Consulting a shaman.

[Philos]

I ask because I read about future Shamans and jungle Shamans and all that. People struck by lightning and people who meditate to cure themselves are by some definitions Shamans. You probably mean an Indian Shaman who uses eggs, tobacco and chicken bones or whatever. I don't think they're supposed to get paid by you. Like idk they may trade for something nice. Predatory Shamans in poor places will tell you whatever they think you want to hear. I think that is a jungle Shamanism problem. Basement Shamans who use pills and other drugs are the best ones I know of. They will have you seeing ducks and snakes real quick, but yeah, nah.Diagnosing spiritual illnesses and curing them I guess is any Shaman specialty but basement Shamans do it best, from what I've read and seen.

As for a power animal, I think any Shaman will do. I wouldn't pay them with money and I would ask them a lot of questions. I know a pretty Romanian Gypsy who does spirit animals. Guess anybody can. If I were a Shaman, I'd say you're a snow leopard cat. Maybe just simplify it to cat. That would be an awesome one to have. I don't know what mine is, or if I even have one. A Jack o lantern would be wicked.

another 1,

The lady I am looking to is a well respected practitioner; she does 'shamanic journeying' and 'emotional block release' among other stuff that I don't understand.

Alex.

 

[another1]

Rosseau is right though, Philos. I wasn't aware of your age. A lot slips by me. Maybe just do it without the drug. She may only be using a sort of placebo herb anyway.

The internet is a techno pagan drug cult and people can give some very, very shitty advice. Cancel the salvia and handcuffs party. Good Luck

 

[gmbteach]

And with much trauma for you to try to survive. Some people come out more wounded than "healed".

BTW, I am doing this because I've been stuck about something for the longest time (15 years) and nothing has worked. But re-watching 'Insidious', 'Poltergeist 2' and the above documentary has reaffirmed a notion that I am haunted in some way. Some part of me seems to have wandered off and been replaced by an unwelcome visitor. The only thing that shifts it for a couple of days is half a bottle of Jack Daniels, but it always comes back.

Don't get me wrong in anything I'm about to say, because fantasy's an important part of us. But it happens in the body and the body's the guide to help find your way in it. If you dim your contact with your own body, whether with booze to numb yourself or using hallucinogens to smash to pieces your ability to sort things while a deluge of psychic content goes berserk, then you really have no guide to help. The shaman will say that's her, but she is not your own bodily awareness which is the ultimate authority in a matter of this sort (so don't bludgeon it).

Just strikes me in what you've said that more dissociation is not what you need. All your experience is your body-in-environment. Notice that even getting this fantasy of spirit invasion ("haunted") that you draped over your bodily feelings ("some part of me") came from your environment (you immerse in much screen-time while also otherwise artificially sustaining unawareness of the bodily self). There's no "bad spirit" to cast out here; too much life has been cast out already.

In place of my prior suggestion of lying down and setting up an imaginary scene to invite your “power animal” to, why not set up two chairs across from one another and sit in one and invite the conflicted bit of your self into the other chair and talk it out and reach a mutually respectful understanding?

Or do it lying down with eyes closed if that makes it feel more real. Though I think it doesn't really make anything feel more real. I’m a skilled visualizer but I don’t feel deep trance states make things “more real”. I think that lends to an increased disembodied feeling which is why you get pagans, shamans, et al, going on about OBE’s and possessions and similar, though we experience nothing outside of our own bodily selves, ever. I'm not limiting "self" to "brain" because if you pay attention to both your joys and sorrows and missing bits you find where the phenomena really are... in the tensions and releases of the muscles and viscera of the body.

Thinking it through and trying to use only reason to solve things isn't going to help either. That's dissociation too.

A therapist who uses the imagination (without ever losing sight of the body’s significance in everything) would be the guide you probably should be seeking. Gestalt therapy is where I learned about dialoguing of self to self to resolve inner conflicts. Here’s a sample of the chair technique in Gestalt Therapy: http://www.cetuesday.com/empty-chair-gestalt-technique/

In my prior days of belief, I would do this. I would 'feel' someone there and so would meditate. My choice was to sit cross legged, on the floor (not that I could now) with a candle and focus on the candle. This would be guided meditation. I don't hold much stock in it anymore as I now wonder how my grandfather, who I had only seen once from the time I was not quite 3 until his passing when I was 19, could find me in Mount Isa which is 2000km away from his son, and on the other side of the planet from him!

