shamanic healing

Lift Your Voice

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Here is a daily practice for connecting your purpose with the web of life.

Begin by sending your energetic roots deep into the earth and ground yourself. Bring your awareness to your heart, take a few deep breaths through the center of your chest, and reach your arms toward divine light.

Now, ask spirit what work is being called through you today. This will be your true work, not mundane tasks or chores on your to do list, but something deeper and more meaningful. This will be work that energizes you, satisfies your spirit, lifts you and others up.

Now, with your voice, using drums, rattles, bowls, or other sound instruments, describe the work you are called to do. Speak, sing, let your body and the space around you be filled with the vibrations of the sound your create as you lift your voice to the heavens.

Let the sound of your voice rise up and join with the web of life. You are sending the frequency of your wishes and dreams, your unique offerings into the universe.

The frequencies you create rise up and join with the web of life, affecting the vast network of energetic filaments in unique patterns and ripples. As you do this practice, you are creating and inviting new possibilities, healing rifts in the fabric of life, focusing your mind body spirit and emotions on the work that only you can offer, creating new connections in the web of life.

As you send your hopes intentions and dreams into the web of life and receive guidance from spirit, you strengthen build and rebuild the network connecting all living beings.

A Practice for Connecting with Your Inner Child

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In this practice, you will be going inward and meeting yourself as a newborn infant…

Find a quiet place where you can relax and just be for a little while. Tune into your breath and your heartbeat. Settle comfortably into your chair or cushion

Now with your inner vision, bring up a picture of yourself as you currently are, your fully grown self. Send yourself heartfelt love for the person you are and the person you are becoming, heartfelt empathy for the challenges you face, the mistakes you’ve made, and heartfelt acceptance for yourself, flaws and all.

Let go of your logical mind for a while and allow yourself to roll back in time to the day you were born.

Tiny baby

Now see your current self lovingly lift up and hold your newborn infant self, cradling him or her gently to your beating heart. You might imagine yourself rubbing their tiny back with the flat of your palm. Perhaps you can feel the velvety softness of the newborn’s skin and hair. Can you see and feel the perfection of ears, fingers and toes?

Smell their scent, Feel and see the perfection, the expansion of spirit in this completely unique, beautiful and tender being.

Do you sense your newborn’s complete trust in you and in the new life they’ve chosen? Can you allow your heart to open with love and tenderness for the tiny but mighty being you were?

As you hold your newborn self in this healing place inside yourself, consider what promises your current self will make to your infant self. What stories will you tell him or her about your life? What will you tell this precious being her about who he or she is. What qualities will you recognize in this beautiful infant? How will you care for and protect your tender inner child?

Spend the time you need reconnecting with yourself on the day you entered this life. When you are finished, put your infant back to sleep and return to the here and now. Tap your cheekbones and the center of your chest to ground yourself in the present. Take a few deep breaths. Notice how you feel now.

In the sacred place deep within your heart, you have the power to soothe and heal your inner child.

At the Heart of Your Spirit

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Dear friends, thank you for your patience while I paused my blog due to an illness in the family. My family member is doing well. We’re back now. Many blessings, Betty

Now, in the words of GCW:

If I could weep, I would not weep, for our Earth and her many inhabitants have survived upheaval, turmoil, danger, disease, war, plague, drought, famine, violence, death and destruction over the eons life on this planet has existed.

Beneath the fear, the terror, the hate and destruction seen in current events, beneath the profound deprivation visited upon so many families lies the spirit, untouched by death and destruction, enduring, gaining in wisdom from lifetime to lifetime. Unbreakable, unshakeable.

At the heart of your spirit lies peace.

GCW in Midwinter

At the heart of your spirit lies a loving and profound silence in which all things are possible.

At the heart of your spirit lies the unfolding of love, the love that carries us from lifetime to lifetime with joyful anticipation, that permeates the billions of living beings on Earth, that infuses the cells and DNA of all living things.

The very web of life is composed of the energy of this love. All spirits are joined as one in this magnificent web.

