I’ve been spending time recently reading Terence McKenna and listening to lectures by Alberto Villoldo on Shamanism. These two men have spent a great deal of time with the Shamen of the Amazon rainforest and both men assert that the worldview of the indigenous people of that region have a great deal to offer the peoples of the industrialized western world. From what I understand, I tend to agree.
There are two aspects to this world
Although the Shamanic traditions can sometimes take the world view that there are two aspects to the world, the visible and (under normal circumstances) the invisible; this is completely different to the idea that there are two separate worlds, this one and the next.
The role of the Shaman
The role of the Shaman is to mediate between the visible and the invisible, often through altered states of consciousness. The skill of the Shaman is in his mastery over altered states of consciousness; which are used to reveal and work with the hidden components of the universe, which ultimately inform and direct the visible, material world. Examples of this would be that of the body, crops, weather and so on.
The Archaic revival
Terence McKenna is a proponent of the idea that the western world is undergoing what he terms an archaic revival. By this he means that rather than relying on science, culture and organized religion to act as mediators between us and the invisible world, we are increasingly returning to the animistic shamanic cultural worldview which was the forebearer of all human culture.
People in the western world exist from this perspective in an unbalanced cultural context that alienates them from the organic world, including their own bodies and many involved in the movement that Terence McKenna initiated would assert that this is the root cause of many of the illnesses and disease – both of the body and of the mind that are prolific in the western world, but virtually unknown to the remaining indigenous peoples.
Contemporary culture
There are many aspects of contemporary culture that we could point to as indicators of the archaic revival – the increasing popularity of tattoos and piercing, dance music with an emphasis repetitive percussion (which is even called “trance music”), mind altering recreational drugs and the urge to be intoxicated are just a few examples. However flawed or poorly reflected these things are, one thing they have in common is that they have their roots in the Shamanic, animistic tradition that predates our own.
The Tarot and the archaic revival
Something that has, for a long time fascinated me about the Tarot is its place in this archaic revival. The invisible world is still very much part of contemporary culture, but for a long time we have confined it to the spheres of psychologies and sciences that make us an object rather than a subject. Tarot is participatory in a way that science and organised religion aren’t. Anyone can pick up a pack of cards and journey into the invisible realms that inform the circumstances of our lives.
A pack of Tarot cards is like night vision goggles, or maybe even Perseus’ shield which he uses to look at Medusa, who would turn him into stone if he were to look her in the eye. It gives us an angle on things that we usually don’t get to see in our waking state and reconnects us with our own mythologies, gods and demons.
The Tarot and the invisible world
Something I always found very difficult when I first started reading Tarot for other people, was the part where you need to address the invisible world. You can often get a validation that you’re on the right track when you talk about financial problems, people and things of the visible world, but what about the invisible?
The tricky part is when you are trying to communicate the often keystone aspects of the Tarot reading that relate to the invisible world. It’s very easy to slip into pseudo-science, psychobabble and cliche when starting to read Tarot. I for one find this particularly disappointing when having my cards read. I’ve found it useful to remember that the Tarot is basically part of an animistic tradition and that the cards that come up in positions in Tarot spreads, categorized in modern parlance as subconscious/unconscious, aren’t cognitive processes that the querent has control over, but are better understood as invisible personalities (or spirits) that the querent is having a relationship with in the context of the reading. They’re participating to some degree and therefore have influence over the outcome of the querent’s question. To talk about them as cognitive, psychological processes is, I feel reductive – they are simply reflected in the cognitive processes.
What makes us anxious about these invisibles? I suspect it’s a fear of the invisible world – it’s out of our control and yet has a certain influence over us. Apart from Casper the friendly ghost, our culture rarely speaks of benevolent spirits. I hope that Tarot in contemporary western culture can reconnect us to the invisible world around us, and help us to enter into a balanced relationship with it.
About The Author
Chris likes Tarot and Astrology; the weird fiction of H.P. Lovecraft and his Cthulhu Mythos; and the toxic kiss of the Green Fairy. To find out more about Chris, check out the Christopher Healey Interviews.
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7 comments… Let's discuss
“The tricky part is when you are trying to communicate the often keystone aspects of the Tarot reading that relate to the invisible world.”
VERY TRUE…although I just read for friends not as a professional. This is exactly right…not only that at times I have trouble putting into words…emotional aspects of a reading…but then I suppose emotions are also part of the invisible world..well in a way…but not exactly as you are speaking of.
“What makes us anxious about these invisibles? I suspect it’s a fear of the invisible world – it’s out of our control and yet has a certain influence over us. Apart from Casper the friendly ghost, our culture rarely speaks of benevolent spirits. I hope that Tarot in contemporary western culture can reconnect us to the invisible world around us, and help us to enter into a balanced relationship with it.”
Oh yes…I can speak to this…in fact my experiences have mostly been “touches” by benevolent spirits, at least I assume that as there was never any real terror but maybe some fright attributed to the unknown or the surprise of the situation. Although I do not rule out the existence of “evil” (for lack of a better word) influences.
