#67 Can You Learn Shamanism From A Podcast?

Access the recordings from the last gathering of the tribe and more by supporting us on patreon - https://patreon.com/wovenenergy

This week we talk about the gathering of the tribe event which took place last week, whether its possible to learn shamansim from a podcast, Terence Mckenna and orings of shamanism. We also talk about the future of the woven energy podcast.

Episode Transcript

(00:06):
Welcome to the Woven Energy Podcast onReal Practical Shamanism with Me, Joseph Psychora
and Damon Smith. We are hereonce again to talk about shamanism from the
ground up and in this episode postthe Gathering of the Tribe, our patreon
kind of gathering that where we exploredall sorts of wonderful things shamanism related,

(00:27):
we are going to answer the questioncan you learn shamanism from a podcast?
So, Damon, how are youdoing? Man? Very good, but
very tired, very happy. Thewhat I'm happy about is indeed the Catherine
of the Tribe. I mean thatthe turnout was absolutely spectacular, so you
know, was the Gathering of theTribe, So Catherine of the Tribe was

(00:51):
originally we were going to get togetherphysically in Austria and we're going to get
all of the i know, whatdo you call them? The patrons.
Patrons that are engaged with the podcastare heavily engaged with the podcast together in
one physical place and do a bunchof different sessions on different aspects of shamanism,

(01:14):
mainly spirit dance and physical chelisity,but we also did some stuff around
drum that went down pretty well,and also have discussions, particularly about the
future of the podcast, which Ithink we're going to talk around a little
bit, so we'll come back tothat. I am delighted and happy by
the turnout. More than half ofall of our patrons made at least one

(01:38):
session on that. Yeah, justjust to clarify, instead of being in
a physical location, we changed thatto being online in a definitely a more
interactive way than perhaps just listening toa podcast, so it was much more
of a you know, very interactive. We did it on Zoom or you
did zoom, and the feedback waspretty good, right, feedback was good,

(02:00):
but also the turnout was spectacular.I mean, thinking about it,
you know, if we go backto those days when we first talked about
doing this podcast, we actually hadmore people on the gather of the Tribe
then I expected to get listeners forthe Wolf and Ntye podcast where we started

(02:21):
out. You know, it wasjust amazing. I was so grateful to
our patrons O the tribe as wecall them. I guess me and you're
in the tribe as well, soit's our tribe. And yeah, you
guys were spectacular. You made theevent, you know, more than it
could have been. It wasn't justme talking and demonstrating. There was a

(02:44):
lot of interactivity on it. Wehad some great discussions and some great input
from the attendee. So thanks everso much to everybody who came. For
the patrons who didn't manage to makeit, that's that's totally cool. But
you know, this is an annualevent. That's the inaugural one. Gathering
of the Tribe twenty twenty three wasfocused on physical Celestey in Spurit Dance.

(03:07):
We've already decided Gathering of the Tribetwenty twenty four will be around Drum Technique,
so there's still an opportunity next yearto come and join. It was
seven seven sessions over seven days.It was a bit of a marathon because
I'm working very very hard at CambridgeUniversity on multiple projects simultaneously at the moment.
It was a bit of a marathonfor me. But I'm so glad

(03:28):
we did it. It turned outgreat as far as I'm concerned, and
I think I think, to behonest, probably got more out of it
being this kind of an arrangement ratherthan being in a physical place, because
it will be a time we couldexplore more options and am I right in
saying that if you are not apatron right now and you feel like you

(03:51):
may want to see a few ofthese sessions, are they available in Patreon
to a certain level of patron?Yeah? Can they access those previous recordings?
So the recordings the sessions were recorded, we said we'd put stick them
in Patreon or Patreon if if therecordings came out, all right. The

(04:11):
recordings did come out, all right, that's a good news. I'm busy
editing them and they are appearing thereone at a time, and I think
you can you can get access tothem from the I think it's the five
dollar level or something, right,the one above you know, thank you
on the podcast. So so yeah, and to be clear as well,
all you need to be is apadron. You didn't charge any money for

(04:34):
this actual gathering, for the weekgathering. This was just no nor should
we Nor should we I mean ifwe tell it in a physical location,
obviously we would have had to payfor facilities and all that kind of stuff.
Because it was online, there wasno reason too. I mean,
our patrons already support us. We'vegot some great recording equipment and things like

(04:54):
that. From the support from thefinancial spot the patrons provide. But to
me, the thing that that's happyabout, I was very very happy about
was the level of input an effortfrom the patrons at the event. Seven
events over seven days. The attendancewas just amazing. So thanks ever so
much, guys, really really appreciateYeah. Cool. So if you do

(05:17):
want to see those recordings, justto put some context around it. The
topics covered was mainly Spirit Dancer,right, there was there was two or
three sessions all on the Spirit dandand also what's really good is that if
you're a long time listener of thepodcast and perhaps you get a little bit
frustrated now and again that it's alwaysa description through the movements, as is

(05:40):
inevitable being an audio podcast. Itdoes put those into context because you went
pretty much from the beginning talking aboutthe various techniques that we talk about on
the podcast, but you could actuallysee them being done and guide us through
the actual movements. And so itdoes add a layer and a level too,
perhaps or a text to perhaps whatyou've listened to on the podcast,

(06:01):
so you know it's there for you. So there was a bit more than
that actually, because I could seewhat people have been practicing. I was,
I was, you know, pleasantlysurprised, you know, talking about
the question what can you learn fromour podcast? Several people were doing this
stuff along with me on the videofeed and sort of showing that the leftl

(06:23):
of practice they've got to you already, and I was, I was gossmacked
how good some of it is.I'm not going to pick out individuals,
you know who you are. Idon't want to flatter some and not others.
But the stuff that I saw waswas really brilliant. And you know,
to the question can you learn Chamanismfrom a podcast? Was some people

(06:43):
have. So that's the that's athat's a positive starting point, right,
and it's something that you've come tocome to change your mind on. Right.
Yeah, well I think I thinkit's Uncle Joe had changed my mind
very gradually over a long period oftime. I mean, you changed my
mind about doing the podcast. Imean, just just quickly find shout out

(07:03):
a few of the patrons for differentreasons. It's just people who have either
up their subscription level or signed uprecently. So we've got thanks everython must
to ben returning patron, Good tohave your Backpal really great. Um.
We've got Kung Fu Fan, Um, thanks Kung Fu Fan. We got
the the very well known Graham Barlow. He's supporting us as a patron as

(07:30):
well as as a content creator.That's Amazon, thank you very much.
And Emily long term patron has upto support for us, which is Amazon.
And you know all of our patrons, you guys are superstars. Total
total revelation in my life to behonest. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So and also also to mention thatthe the the patron, the patreon being

(07:57):
a patron actually welcomes you into thefamily of podcasts that we have here right
at Woven Energy. Woven Energy.This is the this is the original podcast,
the Woven Energy Podcast is this iswhere we come to learn shamanism.
But we also it's an numberrella forseveral other interesting podcasts as well. There's
four podcasts. You've got the EnergyArts podcast, You've got Heretics podcast,

