The Shaman's Drum
The drum is one of the major tools, if not the most important
tool of the shaman. This is because the drum enables the shaman to go into a
deep trance which is vital for healing or divination and to journey into the Otherworld. But inducing a trance state is by far not
the only use of the drum. The drum is a very versatile tool with a long
history as a musical instrument and ceremonial tool in many cultures and shamanic
traditions. The drum can be used for journeying in the Otherworld, for healing,
for clearing space, for sacred dance, for getting into a trance, for calling
spirits, for honouring the land, for communion with divinity, for divination
(divining the future) or getting messages from spirit, and for many other
purposes. Therefore it is not surprising that the ceremonial drum has been held
sacred and treated with great respect and reverence in many ancient cultures!
This article intends to give you an overview of this amazingly versatile tool of the
shaman, the sacred drum.
Sacred
Symbolism
When
meditating on the drum, many things get revealed to us. All we have to do is to
let the drum speak to us. The message is there for those who want to hear it
and who have an open heart and mind. The very symbolism of the drum shows its
connection to Spirit and God/Goddess/All-That-Is -- in short to divinity. To
touch the drum is to touch the sacred.
The drum is round. It forms a perfect circle. The circle symbolises the cycles
of life, from birth to death o rebirth, from spring to winter and spring again -- over and
over. A circle has no beginning nor ending. It is neverending and eternal,
like our souls! Maybe this is why the sound of the drum puts us in touch with
eternity, with our true essence. And though our minds may not understand the
message, in our hearts we know and feel the joy of coming home when we listen
to the beat of the drum.
The drum is
hollow. Its rounded hollowness is reminiscent of the womb of the Goddess from
which all life springs. To really understand the spirit of the drum we need to
honour the Goddess and the Divine Feminine. The Vedic tradition says that
through the divine sound of Om all things came into being. The sacred drum of Siva, the damaru, symbolises the sound of
creation. Siva beats his drum and brings the universe into existence and at the
end of a cycle dissolves it by dancing his tandava dance. This is a wonderful
example how sound and dance are directly connected to divinity and creation.
To understand how sound can create you need to know the first principle of
reality: everything is energy! Sound is just a specific form of energy, the
most subtle energy to emerge from the divine at the very dawn of creation. It
is through the energy of divine sound that the Goddess creates the material universe with its
myriads of beings. For there can be no creation without the Divine Feminine,
also called Sakti (or Shakti), which is the active energy of creation.
But even
though the drum is a very feminine instrument, it could not sound without the
beater. The longish, phallic shape of the beater is representative of the male
energy that is necessary to make the drum sound and thus to create! This shows
us that the Divine Feminine (Sakti) and the Divine Male (Siva) are equally
important. Together they create the world of matter. While the Divine Male is
the pure consciousness that thinks all things into being, but alone is inert,
the Divine Feminine is the active energy needed to bring forth matter. For this reason you often see the Goddess Kali (a form of Sakti) depicted as dancing on the body of Siva who appears completely inert but blissful. This is to show that the creative energy of the Goddess is needed for anything to come into being, for the creation of matter.
When you understand those principles of the Divine Male or Siva and the Divine Female or Sakti, and their representation in the drum, then you can see how the
sound of the drum represents the sound of creation. By playing the drum we
become co-creators. In the drum there is balance between male and female
forces. Earth and Sky, Matter and Spirit, Siva and Sakti are working together in perfect harmony. And so the sound of the drum restores balance to our being as well!
The Shaman's
Horse
The drum is the vehicle the shaman uses to journey to the Otherworld. Therefore
it has often been called the "horse of the shaman". The steady beat
of the drum puts the shaman into a trance so she can leave the world of matter
behind and journey in the world of spirit. In many traditions the shaman has an
assistant who beats the drum for the whole length of the journey or healing
work. This enables the shaman to completely let go of the physical body and go
into a very deep trance.
In modern times people often journey with a drumming tape. I used to do that
too but soon came away from it. At the beginning, when I first attempted to
drum for my own journeys, I found it very hard to beat my drum and keep my mind
focused on the journey at the same time. My arm would get tired and the
discomfort distracted me. Even once I had overcome that problem by finding a
ways to drum very long without fatigue, the very act of drumming still kept
some of my attention on the physical activity and the material world. With
practice I eventually managed to forget my physical body while drumming for
extended periods of an hour or longer. From then on I experienced journeys which
were many times more powerful than those I undertook with the help of a
drumming tape.
Therefore it is well worth to experiment with different sitting positions and practise
drumming until you can do it with total ease while still going into a deep
trance. In the end, you should be able to achieve a state where you can
separate the physical body, which keeps on beating the drum no matter how deep
you go in your meditation or journey, and your spirit body that goes off on its
own and completely forgets the physical body! Working with an actual drum is
always more powerful than listening to a drumming tape, simply because the drum
has a spirit!
