How To Learn Shamanism
As I have mentioned in my previous posts - when you decide that you want to learn how to be a "Shamanic Person", it can be tricky deciding which path to go down.
First thing to mention - You are NOT going to learn how to be an actual Shaman by going to workshops, going on retreats and doing online lessons. These will all help you to gain a shamanic view of the world and help you to grow and develop into what I call a "Shamanic Person". This is a person who has been born and raised in the industrialised, technological, agricultural, so called "civilised" world but doesn't really feel "at home" in it. To be a real Shaman you would have to serve a long, intense apprenticeship with a genuine shaman from a genuine indigenous tradition - not something that would be readily available to most of us.
So, here is the first thing you have to beware of - don't be sucked in by any charismatic individual with a glossy website who claims to be a "Shaman" from such and such lineage who will teach you (and thousands of other suckers) how to be "a Shaman" if you give him or her loads of money. Trust your intuition - if it seems a bit dodgy, a bit wrong, a bit too expensive then just move on and look somewhere else.
What I am really saying here is do some research. The internet is absolutely full of shamanic stuff so take a look around but don't buy into the first thing that grabs your fancy. Little story, my first experience of a shamanic healing session, where the Shaman does the "journey" on your behalf, was with a young man who had been trained in the Inca tradition. The experience was interesting but it didn't feel "right" for me. I personally felt no affinity to this tradition. But we are all different and what feels right for me might not feel right for you - at the end of the day it is up to you to choose your path and the teacher or teachers that will lead you along it.
For me the breakthrough I had been searching for came when I discovered "Core Shamanism". Core Shamanism was introduced to the modern world in 1979 by an American anthropologist called Michael Harner (sadly, no longer with us). The weird thing is that I didn't discover it until 2018 - the year that Michael Harner died. Core Shamanism does not tie itself to any indigenous lineage of shamanism but takes the core truths and practices from them all and blends them into a way of life that can be learnt and practised by anybody who finds themselves living in the strangely alien and unnatural "modern" world.
My path to Core Shamanism did not come directly from it's founder but from an amazing Shamanic Practitioner and Psychotherapist called Paul Francis. Paul teaches something called Therapeutic Shamanism which is based on Core Shamanism with an emphasis on Shamanism as a therapy and method of personal development. When I read his first book - The Shamanic Journey - it completely blew my mind, it was like when I first discovered Carlos Castaneda, only this was a PRACTICAL workbook that I could use to learn the path of Shamanism. That was it, I was hooked.
Using Paul's techniques and his thorough teaching methods allowed me to begin my Shamanic Journey. I will be forever indebted to him for this.
So, to sum up, I recommend that you do some research and do some reading. If you think that Core Shamanism might be a path you would like to go down, I suggest you read Michael Harner's books "The Way of The Shaman" and "Cave and Cosmos".
Then, if you want to follow the same path as me - I strongly recommend that you read everything Paul Francis has to offer. Start with "The Shamanic Journey" then "Rewilding Yourself" then "Finding Your Deep Soul".
Good luck.
In the next post I will will discuss some online resources that are extremely helpful.
First thing to mention - You are NOT going to learn how to be an actual Shaman by going to workshops, going on retreats and doing online lessons. These will all help you to gain a shamanic view of the world and help you to grow and develop into what I call a "Shamanic Person". This is a person who has been born and raised in the industrialised, technological, agricultural, so called "civilised" world but doesn't really feel "at home" in it. To be a real Shaman you would have to serve a long, intense apprenticeship with a genuine shaman from a genuine indigenous tradition - not something that would be readily available to most of us.
So, here is the first thing you have to beware of - don't be sucked in by any charismatic individual with a glossy website who claims to be a "Shaman" from such and such lineage who will teach you (and thousands of other suckers) how to be "a Shaman" if you give him or her loads of money. Trust your intuition - if it seems a bit dodgy, a bit wrong, a bit too expensive then just move on and look somewhere else.
What I am really saying here is do some research. The internet is absolutely full of shamanic stuff so take a look around but don't buy into the first thing that grabs your fancy. Little story, my first experience of a shamanic healing session, where the Shaman does the "journey" on your behalf, was with a young man who had been trained in the Inca tradition. The experience was interesting but it didn't feel "right" for me. I personally felt no affinity to this tradition. But we are all different and what feels right for me might not feel right for you - at the end of the day it is up to you to choose your path and the teacher or teachers that will lead you along it.
For me the breakthrough I had been searching for came when I discovered "Core Shamanism". Core Shamanism was introduced to the modern world in 1979 by an American anthropologist called Michael Harner (sadly, no longer with us). The weird thing is that I didn't discover it until 2018 - the year that Michael Harner died. Core Shamanism does not tie itself to any indigenous lineage of shamanism but takes the core truths and practices from them all and blends them into a way of life that can be learnt and practised by anybody who finds themselves living in the strangely alien and unnatural "modern" world.
My path to Core Shamanism did not come directly from it's founder but from an amazing Shamanic Practitioner and Psychotherapist called Paul Francis. Paul teaches something called Therapeutic Shamanism which is based on Core Shamanism with an emphasis on Shamanism as a therapy and method of personal development. When I read his first book - The Shamanic Journey - it completely blew my mind, it was like when I first discovered Carlos Castaneda, only this was a PRACTICAL workbook that I could use to learn the path of Shamanism. That was it, I was hooked.
Using Paul's techniques and his thorough teaching methods allowed me to begin my Shamanic Journey. I will be forever indebted to him for this.
So, to sum up, I recommend that you do some research and do some reading. If you think that Core Shamanism might be a path you would like to go down, I suggest you read Michael Harner's books "The Way of The Shaman" and "Cave and Cosmos".
Then, if you want to follow the same path as me - I strongly recommend that you read everything Paul Francis has to offer. Start with "The Shamanic Journey" then "Rewilding Yourself" then "Finding Your Deep Soul".
Good luck.
In the next post I will will discuss some online resources that are extremely helpful.
Comments
Post a Comment