S. Kelley Harrell's Blog: Intentional Insights - Ancient Healing, Modern Shamanism, page 115

Weekly Rune – Nauthiz

 

Nauthiz - Need - There’s a pattern of receiving Nauthiz as the weekly Rune after having a wonderful reprieve or long-desired breakthrough.  Isn’t that just the way? Last week we had the ‘Green means go” support of Mannaz carrying us on its shoulders, now followed this week with Nauthiz’s firm but supportive, “Are you sure?”

The Rune of discontent and drive to change comes up now that we have a plan in mind, yet are waffling on following through. Nauthiz can’t tell us what direction to choose, or how to implement our choice. It can, though, shed significant light on all the soul checks that need to happen to be sure this is the right action.  The fact that this Runes comes up now indicates that something about our current plan isn’t right action.

This gentle caution doesn’t necessarily mean we have to go off the rails and start again from zero. Or does it? At the very least, walk around the frame. Kick the tires. Look under the hood. Make sure the details are covered as much as can be in awareness, and bless the ones that can’t.

Nauthiz comes down to basic economics. Humans are built to want more, whether it’s consciousness, money, or icecream.  Yet sooner or later, we all must learn that there is a balance between what we have, what we want, and how what we will do to get it affects us. We must first find that balance within ourselves, then realize there is a greater ledger of balance with All Things. Nauthiz is the scale upon which we weigh what we think we want and the effort it will take us to get it, against what we really want and can heartily enjoy having.

Take seriously that this yellow light may not mean stop or go. It may just be a reminder to slow down and pay closer attention.

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Ethics and Implications of Distance Soul Healing

Kelley,  Last year my friend’s eighty-some year-old father went into the hospital for the fourth time in a few months. He had fallen, had a brain bleed, and other serious problems. She sent out an e-mail asking for prayers for her dad, saying she had been “shown” the possibility of his full recovery. I offered a prayer and sent energy from heaven and earth to be received as his higher self directed. I had no intentions beyond these. When I was praying for him, I “saw” him and experienced his presence. I also saw an etheric issue in his field, which I could imagine my guides shifting. I asked him if it was okay to allow them to do this, and h is response was along the lines of,  ”Of course I want to be helped out of this! Anything you can do, do it. Let’s get started already!”

Our guides and some other angelic took charge of the energy. I don’t remember what they did, though the matter was handled.  A few days later I heard he made a remarkable recovery  and was released to rehab. Eventually he went home, though he never fully recovered. He had other medical incidents and passed away two weeks ago.

My question is, did I do something ill-advised? I have since read that one should never do healing work of this nature without permission from the subject on the physical plane. According to these sources, they need to say “yes” verbally or in writing. Believing that one has permission from that person’s soul or higher self is not adequate. Also, could I have retained any energy from this interaction that is damaging to me?    Thank you, C.

Thanks for your note, C.  What a great question, and what a great experience!  I do distance soul healing as part of my shamanic practice, and I’m often asked about the ethics of it. For my professional work, I base my intentions from what clients inform me needs balance. I do a very careful assessment of the request and determine if I’m a good fit for that distance work. If not, I will say, and if so, I proceed with the client’s permission.

Working from a general request for healing is a very different approach. I am in the camp that you get the verbal agreement when possible, and that you don’t sit down and intend to do healing without someone’s knowledge of it.  In cases like you describe, where it wasn’t at all your intention, I think you were at the right place and the right time for some other touch that needed an earthly vessel to work through, for him.  Because you didn’t intend it, this experience is different.  You intended the space.  What happened in it was beyond you. You were likewise blessed by witnessing it.

