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 A Journal of Cover Art –

Contemporary Shamanism
“The Nature of Technology”
by Mark Lewis Wagner
See page 5
VOLUME 8, ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015

Contents
3 Letters to the Editor
5 Op-Ed: PUNCHE DE MEXICANO: Unexpected and Magical Encounters with an Ally Plant
6 INTERVIEW
Theater of the Spirits: An Interview with Virginia Monte
Cecile Carson, M.D.
1 2 SHAMANIC PRACTICE
Owl Warning: Healing a Costa Rican Community
Rebecca Singer
1 5 SHAMANIC PRACTICE
Meeting with Darkhad Shaman, Erdene-Ochiz of Mongolia
Susan Ross Grimaldi, M.Ed, and John R. Lawrence Jr., PhD
1 8 ESSAY
Architects of the Future
Jill Raiguel, MFT
2 4 ESSAYS
The Holding Space Method: Underlying Shamanic Aspects of Polarity and Craniaosacral Therapy
Gary B. Strauss, MS, RPP, PWE
2 6 Traditional American Indian Bodywork, the Origin of Osteopathy, Polarity, and Craniosacral Therapy
Nita M. Renfrew
2 9 SHAMANIC PRACTICE
Merlin Tree
V. “Ariel” Van Haltern
3 2 REVIEWS
LESSONS IN COURAGE: PERUVIAN SHAMANIC WISDOM FOR EVERYDAY LIFE
by don Oscar Miro-Quesada
Review by José Stevens, PhD
3 4 NUMA: AN EPIC POEM WITH PHOTO COLLAGE by Katrinka Moore
Review by Nita Renfrew
3 6 THE SHAMAN WITHIN: A PHYSICIST’S GUIDE TO THE DEEPER DIMENSIONS
OF YOUR LIFE, THE UNIVERSE, AND EVERYTHING by Claude Poncelet, PhD
Review by Jonathan Horwitz
3 8 SHORT REVIEWS
THE CO-CREATION HANDBOOK: A SHAMANIC GUIDE TO MANIFESTING
A BETTER WORLD AND A MORE JOYFUL LIFE by Alida Burch Review by Tom Cowan
3 8 UP A TREE by Jane Burns Review by Tom Cowan
3 9 MAKING PEACE WITH SUICIDE by Adele McDowell Review by Tom Cowan
3 9 WHISPERING WITH ANIMALS by Maryphyllis Horn Review by Kay Kamala
41 RESOURCE DIRECTORY

www.shamanic society.org | 1
 EDITORS
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Jonathan Horwitz, MA, European Bureau 

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The opinions expressed in A Journal of Contempo-

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rary Shamanism are those of the authors and do not
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SSP BOARD OF DIRECTORS

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Remote Healing • Individual Sessions Genie Hobbs, LCSW
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admin@thepowerpath.com 505-982-8732 Sara Johnston, Executive Director
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2 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015

EditoriAl
L E T TboArd
E R S TO T H E E D I TO R
Jeanne Achterberg, Phd evelyn C. rysdyk

Shamanism: Yes, And

Saybrook graduate School & research Spirit Passages
Institute, San Francisco, CA Yarmouth, me
david J. Baker, md Patricia Shaw, Phd
Professor emeritus of medicine Phoenix Psychological group, Inc.
Mary Pat Lynch
Canadian College of Acupuncture and oriental St. louis, mo
medicine, victoria, BC, Canada
Sarah Sifers, Phd, lCSw
March
Stephan 7, 2015
v. Beyer, Phd, Jd Time now
Indigenous to get specific. I came to
lenses
Peacemaker Services, Chicago, Il shamanism
Salt lake City,after
ut a serious illness that
Following a shamanic path in the mod- completely disrupted my life as it was, a
Patrick
ern Curry,
world Phdunique challenges. We
brings Farrellopening.
classic Silverberg,I Phd,
trained nCPsyA
in core shaman-
seek out the old Studies,
lecturer, religious ways atuniversity of kent,
a time when the Psychologist
ism, seeking out Celtic and especially Irish
london, uk
new, we’re told, is everything. We search Philadelphia,
material PA I could. Tom Cowan’s
wherever
for ways davis-kimball,
Jeannine that are lost, orPhd foreign to how we work,
Sharoninvanthatraalte,
regard, mA was absolutely essen-
were
Centerraised
for theand
Studytrained. We are, most of
of eurasian tial as I began,
mississippi andon,
Station, I’veCanada
found others along
us, goingventura,
nomads, againstCA family expectations, social the way.
norms, culturally mediated goals. And we Alberto villoldo,
I found otherPhd practices too. Because of
Stuartknow
r. Harrop, Founder and Ceo, the Four winds
don’t what Phd we’re doing a lot of the my vivid and intense dream life, I explored
durrell Institute of Conservation and ecology, Society, Park City, ut
time (at least, I don’t). dreamwork. Within a shamanic journey, a
department of Anthropology
Shamanism
university of kent,isCanterbury,
difficult even
uk to describe. new ally walker,
marilyn sent mePhd off to study astrology and
How many conversations have you had alchemy, and I became
Associate Professor an astrologer. Hav-
of Anthropology
with
robinfriends,
June Hood,family,Phdstrangers, trying to mount
ing Allisonthe
explored university
Tarot when I was young,
Adjunct Professor,
distinguish School of
“spiritual” from “religious” and ISackville,
came back newtoBrunswick, Canada
that as well. I developed
environmental education and arobert
sense of
referring to the
Communications
many traditions in which J. wallis, FrAI, FSA intuitive
a world filled with
some concept of shamanic practice can be languages
Professor ofranging from ancient
visual Culture, director ofauguries
mA in to
royal roads university, victoria BC
found? dream messages to Culture,
modernrichmond,
card decks.
Art History & visual the
LikeHoppal,
mihaly all humans,
Phd we long for com- How much
American of thisuniversity
International is shamanic? At first,
in london, uk
munity.
director ofWe all need
Institute groups that share our
of ethnology consistent with my academic training, I
values,
Hungarianunderstand
Academy ofour issues, and celebrate
Sciences kyoim
kept myYun, Phd in separate compart-
practices
our triumphs.
Budapest, Hungary We need our tribes. Finding ments. It seemed department
Assistant Professor, inappropriate of east
to Asian
mix
shamanic communities is part of the chal- languages and Cultures
them, vague and somehow wrong. Over
Stanley krippner, Phd university of kansas, lawrence, kS
lenge wegraduate
Saybrook face, especially
School, if we are charting time, though, two things happened. As the
aSan
course outside
Francisco, CA established traditions and practices became mine, they melded them-
away from teachers and elders. selves together and my shamanic allies told
mary Pat lynch,
Creating Phd
community begins with iden- me to stop pretending they were separate
Athens, oH
tifying what the shared values are, which and start synthesizing.
practices best reflect those
marjorie mandelstam Balzer,values,
Phd and how Let me say, I still have not figured out
we
research Professor, department of The most
move forward on our paths. how to create a synthesis of all I do, but
recent issue of A Journal
Sociology/Anthropology, of Contemporary
Intercultural Center, they continue coming closer together.
Shamanism addressed this head on, with
georgetown university Sometimes answers in journeys come in
an openingdC
washington essay offering a list of basic ele- the form of Tarot cards. My relationships
ments, and a selection of articles pushing with the planets appearing as they do in
robert
the moss, mAof what a clear, easy defini-
boundaries my birth chart become more and more
Founder, the School of Active dreaming
tion of shamanism might include, asking
Albany, nY
like my relationships with my allies. There
questions like: What is shamanism today? is, increasingly, a seamlessness to my own
What
david does shamanic
mussina, mA practice look like? experience of this.
For many
medford, mA of us, a full reflection of who But how do I talk to others about this?
we are in the world needs an even wider Especially, how can I have conversations
PhilipFor
net. m.aPeek,
varietyPhd of reasons, we develop within valued shamanic communities
Professor emeritus, dept. of Anthropology, drew
a practice, or set of practices, that include about what I actually do? I don’t want to
university, Sanbornton, nH
elements that are not shamanic, but over be dismissed. And still, not to talk about
time
larrybecome
Peters, Phdimbued with the same spirit, what I’m really doing feels increasingly
become woven
nepal Spiritual into all we are and do.
excursions, inauthentic.
topanga, CA do we talk about the totality of
Yet how The thing is, I look for and value
what
StephenweProskauer,
actually do md in the world? How do similar kinds of synthesis in others. The
we
Sanctuary for Healing andinIntegration
present ourselves an authentic and best example I can offer here is bodywork,
still acceptable
Salt lake City, utway? something I need and cannot do for

www.shamansociety.org | 3
myself. Certainly I have had competent massages from therapists
without any knowledge of shamanism. But when I look for mas-
sage therapists and other bodyworkers, I watch for those who are
intuitive, who are sensitive, and, best, who are shamanic. What
happens in those sessions may not be “shamanism” but is always
enriched by that deeper connection that occurs.
When I think of shamanic practitioners I know today, more of
us are combining various practices than not. I know shamanic prac-
titioners who are also bodyworkers, dreamworkers, who include a
variety of divination practices like runes and the ogham, who work
with channeling and mediumship, who use henna or tattoos as part
of their shamanic work.
Is there a way we can explore these things together? There are
rich topics for conversation here, things to be shared and learned.
It’s not about broadening the definition of shamanism so far that
everything possible is included, but of allowing ourselves to admit
that our lives and work include other things and, over time, these
things interweave in ways that become essential to who we are.
Shamanic practice is, at its core, based in our ongoing rela-
tionships with trusted allies and listening to their guidance. This
inevitably leads us in different directions, and it may not be helpful
to be too exclusive in setting limits on what can and cannot be
discussed and shared.
Astrology (for example) is not shamanism, but how might it
be shamanic? How has my work in astrology been affected by my
shamanic practice, and vice versa? I would love to find like-minded
others with whom to explore these topics and I suspect I’m not
alone.
Can we make our tent big enough to allow these kinds of con-
versations to happen?
And we must also allow for the very real possibility that the
shamanic tent may get far bigger than we can imagine. At a time
in the world’s history when many paths are crossing, combining
and coming together, we may want to keep open minds and hearts
about where our allies send us. We might find many practices fold-
ing into and becoming shamanic.
In the world of improv performance, actors must learn to “Yes,
and …” When a partner tosses out the unexpected and you’re on
stage together, you can’t say no, you have to build on what’s there:
Yes, and.
My life feels more like improv the farther I go. This does not
mean I lack skills. In fact, good improv performers are some of the
most skilled actors around. What it means is, that I can (or try to)
roll with what comes my way and build on it. I guess I am moving
into a form of shamanic practice that also says, “yes, and…” I think
that’s what my allies are asking of me.
Mary Pat Lynch threecauldrons.com

Day of Sorrow
by Åsa Simma

24th September, 2014, was a day
of sorrow. Ailo Gaup left this world,
passing into a place we can only
imagine. He was a dear friend of mine
for 34 years. I met him the first time in
the beginning of the eighties. I was just
seventeen when he turned up at my par-
ents’ house, asking if I would join a the-
atre group he was starting up. I followed
him to Kautokeino in north Norway.
We worked in theatre for many years,
he wrote scripts and I directed. Besides
that we started on our spiritual journey.
I remember we invented methods to
train intuition, sitting everyday, trying
to read each other’s thoughts, interpret-
ing dreams, and removing ourselves to
other realities.
Ailo had a big heart and a great
laugh, and his skills in shamanism were
incredible.
He came to a hospital where I was
with my mother who was very ill with
cancer. Ailo did what he could do.
Afterwards he said, “Sorry, the disease
has gone too far, we can only end her
suffering.” Three days later she died.
I know that many Sami people
sought help from Ailo, even though the
people of the church condemned it. The
younger generation especially had great
faith in his work.
We must not forget the books he
wrote nor his magic poetry that contains
many mythical secrets. His book, The
Shamanic Zone, has become a must-read
among Sami people.
When I first heard about that book,
I was wondering how I could get hold
of it, which bookstores might have it. A
few minutes after thinking that thought,
the telephone rang. Of course it was
Ailo, wondering where he could send a
copy of the book. Such was my relation-
ship with Ailo, just thinking of him
made him respond immediately.
In March 2014 I was going through
a hard time, my heart was full of fear,
and tears were running down my cheeks.
I was wondering what to do, how to end
this suffering. My telephone beeped,
and a text message arrived from Ailo,
asking what he could do for me.
He has helped me many times and
every time I have thought that this is a
real shaman. Maybe the last real Sami
shaman.
The final indication of that was at
his own funeral. When we said goodbye
to him and saw the car drive away with
his coffin, an immense thunderstorm
started. It lasted the entire afternoon and
night. I am sure he rode the thunder to
the other side.
--
Do not move faster than the speed of
your protecting angel!
Contact Åsa Simma at
Tel +4670 2705770

4 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015

 O p - E d

Punche De Mexicano:
Unexpected and Magical Encounters with an Ally Plant
Carol L. Parker, Ph.D.
In New Mexico wild tobacco (Nicotiana Rustica) is often called
Punche de Mexicano. On the Native pueblos, certain people
grow it for the medicine men to use in their kiva ceremonies, and
elsewhere wildcrafters find it growing at about 4,000 to 7,000 feet
elevation in the desert and mountains.
Ten years ago I had no relationship with this powerful ally
except for a negative association (my father died of lung cancer at-
tributed to smoking tobacco). But the Spirit of Punche had other
ideas, apparently, and one day in Death Valley one of my vision
questers came back to base camp laden with three-foot-long stalks
of a plant she said was wild tobacco.
A few weeks later the same woman took me on a wild-crafting
outing in the Chiricauhas south of Silver City, New Mexico. As
we hiked among the red rocks and arroyos, we suddenly came
upon a tall green plant with large leaves. The plant seemed to
jump out at me, and glowed with a golden light. I usually don’t
see auras, but I felt the plant was making itself known to me. My
companion, an expert wild-crafter, said it was wild tobacco, or
Punche de Mexicano as the locals often call it.
I felt the presence of a Spirit near the plant, and had the dis-
tinct impression that it was letting me know it was my Ally Plant.
Since then, I have had many opportunities to make friends
with my Ally Plant.
A Lakota Sun Dance chief in South Dakota carved a Cha-
nupah (ceremonial Pipe) for me and initiated me into the proper
ways of praying and smoking, using a mix of tobacco and red wil-
low. Once, in a situation that felt somewhat desperate, I smoked
the Chanupah to help dissipate a dark energy in someone’s house.
The heaviness in her home lifted almost immediately as we smoked
and made prayers.
Another time, in the wilderness around Pedernal Mountain
in Northern New Mexico, my husband and I and two friends
hiked considerably off trail and stumbled into an ancient quarry of
chalcedony (flint). All four of us felt nauseous as we approached
this place where ancient people had made their tools. I had my
Chanupah, and knew it was important to introduce ourselves by
smoking our prayers for the ancestral energies there. As soon as we
did so, our nausea subsided. I had the distinct impression that we
had been accepted by the spirits of this place.
I have also become acquainted with Mapacho, the Southern
cousin of Punche, which grows in the Amazon and is widely used
by ayahuasceros for healing and cleansing. When I am in Cusco,
Peru I purchase it in the Mercado de Brujas (Witches Market) for
use at home with students and clients. I often do “soplando” with
Mapacho cigarettes and have been amazed at its powerful ability to
remove hucha (heavy energies).
It has taken Punche a few years to convince me of its desire
to work with me as friend and Ally! I now work frequently with
this powerful plant, and have come to understand that it has the
unique ability to create a pathway through the veils and allow
our prayers and intentions to connect with ancestral energies and
helping spirits, with the result that transformation, healing, and
cleansing happens rapidly and sometimes in magical and unex-
pected ways.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Carol L. Parker is a vision quest guide and pilgrimage
leader in Peru, Death Valley, Canyon de Chelly, the Yukon,
and Hawaii. She has been initiated into the altomisayok
(high mountain shaman) tradition in the Peruvian Andes and
continues to study with her teachers there. She integrates
ceremonial and shamanic methods into her college classes as
well as private work with clients and students.

