The Shamanic Journey

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"He (the Shaman) is a self-reliant explorer
of endless mansions of a magnificent hidden universe."

(Michael Harner)

Shamanism is not a religion; it is a way of being. It is the direct experience of spiritual knowledge that comes from journeys within and through the "shamanic state of consciousness" or “shamanic ecstasy”, which are transcendental states of consciousness, entered into in order to reach other, more mystical realities.

To American Indians, it is often referred to as the path of the sacred clown, in some cultures it is called the path of the feather and it is considered to be the sacred calling of certain select initiates who, by entering into states of altered consciousness. interact with the spirit world in order to ensure the spiritual functioning of the tribe.

But, the true meaning of shamanism is not so simply defined.

Indeed, to cast a spell, is simply to spell, to manipulate words, to change people's consciousness.  And I believe that this is why an artist or writer is the closest thing in the contemporary world that you are likely to see to a Shaman. 

  Alan Moore - Thinking in Times of Thoughtlessness 



Shamanic artist and writer Alan Moore has suggested that because of their ability to manipulate words and to change people’s consciousness an artist or writer is the probably closest thing in the contemporary world that fills the role of the shaman.  

Yet, in our everyday lives the most prevalent, (and subtle), example of the shaman at work comes in the guise of the mass marketing advertiser, (or propagandist), though their "magick" represents the dark side of shamanism.  Where the true shaman will paint pictures, sing songs and tell stories meant to awaken and liberate the people to a new awareness, these advertising shaman will use these same methods in order put them to sleep and enslave them in a prison of a false reality.

(read more : Art Magic: 9 Ways to Use Your Fine Art Skills in Witchcraft)

"Historically, shamans have always been part of the society where they lived, taking care of its problems, whenever they were allowed to operate. For centuries shamanic cultures have been persecuted in the western world until they were almost entirely exterminated. They have managed to survive in secrecy or through complex esoteric camouflage. Nowadays there seems to be more freedom and this ancient knowledge can re-emerge and be used in our own cultural context and not relegated somewhere else. The world needs shamans able to function on the roads, among the electronic equipment and engines, in the squares and markets of our contemporary society."

~ Franco Santoro ~

The word "shaman" originated in Siberia and it describes a specialized type of holy person who practices not only with prayer, ritual and offerings, but through direct contact with the spirits themselves.  The label of "shaman" eventually became incorrectly applied to any medicine man or medicine woman of the primitive tribal cultures, while the term  "shamanism" describes a belief systems which sees the universe as alive and interconnected and the shaman as the intermediary bridging the connections.  

"In a way, this is a definition of shamanism.
A shaman is a person who by some means has gotten out of their own culture."

Terence McKenna

In early tribal societies the primary role of the shaman was to be "The Vision Seeker" for the community. It was the role of the shaman to travel beyond the realm of the material, into the realm of the immaterial, in order to commune with the spirits that guided and protected the tribe. The shaman had to live astride these two worlds; the world of perceived reality and the world of intuitive reality and only by living this dual existence was the shaman able to interact with the mystical realms in which lies the true Nature of the Universe. With the shaman's main purpose being to maintain the harmony between the tribe’s physical and spiritual needs, the shaman might, as an example, go forth on a vision quest before a hunt to meet with the spirit of the animal to be hunted, in order to create a empathy between the spirit of the hunter and the spirit of the hunted in order to secure the tribes basic needs. 

Because the shaman has to live in this almost schizophrenic way, never fully in one "reality" or the other, the shaman is often considered to be "divinely mad".  The belief, by shamanic people that the so called "insane" are divinely attuned individuals has been historically noted in numerous instances. This may also be historically reflected in the fact that many shamans of note who have had to confront non-shamanic cultures, often have had one or more instances of imprisonment or institutionalization, as a result of their personal perceptions of reality being in conflict with the "norms" of those alien society's tenets. 

"Just maybe, going crazy could be the evolutionary process trying to hurry up mind expansion. My mind didn't snap, it was trying to stretch itself into a new shape." 

(Lily Tomlin)