Rebirth, Re-patterning & Renewal

I witness a significant depth and change when a person has worked through pain and fear to a great enough extent that they can envision a new way of living. He or she senses within themselves new being and describes themselves as being renewed as though a door has opened and they have walked through into a new world. At the essential levels of self is that the energy and force at the base of their being has become energized by their own determination and hope. They can envision and act as though all the fears and sorrows they have experienced can no longer hold them back. They take their first steps like a newborn and go on, step by step, from there.

I can think of two clients who have dared to do this over the last month. The first is a single woman in her forties who was severely abandoned from birth on. She is highly intelligent and capable but has had trouble with attachment and trust based on the manipulation of her mother in particular. She has lived a single life with many friends but few intimate attachments. Her work with Shamanic Healing has enabled her to trust a new friendship and to move away to a new state, far away from her old residence. She ventured along an actual highway with trust and self respect and hope that she, despite her losses from childhood onward, could and would meet the challenges of a new life with new people and a very different atmosphere. She even called it a "1,000 mile birth canal".

This is rebirth. She feels new. She feels joyful. She has courage. She is hopeful. She knows herself and trusts she can manage her life. She actually seems like a different person to others. She is ready to love and be loved and to hope that in trusting a new relationship she will not be abandoned. She is now in a new life and says she can do this because she wants to, has to and is willing to overcome whatever obstacles she must to continue.

The second has been a heroin addict. She is no longer using drugs. She is a young woman in her early thirties who has been abused and abandoned by both parents. Her life, from eleven years on, has been one of increasing addiction. 

Today, after much work and effort, a depth of understanding and courage, she is enrolled in college and is thinking of a career working with animals and/or environmental problems. She is eager and energetic.

She worked with both parents and they have been helpful in her recovery. She sees herself as a different person, both physically and mentally. Her spirit is strong and because of her high intelligence, she has great potential. Although her parental problems are not completely solved, she is able to stand alone without drugs. She takes each one day as a renewed chance to stay strong and free. She is a heroine and a good mother to her own inner child. She uses her source or force or spiritual strength to meditate and to empower her new life. She is reborn a free and very able woman.

Learning from the Chumash - the benefits of indigenous teaching and shamanic practice

This past month, I took a journey to a Chumash Village in Malibu, California, established by the Chumash Nation after the land was returned by the U.S. government several years ago. My good friends, Mati and Luisha Waiya with the Wishtoyo Foundation, sponsored this land with the help of Spirit, their mentors and elders, their own hands and hearts and their deep commitment to this land and to the Chumash people.  They rebuilt the village, paying close attention to the authenticity of the site and the sacred nature of the work. 

We spent several days there with them and our families telling stories around the fire and deepening the mentorship of Mati and of Luisha toward all of us.  We shared our hearts and our hopes for all indigenous people and looked at paths we can follow to help in our efforts toward the deepening spread of Shamanic practices and healing for all people throughout the world as this effort is intended for all peoples, worldwide, whether indigenous or other. 


During the week I spent there in the Chumash Village, I thought about how to articulate the tremendous benefit to the soul and spirit that shamanic practice has had on many of those who participate in it.  The simple answer to the benefits of shamanic practice and indigenous teaching is that it brings one to the center of the self, to the ember that is the force, and to alternative thinking, feeling being taken in through the body and spread from the self into the mind and heart.  Shamanic practice is a daily ritual that keeps one in the center of Spirit while honoring the four directions, the four elements, living a life of awareness and gratitude toward Father Sky and Mother Earth and the balance created by their union within the self and in the world at large.  

This practice asks for action in the world with others and with the earth and sky and air and water.  Animals and other beings are honored.  Life is lived in humility and grace with careful attention to integrity and respect.  Shamanic practice is intended to help others.  It is intended to give out toward what is needed outside the self.  The self is not hidden or harbored as a special secret but is shared as an energy to be given to those in need.  Shamanic practice respects and treasures family and tribe and clan and nation.  All growing and living things are treasured.  Life is considered a gift to be shared.  Gratitude is a state of being.


