Shaman says
It has recently come to my attention that I am a shaman. Or, at least, I have been given the same radical alteration of perspective that would have lead to becoming a shaman in any other time and culture. Sadly, in the here and now there are only some fairly shallow (though well-intentioned) New Age practices that nearly miss the point entirely. Fortunately, the spirit world being what it is, it re-surfaced in Western culture through Jung’s work with the collective unconscious, archetypal images, and active imagination. More so, the many who have followed him have taken these ideas and expanded them to much greater scope and sophistication.
Following this trail of modern spirit walkers, I have discovered a real gem. I am just finishing a brilliant and rather challenging book by Patrick Harpur called Daimonic Reality: A Field Guide to the Otherworld. In it, Harpur creates a compelling framework for understanding basically all the weird shit that goes on in the world. Connecting everything from UFO abductions to appearances of the Virgin Mary to shamanic journeying, he paints a picture of our world which makes room for these things to have a vital role without resorting to either literalism on the one hand or flights of fancy on the other. Along the way, he also happens to establish what looks to be an excellent cosmology for a contemporary would-be shaman to operate from.
This is the first thing I’ve encountered in a long time which both feels very true and really intimidates me. I think I’ve finally found the beginning of the next major shift in my awareness. I’ve ordered some books that are oriented around specific practices for working with this type of perspective. I’m hopeful that with the right tools I’ll be able to turn this new theory into a new experience.