As far as picking up things from doing healings for others…  You always have to clean yourself after, even when the session went great, with no tension or distress–to you or the recipient. In the same way that you wash your hands before you eat at a restaurant, clear yourself before healing work.  The same way that you wash them when you are done eating, clear yourself after.   Part of what makes shamanic healing successful is the long-established relationship with one’s guides, as well as great finesse in traversing the spirit realms.  That said, when doing healings, whether in-person or remotely for others or self, we pass through layers that are beyond our awareness.  Even those of us who do such healings and soul interactions regularly don’t know every little detail of  what’s in that space, what’s been there, ever. That’s why we do rituals before and after healings, to clear out what is not appropriate to the healing, and what isn’t appropriate for us to bring back from it.

Clearing yourself after directing healing can be as simple as, “I release anything from this experience that doesn’t bless me,” or “”I release anything from this experience that isn’t aligned with my wellbeing.”  Use the wording that literally gives you a tingle or some clear sense of a shift.

C, you are wise to consider the parameters of ethical remote healing, as well as its potential to affect you.  Thanks for probing thoughts we all need to consider as we become more responsible, responsive Universal citizens.

 

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Weekly Rune – Mannaz

Mannaz - human- Whatever you’re doing, keep doing it, and solicit all the help you can to sustain the momentum.  This week isn’t about acting alone, being the star, or any other solitary victories.  Sure, this is your life, and it all comes down to your choices, actions, and energy, though your ability to be successful with any of that sources from your ability to connect.

Nobody can do it for you, that’s a given. So, neither hero antics, nor suffering in martyred silence are necessary. Get up, get out, and do. Engage. Talk about your plans. Share your insights. Get insightful feedback. Listen.  Give insightful feedback. Be genuinely interested in what others have to say, about your plans, as well as their own.

The message is that you can get there, wherever ‘there’ is, possibly this week. You can be done with what’s on your plate. The way this happens is by becoming authentically involved.  The energy created from your liaisons with others not only manifests your desires, it also fosters the desires of others to manifest.

This is how creation happens. This is how the actions of one affect All. This is how we come together to be community for each other.  This is how we remember we were never separate.

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Weekly Rune – Thurisaz

Thurisaz - thorn- There is an expression, “in the weeds,” in the food and beverage service industry, in which not only have you gotten overwhelmed by the tasks before you, but you’ve fallen behind. Given that Thurisaz translates to “thorn,” I find that an apt symbol for the present vibe.  Worth noting, the last time Thurisaz was the weekly Rune, Mercury was retrograde. It just went direct yesterday.

While that may seem, and certainly feels, dismal on the surface, keep in mind that under duress, amazing outcomes manifest. Elements conspire to form diamonds, metal is whetted into sharp blades, nectar becomes honey.  In each of these, experience creates an outcome utterly unfathomable from its original form.  Thus, our attention turns to how we apply our knowledge, how we acquire it, and the tools we use to move forward in it.

This, too, shall pass.  In fact, it is already passing, and from some deeper vantage point within, has passed.  Imagine what the new, improved you looks like.  How does it feel to be not just through, but beyond the present rough patch?  Situate yourself into that moment. Breathe it, practice walking around it.  When you deeply immerse in the senses of what you want, what is most needed, you will realize that is precisely what you possess.

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Life After Life

Hi, Kelley – I have recently been very bothered with the concept of the end of physical existence. This just hit me as I am watching my small children grow. I have been doing lots of web searching on any proof of existence beyond death, i.e. the afterlife.  In your experience, do we really have existence after physical death? If so, is it your understanding that we get to interact with our loved ones on that plane? Thank you for any response! Randy

Thanks for your note, Randy. I’ve spent a lot of time traveling the spirit realm, processing my own perceptions of what that is, as well as what those who dwell only in the spirit realm say the experience out of form is.  I can’t say for certain if the experience fully removed from the body is the same or similar to soul travel out of the body. I can say that the experiences I’ve had in soul travel are beyond what my imagination could create, and I’m always left compelled to explore the possibilities more.  With that in mind, the short answer is yes, there is something after and beyond being in form, as I’ve experienced it.  Exactly what that is seems to vary.