I have committed to work with Mati and Luisha in any way we need me to to bring honor and success to their endeavors. 

Not recognizing abandonment issues early can lead to problems later.

This month I thought I’d share some information with you on the subject of abandonment among individuals and within families.  Abandonment can take the form not only of physical abandonment (which we commonly see more often), but also of emotional abandonment and it is a deepening trend I have seen in both in the U.S. and in Costa Rica where I do my work.

Abandonment or a sense of alienation occurs when a child, for many reasons, is not welcomed or is incompletely received by parents into life.

This doesn’t mean that the child is necessarily unwanted or not physically cared for, though in some cases that may be true.  In the families I work with, it is more that the child is not noticed at a heart level and deeper, at a soul level. 

The birth of a child is a chance for a mother especially to receive a being, a nature, which we sometimes call “soul”, into her arms and into life.  The father, often close by, may later in life, past weaning and physical mobility, take over and even understand and relate much better to the true self of the child. Still, it is the mother at the beginning who is asked by nature and the hope for a thriving life to look into the eyes of her newborn and see grace...see essence.

A child not interacted with in this sense develops a false self or a persona that he or she hopes will be pleasing to the awkward, cold or sometimes abusive parent(s).  That persona is a mask that pretends emotions and attitudes that are not part of who the child is at a true and natural level. For instance, a child with a warm, feeling nature may become reclusive or even distant, rebellious or self destructive.  A child with a thinking nature may withdraw into an imaginary life while pleasing a needy or unseeing parent(s) with good grades.

A wise woman once said to me, “follow the path the nature of the child sets.  Stay close, stay protective, stay nurturing, stay constant and stay out of the way of the feet of that child, the intention of the child, the will of the child.”

Abandonment and, even worse, alienation, can lead to addiction which can take many forms.  Addiction is not always evidenced by the consumption of drugs and alcohol.  It can take the form of overachieving, greed for success and money or the acquiring of many lovers and few friends.

A child will give a parent every chance he or she can.  A child believes until puberty that there is a chance or hope that a parent will see and understand, will hold and open up, will give up control and replace that with encouragement, or will let go of criticism and give help, will become a mentor and guide.  A child knows, without knowing, that survival and the psychological, spiritual survival of the self depends on a good parent who loves and supports the steps the child takes into its future.

Abandonment happens because a parent is unable to reach out and open up to a child. Most parents want to.  Some do not know how.  Many are abandoned themselves by circumstance and habit or what can be called patterns handed down by families through generations.  Some are workaholics and themselves addicted.  Some are abusive.  Some are cold.  Some have created a wall around themselves with a small opening too narrow for anyone else to walk through with them.

It is the hope of the child that the parent can love.  It is also the hope (often unconscious) that the child will and can respond and thrive.  When the child thrives, the parent thrives.

When I work with a client who has a new child or is having trouble communicating and interacting with his or her child, I tell him or her…


Hold your child on your lap.  Look often into your child’s eyes during conversation.  Tell your child stories. Listen to the stories your child tells you.  Sense and watch the creative spark that indicates the nature of your child.  Does your child hear music in everyday sounds? Does your child see color and line and reproduce images with pencil and color?  Follow the imagination of your child.  Teach and follow the path your child indicates. Listen.  Listen.  Always watch.  Celebrate each step and lead sometimes.  Take your child’s hand and show them the flight of a bird or the way the river runs and deepens.  Take them into nature.  Read them the comics on Sunday.  Show them that there is Spirit in whatever form you believe in.  Teach them that they are part of the four elements of earth, air, water and fire.


When I uncover an abandonment issue with a client, I do a lot of deep therapy to enable the child to create a “parent” so that he or she can “parent” themselves.  I teach him or her the same method I teach the clients who are parents.


Above all, treasure each moment and be glad of the sacrifice in time and energy.  It is worth it and more worth it with the passing of time.  A child on your lap today is the child who will hold you on their lap someday.  Abandonment of a child creates the abandonment of the aged.  The circle of life asks us to embrace step curve from birth to death, to embrace is not to abandon.