Shamanism: Ancient Healing for Modern Souls

By Asaiah Hanif-Saeed

Over the past ten to fifteen years, we've seen a continuing rise among Americans of interest in alternative health care - from treatments for psychological issues to medical health and well being. Some Americans use alternative approaches to health exclusively, while most with renewed interests are finding great benefits in alternative health care as an adjunct to the allopathic treatment which they receive.

Among the many alternative treatments available, more and more, Americans are now seeking modern shamanism or shamanic techniques as a bridge to ancient and modern allopathic approaches to healing.

Shamanism is essentially a cross cultural spiritual practice which, by some anthropological estimates, is over 30,000 years old. The fact that this enduring spiritual practice has survived and thrived for such an extended period of time is due to, and is proof of, the potency of its work. The term "shaman" comes from the Tungus Siberian tribal word for its medicine men. Other cultures also have words for their tribal shamans as well. The Ancient Egyptians use the word Sunu (the witchdoctors) or Shakhum depending on the type of shaman and the temple wherein he worked. The modern day Yoruba of West Africa whose ten thousand year old shamanic tradition is alive and well, call their High Priest shamans Babalawo, which translates as "Father of the Mysteries." The mystery of course, refers to the mysteries of nature and the world of the gods and spirits. The tradition is that one is initiated into the shamanic world of the Babalawos and then is taught by the elder shamans over a period of many years before the new initiate is considered an adept. In some cases, I have heard this study among the Yoruba shamans can be as long as twenty years.

The word or title "shaman" has been adopted by modern popular culture to refer to these types of medicine men, women and high priests of every culture. Although there are some near universal basic shamanic technologies such as journeying, soul retrieval and power animal retrieval, there are no universally accepted criteria of practice.

The goal of the shaman is to help facilitate healing by accessing the spiritual root cause of illness within the individual or community. The shaman accomplishes this by altering his state of consciousness so that it becomes possible to travel or journey to other realms of consciousness to commune with the benefic spiritual entities that are found there. The information received from these benefic spiritual beings or archetypes is information that becomes profoundly healing to the individual or community.

This particular technique is most popularly known as journeying and is one of the main shamanic techniques which can be found in some form in nearly all shamanic cultures.

The shamanic journey is a type of an awakened trance state that allows access to information that could not be accessed otherwise. It gives the journeying shaman access to a limitless transpersonal consciousness. It also has proven to be an invaluable tool in the process of healing.

When one becomes ill, the individual can become overwhelmed by a sense of powerlessness. The shamanic journey allows the individual to access a deeper transpersonal part of themselves to regain the power lost due to the illness or any traumatic situation.

One client in particular that I had been working with, who has become quite proficient at the technique, shared a journey with me where she was confronted by a long list of childhood abusers while in her journey conscious state. Her power animal had brought them to her during the journey and one by one they all asked her to forgive them of the crimes they committed against her.

As she did so, she reported an expansion of her energetic body. This expansion was a literal growing of her energetic body, she became bigger, stronger and more powerful in every instance she forgave each one of the individuals. By this action, she regained a power that she had lost as a child; she regained in a very real sense power that was taken from her. This was a very real energetic shift in the client's being that allowed her an enormous step in healing years of old traumatic abuse issues.

What was immediately apparent was the change in her consciousness. She no longer spoke in a manner that suggested she was still burdened by the old acts. She had effectively released the long held energy of traumatic incidences from early in her life which of course, allows her to heal. She even admitted her amazement, saying that the issue of abuse no longer held the same effect on her.

One of the remarkable traits of the shamanic journey is that it's easily taught and with regular practice, individuals may become quite proficient at the technique. When working with clients, I make it a point to teach and work with them on mastering the technique for they can use it any time to help not only their current healing journey, but also help in discovering answers to issues in other areas of their lives.

Asaiah is a Transpersonal Shamanic Psychotherapist and initiated shaman in the Egyptian/Vodoun systems of Africa. Email: Contact@ TwinSpiritShamanicCounseling.com