Initially I’m told by my spirit guides that what we believe in form is how life out of form shapes.  It makes sense if you think about it, as what we believe is how life in form shapes, too.  That we create our own reality isn’t a far-fetched concept anymore.  So, as someone who carries no preconception of punishment or reward after life in form, I don’t experience that there is such.  What I experience in spirit space is an opportunity for total clearing of my worries, completing or releasing unfinished business, recognizing needs to be filled, deep blessings and gratitude for experiences I treasure, blessing the form and bringing it peace. That space can be very complicated or very simple, it seems, and how much we have managed mindfulness and found peace on stresses in life dictates how gently we fare between lives.

With that concept in mind, I have experienced that the space between lives is rich, if not a landscape for entire other lives, as well.  The idea that we have lives between lives, in the space where we are utterly and completely out of form, is precious.  In that space I’ve encountered soulmates who never come into form, who volunteer to be an anchor in that between space, feeding the work that their physical counterpart does here. Likewise, the notion that we have needs, relationships,  tasks to perform that only pertain to life between lives is amazing.

Coming back into form?  It’s a choice. It seems that some feel they can best make peace with unfinished business by coming back to create themselves again.  I know some cultures honor a very strict hierarchy in returning to form, though I’ve never observed a specific pattern or rules around doing so.

Regarding whether we know each other and can interact out of form, my experience is that we do, though it’s different.  We do recognize Aunt Millie in the spirit realm, though our perception of ourselves and Life becomes so big that we don’t need to restrict her to being just “Aunt Millie.” We don’t need to restrict ourselves to being only what we were, are, in form.  When we traverse the spirit realm, our perception becomes bigger, fuller, deeper. Our concept of ‘relationship’ becomes less about how we knew each other in form and more about how we find each other in ourselves, in everything, all the time.

The questions you’re asking Randy, are ones we all must confront.  By doing so now, you are creating the kind of mindfulness that will allow you to be aware out of form. I truly believe that one of the great disservices our culture has done itself is in not teaching how to die mindfully. The overall message I get from my guides on life after life is if we know how to die well, that means we’re living well, too.

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Weekly Rune – Ingwaz

 

Ingwaz (or Inguz) - People of Ing - We’ve been in this rhythm of movement, then coasting for a while, now. So it would seem with the frequent intermittent presence of Ingwaz, suggesting that we take time to process our journey and let it root into change.

We tend to look for progress as this steady jaunt to some expected outcome, marking completes items off a list along the way. Ingwaz reminds us that true progress is measured not by our ability to reach the finish line first, but to reach it in a way that supports and fosters our integrity, shares our truth, and inspires others to hold to theirs. In short, Ingwaz cautions us that plans change, and it’s okay to roll with what comes. In fact, if we find that our plans have changed and kick in the reflex to fight it, the things we want most can’t come into being. No matter what lies ahead, what plans have been made, what desires motivate, all we can really work with is the present. Give it the attention it deserves, the regrouping we and our desires deserve.

Ingwaz is what I call a ‘hinge’ Rune, in that it’s about that tiny space–or maybe nonspace–between Here—> and

If you would like a personal Rune reading, check out my new service 30 for $30–a thirty minute Distance Rune Reading, for $30. Schedule your session by clicking the button to the right.

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Plight of the Spiritual Renegade: Finding a Respectable Soul Worker

I’ve been sitting with this article on the shaping of shamanism as a dangerous industry in South America, particularly with the use of entheogens as induction into ecstatic trance. I don’t condemn or condone the use of substances in trance work, though everyone I know who uses them never does so alone, always with a trusted master of such approaches to the spirit realm. The use of such chemicals is the focus of the article, though I’m not convinced it should be.  I think something more compelling is at work.

That said, I’ve written several blogs and articles on the pattern of believing enlightenment hides in some far off land, and that trend concerns me deeply. Again, whatever works for you. Whatever gets you there. It is with all caution in mind that I say, the trade of spiritual tourism isn’t limited to tribal nations or economically oppressed countries. A thriving business of spiritual healing exists right here in the US, with potential wonders and dangers of its own. Recall 2009′s James Arthur Ray sweatlodge fiasco. The truth is, we’ve never had to travel far and wide to find charlatans, anymore than we’ve had to in order to find enlightenment.