When times are difficult, when you feel fear, when all you’ve known is breaking apart, tune into your spirit for the wide angle view. Like a soaring bird, your spirit will help you rise up and see your life, your family, your community, the events of the day from 1000 feet up.

When you are able to gain this spirit perspective you can feel the temporariness of fearful and dangerous events, the immensity of peace and love surrounding and permeating this world, this universe.

Love endures. Spirit endures.

Have you been tamed?

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Dear reader, this post is from the archives of AskGCW.

You humans have built an amazing civilization. But I wonder, Dear Ones, does it lift you up in ways that feed your spirit and serve your soul?

You all have within you the energetic memories of a time when humans were in tune with the spirits of the land, connected to nature, free to choose their path and direction, when they lived a simpler life and danced around a fire deep into the night.

Inuksuit

Let me be frank. You have been domesticated and tamed. Of course at first your need for domestication was about survival on this planet with unpredictable weather, predatory animals, unstable food sources, sudden accidents…

And now you have these basics, you have evolved systems of farming and food storage, medical care, learned to keep yourselves safe, the dangerous animals at bay…

But now what? Have things gone too far?

Have you sold your souls and your autonomy for the convenience of a sleek little phone, 2 cars in the garage, a paid off mortgage the best schools for your kids?

I’m telling you, you can reclaim your wild spirit, your deep soul that is your birthright, while retaining what is good and useful in your civilizations for your survival on the planet and a thriving life.

What is your definition of a thriving life?

If you are restless, if you feel you are missing that deep part of you, that something precious has gone, learn to tap into your true and untamed and fierce heart. Do not give yourself away or betray this part of you for love or money or the illusion of safety.

This inner fire is your true inheritance from those ancestors of the deep past who survived, from those who painted on torch-lit cave walls, who learned to speak to spirits and survive in harmony with our Earth’s rhythms and cycles, who found life a sacred trust, a gift of the ancestors.

Reclaim this deep abiding center of yourselves by living consciously. You get to choose what to keep, what to let go of in your life.

You alone can discern what makes your heart sing, what causes dullness and heaviness in your spirit, what lifts you up, what drags you down.

Live as though every moment is sacred, every living thing is holy, every person precious, with your wild untamed heart and spirit at the center of your beautiful life

Separation or oneness?

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Dear ones, I feel the vibrations of pain and suffering emanating from millions of humans right now. I feel the flaming red vibrations of anger and rage boiling over into the energetic shock waves of violence rippling through our land.

In the web of life, in spiritual law, violence done to one is violence done to all, including the self.

I sense the sound waves from so many voices lifted up together imploring for justice and deep change. The frequencies of fear and despair in the atmosphere vibrate in my roots and branches.

Prairie grasses, heavy clouds

Those who believe in separation cannot know that all living beings are connected in the vast web of creation. They are blind to this fact.

They can cause great damage to the web of life, giving even more power and energy to the illusion of separateness – the dualities of black- white, good- bad, us-them. This old order thinking will keep humankind stuck in the battles, curses, and grudges of the past without end.

Dear ones, with your help this dualistic thinking and low level operating can give way to a more expansive and evolved world view in which humans feel and live from the level of spirit, a higher wiser always just universal view, unencumbered by limited vision, ego fears, and skewed beliefs.

Spring tree

Those who put spirit at the center of their lives begin to know the oneness of all beings. They will find a way to live without judging or harming others and transcend the frightened ego to bring true justice to our land.

They will see others through the eyes of source, will see their true hearts, will know the humanity and kinship with all who walk this Earth.

In the web, acts of mercy, unconditional love, justice, and kindness are reflected to all beings including the self.

Who is Your Power Animal?

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Your power animal (or spirit animal) may take the form of insect, mammal, reptile, fish, sea creature, amphibian, bird, arachnid. Even extinct or legendary animals may come to you in spirit form.

They may be tiny, shy, sleek, flashy, magnificent, meek, camouflaged, strong and powerful, a hunter, a grazing animal, a nest builder, or burrower, a deep sea diver…

Grasshopper on purple coneflower

To meet your spirit animal, close your eyes and let them come to you. They may not be who you expect! They will choose you, for spirits know what powers you require in your life, what messages what healing energies for your growth and wholeness. They are attuned to you and your spiritual mental, physical and emotional needs.