(08:18):
the Woven Energy Podcast, and what'sthe fourth one, Pigs and Chickens.
Pigs and Chickens, Yeah, yeah, which is our podcast, Shamanism in
Business. Shamanism in Business. Yeah. So yeah. In terms of the
podcast, I mean, obviously,compared to Wolven Energy and Heretics. The
other two podcasts are quite small interms of numbers of listeners. Encourage you

(08:39):
go and listen to them. Youmight find them more interesting and you think
you're going to Vince sar latest episodeon Energy Arts is it's the most controversy,
one of the most controversial subjects we'veever done, which is I Kedo
versus more Thai, which is apretty It's obviously clickbait title, isn't it,
you know? Um, but Ithink it's quite trusting and obviously the

(09:01):
pigs and chickens. For anybody who'sremotely involved in organizations anything like that and
working within organizations, that should bevery interesting. But it's all listening to
that myself because I'm so at thelevel that I'm at now in my business.
I need some organization tools or somethingto help with my everyday life and

(09:24):
you know, I'm looking into thingslike that. So yeah, i'd be
really cool to check it out.And two Bama the Woven Energy podcast on
shamanism and Heretics by Woven Energy arelike the two flagship podcasts. They're far
and away the most popular podcasts outwith the four UM and Yeah, so
that guess. That's that's where we'reat with it. And there's an awful

(09:46):
lot of listening on those two podcasts, which is another thing, you know.
I mean, some of our someof our patrons and long term listeners
have listened to all of the episodesof both podcasts more than once, which
is which is quite shocking given thatthere's well over one hundred hours listening there.
So it's sort of about I thinkit's people listening to the three times

(10:07):
I three hundred hours of listening,you know, and I think you can,
because they're quite dense, you canyou can get an awful lot by
multiple listenings to them. But oneof the things that did come up,
one of the things that did comeup on the Gathering of the Tribe though,
is that especially the main podcast,it's not really the main one because
Heretics is also very popular, butthe Heretics podcast on shamanism, so that

(10:31):
the Woven Edgy podcast on Shamanism is, unlike Heretics, is a sequential podcast.
I mean, on Heretics, wehave our alchemy tutorial and you have
to do that in order, andwe are a few other things you listen
to in order. But in general, Heretics is a much more dip into
subjects you're interested in, whereas WovenEnergy it's like start at episode one and
then start working forwards until you getto episode sixty seven, that kind of

(10:54):
thing. So one of the thingsthat came up at the gathering of the
tribe is how are we going tomake this podcast in particular more accessible to
new people coming along. Obviously,when we only add one episode, it
was very accessible to new people becauseit was obvious where you know what I
mean, it was obvious where togo. Now you have to scroll down
a very long way to get tothe starting point. Well well, to

(11:16):
be honest, that is a questionthat we've tried to address time and time
again, and we're well aware ofthat question, and it's been in the
background ever since we got quite away into the podcast, particularly when we
got to stage two and three,and it's like, gosh, now we're
on stage four, where it's intensefor a lack of a better word,

(11:37):
and it's very deep, and it'slike it's built on a foundation of understanding
that you need for the previous levelsand the previous episodes, and now we're
at that stage. It's like,well, how do you how do we
keep new listeners coming in and howdo we look after those listeners because we
don't want to reject those listeners atall. We don't want to have a
feeling of you know, it justfar too intimidating. It wants to be

(12:00):
a nice, relaxing, manageable kindof environment for people to come into.
So yeah, totally totally need toneed to address it. And we also
had some volunteers from among the patrons. Thanks guys, you know who you
are to have a crack at somethinglike that. I mean, I think
the general consensus was we need todo something a little bit additional, maybe
like a tiny little introductory course orsomething like that, you know, yea

(12:22):
that we can put on Wolfenergy dotcom website and it's sort of maybe like
a couple of videos or something towatch these before you will listen to that,
or you know, a couple ofthem. Yeah, podcast and talk
about what it's about. Yeah,because obviously the people who've been listening to
the podcast since the beginning or nearthe beginning, they've sort of grown up
along with it. But we're talkingabout new people arriving. I just imagine

(12:46):
what it would be like for somebodywho you know, hadn't yet learned a
great deal about shamanism and jumping intoone of the level four episodes, like
what on earth is this about?You know? So so, yeah,
we need so we'll give ourselves tothe gathering of the tribe twenty four to
get that resolved, to come upwith something concrete along those lines. But

(13:07):
we do intend to do that.Yeah, well, I've got three points
here. I do actually really likethe idea, well, the idea of
extending the website idea with a fewvideos, because I thought, well,
like, what what we could dois potentially devote like fifteen twenty seconds at
the beginning of each each episode toguide people to perhaps the best episodes to

(13:31):
listen to if they're just starting out. It's like, look, guys,
don't worry about this episode. Ifyou've come to us brand new, check
out x y Z, checkout episodesyou know, eight, seven, eight
and nine, for instance, that'sa really good place to start or you
know, right from the beginning ofthe podcast. But you know, grounding
in chelicity, and so we canwe can try and lay lay the bed,

(13:52):
so to speak, in the episodesand go you know, don't worry
about it. Here's some episodes thatyou can listen to to get up to
date or you know, relatively upto it. And also something that we've
talked about several times, which isweaving in these general interest episodes. Yeah,
for sure, the slightly more notnecessarily deep dive into shamanic technique,

(14:15):
but just sort of the the interestingnuggets around what shamanism is and talking about
those as sort of like little waypoints, because some of those are fascinating.
I know, that's what drew meto shamanism, you know, with
us sitting in our sitting in thatliving room at the end of certain we
have done quite a few like that. I mean, for instance, the
one that sticks to mind, theone we did on the events early on.

(14:39):
That was a really good episode,and we should do like that.
I mean, it's one of thethings that's worked were heretics. Heretics started
several years after Woven Energy, butactually it's picked up a following and I
think because of that, there's awhole bunch of stuff that's bound to be
something on heretics that interests you.Somewhere in all the smarngest board of you
know topics that weve we've covered onthere. There's bound Toby, you know,

(15:03):
and I think that's why, youknow, listenership wise, it's done
quite well, and so we tryto and we're going to try to emulate
that bit on energy arts as well. We started off just mostly talking about
ike don't how to fix it,but over time, you know, we
pretty quickly kept to the conclusion thatwe want to talk about all energy arts.
So we'll be talking about shingy andbagi and taigi and you know,

(15:24):
just everything, chigung yoga whatever.Our intention is to talk about all that
stuff and hopefully, you know,take a bit of a lesson from the
success of Heretics and maybe we coulddo more like that on the main podcast
than we have been doing, ratherthan just plowing through endless level four episodes.
It's well exactly, but it's ait's a balance, isn't it,

(15:46):
Because you know, we've talked aboutthis so many times. It's just how
do you do it? And soyeah, perhaps perhaps something we could do
is perhaps taking a little break fromstage four and go right for the next
six episodes. For instance, justoff the top of my head, right
these six episodes are going to bethe introduction to shamanism episodes. Yeah,