Culturally, we are perched on the border of very interesting territory. We see old regimes falling, organized religions crumbling. Many seekers readily identify a hunger to connect with deeper meaning in life, a need to caretake self at every level available. Yet, even though many are leaving those old systems, we still carry with us old engrained truths. Foremost is the belief that we cannot find enlightenment for ourselves, that we must defer to a schooled master of esoteric truths, who will instruct us along the journey to find our own. As well, so many are deeply hurt or turned off by the established institutions that we run to anything that doesn’t resemble them for help. We don’t believe that enlightenment lives in our backyard–literally in the faces that look like ours, the Nature that graces our every day, the circumstances of our own creation.

These seem like small concerns, though they actually manifest as widespread cultural spiritual emergency, leaving people vulnerable to all manner of healers, energy workers, shamans, and exotic adventures that promise great release. Coming from historic frameworks that taught us no spiritual autonomy, the senses to intuit what is in our best interest are often undeveloped. Particularly for those in pain, every healing modality sounds promising, every practitioner is a saviour. Given that, I think it’s important for spiritual renegades to feel supported in finding the path and soul healing approaches that are right for them.  In fact, I think the following considerations are good guidelines for anyone taking their spiritual path, direction, and healing into their own hands:

If it sounds too good to be true, it is. Just because a modality is spiritual doesn’t make it magickal, or honest. All healing approaches take work, usually of the disciplined mindful variety. They also take time. Anyone who says you can be fully healed in one session and offers no support for processing the results of the work after that session likely will do more harm than good.  As well, anyone who says s/he can heal you is working through ego more than soul.
Seek services from practitioners referred by someone you know. If you don’t know how to choose a practitioner best for you, ask a deeply trusted friend for insight.
If you have no referrals, do lots of research. Read. Study. Ask tons of questions. Any practitioner who won’t give you free insight into their work and how they do it isn’t worth your time, let alone your money.
Work only with practitioners who honor you. If you feel disregarded, manipulated, further hurt, insulted, or otherwise compromised by a practitioner, this person is not acting in your best interest. Please also know that this person is not representative of other such practitioners.
Above all, honor your gut feeling about a modality, as well as the practitioner. If a modality is right for you, but the practitioner isn’t, find someone else. If the practitioner feels right but the modality doesn’t, ask if the work can be done a different way. Wherever you are on the path of cultivating your intuition, you have deep signals that tell you when something isn’t good for you. Honor them. They are your best ally.

Though many of us have been on alternate spiritual paths and/or held the role of soul wellbeing facilitator for decades, this road still looks wild and daunting to those who are newly seeking support and direction. I encourage other spiritual healing practitioners to become involved in an active effort to educate clients and the general public about your work, why you do it, how you do it. Education will be the thing that not only informs our culture of its shamanic legacy and potential, it will also be the force that heals us all.

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Weekly Rune – Hagalaz

Hagalaz – Hail – This week expect something out of left field. Not necessarily bad or good, just bear in mind that whatever plans you have, external reality has others.  Hagalaz doesn’t portend that what you want isn’t important or can’t come to pass, though it may be seriously delayed.  Likewise, once you see the wake of Hagalaz and how it shakes things up, you may not want what you thought you wanted.

Is good, yes?

Usually understood as hail, Hagalaz leaves us shivering, if not a tad jittery. It represents damage, uncontrollable conditions, extreme cold. We are reminded of water’s power to destroy; thus, its ability to reshape landscapes, social systems, needs, lives…

Ever read of weather shamanism? Many traditional and modern shamans work with the weather.  Likewise, a lot of people believe that these cohorts of the elements can bend them to their will, drive them to desired outcomes.  Not so. They don’t force results; rather, they flow with processes. They connect with the spiritual manifestation of a weather pattern or element, such that they become it, and a storm never harms itself.  The path of devastation reveals only what stood in its way, what could not bend. Flexibility plods along, unscathed.

