Why Shamanism Now - A Practical Path to Authenticity

What is a shamanic healing in the 21st Century? Host and shaman, Christina Pratt, explores this question in three parts. First we will explore the healing that comes from work with a shaman and how that integrates into all the other healing options available to you in the 21st Century. Being a contemporary consumer of health care in the USA is a challenge. In many ways working with a shaman can help you to orchestrate the rest of the options from the clarity and personal truth of your own core needs. Next we will explore the healing that comes from developing your own relationship with helping spirits. In other words, how does learning the basic shamanic skill set help you to heal your self and your life, which then reenergizes your overall well being. Finally we will explore the healing that comes from engaging in life from a shamanic perspective and the transformations that might get you to that place. Much of what ails us culturally can be healed by rediscovering our core values and deep loves, finding others who share them, and recommitting our lives to living from what has heart and meaning. This week we explore “what is shamanic healing”, what could it be for you, and how to weave that into your very contemporary life.

“Recognition Rites is a ceremonial rite of passage which honors and celebrates Elderhood,” explains our guest, author and shaman, Tom Pinkson, PhD. Join host Christina Pratt as she explores The Recognition Rites Program through which Tom “helps people to create rituals in alignment with their deepest core values, their sense of mission and purpose their highest vision of who they are and why they are here, and how to best use their gift of longevity in their quest for fulfillment in creating and living out a meaningful legacy for future generations.” In short, Recognition Rites is a new, old way to create elders and memory keepers who will enrich the fabric of contemporary life. This process begins with a set of reflective questions that help one to harvest the wisdom of his or her particular life. The process evolves through set steps which lead to “gerotranscendence” or the ability to grow into old age with a fortified spirituality and awareness of a shift from the small, doing-defined self to an understanding of a larger Self that is one with the creative power of the cosmos. Tom is the author of the re-released The Flowers of Wiricuta, The Shamanic Wisdom of the Huichol: Medicine Teachings for Modern Times. He has successfully infused the sacred teachings of his 11-year apprenticeship in the medicine teachings of the Huichol into his work as a contemporary psychologist, assisting North Americans to live spiritually grounded lives in intimate relationship with nature and each other for decades.

“Making Ceremony is a way of reminding ourselves that in fact all that we do is sacred,” explains Annie Spencer, founder of Hartwell Centre for Shamanic & Ceremonial Ways in the UK. And our guest this week. Join host and shaman Christina Pratt as we explore with Annie the art and power of creating Ceremony in our contemporary lives. Annie is a frequent presenter at the UK Society of Shamanic Practitioners Conference and an elder and guide in the practice of ceremonial shamanism the worldwide. She explains, “perhaps it is precisely because we are so barraged by advertising hype, political spin and journalistic licence that we need (ceremony) now more than ever... Getting lost in a delusional, fragmented post-modern world of virtual reality, we become addicted to adrenalin, throw ourselves out of balance and then are terrified to discover that one in three of us will contract cancer and need psychiatric help during our lifetimes. Ceremony, and particularly the ceremonies that are rooted in an earth-based spiritual tradition, help us regain our balance, our sense of purpose, and a deep feeling of belonging in the natural world that brings with it a strong sense of joy.” Annie is our next guest the Society of Shamanic Practitioners sponsored interview series. In this series we explore how contemporary shamans are meeting the challenge of their world where the relations of things are profoundly out of balance. It is the ancient role of the shaman in all cultures to tend the balance of things. How are these shamans meeting this extraordinary need today?

The right use of power requires that you are willing to do whatever it takes. The person of mature spirituality understands that this will mean drawing on discernment, flexibility, and adaptability. One must discern when to act with insight on the past and far-sighted perspective on the future or when to act with trust in invisible allies and intuition in the face of the Unknown. Join host and shaman, Christina Pratt, as she explores what it means to take right action in a world that has normalized a diverse array of the abuses of power. Taking right action always requires facing our fears. Only then can we act with discernment. And we must act if we are to engage in the right use of power. The mature spiritual warrior knows that she must “do whatever it takes” while steering clear of “doing it at all costs.” To act at all costs is the desperate act of the child and often results in soul loss and giving away our gifts and power. This lays down the pattern for life draining co-dependant relationships and/or unexplained autoimmune disorders that drain us of lifeforce. We have all acted at all cost as children and we need to go back, heal and reclaim ourselves from those moments. Join us this week as we explore the warriorship of self-reclamation and the art of doing whatever it takes.

