Healer, Heal Thyself...Is Shamnic Sickness Really Necessary?

Your toughest times may have been just what you needed to help you become a good healer. Eve Menezes Cunningham looks into shamanic sickness and how it aids healers If you’ve ever felt locked into despair and despondency, it might comfort you to learn that your pain might be preparing you for a life in which you can help others. Bestselling author and life coach, Martha Beck says that people who fit into the Shaman archetype typically had “difficult childhoods with loss, abandonment, neglect or abuse. They would have been interested in religion and felt a strong connection to nature. They’re very emotional and are able to read other people’s emotions.

Healer, heal thyself

Your toughest times may have been just what you needed to help you become a good healer. Eve Menezes Cunningham looks into shamanic sickness and how it aids healers

 

If you’ve ever felt locked into despair and despondency, it might comfort you to learn that your pain might be preparing you for a life in which you can help others. Bestselling author and life coach, Martha Beck says that people who fit into the Shaman archetype typically had “difficult childhoods with loss, abandonment, neglect or abuse. They would have been interested in religion and felt a strong connection to nature. They’re very emotional and are able to read other people’s emotions.

 

“By adolescence, they may be in a torturous depression, perhaps dealing with substance abuse issues as a result of being so ‘wide open’. And there’s a tendency to become a healer. Shaman’s sickness is something that lasts a long time. In order to get well and stay well, the Shaman has to become a Shaman (the magic people of the culture).

“In the past, there needed to be a very large percentage of sick psychic babies for one to survive. But between antibiotics and Prozac, many more sick psychic babies are growing up so we have lots of Shamans.”

 

Repressed mysticism

Martha chronicled her own physical and emotional recovery in the heartbreaking yet sometimes hilarious Leaving the Saints. I remember reading it in awe that someone who had suffered so much could be so funny, courageous and inspirational. It was reassuring to know she’d made it through to the other side. For years, Martha has helped readers with her columns in O magazine and books like Finding Your Own North Star, The Joy Diet, The Four Day Win and, most recently, Steering by Starlight.

 

Martha offers Oprah as an example of someone who has the Shaman archetype now radiating “brilliance from her core of peace”. She says, “Our culture represses mysticism. The closest you can get to being trained as a magician in our culture is to study physics, the hardest of the sciences.” She remembers being taught that the brain stopped growing by the age of about 15 at school yet “now we’re discovering how we can change the wiring of our brain. The brain is a constantly mutating object. The brain creates circuitry that gets stronger the more you think a certain thought. You can take someone with OCD and get them to watch their brain and change it.” Martha makes neuroscience sound like magic.

 

One way to learn how to think more helpful thoughts is through Shamanic journeying. Ursula Barbieri blends her shamanic practice with other complementary therapies and NLP. She remembers the healing crises that brought her to shamanic work and says, “When I was in my late 20s, I’d been in a deep depression. Psychotherapy helped but even having everything in life that should have made me happy, I was feeling disconnected. I was going through life in a robotic way. I was starting to question my marriage. I was so disconnected from my body, I couldn’t really connect.”

This all began to shift when she arranged to meet a friend at a meditation when she was in her mid 30s. Ursula says, “We had to visualise going into the core of the earth and into a sea of fire. It was amazing. I was buzzing with energy and couldn’t speak for hours. I was a very intellectual person, left brain. I had an economics degree. But I said ‘That’s it. I’m changing my life’ This was a Sunday and on the Monday, I handed in my resignation.

 

“I really reconnected with the feminine way of living. Shamanic traditions are quite earthy. You connect with the elements. You feel and connect with your physical body and emotional body. I felt happier and was starting to feel that we do live in a vibrational universe.

 

“Shamanic work is about energy. Breathing in the energies of the universe and breathing out the energies that don’t belong to you. I still go through darkness sometimes but I no longer feel alone. If I can stay connected with my own inner light, with this force, this spirit that talks to me all the time, it’s okay.

 

“One of the things I’ve learned is that we have everything within – pain and joy, challenge and support. You can’t deny that there is suffering. And sometimes, powerful experiences of suffering have powerful gifts. A crisis is an opportunity. It’s about feeling alive, recognising that forces are moving and understanding what is happening and how you can unravel the crisis.

