Steven Wolf, a Sundancer and shamanic practitioner of Northern Cheyenne and Irish ancestry, who has practiced within the Northern Plains spiritual traditions for over twenty five years, has this to say:"These days everyone seems to have a definition, and interpretation of the term"shamanism". from the structural anthropologists to the mythologists to the Jungians, the Freudians, the transpersonal psychotherapists, the process oriented psychologists, to the New Agers with their psycho- babble. The academics hold to a strict, rigid definition, feeling they have proprietary rights to the term and smirking at everyone else. On the other hand, New Agers have a definition so broad as to be meaningless. Both sides miss the profound depth and breadth of this particular spiritual way, which is much more than mere technique. Shamanism may possibly be the oldest spiritual path, and consequently has far more profound implications for contemporary humans than its academic interpreters realize. The reason for this is that the act of interpretation is a mental exercise, whereas "shamanism" is a living dynamic that involves all of the senses. A sensuous experience that must be known in a primary and primal way. The mental wheel-spinning of academics or the shallow genuflecting of New Age entrepeneurs will never truly comprehend it until they stop interpreting and start experiencing it, internally and externally, with mind, emotion, body and spirit."(6) :)
Posted on: Mon, 26 Aug 2013 10:44:52 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015