Summary: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is the aftermath of a healthy, normal response to threatening, unpredictable, out of control situations. Within the complex inner world of someone suffering from PTSD lies multiple events of soul loss along with other psychoemotional and psychospiritual dynamics. Shamanism, with its expertise in soul retrieval and unraveling the wounds of the soul, is a critical part of the recovery process for PTSD. PTSD is debilitating, leaving people with nightmares and pervasive fear, deep scars and emotional numbness, and often uncontrollable flashbacks to the event. It can be caused by any overwhelming, violent event, whether large scale like war or personal scale like rape. PTSD can affect not only those who experience the traumatic event, but those who witness it, who offer care, who pick up the pieces after, and those who live with a loved one who is experiencing PTSD. We can all look around us and see that we have largely failed to bring healing to those with PTSD in spite of our medical system’s best efforts. This week, shaman and host, Christina Pratt explores what PTSD is from a shamanic perspective and what we need to do as care providers and community to heal it. From this unique perspective we can bring not only healing to those with PTSD, but heart, meaning, and hope to this ever growing problem in America.