Spirit of the
Drum
Every drum has a unique spirit that interacts with the shaman in various ways,
lending its power and help to the work at hand, whether it be healing, trance
or sacred ceremony. The spirit of the drum is made up of different parts and
can grow in strength with time and continued sacred use of the drum. It can
also lose power when the drum is profaned. Therefore always keep your sacred
drum sacred! The spirit of the drum is a blend of energies such as:
- The spirit of the
animal that gave its skin to making the drum. And, if the drum beater is
covered with leather, also the spirit of the animal that gave its skin to
making the beater.
- The spirit of the trees
that gave their wood for making the rim of the drum, and the stick of the
beater.
- The spirit of the drum
itself, which is made up of all the different parts of the drum.
- The energy and a bit of the spirit of the
shaman who works with the drum.
For this reason
it is best to use a drum made from natural hide rather than a synthetic drum. I
myself am a vegetarian and I prefer not to use products that animals have to
die or suffer for. But a synthetic drum will never hold real power and from a
shamanic point of view is quite useless. We also have to accept the gifts of
the animal world that the Goddess gives us and not be so rigid in our beliefs
that we cannot see the bigger picture. Sometimes animals even willingly
sacrifice themselves to bring a message from Spirit or to help people, or for
the making of a sacred item that can heal many. To reject the generous gifts of
the plant and animal kingdoms because of our limited understanding of what
non-violence means, would be to reject the gifts of the Goddess. Of course, the
spirit of the animal(s) that gave their skin to make the drum, and the
spirit of the trees that provided the wood should properly be honoured, ideally
already during the making of the drum. If that is not possible, then at least
once you have acquired the drum, do a ceremony for the spirits of the animal
and the trees who helped make the drum.
Choosing a
Drum
When
buying a drum it is best to go to a place where you can try out several ones,
because not every drum will resonate with you, and not every drum will match
with your voice if you intend to use it for sacred song as well. Remember, it
is not only you who chooses the drum, the spirit of the drum actually chooses
you! So be open to hear the message of each drum, whether it wants to work with
you or is waiting for somebody else. One way of being sure you choose the right
one is to select the one that sings sweetly with you, the one that speaks to
you and the one that makes you feel powerful when you play it.
The pitch of
the drum is also important. The lower the pitch, the deeper it takes you on Underworld journeys. It is well known in Yoga that various musical notes resonate with the seven chakras (energy centres in the astral or subtle body). The general rule is that lower notes
resonate with the lower chakras and higher notes with higher chakras. The lower
chakras are connected with the Underworld, and the higher chakras with the
Upperworld. Therefore a low-pitch drum will be ideal for Underworld journeying
and a higher pitch one more ideal for Middle World or Upperworld journeys. But that
doesn't mean that you need several drums for going to these different regions
of the Otherworld. When you are experienced enough you can go anywhere you want
with any drum, though it is best to work with one's own drum which holds the
shaman's own energy and power. Still, if you intend to do mainly Underworld
work you may find a very low pitched drum helpful as it probably enables you to
go deeper. Go by how the sound of the drum makes you feel. If there is a drum
that puts you in trance quickly, go for it!
But consider
that the pitch of the drum can change with weather conditions, as the natural
hide of the drum will get tighter in dry weather or when exposed to heat, and
looser when the weather is damp or cool. The tighter the skin the higher the
drum will sound. Generally bigger drums are lower in tone than small drums, as
they have more volume to vibrate. I have two drums, my main drum which is just
14 inches in diameter and quite comfortable to hold for long drumming, and
another much bigger drum with a very deep tone, which is extremely good for
deep Underworld journeys, but a bit difficult to play as it is so heavy. I had
some very powerful journeys with that drum. In spite of its heaviness I have
found a way to beat it almost effortlessly, which makes it possible for me to go on long journeys
with it.
The design of
the drum should have deep personal meaning to you. Ideally it should be one of
your power animals, your totem animal, a sacred
symbol, or anything that connects you to your power. It is great if you can
paint the design yourself, but if you are not skilful enough at painting you
can let somebody help you with the artwork, or you can buy a drum with a design
that really resonates with you. Don't let ego get in when choosing your drum
design. Don't think you need to have an eagle design because you are
"great shaman" when in reality you are a beginner and your main power
animal (totem animal) is a deer! You would do better to honour your own power
animal than just copying a design or pretending to be somebody else! Any power
animal is good, whether it be big or small, fierce or gentle. If it is your
power animal, then this is what you need and what you are most aligned with. So
honour your totem animal!
