It has been a while since I have blogged.  CV19 has put a damper on our planned trips to sites in Perú this Spring and Summer but we can all continue to practice.

We don't become shamanic practitioners by reading a book or two, or by attending a weekend or longer workshop.  We really become shamanic practitioners when our tribe accepts us as such.  When our tribe recognizes that we have skills and practices that improve their lives.  Your tribe can be as small as your immediate family, and that's a good size to start with, or as large as the world.  I follow the old dictum, "Think Global . . . Act Local".  

I realized how true that dictum is after spending years as a international development consultant working in the developing world.  I wanted to change the world . . . and I still do.  However it was frustrating to see years of hard work and progress swept away with a regime change, or when the priorities of the sponsoring agency changed.  I realized that I had helped change individual lives, even if the system reverted to its old ways.  If you remember from statistics courses, that's regression to the mean.

Anyway I hope that you are members of two tribes, the local tribe that you serve and the Tribe of Shamans.  If you grew up in a book religion then you probably remember the mythology of the 12 Tribes of Israel.   Eleven of the Tribes were given a land inheritance however, the Tribe of Levi was not.  Rather, they were disbursed throughout all of the tribes to serve as priests, the Levites.   We don't serve a mythical, vengeful, and psychopathic god of the old testament.  We serve the members of our tribe by connecting with real helping spirits, by teaching them to do the same, and by facilitating healing.  

We are members of the same tribe, the Tribe of Shamans, and are all connected, and we are members of the tribes that we serve.

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I am often asked how I was introduced to shamanism so I thought that I would share this with you.  It is from Chapter 1 of a book on Eclectic Shamanism that I have almost finished.  Six weeks in South America slowed me down a bit.

I am sometimes asked what it takes to be a shaman, and can anyone become a shaman. Because I am asked these questions so often, and you might be asking the same questions right now, I thought that I would address both of them. Second question first. Yes, I think that anyone can become a shamanic practitioner an eclectic shaman. I’m a highly educated, left-brained logical guy who spends his days with numbers, statistics, and computer programs. If I can do it then anyone can!

The answer to the second question is a little bit longer and that’s what this book is about. To get started on that path I’m going to share my journey into shamanism with you.

I grew up with a nuclear physicist. My father earned his Ph. D. in physics when nuclear physics was a new and exciting field. I can still remember going to his lab at Argonne National Laboratory outside of Chicago (security in the late 1950s and early 1960s wasn't what it is today). He was sending alpha particles through cloud chambers surrounded by a strong magnetic field, and then measuring how the particle traces in the cloud chamber changed . . . trying to discover what an alpha particle was.

What you ask, does that have to do with shamanism. Well, I grew up in a family where something was only real if it could be measured and observed. An alpha particle leaving a trace through a cloud in a cloud chamber was real because it could be measured and observed. Spirit, on the other hand, couldn't be seen, measured or observed so it fell into the realm of fantasy and fairy tales, and my father didn't believe in fairy tales and so neither did I.

That changed when I was posted to Bolivia in 1971. My job was to establish literacy centers in the villages in the South Central Andean region of Bolivia from Cochabamba to Tarija to teach Bolivian adults to read Spanish. I was working with Quechua-speaking adults who spoke Spanish as a second language and didn't read Spanish. I had been in Potosí (13,300 feet above sea level) for about nine months when one Saturday, on a whim, I decided to visit the village of Betanzos, about 30 clicks from Potosí. I hitched a ride on the back of a flat-bed truck, got off in the center of the village and walked in to a small cafe for lunch.

Four men, local campesinos (peasant farmers) from their look, walked over, greeted me and asked if they could sit down. After pleasantries they told me that they knew that I was coming. Their village curandero (healer/shaman) told them that I would be there with golden hair (I had blond hair then) and instructed them to go and meet me. He told them that I would teach their village how to read the printed words. At that point all they knew about me was that I was a blond-haired guy who spoke good Spanish and fair Quechua but with an obvious accent; and that I was hungry. By the way, they had walked to Betanzos from their little village, Tecoya, about 6 clicks to the North. My guess is that they left their village for Betanzos before I left Potosí.