(16:08):
and we can devote we can devotesix, six, eight episodes, however
long it takes to just the absolutebasics. Yeah, that's tempting. I
mean I think something along those lines, perhaps not as a block, not
a block of six a word,because for the people who are getting on
with this stuff, for the peoplewho are doing quite well with it,
as I saw on the as Isaw at the gathering of the tribe,

(16:32):
I don't want to hold those guysup. So I think a mixture is
great. Even if it was justwe disciplined, we'd do every even though
it was just every other episode,we do a Level four and then we
do a general interest, and thenwe do a level form, we do
a general interest. I mean,from my personal point of view, I'm
quite excited that we're cracking through quitea few Level four episodes because I so

(16:55):
want to get onto animal spird dance. And we don't need to do sixty
four Level four episodes before we getonto animal spurt dance. You know,
maybe eight, maybe we can doit. After eight we can start introducing
some animal spurt dance, which iswhich is something that I want to talk

(17:15):
about a lot on this podcast,and I have wanted to talk about a
lot for a long period of time, just spurt animals in general. It's
such a fascinating subject and it's socare to what we do, and we're
getting tantalizingly close. I mean,it's taken a long time. It's taken
the early seventy episodes to get wherewe are, but we're not, you

(17:36):
know what I mean. So Ido want to keep the level four stuff
going, but maybe have about everyother episode we do a general interest Now
I got a document I have onmy full of general interest episode as start
taking the Shore for sure. Definitelyso good for those only early days,
you know. I guess before Ihave The working title for this particular podcast

(17:59):
is can you learned Shamanism from apodcast? When when we started discussing this
issue back then? I mean,what years were those? Were they like
early two thousands or something? Itrying to think of maybe mid I can't
remember when it wasn't so long?Are you talking about when we first started
talking about the podcast? Yeah,when we started talking about the podcast,

(18:19):
Um, was it lit around Thatwould have been around twenty Okay, that's
around that, around that, yeah, yeah, yeah, and the stuff,
but the stuff that led up toit, the whole Armabella movement and
all that kind of stuff have beengoing a right, that's right. Twenty
eleven. Twenty eleven was the wasthe official sort of I don't know if

(18:41):
you call it official, but itwas a date on which we thought we
got somewhere with Armabella. I rememberthat in particular because that was the Yeah,
my dad died, so it sticksin my head um, and that
the incident the Armabella was the partof the Armabella thing was coming up with
all the terminology that we used,the English sounding terminology that we used to
talk about shamanism, so you know, things like the names of the energy

(19:02):
changes like jagon Mire and Guy andSquall and stuff that stuff, and also
just words like chelisty and stuff likethat. We wanted a vocabulary that we
could talk about this stuff in Englishor English sounding terms, and that was
that the Armabella was movement effort waspart of pulling that together. But then
coming up to when Joe started talkingto me about the podcast, it well,

(19:26):
we sort of started the podcast longbefore we ever started recording it,
didn't We used to sit in thatcafe sometimes. We used to. We
used to sit in the cafe also, yeah, before training, and we
used to. I mean, thatwas still in the Armabella days, and
I have a very keen fondness forthe Armabella days. There was. It's

(19:47):
so fascinating because at the time youwere so against talking about shamanism. Of
course you were talking about shamanism fromthe Armabella perspective, but from from your
point of view, you always wantedto wrap it up in this sort of
exterior bubble to try and get theideas across in what you perceived to be

(20:07):
a more digestible way. Yeah,And it's really funny because I remember I
remember finally getting you to talk aboutactual shamanism. And I don't think I
ever told you about this, butthere were times where we would be on
the phone together. It'd be likeour hour long phone calls, and I
would try and prod you to talkabout And this was before the podcast.

(20:29):
So I had you on the phoneon speaker, and I had a little
dictaphone recording the actual just for myown, you know, just so I
could have a log of some ofthis stuff. And then finally I thought,
you know, what maybe maybe Ican do some of this stuff that
Damon's been teaching me on Damon himselfand get him to do all this on
an actual podcast. And do youremember we actually did it on YouTube to

(20:52):
start with? We tried to desperatelytried to get the whole camera thing going
and it just wasn't happening. Itjust wouldn't behave and then we just gave
up and just went actually past thelong format of the pot. We also
talked about that, didn't we shouldwe do a little short podcast or she
would do long format? The longform format. Really well, that was

(21:15):
the right decision, I think,and I don't think that short format we
would have ended up with anybody beingable to do what we were talking about.
Frankly so, so I think thatyou know, one of the things
is there's often a desire to seethe stuff, and you know a lot
of people guests were pleased to seethe stuff um at the Gathering of the

(21:37):
Tribe, but I'm at the Gatheringof the Tribe also had people that demonstrating
the stuff to me never having actuallyseen it with their eyes and and doing
a really good job of X whichthis is amazing, So it's um it's
it's quite interesting that I think becauseof the depth of long format that you

(21:59):
can really get into the heart ofthings, the naty gritty of what of
the topic, that the people cankind of pick it up a bit by
osmosis, and because you know,ultimately it's not me and you teaching people's
shamanism. It's just also encouraging peopleto go and get taught shamanism by the
person they should be getting taught by, which is Mother Nature, and given

(22:22):
some ideas about how that could bedone. And there's no rights and wrongs
in that. I mean, theonly wrong really is the whole imagination trap
stuff. The only wrong is youstart imagining things anything else you try that
puts you in a situation where natureis teaching you directly and there's nothing human
intervening in that. That's what chulicityis all about. You are effectively applying

(22:48):
shamanic technique. You can, ofcourse take the benefit of people who've been
doing it a long time and thetechniques that they've either picked up off others
or figured out for themselves or thatkind of stuff, but it is that
kind of a subject. So Ido think that you can learn shamanism from
podcasts given given them, not becauseof the wonderfulness of the podcast format particularly,

(23:08):
but because of the wonderfulness of nature. As a teacher, it's a
very different concept because you know,in for instance, in the martial arts,
we have this concept of lineage,you know, where such and such
a person learned off such as somebodyelse who learned off somebody else who learned
off somebody else. It's a veryConfucian kind of idea, you know,
a very hierarchical kind of idea,and you get, yeah, you get

(23:32):
that. There's some upside to thatthat Sometimes it's it's nice to feel part
of a tradition. I mean,for instance, a shiny tradition is a
long tradition, and it's nice tofeel part of that. With all those
great masters, you know, LiNing wrangg and Jilong Fong and all those
guys going back into the pat ofthe distant past, at least compared to
where we are, it's nice tofeel part of that. But then the

(23:52):
negative is also you can bask inthe glory of your famous teacher or your
famous teachers, teacher, firmous teachers, teachers, teacher you know, and
that's like Laurel Resting. You know, so what if your teachers teachers teacher
was wonderful, you might have beenthe greatest thing since sliced bread. Well,
actually, if you can't do ityourself, what is it? What

(24:14):
is it matter? You know thatthe damage I feel the Confucianism have done
to the especially the Chinese martial arts, but also the martial arts of other
countries is um, it's not inconsiderable. Ah, And it's it gives your
eyes to a lot of um sortof wrongheadedness and things. Whereas nobody's got

(24:34):
an older teacher than a shaman.You know, the teacher of a shaman
is nature. Nature. You know, best estimates what thirteen billion years old
or something like that. You know, the old martial arts master whose night
the age with a white Beard sortof pills in comparison to the age of
every s you know, so so, and it's it's quite interesting in terms

(25:00):
so what a shamans I picked outjust because we're going to talk about this
on this episode. But most peopleare kind of familiar with the fact that
I'm a big fan of Terence mcchanna. You know, you're also probably well
aware that I wouldn't agree with Terencemcchanna. I never managed to meet him,
unfortunately. I would love to havemet him, but before I passed.

