right on...
its interesting... especially among people on this forum i feel that there is a real interest in the exploration motive in peoples relationships with entheogens. What i find interesting though is the shaman archetypes relationship to that motive in the western mind. Traditional peoples we have come to label as shamans (whether its an apt label at all) I have not seen as having much of that same motivation. many where there to help as mediators with the spirits of the natural world, maintain ritual customs, preform healing and divination and to bring a cultures cosmology into the public sanctum. now this last part... in maintianing and bringing an animist cultures cosmology into public consciousness, now that is interesting in the light of the motive of exploration.
It could be said that so many are drawn to entheogens with the motive of exploration because they do not have a cosmology, or at least a collective one that has any real depth of meaning. science has replaced myth ( or so it thinks, but what is science but another myth?) and our old cosmologies our understanding of self and our its place int he universe has been striped bare, dissected, and replaced with a sterile meaningless lack of awe, for many... for others its brought about the desire to explore these wonders that science has revealed. but still we are without a cosmology. shamans or those that we have labeled as thus in animist societies... have a cosmology. they know enough and are humble enough to that which they do not know to (KNOW BETTER) to work as agents of change from within that cosmology. I tend to think then that people confuse the shaman as the explorer of consciousness for a given society and leave it at that. its very common... ive read magazine articles about it even recently. people tend to forget that those we have labeled as in traditional animist cultures, where the primary health care providers, the mediators, the law, and much more. but explorer was not really in their job description. they knew their cultures cosmology already exploration only validated it and was thus not as big of a focus. for those in our society though, we lack that cosmology. we need to discover a meaningful cosmology so that we can apply spiritual insight and ability.
So another interesting idea... and one that Eliade prompted ( he wasnt all bad) was that there were shamans before there where gods... I would go a step further and say that before there was a role that we would call shaman there where just sensitive yet strong and intuitive individuals that explored and shared their imaginative insights, they where those that discovered cosmology or at least put it together with the aid of the others in their community that like them had taken notice that they lived in a living world of great depth and meaning.
another and more fascinating way of putting it would be that before there where shamans and gods and cosmologies that there where persons who were apt enough for the intelligence of the whole to express itself through, to explain itself to its self through in ways that where able to aid individuals in perpetuating the whole, the totality of existences knowlegde of itself as well as further cultivate its own sense of purpose and meaning. that to me is just a gourgous way of looking at it.
so to me the interest in shamans as explorers today is slightly missing the point but at the same time, it creates this juxtapose... people go back to this very ancient memory and find inspiration from peoples who have not needed to change their way of life ( ie traditional animsit peoples), so that they can rediscover the the wholes, the totalities, the universes own sense of purpose and self knowledge through their own human experience.
they explore and are inspired by shamans so that they can make a place for shamans again, so that they can co-create emergent cosmologies, so that they can bring about depth of meaning again to a world starving for it, and heal rifts in our understanding of self and the very real wounds and death that that lack of understanding bring about in the world.
its interesting... especially among people on this forum i feel that there is a real interest in the exploration motive in peoples relationships with entheogens. What i find interesting though is the shaman archetypes relationship to that motive in the western mind. Traditional peoples we have come to label as shamans (whether its an apt label at all) I have not seen as having much of that same motivation. many where there to help as mediators with the spirits of the natural world, maintain ritual customs, preform healing and divination and to bring a cultures cosmology into the public sanctum. now this last part... in maintianing and bringing an animist cultures cosmology into public consciousness, now that is interesting in the light of the motive of exploration.
It could be said that so many are drawn to entheogens with the motive of exploration because they do not have a cosmology, or at least a collective one that has any real depth of meaning. science has replaced myth ( or so it thinks, but what is science but another myth?) and our old cosmologies our understanding of self and our its place int he universe has been striped bare, dissected, and replaced with a sterile meaningless lack of awe, for many... for others its brought about the desire to explore these wonders that science has revealed. but still we are without a cosmology. shamans or those that we have labeled as thus in animist societies... have a cosmology. they know enough and are humble enough to that which they do not know to (KNOW BETTER) to work as agents of change from within that cosmology. I tend to think then that people confuse the shaman as the explorer of consciousness for a given society and leave it at that. its very common... ive read magazine articles about it even recently. people tend to forget that those we have labeled as in traditional animist cultures, where the primary health care providers, the mediators, the law, and much more. but explorer was not really in their job description. they knew their cultures cosmology already exploration only validated it and was thus not as big of a focus. for those in our society though, we lack that cosmology. we need to discover a meaningful cosmology so that we can apply spiritual insight and ability.
So another interesting idea... and one that Eliade prompted ( he wasnt all bad) was that there were shamans before there where gods... I would go a step further and say that before there was a role that we would call shaman there where just sensitive yet strong and intuitive individuals that explored and shared their imaginative insights, they where those that discovered cosmology or at least put it together with the aid of the others in their community that like them had taken notice that they lived in a living world of great depth and meaning.
another and more fascinating way of putting it would be that before there where shamans and gods and cosmologies that there where persons who were apt enough for the intelligence of the whole to express itself through, to explain itself to its self through in ways that where able to aid individuals in perpetuating the whole, the totality of existences knowlegde of itself as well as further cultivate its own sense of purpose and meaning. that to me is just a gourgous way of looking at it.
so to me the interest in shamans as explorers today is slightly missing the point but at the same time, it creates this juxtapose... people go back to this very ancient memory and find inspiration from peoples who have not needed to change their way of life ( ie traditional animsit peoples), so that they can rediscover the the wholes, the totalities, the universes own sense of purpose and self knowledge through their own human experience.
they explore and are inspired by shamans so that they can make a place for shamans again, so that they can co-create emergent cosmologies, so that they can bring about depth of meaning again to a world starving for it, and heal rifts in our understanding of self and the very real wounds and death that that lack of understanding bring about in the world.