Facing our fear is the first hurdle to get over when we take action to create the life we are dreaming of and it is often the next hurdle and the next… Cultivating a right relationship with fear is critical if we want to live for what we believe has meaning and purpose each day. Growing a courageous heart is required so that Fear can become our ally. Host and shaman, Christina Pratt, explains that, “Fear is meant to warn us of danger, not make us afraid of it. And your mind will perceive every change— no matter how welcome and how hard won— as danger.” Join us this week as we explore the true nature of fear and its sad and over achieving cousins, depression and anxiety. In right relationship with fear we are able to see with discernment and to do what ever it takes to bring our dreams into being. That balance between the precision of discernment and force (and finesse) of taking the action happens only in the heart. The mind will grip too tightly and the rubber of spirit never meets the road. Fear exists in relationship with courage. Thus fear and fearlessness are bound and mutual. The paradox of making fear your ally is that the courage that it takes arises from and with fear itself.

“Manifesting Reality is a somewhat bigger prospect than The Secret and all the versions of The Art of Getting What You Want would have you think,” explains host and shaman, Christina Pratt as we continue to explore dreams and visions. The underlying belief of many ancient shamanic cultures is that reality, as we know it is the result of the Dream of the Kosmos, or the Dreamtime as it is called in some cultures. From this Great Kosmic Dream comes the thread of life that connects all things and all times. This thread of life flows through your Ancestors into you and through you to the descendants. You and all of your life have been dreamt into existence just as certainly as you are now dreaming reality into manifestation. So, given the stuff of your life, what are you dreaming? And for the parts you don’t really like, how do you change your dream to change your reality? The helping spirits in a shamanic practice teach us that one of the many responsibilities of spiritual adulthood is to tend your dreams and to pay attention to all that your dreams are creating. Join us this week as we explore how your dreams become part of the Big Dream and how the nightmares of your life can be released by allowing the Big Dream to dream you.

“As we move along our path of continuous evolution,” explain Sarah Finlay and Peter Clark of Shaman’s Flame, “we often go through cycles of heightened or diminished connection to our self-esteem and the sense of our divine power. These cycles might ultimately lead to a spiraling upward of increased consciousness or to feelings of stagnation and diminished potential. Gateways of the Dragon, offered by Peter and Sarah this May at ...the Residential Shamanic Conference in BC, provides useful tools to transmute these inert cycles, helping us to break through barriers to our personal evolution.” This week host, Christina Pratt, explores the many innovations Sarah and Peter bring to their core shamanic practice as a direct result of their unique techniques in obstacle transmutation and the cultivation of multi-dimensional awareness. Peter and Sarah join us as guests in the Society of Shamanic Practitioners sponsored interview series. In this series we explore how contemporary shamans are meeting the challenge of their world where the relations of things—the living and the dead, the humans and nature, and the technological world and the spirit world—are profoundly out of balance. It is the ancient role of the shaman in all cultures to tend the balance of things. How are these shamans meeting this extraordinary need today?

Spirits produce dreams, but not necessarily all dreams. This is important because it means that there are potentially multiple spirits producing dreams, not just a single human soul. Spirits producing dreams can be: personal souls; helping spirits; or non-helping spirits, such as the dead stuck in the land of the living, upset elementals, or angry spirits of the place. And it’s these non-helping spirits that we need to be concerned with. Dreams, no matter their source, are messages. They are gateways to a field of non-localized, non-ordinary information/experience and we need to be sure who is tending that gate. Dreams can be tests, seductions, and distractions that lead us away from our truth in subtle ways never see coming just as certainly as they are guides, warnings, and teachings that can keep us on the path of our true calling. To keep our dreams clear and free of pollution we must be impeccable in our life, live free of fear-based thoughts and motivations, and align with the love light of true awareness. Join host and shaman, Christina Pratt, as she explores how shamans interpret dream messages, dream states, and the true source of our dreams.

This week we explore your nighttime dreams and how shamans interpret them. “There are many valid and useful systems of thought through which to interpret our dreams,” explains host and shaman, Christina Pratt. “It is helpful to understand that there are different types of dreams and to select the appropriate system to use to interpret them. Carl Jung believed that dreams are important gateways to unknown parts of ones self. Jungian dream interpretation is based on the belief that dreams are a direct message from the personal unconscious delivered through the archetypes of the collective unconscious. Working with the dreamer’s symbolic associations the dreamer’s system is accessed. The most important symbolic associations are gathered and combined to give a holistic view of the dream's meaning. Shamans also believe that our dreams are messages, but that the “sender” of the dream may or may not be your personal unconscious. It depends on the type of dream you just had. Dreams can be sent by your spirit, your helping spirits, or by energies that seek to block or divert you from your destiny. We can learn to discern the form, intensity, and sensory quality of our dreams, the type of dream, and how to best interpret it. In this way we can learn whether the dream message is a teaching, a warming, or an intrusion clouding our vision to our soul’s true purpose.