(25:22):
But the I do like a lotof things that he has to say
about shamanis this quotation is really coolto me. It's actually from a song
lyrics that you can find it onYouTube. It's called re Evolution. It
was a collaboration that he did withthe nineties band called The Shaman who did
that famous number one ebonez are good. He's a no good Ebony is a

(25:45):
good, super subtle song that was. But this is a much much better
song, not more catchy, butit's cool, and this is a little
quotation from it. He says,this is what shamanism has always been about.
A shamanist someone who's been to theend. It's someone who knows how
the world really works. And knowinghow the world really works means to have
risen outside above, beyond the dimensionsof ordinary space, time and kazoostry,

(26:11):
and actually seen the wiring under theboard, stepped outside the confines of learned
culture and learned an embedded language intothe domain of what Wickenshin said called the
unspeakable, the transcendental presence of theother. So basically what he's saying is
what I've described this in much moremunday in terms as a shamon being like

(26:37):
a mechanic. The average person whobuys a car just wants it to get
them to work, or let's takethem to do their shopping, and they
just want the thing to work right. But mechanics are different. Mechanics want
to know, like normal people aremore concerned with the outside of the car,
what's outside the bonnet or hood ofthe car. Was the mechanics more

(26:59):
concerned about what's under the hood.And that's just what a shamanism was.
Sha shaman is with respect to nature. A shaman's what somebody who wants to
know how the world really works,what goes on under the hood of nature.
And he talks about how history inthe same song talks about history representing

(27:25):
a radical break from the nature thatpreceded it. This is what you know.
We can see this clearly. Thestart of this song is in our
split between our two podcasts, theWolf and Energy podcast, is what went
on before we invented history and civilizationand all those kinds of things, And

(27:48):
it must be the response to akind of attractor that lies out in our
future. He says, persistent,persistently Western religions have integrated into their theology.
Is the note a notion of akind of end of the world.
And he talks about the shamanistic experiencekind of confirming this intuition. But it

(28:10):
doesn't mean it's going to happen likeanything in the you know, the Book
of Revelations or anything like that.It's not that kind of a cataclysm.
What it really is. You knowthat the Bible talks about it in terms
of the alpha and the oma.Gain it's what it really is. As
a shaman's take an end to endview. They don't look at the hero
and now, they don't look atthis single point in time like most people

(28:33):
do. They take the broader viewfrom the very beginning all the way through
to the end. But the end, in a way, in shamanism is
a psychical subject. The end isthe beginning. And it's so it's not
like an exoteric religion where you know, there's this wonderful world and then all
of a sudden it explodes or something. It's nothing like that at all.

(28:56):
It's about He talks about the echoesof that dwell point. If I quote
it, it's almost it talks aboutthis this point of transcendence out there in
the future, but it also it'sthat point all the way in the past.
It's the same point the beginning ofthe universe. It's almost as though
this object, this is a quotation, this object in hyperspace glittering and hyperspace

(29:21):
throws off reflections of itself which actuallyricochet into the past, illumining, illuminating
this mystic inspiring that's center of visionary. Basically, what he's saying is the
dwell point in the future is throwingoff echoes itself, rippling back into the
past and illuminating our world. Butmy point here is that given the psychical

(29:45):
nature of nature, that dwell pointin the future is also a dwell point
in the past that's giving off echoesof itself down through the generations. So
in this song, McKenna is talkingabout the exact same thing that we often
have on this podcast. You knowthat the n changes being the echoes of
flections of the fundamental energy changes orinteractions that went on in the beginning of

(30:07):
the universe, and those things haveechoed down through the generations. Not just
to be available to us at ourpoint in time, but literally to create
our world, to create our manifests, to create are now for us.
And this is the kind of stuffthat Shamons are interested in. And it's
just quite interesting reading the lyrics ofthis song that were actually written by McKenna

(30:30):
himself. The music was from theShaman that that he's taken. He's basically
given the same concept that Mickey did. I mean Mickey talk about the different
instruments of the creation, instruments likeas in musical instruments of the creation,
which are the changes and these arethe levels are things that we started talking

(30:51):
about on these level four episodes.But it's interesting that McKenna in this case
is talking about the dual point atthe end, the omega rather than the
alpha um. Very interesting, butit's the same concept, right, and
it's it's quite interesting too to thinkabout or to experience how that is a
bidirectional thing, that the the theuniverse being cyclical, the changing in the

(31:15):
seasons, you know, just inthe headerrows now, I love it around
here in this in the springtime,all those little flowers, blue orchids,
and the yellow flowers and the whiteflowers and all the stuff that look blue
belt and everything that come up inthe hedgerows around this time of year.
It's just spectacular. It's a it'sbasically a cornal's it's a shamanist's dream,
absolutely shamanist dream around this time ofyear. But but it is. And

(31:40):
so the thing is that that's andthat that doesn't define what Shammon does.
I mean, shaman's that help peoplebasically detect as a guide to deal with,
to help the people around them.It's not a it's not an extended
thing. It's to help the peoplearound them to to live their lives,
not in better ways, but basicallyin strategically more able ways. Shamon was

(32:05):
very much a strategist of a ofa tribal society, and I think that
is sort of what we've been doingwith the podcast. The shamanism is not
a leader, they're not a boss, they're not a manager. They're just
somebody who just has been along thispath a little way ahead, not a
lot ahead, just a little wayahead of other people and can give the

(32:30):
I guess the benefit of that experience. But not to be duplicated. You
don't want to walk in the youknow, if you think about walking along
a path, the shamanic path,you don't want to walk in the footsteps
of shaman's who went before you.They can kind of help you head in
a good direction, but if youwalk exactly in their footsteps, nothing new

(32:52):
is coming. There's there's no artistryin the shamanism. There's no development,
there's no growth. And nature it'sall about growth and change and adaptivity,
adaptiveness. That's what nature is allabout. So the question is, in
what ways can a shaman who's alittle bit further down that path help a

(33:15):
shaman who isn't quite so far downthat path. And it's not like any
of us are anywhere near as fardown that path as people like Micky,
right, it's just not you know, she was considerably further down the path,
probably you know, past the nextvillage and around, you know whatever.
But the point is, how canwe help you, first of all,

