while...one that has an ancient track record for
addressing such things.
In lieu of shamanic journeying, I decided to pick back
up --as a singular focus-- the Buddhist practice of
shamatha-vipassana meditation (which I'd trained in
off and on for ten years in both the Shambhala and
Japanese traditions). I did so for the purposes of
weighing that path against the litmus test of my own
present experiences.
What I can report is that, having walked this circuit
for close to a year, my conclusion is that I think one
of the most valuable things a shamanic practitioner
can do is to either START their path of shamanic
exploration, or augment a pre-existing path, with the
shamatha-vipassana approach. It is a 2,600 year old
fool proof method for gaining mastery over the wild
horse of the mind, learning to track its tendencies
(and how we habitually seek distraction and
entertainment), helping us to observe potent emotions
without getting hooked by them, as well as for opening
the energy gates of the heart.
As I began to contemplate the potentially invaluable
linkage between shamatha-vipassana meditation and
shamanic work, a kind of seed thought arose: Closed
Heart, Confused Mind, Unexamined Ego, Questionable
Journeys. That is not a commentary on anyone else,
only my own path and the continuing process underway
of stripping away the extraneous to get to the real
heart of my life. Needless to say, it has been an
interesting, humbling, sometimes painful, but
otherwise priceless process.
So, I just wanted to share a few of those thoughts, as
well as Ohki's article.
I wish each of you well and pray you are healthy and
warm.
S A C R E D M A R K I N G S:
Poetic Imagination Meets the Dreamtime
http://sacredmarkings.blogspot
Fake Shamanism or Sacred Initiations?
"I must express an important caveat about some of the workshops given on power animals in the Western world. I have found some of these teachings to be extremely incomplete and not well taught in regard to our ancient ways. Unfortunately, these techniques are among the most popular on the international scene of shamanic interest. One of my major aims in writing this book is to assist people in discerning between what is false and what is true, between fake and real shamans, between good practices and hazardous ones. There is so much shamanic “stuff” out there. Some of it makes my hair stand on end each time I hear stories of people receiving inadequate practices improperly imparted. Just the fact that these ancient practices are announced as power animal “techniques” is a good sign of a lack of true appreciation, divesting these noble traditions of their sacredness. The Spirit Animal teaching is one of the most sacred matters for us and is, by all means, a way of living and of finding our soul. Describing our very soul as a “technique” is, therefore, aberrant and totally out of place. I often meet people who have attended such seminars and workshops, and I always hear the same story. The teaching material of the so-called shamanic practitioners imparting these seminars consists of an “Americanized” or Western technique of power animals and spiritual journeys, probably copied from ancient knowledge, but which has, without a doubt, suffered a process of serious “injury.”
Dozens of people who have participated in these workshops have told me that these instructors incite everybody to journey, a form of inner meditation with drumbeat, teaching that whatever animal the student finds in visualizing a tunnel, is their power animal. Apparently, no one is verifying any of the participant's findings to ensure that they have the proper animal. Deplorably, sincere and innocent aspirants may believe whatever they hear in these seminars. This is critical to me. I have led numerous private meetings with people in order to “replace” the spirit animal for people who were genuinely convinced they had found the correct guardian animal by themselves.
One of the most serious examples I recall is that of a lady who joined a teaching circle I offered a few years ago. This woman was silent in the circle, and everyone was asking me what was wrong with her, as her energy was so heavily “off” and depressing. I was glad when the lady asked to speak privately with me. She then shared that she had participated in one of these “famous” workshops eight years ago and found a bear in her journeying tunnel. Having been told that the animal they would meet in the tunnel would be their own spirit animal, she adopted the bear she saw as her animal and started a process of intimate identification with it. This error was causing her major problems. I expressed to her that we need not talk more, that the spirit animal I was seeing as she was talking was one of a completely different nature. I told her then that her animal guardian was a red hawk and not a bear. For a long minute she did not say a word, seemingly puzzled. Then her face simply illuminated. She told me she remembered in her adolescence that she had a most striking dream of a red hawk flying directly at her face, looking straight into her eyes. There was no more to say on the subject. A year later, I saw this lady. She was very radiant and her depression had lifted. It is no wonder! How could a hawk needing to fly live happily in a bear's cave for eight years?
I have countless examples similar to this lady's misfortune. To surrender to an erroneous spirit animal as your essence and call its attention to you on a daily basis may bring deranging consequences for the rest of your life, if not amended promptly. This can become quite dangerous.
In traditional ways, the medicine people always point out the animal spirit to you, depending on their own vision or your own visions. Even if you receive a vision of a certain animal, this may not necessarily signify that you have encountered your true spirit animal. Often an animal may come as a strong sign in your life, but that doesn't mean in any way that this is your own animal. Even when you dream about a particular animal, however lucid the dream, you must confirm your findings with the shaman guide or a competent medicine person. Moreover, the power to determine or “catch” spirit animals for others is not given even to all shamans or medicine people. Traditionally, this capacity belongs to certain shamans gifted in this art. Permission for a future shaman to recognize spirit animals for others is only entrusted to them by the main shaman teacher when the time is ripe. Furthermore, each medicine person possesses his or her own gift or medicine specialty, as we will see in the next chapter, and not everyone is dedicated to the same shamanic occupations.
