Healers, Shamans and Curanderas, continued

Healing has been practiced as long as humans have existed, in one form or another, by traditional healers and shamans. Fundamentally, healing can be considered as a change of state, resulting in an improved harmony, a relief from suffering whether it be spiritual, mental, emotional, and/or physical in nature. In fast-paced modern cultures, the focus of healing is more often than not on how to accomplish a “quick fix” cure for a problem that relieves symptoms that can be generally applied across the board to anyone, rather than addressing the underlying cause(s) within the individual or community that created the imbalance in the first place. Typically, by the time an imbalance reaches the physical body, it has been present for some time within the more refined subtle bodies.

In indigenous cultures, the focus of a traditional healer is on healing at the causal level, using holistic approaches that address all areas of a person’s life; their family, environment, and community. A shaman is usually a healer; however, not all healers are shamans. A shaman is a hunter or tracker; one who tracks the causes of an imbalance, functioning as a conduit between this world and the otherworlds. Although there are many types of healers and shamans who are at different levels of development, there is no hierarchy for Creator, who is the source of all life and is the only One who heals. A healer can facilitate creative openings for someone to experience healing; however, no one can predict whether or not, or how someone will heal. If a person is willing to change and open for healing on all levels, then it may occur. In all things we have free will which includes whether or not we will heal and the degree to which healing will manifest.

Although anyone can study and practice the healing arts and shamanism, for we are all part of the healing of this world by virtue of our birth and the gifts that we carry, there are those who are called to this path whose life purpose is to learn so as to serve by carrying medicine for the people. Divination before birth may indicate that someone is called to be a healer and/or shaman. Sometimes an event occurs that identifies someone called to be a traditional healer/shaman, such as a near-death experience, being struck by lightning, or recovery from a life threatening illness or trauma. Events like these cause a crack, or an opening in the person’s bubble, initiating a transformative process guided by their soul which transforms them from who they think they are into who they really are. This transformative process eventually culminates in the fulfillment of their highest potential and spiritual freedom.

Direct experience in life is a powerful teacher, and the healer’s survival was seen as a confirmation by Creator, the source of all life, and by Nature of a healer’s calling. A healer learns how to heal effectively by first learning to heal themselves, through overcoming the illnesses, life challenges, and traumas that they encounter in their own lives. During this process, they go through a period of rigorous training with one or more elders who serve as guides pointing the way for an apprenticed healer to heal themselves, to become a clear conduit, and to hone their abilities. Initially, an apprentice healer first works with babies and young children for they are less resistant to change, before moving on to help adults. This experiential training hones the skills they need to help others along their life journey. Rather than becoming carbon copies of their elders, they develop their own unique ways of conducting this healing as an art of living.
Generally, there are two paths a developing healer can take; that of gathering information about techniques and knowledge about the different modalities of healing and offering them to their clients from the onset, or the longer path of focusing on their own healing and helping those that Creator brings to them who ask for their assistance. A traditional healer views the art of healing, as a lifelong pursuit, an art that is learned and developed over many years of practice in service to the people.

Although the tools, clothing, and settings reflect their culture, many of the tools are universal: the rattle, drum, bell, feather, incense, fire, candles, crystals, stones, sacred songs, sounds, and medicine plants. Our bodies respond to all sacred sounds at a causal level for they correspond to sounds we all experienced in the womb before we were born when we created our bodies with the energy and nourishment provided by our mothers. These tools, along with a pure heart, an ability to listen with all of the senses, a clear intuition, and most importantly a harmonious relationship with Creator, the spirit doctors, and nature are a vital part of the healing art.

Healing can be described as the art of changing consciousness at will, for in shifting our perception by expanding consciousness, we can become conduits for healing energy to flow so that we are transformed. At its essence, healing is a shifting from imbalance into a renewed harmony that improves one’s experience of life. The pivotal point is the moment of shifting from discomfort into a more harmonious state of being. We live in a world of polarity, night – day, good – bad, up – down, where everything that exists in physical form has an opposite or complement in our physical world. Where does day start and night begin? In those in-between states, the shifting point from imbalance to balance is the pivot where healing can occur.

There are many ways that a healer may express their art and degrees of development. Many healers function quite effectively using the rote rituals, songs, and formulas taught to them by their elders. At the higher levels, a healer becomes adept at dropping all sense of self, fully present in the moment, becoming as a hollow bone or a living conduit for healing energy to move through. When such a healer enters a higher state of unity and consciousness, they can diagnose and intuit what has caused the imbalance and what can be done to restore harmony. By shifting their energy to match their client’s, a sympathetic resonance occurs, like two sine-waves overlapping in sync. Then, the healer can shift their energy into the appropriate healing frequency and the person moves into a more harmonious state of being. At the highest levels of healing, the energy body of a healer or shaman affects change without any action taken or word spoken. In actuality, there is only one healing event, occurring simultaneously for both the healer and the person being healed: both are transformed by the interchange. Thus, healing is an art and an ongoing practice wherein the healer becomes more adept at being the healing itself.

We live in a time of great change, a pole-shift of consciousness that is occurring globally and cosmically. As part of this transformation, we are going through a quantum leap forward in our evolution as a species. Since 1998, we have been outside of time which has allowed us to grow, change, and transform far more rapidly than before. As more opportunities open up for healers to learn from indigenous elders, we can become living rainbow bridges between the ancient and modern world carrying medicine in service for the people.

Wendy Luckey is a traditional healer and shaman who has practiced the art of healing for over thirty years. She has trained with indigenous elders and shamans as well as modern alternative healing practitioners and brings a unique blend of both ancient and modern healing ways to assist people in living the lives they were born to live. At the heart of her work is freedom, the freedom to be who and what we really are, thereby achieving our highest potential and living life ecstatically.

Published in Heart Beat Magazine www.heartbeat.com and Vitality Magazine www.VitalityMagazine.com November 2009