Thanks Debbie and Odelle for the welcome.
My computer was on the fritz! Glad to be back.
Would you feel comfortable sharing the name of this group on this site? Or maybe they're already on here?
I will, but it was this woman's devotees who where specifically culturally appropriating, and misrepresenting themselves to me, So I don't want to falsely accuse her directly.
http://www.shamanicgrace.comhello GeoDude
What does your girlfiend say aobut all this money spent ? Was it worth it ? Best ask after a year or two. Sometimes time gives us perspective.
yes - "mish-mosh" is what so very many of the New Age "shamans" and "lightworkers" etc come up with. Much of it comes from stuff they've read in books or scan-read in the media. I am utterly dismayed at some of the weird beliefs us Westerners come up with.
Mind you I can't talk. I'm an English man, now in BC. My first introduction to "shamanism" was back in England when another English man took me on a journey to the upper and lower worlds to the sound of drumming. I don't believe he had any idea what he was doing. But I had an extraordinary and very vivid experience. My only experience. I found out later that this man was preaching all sorts of rubbish, and, along with others, making bizarre and unwarranted claims for his "teaching". It's one thing when a group of people, like me, go round to someone's house and pay a small amount of money to experience something different or creative. It's entirely another when someone mish-moshes all sorts of supposedly "Shamanistic" ideas and markets it with Native connections trumped up and ropes people into high-priced, medically-unfounded courses. Often an inner group develops who by now have paid a great deal of money indeed and are fully invested in insisting on bizarre beliefs. Helpful the teaching have been to these individuals but I'm starting to suspect that a large percentage of people are being led well astray. It's not the rich, who can afford it, that is proving so worrisome but those who don't have so much money and who are then persuaded into thinking that the "shaman" is an exception in some way.
I have a lot of respect for traditions, shamanic traditions too, around the world. There's a huge difference between traditional beliefs and new-found belief systems in Western-style "shamans". Traditions often ancient, have the support of ancestors and a lot of living people as an internconnected group. I first learnt about Shamanism at University in England in my Study Of Religion degree. One day, perhaps, a First Nation friend will take pity on me and show me some real tradition in Shamanism.
cheers, Jask
I believe she is a solid, good person. BUT she is searching and feels like she has to spend money....money somehow makes it "legitimate" ... or valid. It's the quick fix.
She has also been to Tom Brown's place in NJ.
Most of the people she has been involved with are
VERY charismatic. They are all
VERY overly complimentary to her "you have a gift"
"you are amazing..." "I can see you have many spirit guides around you...." etc.
It feeds the ego really, and if you are looking for something, its easy to get sucked in.
Now, I am not looking for something, and got suspicious of these people right off the rip.
I don't need to rely on spirit to tell, I am a good read of people....I have a highly acute BS detector. And it went off in the presence of these people, and most of what they said, both through my first hand dealings, and through her accounts. They're not that different from stereo-typical used car salesmen.
I went to a few of the gatherings/chanellings, and it was a poor thespian display really.
I felt sadness in my heart.
These things are really marketed well...quite clever actually.
Ostensibly it is marketed to those that have money. I questioned this "What about the indigent...Don't they have the same opportunities to become a "shaman"?
...."We pray for them and send them love and light."
was the answer I got.
I'm glad she's not involved anymore, but she is still looking.
Shaman has become a brand. It was used by anthropologist as a blanket term for spiritual indigenous people all around the world.
But it does have a catchiness to it, an enigmatic quality. Who wouldn't love that title!? It seems everyones a Shaman or into shamanism these days.
I have met a Mongolian Shaman. He was really funny (in a good way). His people did this throat singing that was amazing!
He was very kind and warm to me.
The experience left me not wanting to be a shaman, but to just be kind like he and his people were....
...didn't cost me a dime