(33:37):
to the wonder of that. Butthis is more about what animism is.
We talked about this early on thepodcast as well, the difference between
shamanism and animism. Animism shamanism isa shamanism, a spiritual specialist in an
animistic society. The joy of animism. Shamanism is not always a joy.
Some of it's dangerous, unpleasant,not all of it someways dangerous person,

(34:00):
but shamanism is a specialist. Theshaman is a specialist role within animal societies.
Animals makes wonderful, you know,just reveling in nature and all the
wonder that nature has to give tous, little flowers and the headerows included.
That's that's something that a shaman wantsto bring other generally wants to bring

(34:23):
other people along too. And sothe question is what are the ways in
which a shaman can do that.Obviously the sort of traditional I know if
it's traditional, but the way thatpeople think in their minds, as you
know, there's the shaman in hishut, somebody in his tribe starts having

(34:45):
the shaman sickness, which we wouldin civilized society will probably be called mental
illness, and the shaman sort oftakes that person into the hut and takes
someone as an apprentice and guides themthrough curing themselves of the sha sickness.
As people would see it, they'renot actually curing themselves of it. The
shaman sickness in many ways gives youan advantage, not a disadvantage, and

(35:07):
anybody can become a shamman. Itdoesn't have to be somebody with a natural
leaning towards it, though such peoplecertainly do exist. It's more like,
how does that typically present itself?You mentioned mental illness, but what actually
is the shaman sickness? The mostHow would that in today's society? How
would that be viewed? Well,I do know a couple of people who've

(35:29):
been through that, so I've gotquite who was was that the gathering of
the tribe? But the most commonthere are many ways that it would be
interpreted by you know, modern psychologyor Madden psychiatry that I don't necessarily agree

(35:51):
with, so I don't want togo into that. That's a subject for
heretics. I mean, the wholeFreudian Jungian tradition is something we need to
get onto an heretic. Somebody,we'll have done some alchemy and those guys
pinched and awful lot of stuff fromalchemy, not in a good way.
I think we might have mentioned itonce or twice, so we'll get onto
that on heretics. But in general, typical symptoms would include hallucinations, either

(36:13):
seeing things, what people would interpretas the person having hallucinations, seeing things,
hearing things, or that kind ofstuff, vasions and all that kind
of stuff. And generally one ofthe ways to know if it's genuine or
not is how enthusiastic they seem aboutit. Yeah, if there's quite you
know, if they've seen Mother Maryand they think it's really cool, the

(36:37):
other behaving like they think it's reallycool that they've seen Mother Mary, and
you know, they seem very sortof in religious awe of the experience and
all that kind of stuff. Generally, that's even imagined of fake people who
have the genuine shamman sickness. It'scalled a sickness for a reason. And
first of all, I want tomake Clay here very very clear because I

(36:57):
don't want to reinforce stupid misconceptions thatare out there in the shamanic community.
You do not need to have togo through shamanik sickness in order to become
a shaman. It's not necessary evento become a great chaman. You can
become every bit. It's got ashaman of someone who has been through that.
It's not that it's more that thatkind of sickness gives people a propensity
towards this kind of stuff, that'sall. They still need to work at

(37:22):
it, and in some ways they'vegot more challenges to deal with early on,
because if you are relatively I knowwhat you call it, ordinary person,
I guess like me when I startedout this stuff, you have all
of that wrestling with the visions andthe hallucinations and all that kind of stuff.
You have that to come on laterin your journey, much later in
your journey. If you have theshaman sickness, you have to deal with

(37:43):
that day one, which is notit's not the right place to deal with
it in many ways in a logicalsense, the sequence of learning shamanism,
that's something you want to be dealingwith at level five strokes six, not
level one. You know. Soit's really interesting because I'm not going to
say who, but somebody I knowum had that in a not in not

(38:06):
in a good way. You knowthat the hallucinations, the voices and hearing
voices and stuff, and yeah,in modern well, if it's distressing,
if it's distressing to them, that'susually the genuine Yeah. If they don't
find it distressing, then it's generallynot. It was distressing, and it
was also distressing in the way thatnobody would believe this said person either,

(38:30):
you know, and it's like that'dbe either cast aside or you know,
not not really taken seriously. Yeah, I mean, so what we get
to do as shamans who are followinga nice you know, like like the
wolven Engy podcast lays out a nicestaged path of seven stages if you want
to call it seven, you callit three, whatever, number one,

(38:51):
a nice even path of gradually acquiringshamanic ability over a long period of time.
You can deal with those things ina measured sense. There's no leaps
of faith at any point. Whatare you dealing with? Big part of
what you're dealing with in me asthma. That's why we started the Heretics podcast,
right, big part of you iswhat you're dealing with this in me
askma. I mean, we've oftentalked about the negative effect that being involved

(39:13):
in shamanism has on friends and family. They start to see you in a
different way, especially because of thesocial perceptions, the very very wrong headed
perceptions about shamanism the existence society.They start to think there's something up or
wrong because affect because you're not conformingor you're ragically not conforming. The thing

(39:35):
with the shaman sickness is it waxedthat into your face hard. Your perception
of reality and the socially acceptable perceptionof reality instantly totally odds with each other.
And I think the path that welay out on the Wolf and any
podcast, if you have a choice, which you don't always, if you

(39:55):
have a choice, is a muchbetter way to deal with it. You're
you're progressing at a rate where youcan gradually build up the toughness. You
remember we said bat you know aboutthe Mongolian word shaman's need that you can,
over a period of time build upthe spiritual toughness that you need in
order to deal with the miasthma clashfor one of a better words, as

(40:16):
your shamanic ability progresses. And it'sa bit like you know, if you
think of that in terms of learningmartial arts. One of the things that
we we do in Shinghy, forinstance, pick a martial art. One
of the things that I like aboutShinghi's approaches it teaches you a very strong

(40:37):
defense very early, and that's goodbecause Shinghi's a heavy hit in art,
and you're going to be expected atsome point in your shinghi career to deal
with some serious power incoming in termsof strikes, very very heavy strikes incoming.
But the order that the art teachesits first the ability to deal with

(41:00):
those strikes, and then the abilityto deliver them, which to me is
exactly the right way around. Andthat's kind of what those seven stages.
That's another way to think of thoseseven stages, is dealing with the ability
to deal with what's coming at stagessix and seven five, six and seven.
Laying a strong foundation, a strongfoundation of chelicity, a strong foundation
of abscre ability, then a strongfoundation of shamanic technique, and then a

(41:23):
strong foundation within the weave, withinthe weave, within nature. Those foundations
set you in really good stead forwhen the inevitable happens, and that sort
of stuff that is inflicted on thepostals who undergo shaman sickness early. When

(41:44):
you have to deal with that,you're dealing with a strong toolkit rather than
a very very weak one, becausewho else is there to prepare you if
you haven't had the training or guidanceof a shaman. Who else is there
to prepare you for that clash.There's only yourself. You have to figure
out self in those circumstances, andthat's not a pleasant thing. In our
societies. They're not old, they'vedeveloped only over the last ten thousand years.

