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The Shamanic Journey

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Shamanism is not a religion; it is a way of being. It is the direct experience of spiritual knowledge and the shamanic experience can be found in every religious faith. The Shamanic Journey is an investiture, a pilgrimage that one must undertake on the way to becoming a shaman.   It is a transformation of spirit and becoming a shaman starts from within.  One must strive to be free of illusions, one must be able to see beyond the limitations of preconceived notions or biases and one must be fully committed to “The Journey”.

The word "shaman" originated in Siberia and it describes a specialized type of holy person who practices not only with prayer, ritual and offerings, but through direct contact with the spirits themselves.  The label of "shaman" eventually came to be incorrectly applied to any medicine man or medicine woman of the indigenous tribal cultures.  But, shamanism cannot be so simply and broadly defined. 

A shaman does not follow the laws of man; the shaman follows the laws of Nature and of Spirit. The shaman must be able to live astride two worlds; the world of perceived reality and the world of intuitive reality. The shaman actualizes this duality of existence by venturing into what is called the "shamanic state of consciousness" or the "shamanic ecstasy" and it is during these cosmic journeys  that the  shaman will travel to other spiritual realms, encountering the people, animals and spirits that inhabit the mystical realms of the Universe. 

 Though it is a personal and individual experience, shamanism is tribal in its nature and needs to be experienced within the cultural elements of the differing tribal lands. The shaman must be attuned to the universal mythos of each tribal region in order to understand the Spirit of the Native Land. Though the essence of the shamanic practice does not change and its elemental ritual experience remains immutable, shamanic rituals and experience will acclimate to different times and cultures. 

 In tribal societies the role of the shaman is to be "The Vision Seeker" for the community.  It is the role of the shaman to travel beyond the realm of the material, into the realm of the immaterial, in order to commune with the spirits that guided and protected the tribe.  With the purpose of the shaman’s journey being to maintain the harmony between the tribe’s physical and spiritual needs, the shaman might, for example, go forth on a vision quest before a hunt to meet with the spirit of the animal to be hunted, in order to create a spiritual accord between the hunter and the hunted.

In modern society the most prevalent example of the shaman at work comes in the guise of mass media advertising, though this represents the darker side of shamanism.  Where the true shaman will paint pictures, sing songs and tell stories meant to awaken and liberate the people to a new awareness, the advertising shaman will  use these same methods in order put them to sleep and enslave them in the prison of a false reality. 

Ultimately, becoming a shaman will usually require that one be chosen by a spirit, totem or deity to be that spirit guide's emissary in interacting with the material world.  A shaman will be also called to accept a relationship with a spiritual mentor who will work with them to awaken the emerging shaman to the power within them and will help them set forth on their shamanic journey, be that as a Luke Skywalker or a Darth Vader.

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Looked at but cannot be seen - it is beneath form;
Listened to but cannot be heard - it is beneath sound;
Held but cannot be touched - it is beneath feeling;
These depthless things evade definition,
And blend into a single mystery.
In its rising there is no light,
In its falling there is no darkness,
A continuous thread beyond description,
Lining what does not exist;
Its form formless,
Its image nothing,
Its name silence;
Follow it, it has no back,
Meet it, it has no face.
Attend the present to deal with the past;
Thus you grasp the continuity of the Way,
Which is its essence.

~Lao-Tzu "Tao Te Ching"~

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