The Practical Power of the Shaman

Spirit of shamanism brings harmony and magic into everyday life

Shamanism is a very practical spirituality. A modern-day shaman
could live next door to you and the only clues you might have
are that they get along well with people and animals and have a
green thumb with plants. Also, shamans have a knack for putting
people at ease and for saying and doing the right thing at the
right time. In his book, Urban Shaman, Serge Kahili King defines
a shaman as "a healer of relationships, between mind and body,
between people, between people and circumstances, between humans
and Nature and between matter and spirit."

If you have a taste of divine ecstasy, shamanism can teach you
how to ground it, how to bring it into your everyday life
through using your natural gifts and talents. Shamanism can
support you in translating that experience, that creative energy,
into physical form so it can benefit yourself and everyone
around you. The essence of shamanism is not an esoteric,
mysterious, ritualistic tradition which can only be practiced by
native peoples in a tribal environment. This ancient spiritual
perspective on life is a down-to-earth, pragmatic, realistic
way of living that anyone can use anywhere, anytime, including
in our modern world.

Currently across the planet, the sacred knowledge of the shaman
or wizard is being translated into everyday street language in
order to create more healthy, harmonious and enriching lives for
people. The spirit of shamanism is more of an open, flexible
attitude and approach to living than a rigid set of rules,
formulas and techniques. Applying the basic principles of
shamanism opens people to new possibilities and options for
dealing with modern daily challenges.

From Alaska to the Andes, from Tibet to Tanzania, shamanism is a
worldwide phenomenon. Virtually every religion has its roots in
shamanism, although shamanism is not a religion. It's a
perspective-a way of seeing all things as sacred. Shamanism does
not preclude any religion. It simply says that anyone can have a
direct experience of the divine without an intermediary. By
honoring the sacred essence of everyone and everything, one's
whole life can truly become a spiritual adventure.

Omens and signs

The shaman relates to every form of life as being alive, filled
with energy and always communicating something to us. The key is
in learning how to receive the communication. "Omens are a way
Spirit communicates with us in the physical world," states
shaman Ken Eagle Feather in Traveling with Power. "You can
decipher omens from virtually anything, but pay special
attention to unusual occurrences, whether it's the strange
behavior of birds, or conversations in which someone says
something that catches your attention in a special way, or when
a book falls off a shelf in front of you. You might find that
messages on billboards change right in front of you, so that
while others are reading anordinary advertisement, you end up
reading a message from Spirit. Be careful about being too strict
in your interpretations, though. Remember, you are looking for
guidance, not assurance. An omen might be the same for several
people, or it might mean several different things. It's up to
you to create your personal omen dictionary. This open-ended
response is called nonpatterning, and it provides the space for
Spirit to communicate with you."

Using personal experience as the means through which wisdom is
gleaned (rather than through reading, thinking or analyzing),
the shaman presents opportunities where people begin to sense a
real, interactive connection with everything else that exists,
even those things believed to be inanimate such as rocks,
plastic, glass or metal.

Everything is energy

The basis of shamanistic creation, healing and transformation
has always been the knowledge that the essential nature of
everything is energy. Modern science, specifically quantum
physics has only recently concluded that every living thing is
made of energy. The reason that walls and rocks appear solid is
because they vibrate at a low, dense rate. We know that pictures
travel invisibly through the air and arrive on our TV screens.
Is it such a stretch to open to the possibility that everything
has an invisible energy within it? And that communication can be
transmitted through this energy?

Shamans utilize the knowledge that everything is energy to
create in their world by using their conscious attention to
direct the flow of energy within all forms of life. Energy flows
where attention goes. Indeed, scientists are now reporting that
the outcome of their experiments are significantly affected by
the beliefs and thoughts of the person conducting the experiment.

Since we come to this planet to evolve our soul within the
paradox of this world of polarity (light and dark, inside and
outside, body and spirit), we must develop the skill to play
consciously and creatively with duality. If we are truly
perceptive, we can see how the energies of each opposing
polarity are serving us. If we see how we are at effect of all
these dualistic energies, then we can make a choice of what to
keep and what to eliminate. This is an act of magic. True
magicians are those who can influence energy, whether it is
inside them or in the world outside them. If we have learned how
energy moves and behaves, we have opened ourselves up to our
true selves. This is what the paradoxes of our world teach us.
Shamans know that humans are determiners of spirit, and the
choices, decisions and priorities that we set fashion the
reality of the world in which we live.

