Real shamanism is about working directly with the elemental forces of nature and other beings in order to help people. Shamanism on its own is not a path of Self-realization, but the the shaman–as healer, divinator and mediator between worlds–is an honored person in all direct realization traditions.
Shamans are produced through a complex set of circumstances. A person is made a shaman by nature, not by workshop. No one who really understands the genesis and path of the shaman would undertake to dabble in it. The stakes are high, the birth process is often frightening and the responsibility is enormous.
I recently came across this wonderful documentary and am happy to be able to share it with Living Tantra readers. The shaman who speaks here gives us a rare opportunity to enlarge our View of how humans, animals, other being and the forces of nature cooperate and communicate.
The poisons of attachment and delusion are infallibly annihilated only by the nectar of immortal naturalness.
–Dattatreya, The Avadhuta Gita
Digambara means “sky clad,” or “naked.” Among other uses, it refers to the yogin Dattatreya who wandered without clothing 4,000 years ago in South India. more…
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