Cover Art
By Mark Lewis Wagner
"The Nature of Technology” The question at a conference on the Earth and Technology was… “What does Technology Want.”
Answer: "It wants to be part of Nature.”
Mark Lewis Wagner MA is a digital and traditional artist, and educator. His artwork was on the book cover of Michael
Harner’s The Way of the Shaman, and his illustrations appeared for many years in the magazine Shaman’s Drum. Clients
include, the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History and Pixar/Disney. He is also the founder of the nonprofit Drawing on Earth
which passionately connects art and creativity to youth and communities around the world (please donate). Their first project
set a Guinness World Record for the largest chalk drawing. Wagner has created 5 pieces of art that have been photographed by
satellite. He is currently showing work at the Living Shaman Museum in San Francisco. Web sites: www.drawingonearth.org,
www.marklewiswagner, www.heartsandbones.com

www.shamansociety.org | 5
 I N T E R V I E W
VIRGINIA MONTE:
Theater of the Spirits
by Cecile Carson, M.D.
This is the first of a series of interviews with shamanic prac-
titioners who are integrating shamanism into Western culture in
interesting and unusual ways that open our hearts and minds to
what is possible for spirit’s healing in our troubled world.
In “Theater of the Spirits,” Cecile Carson talks with Virginia
Monte, a theater director who is aware and intentional about
bringing an experience of the numinous to her audience, as well
as working in that dimension with the actors.  During an intro-
ductory workshop in core shamanism several years ago, she was
bowled over by how much of her life and her work in the theater
fit into a shamanic framework.  reading a line by Joseph Campbell early in the director’s program
Virginia Monte photo by Cecile Carson
CC: Tell me a little bit about your background in theater
and your hopes when you began your professional training
in this.
VM: I was always just a little different, a little off center,
from most of the people I knew, and the theater became the one
environment where all those little oddities of who I am became
completely natural and completely usable.
I did undergraduate work in fine arts, art history, opera,
and theater. I remember someone once telling me that I had to
choose one of these, and couldn’t understand why: painting was
the same to me as storytelling, which was the same as singing.
They all had the same feel, and I really enjoyed playing with
their boundaries.
Then I spent a few years out in the world doing design work
in regional theaters. During my time in Manhattan, I found
while designing sets that I actually wanted to fix the costumes
6 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
and work with the actors to fix their lines. And I realized at that
point what I really wanted to do was to direct, not to design.
CC: What happened then?
VM: I miraculously got into an overseas program for direct-
ing at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. And that’s where
everything changed. I realized my work started becoming less
about me trying to fulfill this need to be acknowledged and
more about me opening to the world instead of hiding from it.
And I started to look at things with my third eye open,
which is where shamanism really first began for me. I remember
that compared the works of modern artists to the practices of
original shamanic teachings. Campbell posited this idea that
these practices for both shamans and artists are for helping peo-
ple through big problems, and for asking the biggest questions
of themselves. And in this very naive moment, I wrote in my
journal “I’m going to be a shaman.” I knew I wanted that kind
of art, the kind that brings people to know themselves, that has
this bigger sense of the world, and that can bring us together in
a way that most things nowadays can’t.
CC: I think it’s great that you didn’t know any better!
VM: I don’t think I would have done it! I think that just
put a beacon right on my back, and suddenly spirit said, “Okay,
you’ve opened the door, here we come.” It was a really critical
moment, and both the best and worst experiences of my life
followed from it.
I found myself in the cataclysm of being torn apart through
the extremes of first waking up so completely, and then engag-
ing with my environment so fully, that I self-destructed. In part,
it was because the program as an institution is not the place
to have an awakening like that; it’s more a teaching-technique
institution vs. a coming-to-yourself institution.
I remember at the worst of it being very angry and question-
ing why the faculty couldn’t have understood and supported me.
And yet there were individuals there who did, in their own way.
Even though I had to step away from the program for health
reasons, the Dean and the head of the program let me finish. It
took three extra years.
I think, too, of Nadine George, a voice instructor there I
now know was operating shamanically, and who would walk
into a room and change things simply by her presence. Lerna
Penny was another vocal instructor so acutely aware of the body
and of how people were embodying themselves that she would
turn actors around in a few moments to give spectacular and
honest performances. And I’d say to myself, “That’s exactly what
I want to be able to do!”
Later on I would meet Glynn MacDonald at The Globe, the
famous theater of Shakespeare, who was working with whirling
dervish techniques. She would stand us between the two famous
pillars of The Globe’s stage and have us energetically hold space.
It was from her that I learned the incantation that they use there
on the stage:
“I take from the Earth all that I need and bring it into me,
I take from the Heavens all that I need and bring it into me,
And once it is inside of me,
I give it away.”
I still use this incantation with my actors today, as a power-
ful invocation before opening performances. The impact is
often profound, and I can’t thank Glynn enough for teaching it
to me.
CC: And of course there were those who were not sup-
portive of the process you were going through.
VM: Yes, the flip side is that I met other people for whom
what I was exploring was terrifying because it demanded a lot of
the people involved, including instructors. In my naivete, I just
went full force and we clashed, because I couldn’t understand
how anyone would not want something this fantastic that took
the craft to a spiritual level, that asked the actors and audience
the biggest questions: “Who am I?” and “Why am I?”
I know now for some people that’s asking too much; that’s
not why they come to theater. So for me, a huge lesson during
my recovery period was learning to respect and acknowledge
others’ path in theater, even if it’s not my own.
CC: As you share this, I find myself thinking about the
shamanic process of dismemberment and then of remember-
ment, as we remember who we deeply are. It seems there are
a lot of parallels here.
There really were. I started experiencing moments of hav-
ing my foundation kicked out from under me, not knowing
whether what I was doing had any grounding any more. Having
gone through the process of bringing everything that I was up
to the surface, and then suddenly having to bring it all into
question in a manner that had no resolution, was very difficult.
And there wasn’t anyone I had at the time that I could talk to in
a professional setting about seeing auras or feeling body energies.
So part of the difficulty was not just the dismemberment, but
feeling very alone in it.
As I look back, I can see there were some voices. Nadine
George said what I needed to do was sit in this and come back
to her when I found my way through it. She understood that
for what I was going through, there was nothing she could do
except have me come back and see her when I was done with the
process. She was right, but it was very hard to hear.
Everything in the universe seemed to conspire and say, “You
are done!” There was something I needed to learn and couldn’t.
I believe the universe gives you what you need, and if you’re not
listening they’ll give it to you again harder. I feel I was given the
opportunity to learn the lesson of compassion for those I work
with, and since I didn’t learn it the first time, the universe sent
me home without that degree.
CC: Sounds like a dark night of the soul: very painful,
confusing, and bleak.
VM: I remember one of the hardest things I had to do was

Celebrating 20 Years of Service in the Bay Area and Beyond

• Indigenous Lifeways Program-Path of the Human Being,
Way of the Awakened Warrior
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• Bodywork
• Instruction in: Tai Chi Chuan; Native Drum & Flute; Didgeridoo

Phillip Scott, Founder/Director, is of mixed Ancestry, including

Ancestral Voice is a Center of
Healing and Learning devoted
to the preservation, application
and respectful dissemination of
Shamanic and Indigenous Lifeways.
Oklahoma Tsalagi, and a Ceremonial Leader in the Lakota Tradition.
He has walked the Native Path for over 30 years, learning from
Medicine/Holy People,Tribal Spiritual Leaders, Elders and Shamans
from various cultures.
Phillip@AncestralVoice.org
www.AncestralVoice.org
(415) 897-7991
www.shamansociety.org | 7
to look at one of the individuals who had
done me a great deal of wrong. It would
have been so much easier for me just to
give him the hate I felt—yet all I could
see in that moment was this very sad
and sorry little boy who had lashed out
because he was scared of what we were
doing and what I was bringing, and who
did what he needed to do to feel safe.
Suddenly I no longer had the conviction
that I was right. My disassembling really
began in that moment as I recognized
that I could cause so much suffering and
pain through what I was doing. I knew
I didn’t want to hurt people or create art
that was based on fear or anger or resent-
ment or an “I’ll show you!” mentality.
At that point, I really cognitively and
mentally disintegrated. I began to have
vivid dreams, and I felt my mind was
coming against me and didn’t know how
to control it. It was really scary. So that’s
how I ended up having to return from
abroad without what I had gone for and
with having to question everything I had
put myself through.
CC: So how did you get through
the dismemberment?
VM: Day by day! One of the biggest
challenges for me was simply accepting
what had happened. I wanted to deny
how powerful and scary what I went
through was, as well as the sense that I
had somehow done it to myself. It took
me a while to be able to say if that’s what
happened, it’s okay.
My family, who were supportive and
helpful, thought of it as depression, but I
chose not go on drugs. I knew they were
not the solution, because it was not a
mind hurt or a body hurt, but something
deeper. So I started looking at how to fix
a soul hurt by examining my interest in
ritual and religion. I went to a Zen center
and sat for a while and learned what that
was like; I looked at yoga and what that
was like. I started reading Thomas Moore
and other religious texts to try to figure
out how others who had come through
something like this could still have a joy
of life.
CC: Sounds like protected time
and a willingness to accept what had
happened was important to start your
healing.
8 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism
VM: I knew my fear was having gone
through this once, that even if I recover,
there’s a chance of relapse. So I began
to focus on how to put into place the
mechanisms that would keep me doing
what I want to do and making art on
the level I want. The one thing I knew I
couldn’t give up was art—and that was
what pulled me through.
It was during this period I came
across JourneyDanceTM developed by
Toni Bergins that acknowledges the body
before the mind. In my first experience
of it, I felt as if someone had flipped
the “on” switch in me. In the middle of
the ritual dance, in a section of the fire
ceremony, I actually ritually put myself
in the fire and acknowledged that there
were things that needed to burn. It
was a wonderful transformation, and a
shamanic tool that I’ve now adopted into
my own practice.
Through the use of ritual I was able
to re-acknowledge that what I had done
was damaging, what I could do could
be dangerous, but that it could also save
souls. And now that I had learned its
dangers and also what it could do, I now
needed to see how to put it into place in
my work.
I always knew even during the worst
of it all, that innate compassion was what
I was lacking. I don’t think I understood
until then why it was such an important
tool. I think it was this acknowledgment
that we all heal, and that if I can be a
vehicle in any way, how could I say no
or walk away from something that could
provide that kind of benefit?
CC: What you’re describing seems
to me to be steps of a shamanic initia-
tion that break apart the old structures
and assumptions to lay us bare to
rebuild ourselves and bring that back
into the world. How did your personal
transformation and your awareness of
the power of art begin to translate into
your work in the theater?
VM: After a long hiatus, I had an
opportunity to do my first directing piece
as a little piece of Hamlet. Although I
had always put the actor first, it was the
first time I experimented with this model
of directing where I put the actor in a
spiritual role and asked them to truly
VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
question their character in a way that was
honest, asking of their character, “Who’s
hurt?” and “How are you hurting?”
So we looked at what it was to take
this on, this character as a vessel—and
also what it was to take it off. And we
also looked at how to make a sacred and
safe space for these two actors who were
experimenting with this. I had a female
Hamlet, and she found an honesty in it
that really had the audience questioning
this character who’s usually seen as a bit
despicable and selfish. What they saw
instead was a human being in pain. And
Ophelia’s pain was no less pain; both of
them were equally hurting. Both actors
and audience found a human scenario in
the performance that was very moving;
they were just exquisite.
CC: I can certainly sense the com-
passion in this method you’re bringing
to your actors. How does this compare
to other acting methods you were
introduced to before your dismember-
ment?
I’ve seen some acting methods where
actors actually carried the negative energy
of the character they embodied home
with them, and I remember thinking that
even if it’s making great work, it can’t be
right or good for the person. As a direc-
tor myself, I now question the morality
of any director who puts another indi-
vidual in a situation like a Hamlet, who’s
a suicidal character, and just lets them
languish in that.
CC: I know there are shamanic
methods in which the shaman takes on
and embodies the illness or tragedy of
the client, but then brings that energy
through themselves and remains intact
as to who they are. Seems like there
are some similarities with this method
you’re using.
VM: When I started, even before
my coming apart, I watched how actors
worked and the amount of damage they
would take on in the pursuit of the per-
formance. Having a mixed background
as I did with fine art and other art forms,
I realized there was not one fine artist
I knew who would take on this level of
damage to make art. So how could I as
a director create a healthy environment?
Because actors use their bodies as their
art form, there’s no way for them to avoid bringing in the nega-
tive energies and emotions of their character.
I started to look at how different artists were doing that, and
found that all of them were using spiritual language, breaking
down the “I vs. Thou” mentality. And so I began putting in
more spiritual language in my directing, which is a little tricky
because for some people it’s a huge shutdown. Finding the right
vocabulary took a while, but that’s when I started to build my
environment around spirit.
The King and his Fate from The Winter’s Tale
annettedragonphotography.com WT0078
And The Winter’s Tale was the first large-scale experiment
with that. I set forth a kind of Hippocratic Oath for myself for
this project to do no harm. Knowing that there were characters
who had to go through a lot of pain, I vowed that I would check
in, I would maintain a healthy environment, and that I would
not raise my voice no matter how frustrating the process.
CC: How did you do that?
It came down to being clear and being strong and at my peak
to hold those containers separately but strongly. It took going
in ahead of time before rehearsals and meditating and clearing
the space and setting the intention that this would be a healthy
environment. And I could not be lax in that. I had to honor my
own vessel, because if I didn’t, how could they honor theirs?
And it surprised me at how responsive the actors were—all of
them could feel it, and they took to it.
CC: You’ve had some training in core shamanism recent-
ly. Can you speak about how that framework mapped over
the process you were developing in your craft as director?
VM: Theater began as a ritual; in its original context in
tribal cultures, theater was an enactment of myth to bring im-
portant stories closer to us and to make them relatable to us. As
the West developed, acting became very presentational and not
about the ability to impact someone; you simply had to be that
object. So it was less about your emotive quality and more about
your mastery of form; your ability to “feel it” meant nothing.
About 150 years ago, art changed. You can see it in the fine
art world, where Impressionism appeared. The Impression-
ists were really the first to say, in a big way, “This is not just
about that I can technically paint, it’s that I was there, I painted
that.” It’s the first time the content was placed on the artists
themselves. Modernity did a wonderful thing, and that’s when
shamanism came back to the artist—when the artist became
responsible for content and technique.
Theater did the same thing as fine art right around the same
time and took on more potency. And it’s a little bit danger-
ous too; that’s a lot to ask of actors. And it also meant that the
techniques we had been using were not necessarily suited to help
people through these new demands. I don’t think Shakespeare
intended Hamlet to be a painful role; the text was supposed to
do that for you. But now we expect acting to have this emotive,
mimetic relationship where we as audience feel what the charac-
ters are feeling. And to do that safely, you have to have some form
of shamanic grounding: you need to know where you stand, and
you need to know what you’ve inviting in, and you need to know
how to protect yourself.
CC: Moving from a macro view of your theory and his-
tory to a micro view, what are some instances where you
intentionally brought the transcendent in the performance?
VM: I have a tendency to gravitate to scripts where spirit is
already present. I want to ask those bigger questions. So what
makes the classics more accessible to me, is at the time Shake-
speare was writing, religion was more in the open, and it already
had a vessel within it where spirit wants to be, where we have to
ask those important questions.
One of Three Fates in A Winter’s Tale
annettedragonphotography.com WT0136
What attracted me to The Winter’s Tale is that it reads like a
dream; to me, that’s a huge indicator of a place for spirit.
In looking at a script like this one, spirit questions emerge:
“What is Change? What is Death?” and that’s exactly what this
script addresses. A bear shows up at the end of Act III and eats
a man, and if you were to look at it in a modern context where
a man randomly is eaten by a bear, it could be comedic. But
if you were to look at it through the lens of spirit, which is re-
www.shamansociety.org | 9
ally what I tried to do for this script direction, this bear is not
an accident. It is rather a culmination of everything that has
happened up to that point where this man has made a terrible
choice to go along with a terrible law he knows is wrong, and
there has to be divine justice for it. So the bear is actually an en-
actment of all the pain and all the suffering that all these choices
have brought together and created something bigger. The bear is
actually more divine than it is physical.
On a personal level as an artist, that’s the question I tend to
gravitate toward: “How do we accept Change or Death?” We
are afraid to take those steps, and yet we crave a higher spiritual
experience.
CC: So how did you get the actors in the frame of mind
for those spiritual questions, like in The Winter’s Tale with
the bear?
VM: A lot of it came down to discussing it dramaturgically.
For example, in Shakespeare’s time, Fate would be understood
as a physical force. Then all you had to do in the story was refer-
ence it, and it might as well be present. In today’s society, that’s
not so true. So for this play, we actually chose to embody Fate
physically in the form of these ethereal creatures that roamed
the stage. The funny thing was, I think without ever using spiri-
tual or religious terms, the actors were willing to embrace it on
that level with storytelling. I think the story took them.
We all have our stories; and I’m particularly interested in
the stories we all share, the Jungian archetypes, and those things
that bring us all together. It’s actually so much easier to be
divisive, and it takes so much more energy to be inclusive. It
takes so much more willpower and thought power just to look
at somebody and say, “I see you.”
CC: Say more about when you sit on the sidelines and
give the actors agency and then watch the response of the
audience.
VM: I don’t believe the director is an artist in the traditional
sense; I believe we are curators for other artists. And if you take
that role on and really embody that as a director, you have to
give the actors the room they need to make their own art.
I know one of the most popular theories used in directing is
this idea that I will tell you who you are, what you are, how you
act, and what that is. But if you want the actor to have the kind
of experience that’s more a one-to-one relationship with the
question itself, as a director you have to get out of the way. You
have to allow the actor to use his own vessel and not put your
imprint upon it.
A show is a vehicle that requires many vessels to be operat-
ing instantaneously with each other, so my job is to guide and
to make sure each one of these individual works of art can coex-
ist in a way that services the story.
I really believe in allowing them their artistic right and
allowing them their practice and their own answers to these
profound questions—even if the answers are not the ones I
want. By their coming to their own answer, the role becomes
meaningful to them and they become invested in that role.
Because we all have every character in us, every archetype, it will
manifest differently for each person.
10 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
And I’m also there to be the conduit between what the
playwright has written and what they get out of it. Part of my
job is to give them the tools they need to take that embodiment
on personally. And what I’ve found is that it creates artists who
want to tell the story; it’s no longer a chore, and they enjoy the
experimentation. They enjoy asking the questions, and even
in some instances enjoy the frustration. I’m just really there to
set the groundwork so that each of these artists can come to the
script with their own honest vitality.
CC: So that’s the actors’ experience. What happens with
the audience?
VM: To me theater is a sacred space; there’s a community
that watches and a community that enacts. And the commu-
nity that watches is there to have a mimetic relationship, in
that they will have feelings and they will be brought to a higher
understanding of some kind by witnessing somebody else going
through this experience.
CC: So the depth that the actors can get to will pull the
watchers along into their own deeper experience into that
larger story in which we all exist.
VM: One of the worst things we can do to an audience is
to lie to them. Because the minute we feel we’re lied to, we shut
down. So how can we truthfully work with these stories and
with this audience? As much as the audience gets to feed off the
actors, the actors do the same. So when the audience is with
them and believes what is happening, they become invested.
And as that energy grows, the actor becomes more invested.
There’s nothing more wonderful than everyone in the room
is thinking and feeling the same thing, everyone having the
same joy, and the same sorrow. I think as a community that’s
how we heal and how we thrive.
CC: How do you see shamanism and a shamanic per-
spective informing and inspiring your work?
VM: I think the biggest thing shamanism has done for me
is given me a language and a home for my instincts. Shaman-
ism has provided a vehicle by which I could suddenly start to
structure and utilize them.
Once I started to see how ritual could work and how ritual
has been used to heal and to move others, I suddenly had a
direction and some tools. For instance, I would journey with
a text in mind to try to get some perspective and direction; I
would use it as a personal tool to find my strength for any trepi-
dations and fears. It also gave me some clarity on things that
up until that time I had been afraid to talk about: like seeing
energy systems and being able to manipulate them. Shaman-
ism gave me a way to recognize them as a legitimate force and
something that I could use in a healthy manner.
One of the challenges going forward has been how to bring
shamanism out of a personal practice and let it be more produc-
tive in my rehearsal spaces, without it being something that
creates difficulty for others. What amazes me is the more I bring
it forward, the more people are interested and want this.
It’s starting to grow and evolve in such a way that I recog-
nize if I really practice what I preach, my mission is to take on
shamanic theater in my own fledgling theater. We’re still in the
beginning stages of it, taking on sacred
spaces and sacred texts to really give them
a place.
Right now, though, a large part of
that is to create a sacred container for the
artists themselves. Because if they want to
speak on something sacred, I think they
need to be ready to honor that; and that
includes having a personal practice that
include this sense of forever evolving.
CC: So is this like an actors’ school
or dojo as part of your fledgling theater
company?
VM: Kind of. What I’m looking
at is more of a place with discourse, or
instruction, or whatever it is the artist
needs. It’s about mastery, which is an
ever-evolving state in which you are ask-
ing yourself: “What don’t I know? What
am I ready for next? Where’s my edge?”
And it’s a place where people can start to
build the personal rituals they need that
ground them and make them ready for
what they do.
CC: Historically we had the mon-
astery for spiritual initiation. In the
monastery you had a safe place where
you could fall apart, and people would
tend you and feed you and protect you. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Your shamanic theater has some of that
Virginia Monte is a theatrical
same feel.
director, designer, and theorist who has
VM: In Buddhism, it’s said to not
designed and developed theater for Off-
take on a koan without a teacher. You
Broadway, Off-off-Broadway, Regional
have to do the work, but sometimes these
and International Theater companies.
answers are very difficult and hard, and
Virginia is the Founder and Artistic
there’s so much to be gained by having
Director of Wallbyrd, a theatrical
someone there ready to say it’s okay that
production company. She has an MA
it hurts, it’s okay that it’s hard, and it’s
in Directing Classic and Contemporary
not a problem. It’s not a sign that you’ve
Text from the Royal Conservatoire
done something wrong, but that you’re
of Scotland and a BA from Stetson
developing.
University in Fine Art (Painting)
So I am making a space where actors
with minors in Theater Art and Art
can continue to evolve and to look at
History.  In 2011 she was the National
their craft not as a technician but as
Youth Theater Awards recipient for
an artist, as the shaman that Campbell
Most Outstanding Costume Design.  
talked about: the one who is awake and
www.virginiamonte.com
ready to take on the responsibilities of
these very important myths that are a Cecile Carson is a shamanic scout who
part of these texts. has been guided to collect stories about
What I love the most about shaman- people bringing shamanism into western
ism is there is no myth outside our scope. culture in innovative ways.  She now
We have the ultimate playbook because really “gets it” that spirit is everywhere,
we are the playbook! What better can and she has been seeing many new
there be? things through that lens.  www.
cecilecarson.com