I would consult someone about meditation first, and see how you go, and without any drugs! If something is really there, you won't need drugs to find it out. If you need drugs to find it out, then it is a figment of your imagination and I would just tell them to 'BUGGER OFF!' every time they annoyed you.

Good luck though.

 

[gmbteach]

What happened 15 years ago?...How did you get that "visitor"?...

Thomas II,

It was at the death of my father. I was alone with him when he died, and the experience changed me from that moment. No graphic details here, but my father had an elemental anger which stayed with him to the last breath, even under heavy doses of morphine and sedative. I have been with other dying people and they were different, calm and accepting. He was another thing.

I subsequently entered a severe illness myself, both physical and psychological and nothing helped. There were many doctors, counselors and various therapies. No good. Time has dimmed the harshness of memory, but I have never recovered my previous health and peace of mind.

I now know that something died in me at that time, and in the space another thing seems to be here. It comes in dreams but it is not him. Recently a Shiatsu practitioner told me that there was something going on and (amazingly) brought out some grief. It was so hard that I didn't go back to her. Now I am wondering if this might be the time to face the demon, before it is too late.

Alex.

Alex,

Maybe you need to get the grief out. Maybe go back and see if more can come out. Maybe what you feel is unresolved feelings about your dad.

Gaynor

 

[Angry Floof]

Well, if you feel you have deep emotional issues to release, ayahuasca might do the trick, but there are risks. A very small percentage of people end up with worse psychological issues after the ritual, but those are probably people already with tendencies for psychiatric problems. Another percentage experience physical problems and some have died. Imagine facing your worst fears. That is part of the process. How does your body respond to terror? Hypertension, heart disease, and other conditions would disqualify you from the ritual (or should disqualify you if the shaman is worth a shit).

The ayahuasca ritual has been described as a psychological overhaul. I imagine that is a different experience for every individual.

Not trying to scare you off, but please be careful. And again, if you do it, come back and tell us everything!

 

[abaddon]

In my prior days of belief, I would do this. I would 'feel' someone there and so would meditate. My choice was to sit cross legged, on the floor (not that I could now) with a candle and focus on the candle. This would be guided meditation. I don't hold much stock in it anymore as I now wonder how my grandfather, who I had only seen once from the time I was not quite 3 until his passing when I was 19, could find me in Mount Isa which is 2000km away from his son, and on the other side of the planet from him!

Belief? But I wasn’t describing any sort of seance. Just psychology.

To talk with oneself is to talk with oneself. Psychologically our selves are not coherent units, but rather a society of impulses and memories and feelings and intentions and introjections that sometimes work at cross purposes. If you talk with a passed-away person, it’s inevitably a talk with an introject of that passed-away person; that is, an internalized image of them (maybe a harshly judging voice if the introject is of a harsh parent for example) that's taken up too much awareness/vitality, with the intent of clearing up "unfinished business" for one's own sake, to be free of that burden and more fully one's own self.

Spirit talk is always psychological talk. Spiritual people who take it literally are confusing bits of themselves as "me" and external "other" bits.

So, I’ve only advocated here-now awareness, and not just sitting in observation as in the more silent sort of meditation, nor "now you're seeing this, and now you're seeing that" guided meditation, but rather engaging the here-now experience in dialogue. The more unplanned and spontaneous the more authentically real it is. It’s entirely a matter of feeling into the body and contacting here-now awareness and using fantasy temporarily only as a tool for that, by lending a voice to viscerally felt tensions so they may express and release.

And it's just an idea I tossed out there for Alex's consideration, from my own life experience. I'm impressed with how immediate results are with dialoguing and relating well with one's pluralistic self, and the strength that comes with identifying the "introjects" and realizing "no, that hateful bit is NOT me so I'm going to defuse its energy". Even if he finds a power animal, that too is some energy of his own psyche just offering some support to other aspects of his own psyche.

 

[gmbteach]

In my prior days of belief, I would do this. I would 'feel' someone there and so would meditate. My choice was to sit cross legged, on the floor (not that I could now) with a candle and focus on the candle. This would be guided meditation. I don't hold much stock in it anymore as I now wonder how my grandfather, who I had only seen once from the time I was not quite 3 until his passing when I was 19, could find me in Mount Isa which is 2000km away from his son, and on the other side of the planet from him!

