For some of us, the word prayer invokes feelings of being small while making entreaties to a god
that is big and far, far away. Some of us might associate prayer with
guilt, as in “I don’t pray enough” or more likely, “I am _(lazy,
unenlightened, lame, etc)_ because I have not kept up with my spiritual
practice.”
But there is no shame or blame in the spirit world that we choose to engage with in shamanism. There is only love.
Shamanism
in all things is about relationship. Relationships with the awesome,
embracing, guiding spirits, relationship with the self — and just as
profoundly, relationship with the land. This relationship with the land
is where prayer comes in.
Prayer, meditation, yoga,
martial arts practices all talk about Being. As a shamanic person, this
means being myself as the magnificent carnal creature of the earth that
I am. As I go deeper into my meditation, I am more and more awakened to
my fibers, to the breath of the trees, to the birds, to the concrete
and cars passing by. I am awakened, once again, to the passages that
connect it all together. The connection, all around like crazy and
wrapping back to me, is relationship. It is highly intimate if I open my
heart to it.
This work, this gentle finding of our way back into relationship with the Mother Earth is prayer.
The experience is more like Ahhhh… There you are! Ahhh… There I am!
And Ohhhh, it’s so nice to be back. It’s a home-coming. It is unique to
all of us and unique each time we practice. We practice and practice
with no goal, really, because we reverently know that there is always
more to find. This practice of finding, communing and balancing is all
there is. It is what it is. It just is. Delicious.
In this conversation with her, some of us may find peace, some may
find revelation, in some, a long awaited release of emotion. After we
have been able to clear the private rivers of mind and emotion, there
is, waiting for us, joy. This being in relationship, being in balance,
is intrinsically, joy.
As a shamanic person, I do not find that I teach or hold ceremony out
of an altruistic desire to help, nor from a feeling of obligation.
Rather, I do it because it is my function in this vast web of beings to
bring things back into balance – myself, the land, the humans I walk
with and between the earth and sky energies. I do what I do because it
is who I am, so I don’t need any reasons. It makes things less
complicated. I am a love-earth creature and my job is to bring balance.
It is my place.
Prayer is the first step to coming back into relationship with my
home, Mother Earth. It is the prerequisite to doing any other work. She
is always there, waiting. Or not waiting. Just being. But she is always
there, willing to connect. All the good stuff.
Shamanism. Relationship. Balance.