 

“I haven’t seen many people [doing this kind of work] who haven’t gone through the suffering. The more extreme the experience of suffering, the more the gift. You don’t want to stay in the shallows.

 

“I really embrace the wild feminine. If you repress it, it can cause a lot of trouble – psychotic experiences, cancer or tumours. When such events come into your life, it’s showing you you’re not in harmony. The experience is useful.

 

“It’s an experience of surrender. At times, I find myself stuck and go neurotic and fight. The best thing I can do is bring myself into balance. It’s about flowing with it and not resisting. It’s not easy to be human – we are sophisticated beings. But connecting to spirit in everything helps you flow. The balance is in the heart.”

 

Emotional breakdown

Steve Nobel, director of Alternatives (www.alternatives.org.uk) and author of Prosperity Consciousness, is also Ursula’s partner. When he was very young, Steve says, “I was very interested in magic, martial arts, yoga and anything that had a feel of working with energy and imagination. I had a slightly occult sense of exploring the inner worlds. At the age of 16, I had an emotional breakdown of some kind. I was doing very well at school but burned out.

 

“I left school and started working. I got married and settled down at 21 and had kids at 22. I was getting away from a life my family thought was weird.” Steve worked in the City for a decade. After leaving, he had another breakdown and spent a year off sick before moving into local government.

 

He says, “I was really interested in spirituality and got to hear about shamanism. I thought there must be something more to life than this. My father died as well.

 

“When I started working in local government, I was introduced to several spiritual teachers. One introduced me to magic, shamanism and a whole range of things. I was a bit suspicious but because this woman was an academic, too, it allowed me a way in.

 

“Once I got comfortable with journeying inside (I’d been worried about what would happen if demons got into me), I realised that the shamanic worldview is one where the world is basically friendly and supportive.

 

“Once I eventually left my local government job, I’d decided that if the universe is friendly and supportive, it would guide me. Logically, I had a family and it made no sense. But I found myself in the perfect place with a perfect CV – I’d done so many spiritual courses, no regular employer would have wanted me. I had a dream that told me to just go and volunteer at Alternatives. This was some 14 years ago.

 

“I asked myself, ‘How do I know this is the right path for me?’ What I loved about the Shamanic path is that no one tried to convince me it was the right thing. Shamanism and Wicca are, by and large, about experience rather than belief.”

 

Steve feels that his breakdowns led him to this new path. He’d tried religious as well as medical paths as well as psychotherapy for his chronic depression. He says, “If my life had been working well I probably wouldn’t have found this. I began to trust the natural guidance of the universe.

 

“I think it’s probably essential to get to the path through some form of crisis although some individuals may have been born into shamanic families and not have to do that. We get motivation through inspiration or desperation. Life hits rock bottom or something’s not working.

 

“If someone’s going through a dark night of the soul, it’s usually a call to something else. You’re in the dark place for a reason. Your soul is calling you for something more. It’s probably essential to have some sort of crisis and not just a solitary ‘Let me heal my wounds’. There’s got to be some sort of understanding.

 

“How are you going to help someone out if you have no idea? The shamanic journey knows about inner terrains and how to navigate them. It gave me a great awareness of what was going on inside. Life is like going through swampy marsh or going over stone battlements. Feeling blocked by a 20 foot stone wall you can ask, ‘How do I get over it? What’s on the other side?’

 

“Inner journeys were very liberating for me. I had more resources than I thought I had. The outer world is a reflection of the inner world. If I practiced misery (which I had done for years) that’s what I’d see. But as soon as I practiced other paths, I noticed more joy and opportunities.”

 

Like Martha, Steve is fascinated by the fact that science is bearing out ancient shamanic wisdom. He remembers the film, What the Bleep? showing the networking of the brain. Steve says, “The neurons made connections depending on habitual thoughts. As soon as you start forming new pathways, the nervous system actually follows that. For me, after 15 years, the world seems different.”

 

Steve’s advice is to find “some form of something more joyful, inspiring and hopeful. For most people, it won’t be shamanism. But reading inspiring books rather than Mills and Boon stuff, finding silence in life, attending a workshop on creative writing might help. In this silence, there will be signs.