At the core of well-being is the cultivation of right relationship with your self. Shaman and host, Christina Pratt explains that, from a shamanic perspective, right relationship with your self involves your physical and mental health as well as your engagement with others, with your environment, and with the spirit world. And all of this is put into context by one thing—your unique genius or soul’s purpose. Well-being in all of these areas can be cultivated when we feel vitality and energy. And when we don’t feel our vitality, even getting out of bed feels impossible. Our vitality and life force rise and fall relative to how close or far away we are from our soul’s purpose. As we set our focus on living our purpose in the coming year we draw inspiration from the words of Martha Graham, “There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening that is translated through you into action. And because there is only one of you in all of time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and it will be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is, or how valuable, or how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open.”

“The ethics of shamanic practice were brought by the First Shaman who was of Divine origins and not entirely human. The First Shaman brought knowledge and the skills across that broken bridge between the Creator to the humans in each shamanic lineage,” explains shaman and host, Christina Pratt. “The First Shaman brings the teachings necessary for survival in all aspects of daily life, both ordinary and non-ordinary. The First shaman brought the teachings for how to live in good relationship with ones self, with each other, with the Ancestors and the beings of the spirit world, and with the physical environment. Cultures, traditions, and civilizations were all built on the knowledge brought by the First Shaman. The First Shaman taught the next shaman, a human shaman, how to work with the spirits, conduct ritual and ceremony and to serve the people. This is important for us as contemporary shamans to realize. Each shaman, though human, endeavored to walk the path of that First god-like shaman. From this effort comes the morals and the ethics of the practice as well as the continual need for personal sacrifice, cleansing, and ongoing transformation to stay on that path.

“The shaman works by asking for help,” explains Jonathan Horwitz, co-founder of the Scandinavian Centre for Shamanic Studies with Annette Høst. “We never get anywhere alone. We’re always being helped, although often we do not recognize… The shamanic path is excellent for learning to re-connect with being alive, re-discover the spiritual power we are all born with, and to re-learn what it means to be a part of the whole.” Join us this week as host Christina Pratt explores our “shamanic inheritance” with Jonathan Horwitz, the plenary speaker for the 2010 UK Society of Shamanic Practitioners Conference. Jonathan is an elder and teacher in the UK, Scandinavia, Russia, and Hungary. He joins us for the next show in the Society of Shamanic Practitioners sponsored interview series. In this series we explore how contemporary shamans are meeting the challenge of their world where the relations of things are profoundly out of balance. It is the ancient role of the shaman in all cultures to tend the balance of things. How are these shaman meeting this extraordinary need today?

The shaman’s heart is an awakened heart. The path the shaman walks to free the heart offers a metaphor for each of us to find the courage to heal our broken heartedness and step into spiritual adulthood. “Contemporary life can break your heart on any day,” explains shaman and host, Christina Pratt. “And from that wreckage most of us learn to stand in our own way, habitually, practically, and fearfully rationalizing why we remain disengage from our heart and the hearts of others.” What the shaman knows is that while the broken heart is real, the story that we wrap around it is not. If we have the courage to unwrap the story and feel again, we return to reality. In reality the heart contains its own medicine to heal. Where the heart has been emptied by grief and loss, it can be freed to fill its great depths again. Where the heart has closed in fear and protection it can be opened by the wisdom of what truly matters. Where the heart is weak with the struggles of life it can find power in honoring the essence of life. Join us this week as we explore how to engage the medicine of the heart to heal and allow the energies of the heart to flow with passion in our lives.

Can shamanism help with mental illness? What about my depression? Am I cheating myself out of healing by taking my pharmaceuticals? Can you heal my father’s dementia? Does shamanic healing work long distance? How do I “pay the rent” with powerful psychoactive plants and stay in good relationship with the spirit world? Why does gratitude matter? Tune in this week for answers to these and many other listener questions. Shaman and host, Christina Pratt, explains, “Many of the questions we receive are thoughtful and complex. They come in after the shows, via email. This show is dedicated to circling back around to answer many of them.” We will clarify what a shaman means when they say that experiential learning “writes on your bones” and why that matters. We will explore the difference between “entering the Void” and moving in the Taoistic nature of things. Finally, we will look at how shamans understand that while we are not our body, the fact that we are here in a body is essential to living our soul’s purpose and doing what we have come into this life to do.

Have you ever wondered if shamanic healing might help your animal or pet? Join us this week as host and shaman, Christina Pratt speaks with Carla Meeske, the shaman who pioneered Shamanic Method for Animal Communication. Shamanic healing with animals is the same in many ways as it is with humans. Animals lose soul parts and take on invasive energies, for example, just like humans do. At the same time, animals are different. They have animal tribes with members in the physical world and the invisible world, deeply interwoven soul stories with their humans, and they don’t carry ancestral illnesses as humans do. Shamanic healing for animals gives the humans a way to know what a pet feels and needs to bring an animal relief. Often this healing involves giving the human rich advice from the animal. Shamanic skills also give humans a way to attend compassionately and completely to the dying and death of a beloved pet. Join us as we explore the rich and extraordinary gifts that come to us from our animals and their shamanic healing.