(42:07):
But ten thousand years is a lotlonger than the short young the life
of a young person trying to figureall the stuff out for themselves. And
I think that's why shaman is muchbetter described as a guide than a teacher,
because nobody can teach that other thannature. And you know, one

(42:29):
of the ways, one of theways to be a shaman in this world
is, you know, just everybodyyou meet, you know, try to
get closer than nature. Try toput yourself in a place where nature teach
you. Just say that over andover again. It's a very similar upport
But rebbe you'll be able to persuadea few people that do it that way.
But obviously I think people expect abit more than that, and the
question is then how we how wego about giving them that. So,

(42:52):
in terms of traditional model, apersonal goes shaman sickness or just has a
natural propensity to it, or theshaman just thinks that changious in some cultures
they will harangu the shammon until theytake them in. You know. That's
another one that was a bit likeme with a lot of mine Malts training
and and eventually shamanic training as well. It just keep haranguing the shaman until

(43:13):
he eventually takes you in. Youwant to tell a shaman's genuine Another one
is you know, you really reallyhave to keep hassling and before teach anything.
Joe had that with me to settingextent. Yeah, well I had
the same experience. But and it'sgood because you teaching someone shamanism or guiding

(43:36):
somebody with shamanism, it's a bigundertaking. There's a lot involved in it,
just like the only effort we putinto this podcast, so Joe and
I and Graham and more likely Tamoand Terry of putting into building up these
four podcasts. It's a lot ofeffort, especially when you know it's not
the thing that we're doing to earna living any of us. It's we
have to earn a living as well. It's it's a lot of effort,

(43:59):
and so it's a big undertaking.So you have to and this in a
way that you have to be judicious, where you put the relatively small amount
of time and effort that you've got, because shamon also still has to do
the job of being a shaman,right, so where you put that effort,
And obviously a shamon doesn't want towaste a lot of effort and talking

(44:22):
to someone who's just gonna, youknow, or encouraging somebody who's just gonna
just waste it and not go onand ultimately pass that onto somebody else.
I mean, to me, whatI'm very hopeful for is what I say
hard working. I mean that thepatrons who are really studying heart this stuff
hard. A lot of them area lot you guys are. I really

(44:44):
really hope you guys are going topass this on to somebody else over time,
and even you know, even thepeople who listen to the podcast and
aren't patrons and who are practicing hard, I really hope you guys pass this
stuff onto somebody else. Shamanism hasto re event itself for every generation.
And we talked about this a littlebit on the podcast as well. People
will say asking things like is itokay if I do an event? And

(45:07):
it's that okay, of course itis, you know, do what you
like, Shamanism is a creative thingwhere we're playing with nature's energies within nature.
So never, never, you neverhave to ask anybody's permission as far
as woven energy is concerned. Justcrack on, get on and do it.
You don't see what happens, learnfrom the experience. You know.
It's um, that's what the kindof thing that shamanism is. I deliberately

(45:29):
haven't trademarked woven energy. I thoughtabout it, but I have deliberately haven't
trademarked it because it's it's really thewhole thing is. It's a description of
what we're about. The universe isa pattern of energy. And you know,
at one time that would have soundedwoo woo, until you know,
modern physics came along, and nowit's pretty obvious, you know, seemingly,

(45:52):
the only things that have any kindof master at all in the end
in the universe under the current understandingwithin physics are quarks and things like that,
and they have very very little massto speak of. So the vast
majority of everything is actually energy,including what we interpret as mass as matter

(46:13):
if you like. And you know, that's going back to I say that
egos mc squared just says it all, doesn't it. If he really was
this genius, he wouldn't have toldanybody about that, would he, Because
you know, C is a verybig number, and what happens when you
square a very big number. Um. You know, this is just just
going back to the sickness a second. This is a simplistic kind of thought,

(46:36):
so all things considered, but it'san interesting thought. I was thinking,
like, it is what we callthe shaman's sickness quote unquote, like
nature's way of sprinkling potential shaman's intothe world, and it's it's nature's way
of making sure that this fundamental andessential, integral part of what it means

(47:00):
to be human it is. It'snature. It's part of, not all
of because nature has many ways ofdoing that, of which shamon sickness is
only one, And as I've said, it's not the only one. And
I believe it's possible to become agreat Shammon without ever undergoing shamon sickness.
At least you wouldn't call it shammonsickness when somebody would who's solid on level

(47:21):
one, solid on level two,solid on level three, solid on level
four, They start practicing level five, six and seven. You would never
call it a sickness because it doesn'tmake them ill. Do you follow me?
That they've got tremendous bat they've gottremendous tosial team, they've got tremendous
ghak. They are more than ableto deal with that stuff when it comes
along in their training, So youcouldn't really call it a sickness. They

(47:45):
do go through the same stuff,but they're well able to not be distracted
by it, to plow on andbe directed in the Shamanac technique. But
yes, I believe that nature interms of for instance, just in terms
of gen X, nature throws upa number of anomalies deliberately. And you

(48:07):
know this is to do with genetmutation and stuff like that. Nature throws
up a number of anomalies deliberately inorder to keep the development of life and
non life it's just two in termsof geology and cosmology and all that kind
of stuff, to keep it flexible, to keep it plastic, to keep

(48:30):
it relevant, and to keep itsability to adapt to new things. If
that stuff didn't happen, for instance, in gen X, you know what
a dull world that would be wewould all be almost carbon copies of each
other or carbon copies of our parentsand stuff. You know, yeah,
this is not good. It's notjust in terms of actual mutation of genes,

(48:53):
that's the rare thing. You alsoget dominant recessive genes. You get
complex patterns of genes, and that'show you end up not being just a
strict copy of your half your yourfather and half of your mother. That
that's how it happens, because GenExis more complicated than that. Very interesting
subject if anybody wants to look intoit, right up until you start getting

(49:14):
into biochemistry and then it gets hardanyway in the mind. But the which
incidentally, we talked about a bitof biochemistry at the gathering of the tribe
as well. That I think thatwas cool because you that that was the
opening lecture called the scientific Basis ofShamanism. We've said, we've talked about
this a lot of times. Idon't like the word basis. Incidentally,

(49:36):
I think the Scientific Explanation of Shamanismwould have been about a title, because
it's not the basis shamanism. TheScientific Explanation of Shamanism. Always pleased to
have the opportunity on the in thelecture format was you know, slides and
evidence I can show in pictorial formthat that what we've been saying about,

(50:00):
they're being nothing supernatural about shamanism.And we got into quite some detail on
things like biochemistry on that on thatlecture, and that lecture is available already
inside Patreon incidentally, and it wasnice to be able to do that at
Long last week. We've talked aboutit so many times on the podcast that
there's nothing supernatural here. It's allexplainable by science. And actually a lot

(50:22):
of it has been explained by science, despite the way some people act.
You know that that lecture covered thesupposedly mystical subject of internal energy in quite
a lot of biochemical detail, justto show that this stuff has already been
worked out. And you know thatall these people, these pseudoscimists who are
looking for what cheers are looking forwhere tears. I'm fraid sorry, there's