We have a benevolent spirit in our family who has visited at least THREE generations of women in the family (usually around a birth or younger child in the family). Call me crazy but I DID see her myself (when I was six).
Thanks for you’re comment Ginger – I find that fascinating. As regards your first point – I do think that emotions are part of the invisible world undoubtably. I think one of the misconceptions we have in the western world however, is that we have some kind of sovereign control on them and that they belong to us… I think that from what I understand of the Shamanic traditions we can relate to them, have agreements and contracts with them but they have a certain independence from us. I feel that this perspective is something that we in the modern world have lost somehow. We are very egocentric and sterile in the way that we see ourselves and insist on taking ownership of the part of the invisible world we are aware of. Perhaps this puts it out of context and makes our efforts in dealing with it futile. I’m sure that many emotional issues that run in families – depression, alcoholism for example might be better addressed in a broader context like this. I often muse that depression itself might simply be the result of owning emotion.
Particularly interested in you’re comment about the benevolent spirit that visits your family. That’s something that I’d definitely like to know more about. For my part, the spirits I’ve been in contact with have usually been angry or destructive. There was one that visited for years, initially contacted via the Ouija board and was actually described by a friend I had at the time who was clairvoyant almost exactly as he appeared to me. I’d shy away from saying he was evil, but he was definitely angry and definitely destructive. For a while I wondered if he was an aspect of myself, but following conversation with the clairvoyant friend I mention it seemed to me that a better understanding would be that I had maybe drawn that kind of entity into my sphere as a result of my own inner frustrations at the time – birds of a feather flock together they say?
Then there have been the incubi/succubi – I’m incredibly prone to these spirits which have existed and been described by man for aeons. An interesting point is that in some eastern cultures these are seen as fortunate experiences in contrast with our own culture’s demonizing of them which possibly comes with the incredible burden placed on all other than procreative sex by the catholic church via Constantine and the Roman empire…
Thanks again Ginger – interesting stuff!
Hi Chris,
Welcome to the world of blogging! After reading your Interview with Doug, I was excited to see you became a contributor to Tarot Eon. I wish you well and hope you enjoy the experience.
Now, what a great post! Although I have dipped my toe in shamanic waters, I haven’t gone too far. My interest has been in journeying and while I can do it easily with a guided meditation, I wanted to be able to ‘get there’ without so much assistance.
I looked at some CD’s of Native American Indian drumming and chanting – which yes you’re right, is reminiscent of modern ‘tribal’ dance music, but settled on trying a Native plant known to assist in this kind of work called Osha Root. I burned it on charcoal in a confined space and drifted away pretty easily and went underground for the first time – meeting my power animals in the process. It was an awesome experience and one I keep saying I will write about on my own blog, which hopefully very soon, I will
Apart from trying something external, which is ok, as tribal shamen do this too, I wondered if you knew of, or used a technique you could relay on the blog that would assist with journeying and/or meeting spirit?
I loved this line, it raised a smile – but the Osha Root will have to do!
Looking forward to reading more of your work and ideas
Warm wishes,
Catherine
Thanks for your response Catherine; I’m glad that you enjoyed my post. I haven’t much practical experience when it comes to journeying in the sense of planned excursions, but there have been a few incidents in the past that have drawn me in to the subject.
One of the first was with Doug when we were students. We were sitting in the bedroom of my student house not doing anything much really and all of a sudden I heard a snarl in my right ear – like a wolf or a dog. I actually felt it’s hot breath on my ear, it was that vivid, and then a pressure bearing down on me. Doug had a very similar experience at the same time and can probably verify this. No idea how or why that happened and I can tell you – it was pretty scary!
Another important event was at the summer solstice celebrations at Stonehenge a few years back – with Ewen who also writes for this blog. As the druids were performing the opening ceremony I very vividly experienced what I can only describe as a pulsing sensation – almost but not – nauseating in the pit of my stomach which felt almost like a ripple in the atmosphere caused by the chanting. Afterwards I felt in a state of ?bliss for a good few hours. Again, Ewen had a very similar experience at the time.
Places of power such as stonehenge, again – a pretty archaic idea – we’ve got a neolithic monument not far from where I live in Staffordshire where I have also shared some very unusual experiences – but that’s another post all together
Now I’ve had a spectrum of experiences in altered states caused by conventional intoxication (as opposed to ritual intoxication) and in the liminal state between waking and sleeping. The key part of the two I just mentioned was that I was in a normal waking state, sober as a judge and possibly quite bored. Rather than the brain firing off randomly in an altered state of consciousness and generate some kind of experience of a subjective nature both of these incidents indicate to me that the invisible world isn’t some distant realm, but is actually cheek and jowl with us all the time. I find that fascinating and the idea lead me to the works I mentioned at the start of the post. I particularly recommend “food of the gods” by Terence McKenna” if you haven’t already had the pleasure.
