Wilder Grief
April 30, 2019What will it be like, someday, when my children are running through the forest after I’ve died? Will they feel me with them, sharing in their joy?
Category: shamanism
Doorway
April 20, 2019I think thats why it can be difficult to talk about that doorway, I disappear completely. There are no words, and little thought. Absolute silence from within.
Goodbye-ing
January 13, 2019It turns out I’ve been carrying around a floating divorce of sorts. Terry and I did not say “’til death do us part” in our wedding vows. Now I understand why people include that clause. If the spirits are real to you, tangible in your life, does your marriage really end after death?
Carried
September 18, 2018I would like to carry her
down this hallway,
my sometimes tender
often edgy bird,
to lay her on the waiting bed.
Michael Harner 1929-2018
February 19, 2018What can you give someone at their passing, who, seemingly effortlessly, held open a door for you that led everywhere? If I had every day, for the rest of my life, to walk down the many paths that open door made available to me, I wouldn’t even begin to explore the potential that is there.
Mending
February 7, 2017Mending asks us to sing.
Mending may require dance.
Mending asks us to allow ourselves to be filled with light.
Mending asks us to grow.
Mending requires that we receive as well as give.
The Grace of a Daily Shapeshifting Practice
October 17, 2016How do you reclaim wildness, when you are part of a culture hell bent on minimizing or destroying everything wild? How do you embody the presence of an animal to call forth your humanity?
Slipping Into The Otherworld
August 23, 2016I’ve been indulging in a rare pleasure recently – watching something that lasts more than 15 minutes (my current self-designated guilty Papa-pleasure allotment.) Stranger Things on Netflix has…
Green Offerings
May 4, 2016When I was making my rounds that fateful day, I was being shown that my work with the Sidhe is always happening. Its really about a quality of presence and relationship to life that never ends. Everything has to fit within that connection.
True Prayer
March 7, 2016…I journeyed to the spirit of the Slough, finding an ancient woman twisting her yarn at a spinning wheel, weaving out the eons singing to the tap of her wheel. Listening to her spinning song slowly turned me to gunpowder-black dust. She sang, wove and spun until I became a small bird perched on her wheel transformed by her radiance.
Crossroads
February 8, 2016I’ve been feeling lately, like so many of my friends, that I’m sitting at an important crossroad. I understand that I need to move forward, but have not really been given the direction yet. So I sit with potential, and that can feel oddly frightening, like you’re pausing at a threshold while something ominous and unknown draws closer.
Wonderment Rituals
January 10, 2016I suspect somehow that our wonderment actually feeds the Earth.
The Not-Special of Caring for the Other-World
September 25, 2015We’re like forest rangers for a forest nobody around us believes exists. We setoff into that world, sometimes stumble into it ourselves waking or dreaming, to work with the spirits there, to heal to bring balance, to remember soul in life. I suppose in a way, thats special. But sometimes I think it shouldn’t be.
Grieving Slain Dragons
August 4, 2015To finally destroy them in our culture they first had to be painted as physically real, then evil, then slain, replacing many Gods with one God. But if Dragons are larger forces of nature, they cannot be slain anymore than you could kill the rain or wind.
Selkie Dad
June 24, 2015This is the journey available to us if we open to it, the yearning we feel for something more profound, and the answers nature offers us.
Upping Our Game
April 6, 2015Language, way of life, much of what we do in the West actually DRIVES us away from the palpable presence of our own souls…
Leaving Utah
January 28, 2015Its funny how water connects us and pulls us apart. He was the one who dragged me out of that lake when I nearly drowned all those years ago, now I’m driving his ashes, my Mom, son, and artifacts that story 45 years of their life in Utah out to the coast.
Dangerous Forests
October 20, 2014When I find myself in a forest I feel that I am the one being understood, not the other way around. Its as if my spirit is finally free to expand to its biggest size and once there, it finds itself wholly encompassed by something much larger and more mysterious than I can ever fully understand.
Life, Death & Screaming Kids
September 15, 2014Now being loved this much is of course AWESOME, the first 5,000 times it happens.
Pulled Through That Dismemberment Keyhole
August 21, 2014Dismemberment is not a metaphor, nor is it a recent phenomena. Its one of those core human experiences that points to a universal spiritual terrain we all walk as human beings.
