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38 A Journal of Contemporary Shamanism Volume 6 Issue 1 SPRING 2013 Jonathan Good question Lenore At that point I shifted from a paradigm of social revolution to one of social healing and started naming things like racism and misogyny as social wounds and wondering how we could heal them. I was alone with my initiatory experience and didnt know anything about shaman- ism. When Sandra Ingermans book Soul Retrieval came out in 1991 I read that. And I immediately realized that we had experienced soul loss as a nation with the assassinations of Dr. King the Kennedys and Malcolm X and also with the betray- al of the Democratic Party convention in 1968 and later Watergate. Our citizenry was a broken body politic paralyzed in the face of a right-wing reaction to the gains of Civil Rights feminism labor etc. I received intensive training with the Foundation for Shamanic Studies and then started teaching all along thinking about this question of shamanic social healing. The first social healing ritual I developed was Dreaming the Dark a celebration to honor and receive healing from the spirit of darkness. The intention was to heal our relationship with the Dark the Western repository of all bad things. Dreaming the Dark became a highly-anticipated annual winter solstice celebration in the Pacific Northwest. Jonathan When was that Lenore I think the first one was in 1994. Jonathan I suppose some people un- derstood the ritual as political and others did not. Lenore True. In fact I think there are different ways for shamanic practitioners to influence the political situation. We can participate in community organiz- ing meetings and bring the perspective of the spirits into planning that work. And there is very private work like the Buddhist practice of tonglen and other practices to help shift the social and Earth vibration that we can do alone. Another level is doing closed healing rituals and other circle work that is focused on social healing like Dreaming the Dark. And we can do very public things like bring- ing ritual into public protest and thereby transforming it. Ive had decades when Ive been out in the streets protesting and years where its been more about writing. Ive worked privately in shamanic circles and Ive also done a lot of very public interfaith work infus- ing shamanism into interfaith social activ- ism and also bringing the power of ritual into public protests. Now Im making a dramatic film AMERICAN UBUNTU which weaves together shamanism Earth activism and politics. Jonathan When youre working in sha- manic circles doing work on behalf of so- cial or Earth issues how do you approach that I can imagine all kinds of interesting ethical issues arising like how much can I ask my spirits to interfere with the pro- posed Monte Belo monster dam on the Xingu River in the Amazon basin that kind of thing. Lenore Yes as with all shamanic work I am careful about asking for specific out- comes. I usually include a caveat that our work ultimately serves the highest good of all because we dont have the whole picture. Through our shamanic work we can get a peek at the big view. But for example with the election I wasnt will- ing to do shamanic work specifically for an Obama victory because maybe Rom- ney needed to win so that we can have a revolution. How would I know the best outcome of the election So I think one crucial thing in shamanic activism is to have humility as we stand before the Great Mystery and to know that we havent got the meta view. It is hubris to think that we can know how the specific outcome of each individual struggle will affect the whole. Does that make sense Jonathan Of course it does. Lenore This came up recently in my drumming circle. Someone said that Monsanto Corporation is the embodi- ment of evil and we should ask the spirits to destroy it. After discussion we asked instead for whatever was necessary for harmony and healing on the planet with regard to Monsanto and left it up to the spirits as to how they want to handle that. Another time I was teaching a Shaman- ism for Activists weekend and it hap- pened that the World Trade Organization was meeting at the same time. Naturally people wanted to journey about putting a stop to globalization. I told them My heart is really with you. But remember what I said about having humility before the Great Mystery We do not know ulti- mately what the role of globalization is in the evolution of the world. The amazing thing was that these activists all nodded their heads soberly. And we reframed the question as What is our right relation- ship to globalization It was a very pow- erful journey with not a few tears. Jonathan Sometimes Im really torn when I become very emotionally involved and really want to do something like that. One way is to ask to see a given situa- tion through one of my spirit helpers or teachers eyes. And although sometimes you dont get a total view you often can get a more nuanced view. You can see a lot of things that arent immediately ap- parent. Lenore Yes exactly. Jonathan Because if youre going to use thespiritstoengageasanactivistyouhave to go into the activism from their point of view and not from your personal point of view. Lenore Right. One of the most power- ful things shamanism can bring to activ- ism is exactly this. It can help us to work on issues and work in the midst of con- flicts in a way that brings about harmony and connection. Because one of the root problems if not THE root problem on the planet is the human illusion of separation. Not only separation from spirit but from one another from the Earth and some- times from ourselves. I feel the danger in