Let me begin, by making one thing perfectly clear.  

Shamanism is not a religion.  It is a series of practices which could be called spiritual, in that the purpose of such practices is to bring the individual closer to the source.  

The dreamer encounters the source and It’s manifestations face to face.  No intercessor, no priest, no minister, no interpreter is required.  

You will meet people who tell you that they know what is best for you.  They will tell you that God has told them thus and so, and this is how it is.  Run away fast. Flee, in fact from this website until you can accept the responsibility for being you.  

 (Is this one of your sacred cows?  Here, let me kill it for you.)

To be very blunt and personal about this, shamanic practice makes it possible for you and God to be locked in a room.  Together.  

In fact, every time you read in a bible, or anywhere else something like, ‘and God said…’ simply know that you are eavesdropping on a shamanic encounter. The Bible is full of them.  And in the beginning, it's possible that your reception of God will be unclear.  This is not sufficient reason to be abandoning your efforts.  Practice makes perfect. 

When you get onto it,  God speaks to you directly-  Whatever you hear becomes your responsibility and nobody else’s.  That’s it.  Whatever He might tell your neighbor is something else again, since there are no guarantees that you and your neighbor hear even close to the same thing.  No guarantees.

No Guarantees, you dig? 

Please read that again, and again, until the sacred cow you brought in with you is dead.

Within the practices referred to, there are strategies designed to make such a face-to-face encounter possible.  Some of the strategies are brought on, described, or even hidden in stories.  

Thus, the stories by-pass the rational mind and function like...  code.  The stories also do one more thing.  

Stories adjust the mind.  Let’s not forget.  Again.  Stories adjust the mind.  So do drugs, it’s true, but drugs are not necessary.  In fact, drugs work against the student, but let’s leave that until later. 

 Here’s a simple example:

 For many years, a man sought the secrets of life.  Eventually, he found a sage who said that all secrets were within.  “Know yourself,” the sage told him.

 Here, the meaning exists on several levels.  One level echoes an Arab proverb that says, if God was hiding, He could find no better place to hide than in a man.

How might we extract more meaning from this simple little idea?  By the use of imagination, actually.  It’s not an accident that the words imagination, magic, magi all hint at the ability to visualize.

Imagine one is seated in the middle of a very large sphere.  We are facing East, and truly we are the center of the universe.  Imagine one may have contact with the seven points on the sphere called East, West, South, North, Above, Below, and Within.  It's the beginning of celestial navigation. 

Preview the first 3 chapters of The Light of The Magicians by Clinton Jarbeau no charge. For easy download instructions click on the book.

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