Even better
than buying a drum would be to make your own drum from scratch. But not
everybody has the necessary skills and patience for this. But at the very least
you can do some work on the beater, for example you could decorate it with
leather or feathers or beadwork, or engrave sacred symbols into it. This way
you make the drum fully your own and put something of yourself into a part of
the drum at least. The drum should be painted with a design which resonates
with you, such as your power animal or power plant, sacred symbols that resonate with
you, the image of a Goddess that you love and serve, etc.
As the spirit of the drum works with you specifically, and as it holds some of your power as well, it is best not to lend
out your drum. If you let others play your drum their energies will blend with
it, which is not a beneficial thing. Negative energies could get in, or your drum may lose power and be less effective for healing or journeying. To keep your drum vibrant and its spirit
happy, use it only for sacred ceremony and shamanic work. If you let somebody
even touch your drum once it may result in a power loss. The shaman's drum is
an extension of his or her power and for somebody to touch it without
permission is akin to stealing their power! If you keep your drum sacred it
will build up an enormous amount of energy and become very powerful in time.
The drum will also need regular cleansing, such as smudging, which is to be
done after each healing work and whenever you feel it is necessary. The spirit
of the drum will want to be fed and you will have to find out in which way the
spirit of your drum likes to be fed. You can journey and find this out from the
spirit of your drum directly.
Healing with
the Drum
There
are various ways of using the drum in healing. For one, by journeying with the
drum the shaman can go to the client's Underworld
and retrieve power animals
or soul pieces for them, or do whatever else is needed to restore the client to wholeness. Besides these obvious
uses the drum can also serve as a diagnostic tool to find places of weakness in
a person's energy body. I read somewhere that there is evidence that regular
beating of the drum at a slow steady beat increases health and decreases
stress! Just beating one's drum regularly is definitely very soothing if not
healing. Though the sound of the drum is pleasant to many people, most entities loathe it and so the drum can be
used to drive them out! But not everything negative will be banished that way,
major demons certainly won't come out just because you beat the drum a bit!
Still the drum is useful for clearing negativity.
The drum can also be used as a tool to heal the energy body and drum power into
a client (an example of this you can find in Suditi's Story). Every shaman has to find out for themselves how their drum wants to
work with them. The more you use your drum the more it will speak to you and
tell you things about the client, for example, I found out that whenever I have
clients that either have very strong negativity that needs clearing, or very
strong resistance to being healed, my drum goes quite flat! At other times the
drum is extremely eager to get going! Often my drum will sing to me and create
a resonance beyond the actual beat of the drum that creates a feeling of bliss
and joy.
The drum can
also be used for clearing space, getting rid of negativity in an area and
drumming positive spirits in. Negative beings generally don't like the sound of
the drum. In some cultures drums are still used today to drum negative spirits
out on New Year or other festivals. The drum is also wonderful to use in
singing songs to Mother Earth, in honouring the spirit of the land, or even for
healing the land. I have used the drum to heal trees or sing to the ocean. The
drum beat reminds us of the heartbeat of Mother Earth and puts us in touch with
Her.
Guidelines for
Working with Your Drum
The
first thing you should do with a new drum is to welcome it and bond with it. It
would be good to do a ceremony to honour the spirits of the animal and the tree
that have given of themselves to create the drum. If you wish, you can
consecrate the drum as a magical tool as well. To bond with the drum begin by
putting a personal touch to it, such as painting it with your own design, or
decorating the drum beater. The more often you use it, the more you bond with
your drum. Keep it near you and touch it often and you will bond with it faster
and more deeply. You can also journey to the spirit of the drum to commune with
it.
Once you have consecrated the drum and bonded with it properly, do not let
anybody else touch it or play it. If somebody does touch it by accident, smudge
it immediately. I find that in the West people have a very grabby attitude and
are prone to touching other people's sacred items or even personal jewellery
without permission or respect. To avoid this happening keep your drum close by
and tell people you are working with in ceremony not touch it. Some say the
drum should not be placed on the earth or negative energy could get into it. I
don't feel this is correct because the drum is very much connected with Earth
energy and can actually draw power from the earth. As long as you treat it with
respect and not just let it lie around around carelessly, placing the drum on
the earth should be no problem at all. The idea that earth energy would harm
the drum is typical of ungrounded "love and light" people, who only
know how to deal with sky energy but not earth energy, in other words, typical
new-age people who have not integrated their shadow.
After each healing, or whenever needed, the drum should be cleansed. The best
method to do this is smudging (see Smudging Page). You can also magically
exorcise the drum, with blessed salt and blessed water, and by passing it over
a candle flame and through incense. This is very useful when the drum has
become severely polluted, such as when a very negative person has touched it,
or when during a drum healing demonic energy has been released.
