What is "Real"?

All of our perceptions of reality are based upon – or extrapolated from – the product of our five physical senses. The general paradigm is "if I can see it, touch it, taste it, hear it or smell it – it must be real."

The problem with this paradigm in a shamanic context is immediately apparent. So much of what we are working with – the soul, spirit, ancestors, journeying – deals with experiences that are necessarily beyond the realm of our physical senses.

Fortunately, it is relatively easy to refute this perspective – as I've done frequently in many workshops and with many students over the past twenty years – through direct experiences that the ego cannot entirely dismiss. To this end, I suggest a definition of reality that allows for a much broader experience: "If the experience leaves a lasting impact on my life – it is real."

THis is not always enough. Many people have an ego that is so strong and fearful, that it doesn't allow them to experience anything that it feels threatened by. Perhaps what I'm looking for is really more a matter of "validity" than "reality", however, because we tend to discount anything that doesn't pass our definition of "real", I need to address that directly.

Another, more subtle, paradigm of reality is "if you experience the same thing I do, then it is probably real." This is also problematic in shamanic work, because to much of what we encounter is filtered through our subjective perspective. When encountering the World Tree, everyone seems to experience "something" that they define as the World Tree, however,t he details vary widely. I do not believe that this is because what they are experiencing is really so different but that we do not have the practice of matching our perceptions to a consensus in the otherworld as we do here.

At the root of all these issues, is one prime cause: That is the struggle between the ego and the soul. It is the nature of the soul to awaken, just as it is the nature of the ego to resist that awakening. The soul is patient, but it will respond to opportunities. The ego wants to hold onto the illusion that it is the Self. Having to recognize that it is merely one part of something much larger is uncomfortable at best and generally terrifying. But it is this recognition that really frees up the Self to experience a larger reality and thus re-set the paradigms of what is real.

Walking Between the Worlds

So – I'm just back from two back-to-back neo-pagan events at Brushwood Folklore Center near Sherman, NY. I have been making this trip every year for perhaps 15 years or more, and it provides me with an annual milestone of sorts – checking in with myself each year to see where I am relative to where I was.

Brushwood has been hosting gatherings of this kind since the early 90's, and has gradually grown into one of the premier sited for the neo-pagan movement to hold large festivals.

Over the eight days there – teaching workshops, attending workshops, chatting with interesting folks, catching up with friends who I only see during Brushwood time, and just hanging out with my dear friends at Camp Sashu – all this served to open my heart and move me into a fairly deep altered state. Leaving that space and driving home has been a kind of movement from one world to another. Over the past few years, I've noticed that there is less of a shift.

The shamanic perspective is that we are living in many different worlds all at once AND that all these worlds are the same world – perceived from slightly different perspectives. The ideal is to – eventually – integrate all the worlds (and all the parts of the Self) into one, unified whole.

Coming home from Brushwood, I stopped for gas and noticed that I was scowling slightly at the people around me. I wondered why, and looked at what was behind this. I realized that I felt vulnerable and disconnected from these "others" because I had spent the previous eight days connecting within a limited community setting. This had created within me a sense of "us and them".

Taking a few slow breaths, I attempted to extend my sense of "us" to include the rest of my fellow humans. I'm not sure how well it worked, but I stopped scowling.

And I'm very happy to be home.

Banging Head Against the Wall (Publishing eBook)

Just a brief update here.

I've spent my spare time over the past month formatting my Dance of Stones manuscript to be published as an eBook – only to have it run into issues in the conversion process. Apparently there are mysterious things that happen when a Pages document is converted to a Word document. In any case, I finally got most of the issues sorted and it is now available through www.smashwords.com. If you would be interested in reviewing the book on the smashwords site, contact me and I will give you a code for 50% off.

Back to life as a papa shaman.

namaste,

Kenn

The miraculous Quality of the Mundane (II)

One of the gifts of being a new father is the constant reminder to really be mindful of what a miracle this life is. It's easy to see that when I look at my beautiful little daughter, but this is a reminder fro me to realize that miracle in everything else I see as well. This miracle is not just in what is beautiful, or beloved or even alive. It is in all the bits and pieces in between as well. It is in the concrete sidewalk, the plastic cup, the rusty hinge on my garden gate and even in the plastic keys that I am typing on. The miracle is existence. It is easy to take this miracle for granted, but stop for a moment – right now – and open yourself to the realization that all of it is miraculous.

Let that soak in a bit.

Post-Tribal – not Anti-Tribal

I've had a few people respond to the concept of "post-tribal" as if it was a reaction against "tribal." This could not be further from the truth. While I have great respect for the various tribal traditions, "post-Tribal Shamanism" simply recognizes that, for those of us not raised in a tribal setting (with tribal values, spirituality and internal ecology) it is inappropriate for us to use some of the shamanic techniques that most clearly pertain to tribal culture. The most obvious case of this appears in the relationship between the shaman and his/her patient. In a tribal setting, it is often appropriate for the shaman to act in the absence of the patient, or even without the patient's knowledge, for the good of the tribe. In our modern culture, this action would disempower the patient, causing the power to be projected onto the shaman. This is something we should try to avoid, as this sense of personal power and responsibility is considered essential for people in our culture.

not generic shamanism

One of the responses I've encountered to Michael Harner's "Core Shamanism" is that it is "generic". I understand the charge. Harner essentially plucks shamanic practices out of the context of the indigenous culture and drops them into our Post-Tribal Culture without much – if any – context. His idea seems to be that when many cultures all do the same thing, that this thing is "core" to shamanic practice and can thus be done by others not of that culture as well. In a sense, it's like he's offering a non-branded version of shamanism.

I wish to differentiate this approach to shamanism from Post-Tribal Shamanism. While "Core Shamanism" extracts practices from their tribal contexts, it is still derived from that matrix. The practice of Post-Tribal Shamanism is often inspired by the practices of indigenous shamans, but is embedded in the matrix of our Post-Tribal culture. It is a non-tribal "brand", but it's still a "brand".

One of the challenges of Post-Tribal shamanic practice is that the context in which we operate is so different from the other "brands" of shamanism. One simple example of this is the fact that we, in this Post-Tribal culture are not brought up with an understanding and awareness of our ancestors or the fact that we are part of something much larger than ourselves. Our parents may have something to say about this, but the culture itself does not respect or honor the ancestors. It does not honor or value the Earth, spirit or our own souls. While the other brands of shamans are helping their people to focus on their place in the world and how to function appropriately, we Post-Tribal Shamans must begin by reminding our people that they are part of a tapestry of life that stretches from their ancestors, through them, to their descendants. We must help each individual discover their own balance – the way in which it makes sense for them to live. There are no "brand specific" qualities that easily fulfill this need. Instead, we must constantly improvise in the moment to come up with what is needed to deal with Now.

New Post-Tribal Shamanic Video – Shamanic Journeying VS Creative Visualization