Respected Kamasqa
Curandero from Peru
don Oscar
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NEW BOOK!
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Peruvian Shamanic Wisdom for Everyday Life
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www.shamansociety.org | 11
 S H A M A N I C
Owl Warning
Healing a Costa Rican Community
by Rebecca Singer
For five years, I lived near Monteverde in the Costa Rican
rainforest, encouraged to go there by my first teacher, a woman
of Lakota and Irish ancestry, who told me I would learn much
from the trees. My house was small, made of wood and concrete
like most Tico houses, but I had painted the entire inside and
outside myself, each wall a different primary color. The local
people called it the la casa de feliz cumpleanos….“It looks like a
birthday cake, very happy,” they would remark. My transporta-
tion for those five years was a horse I trained named Chispa,
who lived in the field outside my home. The small, normally
peaceful town of Santa Elena was a fifteen minute walk up the
road.
Now, every night for two weeks, an owl had been hoot-
ing near my window. I had never heard such a loud hoot—it
alerted the entire rainforest. On moonlit nights I could see that
this owl was huge. It perched high in a tree near my kitchen,
but the sound was so loud it might have been right outside my
bedroom.
One day, Nani, my friend and nearest neighbor, came to say
this owl was bothering her, that she had a bad feeling about it.
Nani, who often knew things, thought the owl was a messenger
of no good.
The murders ripped through the innocence of Monteverde
like a knife through silk, changing the inner and outer landscape
of the place forever. It was the worst crime in Costa Rica’s his-
tory.
I was riding home on my horse Chispa when the first heli-
copter appeared, headed directly toward the town, the chopping
sound disturbing the usually peaceful mountaintop air. Chispa
startled at the sound, and raced toward the safety of home,
taking refuge under the barn roof. Helicopters never flew into
Monteverde: the valley with its shifting winds was too danger-
ous, and the 5000 foot altitude was too high to safely make a
passage through the rainforest for landing.
Then Nani came up the road, crying. Nani never cried, no
matter what horrible things were said or done. She had a good,
big heart, but she had learned to be tough, as life on the moun-
tain sometimes held cruel surprises.
But this day she came crying, and asked to come in.
Nani, short with deep almost-black eyes, was my dearest
friend on the mountain. We were like sisters, walking together
every morning, having coffee together nearly every day. It was
Nani who had taught me to cook, take care of my garden, and
12 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
P R A C T I C E
shop. Nani was also as silly as I, and the two of us giggled and
laughed easily. But this day Nani’s tears flowed into her tea. Two
Nicaraguan men had robbed the bank and taken twelve local
people hostage. They were trapped in there, in the bank, unable
to leave. Already three shots had been fired, and rumor had it
that three people had been killed in the first hour. The ongoing
siege was on the news, and we turned on the TV to watch.
As the drama unfolded, Monteverde was besieged by the
media, both local and national, descending like vultures, and
Monteverde was filled with armed police, trucks, cameras, and
strangers.
One of the robbers lay dead outside the bank steps, perhaps
shot by a local policeman. The locals were told to stay in their
houses; most of the town was cordoned off, so they were forced
to watch from a few blocks away. It was like watching a show
from another planet. They witnessed a few of the hostages escape
through a window in the rear of the bank and run for their lives
into the surrounding forest. All through the night the whole
town was paralyzed.
No one knew who was alive, who was in the bank. Frantic
calls were made house to house, until word got out. William
the mailman was in the bank. The florist. More shots during
the night. The next morning, one of the bankers convinced the
robber to come out, hands up, and that’s when everyone learned
of the nine dead people in the bank. They were all people known
by everyone on the mountain. Good people, kind ones who had
simply been in the bank to take care of their financial affairs.
And now they were dead.
The town was in shock. Once the media and police thinned
out, people stood in the town center day after day, through
night time candlelit vigils, whispering. Many were simply frozen,
showing no emotion. How could it be? How could this have
happened?
The government sent counselors who held meetings for any-
one to attend. People began to unfreeze, and the tears flowed.
A memorial of poetry, dolls, flowers, balloons, prayers, stuffed
animals, and written memories covered the entire downtown.
Every day new prayers, more poetry. Huge black ribbons ap-
peared on doorways as people tried to get back to daily life—but
they couldn’t.
Then the funerals began, funeral after funeral, pierced by the
calling of the birds, the occasional rumble of thunder, all of us
standing numbly beside grave after grave.
 Monteverde was a small enough community that the absence
of even one person was noticeable. Suddenly there were nine
people gone.
Three weeks after the event, I was riding Chispa home when
I suddenly felt I must go into the bank and clear out the energy.
I had a strong feeling that some of those who had been shot still
did not understand they were dead, and needed an explanation.
But the town was very Catholic and I did not want to offend the
priest. Then I heard my beloved teacher’s voice in my head, as
clear as though she was right beside me, riding next to me: “Go
in and ask the bank manager.”
I tied Chispa to a post outside
the bank and entered. It was near-
ly closing time. I asked to speak
to the manager, and was granted
permission to enter his office. He
indicated I should sit in the chair
opposite him. He was a small
man with an ample stomach, his
shirt buttons nearly popping. He
had kind eyes, and he looked at
me with curiosity. We had done
business for four years now and
he knew me to be a trusted client
in the community.
“Con permiso, tengo una pre-
gunta un poquito differente,” With
permission, I have a question....
it’s a little unusual.
He gestured for me to con-
tinue. I explained that I was able to do the work of a curandera,
that I could clear the energy in the bank so that it would be
lighter and easier for the people to work there and for the people
in the town. I explained that everything I did would be in
harmony with the church, that I could do the work with others
present, maybe around closing time. I mentioned I might be
singing, lighting a candle and some sage, walking around. And
then I waited.
He answered immediately and his response surprised me.
His eyes filled with tears and he said he would be so grateful.
That they could hardly breathe in there. That working was nearly
impossible. When could I come to do the work?
“In three days,” I answered. “I will come in three days, at
5:00 pm. And I am most grateful.”
“No, it is I, it is we who are grateful. Just come in, and all
but a few will be done for the day. Thank you so much for offer-
ing this to us.”
I was startled at his manner, at how grateful he was; it was
as though he had been waiting for someone to ask. As I rode
Chispa back to my house, I began to see what must be done.
My teacher had taught me how to enter the World of Spirits,
the world that had spontaneously opened to me as a child, and
often irritated and sometimes haunted me as a young adult.
Now I had the tools to shut it down or open it, and open it I
did.
I contacted a group of ten people on the mountain, both
locals and expatriates, who practiced a form of Japanese healing
similar to Reiki. I asked them to gather in a house to the north
of the bank on the date I was going there, and they agreed. I
asked them to send light.
Then I approached a group of Quakers who lived on the
mountain, and asked them if they would gather in a room down
the street from the bank, and be still and pray for those who had
been killed. They agreed.
I called healers from North America and asked them to drum
at the time I would be in the bank, and they agreed.
Most importantly, the sha-
mans of Mt. Chirripo had taught
me how to enter, through deep
meditation, their sacred healing
space, and to ask for their help. I
did this through a specific ritual,
and they agreed to assist me.
Essentially I had the four
directions covered, groups and
individuals holding protection
and sending light from all four
directions.
Then I began my research on
the history of the bank. I was not
surprised to find that in the past,
on the same ground, there had
been a bar, and that there was vi-
olence and death associated with
that bar. Before the bar, there had
been a house, where a child burned to death. The ground itself
had a history of death and violence.
I asked all those involved not to speak about the cleansing,
that for their protection and mine it was best kept quiet. Also,
I did not want to be known for this work, as it was not me, but
the combination of everyone, that would make the bank clear.
On the evening I entered the bank, I had prepared with ritu-
als of protection for myself and everyone involved.
When I walked in, I could see five bodies lying in pools of
blood on the floor. Undead. This type of “seeing” was something
I was born with, and I was not surprised at the bodies; I knew
they were spirits. Unsettled. Not understanding. Shocked. Still
not able to go.
I sat among them, vaguely aware of the three people left
working in the bank, who purposely ignored me. I knew I had
to work in a way that would not alarm or offend the workers.
Quietly I began by lighting a candle and clearing the space
with a small bit of sage and juniper. I brought a large eagle
feather to send the energy out and up into the sky where it could
be transformed into light.
I began explaining to the five souls what had happened to
them. How the robbers had entered, through what door, and
to each I explained that they had been shot, and that they were
dead, and could go home to their god now. In fact, I told them,
they must. So that life could go on. Their relatives were saying
www.shamansociety.org | 13
goodbye, they were, in fact, now buried in the ground, so they
would not be able to re-enter their bodies. They had to go. It
was done. It was okay. They could go in peace. Their families
knew they were dead. They must not stay there. Here. Here was
a good light to look into. Watch. There were angels coming,
relatives who were already on the other side. They were to watch
them as the dead came to greet them.
Slowly, one by one, they left, going into the light.
I placed a small statue of Mary in front of me. I sat still till I
could see the light begin to emanate from the center of the room
and slowly spread inside the building, into every crevice, every
darkened space, into the earth, deep, and now circling the bank
on the outside, like a small hurricane of light. Then into the sky,
into the night time, signaling to the stars that all was well on this
tiny spot of earth, that the spirits were at peace, had gone home,
and It Was Done.
I rose slowly after a long prayer of gratitude and closed the
work. I did not know that several hours had passed, and as I rose
to leave, I noticed that only the bank manager was left, waiting
for me.
He was crying.
Without words, I hugged him and left, walking down the
street to the room where the people were gathered at the end of
the street. I entered the small, dark room, and asked them what
they had seen.
“Light,” they said. “Light first coming from inside and then
swirling around the outside of the bank and into the sky.”
I thanked them and said it was done. I felt faint, and one of
them offered me a ride home.
14 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
After I entered my house, I began vomiting, again and again.
Then, spent, I walked out into the night and listened to the
night sounds. An occasional dove call or “mot mot.” Mostly
crickets, in chorus with tree frogs.
I slept for a day and a night.
A week later, when I entered the bank, I was delighted. The
priest had brought a beautiful statue of Mother Mary to grace
the corner of the bank. Large plants stood in the other corners.
Local artists had hung gorgeous paintings on the bank walls.
Behind each teller’s window, they now had tiny personal belong-
ings, pictures of their families.
It was done.
The owl was silent, gone. I never heard that sound again, as
long as I lived in the Birthday Cake House.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Rebecca Singer is a shaman trained in ancient healing
ways, whose 35-year journey has taken her to the very roots
of shamanic traditions. She has been taught by shamans,
healers, and teachers among the Lakota of Pine Ridge in
South Dakota, the indigenous tribespeople of the Costa
Rican rainforests, and the Reindeer People in the northern
mountains of Mongolia, all of whom accepted her and passed
on to her the wisdom of their healing ways. Rebecca currently
lives in upstate New York, where she is at work on her
memoir, and she travels internationally offering ceremonies,
healing sessions and workshops. You can read more about
Rebecca at www.shamanicenergy.com.
 S H A M A N I C P R A C T I C E

Meeting with Darkhad

Shaman, Erdene-Ochiz,
of Mongolia:
His Story and Description of a Special Tool for Extraction Healing
by Susan Ross Grimaldi, M.Ed., and John R. Lawrence Jr., PhD

Introduction He began, “When I was 13 years old, I got frozen.” He was

Since the mid 1990’s, Susan Grimaldi and John Lawrence,
Jr. have together been searching for, and researching, surviving
traditional shamans. Their work has taken them to three conti-
nents. The fruits of their labor have been preserved in photo-
graphic, video and audio recordings as well as in written form.
The video recordings include face-to-face interactions, conversa-
tions, interviews, shamanic rituals, and healing work. For the
work presented here, they began a quest to see if they could find
practicing shamans among a nomadic tribe of reindeer herders
called the Dukha (AKA Tsaatan), these people being the last
remaining, truly nomadic, subsistence reindeer herders in the
world.
Just as they finished packing their gear and were preparing
to begin the last leg of this expedition into the West Taiga, John
and Susan had the unexpected good fortune to meet a shaman
from a different ethnicity, the well known Darkhad shaman,
Erdene-Ochiz.
The following findings were gathered during this expedi-
tion to the Sayan Mountain Range, in the remote outpost of
Tsagaanuur located in northern Mongolia.
We asked Erdene-Ochiz how he had become a shaman. 
Erdene-Ochiz, Darkhad Shaman Photo by John R. Lawrence, Jr.
attending a boarding school in a different town. He missed his
family and hated school.  One winter he tried to escape from the
school and reach his home. On the way, his ears and toes were
deeply frostbitten.
During his escape he was stricken with another serious ill-
ness. It’s a childhood illness known as the “wind flower illness”.
He explained, “This illness got inside of my body and I got
crazy. A rash appeared on my skin. I was told that I had become
delirious with a high fever and had taken off all of my clothes. I
was unconscious.” He didn’t remember any of this. Someone in
a car found him naked, lying beside the road. He was frozen so
hard that his “feet were as hard as wood”.
He laid in the hospital unconscious for fifteen days. When
he awoke he remembered nothing, only knowing that he was in
the hospital. For three months he stayed there, and during those
months he had to have fluid aspirated from his chest and from
behind his scarred ears. He lost some of his toes. Eventually,
though, he got well.
We wondered why he had run away from school and he told
us, “I missed my home very much. I was not interested in school
at all. I had tried to run away before, and my family would catch
me and send back to the school.”  
We wanted to know what happened after his recovery and
were told, “After I got well, I had to go back to school. When I
was at school, I started foretelling the fortunes of my classmates.
The teachers didn’t understand me. They blamed me for doing
these divinations and said that I was bad and doing wrong,
claiming that I was turning around the heads of my classmates.
My teachers hit me, beat me and threw me against the wall.
Shamanism was prohibited and punished by the Soviet govern-
ment. My teachers made me hit the wall because the society
was against the shamanic traditions. They tried to take away
my power and destroy me. So, I stopped doing these shamanic
practices under this pressure.  I quit this kind of seeing. It was