That experience was very unsettling to someone who had been taught to only believe in what could be measured and observed. I had only decided that morning to visit Betanzos and hadn't told anyone where I was going (I know, stupid). This really upset my view of the world.

So what does it take to be a shaman or a shamanic practitioner? Well first, you have to think like John Lennon. He wrote, “I believe in everything until it's disproved. So I believe in fairies, the myths, dragons. It all exists, even if it's in your mind. Who's to say that dragons and nightmares aren't as real as the here and now?” 

That one experience in Betanzos was all it took to change my world view and to help me realize that there is much to the universe than what I can see, explain, measure, or observe. The world is much, much more exciting and filled with a lot more than you or I can see with our 3D eyes. So the first step, if you want to learn shamanism is to open yourself up to the possibility that you can become one, and open yourself up to the possibility that there are other worlds that are real and which you can experience.

The curandero/shaman in that small village outside of Betanzos was don Juan Carlos Medrano Jimenez and he became my teacher that day and taught me until his death in 1996, 25 years later.  By the way, I did visit their village and started a literacy center there.

Let me tell you a short story . . . Once, when The Buddha was out walking, he came to the town of Kesaputta of the Kalamas.   Now the Kalamas of Kesaputta had a burning question.  They had been visited by many preachers.  One would come and preach then then "disparage, debunk, revile and vilify the doctrines of others."  This preacher would be followed by another who would teach a different doctrine and attack the teachings of the others . . . and the cycle kept repeating itself over and over.  I live in a town where there seems to be a church on almost every street corner, and sometimes there are four, one on each corner.  M many of my friends feel like the Kalamas of Ksaputta.  They don't practice shamanism.

After describing the situation the Kalamas of Kesaputta said to The Buddha, we are perplexed, "which of these good ascetics speak the truth and which speak falsehood?"   The Buddha proceeded to give them a couple of tests that are just as valid today as they were at the time of The Buddha.  First, The Buddha told them what to avoid:

• Don't go by oral tradition.  Just because "they" say it is true, don't believe that it is really true.
• Don't go by lineage of teaching.  Just because something has been around for a long time and has been passed from person-to-person doesn't make it true, it just makes it old.  In fact, as it was passed from person-to-person it probably was changed and the original message was corrupted.
• Don't go by hearsay.  Just because someone's best friend's father said that it is true doesn't make it true.
• Don't go by a collection of texts.  Just because someone wrote it down in a book, even if the book is really, really, really old, doesn't make it true, it just means that it has been written down.
• Don't go by logical argument, inferential reasoning, or reasoned thinking.  Just because someone can build a good logical argument about something doesn't mean that it is true or that it works. Think about all of the "good" logic that went into proving that the world was flat.

If we can't use all of the "traditional truth tests" then how do we decide what to do?  

The Buddha (above) told the Kalamas of Kesaputta what not to rely on.  In essence he told them not to rely on blind faith.  Rather, he told them to rely on personal experience; try it out, see if it works.  He told them, "But when you know for yourselves, 'These things are wholesome; these things are blameless; these things are praised by the wise; these things, if undertaken and practiced, lead to welfare and happiness,' then you should engage them."

Did you notice what The Buddha didn't say to the Kalamas of Kesaputta?  He didn't say, "My way is the only way.  My way is the right way.  Ignore the others and follow me!"  He said to try it out and see if it works.  Make an evidenced-based decision, not a faith-based one.  I like that. I can live with that.  And, that is why I practice eclectic shamanism.  If a practice or concept makes sense to me and it works consistently (for me) then I add it to my tool kit.  If it doesn't make sense, or doesn't give consistent, expected results then I discard it.

What makes sense to me and what works for me may not be the same for you.  I do think that there are some core ideas and practices that seem to be pretty universal.  However, I encourage you to practice, try new things out, and find what works best for you.  I don't want to you practice my shamanism, I want you to practice yours so explore, have fun, and make it yours.

And that, my friends, is why I practice eclectic shamanism,

Dr. Dave