What is Shamanic Healing?
Shamanic Healing is possibly the oldest spiritual practice and its survival is testament to its potency. Contemporary shamanism blends ancient and modern wisdom, using the techniques of our ancestors to enable the client to discover their unique path to healing and well-being. Shamanism teaches that everything in existence has a spirit, is alive and that we are connected to all life through the web – all disease, whether emotional or physical begins as an imbalance in the spiritual realm. A shamanic healer will work in this realm in an altered state of consciousness with his or her Guides and Allies to seek healing for the client.
How?
This may involve clearing spiritual or energetic blockages from the body; bringing back information or guidance from the spiritual realm; recovering soul parts or power that has been lost. Each session is different, depending on the initial diagnosis and all work is performed under the direct and conscious guidance of the practitioner’s Spirit Teachers and Allies.
Soul & Power Retrieval
Power loss may cause depression, chronic illness or a series of misfortunes and the shamanic healer will journey to restore the client’s lost power. Soul loss is potentially more serious and leads to disassociation, addictions, depression, illness, immune deficiency problems, post-traumatic stress disorder, unending grief or even coma. This may have occurred as a result of physical, spiritual or emotional trauma such as an accident, surgery, abuse, war, or surviving a natural disaster. During such experiences a fragment of our vital nature may ‘escape’ from the situation, so that we go into “survival mode” and in most cases the soul fragment will return spontaneously.
Sometimes however, the soul part may become “stuck” or lost which may initially leave us feeling as if we are not really present in our lives but simply observing. On some level we know that a vital part of who we are is missing – we may feel as if we have an empty space inside us that cannot be filled. If unaddressed, this situation may ultimately result in some of the more serious conditions previously mentioned. In these cases a shamanic practitioner would journey to the Spirit World on behalf of the client and with the help of their Spirit Teachers and Allies, track down the client’s lost soul parts and retrieve them.
In the Spirit World there is not such thing as linear time and often the soul part is found in a situation that represents (symbolically or literally) what the client was experiencing when the soul part left. If a soul fragment is caught up in an event then on an energetic level it is if that event is still happening to the client, they are frozen in time and unable to move on. Returning the soul part to the client is the beginning of integrating the past. Once incorporated, it can renew and revitalise, perhaps bringing a feeling of wholeness and completeness to the client that may have been absent for many years.
Midwifing the Dying
Death is still a somewhat taboo subject in our culture and unlike our ancient forbearers our society tends to hold the process of death and dying at arms length. One aspect of shamanic healing is to facilitate the transition from the end of this physical existence through to the Spirit World, helping ease the client’s journey to the Land of the Dead.
Shamanic healing may be appropriate at any stage of our lives and not just when we have suffered a recognised trauma or loss. At a later stage, once the client has learned to journey for themselves, Shamanic Spirit Counselling can be a powerful tool to help them access their true and full potential, offering invaluable guidance and insight from the Spirit World when a cross roads have been reached or when changes need to be made but it cannot be clearly seen how to make them.
Raven runs a small shamanic practice in Bristol. For further information and bookings please telephone 0117 3774670 or mobile 07956171854 or email ravenseal@hotmail.com