www.shamansociety.org | 15
something I had to stop for a period. It was when I was 27 years
old that I became a shaman in the real meaning of the term.”
He finished school, married and had a family of his own. At
the age of 20, he became insane. He ran away from his home and
family. He ran away fifteen kilometers and preferred to be in the
mountains, in nature and alone. He became strange and couldn’t
be with regular people. This condition lasted for over a year.
He doesn’t remember that time well. He only remembers
what he heard from other people.  He ran through the valley and
on occasion he would return to his home only to eat, but then he
would run away again. People couldn’t recognize him because he
had lost a lot of weight and seemed like a different person with a
different appearance.  He was really thin. He only wanted to be
alone and to pray.
An old shaman saw him jumping up and running away into
the mountains and tried to make a shamanic “re-pairment” for
him, which we later understood to be the same as soul retrieval.  shaman’s body, enabling him to see the reason for the bizarre
With this help he made some improvement and after one year
he stopped running away. That old shaman helped him to get
back to life and regain
his sanity. The old sha-
man had told him that
he needed to have some
shamanic tools, so he
got three items: a rattle,
a jaw harp, and the Sky’s
Arrow. His teacher made
the jaw harp alive for
him by whispering some
powerful energy into
it. A craftsman made a
Sky’s Arrow for this sha- Drawing of Sky’s Arrow, by Erdene-Ochiz, Darkhad Shaman
man, which he still has Digital Image by John R Lawrence, Jr.
and uses for extraction
healing.
Erdene’s grandmother had been a shaman, too. One of her
students who had become a shaman informed Erdene that he
had been chosen to become a shaman. During this initiatory pe-
riod he began to dream of shamanic teachings, learning directly
from deceased ancestral shamans.
As a tool, the Sky’s Arrow has its origins in the Bronze Age.
The length of the Sky’s Arrow is 7-10 inches (20cm). The point
is sharp, and the shaft is twisted into a spiral. The Sky’s Arrow as-
sures that the shaman is always able to connect with the sky. He
explained to us that, “The Sky’s Arrow is empowered by thunder
and lightening, and that the vibrations of the thunder and the
power of the lightening can destroy an illness”.
He described how he uses the Sky’s Arrow for healing pa-
tients. “The Sky’s Arrow is used for getting out bad things. The
helping spirit goes into my body, and tells me what to do with
the Sky’s Arrow”. For instance, he was instructed by the spirits
to “wipe the patient’s body clean using the Sky’s Arrow. If the
person is having spasms, or twitching, the Sky’s Arrow needs to
16 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
be wiped over them from head to foot and crosswise. I may be
shown how to draw this bad out from somebody.”  He says that
he often doesn’t remember the healings, “Because, when the
spirit goes away, I forget what I have done”. He compared his
shamanic healing journey to a dream, saying, “It is like a dream.
It is the spirit that knows”.
The Sky’s Arrow is a tool especially important for treating
psychosis. He has treated many insane people successfully. He
spoke about one man who had been insane for seven years. Dur-
ing this period this insane man had two horses that he would
tie together by their necks. He would stand on one saddle and
then step across the moving horses to stand on both saddles.  We
asked why the insane man didn’t fall off, and he explained, “It
was because while he was insane, he was very good at communi-
cating with the animals”.
During the healing for this man, a helping spirit entered the
behavior.  This was a case of ‘shamanic poison’. “This insane
person was an unusual person but he wasn’t a shaman.  The
shamanic poison oc-
curred because the
patient had broken
a taboo. He had
offended nature and
was experiencing
punishment”. In
the healing process,
“The Ongot spirit
tells the shaman
how to get rid
of that shamanic
poison so the person
will be sane again”.
We understood
Ongot spirits to be
deceased shamans, ancestors, and nature spirits.
During a healing, the shaman calls on his many helping
spirits and these go into his body. Erdene revealed, “It’s like be-
ing shifted”. He said, “I have seven helping spirits. Almost all of
them are old people spirits who already lived on the earth and
have passed away”. He told us that during a healing, his soul goes
out of his body as the spirits go into his body. 
We told Erdene that we had been informed that a few sha-
mans in Mongolia practice black shamanism and we wanted to
know if this is true, and, if so, we wanted to know if he could
explain why someone would do this. We had heard that in olden
days there were two brothers who were both Darkhad shamans.
They died in the 1960’s. One shaman was white and one black.
The black shaman would cause hardship and the white shaman
would try to fix what his black shaman brother had caused.
When the black shaman was still living, every year on a particular
day, he required everyone in his community to pay him a visit
and give him a valuable gift. Even the poorest person had to do
this or they would die. He took advan-
tage of everyone and did terrible things
with his power. To this day people will
not speak the name of this black shaman
for fear of awakening his spirit.
It was explained to us that the reason
someone would practice these dark
arts was because they were bad people,
something was not right in their mind. A
person who enjoys making others suffer
and manipulating others to their advan-
tage has the behavior of a sociopath.
He said that there used to be black
shamans in the old times but nowadays
he doesn’t know whether they exist or
not. But then he went on to say that he
doesn’t know about it directly, but he
knows that it does happen.  He added
that if a shaman is trying to do good and
is working to heal a client, it takes a long
time, but for a ‘black thing’ it takes a
short time.
We wondered what happens to a
black shaman, asking if there are bad
effects of doing bad things.  He told us,
“Bad things can affect the black shaman’s
children or relatives, like their brothers
and sisters, or the next generation”.
We asked him to tell us about his
drum.  He told us that shamans here
never make their own drums.  It must be
another person who makes a drum for
the shaman.  “Drum makers are special
people. Some shamans make drums for
other shamans but not for themselves. A
drum maker must have knowledge about
shamanism and know the ethics and rules
for making drums. They use larch wood
for the rim. The drumhead is made from
a doe’s skin. It must be from a two-year
old female deer. A female deer usually
gives birth when she is two years old, but
as for the skin for the drum, the female
deer should not yet have given birth.”
We told Erdene that we had seen
shaman’s drums with objects tucked
under the hide, on the outside of the
wooden hoop and we wanted to know
about these bumps. We learned that
these bumps are usually made of wood
and that the size varies. “These bumps are
part of the shaman’s regalia and signify
the shaman’s rank. A young or new sha-
man starts with small bumps. When that
shaman’s rank is higher, and he becomes
more skillful and powerful, then the
bumps will be bigger.”
We asked Erdene if he has an impor-
tant message that he wants for us to con-
vey when we return to our homeland. He
hesitated only a moment before saying,
“The most important thing when becom-
ing a shaman, is that for the first three
years, the shaman doesn’t do any healing
for others because the shaman needs time
to mature in their understanding and
grow in their abilities.”  He compared it
to when a baby is born, saying, “It needs
time to grow up, and start to walk.  It
takes time, for a shaman to be ready. The
first year, just after becoming a shaman,
if they start to do something, it’s like just
after being born, trying to run or walk,
it can’t be. These shamans are not good
for the people because they are not yet a
matured shaman.” He cautioned, “This
could result in more suffering for the
client. The shaman must learn step by
step to become powerful and helpful for
people.”
 He was curious about us and wanted
to know if we are shamans, researchers or
if we are delegates from an organization
wanting to protect the shaman’s rights.
We told him that we are research-
ers and that we practice shamanism.
We explained that we are working to
preserve shamanic knowledge and that
we would be contributing our findings
to the Foundation for Shamanic Studies’,
Shamanic Knowledge Conservatory and
that it would be protected and preserved
for future generations.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
John R. Lawrence, Jr., PhD, is a
Cultural Anthropologist, explorer,
documentary videographer, and
photographer specializing in the
research of traditional shamans.
His fieldwork has led him to China,
Tuva, the Amazon Basin, Estonia
and Mongolia, where he worked to
record and preserve the practices of
these tribal traditional healers. He
co-produced three documentaries, and
has published numerous articles. He
is a shamanic practitioner, counselor
and licensed massage practitioner
living in Seattle, WA.  john@
consciousnessworldweb.com
Susan Ross Grimaldi, M.Ed, is a
dedicated, ethnographic researcher
committed to cultural preservation,
specializing in Audio/Visual
Documentation. Susan was born into
the Choctaw Nation and is a highly
respected, internationally renowned,
Native American shaman, based in
Montpelier, Vermont. Her fieldwork
has been ground breaking and pivotal
for catalyzing the reemergence of
shamanism in China. Her dedication to
cultural preservation has led her to the
Amazon basin in Brazil, rural China, and
to the most remote northern taigas of
Mongolia, where she filmed shamanic
traditions. www.susangrimaldi.com
LAST MASK CENTER
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Explore the medicine of the Healer and
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learning shamanic skills to their direct
application in actual energy clearing,
working effectively with power objects
and sacred space, and true intimacy
with your helping spirits. The Cycle gives
you access to mentorship, teleseminars,
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www.shamansociety.org | 17
 E S S A Y
Architects Of The Future
by Jill Raiguel, MFT
The temple and light column work that have been revealed
to me over the last several years convinces me that ancients from
many cultures are gifting us with their secrets. The light column
work and temple work are just two aspects of that secret knowl-
edge. These spiritual allies are giving us a template for the next
26,000 years, so we can build a future not just for our children
and grandchildren, but for generations to come. This article
describes how I was initiated in this work, and how it is being
used. It discusses some of ancient knowledge contained in this
wisdom. Then I explore why it is being re-remembered now, and
how people are participating.
Spontaneous Initiation
I had been asking my spiritual team, “How else can I help
the Earth?” When I journeyed they replied, “Put in light col-
umns.” But, what did that mean? How would I do that? Then,
after closing up the house one chilly night, I sat in my easy
chair to meditate. For some years this has been my practice. I
give thanks, make my offerings, and often sing to my spiritual
helpers. I had just settled in and taken a few deep breaths, I
slipped quickly into an altered state. Quite suddenly I was inside
a ceremonial structure filled with light. Excitement and fear
raced through me. My body was being infused with power and
filled with light. as quickly as it came, it was gone. My heart was
racing, my body pulsing. I felt honored and humbled, but what
had just happened?
Over the next weeks, I asked my spiritual team that question.
I was introduced to the Egyptian god, Horus, who told me he
was the spiritual being in charge of the light column work. He
instructed me in a two-minute process to install a light column
for healing the Earth. Then, he told me how to install such col-
umns anywhere on the Earth. He suggested that I ask for a new
spiritual team for my light column work separate from my team
I use for regular shamanic work. It now consists of an animal, a
tree spirit, an ancestor, and Horus. The light column initiation
involves a sigil which is a symbol that has a magical purpose.
I was excited, but was I making all this up? I called a clair-
voyant friend of mine. She came over to watch me as I did the
process silently with a map on my lap. I told her nothing about
what I was doing. She remarked, “You are building a column of
light and then it’s going in to the Earth.” That was eight years
ago.
18 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
But where was this wisdom coming from? Could there have
been a spiritually and technologically advanced culture whose
ancient teachings are now being accessed? Why was this being
revealed now?
One Ancient Culture
I found part of the answer in cartographer Charles Hap-
good’s book, Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings of the Ice Age: Evi-
dence of Advanced Civilization in the Ice Age. He has discovered
ancient maps.
Hapgood states, “As our studies extended from map to map
we accumulated more and more evidence of an ancient exis-
tence, in an era long before Greece, of spherical trigonometry
and its application to map-making.” (Hapgood, p. 183.)
Through Hapgood’s meticulous research, he infers that
there must have been one ancient seafaring civilization that was
the root of many major world cultures. In addition to being
spiritually sophisticated, these sea-going people had knowledge
of longitude and latitude, spherical trigonometry, and higher
mathematics; they knew the Earth was round.
What was this ancient civilization? Some call it Atlantis,
Mu, or Lemuria, but evidence shows it may have existed 11,000
years ago. Although it is not possible to confirm that certain
cultures came from Atlantis, some scholars present convincing
evidence. Clues exist throughout the world. In the jungles of
South America, Hapgood asserts, explorers have found remnants
of ancient pyramids from long before the Inca that predate the
Egyptian ones and that could have been built by this culture.
The Cherokee tell stories of their ancestors who came from
what they called Elohi Mona or Atlantis according to Dhyani
Ywahoo’s Voices of our Ancestors: Cherokee Teachings from the Wis-
dom Fire. Tracing their origins from the Pleiades, the Cherokee
are a star people who came to islands in the Atlantic they called
Atlantis.
Ywahoo reports, “The islands and civilization of Elohi Mona
were eventually destroyed through the arrogance and ignorance
of those who abused sacred power...This went against the ele-
ments holding the people and islands together, and thus the
islands broke up and the great migrations began.” (Ywahoo, p.
11)
Temple Keepers of the Americas, who existed before the time
of Christ trace their migrations to Atlantis. Ywahoo asserts that
these temples had no interior light; they were lit up by seven to
twelve wise people who sat in them. One could only become a
Temple Keeper after demonstrating one’s ability to create this
Light for the community.
After I had drafted this piece, I journeyed and asked my
Atlantean spiritual teacher for his comments. He said that by the
time Atlantis sank, the spiritual leaders had mastered extrasen-
sory skills and the healing arts. They could even manipulate the
weather. Priests and priestesses who still worked in the light
encoded the sacred teachings to be retrieved in the future. That
time is now.
Ancient Knowledge
We know that some ancient cultures remembered their
soul purposes and technologies better than others: Egyptians,
Atlanteans, Hawaiians, Peruvians, Cherokee, Hopi. But strife
and lack of cooperation led to their physical destruction. Some
shamans, healers, and priests preserved their deep spiritual teach-
ings, but found their societies were not ready and responsible
to use them. In some cases individuals and adepts took care
to hide
 these important teachings until the time was right for
future humans to uncover and use them.
The Tibetan Buddhist word for these secrets is “terma,” a
hidden bundle of ancient teachings or buried treasure. A person
who is born with the destiny for recovering a bundle of teach-
ings and making it available to the world, is called a “terton.”
Here are a few examples of people being downloaded spiritual
teachings.
Sharon McErlane in her book, A Call to Power, relates her
experiences with the Council of Grandmothers, a group of non-
ordinary reality beings who have come to help women and men
8  SCGMSS  Residential  Animist/Shamanic  Conference  &  Gathering
th
Wednesday  4  –  Sunday  8  May  2016  -­‐‑  Pre-­‐‑conference  Monday  2nd  &  Tuesday  3rd
th
CALL  FOR  PRESENTATIONS
Closing  date  for  submissions  12noonPST  July  15th  2015
balance their yin and yang. They assert that part of the problem
in Western culture is that we are too yang focused, and we need
to call forth our yin energy. In his book, The Bowl of Light, Dr.
Hank Wesselman shares with readers the description given by
Hawaiian kahuna and shaman, Hale Makua, of what Makua
called the Great Ancestral Plan set in motion tens of thou-
sands of years ago to be activated as we end one age and began
another. Nicki Scully and Linda Star Wolfe share the power of
the heart initiation of ancient Egypt in their book, Shamanic
Mysteries of Egypt. These are just three examples of spirit gifting
us with ancient wisdom crucial to our personal and planetary
transformation.
Secret teachings are being re-remembered because of the
critical time in which we live. They can contribute to our power
and wisdom, bring us solutions and guidance, and perhaps as-
sist in insuring a new age of peace. The Egyptian light column
teachings are such teachings, perhaps as much as 16,000 years
old according to our teachers in the spirit realms.
Collaborative Shamanism
Veteran shamanic practitioner and another light column in-
structor, Marta Boyett, who lives in Eugene, Oregon, and I, who
live in Southern California, developed a way of working together
using shamanism over the phone to erect light columns. This
collaborative model was born out of spiritual helpers telling us
that one person was not enough to address certain world issues.
It takes a team, but how to be a team when light column people
are located all over the US? So, we created our monthly calls.
During the last eight years, the light column practitioner
group has grown to over a hundred people living all over the
country. Although we have had three annual conferences in
‘Death  &  Birth;  The  journey  of  lovers’  
 