The Problem is You’re Doctoring Souls
April 29, 2014The problem is you’re doctoring souls and nobody cares about their own soul anymore…
Omens
March 21, 2014I was wide awake at the wheel when the Elk danced into my headlights. He was big, just under 300 lbs from the sheriffs report. I moved to the right to avoid, he dance to the right, I moved back, he jumped back.
Not Wiped Away
February 18, 2014Death comes into our lives in many different ways. People sometimes think that because we get to work with spirits, and the processes of the psychopomp, that death transforms into something easy, perhaps even palatable.
Persephone Returns!
January 28, 2014Just two days ago I invoked a number of my deceased friends as part of a ritual performance I had the great honor of performing for the Foundation For Shamanic Studies Council gathering. It was a way of calling out to those who I felt suffered from the lack of any real method of accessing the worlds shamans know so well.
Ripe
December 5, 2013We are a group that has taken a long time to ripen. Not only did we have to survived the wounding of being deeply inspired in a culture that often rejects or eats alive the inspired, we then had to figure out how to support ourselves and perhaps our families…
The Packa Tree
October 16, 2013Tadg has always called him “Packa”, a little ones abbreviation of the more difficult “Grandpa”. The Packa tree’s ruby red fruit hung for months, darkening to a cherry-black red.
Cave and Cosmos by Michael Harner
May 7, 2013When Michael Harner began to read selections from his new book, “Cave and Cosmos” at the most recent Foundation for Shamanic Studies (FSS) Council meeting, I saw spirits surrounding him, supporting him as he read.
Journeying to the River
February 28, 2013We modern people stumble to the waters edge by chance. We go there in dreams, on fortunate drug trips, when we slip between living and dying, when our hearts are open, our minds are quiet and the Earth reaches out to us.
On The Kindness of Ravens
January 29, 2013You joined the meeting about ten minutes in, slamming up against the plate glass again and again.
Santa Solution: Restoring Our Guardians
December 24, 2012Agencies, institutions and laws do not heal people, that much is clear. At best they can provide opportunities for transformation, guide books, the names of mentors, directions to journey in. They are not in and of themselves, healing. That is the work of our fellow human beings, and the compassionate spirits who offer their wisdom and support.
Listen
November 21, 2012I was finally willing to let the veil fall, hearing again the world beyond the wooded ramparts of my home.
Harvest Moon of the Maker
October 2, 2012I got to make a friend a Shillelagh this past week from an oak in our grove. A special gift, I empowered it using shamanic techniques, some taught by the Foundation for Shamanic Studies and some by Tom Cowan.
Dream Healing Time Travel
September 22, 2012The five of us were crammed in the back of an old Lincoln heading over a cable bridge just past sunrise. The river was low from the long summer, the morning light made perfect diamonds flicker across its surface.
The Journey to Now.
September 11, 2012I’ve come to see my journeys as a way of moving within the spirit of the Earth more freely, I’ve even been thinking of the spirit world as her consciousness.
Ordinary-Extra
September 5, 2012I’ve been going through some tremendous healing lately. Almost nightly as I dream, my heart is being mended and remade. Scabs I never thought would come off, turn to dust as I rise for morning chores. This has been going on for weeks now, I don’t want it to stop. Ever.
I’m a Yankee Doodle Plastic Shaman
August 27, 2012The suffering that our western culture has wrought in this world is due in part, I believe, to the oppression of our own innate ability to access the spiritual dimension of our world. We perpetuate that distortion of ourselves every day, by denying the presence of the spirits.
The Bump
August 14, 2012Real change does not feel soft. Its a bump – a big bump, that moves your life ten feet in a direction you never expected.
Guest Post: Delectable Ceremony by Tasara
August 6, 2012There is hunger for ceremony in our communities. The free, open-hearted, accessible and powerful movement of healing energy in a safe and sacred way.
Belonging
July 24, 2012“Olivia is still connected to my heart Papa,” Tadg said to me yesterday. Indeed, she’s still connected to all our hearts.
Learning To Fly Again
May 1, 2012The other night I surpassed that stage of flight. After a great dream spent soaring with friends, I was given a bare broomstick to practice levitation.
Interview with Ann Riley www.storyshaman.com
April 26, 2012Posted below is an interview I did with my dear friend Ann Riley a few years back. She weaves shamanic practices, storytelling, and Celtic traditions masterfully.