(50:45):
a whole bunch of genius chemists andbio just to have beaten you to the
draw. Guys went out long ago. Yeah, So we talked about that
in I believe just before stage two, because you know, if everybody's interested,
if you go back to gosh,now I'm testing myself. Probably around

(51:06):
the episode sixteen mark we started talkingabout the amscarent stage two, but we
did a few episodes leading up toit talking about the science and that's right
ATP and you know, all thiskind of yeah, the electron transport and
all that kind of stuff. Buton this lecture, as we also did,
I mean, I just give acouple of examples electron transport chain ATP
was one in terms of internal energy. But the other one, briefly they

(51:28):
gave was the terpenes, the language, the chemical language the trees used to
communicate with things that aren't trees,including shamans. But also how in chemistry
terms, trees talk to clouds,for instance, to make it rain.
You know, all of that stuffwould have been woo woo and mystical,
probably in some people's minds it stillis. But however many rain dancers and

(51:50):
human shamans do and it doesn't rain. Trees are always worried better at humans
than humans at shamanism. They're wellable to make it rain, and we
go into that on the lecture asin scientific terms, how they managed to
do that, it's very interesting.So so yeah, so that's that's a
traditional model of the sham and theirapprentice, and then there's a few other

(52:12):
models that's them the model where youknow somebody who's very honest and gets the
idea of chelicity and and just goesout into nature and just plunges into it,
and it's very honest with themselves andtries to constantly to suppress their own
imagination and just allows over a longperiod of time, nature to to teach

(52:37):
them directly without a guide. That'salso possible, it's a very hard way
to do it. Because one ofthe advantages I found with my guides in
life is is you know, youthink you're getting somewhere, and your guy
can just turn around and tell you, now, that's your imagining it,
mate. You know, that's souseful, It's so so easy. Because

(53:00):
back when when I first started doingthis stuff, it was it struck me
how quick that this imagination trap cancome upon you. Because just by laying
down and doing a bit of quoteunquote meditation, and I know that's a
term we don't particularly subscribe to,but just sitting down trying to clear the

(53:21):
mind. If you do that fora little bit, you will start seeing
stuff, and I was seeing,I was seeing shapes, I was seeing
all sorts of colors and contact andlike and like behind my eyelids, the
whole world started to Which is,as long as you don't try and interpret
it in my asthmatic terms, aslong as you don't try and interpret it

(53:43):
at all, it's fine. Yah. The problem is that they've pretentive you
to interpret it. But it juststruck me as it struck me that it's
so quick, it happens so quick, and it's like people can get sucked
into those aspects that will happen.When you start learning shamanic technique or you
even just scratch the surface by quoteunquote doing a bit of meditation, you

(54:05):
know this stuff will happen. Andso it's like, how do you deal
I'm not I mean, obviously weknow it's it's the imagination trap, but
it's like, how do you dealwith that? How do you move through
that without letting that distracted? Butalso it's also important to understand why that
happens. We human beings are nottypical animals. Now, I don't want
to have a sort of biblical Adamand Eve thing. We're not atypical in

(54:29):
that way. We are not anydifferent from other animals in that sense,
you know, like Adam and Evecome along and and they are the ruling
over the animals, and they're notanimals kind of thing. I don't mean
it in that way. What Imean is this this whole thing we're tool
use. And again we talked aboutthis on the lecture. How you know,
starting off the trees gives us certainadvantages. They need to visualize tools

(54:54):
in order to be able to makethem. We're not the only tool making
animals. Chimpanzees do it thanks toit. But that ability to visualize makes
us especially prone as a species comparedto other species that don't particularly use tools.
I mean, tigers use tools,but they come naturally. They don't
have to do anything to get clauseright, they're just They's nothing we have

(55:16):
to do to acquire them other thanjust like grow. So so I think
that it's important to understand that we'renot We're atypical, and this is why
we've done this atypical thing that thatTerres McKenna is talking about in the song.
Human History represents such a radical breakwith nature and the natural organization that
preceded it. It's a radical breakbecause we develop that ability to make tools.

(55:43):
First of all, we developed theability to physically make them with the
oppossible thumb because of tree climbing.You know, we started off in the
trees and then came down from thetrees, which is cool ability. We
could then manipulate. We're good atmanipulating things because the possible thumb. And
then i'll brains basically fused the bitof the brain that deals with visualization and

(56:06):
the rest of the brain so thatwe can start to visualize things that don't
exist that as if they do exist, like gods and you know, monsters
and you know, all that kindof stuff. And you know, imagine
ourselves as something that we're not like, you know, imagine ourselves as a
powerful shamon. We're actually we haveno ability whatsoever. You know, this

(56:29):
type of thing. You see thata lot. There's a reason why we
developed to be particularly prone to it. So what I'm saying, as human
beings are particularly prone to the imaginationtrap because of our nature of how we
evolved. I mean as a species, as a group of animals with a
particular outlook on the world, ajedac outlook on the world. We're particularly

(56:49):
prone to that problem, whereas Idon't think you'll find an animal like a
swallow is particularly prone to the imaginationtrap. There's no way they can be.
I mean, the fly through mygarden, it's just wonderful. I
sitting watching for hours, you know, taking those insects out of the air
at high speed, making those amazingturns. It's just phenomenal. If they

(57:10):
weren't in a deep, deep stateof chelicity, they would never be able
to do that. I mean thatthere's no room for thought. No,
there's no room for chelicity. Theyare chelicity and not the only animals that
I do like swallows, but they'renot the one. And that's also it's
a shingy animal, isn't it,you know? But they're not the only
and we will when we get onanimal spirits, will we ever be doing

(57:35):
swallows at some point in time youcan look forward to that. They they
are total masters of chelicity, andbut they're not total masters of toolmaking.
You don't want to get, um, you don't want to get a swallow
to do You're flint napping for you. Um. So we talked about flint
napping on the podcast on the sorrythe guy think of the tribe as well,

(58:00):
which is great. And we hadto actually some some semi expert input
from from patrons, greatly appreciated.And yeah we have I'm not going to
spoil the surprise, but we havea patron who we'd liked interview at some
point in time I won the podcastswho's a bit of an expert in that
type of stuff. So, butI want to spoil surprise just yet.

(58:21):
Okay, so yeah, yeah,lovely, I do have one more question
that may or may not annoy you. Oh go fant man, do you
consider there's a reason why I'm askingthis? Do you do you consider Terence
McKenna, as we brought him upin this podcast, to be a shaman
or more of an animist. He'sa super interesting guy. I mean,

(58:45):
he's a super interesting guy who isalso or was also a guy who was
full of ideas, full of energy, full of life. And and I
tell you the reason why I askedthat questions and then and then you continue.
So the reason I asked it isbecause having listened to having gone through

(59:07):
all sorts with you, he's anenigma in my mind, is terms mcconnay
because of how much he is.He is adamant, you know, about
the psychedelic experience and the usage ofsaid substances in order to gain insights.
So I'm wondering he has such avisualization and a clarity of mind as to

(59:30):
what shamanism and animism is, andthe way he expresses it is very visual,
and I'm wondering does that come fromhis use of psychedelics and how do
we square that with we's square init. There's no problem squaring it.
Mean, I've never denied that youcan pursue shamanic technique using psychoactive substances.