Easter  Seals  Camp,  Squamish,  BC  Canada  
 
th
 
 
Guillermo  Bedregal,  A  Bolivian  revolutionary  said  this:    
“To  make  your  love  fit,  something  would  have  to  die  in  the  world.”  
Birth  contains  the  journey  of  death  and  Death  the  journey  of  birth.  
For  something  to  come  in  to  being,  something  else  must  leave.  
It  might  be  thought  that  Death  and  Birth  are  twin  lovers,  
yet  in  truth  they  are  together  the  act  of  love.  
It  is  sung  that  the  soul  that  does  not  sing  of  death  is  not  living  
and  the  dead  that  do  not  sing  of  living  cannot  be  reborn.  
We  gather  to  make  a  love  that  fits!  
information on the gathering, previous gatherings, and to submit
Please view http://circleofgreatmystery.org/2016-death-birth/
or email generalscgmss@gmail.com  
www.shamansociety.org | 19
Oregon, we do gather monthly on freeconferencecall.com, free
to the participants. We sit in sacred circle and journey out loud
focusing on a global issue or area that we are called to. That
could be the racial violence in Ferguson, Missouri; a plane crash;
the California drought; or last summer’s wild fires. As directed
by our spiritual teams, we use the various light column tools we
have been given. Initially, Marta or I lead the call; but now we
have trained others, so we rotate the leadership and responsibil-
ity. Calls are about one hour. I find them very nourishing and
satisfying as well as a way to stay connected to people I don’t get
to see very often.
The process of installing an energetic light column is an easy
process that takes a few minutes after an initiation by a light
column instructor. It is a sacred process that is taught to people
when they are initiated. As we have installed light columns,
Horus and other beings have given us other tools as well. These
include light curtains, girds of power protection of support, a
re-generation of species process, a healing for trees and plants.
As my spiritual team has instructed, we can install any or all of
the light columns tools in a person as well as on the land. To me
these columns look like beams of light. Recently, a light work
practitioner who was called to do light work for the fires in the
West, was shown how to install a water light curtain and a water
light blanket to help the burning land. It seems that as we have
a need, our spiritual teams create a technique for healing that
need. When one of us is given a new light column tool we share
it with everyone else.
A spirit helper supervises each light techniques; they include
Isis, Osiris, Thor, and Neptune. Spirit has told us that these
energetic light columns raise the vibration of not only the Earth,
but also the humans beings installing them. There are now nine
of us who are light column instructors, who can initiate any
open-hearted, healthy person who has a passion for helping the
Earth.
In an effort to share this work with more like-minded
folks, Marta Boyett, Susan Brietmann, and I initiate any other
shamanic practitioner on the phone, no charge. It takes about
45 minutes. If people are interested in the work, we ask them to
journey to their helping spirits to see if it is right for them.
Temples of Light
I thought that light column work was enough to keep me
busy for years, but spirit had other plans. Starting in April 2011,
an energetic temple was installed on my property. To double
check our perceptions of the Temple process, Marta Boyett and
I sat together in journey mode on the phone. We were so exhila-
rated and overwhelmed with surges of love and power, we had to
take breaks to assimilate what was happening. Shortly after that,
a second temple was built in non-ordinary reality on Marta’s
property in Eugene.
I asked my spiritual team what was next. They wanted more
temple hosts. Marta and I made a list of shamanically trained
folks, doubled-checked these names with spirit, and then asked
20 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
each person if they were interested. First, they asked their own
spirits helpers if this was right for them. Then each person was
to detoxify and strengthen. For me that meant swimming and
detox foot baths. To date, over 60 people have volunteered to
host temples. Some needed to fast; others took certain baths;
others adhered to a certain eating program; some needed to
walk, swim, run, do yoga or practice judo. As of this date, there
are temples installed throughout the US, Central and South
America, China, Japan, Australia, and Europe.
Every temple appears to be unique; whether like a pyramid,
or rectangular with columns, or stone in structure or made
of crystals. There are 200 plus temples world-wide. As these
magnificent structures are built and are instructing each temple
host, I have more questions than answers. Who was directing
this temple project? I would soon find out.
The Master Temple Keeper
One morning, I saw inwardly a long time member of my
spiritual team. I greeted him with respect and honor and, yes,
curiosity.
He said, “I am the keeper of the template of these temples. I
am from Atlantis.” I was thunderstruck. I had met this spiritual
teacher in a past-life regression almost 40 years ago. I did man-
age to ask a couple of questions before I had to focus in ordinary
reality and see my day’s clients.
“You have been at my side as a guide for all these years, why
are you just telling me this now?” I asked aloud.
“It was not time yet! We -- you and I -- agreed to do this
when Atlantis was sinking,” he said. I was overwhelmed, but his
broad smile and kind twinkle in his eye was reassuring. I was so
excited that I floated through the day of client sessions.
Temple Purpose and Function
Each temple appears to have a distinct purpose; and that
purpose directly correlates to its host’s life purpose. For ex-
ample, I am a life long teacher; I have taught high school and
college and continue to teach in my private practice. My temple
in Southern California is the Teaching Temple; it looks like a
step pyramid. It serves as the incubator for all the other temples.
Tonilee Hanson’s temple, covering the Spokane River and aqui-
fer spreading over 100 square miles, is the Water Temple. In her
everyday life, she is director of the water board that protects that
area; and she and her life partner run the Spokane River Project
that is dedicated to cleaning up the Spokane River. Her’s serves
as a healing temple and generates energy for the other temples.
Susan Brietzmann’s is a Healing Temple since she is a Reiki
Master.
Although the temples have special functions, they ALL seem
to act as a healing temple. In my experience, the temple heal-
ings are much faster than other shamanic processes. How this
happens I don’t know, but I have personally experienced deep
healing. And others have reported similar healings.
 Hosts learn what their temples can do
and provide. One host said, “Each tem-
ple is analogous to a computer.” Just as
a computer has many programs that ac-
complish different tasks, so temples have
multiple functions. They are like power
stations; many have libraries within their
structures; most have terma embedded in
them; and they act as portals. By that I
mean, I can use my temple as a “launch
pad” to non-ordinary realities, times, and
dimensions. The portal also allows light
beings, avatars, and teachers to come here
and assist in our transformation.
The Siberian Ossuary
To illustrate how one temple came
into being, I’ll explain how the Temple
of the Bones came about. I had seen in
one of my journeys a Siberian shaman
who had a box he called an ossuary. I
did not know that word; they said look it
up on line. It means a box usually about
two feet long to hold a person’s bones.
But why a box for bones and why from
Siberia?
I have no ancestor connection to
that region of the world, and very little
knowledge of Siberia. So, I waited until
the mystery revealed itself. My mentor
and friend, Dr. Betty Kovacs, was the
key. I knew she had traveled the world
extensively, and I recalled she had made
a trip to Siberia. And I wanted to know
more specifically about that trip.
At one of our lunches, she began,
“We traveled to Altai, an autonomous
region between Mongolia and Siberia.
That region is said to be the center of
shamans. The village of Kamlak in Altai
is where Siberian shamans met.” I asked
her about ossuaries and bones. She told
me that for Siberian shamans, there is
great power in bones.
I came home and journeyed to Altai;
and a Siberian shaman was there to greet
me. He took me inside a yurt he called
the Temple of the Bones. He told me that
he and his colleagues are standing with
us, as are the great shamans and spirits
of many traditions because the earth and
all of humanity has such great needs.
Within the teachings that these bones
and the temples are housing, are many of
the solutions.
Anyone can journey to the Altai
Temple of the Bones that looks like a
yurt. Go inside and have yak butter tea
and chat about Siberian wisdom with the
shamans there.
The Powder River Temple
The Powder River Temple came about
through a series of journeys that started
when I reviewed Hank Wesselman’s
training as my spiritual team suggested.
Poised on the edge of the Pacific Ocean,
the training was at Big Sur in a mag-
nificent setting. Giant cliffs, crashing
surf, inspirited land. During one of the
journeys I was inwardly dancing around
a council fire as a Native American medi-
cine man. I could see several other tribal
chiefs around the fire. Then I looked
across the fire and saw a white man. It
was General O. Otis Howard, the great-
uncle of a friend of mine. I was amazed.
I had read General Howard’s autobi-
ography about his work with the Ameri-
can Indians in the 1870’s. After losing
his right arm in the Civil War at the
battle of Fair Oaks, he was commissioned
by President Ulysses S. Grant to make
peace with the Indians. Howard made
several, what had to be very arduous,
trips to the American West to meet with
Chiefs of many tribes including: Black
Kettle, Red Cloud, Cochise, and Chief
Joseph. These fellow warriors grew to
trust Howard as an honorable man. As
a result, Howard was very successful in
brokering peace agreements. Indians even
gave him many ceremonial objects: clubs,
bead work, arrows, and tribal clothing,
much of which is at the Smithsonian
or at Howard University. Tragically, by
the late 1800’s the next troop of white
soldiers slaughtered the Indians. In his
autobiography Howard relates that at
the end of his life, even though he was
a decorated war hero, had started the
Freedman’s Bureau for freed slaves, and
founded Howard University, he felt he
had failed the Indians.
With that as background, I journeyed
www.shamansociety.org | 21
for more information after the workshop. In my mind’s eye
with my eyes open, I saw Howard in a white muslin long-
sleeved shirt slumped over. He seemed entangled in white web-
bing. General Howard told me he felt he had failed, failed to
make the peace. A new power animal, a tarantula, began eating
away all the webbing. Howard stood up smiling.
Spontaneously, I began to address him: “Thank you for the
red man, for the white man, for the black man. You led an
exemplary life of service to your country, to men and women
of all races.” I was crying. With tears in his eyes, he kissed me
on the cheek. Then two angels appeared and took him to the
light.
Several days later, in journey mode, I saw Red Cloud, Black
Kettle, and my spirit helper, Red Eagle... and General How-
ard. As one voice they said, “We want a temple for peace...for
peaceful relations between all peoples. It will help us fulfill our
promise to make a lasting peace.... at the Powder River fifty
miles south of the Wyoming/Montana border.”
Why the Powder River? When I looked it up on line, I
discovered that that river was the scene of Red Cloud’s War.
Now a spiritual place, it is open to all who want to strengthen
their peaceful relationships. In non-ordinary reality, anyone
can dance around the tipi, or bathe shamanically in the river, or
whatever one’s spiritual team directs them to do.
Earth’s Template
The spirit helpers of the temples relate that the teachings
and knowledge of the various terma will be revealed in time,
but what do the temples themselves provide? I had another
conversation with Dr. Kovacs, mythologist and retired Pasa-
dena City College Professor. She related her thoughts about
the temple installations.
She said, “Perhaps these current Temple Keepers as well
as thousands of others are igniting the Earth’s new energetic
pattern. Perhaps these energetic temples are helping set the
pattern for the Earth’s new template. Since so much negative
destructive energy is rampant on the planet, building of the
temples can be a conduit for positive love, energy to flow into
time and space and stabilize matter. Temples are like anchors
for peace, harmony and good.”
Hale Makua, Hawaiian shaman, stated in Wamea, Hawaii,
“The end of 2012 marks the end of a 26,000 year cycle; 2013
begins another 26,000 year cycle that can be an age of peace,
harmony and prosperity for all. We, who are awake, can set the
pattern for that to occur.” We are those people.
Re-designing Our Future
But what about the Earth? What about the future? Dr.
Kovacs had some answers. Since the Temple work started Betty
has been and continues to be a wonderful support. She adds
her vast knowledge of ancient cultures as we dine.
She explained that the ancient stone circles and sacred
22 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
temples all over the world were built on ley lines and power
centers where the Earth’s magnetic energy came together and
was especially powerful. These structures were built in align-
ment with astronomical and natural cycles of the stars, sun,
and moon. On the surface they may appear to be simple, but
they certainly were not. They required complex mathematical
calculations to execute. So, when a man or woman stood in
these temples, they were empowered with tremendous energy
and were aligned with the natural forces.
Dr. Kovacs described a journey she had to the Earth Mother
who said, “Create your world to keep me well.” As the ances-
tors of our descendants seven generations from now, we are the
keepers of the wisdom for them. Let us create, with our spiri-
tual allies, a world of peace, health and prosperity for all life.
Sources
Bruyere, Rosalyn. Wheels of Light : Chakras, Auras and the Healing
Energy of the Body. New York: Fireside Books, 1989, p. 18.
Hapgood, Charles. Maps of the Sea Captains of the Ice Age. Kempton,
Ill. Adventures Unlimited Press, 1996, p. 181.
Kovacs, Betty. Miracle of Death, Claremont, Ca. Kamlak Center,
2003.
Personal interviews August 21, 2011, and April 19, 2014
Ingerman, Sandra and Wesselman, Hank. Awakening to the Spirit
Realms: Paths of Direct Revelation. Boulder, Colorado. Sounds
True, 2010.
Makua, Hale, talk by Makua at Visionseeker 2, Waimea, Hawaii,
August, 2001.
McErlane, Sharon. A Call to Power: The Grandmothers Speak. Laguna,
Ca. Net of Light Press, 2006.
Raiguel, Jill. Alternative Healing Beyond Recovery for the Genius.
Nashville, Tenn., Charity Channel Publisher, 2015.
Scully, Nicki and Star Wolfe, Linda. Shamanic Mysteries of Egypt:
Awakening the Healing power of the Heart. Rochester, Vt. Bear and
Co., 2007.
Wesselman, Hank. Bowl of Light: Ancestral Wisdom from a Hawaiian
Shaman. Boulder, Colorado. Sounds True, 2011.
Yawhoo, Dyani. Cherokee Teachings of the Wisdom Fire. Boston, Mass.
Shambhala Publications,1986.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jill Raiguel Author of Alternative Healing Beyond Recovery
for the Genius, Jill Raiguel, MFT, is a psychotherapist at
Kohut Psychiatric medical Group, in San Bernardino, Ca.
and she has a private soul retrieval practice. She conducts
workshops in the light column and temple work as well as
the alternative work she uses in her therapy. Visit jillibean.
com or jillraiguel@gmail.com.
 Praises for The Gift of Shamanism
“Be amazed and inspired. Above all, be open to your own powers.”
– John Perkins bestselling author of Confessions of an Economic Hit Man and Shapeshifting

“A beautifully crafted and inspiring work...Read this book!”

– Alberto Villoldo Ph.D, bestselling author of Shaman, Healer, Sage, and One Spirit Medicine.

"Itzhak Beery is a master storyteller...inspire us to tap into our shamanic potential. Brilliant book!"
– Sandra Ingerman, author of Soul Retrieval and Walking in Light: The Everyday Empowerment of Shamanic Life

“...offers clear teachings as well as riveting testimonials about what becomes possible when
we walk this path with humility, reverence, and discipline...I love this book!”
– Hank Wesselman, Ph.D., anthropologist and author of The Spiritwalker Trilogy, the award-winning Awakening to the
Spirit World and the Bowl of Light

“The wonderful message of Itzhak Beery's excellent book...is that everyone has the shaman with-
in....Beery's gift to readers is his deep understanding of what makes a shaman and how a shaman
lives in this confusing world. Even better, his story teaches us to trust the visions of the spirit world.”
– Tom Cowan, author of Fire in the Head and Yearning for the Wind

Available Wherever
Books are Sold

The Gift of Shamanism

Visionary Power, Ayahuasca Dreams,
Itzhak Beery is the founder and Journeys to Other Realms
of ShamanPortal.org,
cofounder of the New York By Itzhak Beery
Shamanic Circle, and he is on Foreword by John Perkins
the faculty of New York Open
Center. Beery is an internation-
ally recognized shamanic $16.95
healer and teacher. He was ISBN 9781620553725
initiated into the Circle
of 24 Yachaks by his Quechua
teacher in Ecuador and by
Amazonian Kanamari Pagè.
He has also trained intensively
with other elders from South www.InnerTraditions.com
and North America.
www.itzhakbeery.com www.thegiftofshamanism.com

www.shamansociety.org | 23
 E S S A Y
The Holding Space Method:
Underlying Shamanic
Aspects of Polarity and
Craniosacral Therapy
by Gary Strauss
Originally, in traditional societies doctoring was of a femi-
nine nature I am sure, though I wasn’t there, or maybe I was.
That is to say that doctoring was by its nature receptive and
listening. Our modern medicine has become overly masculin-
ized with technology and prescriptions that are often based on
a masculine functional idea of one size fits all. The problem is
that health is more individual than that, especially on the road
of manifestation into a condition. However, the feminine is still
alive and finding a resurgence in the energy based healing arts
which I have practiced for over 35 years: Craniosacral and Polar-
ity therapies.
Both Craniosacral and Polarity therapy started with Dr.
Andrew Taylor Still, MD DO, who originated Osteopathy in
the late 19th century. He believed that every cell in the body was
imbued with a spiritual intelligence. Likewise, in the aboriginal
worlds where I have participated, they believe that all things
have their own innate intelligence and deserve to be regarded as
sentient.
One of Andrew Taylor Still’s students was Dr. William
Garner Sutherland, DO, the originator of cranial osteopathy.
He determined that this spiritual intelligence had a pulsation to
it that emanated from the core of the brain and spine, which he
called the “breath of life.” Wherever the pulsation was healthy,
there was health, and where it was impeded, there was disso-
nance and the beginnings or presence of pathology. He arrived
at this thought under Still’s tutelage. This work is the basis for
today’s Craniosacral therapy.
Another student of Andrew Taylor Still, a contemporary
of Sutherland, was Dr. Randolph Stone, DO DC ND, who
determined that this pulsation was animated by life energy as it
pulsed through the soft and hard tissue of the body. He believed
that this pulsation was the emanation of our spirit and soul as
it made its way through the process of evolution, or the coming
into being. He called the system he originated Polarity, the Vital
Element in the Healing Art.
In my personal journey, some 35 years ago, when I had been
practicing yoga, meditation and the martial arts, and was feeling
nourished by something that I only vaguely understood, I met a
young man who introduced me to Polarity. He rubbed his hands
24 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
together and pulled them apart, encouraging me to do the same.
When I did so, I was amazed by what I felt between my hands.
It was like electricity; it had a pulsation and a magnetic type of
feeling, and I became excited and deeply intrigued. I had never
quite had that experience of myself with such ease. That led me
to study Polarity and Craniosacral therapies and make them
my life’s work. Since then, I have done about 35,000 sessions,
trained thousands of students throughout the world, and have
been an avid student, practitioner, teacher and mentor of the
energetic healing arts.
On this journey, my life was transformed. My relation to my
own life energy and to others’ had been awakened. I discovered
that everything had its own intelligence, or pulsation, and that
it loved it when I thought that and behaved like that. In fact, I
found that the more I regarded life as though it were a sentient
being, the more it responded with enthusiasm and with my
own self-empowerment. I started to feel that the less I did, the
more life just unfolded naturally and healthily. Whatever a client
would bring me, whether it was a broken bone, a headache,
depression, cancer, bulging discs, etc., it was always a similar
process, where I would sit and listen as if life’s intelligence was
speaking through the issues and health of the client, consciously
and unconsciously. The more I listened and honored the intel-
ligence, the more the client seemed to unfold and unravel the
blockages in their body and life, bringing about changes to their
life and body that I could not have imagined. This kind of lis-
tening began to permeate my work in the energetic healing arts
with clients, students and teachers, and then my relationships.
At first, I began to use the language of “Holding Space” in
my classes. I thought I had discovered the idea, although in
hindsight, I believe those words were ready to come to many
people.
At one point, I met a North American aboriginal teacher,
with whom I was called from afar to study during a week of
ritual and ceremony. Before I met him, I dreamed that I would
do so, and that it would greatly influence my life. When the
time came to meet him, I was so excited, waiting to hear what
he would tell me. Like a child learning a new lesson, I was feel-
ing a bit awkward. I waited and waited for the teaching, and
there was only silence. He didn’t say anything. And when I real-
ized he wasn’t going to say anything verbally, the awkwardness
became magnified.
As time went on in our journey, however, the silence became
nourishing, and the lesson I received was about stillness. In
stillness there seemed to be no need for discussion. I soon felt
like I was hearing him loud and clear. I lost the need to have a
transmission with words. In fact, the stillness seemed to open
something vital that could only be sourced through emptiness.
In Craniosacral, unwinding that stillness is the beginning
of the process that allows the body to unwind, unfurl and find
healing in the places that have become tight and restrictive. Our
modern astrophysicists and particle physicists have postulated
that the known universe is but 4% of what exists and that the
other 96% can only be accessed through an empty doorway
of darkness. In fact, their process is about contemplating that
darkness to find the artifacts of reality that animate the world we
perceive. This has been my journey with the human body and its
various dimensions as well.
Throughout my journey I have been amazed at the parallel
principles that exist between physics (traditional western sci-
ence), aboriginal attunement to life and wisdom, and the work
of Craniosacral and Polarity therapies. Dr. Stone, who was my
mentor, would say that the infinite within is ever expanding,
that it is a statement of how we are being expressed physiologi-
cally from something unseen that is vaster and more potent.
My work has seemed to be based on this part of the human/
cosmic energetic continuum of life: that the unseen animates the
known world with a potency, a force that is capable of altering
our world. Likewise, I have had experiences spending time with
shamans, where I found that they live outside their culture; they
are with it, not of it. They serve as mediators between the known
4% and the unknown 96%.
Similarly, in my way with all of this, I have found a path that
works, that is between the worlds. It is almost as if I were negoti-
ating between the larger and the smaller to bring about a natural
cure or way for the people I work with. In the Toltec tradition,
I understand they believed that the seeker of truth, or spiritual
aspirant, needed to wake up each day and make war on encul-
turation. They believed that the culture of society had an insan-
ity to it that you needed to avoid. Einstein would later say that
you cannot heal the problem of an entity from within the system
that created the problem. It takes someone from outside to help
it, to right the ship. My brother, in fact, has made an incredible
living for himself by being a consultant to large hospital chains.
He goes in and helps them do the things they need to do, that
they cannot do on their own, because they are so entwined
within the system. And, every time, he brings them from the red
to the black, and helps them find their way back to integrity.
I actually do the same thing. I just do it with energy, finding
where the energy needs to right itself to restore integrity to the
person’s system. Dr. Stone always said that energy has intel-
ligence and a direction that it needs to flow in. The wise person
sees this and assists nature in doing its job: the nature cure. It
seems that this is also the way shamans work.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Gary B. Strauss, MS, RPP, PWE is a Master Practitioner and
Instructor of Polarity Therapy and CranioSacral Unwinding.
Gary has helped thousands of people find greater health and
well-being with his work and mentoring. His educational
programs have uplifted many students to greater levels of
skill, self-awareness, empowerment and deep understanding
of the Principles of Life Energy. Gary’s unique perspective on
healing, energy and “holding space” is original and profound,
and he is known for his compassion and devotion to helping
people through his work. He has over thirty years experience
in the Energy Medicine field, and is the founder and director
of the Life Energy Institute and Polarity Healing Arts of
California.
www.shamansociety.org | 25
Traditional American Indian
Bodywork, the Origin of
Osteopathy, Polarity, and
Craniosacral Therapy
by Nita M. Renfrew