Belief? But I wasn’t describing any sort of seance. Just psychology.

To talk with oneself is to talk with oneself. Psychologically our selves are not coherent units, but rather a society of impulses and memories and feelings and intentions and introjections that sometimes work at cross purposes. If you talk with a passed-away person, it’s inevitably a talk with an introject of that passed-away person; that is, an internalized image of them (maybe a harshly judging voice if the introject is of a harsh parent for example) that's taken up too much awareness/vitality, with the intent of clearing up "unfinished business" for one's own sake, to be free of that burden and more fully one's own self.

Oh, I don't recall referring to it as a 'seance' either. Further, any mention of my grandfather was purely due to the fact that my 'guide' in meditation, kept referring to the 'presence' as my grandfather.


Spirit talk is always psychological talk. Spiritual people who take it literally are confusing bits of themselves as "me" and external "other" bits.

So, I’ve only advocated here-now awareness, and not just sitting in observation as in the more silent sort of meditation, nor "now you're seeing this, and now you're seeing that" guided meditation, but rather engaging the here-now experience in dialogue. The more unplanned and spontaneous the more authentically real it is. It’s entirely a matter of feeling into the body and contacting here-now awareness and using fantasy temporarily only as a tool for that, by lending a voice to viscerally felt tensions so they may express and release.

And it's just an idea I tossed out there for Alex's consideration, from my own life experience. I'm impressed with how immediate results are with dialoguing and relating well with one's pluralistic self, and the strength that comes with identifying the "introjects" and realizing "no, that hateful bit is NOT me so I'm going to defuse its energy". Even if he finds a power animal, that too is some energy of his own psyche just offering some support to other aspects of his own psyche.

I get what you are saying, and I concur. I am just saying that I used to do such stuff regularly - not anymore.

At the moment, the more suggestions Alex has, the better IMO, as what he is doing is, hopefully, life changing for him.

Further, I don't recall saying it was a 'seance'. Further, any reference to the 'presence' being 'my grandfather' was made by my 'guide' at the time. Nothing more.

 

[abaddon]

gmbteach, some mistaken reading/assumptions on my part. Beg your pardon.

 

[gmbteach]

gmbteach, my mistake. Beg your pardon.

That's okay. I had to re-read what I posted as my brain is a bit foggy at the moment TBH, so wasn't sure.

 

[Philos]

Alex,

Maybe you need to get the grief out. Maybe go back and see if more can come out. Maybe what you feel is unresolved feelings about your dad.

Gaynor

Gaynor,

OK, this is the very bottom line.

As I approach the age at which my Dad died, I have developed this fear that he will be waiting for me on the other side when I die and start up on me again. This is a person that did not want to die and fought for every last second of life with intense willpower. Although I have no formal religious beliefs there is this gut feeling that he is hanging around in limbo, waiting to attach again.

It is very difficult for me to see this stuff as 'grief' in any normal sense of the word. On one hand it seems kind of crazy, but on the other hand the possibility feels real. A psychotherapist once told me about 'hungry souls', people that have to feed off others in order to feel alive. I'm thinking they may be the ones that cannot pass through death, and get trapped like ghosts somewhere.

So, it struck me that shamans do deal with this stuff, and ancestors feature in their belief system. If I do have to face this dreaded scenario, an understanding of shamanism and a very powerful spirit animal sounds like a good plan to me.

Alex.

 

[gmbteach]

Alex,

Maybe you need to get the grief out. Maybe go back and see if more can come out. Maybe what you feel is unresolved feelings about your dad.

Gaynor

Gaynor,

OK, this is the very bottom line.

As I approach the age at which my Dad died, I have developed this fear that he will be waiting for me on the other side when I die and start up on me again. This is a person that did not want to die and fought for every last second of life with intense willpower. Although I have no formal religious beliefs there is this gut feeling that he is hanging around in limbo, waiting to attach again.

It is very difficult for me to see this stuff as 'grief' in any normal sense of the word. On one hand it seems kind of crazy, but on the other hand the possibility feels real. A psychotherapist once told me about 'hungry souls', people that have to feed off others in order to feel alive. I'm thinking they may be the ones that cannot pass through death, and get trapped like ghosts somewhere.