Seeing

When shaman use their ability to "see" the underlying energy
dynamics of situations and relationships, they are able to "see"
cause and effect connections and forces that are not visible
when viewing the circumstances superficially, i.e., looking only
at the outer form. Perceiving the energy dynamics of life events
reveals new alternatives and possibilities not previously
apparent.

"The art of the (shaman) is to be able to guide, to be able to
illuminate the path in such a way that the person hooks on to a
greater experience-that of freedom..." Eagle Feather shares.
This allows people the freedom to move beyond limits of past
perceptions into the realm of options, fresh creativity and
natural magic.

A shaman would "see," for example, that the anger of a
supermarket clerk resulted from the clerk's inability to express
their feelings. The shaman could "see" how these emotions were
adversely affecting not only the clerk, but the people in line.
Consequently, a shaman may choose to engage the angry clerk in a
friendly, relaxing conversation in order to shift the situation
into flow and harmony.

Power

We have many powers within us that we can learn to use for our
own benefit and for the benefit of others. From the shamanistic
point of view, all power comes from within. Power comes from
authorship (authority). Shamans become the authors of the
creations in their world by freeing themselves of programmed and
conditioned perceptions. In moving beyond customs, manners,
rules and techniques, the shaman embraces the practicality of "
What works, works." The shaman has little concern for how
something works, only that it produces the results that one
intends. Shamans are the most flexible, utilitarian and
efficient authors of their world. They take the shortest,
quickest route to their goals, even if the path tramples on
their own concepts or beliefs.

One way people can experience this power is to look for proof in
their own lives. Take love, for example. One way to increase the
presence and power of love in a person's life is to decrease the
presence and power of judgment. Shamans notice that their
attention cannot be in both places at the same time, and,
therefore choose where they want to spend their energy. To spend
energy judging that they harmed someone or that another person
caused them harm, would be a misdirection and waste of energy
for a shaman.

Eagle Feather explains more about the true nature of power, "
Anyone looking for power over others or control over material
processes is probably going to be disappointed by the teaching,
which essentially define power as the ability to free oneself
from one's own perceptions and habitual patterns. The message
seems to be that once you align with the energy, you're no
longer the master. Spirit is."

Healing

A shaman is a bridge between this world and the invisible world
of the spirit. A shaman is very anchored, very present in this
world. Being so centered and grounded, a shaman can assist a
person to travel into dimensions and see things from a much
bigger perspective. Then people can heal because there is more
room for them to expand and open to fresh new realities. This
expanded awareness from the shaman creates a strong foundation
for people to awaken to their own healing power within. The goal
of the shaman is always to support the awakening of the soul.
The shaman acts as an anchor so the person can reach their own
depth and move through their own cellular transformation.

Shaman Frederick Wolf concurs. "People really know how to heal
themselves. It's an illusion to think that someone is going to
come and heal them. But what will happen is, when they feel the
support and safety that the shaman can hold for them, they will
have faith enough to go into that place inside of them that
knows how to heal. It's not some magical thing that happens. It'
s very natural."

Way of Living

Shamanism is a way of living on the altar of Mother Earth. It's
a way to live in balance on the earth, a way of finding not only
peace with yourself personally, but peace with nature and your
environment. Shamanism is bringing the two worlds together: your
inner world-"your heart"-with your outer world. It's important
to be balanced, to be grounded in both worlds. We should be able
to go anywhere and be at home, whether it's in a cave or a big
city.

Shamanism is a pathway that can help us to realize the
sacredness and magic within and all around us. Birds that soar
into the heavens, trees whose roots reach deep into the earth,
everything in nature reflects an aspect of our souls. As the
poet Rumi said, "You will see stars and moons mirrored in your
being." Shamanism is letting go of our limited ideas and
concepts of who we are. As we abandon our illusions of
separateness, we open to the beauty and simplicity of our true
nature-our connectedness with all of life.