I have done some limited path working/journeying – not sure what the difference would be… met my power animal – the crocodile – by this means only last week… Might try out the Osha Root you mention as soon as you post on it on your blog – looking forwards to that.
take care,
Chris
First of all, I can tell that both you and Doug are much more researched and versed in these topics than I am from a scholarly perspective. I speak only from personal experiences and my own rambling thoughts, with perhaps a tad bit of knowledge thrown in…so please pardon the amatuer quality of my stuff. But of the things that I have experienced…I draw no real conclusions, I have no real answers…just they were strange and well “other worldly”
I mentioned elsewhere that I spent the first 18 years of my life on a haunted farm (thats what we called it I have no idea what it was really all about). And perhaps haunted is the wrong word because we didn’t feel real terror but honestly more of an acceptance of the phenomena or perhaps a little fright because it was often odd and unexpected. In fact, it is odd that some of the things were just “accepted”. No one really spoke of them at the time, and only much later did we all sort of “awaken” and realize just how odd they were…perhaps we just accepted them and thought everyone experienced such things. Then there were other things we did discuss when they happened.
However the spirit I speak of, it’s hard to get all the details down but basically…I know for sure my mother and two of her sisters saw the same “little old lady”. (My grandmother may have, I am going to ask my older sister about that part but I think it is possible, I seem to remember that vaguely…if so it would be four generations.) I say old although she was old (looked wise etc) but wasn’t wrinkly old…sort of hard to explain, both youing and old at the same time…..Everyone describes her that way although with perhaps different words but meaning the same concept.
I saw her when I was six and one of my daughters and two of my nieces have also had a visit from her….now most of these visits were linked together much later…What I mean is…my daughter had no idea that the lady she saw when she was 12 looking over her baby sisters crib was the same lady I had seen when I was six and my mother had seen about ten years prior to that. They were not all on the haunted farm, in fact only two were. Some were in Kansas City (about 4 hours away) and a couple other locations. All centered around either a new baby or a younger child in the family. We joked that she was our family guardian angel welcoming the new baby.
Well, I don’t want this to get too long but I will add two more details…
1. My mother was a remarkable lady. With some “talents”, she sometimes had precognition and read cards and some other things BUT she always refused to use a Ouija board, partly I think because of the farm (and its nature) and partly because of an earlier life experience that was fightening or bad. She insisted the use of it opened a gateway and invited evil (her word not that its 100% true……just what she thought……but honestly I trust her instinct and I shall not use one either and have passed that on to my own children)) While I say she had “talents” I think they frightened her quite a bit and she shyed away from using them or even fully acknowledging them. Yet she seemed to be drawn back at times to the “supernatural” for lack of a better word.
2, One of the things we still wonder about…the farm…now that it is no longer in our family..being sold about four years ago….do the strange things still happen there…the silent woods, the little man in the attic, the ghost lights, oh just lots of stuff…Is it still there? Was it part of the land? the location…or was it part of “our family” linked and tied there in that particular place because we were there. Or now after reading your stuff…was it THERE at all or was it somehow part of the invisible world that “came through to us” in little flashes? You have given me much to ponder.
fascinating stuff Ginger – I think your questions are very old questions that many people in private having experienced the “supernatural” come back to again and again. I too lived in a haunted cottage back when I was a student, and like you have many many odd tales about the events there. I’m considering using those experiences to seed a novel or short story. There is an urge when we come to experience these things to express them somehow – get them out there – like you are in your blog.
However, it’s my assertion that these experiences on the peripherals of consensus reality neither belong to us and our psychologies or the land. Science and techology tell us that we are seperate and independant of our environment and yet the human experience is completely contrary to that. We are in fact nurtured and given form by our circumstance and context – conditioning the scientist or psychologist would say. The line between the external and internal is often very arbitary. Ancient mythology from across the world, that still hides in the modern cultures it birthed in the form of fairytale and horror stories, dreams and nightmares tells us that there are places in the landscape where the invisible world and the visible world co-exist to some degree. It’s in these places that we can – as you seem to have- begin to re-establish some kind of rapport with the invisible world.
The problem in doing so is that our culture has a poisoned and mutated frame of reference to these places and these experiences… so when we come to it we end up having frightening experiences, hauntings, alien abductions and the like which only serve to re-inforce our preconceptions about the invisible world.
There is some fascinating work out there on this subject – I urge you to read “Alien Energy” by Andrew Collins for a start – I came across that book on a visit to the stone circle at Avebury. “Communion” by Whitley Streiber is another good in depth exploration of the same subject, and the book of “the mothman prophecies” is on the same theme…
I’ll look forwards to checking your blog out Ginger… very short on time at the minute but I wanted to check back with you about this because I find this topic very fascinating.
I have been writing about the haunted farm for about two years now on one of my blogs…Ginger’s Journey…but it is hidden among family posts and other ramblings….since last fall I have been “playing around” with creating an oracle deck based on the haunted farm and other life experiences…this deck is a PERSONAL, family history deck ONLY with no intention of publishing it…I know a lot of people do that (make decks to publish) but honestly these cards would only have deep meaning to family people who know the history….any way once again I ramble…the point is…I am transferring the haunted farm posts to the new blog…The Silent Woods….if you are interested…stop by…it’s just getting started so it’s a bit bare right now..
http://thejourneydeck.blogspot.com/