 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
The World of the Shaman The world of the shaman is one where everything is alive. Animals, plants, even rocks and crystals are believed to have spirit and can communicate with the shaman. The shaman speaks to the spirit of the mountains, and to the sea, to Mother Earth and Father Sky. There is nothing in the world of matter that is inert to the shaman. Everything has spirit and everything is alive, everything is part of that one Great Spirit that created this world and all therein. But a shaman is not restricted to the world of matter, not even to the spirit part of the material universe, but the shaman also has access to another unseen world, the world of spirit, the Otherworld, which remains forever invisible to ordinary mortals. To a shaman this invisible world is just as real as the world of matter is to the uninitiated worldly man, in fact the Otherworld is more real to the shaman! It has been said that a shaman stands with one leg in this world and with the other in the world of spirit. A shaman has access to both worlds and goes from one to the other with total ease. A shaman is a walker between worlds! To access the Otherworld the shaman needs to enter into a trance state which can be achieved with the help of a drum, a rattle, or various other methods. The shaman journeys in the Otherworld with her spirit body. To affect healing the shaman changes things in the Otherworld or gets information from various spirit beings residing in the Otherworld. To a rational mind person, caught in the illusion that this world of matter is real -- and the only reality -- this may sound like utter nonsense. But to a shaman the Otherworld is the underlying reality of this world and everything that happens in the Otherworld has an effect on physical reality and thus makes perfect sense. A shaman is beyond the illusion of physical reality! To a shaman all life is interrelated, everything is connected. The Great Spirit may convey a message via an animal that appears to a shaman, a plant along the way, even the formation of clouds or the shape of a pebble. Shamans are very good at interpreting omens. What worldly people see as superstition to a shaman is a message from Spirit. Nothing that happens is a coincidence, everything has meaning. A shaman meditates on the meaning of seemingly random events and understands what Mother Nature wants to tell her in the little things that happen every day. There is great wisdom in the animal, plant and mineral kingdoms and the shaman knows this. In this place I would like to tell you a little anecdote that happened to me and a friend of mine: The Clever Fox We were going to the airport to attend a medicine ceremony abroad. We left my home village in the early morning hours. I was driving. As we came out of the village, in a place where I had never seen any animals besides the local cats, a fox crossed the road! It crossed from right to left – only it wasn't on four legs but on two, and it didn’t actually walk or run, I swear it danced! The fox crossed all the way to the other side, dancing on its hind legs. meanwhile I had brought the car to a halt. The fox reached the other side, but instead of running into the bushes, turned around and crossed again, still dancing on two legs while looking straight at us! It was totally unreal! When it reached the right side of the road, it turned once more and danced back on its hind legs. Three crossings on two legs while performing its strange dance! I had never seen an animal behave like this in my whole life. While my friend exclaimed over and over how cute the fox was, I immediately knew it wanted to tell us something very important. I knew it was a warning and that we had to be clever. I was sure I had packed all my papers (triple checked!), but had my friend? So I asked her “have you got your passport, your money, your driving license?” My friend assured me she had it all and held them up in the dark. I was still puzzling over the incident when we reached the airport about four hours later. As it turned out my friend’s passport had expired and she wasn’t permitted on the flight. I had to take my scheduled flight while she had to go to the nearest city hall, get an extension, and finally took a later flight which cost her over £200! Obviously her entities were trying to prevent her from going to the medicine ceremony, where they would be removed! As we were separated I couldn’t protect her and she had endless problems reaching her destination (including a very rough flight where people were praying for their lives!). All this could have been avoided had she heeded the fox' warning and checked her passport! The fox had told us to be smart, but we hadn’t been smart enough! This is just an example on how important it is to be open to the messages from Spirit. There us much more to being a shaman than attending a few workshops and taking your drum out on the weekend. Being a shaman means to have a shamanic world view and life style, and this should show in all aspects of one's life. It means to seek to understand the deeper meaning of events in our lives, from seemingly random encounters to the big things that happen to us, such as accidents and disease. If everything is interconnected then there can be no meaningless events or encounters. If an animal draws your attention to it, or shows up repeatedly, reflect on what it wishes to tell you. In time many things will be revealed to you through the little messengers of the Great Spirit. But to be a real shaman you have to fully understand the interconnectedness of all things, the One Spirit behind all life. And not just understand it with your mind, but with your heart! You have to shed the illusion of the material world and go beyond, to the place where all life is one, where everything is spirit. To be a real shaman you have to touch the mystery, and know the One Spirit that manifests as myriads of beings, that is eternal and indestructible, that is the source of all life, that is your very own self! A shaman has experienced the Oneness and touched the Great Mystery! The first step to becoming a shaman is usually to learn how to access and journey in the Otherworld. So let's explore the mysterious world of the shaman, the Otherworld together! Like our planet Earth, the Otherworld, has various regions, some more pleasant, others not so, some that are perfectly safe and others dangerous. And there are various denizens of those regions as well, friendly and unfriendly ones, helpful and hostile ones. The most commonly known regions are the Underworld, Middle World and Upper World. On most workshops this is all you ever hear about the Otherworld (if you wish to learn more, please visit the Workshops Page). But restricting ourselves to those three regions is a bit like naming northern I hope you will enjoy this excursion in the realm of spirit! Copyright © Avalon Lau, 13.08.2008
Underworld Safe Place Middle World Upper World
world of the shaman, spirit, shaman, shamanism, Mother Earth, Father Sky, Great Spirit, Otherworld, walker between worlds, trance, trance state, drum, rattle, spirit body, spirits, spirit beings, beyond illusion, Underworld, Middle World, Upper World, workshops, journeying, safe journeying, Otherworld regions, Otherworld denizens, realm of spirit, Oneness, interconnectedness, omen, medicine ceremony, message from spirit, fox, fox spirit, entities |
