A friend of mine recently told me he contacted a very famous shaman whose name I will not reveal. This "shaman" (who I'm going to refer to as "Sandra", but it's definitely NOT Sandra Ingerman) teaches shamanism and has written many books on the subject. My friend asked Sandra where she had received her training and if Sandra was a practitioner, human-trained or spirit-trained shaman. Sandra's assistant replied and said that Sandra took a 2 credit elective with Michael Harner in Beginning Journeying and that after Sandra met her spirit animal and spirit teacher, the rest was history. The assistant then said that Sandra "believes that to call oneself a shaman is coming from ego because it is a lifelong journey and when one comes from ego, helping spirits stop assisting."
This is the biggest load of shit I've heard in a long time. So let me savor this moment before I begin.
*deeeeeeeeep breath*
The thing that I want to address is Sandra's view on calling oneself a "shaman".
Sandra said this is a "lifelong journey", which IT IS. So do you think that calling yourself what you really are, which is merely stating a FACT, would convince the Spirits to just throw the baby out with the bath water? Taking into account all the effort and preparation that has been laid out by the Spirits to build the foundation for the shamanic path for Sandra? WTF?
Sandra believes that the Spirits that have busted their energetic asses to train and set the wheels in motion for her since birth will abandon her along the shamanic path and would just "stop assisting".
Spirit 1: Hey, we've been working for countless of your "lifetimes" to prepare you for this difficult journey. It's going to take a lot of sacrifice and moxie on your part, but we're so excited to see you blossom into the shaman we know you can be! BUT if you call yourself a "shaman" (which is technically your job title in this incarnation), we're going to quit and throw away all the "time" and energy we've invested in you. Understood?
Spirit 2: Yeah, don't you DARE call yourself what you are because you shouldn't be honest and truthful to people. We want you to confuse them with semantics. Maybe consider calling yourself a plumber or architect. We don't care, but DON'T EVER refer to yourself as what we trained you to be. The whole lot of us will scrap the entire motherfucking project and quit being your guides and helpers so fucking fast, you'll think you were in a goddamned time warp. Got it?
If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, then it's a motherfucking duck! (Don't get me wrong here because I'm not defending that she's a "real" shaman. I personally feel she's more of a poseur-practitioner).
I can assure you that when I refer to myself as a shaman, that wouldn't even be a tiny blip on their "just-give-me-a-fucking-reason-to-abandon-you" radar. That's NOT how it works.
Sandra talks about "coming from ego" and makes it sounds like she DOESN'T have an ego, but the harsh truth is that Sandra's ego isn't big - it's FUCKING HUGE! If you have a big ego and it's obvious because of your words and actions, that's a yang manifestation. PRETENDING to be humble and saying that you don't have an ego is the yin version of having a huge fucking ego. Sorry sweetie, but I see through your bullshit.
People try to hide their ego like this in order to impress others into thinking they are ego-less. There are always two sides to the same coin and it will always be either the yin or yang manifestation. (Please read the article on yin and yang for more info.)
I never cared much for the information from Sandra in the past for other reasons that I won't share here, but having this little tidbit of information definitely helped me view Sandra in a new (shittier) light.
Don't fall for others trying to act humble to hide their huge ego.
Comments