In addition, some of these practitioners have established what they call “shamanic institutions” that offer instruction in these supposed “techniques.” I ask myself, how can people institutionalize shamanic ways? If the spirit animal teachings are a sacred way into life, how can life be institutionalized? Life is a wondrous reality of transient qualities, and there exists no way to retain it in a cage like a bird or in a “building” as a captive. From ancient times, shamanic ways could never be contained in any societal or religious classifications, for they reflect the great ways of Earth and nature.
Furthermore, anyone who lacks the maturity of these ways may experience all sorts of animals in the journey's tunnel. The inexperienced may even encounter the animals of other persons present in the room with them, all trying to undertake their first journey. A beginner is as a child, fresh and open, not always possessing the aptitude to discern what is real. Many animal guides may surface in the tunnel. Your own fears may be disguised as spiders, rabbits, or snakes, reflecting your own psychological complexes. Angry animals may represent your emotional traumas and ravens, among others, may appear if you are pursuing a healing at some level. But these do not signify in any way that you have unearthed your true power spirit animal, the one that will dwell with you for the rest of your life.
In these questionable seminars, a “technique” of Soul Retrieval is also taught. The instructors have people work in pairs, and one of the two partners must journey to find the power animal, as well as their partner's soul in the Underworlds. This is done simultaneously, as the other pairs also attempt to accomplish the exercise in the room. These students, hardly knowing each other, are assisting one another in retrieving their Souls. They are not taught to discern the significance of an animal or entity encountered in the tunnel, yet the novices are expected to bring it back and blow it into the body and chest of the partner. For instance, if someone finds an illness in the form of a spider or, by chance, the animal of someone else in the room, whatever animal is found in the journey is then blown into the partner's chest as if it were the power animal of that person. When I hear these stories I do not know if I should laugh or cry!
It is important to understand the magnitude of the emotional damage such “methods” may produce for someone inexperienced in these practices. First, not everyone possesses the natural gift of soul retrieval. It is given to specific types of shamans or healers who indubitably must undergo years of hard training. As I have experienced myself, soul retrieval ceremonies performed by native shamans generally last a few hours, during which the shaman, in a deep trance state, suffers and endures the anguishes of the ill person. Upon his return, he is sweating, considerably exhausted.
Second, not everyone suffers a loss of soul. This practice is the latest vogue, poorly divulged by all sorts of false shamans. Many are led to believe that their souls are lost. Regularly, people ask me in their healing to retrieve their souls, when, in reality, there is nothing wrong with them at that level. These doubtful seminars announce: “Let's have everybody retrieve their souls, now!” Why do people allow an unfamiliar and inexperienced person to blow anything into their chest, their heart center, the seat of their spirit, and one of the most delicate and subtle organs of their emotional lives?
This flimsy emulation of native ways exhibits no respect or discrimination. I can only urge people to be careful. These supposed practices are imparted with the assumption that whatever emotional blockages or past traumas we have suffered have caused a soul loss. A true native perspective of soul loss would be more discerning and not so generalized. Consistently, all the Maya, Mongolian and Native American shamans and healers I have met, have taught me that when someone suffers a complete loss of soul, he or she usually lingers sick in bed, physically depleted as the days go by. They would, therefore, certainly be physically unable to attend any seminars! In the case of a partial loss of soul, the patient is commonly quite emotionally disturbed, seeming far away and totally incapable of functioning properly on a daily basis. I frankly doubt that everyone who attends these seminars finds themselves in such a state.
Of course all humans have, at some point, suffered a strong trauma, the reality of their emotional blockages and past ordeals. Who has not? But this in no way implies that your soul is kept captive by a spirit, is missing, or must be retrieved. Time reveals itself to be the best healer for these emotional problems. And for this, you must find an appropriate internal path to liberate you from them through the course of your life. But the soul generally remains fixed in the body. Though it may be wounded, it is nonetheless there. Often, life situations may create a catharsis, allowing us to purge past hurts, injuries or sentimental bruises, much the same way that our bodies will create an ailment such as a high fever. With the majority of people, it is not retrieval that the soul needs, but to be freed. This naturally involves an entirely different type of healing and spiritual practice. So it is important to place your emotional and spiritual life in the hands of competent healers or shamans when you seek guidance to uncover your inner puzzles and understand your illnesses.
The worst and most critical fact is that all sorts of people “graduate” from these seminars after only a few of these classes, claiming to be shamans, when, in reality, they have no real gift, no true vocation and no veracity, nor any real understanding of these ways. In turn, they may only create more ungroundedness and imbalance within those they instruct or heal. The universe has not chosen everyone to be an enduring shaman, one who must strive along the road to obtain these special ways and develop medicine powers. Even among natives, the medicine people develop their own distinctive field. There are the prayer people, the healers of all sorts, the retrievers, the removers, the blowers, the transformers, the shakers, the shape-shifters, those who pulse, those who perform limpias, the seers of the spirit world, sweat lodge leaders, and the vision makers. In actuality, there are not many true retrievers. This skill is only mastered after many, intensive years of self-healing, through various arduous initiations which corroborate whether someone possesses an authentic spiritual tenacity and vocation.
So it is absolutely essential that ancient power animal teachings be taught properly, with sound guidance, to enable the true and serious seeker to reach, through animal integration, the true gifts of their essence."
