Many have been intrigued by and asked me about shamanic healing. Let me explain a little from my 22 years as a Shamanic Healer. I incorporate Shamanic practices into many of the things I do. I have two non profit affiliations in Sonoma County working with youth at risk in a storytelling project with youth and their families and community. I also produce a radio program on KBBF, 89.1 in Santa Rosa, called “El Consejo de las Abuelas” (The Council of Grandmothers) which uses Shamanic ritual and healing to work with community concerns.
Shamanic healing is not as strange or “out of this world” as it may sound or what you may think. At its very core, Shamanic healing is simply ancient and ancestral wisdom combined with engagement with the spirit. It’s about mending the soul through communication and storytelling.
Let's begin...
I draw an image of a black dot in the center of circles that move outward from the dot. At the moment of your birth, your soul or self or force or essence was and is that which sustains you and moves you forward in your life. The first circle represents your foundation from 0-5 years and the second is your base from 5-10 years. The third is your youth from 10-25 years and the fourth is your adulthood from 25-on with the fifth being your persona or "mask" to the outside world. The circles are the lines of your patterns and how your soul or self responded to and was influenced by your environment.
I then draw a line from the black dot, past the circles to create the aspects of your self or soul. I draw a diamond shape to represent your force or self or soul which has facets like a diamond. Much of the Shamanic healing work would be within those facets/aspects.
We begin a drumming session as I explain how the Shamanic aspect of our work together would be used. If you wished to continue with your story and to press on into some concern that was bothering you, we would do that. I would listen and we would begin our dialogue using the imagery we've just drawn with the circles to represent your layers.
I am a healer so I would advise as needed. We might talk about dreams, patterns and family concerns as well as fears, anxieties and losses.
I then draw three parallel lines to introduce the concept of the Lower World where you would find your Power Animal. In the indigenous world, it is believed that a Power Animal goes journeys with you into the Spirit World to protect you because animals have better instincts than humans and came into this world before us. The Lower World is often where the work is done with an intention stated by the client.
The middle line represents the Middle World which is ordinary reality where you go to look at everyday problems like a worry about work or something down to earth like that.
The top line represents the Upper World where you go to find your healer for a specific problem/illness and your teachers or guides.
There are two circles. The first is at the end of the Upper World and is called the World of Spirits. There, you receive an image or sense of your own Self/Soul and retrieve the spirit of a departed beloved who may be able to help you.
The second circle below the Lower World is the World of Souls. You journey there with your Power Animal and Soul/Self and a Healer and I would go as well, to work on a very entrenched problem or very frightening past or present wound.
All this work would be done with your journeying or meditating and entering an alternate state in order to see and sense and work with the intention you bring.
Afterward, with the visions or sense of what needs to be done or can be done, we will talk about your life going forward with the changes needed.
I would then say goodbye until the following week or second week, working in two hour sessions so that time in-between can be two weeks.
