Workgroup Notes: ATD and Shamanism

Notes from the Open Source workgroup: Saturday, June 18

Can Shamanism/Condor practices enhance our ability to do the work of the symposium? Can our dreams guide us, and if so, how could we engage with these areas?

Cindy Dixon

Tuck Taylor, Vicki Peck and Cindy Dixon combined topics for a group conversation. Tuck started the conversation by talking about the Achuar practice of rising early each day to examine dreams experienced by individuals as a means for making decisions and planning their lives. Leslie Whiting, who has been to Ecuador, described being with the Achuar as they went through their daily ritual. Arising at 4:00 AM, tribe members would come together and drink a special tea which is part of a daily purification ritual. The community dreams are collected in conversations, and this information is used by tribal elders as they consider group actions.

Noelle Poncelet joined our group early on. She and her husband, Claude, teach shamanism workshops, and have been involved in this subject area for many years, including travels all over the world researching indigenous shamanic practices. Her answer to the general question we’d posed, about whether it would be valuable to our work with the symposium for us to learn and engage these practices, was an emphatic “yes”.

Noelle answered our first question, “What is a shaman?” A shaman uses his/her experience to empower individuals to seek and trust the spiritual guidance available to all of us. Spirit is everywhere. Everything is alive. Shamanism completely honors and values the body as a source of connection. Noelle believes that shamanism can help open the door for us to explore topics relating to our work, including the spirit of social justice.

She talked about the “Miracle Cure” exercise, which is included in the facilitator notes for the symposium. In this meditation, you go to sleep and have a dream in which you find that every problem that we are facing has been solved. Upon waking, when you find that this transformation has taken place, ask yourself what you notice first. This simple visualization can be profoundly impactful.

From the group’s input, it was clear that this connection to spirit can be exercised in numerous ways – Trish Sharpe uses tantric dance, which she demonstrated during the Talent Show that evening, to achieve deep connection and heightened consciousness. Whether shamanism incorporates the use of meditation, plant medicines, drumming or other means depends on the intent of the leader and context of the journey process.

Noelle made a remarkable offer to all of us who are symposium facilitators: She and Claude would provide a 2-3 day workshop, tuition free, to anyone so inclined. Her only request was that she not be involved in any of the organizational details. Susan Burns, who also contributed her experience to the group, is with IONS and we talked about having the workshop take place at the IONS conference center. She believes she would help us make the arrangements and keep the costs low.

As a starting point, Noelle suggested books by Sandra Ingerman, specially mentioning “The Beginner’s Guide to Shamanic Journeying” as an excellent preparation book. http://www.shamanicvisions.com/ingerman_folder/04books.html. Several people in the group know others who conduct explorations of this nature – Julie Earl (juliaearl@mindspring.com), Vinit Allen (vinit7@yahoo.com), and Azlan White (azlanwhite@yahoo.com) have references they could share.

We began a list of folks who are interested in the workshop with Noelle and Claude Poncelet. I will enter these in a database, and anyone else who wants to get on the list can contact me (cindy.dixon@charter.net) and I’ll take care of it. I’ll begin by emailing the people I have on the list to see if we can establish a planning committee for a workshop.