Shamanic Counselling

Shamanic Counselling is much more “experiential” in contrast to the “verbal” or analytical approaches of traditional western methods of counselling, and they are based on the journey technique of classical shamanism. Shamanic counselling is a system for permitting clients to make their own shamanic journeys of divination to non-ordinary reality, where they personally obtain direct spiritual wisdom and guidance in answer to the questions most important in their lives.

Although it is based on the methods of classical shamanism, shamanic counselling has certain innovations that set it apart from traditional shamanic systems. For instance, the divination or problem– solving journey to non-ordinary reality has traditionally been made by the shaman on behalf of the client. One of the main features of shamanic counselling, however, is to turn this procedure around so that the client is being counselled to become his or her own shaman for this type of journey. The object of this change is to restore spiritual power and authority to the client.

Another innovation is the use of electronic methods rather than live drum technique for induction of the shamanic state of consciousness(ssc) In this system the client uses a drumming tap on a cassette player to provide the sonic driving necessary to facilitate the journey to non-ordinary reality in(ssc). The sound of the drum perceived only through a set of earphones has been found to be an effective method in this regard, and has the advantage of not creating the noise –disturbance problems that can arise when one attempts to use live drumming in the crowed urban setting in which the sessions must take place in our culture.

The use of a drumming CD also permits the shamanic counsellor to utilize another major innovation of the system- the technique, where the client is asked to narrate out loud the details of his or her journey as it happens. Simultaneous narration is possible because the sound of the drumming CD is confined to the clients headphones and therefore does not interfere with audibility of the narration as a live drumming would do. The clients narration consists of verbatim description of what is happening in the journey, and provides an opportunity for the client to review the answer to his or her question with the help of the counsellor. A recording of the narration is also made as a permanent record of the journey, which is given to the client for his or her own purposes.

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