(59:52):
I've never denied that. I don'tdisagree with a lot of the stuff that
McKenna says in terms of especially Imean, for instance, my favorite work
of face is the book called Foodof the Gods. If you want a
mechanic recommendation and you haven't read thatamazing work, then do read it.
There's hardly a word I disagree within that book. What im where people

(01:00:15):
would see me as having a differentposition to him is an emphasis his emphasis.
And it's no wonder he's a botanistfor goodness sake. You know,
he's interested in plants, and obviouslythat's the lens through which he sees everything.
You also everything. And I don'tblame him any he has a totally
legitimate view of shamanism or shaman shuhe was. They only differences that you

(01:00:43):
know, every shaman has a differentway. They have to find their way
to bring other people to this path. And the richness of his character is
one of the things I'd like tostress. A lot of Shammon's end up
like that. You know, youcan see with me and the richness of
my characters come in a different way. I'm the martial arts collector, aren't

(01:01:04):
I. You know, I'm alsothe spirit dance collector. I mean,
for instance, so for the firsttime io I did some I mean first
time ifo with other people, Idid some Malay spirit dance on the gathering
of the tribe along with the normalyou know, you know, I don't
believe the spirit dance is anything todo with different countries, but some some
spirit dance stuff that will come fromthe Malay tradition I showed, you know,

(01:01:25):
just just to show that you know, this thing is not the exclusive
preserve of Mongolia and Japan, whichyou might get the impression, you know,
if you see me talking about spurtdance normally. So the point is
that Shammon's because of the tortial teamthing, they end up with quite rich
portfolios of technique if they do itfor a long time. And McKenna looked

(01:01:49):
into a lot of different things,skewed by his interest in plants and the
psychoactive I don't know side foundation aspectof shamanism um, and my interest has
been heavily skewed by spirit dance.You know, we have this podcast on

(01:02:09):
shamanism, and we do talk aboutdrum technique, and we've talked about other
things. We've talked about homey lookand various other shamanic techniques. We did
some drum technique and we're gonna onthe gathering of the tribe. But we're
gonna the whole of the next gatheringtribe is gonna be on drum technique.
But if you took this podcast asa whole, you would see that Damon
has a particularly skew towards spurt dance. Right. It's and I would never

(01:02:34):
deny that it's my particular portfworder portfolioof m shamanic technique. So but in
a way, my spurt Dance isMcKenna's Mushrooms. That's approbate between Follo out
of Me. The reason I likespurt dance is its richness, its variety.
But also in some ways spurt dancegives you a path to Battoshalton and

(01:03:00):
Goooker in terms of use of psychoactivesubstances, especially bad it gives you a
path to that that you are readywhen you experience that stuff. And my
worry about the psychoactive substances has alwaysbeen out of sequence in terms of a

(01:03:21):
new person newly coming to the subjectof shamanism, that advanced practice comes out
of sequence and it ends up makingthem think that they are doing shamanism when
in fact they are doing amplified imaginationtrap amplified a course by the psycho substances.

(01:03:43):
Yeah, so that's my worry.But but you surprise. I mean,
we could do a review of thatbook Through to the Gods. I
do love it. It's one ofmy favorite books ever, and it's just
such a special book, and itdescribes them the asthma. The only literary
work that describes the asthma better thanthat is The Chemical Wedding it's the only

(01:04:08):
one. Um yeah, which yeah, which needs deciphering in and of itself.
Yeah, well we'll start out.So many people asked us for so
long to start on day two andheretics, and we have actually started,
so probably we'll be getting moved onwith day two shortly. But it is
a really great book, and soyeah, I recommend that book to anybody.

(01:04:30):
And I think it frustrates a lotof people around me. They can't
understand why I have such a reverencefor McKenna when I seem to have such
vehement disagreement with them. But thedisagreement is kind of superficial. That's probably
the way from my point of view, if we did get together that there
would we would have a far morein common I think than you than you

(01:04:51):
might expect. That's that's my view. Yeah, And what a wonderful person,
you know, and and his outputinspired me among many others. I
remember back back when we were therewas a period of about a year where
we did so much housework here itwas ridiculous. But one of the things

(01:05:11):
that got me through it was justlistening to Terrence McKenna on repeat, you
know, Like there's lots of videoson YouTube of him just just literally talking
for hours and you just get wrappedup in it. He's such a such
a good orator. So yeah,so I mean, but there are dangerous
to that as well. You can'tdo it all on the baseline. As

(01:05:31):
you know, you can't do thestuff. It's not good enough to be
away from painting. And I thinkthat is the one thing that we have
harped on about, probably like astuck record since the beginning of this podcast.
I'm quite pleased about it. Isjust thinking about this stuff, just
listening to our podcast, just readingbooks, just all that I'm thinking about
in your head. You've got topractice, you've got to go out and

(01:05:55):
do it, and you've got ahead butt nature. As we've said many
times, the idea that the solutionto anything is some kind of baseline,
right theoscination is a really bad ideawhere especially when it comes to spiritual kind
of subjects, because spiritual subjects aretop line subjects, right, the upper

(01:06:16):
world subjects, they're not underworld subjects. So it's it's important to keep this
in mind when I'm recommending books andstuff. I'm just recommending it as a
good book that will give you someinsights into the development of shamanism over time
and help to give a broad aboutthe picture of what the me ask me
is. This may ask my thingthat we keep talking about, but it

(01:06:40):
isn't going to help you become ashaman at all. It's not you've got
to practice for that. But seeingthe progress of our patrons or the gatheringment
of tribe. As I said earlier, it's a it's it's a joy to
me. The answer to the question. You know, if you'd ask me

(01:07:00):
back in twenty thirteen, then ifit was twenty thirteen, can you learn
shamanism from a podcast? If Joeasked me that, then he doesn't ask
me that, he's just saying,can we do a podcast next time we
see him? Can we do apodcast? And so on? Wouldn't been
a firm No, I'm not sosure anymore. I'm not so sure about
that anymore. Well, it wasdue to your Toshal team that we that

(01:07:24):
we did it. You know,wants to lose. Let's let's play,
let's experiment. Let's throw throw itout into the world and see what happens.
Yeah, yeah, okay, thenabsolutely brilliant as this episode. Anything
else you want to add or shouldwe should we wrap it up? No,
just to thanks our patrons once again, you guys brighten up my world.

(01:07:45):
Thanks ever so much. Excellent yep, and of course just to reiterate,
you can come and join us onpatron and of course get access to
the previous gathering of the tribe whichis included in there, and any future
future posts that that we put up. So thanks a lot for listening and
we'll see you in the next one. Thanks for listening, guys,