Be open to whatever creature comes to you. Set aside your logical mind and allow yourself to be curious, without judgment. All creatures have powers and wisdom to share!

Power animals, also called spirit animals or totems have access to spiritual information that humans do not. Human vision and knowledge are limited and Earthbound.

Your spirit animal can help expand your awareness and bring hidden knowledge and wisdom to your life. Ask your power animal how they will work with you, what you can do for them, how to honor and thank them for their service to you.

When you meet your spirit helper in animal form, use your senses to get to know them. Imagine feeling the texture of their coat, their scales or feathers… imagine smelling their scent, hearing their voice. Picture them running, flying, sliding, gliding, crawling, swimming. Imagine the feel of their body heat, or the dry coolness of the skin or scales, the delicacy and fragility of their tiny wings, the sharp claws, the wet nose, the soft fur…

Red winged blackbird
Red wing blackbird

Get to know them. Create a relationship with them by meeting often. You can do this by learning to do shamanic journeys, by writing and asking them questions, by going out in nature, leaning against a tree and tuning in to the wavelength of spirit and asking for their presence.

You must call them in each time you wish to visit and have a question or intention for your meeting. Pay attention to the messages you receive.

Build up your trust in them by meeting often. When you know them well, your power animal will be with you during times of trial, they will be with you when you are sick, they will be with you when you sleep, when you travel.

Orange butterfly on elderberry bush

Your part is to ask for their presence, ask for their advice, ask for their protection…ask for what you need from them. Then use your senses, including your sense of intuition to discern the messages they bring.

A power animal will expand your awareness of what is possible in your life.

A Practice to Energize You

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Drum! if you don’t have a drum get a wooden spoon and cooking pot lid, an old wooden box, a metal wastebasket…

You don’t need to be a student of percussion, you don’t need to have any practice or expertise, you don’t need to be good at it, you don’t need to perform for an audience.

Now begin! Match the rhythm of your heart as you beat your homemade drum. Now add your feet and get moving. Let your body sway and express what you are feeling. Let your whole self dance and move and twirl and stretch and twist and flow with the beat. You need this!

Try new patterns with your makeshift drum. Go slow then speed up, start with a simple pattern, moving into more tricky rhythms. Try multiple noise making objects that you can beat on shake or rattle without breaking or damaging them.

Now as you drum and move, let yourself vocalize and sing. Make beautiful sounds and not-so-beautiful sounds, let them express what you are feeling- joy, freedom, frustration, anger, fear, worry… happiness…

Try growling like a tiger, singing like an angel whooshing like the wind through an evergreen tree. Make up new words, create personal lyrics, specific to your life, or have no words, just the sounds of your voice.

Go high, go low, spin your voice like sugar, let it slide and play. Cut loose and let yourself be one with the sound that originates deep within you and continues outward into the web of life.

Celebrate your life with sound and drumming. Get your heart and body and voice activated. Energize yourself!

Raise up your deepest requests and desires on this wave of heartfelt sound and rhythm. Ask for the world you wish to see and for the life you wish to live. Ask for all the inhabitants of our dear planet, animal vegetable and mineral to prosper with full and robust health, for the web of life to be repaired.

Red winged blackbird

When you drum and sing with focus and heart and sincerity, the spirits cannot fail to hear you and be moved by your requests.

A Practice to Calm and Raise Your Vibrations

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Dear ones, as you try out this practice, set an intention to raise your vibrations and calm yourself during this time of great uncertainty.

Breathe in Earth energy, breathe out fear

Visualize beautiful deep roots like the roots of a large tree growing down into the Earth from your hips, legs, feet. Now breathe in through your roots and feet. As you inhale, allow your feet, legs, hips, abdomen and lower body to fill with Earth energy. This will anchor and connect you with Earth’s loving vibrations, the energy of home.

Take several deep breaths in and out through your feet and roots. On the out-breaths, let tension, stale energies, old emotions, fears, and worries you no longer need to carry within you drain into the Earth for energetic recycling. This will ground and clear you.