 

“Shamanism is essentially a path of ecstasy – guided by impulses of joy, passion, love and light, not the intellect saying ‘Shall I turn left here or right?’ Beings on the other side work to call you to that side. It’s a web of life. All things are interconnected. There are teachers, guides, allies on other side who want to walk with you through journeying and silence. It’s an animistic nature path. Sitting with trees is possible even in cities.”

Veronica’s story

 

When Veronica was diagnosed with breast cancer, she was already at an all time low. A nature walk with a friend offered some comfort and Veronica started noticing medicinal herbs.

 

She remembered her homeopathy and naturopathic training and realised, “There was another way to deal with the cancer. I made a decision to follow a completely different path. One that felt right for me.

 

“I believed that since my body/mind had made this cancer it could unmake it if I gave myself the best possible support and care on all levels. I knew that conventional treatment was there if needed.

 

 “For a long time, I felt like I was taking one step forward and two steps back. This was the hardest work I had ever embarked upon. I was not sure I would ever come out the other side. Every step seemed so hard but no one else could do this for me.”

 

The thought of helping other people through similar situations helped Veronica through it. Now she runs cancer support workshops empowering people to help themselves and offers one to one consultations as homeopath/naturopath and healing foods chef.

 

She uses tools and techniques that helped her through her own cancer and other illnesses. Veronica’s methods include self help tools, meditation, education, naturopathy, homeopathy, reflexology and organic whole food cooking.

 

To contact Veronica, email meconopsis@onetel.com or phone her on 01364 654339 or at The Haven Clinic on 01364 654339.

 

 

 

Martha’s Surefire Decision Maker

 

While it’s rare to find someone working as a healer who hasn’t been through some kind of shaman sickness, there are things that anyone can do. Get in touch with your own body’s wisdom and stop stressing about your next step forward.

Martha explains, “The body begins to react with stress long before you can articulate why a situation is wrong (not North) for you.”

Learn to read your body’s signals by thinking of a situation that was bad and remembering the feelings you got in your body. Was it a tightness in your chest? A sense of nausea? Feeling lightheaded? An upset stomach? Let your body remind you of these sensations.

Bring yourself back (maybe drink a little water) then think about a good decision you made. What feelings did that bring up in your body? A sense of excitement? A feeling of being very grounded? Tingly hands and feet?

Get to know your own body’s signals and start paying attention before you make future decisions. Your body knows what’s best for you.

 Ursula’s relaxing meditation

 

Before going into the relaxation, it’s important to have an intention. What’s happening in that moment? (Are you angry with your partner? Exhausted from work?) What would you like from your meditation?

Breathe in and breathe out. Slowing your breath, focusing on your breath, breathing in and, as you breathe out, discharge anything that is tension, a negative emotion or negative anything. Breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth.

Connect with nature. Imagine yourself in a beautiful garden in a place that you like. Breathe in fresh air. Sense your bare feet on the grass. Breathe in the sun, connecting with nature as much as you can. Feel the garden welcoming you. Imagine that you are walking on earth.

Now connect with some sort of guidance that is positive. Ask for spirit to come in some sort of shape or form that you feel comfortable with (an animal may come or your higher self or a spirit or a tree).

Remember your intention and ask your spirit guide a question (e.g. “How can I speak to my partner in a way that is relaxed and conducive to harmony?”).

Surrender is very important at this point. Allow yourself to receive the answer and the healing. You’re allowing the healing to happen to you. You are alert, you trust it and you’re not manipulating it. It’s amazing how our imagination and ability to journey is innate. You absolutely know how to do it.

Usually we ask for advice or healing. Allow yourself to receive this. Shamanically, healing is very simple. Either you need to connect and fill yourself with energy or you need to release energy that isn’t good for your body.

Always be connected to what is happening in your body. Where is the tension? Where do you need light or power to come into your body? Feel this expanding sense of connection.

After the journey, write down the most important points to ground the experiences.

 

More information

Martha Beck’s website is www.marthabeck.com.

Ursula Barbieri’s website is www.core-rebalancing.com.

Steve Nobel’s websites are www.stevenobel.com and www.stevenobel-interviews.com which feature podcasts and other resources.

If someone’s going through a dark night of the soul, it’s usually a call to something else

 

There are teachers, guides, allies on other side who want to walk with you through journeying and silence

 

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