Eoster on the Elkhorn Slough
April 10, 2012The secret, wind-filled family-time buoyed us all with helium laughter. Blustering fog off the incoming tide wiped the dust from the crevices in our faces. The dry winter was over.
Cultivators Also Displace
February 29, 2012If someone sold pin-up’s of Amish farmers, our walls would probably be plastered with them.
My Ratatoullie
January 18, 2012You were born to journey, like some of us were born to cook. One of my favorite Pixar movies, “Ratatouille”, covers this topic well.
The Santa Solution – 2011
December 5, 2011Santa was very happy to see me this year. As jovial as ever he instantly embraced me and welcomed me into his workshop.
Today the land is teaching me …
November 29, 2011Our land is never fallow, something is always ripening, one of the blessings of living in California. This morning before he left for school, Tadg and I harvested some deep red prickly pears that seemed to appear out of nowhere.
Real Men Dance
November 22, 2011I came of age in cavernous halls, often dancing with adults and little or no parental supervision.
The Ritual of Giving and Receiving
November 15, 2011In one of my first journeys to the spirit of the land she was engaged in a continuous dance of giving and receiving.
Raindrops
November 8, 2011I want every day to feel like this, maybe you have a time of season and place that feel that way to you. Ever since I was a child this is the time of year that makes me feel like I belong here and now, I feel loved.
Teaching from the Ashes
November 2, 2011At my Dad’s memorial service a little over a year ago, I learned that his father found his true calling as a high school shop teacher after having graduated with a degree in mathematics during the Great Depression.
View From the Trough
October 25, 2011There are places of stillness in our lives, vantage points from which we can take in the transformations occurring around us always. The horse trough out our back door is just such a place.
True Harvest
October 18, 2011I’m struck by the feeling of newness+oldness this time of year brings. Life bursts forth while ancient energies abound. Like practicing shamanic techniques in a modern culture, old and new are intimately entwined.
Who Gets to Have a Soul?
October 4, 2011The shamanic journey awakens us to the spiritedness of all things, and to the special responsibility we have to creatures we kill for food.
Getting to Yes Through Shamanism
September 27, 2011This Autumn is different than any other, I felt it for certain this morning. Usually I don’t notice the spirits of the land speaking this loudly until late in October. The potency of this season catches me off guard time and time again.
Mending Our Animal Ways
September 20, 2011I wanted to find a way back into the Earth, deeper into an authentic spirituality.
9/11/1857 – 9/11/2001 The Wakeful Dead
September 11, 2011154 years ago today another tragic massacre occurred in southern Utah. A group of a 120 immigrants, making their way to a new life in California, were slaughtered by a group of Mormon militia men.
Invitations From The Mist
August 30, 2011This summer’s dominating grayness finally crumbled before the dipping sun of late August. The mist dances away around ten and rushes in like a stampede of phantom mustangs around four.
Knotted Me
July 5, 2011Last night I found myself sitting up late again, grateful for the blanket of post-midnight darkness. It seems like every few nights I have new knot in myself to sort through.
Begin
June 14, 2011Every step holds the potential for a new beginning, that’s one of the things dance taught me. If you’re really dancing, you’re on an edge that can lead you in any direction.
Time To Dance
May 31, 2011I was told you should do the 1 legged stork dance.” That’s what the spirits told my friend Ann when she journeyed about my healing.
My Soul, Your Soul, Our Soul
May 24, 2011The lesson lately has been that just by spending time with my spirit, sitting and becoming aware of its stuck places, I can create healing. Listen, breathe, pay attention.
River Songs
May 17, 2011Singing is the best part. I tone whatever feels right, let words come if they will. My foot responds – flooding with warmth, but not blood.
Ocean Prayer
March 22, 2011I remembered the depths of sorrow in me,
are less than
a drop of your water.
The Santa Solution
December 18, 2010Shamanism teaches us that any being in our awareness can appear to us as a helping spirit when we journey to the upper or lower worlds of Non-Ordinary Reality (NOR). I’ve found that figures like Santa are especially helpful to journey to.
Harvesting Story
October 7, 2010We are the makers of story, and story is the maker of us.
