What is Shamanic Possession?

Shamanic possession is not actually possession at all, but the intentional embodiment of spirit help with whom the shaman has already developed a working relationship. Unlike possession, or the unintentional intrusion of some type of foreign spirit into a person’s energy body, which is considered an energetic illness or unhealthy state in shamanism, embodiment is an effective, working, altered state the shaman is able to begin and end at will. To truly understand shamanic practice we must recognize the equal importance of journeying and embodiment without carrying forward the bias of decades of academic research into shamanism. Join host and shaman, Christina Pratt, as she explores embodiment from the n|om of the African Ju|’hoansi to vitu of Finnish women to the embodiment dances of the helping spirits of shamanic peoples around the world. Simply put, there are gifts embodiment offers us as contemporary practitioners that our journey states cannot. And there is joy and the sacred to be found the intimacy of embodiment.