It seems that the origins of Osteopathy, created by Dr. An-
drew Taylor Still, MD DO (1828-1917) in the late nineteenth
century, indeed, lie in traditional American Indian bodywork. (I
use the term “American Indian” as used by AIM in the “Ameri-
can Indian Movement.”) We know now that among the natives
of this land, there was a healing tradition that combined a form
of osteopathic massage and manipulation with energy and narra-
tive work.1 In fact, Dr. Still, whose family was from southwestern
Virginia, where the territory was traditionally Shawnee and
Cherokee, lived among the Shawnee for many years on their res-
ervation in Kansas, where the tribe was forcibly relocated in the
nineteenth century. Still’s father was a missionary and a physician
to the Shawnee and, starting in 1853, Still assisted him for a
number of years as part of his medical training.
Earlier, however, in Tazewell County,
Virginia in the late 18th century, where
the territory was strongly contested
by the native inhabitants, the
Cherokee and the Shawnee, Dr.
Still’s family of settlers had al-
ready had several momentous
encounters, of a different
nature, with the Indians. In
the struggle over owner-
ship of the land, a number
of Still’s ancestors had lost
their lives and others were
taken captive. His mater-
nal grandfather had been
captured at age fourteen by
Shawnee Indian Chief Black
Wolf in an Indian raid on the
homestead and taken to live with
the Shawnee in Ohio. Then, in a
subsequent raid, Still’s great grandfather
was killed with three of the children, and Still’s
great grandmother was taken captive with the remain-
ing children, and later killed also, during the journey north.
Still’s grandfather was eventually rescued, after being sold into
slavery to a French trader, and he returned to Virginia after a few
years.2 Nevertheless, it would seem that destiny had in mind a
continuing connection between Still’s family and the Indians, for
Andrew Taylor Still and his father are reported to have developed
an excellent relationship with the descendants of those same
Shawnee in Kansas. Still lived with his wife and children on a
farm on the Shawnee reservation for a number of years, plowing
the land with oxen, growing corn, and is said to have learned the
Shawnee language fluently, while he helped with doctoring the
Shawnee.3-6
Later, when Dr. Still became a recognized physician and
surgeon, although he never said where he had learned his
musculoskeletal and organ massage techniques, which he called
Osteopathy, he is known to have alluded to the bone-setting
methods of the Shawnee at least once, as reported
by the director of the Museum of Osteopathic
Medicine in a lecture, who added that
Still often used “the phrase ‘Tak-
ing an Indian look’ at something.
Forgetting what you know and
just to quietly observe with no
thoughts.” This was followed
by a quote from Still’s Auto-
biography:7
“All Nature seemed to
wait in hushed expectancy.
With the iron hand of
will I barred the gates of
memory, shut out the past
with all its old ideas. My soul
took on a receptive attitude,
my ear was tuned to Nature’s
rhythmic harmony.”8
Indeed, Dr. Still lived his life,
like the Native Indians, by a nature-
centered belief.9 And when he started his
medical practice, he advertised himself as a
“magnetic healer” and “lightning bonesetter” before
naming his methods Osteopathic Medicine.10
Today, much of the traditional healing of the American
Indians has been lost, because the Christian missionaries called it

26 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015

devil worship. However, what has survived in pockets around
the country (along with Zuni and Navajo healing and bone-
setting) is Cherokee bodywork, which was surely similar to
Shawnee practices, since they were neighboring tribes in Vir-
ginia. Cherokee Bodywork today is practiced and taught by Dr.
Lewis Mehl-Madrona, MD PhD, of Cherokee and Lakota heri-
tage, professor at a number of colleges and universities (most
recently Dartmouth Maine), medical researcher, and author of
many books, including Coyote Medicine. His thesis, along with
some of his colleagues, is that Dr. Still learned much of what
would become Osteopathy during his years assisting his father
in his medical duties among the Shawnee. Dr. Mehl-Madrona,
who is seeking to honor and preserve Cherokee Bodywork,
came to this conclusion after experiencing and seeing the many
similarities between Cherokee Bodywork and Osteopathy.
Interestingly, this would indicate that the origins of
both Craniosacral and Polarity therapy also lie in traditional
American Indian bodywork, since both Dr. William Garner
Sullivan, DO (1873-1954), the originator of Cranial Osteopa-
thy (the foundation for today’s Craniosacral therapy), and Dr.
Randolph Stone, DO DC ND (1890-1981), the originator of
Polarity therapy, were Andrew Taylor Still’s students. Cherokee
bodyworkers, reports Mehl-Madrona, who learned the method
from two traditional Cherokee women, are masters at working
with energy and the breath, and they also move cranial bones,
seeking the ridges, albeit with more force than Craniosacral
practitioners. They do this along with osteopathic-like massage
and manipulation of musculoskeletal tissues, organs, and joints,
as well as acupressure on points and energy channels (that, in
fact, correspond to the meridians). They combine all this with
gentle rocking and with narrative healing, both verbal and
energetic, using story telling, and dialogue with the musculo-
skeletal system and with the client, and intense breathwork to
“restore spirit” to all parts of the body, when giving treatments
that they commonly refer to as “doctoring.”
There is, in addition, a very important spiritual component
to Cherokee Bodywork, which can appear as elements of tra-
ditional ritual and ceremony, which might mean using smoke
(offering herbs such as sweet grass, cedar, sage, and tobacco),
feathers, crystals, imagery, and intent, to move energy and work
with the spirit world, or prayer. Interestingly, in addition to the
physical bodywork that Osteopaths do, Dr. Mehl-Madrona has
found one more similarity between Osteopaths and traditional
American Indian bodyworkers: many Osteopaths, although
they don’t normally talk about it publicly, like the Cherokees
and other American Indians, converse with guides and other
spirit beings, and use dialogue and intent during their practice.
And both Polarity and Craniosacral therapists are known to do
the same.
Widely-recognized Biodynamic Craniosacral and Polarity
teacher Franklyn Sills, in one of his training books, describes
the parallels between “shamanistic,” or traditional healing, and
Craniosacral therapy:
“Shamanism is a healing tradition found in almost all
ancient and primitive cultures. It recognizes a divine ordering
principle at work in the universe and spiritual roots of creation.
The work we do in craniosacral biodynamics has direct sha-
manistic resonances. We orient to deeper forces at work and to
ordering principles that are “not made by human hands.”11
Sills goes on to talk about the “striking similarity of ap-
proach among very diverse cultures,” including “Navajo
shamanistic healing,” and “soul retrieval” in classic cultures.12
Likewise, in the companion article to this, Craniosacral and Po-
larity instructor Gary Strauss talks about the similarities in his
work with shamanistic practices.
I say, isn’t it a sweet irony, or poetic justice, rather, that we
apparently owe Osteopathic Medicine, Polarity, and Cra-
niosacral therapy to the original inhabitants of this land, the
American Indians? And isn’t it time that we give them the
credit due, and that we help them restore their spiritual healing
traditions to their rightful place in America’s healthcare system?
We can do this both by supporting traditional healers in their
work and by honoring their systems—learning and practicing
them, so as to make their healing methods more available. In
this way (as was done with traditional practices such as Chinese
medicine), we can follow in Lewis Mehl-Madrona’s footsteps,
helping to bring about the inclusion of American-Indian, or
Native American, traditional healing practices into mainstream,
integrative medical services.
AUTHOR’S NOTE: Although the word “shaman” origi-
nally came from the Siberian, Tungusic Evenki language, it
now has a far wider and more generic meaning: working or
mediating between the invisible and visible worlds, or between
the physical and spirit worlds, to effect change—hopefully
beneficial— in health, or other. It is in this sense that I use the
term.
Endnotes
1 Mehl-Madrona, MD PhD, Lewis. “One Road, Many Branches.”
A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism. Vol. 7, #2, Fall 2014, p.
32.
2 Booth, PhD DO, E.R. 1906: “History of Osteopathy,” pp.
2-4. (Still’s ancestors’ bloody encounters with the Shawnee in
Virginia) http://www.mcmillinmedia.com/eamt/files/booth/
chapter01.htm
3 Paulus, DO MS, Steve. Andrew Taylor Still (1828-1917): A Life
Chronology of the First Osteopath, pp. 1-4.
http://osteopathichistory.com/pagesside2/LifeChronology.
html#Anchor-11481
4 “Andrew Taylor Still.” KansasBogusLegislature.org, p. 1.
http://kansasboguslegislature.org/free/still_a_t.html
5 “Andrew Taylor Still.” Pulpdiddy’s Place, p. 1.
http://www.pulpdiddyspermutations.com/2014/09/10/
andrew-taylor-still-8/
www.shamansociety.org | 27
6 Ball, Bonnie. “Andrew Taylor Still: founder of Osteopathy,” p. 3.
(reference by Still to herbal treatments by the Indians)
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~vahsswv/
historicalsketches/stillandrew.html
7 Haxton, MA, Jason. Lecture: “Part I: Dr. Andrew Taylor Still
And... his Observations About Nature,” pp. 20, 33. (Still’s
account of Shawnee bone-setting and “Taking an Indian look”)
http://www.johnwernhamclassicalosteopathy.com/
wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Dr-Andrew-Taylor-Stills-
Observations-About-Nature.pdf
8 Still, Andrew Taylor. Autobiography of Andrew T. Still. The
Author: 1897, p. 378.
9 Lewis, John. “A.T. Still: From the Dry Bone to the Living Man,”
pp. 1-2.
http://www.atstill.com/
10 “Andrew Taylor Still: Father of Osteopathic Medicine.” Museum
of Osteopathic Medicine, A.T. Still University / ATSU, pp. 1-3.
http://www.atsu.edu/museum/ats/
11 Sills, Franklyn. Foundations in Craniosacral Biodynamics: the
Breath of Life and Fundamental Skills, Vol. 1. Berkley, California:
North Atlantic Books 2011, p. 353.
12 Ibid., p. 355, 359.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Nita M. Renfrew is a practitioner of Cherokee Bodywork
and licensed massage therapist, and a student of Dr. Lewis
Mehl-Madrona (with whom she co-authored an article on
Reiki, along with Barb Mainguy, for a medical journal).
Renfrew has studied with a number of traditional and other
healers, and practices several energy-healing, as well as
shamanic-healing modalities, including Craniosacral. As
a staff member, she practiced energy healing for several
years in hospital and medical-clinic settings, and she is a
research associate of the Coyote Institute for Studies of
Change and Transformation. As a follower of the Red Road,
she has danced in Sun Dance—with Dakota Intercessor
Durwin WhiteLighting—and is a pipe carrier. She is also an
artist, a writer, and an editor of A Journal of Contemporary
Shamanism. She lives in New York City, and can be
contacted at: (212) 879-3961; nitarenfrew@yahoo.com

28 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015

 S H A M A N I C P R A C T I C E

Merlin Tree
by V. “Ariel” Van Haltern

In this, another age

Of evolving “tools” and “weapons”
How are we to grow?
Survive?
Without the sacred ways
Of our ancient ones…

It started with the tree.

The Eagles, Hawks, and
Osprey used to stop in the
stand of green between the In-
dian River to the west and, the
Atlantic Ocean to the east. The
island of pine, the shelter of
life, overlooked the Medicine
Wheel in the far north of this
land the county claims I own.
On the west and north of
the Wheel the Banyan, Sea
Grape and Night Blooming
Jasmine add their scents, their
luxurious dreadlocks and,
populations of rare Butterflies
enjoying Milkweed. Just weeks
ago, not a day passed when
the winged creatures missed
coming to those strong wil-
lowy Pines to share their songs,
messages and blessings for
sunrise and sunset ceremony at
the Wheel.
That stand of trees stood
tall, shelter and buffer, near
the coast, a quieting place for
the western wind, an oasis of
reflection, a mirror of starlight.
How many days I flew
to the tops of those trees to
Drawing by Julia Bertand
commune with my feathered
friends under the great blue or
celestial night. How often we rode on meteors and sang the songs of wings and air, spirit and space.
One day I heard the sound of the chainsaw on the other side of the lot. Then it went away, leaving the patch safe. A week later when
I returned the green patch had vanished – a hollow womb in its place, signs of a great uprooting. Instead of the peace of the grove, a

www.shamansociety.org | 29
wide view unfolded of a newly placed cell tower.
I choked deep in my heart, my gut. My insides cried a sea of
grief. I could not breathe. The winged creatures were gone too.
The air smelled of gasoline. Far off, ghost birds circled in the
air, wondering with stronger hearts than I, more than I could
wonder.
I could not talk. I could not speak. I found myself frozen in
bed for three days. I stared at the wall. I did not know what was
the matter yet I did not concern myself with matters. I knew
only that I lost my dearest friend, an important soul partner.
The green had been there when the Medicine Wheel came into
being, a guide of the southern direction of healing and discovery
and so, shared the deep, lasting blessing of the first ceremony,
heaven and earth, the spiral, the three worlds, the seven direc-
tions.
Three days later – in the evening, for I could not bear going
out in the day to see what chainsaws had done, I went out for a
walk, to pray, to leave sacred tobacco and corn meal at the place
of desecration – the place where Mother Earth had given her
heart to the tree so it could rise up and share the language of our
Earth’s cosmic connection.
I stopped in the shallow near the dark and empty well and
prayed and honored the great being of my friend, the tree, the
gifts it had given us for so long. I sang the song of my friend and
my friend’s journey home, flying with the Windhorse, where
trees are loved and revered, where trees bless the cosmos with
their sacred branches and join the Norns weaving songs into the
web.
There, there in that night, feeling quite alone and sad I sud-
denly felt an energy I had not felt previously. I looked in the
direction of the Palm and saw a shadow there. It was as if some-
one had been standing out of view watching me for some time.
The form moved. In that movement I saw a light, a swirl of grey.
It moved like a fog or an infinite cloud congealed in a central
dimension. Then a more definitive form expanded to the right of
the Palm. I saw him clearly then, touched by moonlight, a man
of the woods, a man of the forests. He might have been part tree
himself. A soft breeze lifted the fronds, a quick even clatter – but
there was no breeze.
In his long flowing garment he turned to the owl sitting on
his right shoulder. He said something to the owl and then they
both turned to face me. The moonlit form made a sign that he
was hungry. He moved his hand back and forth to the earth, to
his heart, to his mouth, and there he stood, grey eyes looking at
me, making sure I followed his movements. I stood speechless,
determined to hold my eyes steady so as not to miss a note. He
turned one more time to the owl to communicate something.
I knew it could be none other than Merlin himself, here in
the midst of this barren womb holding on for all of us, holding
the sacred ways and wisdom of nature, begging, pleading for
us to pay attention, to do something before all starves, all of it,
Merlin too, and, the sacred ways.
I told him I understood but my lips did not move. He told
me with his eyes, with his miraculous dimension and, nature of
impossibility that I was not alone in my suffering, that we des-
30 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
perately need each other to awaken and care for Mother Earth,
the sacred messages, and, the ways of our Wisdom-Keepers. He
showed me how close he is, right in our midst, here with Mother
Earth to guide us - if only we take up the call and carry the ways
forward for the good of all.
I do not know how things happened afterward only that
things happened rapidly so rapidly it was all I could do to keep
up with the flow of information.
Here and now, the world held no time for bed or grieving,
only time for sacred ceremony, to move ahead and, to awaken.
A book came to me from a Russian translation of very old
texts found in, I’m thinking, Wales. The material connected
magically with other works I had been drawn to research further
– the Zodiac of Dendara, Egyptian pyramid star alignments, The
Eight Immortals, ancient Taoism, my general interest in ancient
sites, mounds, rock art and geometries, structures aligned to the
stars, Solstice, Equinox, and, the realms of Stonehenge.
Standing face to face with Merlin, admitting it to myself
proved intellectually difficult, the steps often lost on how to
reckon this phenomenal encounter with the mundane – to shake
it, yes, shake it awake.
I had never bought into or followed the Merlin, King Arthur
route. If anything my feelings passed as mere enjoyment in a
tale. I simply preferred to have something more definitive for my
own work. The only other time I remember seeing Merlin hap-
pened during a Shamanic Journey. He passed through, floating
lightly from sky to earth then he vanished with great fun as if a
trickster on holiday. I remember saying, “What’s Merlin doing
here?” He laughed and passed through several times, then noth-
ing. He did leave his mark however throughout the journey, that
feeling of his energy hiding in the air somewhere.
I will say that after that journey I did release my “opinion”
that he was all tale and fluff!
Now through a great loss I had found this book that men-
tioned his star palaces, his years of work and healing. I knew it
was real, as real as the translator’s discovery of Llys Don, Ances-
tor Palace. I knew too, Ancestor Palace was my star palace and
it called to me to do something and that I better pay attention.
Soon, more star palaces came to light along Merlin’s route to
feed nature and the world. More and more happened, quickly as
ever.
Still I cannot forget that Merlin truly waits hungry and, the
owl on his shoulder waits for us to return to wisdom.
Meanwhile the parts continue to come together.
Dendara plays a part, and, The Eight Immortals who are said
to have been taught by a man who came from the far western
world, a sage who lived in trees in the forest and worked with
the plants and forest energies, a great teacher they called the
“Wizard” who disappeared back into the forest after showing
The Immortals the corridor of stars, the palaces, the celestial
river and cloud scripts. Merlin, another Bon Jhankri of the wild,
another Shiva, another Wisdom-Keeper of the ancient ones
calling us to reunite and accept the gifts of the sacred elements,
Mother Earth and the stars, heaven and earth, yin and yang.
More details of the star palaces and the ancient wisdom
comes in the divine and perfect order – not that I am the one ABOUT THE AUTHOR
The the
doing Society
work.for Shamanic
It comes Practitioners
magically and quickly as this work is
V. “Ariel” Van Haltern Shamanic Practitioner, Tibetan Bowl
NONPROFIT
2300 Eighth
known Streetit is of “heart” and “soul” leading the way
to come when
Sound Healer, Reiki Master
without “us” in CA
the way. US POSTAGE PAID
Olivenhain, 92024
We have a Merlin group now in Florida and we come togeth- Ariel is a lifetime student of medicine work Permit #154
and sacred ways
www.shamansociety.org ENCINITAS,
with various wisdomkeepers around the world. CA
Her extensive
er to share and honor Merlin and the wisdom of the ancients, the
RETURN
star palaces, theSERVICE
dragon linesREQUESTED
of heaven and earth, the jade veins, studies include Himalayan Shamanism, Cosmology, 92024Healing
the song lines, the sacred forms of the Aboriginal bark paintings, Techniques and Methods, Yungdrung Bon – Bonpo Studies
the quantum lines, growing us, healing us, showing us the way. – the native religion of Tibet, with Shenten Dargye Ling
Merlin calls to all of us to feed and share the light. No one in Blou, France. She has studied at Sacred Circles Institute,
has to starve. Wisdom does not have to die of starvation. Teaching and Leadership – Sacred Circle’s Teacher Leader
The gift awaits each and every one. Wolf Clan with Dr. Mattie Davis-Wolfe and Dr. David Thomson
Merlin’s world, our world, does not want to die of starvation in Washington State, and at the Shamanistic Studies and
and disappear. This gift, this blessing wants to hold us too. Research Centre, with Mohan Rai in Kathmandu, Nepal.
Merlin comes to remind us – to call us. Currently Ariel is conducting research for a book planned on
We journey. We listen. We honor. We re-member. Sacred Fire Traditions in Mongolia and Finland with local
And so our tears are no longer tears of sadness, instead, tears Shamans, due for publication in the summer of 2015. She is
of joy, the mirror of pure yin and yang in the sacred flow of the author of Across the Phantom Divide, Song of Chagos Books
water that nourishes the wood, the Tree of Life, the connection, 1-3, all available on Amazon.
the circle, the way of heaven.
sleepingwillowmoon@gmail.com
…in this place, we humbly do our part to honor the gifts, the
wisdom of the ancient ones…they are here calling… Questions re: Merlin work
spiritbender713@gmail.com
To Merlin,
with love always and endless gratitude