Remember that, now.  Whatever storm comes your way this week, find its center and sway with it.  Blend your essence with confrontation by greeting it as a friend, and that relationship will prevail.  Also, hold in mind that the way things looked before Hagalaz will not be the way they look after.  When the storm passes, you will not be the same person.

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The Darker Side of Lightwork

Kelley, The spirit of Tara, my ex wife and dear friend, has appeared to a new psychic friend. She seems to be warning me of something harmful that is coming. Three days ago was the seven-year anniversary of her passing, which was very unusual and unexpected in the jungle of Ecuador, while doing Ayahuasca with shamans. Any insight? Thanks, Flash.

Thanks for your note, Flash. The anguished aspect of Tara that I met was still in the jungle. You and I have done work around her death years back, though something that became evident this time was that this aspect of her was being held back on purpose, through no efforts of her own. I realized this as when I met her this time, she pointed behind me to a seething spiritual presence of indigenous magick that draws on the abilities of others. It appeared as a group of men dressed in plants, wool, and body paint.

My understanding from the altercation that transpired between myself and the men was that Tara wasn’t being held only for her intuitive abilities to be usurped by them, but everyone who energetically reached back to the point of her death in an attempt to understand what happened to her or do release work around her death, was being wicked of their abilities, as well. I don’t pretend to know what this presence was, it’s particular method, etc. What was clear is that they were a local force that had long-mastered the ability to draw on the spiritual abilities of others for their own use. They recognized Tara as a powerful intuitive, and they decided to keep this aspect of her soul there for good, to continue using and attract other intuitives to come find her. As these innocents came to help Tara, they would be leeched of power, possibly rendered unable to help Tara. In other words, this magickal force attached to those who have attempted to help Tara, and remained attached, drawing on power from many people over the years–including you. Especially you.

My guides intervened and took over the whole situation. They bound that presence to Nature, such that it can be gradually healed and released. It didn’t feel right to just yank it out and remove it. There was a need for this presence to come to know a more connected, balanced way of holding magickal power. Until such time, it is bound to Nature. Healing was done for Tara, whose final words upon her deathwalk were, “Heal Flash.” All healing that could be done for you and those who have attempted to help Tara over the years was given, and rooted into all present lives.

For you this means a steady return of power you haven’t felt for a long while, or felt but couldn’t hold onto fully. What was being taken from you is now able to be fully possessed by you. There may be emotional healing needed around this, as its return could stir some echoes of grief and longing. Overall, nothing is coming, Flash. It was already there, and needed to go. A light you’ve needed to see for a long time is flickering to life.

Edited to add: This article on ambiguous spiritual tourism and the use of ayahuasca just came out this week.

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Weekly Rune – Ingwaz

 

Ingwaz (or Inguz) - People of Ing - It’s quiet time.  A lot of ground has been covered lately, and the solitude needed to process that journey and let it root into a changed course is now.  In western culture, even among spiritually well-intended folk, is the drive to Go Go Go! and not allow time for what has been upturned, re-evaluated, calibrated, and set into motion to fly, be free!.  Somewhat addicted to the allure of expanding consciousness, we want to sustain that esoteric high.  We constantly stretch for the goal, then wonder why we burn out, or the goal shifts just left of center.

I’ll tell you why:  everything must root, and to properly ground into the place where we need to grow, we have to make peace with being still.  Of course being still doesn’t mean doing nothing. Solitude requires a tremendous amount of effort, particularly for those not comfortable being mindful.  That is exactly how all of the good-living practices, healing work, and study come to fruition.  This is the point that they become intuition.

Ingwaz is what I call a ‘hinge’ Rune, in that it’s about that tiny space–or maybe nonspace–between Here—> and

Worked muscles must rest.  Wounds must mend. Knowledge and experience must marinate into wisdom. So let this time be the point that rest, allow, and in doing so engage our deepest truth.

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