Connect to the Earth

Fill yourself with divine light and color

Visualize a beam of pure clear golden light filling you through the crown of your head. Allow it to pour down through your entire body, permeating every cell like liquid gold.

Imagine every hair follicle, skin cell, blood vessel, every nerve, all organ systems, every bone, connective tissue and tendon, all muscles, your immune system and glands, respiratory and circulatory systems, every energetic particle of your physical being filled with this sacred light, bringing all body systems and organs into balance and harmony, clarifying your aura.

Now, as you visualize this beautiful light, allow it to become any color in the spectrum, whatever vibration of color is needed in your body to bring wholeness, healing and well being. Let the colors change and flow and mix as needed.

No need to think too hard about it or consult a chart. Ask for the colors to be just right for your body’s needs. Allow yourself to sit with the healing colors and light as long as needed.

Yellow swallowtail butterfly on deep pink Zinnia

Create sound and connect with all that is.

Set an intention to use your voice to resonate those areas of your body that feel out of balance. You will fill them with the healing vibrations and loving waves of your voice. You do not have to be a good singer, the only requirement is that you can make sounds with your voice.

Begin by humming, then make vowel sounds. Change the pitch and sound you are making and feel the vibrations resonating in different parts of your body that need attention. Intend for the sounds you create with your voice to reweave and harmonize the subtle energy of your physical and spiritual being and fill your being with peace.

Flowing stream, light dancing on shallow water

Connect to the Earth through your roots, fill yourself with divine light and color, weave all together with sound. Experience the oneness of all creation.

In this moment

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Take a moment to celebrate the fullness of your life. Know that all is well in this moment.

Your heart beats in your chest, your in-breath expands your lungs, the out-breath releases and contracts, the slow and sweet rhythm of life flowing and ebbing like waves on a beach.

You have been given the simple yet miraculous gifts of sunlight, fresh air, birdsong, eyes, hands, ears… the senses through which you experience life in your body.

Robin in late winter

If you are a worrier, anxious, fearful or regretful, you might miss the perfection of this moment here and now, the still point between breaths, the simple yet most precious gift of life.

Bring your awareness to your now. Yes, life here on our planet can be difficult and dangerous, fragile, fleeting, unjust, and heartbreaking. Please do not allow fear grief and anger to steal the fullness of this moment here and now as you partake in the beautiful mystery of life on Earth.

Let your mind rest and bring full awareness to the perfection of this particular moment. In this moment, you are safe, you are alive.

Allow yourself to enjoy and appreciate the most precious gift you’ve been given. Life on Earth in a human body.

Anxiety

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GCW speaks of anxiety

Dear reader, this post is from the archives of AskGCW.

DSCN1835

Heavy cloud cover

Dear ones, we can feel that the energy you call anxiety is contagious. You feel it and pick it up from each other. It is in the air, so to speak. In the atmosphere around an anxious person.

Those on a similar wavelength tune in and the red frenetic energy you call anxiety spreads to the other like a virus. It is like what you call panic, and can spread like fire through a family or group of people.

This does not help anyone! It saps your strength and power, distracts you from your inner light, as you are felled by the churning in your gut, the tense neck, the heart that hurts, the throat that closes up…

My dears, you do not have to be imprisoned by these feelings of anxiety. Learn to breathe deeply from the belly. The heaviness you feel will clear like clouds before a breeze. Run, swim, walk, move. You are meant to move! Dance. You must move as much as you can, to be fully who you are meant to be. Your body is not designed to be still!

All feelings must move, all beings, all energies must move! If not, you become stagnant like the smelly water backed up in the creek on a hot summer day.

Surround yourselves with people who light you up! Hug a tree like me and imagine your roots growing deep in the earth as if pulled be a magnet to her core. Then feel the stability when the winds of emotion blow. You are anchored and nothing can knock you down.

Trees and rooted things do not know anxiety or worry,doubt or fear. We can be an example to you! Are you open to that?

Put your hands on your heart and breathe deeply. In this way you calm yourself and soothe yourself. Know that in this exact moment place and time you are safe.