So, it struck me that shamans do deal with this stuff, and ancestors feature in their belief system. If I do have to face this dreaded scenario, an understanding of shamanism and a very powerful spirit animal sounds like a good plan to me.

Alex.

Alex,

Thank you. It sounds like your head is well and truly screwed on right and are approaching this rationally. Well done!

Good luck.

Gaynor

 

[Philos]

Alex,

Thank you. It sounds like your head is well and truly screwed on right and are approaching this rationally. Well done!

Good luck.

Gaynor

gmb,

Good grief, I didn't expect anyone to say that. I was expecting to be called a fruitloop.

Your post is a keeper for me.

Alex.

 

[another1]

On the Aya issue, I read on the archaic revival facebook page (really neat) that Ayahuasca is like a mind defrag and pure DMT smoked in a pipe is like a total operating system replacement. In my couple of experiences, I saw some images that weren't from my own imagination. The Aya experience I had was like a movie sorta. Not extremely clear, possibly because the people who cooked the stuff put other agents in the brew. They used a jungle dope method and threw Datura in the stuff. Datura is a deleriant and people have died on it, but it is supposedly safe the way they cook it. That must be a very precise recipe I'd think. I was searching for a pack of cigarettes all night and it was like the wisdom stone to me. If I could just find those damn cigarettes I could o to sleep. I was talking to some people about this red line I kept seeing shoot through the room. Later I learned the people weren't really there. They had distinct personalities and I felt like I knew them, but they were just parts of me having a conversation. What was said I can't remember, other than complaining about the damn red line.

That was as far as I went on the Aya, but the smoked stuff was indeed the breath of God. I have a morbidly deranged imagination and I have been like that all my life, so what I saw may not be relevant to a person with good thoughts. I saw some really shiny stuff and some grids, geometry shapes, insects, satellites in a vacuum, my whole life and the decisions I made written in strange text above windows that played memories like youtube videos. There was a sinister theme to it, like I've lived as a sort of plague in life. I saw some other things and tried to communicate with the things and they pushed me away. Dude, there are no words but I love talking about it. Just ten minutes that seriously were like a lifetime in a little Merkaba sport spaceship where I was editing a film reel of my future. I would never stop talkin about this experience for the rest of my life.

But yeah, Aya is drawn out and like a journey, and the smoked DMT was sort of like a revelation that I already reached the end of a journey. I was a sports caster raving about the highlight reel on the smoked stuff. First love and Mom hug memories were streaming from this object that was connected to me through a math equation that I could see solving itself. I don't do math and I hate it but it seemed pretty easy on the drug.

I'm no better as a person having done the stuff but it was interesting. I would go into the feeling of physical death I experienced on the smoke, but maybe another time. It is always nice to talk about hallucinogens with people who aren't tongue tied, stupid and burt out. The shit burns people in a heart beat. Not everybody, but I notice people get stupider and less capable of describing their life after doing a lot of hallucinogens. Acid especially does this. DMT not as much and Aya I've seen normal people return to corpo fully intact every time. Lot of tears and vomit on their shirts, but back in their body safely. The derealization syndrome that comes with long term DMT use isn't researched, and couldn't possibly be documented. Reality can just switch off for some users and they don't have the faculties to control the switch anymore. There are other things I'd mention but yeah the shit is just absolute insanity and hopefully, for most, that is temporary and beneficial.

 

[another1]

This is what long term LSD use makes a person talk like. It sounds amazing in this guys head but he strains to get two words out. First minute only, the rest is eye candy. Laughs.

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

Folks,

For some time I have been considering consulting a shaman to reconnect me with my animal spirit. Is this a wise move and what could go wrong?

Alex.

Stay away from furries.

 

[Thomas II]

And with much trauma for you to try to survive. Some people come out more wounded than "healed".


Don't get me wrong in anything I'm about to say, because fantasy's an important part of us. But it happens in the body and the body's the guide to help find your way in it. If you dim your contact with your own body, whether with booze to numb yourself or using hallucinogens to smash to pieces your ability to sort things while a deluge of psychic content goes berserk, then you really have no guide to help. The shaman will say that's her, but she is not your own bodily awareness which is the ultimate authority in a matter of this sort (so don't bludgeon it).