The skin of the drum will need to be oiled occasionally to stay subtle. I use
ghee (clarified butter) for this, and my drum likes it, but yours may not, so find out that your
drum likes. If you have painted any design on the drum, make sure that it
doesn't come off when you oil it. And finally the drum will want to be fed
regularly. The feeding of the drum can be done in many different ways, such as
by wafting incense of various herbs and resins over the drum, or leaving it exposed to moonlight
occasionally, sprinkling various herbs on it, etc. You will have to find out
what the spirit of your drum wants by meditating with it or by journeying to
the spirit of the drum.
Warning: never leave your drum near a source of heat such as a radiator, or in your car on a hot day, as the drum skin could dry out and become so tight that
your drum implodes! Never leave the drum out in the rain or let it get
thoroughly soaked, as the skin could get water-logged and extremely loose and
when it dries again it maybe warped and the drum will no longer sound good.
Once, after teaching a very intense workshop, I came home tired and had many things to unload from my car. In my fatigue I forgot one of my drums outside my
house. The next morning I was shocked to find it outside my door. It had rained over night and the skin had become extremely loose. When it dried the skin was uneven and very warped. The drum didn't sound
properly at all anymore, plus it looked quite ugly as the artwork was very
distorted. Here is what I did to fix it again:
First I let it dry completely. Then I sprayed a bit of water on the face of the
drum, both on the inside and outside, so that the skin would become suppler. I then laid the drum down in a room
with an even floor and very thin carpet and filled it with clean small pebbles (about half an inch
in diameter). My intention was to weigh down the distorted area and hopefully make
it smooth again. Note: Do not lift the drum up once it is filled with pebbles
or it will break! I let it dry like this for several days. Then I removed the
pebbles by hand (do not lift the drum and pour them out!). The drum was perfect
again, neither the skin, nor the artwork nor the sound suffered! If your drum
has become extremely warped you may have to repeat that process several times.
Clean sand could also be used instead of pebbles.
A natural skin drum needs a bit more maintenance and care than a drum with a synthetic skin, but I feel it is
well worth the trouble. A drum made of natural hide just sounds so much sweeter, and can
hold much greater power, as the spirit of the animal whose hide was used to
make the drum combines with the energy and power of the shaman. Just take good
care of your natural hide drum and it will be with you for very long, as your
friend and companion on many wonderful journeys and adventures in the Otherworld!
Of course
possessing a drum doesn't make you into a great shaman yet. It takes hard work
and facing many challenges, to become a real shaman! You can't buy power. You
will have to earn it and work for it (or steal it, as vampires do. But hopefully this is not the
path that you have chosen for it will ultimately lead to your destruction!).
Though the drum doesn't make the shaman, having your own drum can be an
incentive to becoming a shaman, marking your first step on this path. After all
you will probably spend a good amount of money on it, which means sacrifice on
other luxuries (unless you are rich!). Alternatively you could make your drum
but this will also cost you something: effort and time! Either way sacrifice is
involved, and this can be an offering to Spirit that shows your commitment to
shamanism.
Having your own drum can facilitate shamanic journeying and make your journeys much more powerful.
Having a drum is essential for most shamanic work, especially if you need to do
healing on others. I also use my drum in the magick circle and find it empowers
the magick as well.
Even if you aren’t into magick or shamanism at all, working with a drum is very beneficial
for almost everyone, but especially for ungrounded people. Being ungrounded is
not a popular state of being at all. Due to ego most people will deny being ungrounded. It is
however very common in these modern times for people to lose their connection
to the Earth and become ungrounded. Many times during healing work I find that
people have very poor "roots" and not much energy flows into their
foot chakras from Mother Earth. People are living too much in their heads
rather than in their bodies, spending too much time in cities and too little
time out in nature. An overemphasis on the mind and on sky energies also causes
ungroundedness. (I am going to write more about this in an article on the dangers of the New Age soon!)
When you are ungrounded you become an "air-head", a
nice descriptive term that shows the imbalance between earth and sky energies.
To become grounded again you need more earth energy, which the drum can
provide. Therefore working with a drum is very beneficial for all those who
need grounding. If you do your drumming outdoors, in nature it will be even
more effective!
Working with a
drum is also wonderful for anybody who wants to work with the energy of Mother
Earth and feel Her heartbeat through the sacred sound of the drum. And, last
not least, working with a drum is fun and gets you into a positive vibration!
Copyright ©
Avalon Lau, 09.10.2008
drum, sacred drum, shaman, shamanism, trance, shamanic trance, healing, divination, journeying, shamanic journeying, shamanic, shamanic work, shaman, sacred dance, sacred ceremony, sacred symbolism, sacred, ceremony, Underworld, Otherworld, power animals, power plants, power, Goddess, Spirit, spirits, spirit of the drum, divine feminine, divine male, Shiva, Shakti, Siva, Sakti, Shiva and Shakti, chakras, energy body, totem animal, entities, demons, drum design, drum cleansing, smudging, Mother Earth, earth energy, sky energy, clearing space, exorcism, drum feeding, drum healing, vampires