SHAMANISM WITHOUT BORDERS

A Guide to Shamanic Tending for Trauma and Disasters

A SOCIETY FOR SHAMANIC PRACTITIONERS HANDBOOK

In this book, experienced practitioners explain techniques and
principles used by shamans throughout time to deal with trauma
and disasters and how these practices are still applied today.

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www.shamansociety.org | 31
 R E V I E W S

Lessons in Courage:
Peruvian Shamanic Wisdom
For Everyday Life
by Bonnie Glass-Coffin Ph.D. and don Oscar Miro-Quesada
A Review by José Luis Stevens, Ph.D.
When I first began to read “Lessons in Courage: Peruvian Sha- a student of ancient traditions of Hermes, Sufism, Theosophy,
manic Wisdom For Everyday Life” for this review, I prepared myself Buddhism, Gurdjieff, and a host of other spiritual lineages that he
for yet another laundry list description of the Andean cosmology, adroitly weaves through his discourse in a way that is revelatory
its rituals, and its practices. Not that there is anything wrong with rather than distracting.
this, however I have read many such books with this same theme As he describes the development of consciousness through his
and I was hoping for something different this time. Within a few Peruvian shamanic tradition he borrows a page from Vipassana
pages I knew I had struck gold. Buddhism when he says, “We do
While some of these beliefs and not silence or reject any emotion,
practices are mentioned in the fear, or lower impulse. We simply
book, it is the spirit and heart be- observe it. This is a consciousness
hind them that he emphasizes. As that requires we abandon all attach-
an added benefit, Oscar Miro-Que- ments to everything we thought we
sada skillfully weaves the wisdom were….”
of his tradition with the teachings In short this is the life story of
of great adepts and masters of other Oscar Miro-Quesada, born of a
traditions as well. Peruvian father of Spanish descent
His story is presented through and an Italian American mother,
the writing of Bonnie Glass-Coffin, raised in Peru and educated in the
Professor of Anthropology at Utah United States, a man challenged to
State University and long time bridge various cultures throughout
student and apprentice to Miro- his life. This is a story of severe
Quesada. Bonnie Glass-Coffin has childhood illness, family dysfunc-
done a superior job of presenting tion, psychological challenges,
his teachings as if he had written breakdown, initiation, apprentice-
the book entirely himself. In other ship, and realization. It is a classic
words she sees no need to insinu- hero’s journey complete with “all is
ate herself into the storyline or the lost” and redemption. He does not
teachings, an admirable and rare hold back or whitewash the story
accomplishment. of his own dysfunction and how he
Receiving his higher educa- is brought to his knees through his
tion in the United States and self-destructive patterns. In true
apprentice to powerful shaman shamanic style he recognizes the
teachers in Peru, Miro-Quesada healer in himself emerging from his
is in a unique position to bridge wounds.
and bring together these disparate In his tales I detected no
worlds. Because of his education in artifice, no guile, no arrogance, no
the United States Miro-Quesada is well versed in Gestalt, Jungian, hostility for outsiders, only a deeply compassionate and humble
Humanistic, and Transpersonal Psychologies. In addition he is teacher dedicated to his life task work, spreading the teachings

32 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015

 of his tradition to the people of North
America.
In the body of the work Oscar takes
particular pains to explain the power and
importance of ritual in setting our world
right. He writes, “The ritual gesture of
composing graceful ceremony is the way
we re-member ourselves as an interde-
pendent strand within the sacred web of
life. This is the way we bring beauty into
our hearts. It is how we open our hearts
fully to love.” He goes on to say that the
practice of teaching love by the way we
live is in fact the heart of the tradition he
teaches.
Miro-Quesada places great emphasis
on awakening the Pachakuti Mesa, the
central fixture of his teachings, and the an-
cient altar of his ancestral teachers in Peru.
By teaching the Pachakuti Mesa which he
outlines in this book, he introduces his
students to a simple but powerful way of
ordering the cosmos to live a life free of
instincts and impulses that lead to chaotic
conditions. He states that the ancient ones
knew that nature informs purpose and
they set up their altars and ceremonies to
mirror the beauty of creation.
Near the end of the book he describes _______________________________
we can do this by remembering the four Left: Annette Høst.
exactly how to make a Pachakuti Mesa
S’s in a full seidr: Song, Staff, Seat, and
and how to activate it with prayers and
Spirits.
visualizations. He then goes on to explain
exactly how to use it and apply it for
Finally,benefit
personal to honor seidrofitothers.
or that is important
In addi-
that
tionwe he respect
explainsthathowtheto craft
makeand songs
traditional
are froeði, Despachos
Peruvian demanding(offerings),
skill, and we must
explains
take our time to learn them
the methods of offering, and describes well. It is the
worth
building of the Apacheta (Rock Cairn)best
it to make the effort to do our
with each seidr,
and explains how knowing
to use it.that theprovides
This steps
we take today
a richness thatcreate the the
prevents tradition
book from be-
ofingtomorrow.
too theoretical and instead makes the
material more practical and useful.
About What IthE particularly
Author liked about the
book was his inclusion of a variety of
Annette
simple butHøst, powerful
based shamanic exercises
in Copenhagen,
that can behas
Denmark, practiced
studied,easily and I find
practiced, anddo
bear fruit. I enjoyed reading
taught shamanism internationally this concise
book
for overpacked with shamanic
two decades. Her 25 wisdom
years from
Peru yet easily understandable
of research and teaching of old without an
overwhelmingshamanic
Scandinavian amount oftraditions
jargon. Miro-
include lecturing on seiðr at presenting
Quesado has a way of clearly the
practical shamanic
National Museum notions
of Denmark. so thatShethe ma-
terial is easily digestible
is co-founder of Scandinavian Centerfor almost anyone.
for Shamanic Studies, with Jonathan
Horwitz. For more about her work on
shamanism and other articles on seiðr,
see www.shamanism.dk.
www.shamansociety.org | 33
 R E V I E W
Numa: An Epic Poem with
Photo Collage
by Katrinka Moore
Review by Nita M. Renfrew
Numa is an epic poem about a wild feline numen—a nature
spirit—learning to shape-shift. As Numa grows up, she learns
to take the form of other animals, and of plants and even ele-
ments. Accompanying the poem are Moore’s charming photo
collages of such things as animal tracks, feathers and, appropri-
ately, stone eggs in birds’ nests.
Ever since I was a little girl, I have been intrigued by
shape-shifting. I read children’s books about shamans, and was
fascinated by the prospect of being able to physically shape-
shift, especially into a bird so that I could fly. Much as I tried,
however, all my efforts were in vain; I was never able to fly.
Eventually, I became interested in other things, and forgot
about shape-shifting. Then, many years later, when I began my
own shamanic practice, I read Teton Sioux medicine man Fool’s
Crow’s autobiography, where he said matter-of-factly that he
had shape-shifted into a dog during the 1973 Wounded Knee
standoff, in order to slip past the U.S. military that was encir-
cling the American Indian Movement (AIM) camp. I believed
him, and my curiosity was reignited. But Fool’s Crow did not
explain how he did it.
I also read another compelling account, in Lesley Thomas’s
book The Flight of the Geese (Sandra Ingerman recommended it
to me), about the experience of a young indigenous woman in
northern Alaska learning to shape-shift, which has continued to
haunt me. Today, I find that the poetic Numa dovetails nicely
with Thomas’s far-more-graphic narrative.
During a workshop once with Amazonian shaman Ipupiara,
I asked him privately about shape-shifting, and he explained
that you needed to begin by shape-shifting just one molecule
into the animal you wanted to become, then two, and so on,
and slowly build up to your entire body. He referred me to one
of his students, who related that he had done just that over
a period of time and, suddenly, he had found that he was a
complete wolf somewhere in the wild of the north. However,
he found that he was a wolf facing a hunter taking aim at him
with a rifle and, terrified, he hurried to shape-shift back into his
ordinary human body. Ipupiara’s student felt that he had just
escaped being killed, and was wary of trying this again.
When I started reading Numa, I expected a narrative of
what I imagined shape-shifting to be, but what I found at first
34 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
seemed like rough, disjointed sequences. Very quickly, however,
I became enchanted by the realism of Numa’s otherworldly
experiences; and it was perhaps the not-fully-successful at-
tempts—rough and disjointed—that led me to suspect that
Moore must herself have been in that space of becoming an-
other. In a later exchange with Moore, she explained to me that
in the section “Shifts,” Numa is still immature, and “can’t fully
realize the metamorphosis” into the powerful spirit of Bear.
And so, the numen:
comes out sketchy / more
critter than beast / tucked
inside rib bones, damp &
warm / knocked-about
passenger within black-
furred lumberer 1
Later in the poem, when Numa is teaching her cub:
... she curls up egg-like, her cub copies.
Two shells grow, crack open. Full-fledged owl flies
to a low branch. Hatchling (tiny cat paws) clings
to a flimsy stalk. 2
Moore, I slowly realized, had actually managed to capture
the essence of what it must be like to learn to shape-shift on a
physical level. When I arrived at the end of the poem, indeed,
to my surprise, I was feeling like I had begun to shape-shift
myself. On a visceral level, my ordinary reality had been pulled
this way and that, and was definitely out of shape. Where, at
first, I had sought a realistic narrative of Numa’s shape-shifting
experiences, I found, rather, that I was in the grip of the very
energies and inner workings of journeying that we shamanic
practitioners encounter, and of the shape-shifting process itself,
rough and disjointed.
As I read, I found that the very juxtaposition of words, that
I thought must have self-selected, depicted the powerful inner
movement of journeying. They were words that had manifested
as a reflection of a primordial, inner moving of energy, where
shapes have a liquid aspect no longer bound to our consensus
reality. In fact, I had quite literally been pulled into that space,
as I was to find later.
 ... / Numa
calls / concocts her
self (each cell burns)
gathers rind and bone

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she calls / corrals / becomes / begins again 3

After all that, the unexpected ending to the story

when an interloper appears in the forest could not, in
retrospect, have been any different.
It was the after effect of the poem, however, that
brought the real surprise for me. It came after I had
finished the book late one night and went to bed. I
had an intensely unsettling dream where, suddenly and
frighteningly, I found that I was conscious and was
making ear-piercing, high-pitched sounds that I couldn’t
control or understand. And I was aware that I no longer
knew who I was or where I was going. It was terrifying.
I realized later that I had, in a sense, been suspended
between ceasing to be “me” and becoming “another.” I
had been trapped in the gears—the very interstices—of
“reality,” where, dangerously, I was stuck making the
foreign sounds of another creature I was not able even to
identify, but without the intention of “becoming” any-
thing. For what seemed like a long time, I struggled to
cease making those more-and-more-ear-splitting sounds
of desperation, and to exit from the dream. And when I
finally did manage to awaken, I realized that I had just
had a lesson in what not to do when shape-shifting. Just
as important as knowing what you want to shape-shift
into, I realized, was knowing how to come back to your
original shape, so as not to get trapped in between. As I
saw it, I hadn’t taken with me any tools for navigating,
for directing the experience.
I knew then, with certainty that, indeed, to write
such a powerful poem about shape-shifting, Moore had
to have had the experience herself, at least on the ener-
getic level. I knew that Moore had been a Butoh dancer
with a Japanese company, where dancers moved so
slowly that the movement was almost imperceptible, and
it might take an hour to move across the stage. But now
I learned, in an exchange with Moore, that she had also
studied with anthropologist Felicitas Goodman, author
of Where Spirits Ride the Wind, who explored posture-
mediated trance, based on prehistoric cave paintings and
indigenous artifacts that often portrayed metamorphosis,
or shape-shifting. And, yes, Moore explained that she
had had some powerful experiences, which were reflected

Reading  by  Katrinka  Moore    

in Numa.

Endnote
1 “Shifts,” p. 15. &
 Guillermo
 Filice
 Castro
 
2 “Meander,” p. 59.
3 “Rises,” p. 69.

