What's a Shaman?
In 2006, my great-grandmother, Lily, joined me midway through a lovely dinner in Lenox, Massachusetts to tell me I was a shaman. I was surprised to see her (Lily died in 1955, 10 years before I was born) and then quite distraught at her abrupt departure as I had not a clue as to what (or who) a shaman was.
Since then, I've found that shamans come in all shapes and sizes. Some of those shapes are quite adamant, rigid and proprietary in their definitions. And they bring wonderful gifts and beautiful medicine to millions of people across the Universe. Personally, I've never found the Universe to be adamant, rigid or exclusive about anything, so none of those definitions fit my experience.
To me, David Abrams comes closer to a definition, at least one that works for me. In Becoming Animal, he writes that humans "hold ourselves apart from the world to subdue its wildness." To me, shamans do just the opposite. We embrace that wildness. We surrender to its currents. And we listen to its wisdom. (Then, if you're a storytelling shaman like me, you share that wisdom).
And that wildness is everywhere. Pretty much the one thing on which everyone can agree is that shamans experience all matter as having energy. From your crazy Aunt Lucy to your adorable dog to the tree that shades your back porch...even the rock that got in your shoe this morning. As important, that energy communicates in its own, unique ways. So, you don't say to your dog..or the tree..or the rock...and certainly not Aunt Lucy..."What's up?" You shapeshift and move beyond the surface to experience their unique ways of sensing, of communicating, of being as they experience them As Osho says, you become the tree. Which is how you receive its wisdom.
Now, here's where it gets really fun. This spirited, chatty energy exists not just in the realm of our day to day experience. As Gurdjieff and others teach, it stretches in a steady stream all the way back to primordial times and all the way forward into infinity.
Shamans know how to travel along that stream. It's our daily commute. It's the path of our own journey and, as shamans do, we illuminate and share the wisdom along that stream so that others may see their own paths, their own journeys, a bit more clearly.
Since then, I've found that shamans come in all shapes and sizes. Some of those shapes are quite adamant, rigid and proprietary in their definitions. And they bring wonderful gifts and beautiful medicine to millions of people across the Universe. Personally, I've never found the Universe to be adamant, rigid or exclusive about anything, so none of those definitions fit my experience.
To me, David Abrams comes closer to a definition, at least one that works for me. In Becoming Animal, he writes that humans "hold ourselves apart from the world to subdue its wildness." To me, shamans do just the opposite. We embrace that wildness. We surrender to its currents. And we listen to its wisdom. (Then, if you're a storytelling shaman like me, you share that wisdom).
And that wildness is everywhere. Pretty much the one thing on which everyone can agree is that shamans experience all matter as having energy. From your crazy Aunt Lucy to your adorable dog to the tree that shades your back porch...even the rock that got in your shoe this morning. As important, that energy communicates in its own, unique ways. So, you don't say to your dog..or the tree..or the rock...and certainly not Aunt Lucy..."What's up?" You shapeshift and move beyond the surface to experience their unique ways of sensing, of communicating, of being as they experience them As Osho says, you become the tree. Which is how you receive its wisdom.
Now, here's where it gets really fun. This spirited, chatty energy exists not just in the realm of our day to day experience. As Gurdjieff and others teach, it stretches in a steady stream all the way back to primordial times and all the way forward into infinity.
Shamans know how to travel along that stream. It's our daily commute. It's the path of our own journey and, as shamans do, we illuminate and share the wisdom along that stream so that others may see their own paths, their own journeys, a bit more clearly.