The Cauldron of Autumn
September 9, 2010Autumn used to be the time to savor my most intense feelings. Wrapping them tightly in earthen bundles, I’d carry them into the woods on aimless walks.
The Victory of The Dove
August 30, 2010Omens are a way life can change who we are. They are not just messages, they are reworkings of the place where our spirits and the material world connect.
Remembering The Sacred
August 5, 2010This morning I got a very strong feeling while dancing. It was an awareness of being involved in a quiet cultural movement with many divergent tributaries.
Tending The Family Fire
July 28, 2010There Is Really Just One Project.
Calcinatio – What of the Fire Beneath the Cauldron?
May 12, 2010What’s left is only that which is essential – only that which can embody the transcendent.
Separatio
April 29, 2010Alchemy only works when you begin with separate elements. A little of this+a little of that = gold.
Things I learned when my Dad died.
April 19, 2010The sudden death of someone close is like walking away from a really bad car crash. Even though you’re unscathed, every molecule in your body suffers an impact.
Stepping Over The Edge: An Invitation
March 30, 2010Telling this story is the last part of the drum beat – the vibration that follows the collision of beater to leather.
Stepping Over The Edge: Ancestors
March 27, 2010I like to imagine what my wildest Pagan ancestors would say to me if they were sitting beside me now. Likely they wouldn’t caution me to be especially concerned with respect or propriety when exploring my spirituality.
Stepping Over The Edge: Open Message To The Dead
March 18, 2010I’m telling you this now because I want you to know something – I’m coming for you.
Stepping Over The Edge: Yage Is Only A Vine
March 12, 2010Like a trip through a baroque gun barrel, Ayahuasca by its very nature refutes the label “recreational drug.”
Stepping Over The Edge: Into The River
March 2, 2010I want to gather each story from the river and share it with you; slowly, gently – like drinking warm honey
Stepping Over The Edge: The Way A Snake Sheds Its Skin
February 22, 2010I turn to the concrete circle in the middle of our acre of land surrounded by a forest of Oaks. Bowing, I step across the threshold and begin to dance.
Stepping Over The Edge: The Lightning Shaman
February 16, 2010When seventy-five serious students put their best intention behind a powerful shamanic teacher like Sandy you know the roof with be raised.
Stepping Over The Edge: Joining The Circle
February 8, 2010I became a member of the tribe of Shamanic Workshopper’s shortly after graduate school.
Stepping Over The Edge: Dancing With The Dark Feminine
February 1, 2010“I used to be afraid of the dark until I had my first child. Then I had to get up in the middle of the night to breast feed her. It was through that experience that I came to know the dark was sacred.”
Stepping Over The Edge: Bone Journey
January 23, 2010I knew this bone was held by the ancient people that fed on the animal it came from. Holding something stone that was once living opens a world of possibilities.
Stepping Over The Edge: Chop Wood, Walk Through Darkness
January 13, 2010Last night I was surrounded by at least a dozen spirits, they were tossing me around like laundry in a dryer.
Stepping Over The Edge: Coyote Friend
January 7, 2010During our brief friendship Ernesto took me under his wing, trying to help me to understand what I’d been going through.
Stepping Over The Edge: Writing As Re-membering
January 4, 2010I keep backing away from my keyboard, finding excuses to be distracted. Its been far more difficult writing about this part of my past than I thought it would be.
Stepping Over The Edge: Feet On The Path
December 27, 2009The dreams, visions and waking shamanic experiences started several years before I found my way to a Shamanic Practitioner
Stepping Over The Edge: Outlaws
December 21, 2009What would you do if after years of hearing voices you woke up one morning to them saying “It is time; now they are calling you.”
Stepping Over The Edge: The Shaman And The Samurai
December 11, 2009only heard about Rolling Thunder because I was taking Iaido lessons from one of the last living Samuri.
Stepping Over The Edge: Coyotes Formula For Change
December 7, 2009I felt like my head had been cut off, filled with hysterical laughter and put back on upside down.
Stepping Over The Edge: Re-discovering Shamanism In The Western World
November 30, 2009Nina was experiencing a call to a sacred practice. That calling has been ringing out for at least as long as we have had language, story and song.
Of Suffering And Sovereignty
June 25, 2009A few months ago I played the Beheading Game. Don’t worry, my head was returned to me – though I’m sure its not…