 
Music
 performed
 by
 Catherine
  Graetze
www.shamansociety.org | 35
 R E V I E W
THE SHAMAN WITHIN:
A Physicist’s Guide to the
Deeper Dimensions of Your
Life, The Universe, and
Everything
by Claude Poncelet, PhD
Review by Jonathan Horwitz
Claude Poncelet is an nuclear physicist who has been teach-
ing and practicing shamanism for over thirty years. His book,
The Shaman Within, is a comprehensive compilation of many of
the things he has learned and is highly recommended, especially
for anyone who has an established shamanic practice or for
people on a spirit path who are interested to see where shaman-
ism could take them.
The Shaman Within is divided into two sections and thirteen
chapters. The first part Poncelet calls “The Shaman Within,”
and the second part “Shamanism in the Twenty-First Century.”
The book includes exercises and suggestions for shamanic work
in each chapter. However, it is basically not a how-to beginner’s
book, but rather a treatise on what it can mean to be a practicing
shaman in today’s western world. Poncelet’s emphasis is definite-
ly on how to live on the shamanic path, and he generously pep-
pers the book with ideas, guidelines, suggestions and encourage-
ments for doing it. The book is also unique in that Poncelet does
not try to hide his physicist background, but instead shows how
it has influenced his shamanic work and how these two different
fields are well connected—as, he points out, is everything in the
Universe—and can dance beautifully together.
The Shaman Within is primarily concerned with shamanic
ethics and spirituality; “spiritual,” as Poncelet says, “not in the
sense of religious but in the sense of transcendental or meta-
physical, sacred or hallowed.” He goes on to write: “Along with
bringing us back to the sacred, shamanism can bring us back to
who we truly are—our essence, the divine in us, our true nature,
which I refer to as authentic being.”
The concepts of authentic being and impeccability are central
to Poncelet’s understanding of what it means to work and live
shamanically, to be a shaman. In his chapter “Impeccability
and the Art of Living” he writes: “I believe the art of living is to
36 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
be found in doing things well: every single action, every single
day… using everything we have, secular and spiritual…not [for]
making things ‘right’ or perfect, but [for] making them con-
sciously, based on the authentic being we are and in harmony
with the Universe, with the Source. To do things consciously
means slowing down and not allowing ourselves to run on
automatic…. We cannot limit shamanic practice to particular
times and places, to drumming circles or workshops. We must
integrate it into all other aspects of our lives. At the same time,
we cannot develop an impeccable shamanic life if we do not also
seek impeccability in our ordinary, daily life.”
He goes on to talk about the obstacles which keep us from
living and practicing with impeccability, for example, attach-
ment to achievement and running our lives according to the
expectations of others. The greatest of these obstacles is what he
refers to as the shamanic ego which “tries to define and control
our shamanic and spiritual life, rather than letting authentic
being take the lead….it is very good at forming alliances with
other difficult parts of our ego, such as the narcissist, the power
seeker, the self-righteous, the teacher or the healer….” The sha-
manic ego is addicted to “…peak experiences—the exotic, the
powerful journey…. It aims to run our shamanic practice and
is convinced it is doing the right kind of shamanic work. Most
shamanic practitioners who are willing to look inside are familiar
with it.” This shamanic ego seems to be the special trickster for
shamanic practitioners and looking back over my almost thirty
years of teaching I can see many instances of the shamanic ego—
mine and others’—joyfully dancing. But what to do about it?
For one thing, Poncelet suggests making a journey of inquiry to
your spirit helpers to “ask if they will guide you in finding out
when and in what circumstances your shamanic ego tends to
take charge.” He points out that it is our relationship with our
spirit helpers and our collaboration with them which is our best spirits, usually my own spirits guides and the spirit I’m journey-
tool for dealing with the issues of the ego and the shamanic ego. ing to…. I always start with something like, ‘If it is appropriate
In the next three chapters of this first section of the book, in light of the greater harmony of the whole, I would like to
“The Art of Dying,” “The Art of Healing,” and “The Art of request…’” Respect is a quality he values highly.
Shapeshifting,” Poncelet looks at these three aspects of shamanic Some of the most unusual aspects of The Shaman Within are
practice through the lens of authentic being and impeccabil- the chapters dealing with shamanism and scientific discovery,
ity. In “The Art of Healing,” he shares with us his own journey time, and the birth of the Universe. Of course this is normal
through working with what he referred to as “my birth and re- fare for a shamanic physicist, but not something one expects to
death experience”—that is, a diagnosis of possible lung cancer— find in a book about shamanism. But in three mind-bending
and all the questions and doubts this brought up for him. Were chapters Poncelet takes us beyond the edge of the cosmos to
the spirits helping him—or creation in a way that shamanic
testing him? Was this an initia- practitioners can easily follow and
tion? And, finally, do the spirits appreciate. And, appropriately, he
really exist? He also shares how calls us back to Earth in the final
he worked shamanically with two chapters which deal with heal-
his life situation in the time ing the world and its communities,
leading up to the operation, and healing our relationship with
right to the moment he was Nature. For me these very grounded
being rolled into the operating yet poetic chapters provide much
room. He shares with us many encouragement and many guidelines
things he learned about healing for everyone who has ever thought “I
as a result of this experience, want to heal the Earth.” As Poncelet
perhaps the most important be- incisively points out, “The transfor-
ing “…that healing is all about mation must begin with us… [and]
transformation; it is a return to ultimately depends on changing our
authenticity.” attitude toward and relationship
The second part of the book, with the natural environment….
“Shamanism in the Twenty-First This is because humans are an inte-
Century,” moves the reader into gral part of nature; a human is, after
applied shamanism. The first all, an animal.” No separation!
two chapters deal with shaman- Since Michael Harner’s ground-
ism in family, daily, and profes- breaking The Way of the Shaman
sional life, and again he brings there have been quite a few books
the concepts of authenticity and about the practice of modern
impeccability, the foundations shamanism. The Shaman Within is
of ethics, into focus. True to his one of the best. Claude Poncelet is
credo that shamanic practice generous with his thoughts, insights,
is something that must go on and experience. There is an inviting
24/7, Poncelet outlines numer- warmth, openness, and compassion
ous guidelines for incorporating shamanism into what many in his style. But, because it is so packed, it is not a quick, easy
experience to be the battlefield of the family or the wasteland of read. The book is for studying. Thirteen chapters, one for each
nine-to-five. “Practicing shamanically in today’s work environ- moon, perhaps—that feels about right. Hopefully, it will help
ments requires daily—sometimes hourly—work, awareness you, as it has me, to see your own shamanic path with fresh eyes
and attention….We tend to be ‘asleep’ and forget to do our and come to deeper insights of where you are going, where you
shamanic practice when we are at work; we forget that spirits have been, and most important Poncelet would say, where you
are all around us and that everything is sacred and interrelated. are. I look forward to his next book.
Remembering the spiritual dimension in everything is perhaps
the real challenge in bringing shamanism into professional life.” ABOUT THE AUTHOR
He suggests, among other things, journeying to the spirits of the Jonathan Horwitz is European Editor of A Journal of
organization or the work environment and even journeying to Contemporary Shamanism. He has been studying and working
the authentic being of a colleague. with shamanism since 1972 and teaching since 1986. He
Throughout the book, especially with his journey sugges- is co-founder and director of the Scandinavian Center for
tions, Poncelet is clear about the ethical boundaries the shaman Shamanic Studies and lives in the woods in Sweden.
must recognize. For example, before journeying to the spirit of
an organization he asks “for permission to do the work from the
www.shamansociety.org | 37
 S H O R T R E V I E W

THE CO-CREATION HANDBOOK

by Alida Burch
The Co-Creation Handbook: A Shaman-
ic Guide to Manifesting a Better World and a
More Joyful Life lays out a thorough plan for
deepening shamanic practice and applying
new personal insights in concrete ways to
one’s everyday life. Alida Birch carefully
presents guiding principles behind the way
we envision our lives, perceive our current
selves, and launch resolutions for enriching
our lives and the world around us.
Birch draws on insights from sound
psychology and life-coaching practices
to ground her techniques. The steps for
co-creation are structured in an eight-week
format so readers can pace themselves and
make sure they have covered all the aspects.
Some of the concepts Birch works with are:
stress and creative tension, the role of the
subconscious, the value of making personal
statements, the law of synchronicity, per-
sonal relationships, balancing personal life
and work, and the power of blessing.
Accompanying this book is a three-disc
audio recording made by Birch, incorporat-
ing visualizations that she gently leads with
pauses to allow for personal reflection. The
visualization sessions are accompanied by
light shamanic drumming. These CDs
structure the manifestation work over eight
weeks, and each week’s material is divided
into a morning and evening session. A
committed reader could complete the entire
program in two months time. Each of the
eight chapters, corresponding to the eight-
week program, includes a list of “action
steps” with practical activities to put the
information of each chapter into a working
mode. Many of the “action steps” draw on
shamanic practices and principles.
Birch’s co-creation process will make an
excellent program for shamanic counselors
to use when working with clients who are
new to shamanism or know nothing about
it. By going through the program a client
will learn how to slip into non-ordinary re-
ality and discover information and practical
wisdom as well as meet helpful spirit guides.
Seasoned practitioners can use the program
as a means to extend and broaden their
shamanic lives. TC

UP A TREE
by Jane Burns
Jane Burns’s Up a Tree: A Novel and Shamanic Handbook
tells the story of Clare, a recently widowed mother coping
with her personal problems as well as those of her two teen-
age children. As a shamanic practitioner, Clare draws on her
journeys to help her process her own grief, that of her children,
and the knowledge that her late husband was having an affair.
Her life becomes ever more complicated when her own mother
enters the picture and when Clare meets an artist named Dill
who works in a studio next to her own. The story is very
believable, and Burns has a remarkable gift of catching dialogue
and allowing each character to present him or her self through
conversations.
The twelve chapters, each named after a tree, bring in
important tree-lore as Clare discovers the spiritual strength of
trees in her shamanic work. In each chapter Clare journeys at
some point to find the strength to go on with her life and finds
wisdom and insight to her problems from various trees.
As Burns writes in her “Author’s Note,” “I wanted to convey
how the shamanic way of life is not an esoteric practice that lies
peripheral to reality. It is a way for ordinary people to live their
ordinary lives in an extraordinary way, a way of living more
wholly and deeply, more peaceably and compassionately.” In-
deed Clare’s story is gripping in that she is an ordinary woman
confronting ordinary but difficult challenges to carry on with
her life.
The final section of the book is a shamanic handbook,
consisting of twelve chapters that correspond to the novel’s
chapters. Burns begins by explaining the shamanic journey,
and then continues to present shamanic journey ideas with tips
and suggestions so that readers discover, as Clare does, how
living shamanically can enrich one’s life. Burns tells the readers
up front that they can become the heroes of their own lives.
But as Burns acknowledges, “It is shamanism that is the hero,
shamanism that saves the day and leads by example.” And Up
a Tree is a wonderful and compelling example of that. TC
www.journeystothesoul.com.

38 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015

 S H O R T R E V I E W

MAKING PEACE WITH SUICIDE

by Adele McDowell
Making Peace with Suicide: A Book of Hope, Understanding,
and Comfort by Adele Ryan McDowell, PhD treats this ever
painful subject with compassion, insightful reflections, and val-
ues important to shamanic practitioners. McDowell digs deeply
into the history and worldwide views of suicide in its various
forms. From this study she derives the three common elements
of suicide: pain, disconnection, and disenfranchisement. She
notes, “All three elements...take us to shut-down, closed-off
places (that) lead to inactivity, inertia, passivity, and powerless-
ness.” And so “we feel stuck.”
McDowell’s excellent book is an indispensable compan-
ion for anyone dealing with the suicide of friends, family, or
acquaintances. The chapter “What Leads to Suicide” includes
ancestral considerations (the family tree), addictions, bullying,
lost relationships, shame, soul loss, and spiritual crises: all topics
that shamanic practitioners deal with on many levels. She also
considers special cases such as teenage, military, maternal sui-
cide, and suicide as a “conscious end-of-life choice”: an impor-
tant aspect of death, dying, and psychopomp work. Her chapter
“Tales from the Front Lines” contains vital first-person accounts
from suicide survivors.
Most important from a shamanic point-of-view is a chapter
on “suicide and the soul” which presents an expanded perspec-
tive on these topics. Here readers will find discussions of death,
the afterlife, reincarnation, soul contracts, messages from the
other side, and the death of the ego. This last topic McDowell
presents as both psychological and spiritual. The former is sui-
cide which results from unrelenting pain, depression, heartbreak,
loneliness, etc. The latter is a soul’s choice, a willingness to drop
the ego and choose suicide for a higher good, “to do work from
the Other Side in service for humanity.”
As a therapist, minister, and shamanic practitioner, Mc-
Dowell brings a wealth of insight from many angles to this
painful and disturbing topic. In addition to her own wisdom,
she includes an appendix of resources for readers who want to
read further about these many topics and issues. This book is a
wonderful addition to the literature about suicide. TC

WHISPERING WITH ANIMALS

by Maryphyllis Horn
Whispering With Animals

Maryphyllis Horn writes a deeply personal, spirited and accessible accounting of

her communication with members of the animal, bird, insect and plant kingdoms.
Her stories of the messages and wisdom that come from turtles, horses, dogs, cats,
deer, birds, squirrels, insects and trees are simple, sweet and direct. I also found her
drawings of dog and cat companions, and photos of her friends in the wild, a won-
derful visual complement to the stories.
Horn introduces the book with a thoughtful and instructive description of what
motivated her, after a lifetime of intuitive and telepathic exchanges with tame and
wild creatures, to share her experiences in this quick and enjoyable read.
Maryphyllis Horn

Horn makes the point quite well that harmony and balance between humans and
members of the other kingdoms with whom we share the planet is greatly enhanced
by our ability to learn the language of those kingdoms. Each one communicates
differently and is communicating all the time. Through her experiences, she gives us
pointers on how to silently send and receive messages from our animal companions
at home and with creatures in the wild.
Although there are many good books out there about this subject, I have found
some of them to unfortunately be somewhat preachy. This one is not. Much to my
appreciation, Horn takes you with her on her encounters in a way that inspires the
same wonder and curiosity that she herself is experiencing. After each encounter,
she includes helpful insights and reflections about what she learned, which I found
particularly useful for anyone wanting to delve into the subtle world of inter-species
communication. KK

www.shamansociety.org | 39
 Whispering With Animals
by Maryphyllis Horn $12 book available at Amazon.com/

In Whispering With Animals, Maryphyllis Horn shares

stories of her own personal telepathic experiences with both tame
and wild animals. Telepathy is the mind-to-mind way we converse
with Highest Spirit, i.e., the internal silent communication closely
connected to prayer and meditation. In 2012, her Spirit Teacher
requested that she write this book. It provides a focus for Spiritʼs
message, i.e., to give the world an additional voice on behalf of
animals and nature. These “younger brothers and sisters” of our
world have as much right, special intelligence and mission to be
living on this planet as we humans do. Their telepathic language
is just different from what many of us are accustomed to. These
stories can help you learn how to be telepathic with animals, or to
recognize that youʼre already doing so.

Maryphyllis Horn, M.Ed., is a former high school choral

music teacher, now a shamanic practitioner, artist, certified
therapist, and ordained metaphysical minister who loves and
respects animals and nature. Since 1995 she has been in private
practice of shamanic counseling and spiritual healing for humans.
Much of this is done clairvoyantly and telepathically with her spirit
helpers and archangels. As a side benefit, she has become more
attuned to the telepathic communication of wild and tame animals.

A Journal of
Contemporary Shamanism
Submit an article and become a member with a website listing!

The Society for Shamanic Practitioners

Dedicated to the reemergence of shamanic practices in modern society,
especially those that promote healthy individuals and viable communities . . .
We are artists, educators, healers in multiple disciplines, therapy-dog
owners, nonprofit professionals, editors and many more. We live in Italy,
Idaho, the UK, California, Canada and Iceland. What binds us is our belief in
the practice of shamanism as one of healing that reminds us of and supports
our connection with all that is.

If you would like to submit an article, join as a member with a website listing,
order back issues, or come to one of our international* conferences, please
visit us at:
www.shamansociety.org

Please join us as we make shamanic practices and wisdom more available to all!

40 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015

 S P R I N G / S U M M E R 2 0 1 5 R E S O U R C E S

ART/TOOLS/SUPPLIES ORGANIZATIONS
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www.shamansociety.org | 41
 S P R I N G / S U M M E R 2 0 1 5
THE GIFT OF SHAMANISM EVENTS AND
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42 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015
R E S O U R C E S
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 S P R I N G / S U M M E R 2 0 1 5 R E S O U R C E S

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4-Year Training Program & Community Counselor,specializing in non-ordinary
www.lastmaskcenter.org states work, life transition,
800-927-2527 ext 02586 psycho-spiritual crisis and shadow
Practical application of shamanic skills work forspiritual practitioners.
Live Internet Radio & Podcast Archive Holotropic Breathwork™, guided
www.whyshamanismnow.com focusing sessions & shamanic
See ad on page 17 counseling.
646-415-6721
GAELA MORRISON SafeJourneysHome@gmail.com
Forcers of Nature Design See ad on page 2
Geomancy, Feng Shui, Clearings
SACRED HOOP MINISTRY
Art Commissions Helping People Heal Themselves
Gaela@ForcesofNatureDesign.com Using The Ancient Techniques of the
ForcesofNatureDesign.com Shaman’s & Indigenous Cultures.
For Personal Empowerment Through
THE POWER PATH SCHOOL OF The Spiritual Aspects of Healing.
SHAMANISM Woodland Park, CO
Providing practical tools for conscious (719) 687-4335
living www.SacredHoopMinistry.org
Individual sessions and remote healings
Santa Fe, NM LYNDA SKEEN
admin@thepowerpath.com Soul Retrieval, Spirit Release, Extraction,
505-982-8732 Power Animal Retrieval, Journeywork,
www.thepowerpath.com Reiki
See ad on page 2 Los Angeles
323-363-2040; lynda@lyndaskeen.com
www.lyndaskeen.com

Call For Artists

Our editorial board is actively seeking submissions of shamanic artwork to be used in upcoming publications of A Journal
of Contemporary Shamanism. We are intending to introduce artists and feature shamanic paintings, weaving and textiles, drums,
rattles, photographs, watercolors, pen work, sculptures etc. on future covers (color) and to accompany articles within the body of
the Journal (B&W). Artist must be the creator of the work submitted and hold the copyright. No photos of people unless you have
a written, signed release to publish the photo. Send photos of your work along with a short bio and contact information to: sara@
shamansociety.org or kaykamala@aol.com.

www.shamansociety.org | 43
 S P R I N G / S U M M E R 2 0 1 5 R E S O U R C E S

SOUL RETRIEVAL, TRAINING POWER PATH SCHOOL OF

EXTRACTION, SHAMANISM
DEPOSSESSION FOUNDATION FOR SHAMANIC Providing Practical Tools for Conscious
Recover your lost soul parts STUDIES Living
Restore your true self in the energetic Michael Harner Santa Fe, NM
presence of Mt. Shasta Training in core shamanism and www.thepowerpath.com
530-859-3499 advanced shamanic healing See ad on page 2
www.shastashaman.com info@shamanism.org
www.shamanism.org RIVERDRUM
EMILY TOWNSEND See ad on inside front cover Tom Cowan
Environmental Shamanism heals Celtic visionary & healing techniques
built and natural places. As a former HEALING WORKS INC www.riverdrum.com
architect I support creating healthy, A healing center dedicated to helping See ad on inside front cover
more sustainable environments. people who are transitioning through
http://www.etstudio.net/shamanism.html    physical, emotional, or spiritual SHAMANIC TEACHERS
emily.townsend (at) gmail.com imbalances. Shamanic teachers and practitioners
Katherine Franta, PhD, PT, LMT trained by Sandra Ingerman
WHOLEBEING WELLNESS Barbara L. Williams BS, LMT www.shamanicteachers.com
COUNSELING Wilmington, DE See ad on page 3
Subsidiary of Orenda Healing www.healingworksinc.com
International healingworksinc@comcast.net
www.orenda-arts.org  
Individuals & Families THE HOLLOW BONE
Distance Counseling Shamanic Healing
Shamanic Trainings Shamanic Workshops
Valentine McKay-Riddell, PhD, MACP Earth Healing Apprenticeships
505-780-5990 or 510-277-2518 Peruvian Expeditions
wholebeing@orenda-arts.org www.thehollowbone.com
http://wholebeingupdates.wordpress. Ana Larramendi
com/
LAST MASK CENTER
WHY SHAMANISM NOW.COM 4-Year Training in shamanic practice for
Practical application of shamanic skills the New World.
Live Internet Radio and Podcast Archive Adv classes: Ancestral Healing and
www.whyshamanismnow.com Clearing
www.lastmaskcenter.org
See ad on page 17
 

44 | A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism VOLUME 8 ISSUE 1, SPRING/SUMMER 2015

www.shamansociety.org | 45
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Spirited Medicine
Shamanism in Contemporary
Healthcare
Spirited Medicine is an exciting contribution to the integration
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society. Most of its authors are dually trained as both healthcare
providers and shamanic practitioners, and collectively they offer a
broad framework and powerful clinical examples of how to attend
to the soul of those who fall ill. Filled with practical strategies for
healthcare and shamanic practitioners alike, this book brings sha-
manism forward from its historic and animistic origins into a broad
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tation medicine, family medicine, naturopathy, osteopathy, hospice
care, private practice and a general medical clinic.

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