Shamanism 101

Today I started a course in Shamanistic studies. It takes years to get the stuff down, so I consider this just an introduction. I’ve had some training in shamanic techniques before, but that just scratched the surface, and I’m sure I’ll be digging deeper into this as time goes on. It really feels like following this path is the next step in my evolution.

This class went amazingly well. What that means for me is that I actually got what we were supposed to be doing in the journeys. If you don’t know what a journey is, think of it as a guided meditation. (That’s not really it, but you can find out more on the internet, so use it.) It wasn’t so long ago that this kind of stuff didn’t work for me. I was way too much inside my head to be able to feel, and way to self-conscious and worried about “getting it right” to let go and just let what happens, happen. It was a wonderful surprise to discover that I could be water, be air, earth and fire. Very cool. And I saw, and felt, that being air is how you fly: You become air, and just do what air does, up among the clouds.

As a little background, I’m been working on a post about fear. I completely rewritten it four times, and It’s still not ready. Maybe because it’s just a process I need to go through, maybe what I’m actually doing is changing my relationship to fear, not getting rid of it. More on the later, as it came up in my journeys. Before I talk about my journeys, I want to talk about what happened at lunch.

I didn’t bring any lunch, since the course paper work said that there was a place to get food “across the street.” Well, “across the street” turned out to be a mile up the road. And I was walking. It’s all good though, cause I had a good walk, once I got over the bitch’n. It was cloudy, with some sun, with an interesting wind. I was enjoying the wind when it hit me that I really enjoyed the wind. And this wind was saying “Hi!” It really seemed like an old friend. I have always liked wind, no matter if it’s soft and warm, or harsh and cold, or teasing and playful. I love clear air and a fresh breeze. Talking about this later in class, the instructor pointed out that air is the element associated with being in your head, and, boy, have I been in my head most of my life!

Since I had so much time to walk, I figured it was time to wonder why my feet were so cold today. That part was easy: Fear. But fear of what? It took some time to tease out the the answer, seeing how I had to fight for each word, but I finally got it: I was afraid that I would find out the real reason why I was so selfish. Who me? Selfish? I’m still wrapping my head around that. Here I’d thought I’d made real progress in that area, but, apparently, there is still much to learn. I have a feeling that that word doesn’t mean what I think it means.

I think we had three journeys. I can’t remember them all separately, so I’m going to tell it the way I remember. (I know, I should write things down. But I really don’t want to. I don’t have a good reason for that, I just really, really, dislike taking pen in hand and trying to write down how I feel. It’s much better to talk, next comes typing, which isn’t so bad, but writing comes dead last, in my world. I must have a lot of bad feelings wrapped around writing. From my childhood perhaps?)

I remember starting with an exercise where we tried being each of the four elements, earth, water, fire and air. That was fun. I’m not sure if I was actually being each element, but I sure felt like I was full, or made of, each element. Earth felt all peaty, like soil, water, cool, crisp and weighty. Fire seemed my least successful as I just felt energetic, but air was the most fun. I felt cool and light and transparent and ready to take flight.

Next, we went to the lower world, the land of essences, as I understand it. I went to find my “place,” and discovered a meadow of waist-high grass, along a meandering stream, inside a thick, pine forest. As I approached the stream, I found a clear area of dirt and lots of “Me”s: Many different instances of myself, all different ages and from different times, all different incarnations and realizations of the possibility that was me. Most were faint and ghosts-like, and payed no attention to me, but there was one who was solid and, lets say, mature. He was on his knees, working on something. A drum perhaps. And he seems angry or annoyed with me about something.

My mind has a real tendency to wander off, and this time was no exception. I don’t even know where I go. It’s just that I frequently I realize that I’m suppose to be doing something, or the instructor just said something and I can’t remember what I’m doing, or what the instruction means, because I can’t remember the context. That is why my recollections are always a bunch of separate scenes, punctuated by periods of amnesia.

Anyway, going to meet my guide: I was sitting on a log, with an ordinary-looking guy: thin, youngish, in ordinary clothes. Said his name was Allen. “Allen? Really? What’s your real name?” was my response. He just smiled a wan smile and shrugged. I didn’t get any further with that. At some point it occurred to me to return to the old guy and try and find out what he was so upset about. I had just started that conversation when the instructor called us back.

The next journey was into the upper world. That was my favorite. We needed to find a way up, and, since you can use whatever method you like, I picked a tree. There is a pine tree near my house that is very tall and straight and, when you put your head against the trunk and look up, it seems like it goes on forever. So I rode that tree up, into the sky, through the clouds, into space and into the upper world. I’m told that it looks different for different people, but for me, it was hazy with pastel colors. Sort of like walking on clouds. I found myself a bench to sit on, overlooking the world below. I had a sense that I could look down there and see whatever I wanted: The world, my life, my past, my future, other worlds, anything. At some point, I called in “grumpy old guy” to finish our conversation.

The conversation still didn’t get too far, but I learned a bit more. First, he was disappointed with me because of “so much fear.” It was my turn to be upset: This, after all the work I have been doing on fear? Anyway, I eventually got that there are fears that I’m so not willing to admit to myself that I don’t even feel them. I had just asked the question “How do I deal with fears that I can’t even feel?” when I ran out of time an had to come back.

Coming back was super fun, I just stepped off the overlook and flew down through space and the clouds, slid down the tree and “poofed” my feet onto the ground. I wish I could do that all the time! I wonder if it’s possible, one of these days, that I might get so comfortable with flying that I might just step off some high place, forgetting that gravity tends to have its own way, in this world, at least. I suppose I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.

I’m really looking forward to the next class. In the meantime I have a lot to chew and meditate on. As usual, send questions and comments to rodwhitehouse@ieee.org. Take care.