Just strikes me in what you've said that more dissociation is not what you need. All your experience is your body-in-environment. Notice that even getting this fantasy of spirit invasion ("haunted") that you draped over your bodily feelings ("some part of me") came from your environment (you immerse in much screen-time while also otherwise artificially sustaining unawareness of the bodily self). There's no "bad spirit" to cast out here; too much life has been cast out already.

In place of my prior suggestion of lying down and setting up an imaginary scene to invite your “power animal” to, why not set up two chairs across from one another and sit in one and invite the conflicted bit of your self into the other chair and talk it out and reach a mutually respectful understanding?

Or do it lying down with eyes closed if that makes it feel more real. Though I think it doesn't really make anything feel more real. I’m a skilled visualizer but I don’t feel deep trance states make things “more real”. I think that lends to an increased disembodied feeling which is why you get pagans, shamans, et al, going on about OBE’s and possessions and similar, though we experience nothing outside of our own bodily selves, ever. I'm not limiting "self" to "brain" because if you pay attention to both your joys and sorrows and missing bits you find where the phenomena really are... in the tensions and releases of the muscles and viscera of the body.

Thinking it through and trying to use only reason to solve things isn't going to help either. That's dissociation too.

A therapist who uses the imagination (without ever losing sight of the body’s significance in everything) would be the guide you probably should be seeking. Gestalt therapy is where I learned about dialoguing of self to self to resolve inner conflicts. Here’s a sample of the chair technique in Gestalt Therapy: http://www.cetuesday.com/empty-chair-gestalt-technique/

In my prior days of belief, I would do this. I would 'feel' someone there and so would meditate. My choice was to sit cross legged, on the floor (not that I could now) with a candle and focus on the candle. This would be guided meditation. I don't hold much stock in it anymore as I now wonder how my grandfather, who I had only seen once from the time I was not quite 3 until his passing when I was 19, could find me in Mount Isa which is 2000km away from his son, and on the other side of the planet from him!

I would consult someone about meditation first, and see how you go, and without any drugs! If something is really there, you won't need drugs to find it out. If you need drugs to find it out, then it is a figment of your imagination and I would just tell them to 'BUGGER OFF!' every time they annoyed you.

Good luck though.

Alex, let me know what you do...I see that the solution is way easier than you think, and does not involve drugs...

 

[gmbteach]

For you Alex:

 

[Philos]

Alex, let me know what you do...I see that the solution is way easier than you think, and does not involve drugs...

Thomas,

Yes, my life has not been drug free but does not include LSD or similar. The previous post by Another1 is fascinating and I have total respect for the experience but I'm just not stable enough for the trip IMHO. Quite a few younger friends have done Mescalin and the results were mixed, some good and some quite bad.You just don't know until it happens.

I'm pretty sure that the right person can show me the path (Gaynor's post above ), particularly after the Shiatsu thing.

But that's enough about me.

Alex.

 

[another1]

Philos, years ago I was on a thread somewhere and I, along with about ten other people were praising deadly Datura and raving about how amazing we thought it was. After looking at pics we posted of the plant, this guy who had never tried it said "holy shit that is growing in my backyard brb Ima smoke some". Before anyone could say omg no don't, he was gone and he seriously never posted again. Nobody knew what happened to him, even his closest contacts. I've wondered what happened to that kid ever since.

The people on that thread and in drug communities in general are needy and weak. Most of them talked about the drugs to glorify their own personalities as they projected an image of ascension and wisdom to anyone willing to reverberate the fatuous bullshit back to them. Those are inadvertent ways in which they go about making things true about themselves, unto themselves. They used their drug experience reports to accentuate their personalities, rather than improving their personalities. They draw flame pinstripes instead of maps to the unknown.

That is overall just human behavior when it comes to anything, and on some level, most people do it. But when it comes to deadly or potentially mind destroying substances being a part of their show and tell - hence believe, rationality... not good. I would avoid drug communities and you tube when seeking advice about entheogens if I were you, because your motivations are pure and you're being real, unlike the majority of the psychonauts who aren't going to be real with you or try to actually help you.

 

[Philos]

Folks,

I just want to thank everyone on this thread for helping with some deep s*** and sharing wisdom. Guess the thread should have been in the support section but I'm too proud.

We are 'just' a virtual community, but we fully connect on the serious stuff.

Alex.