My eyes pop open in the hours before dawn as though a dim voice has spoken plainly into my ear, “Time to get up. Come to the fire.” I swing out of bed and whisper to my wife, Carin, who is still asleep, “I’m going to the fire.” I quietly get dressed, drink ½ a cup of coffee, and head out the door with a medicine bag over my shoulder.
[Read more…] about What Is A Fire Ceremony?Significant Life Journey
We are on a significant journey in this lifetime. For many of us, it’s a long and arduous return to love, a return to the truth of who we are and our connection to Source. Like the strains of a distant melody, our relationship with the Intelligence that created us is a song we know well but have forgotten the words. The ego always dissolves at its sound.
[Read more…] about Significant Life JourneyShamanic Healing Energy
What Is a Shaman?
“What is a shaman anyway?” asked a friend who is a PhD psychologist. “It sounds kind of scary, maybe you should tell people what that means to you.”
It was many years ago, out of the blue, that my inner voice said, “You’re a shaman.”
[Read more…] about Shamanic Healing EnergyFinding Your Way
How many times have you found yourself afraid to open up, unsure if what was in your heart could be held by another? Or too proud to ask for help because you couldn’t admit to yourself that you needed it? Or stoically hiding the pain of what you thought was failure, ashamed to acknowledge or even talk about it?
I’ve been there and I remember the feelings well. Many times, I have buried a memory with its lesson still unclaimed; until the trial returned once again, unwilling to be ignored, wanting only to be resolved. This is the human condition.
These gifts of the spirit, disguised as pain and difficulties, are often hard won through the experiences of failure, loss and dark detours. When we bottom out in life, we are compelled to reexamine the challenges and the drama we created for ourselves and others. Later, we may rightfully call the lessons we’ve learned wisdom—and we should—because it’s wisdom we’ve earned and is ours to share.
It is often only in moments of desperation or paralyzing uncertainty that we become willing to ask for help. When you send out a call for help, you suddenly realize you have an uncanny ability to shut out all other distractions and focus on the problem right in front of you, and the solution that inevitably follows on its heels. Then you listen for what is yours to hear as if your life depended on it—because it does. Listening for inner guidance is something no one can do for you, nor would you want them to.
It doesn’t have to be so hard, but often it is, because that’s how the universe gets us to pay attention, find a way to alleviate our own suffering, and wake up. On this journey called your life, finding your way takes everything: heart, mind, and spirit. How do we induce our own awakening without bringing suffering into it?
When we move away from the interference of cell signals, microwave radiation, and electric grids, we become free to think and perceive more clearly. And when the noise of the ego goes silent and everything falls away, something else becomes available; a higher order of thought, a greater feeling of connection. You’ve been here before, know the feeling, and hunger for it.
You are a great sending and receiving channel, continually broadcasting your frequency. You never stop. Removing yourself from the noise and interference to your signal frees you; but it’s more than that. You are a distinct consciousness with direct access to the Creator. You have your own communication link to the Intelligence of the universe. What do you do with the awareness of such access? Do you believe it’s available to you?
The single most important and decisive thing any of us could ever do is take time every single day, multiple times a day, to strengthen our connection and cultivate a deeper relationship with the Intelligence within. Call it God, Creator, Source—whatever name you give it, the relationship is yours, it belongs to you and you belong to It. Then, when you find yourself struggling, you know you are not alone, you have somewhere to turn. When everything outside you seems to be falling apart, you fall in. You’ve been here before, too, know the feeling and hunger for it. The memory of God within you is completely unchanged by your forgetting—it’s right where you are.
Who doesn’t want to be plucked out of the insanity of this world and dropped into a sacred container so they can remember who they are? Who doesn’t need a place to go where they can recover themselves and be restored to their right mind? Who doesn’t want a deep and abiding connection, one they can turn to for solace and peace?
Finding our way in this world requires enormous clarity. By definition, clarity is the quality of being certain or definite. Clarity literally means the state of light. The state of light we seek is our own, but how do we find such clarity as this?
The ability to clearly see the deeper reality underlying all things takes a quiet mind. Sustained concentration is difficult for anyone. A little willingness is essential just to get the ego out of the way for a while. Quieting the mind is a gentle discipline. Love, forgiveness, surrender and trust are all in there. The understanding that dawns upon an open mind is a healing light that resolves itself into peace and enters the heart. Let that be enough for the moment.
If truth is true, and it is, then what is true for some of us is true for all of us. You already have all the light and strength you need to do what you are called to do in this life. These qualities go together and reside within you. The power of Spirit works through you if you allow it, and even when you don’t. And you are never without hope, because a call for help is always answered.
A Portrait in Falling In
There are places I go on the land that are sacred to me; places where time seems to slow down, and I slow down with it. Usually before sunrise, or at sunset, I go out alone, in every kind of weather, letting exposure to the elements awaken an ancient memory. The silence calms me and the ordinary activities of walking and breathing loosen my mind. The effect is profound and often brings me to tears.
When I find my place on the land, I gather wood to make a fire, lay out an altar and prepare a place to kneel. These simple activities are deliberate, part of a ritual, every aspect filled with all the meaning I can give it. The connection to Earth and Spirit effortlessly follows. I fall in, dropping into sacred space. When the fire burns bright, I revel in its warmth and illumination. I express my gratitude for life and the love that surrounds me. Offerings of cedar, sage, sweetgrass and tobacco are symbols of my devotion. I ask for guidance and listen without strain. My journal is open, ready, and I write what comes as though I am being spoken to, because I am. My guides once told me, when God talks to you, take good notes.
I gather more wood, laying it gently on glowing red-hot embers and wait for the light to return. As the fire blazes, I take a handful of loose sage and offer my prayers to the fire, asking it to accept my gratitude, take my burden, and let it be consumed up in smoke. And as the smoke billows up into the morning sky, I begin to see more clearly again, putting things in their proper perspective, without adding anything or taking anything away.
This article originally appeared in EPIC Magazine in the Mar./Apr. 2021 Edition.
Dr. Tom Garcia is a shamanic teacher, mentor and guide who helps men and women find their authentic voice and true purpose, so they live a life of meaning and contribution
Gossamer and Other Delicate Things
The voice didn’t barge in. It came quietly; so distinct and clear there was no denying its presence. I didn’t even bother to ask, “Who are you?” because I knew. It was a voice I had not heard before and it has been with me ever since our first encounter.
Eleven years ago I found my voice, or rather it found me, in the woods lying under a tree writing intently in my journal. Between writing and listening, something shifted. Instead of me posing questions and composing my thoughts, my journal began talking to me, as though it had been waiting patiently for its moment, a moment that had been building for months, and wasn’t entirely unanticipated. I knew it was coming. There had been several attempts to get through to me, like someone knocking at the door, but I wasn’t quite ready to answer. Nature is the best medicine, and without knowing what to expect, I set a time and prepared a place on the earth, amongst trees and an open sky. I prepared myself, because I was waiting—for something.
For years I have used my journal to facilitate an internal dialogue to gain deeper insights and understanding, but what occurred that day was different, a quantum leap into new territory, an opening big enough to step through.
We all have a voice. You have a voice. At first, your awareness of it may be fragile, as delicate as gossamer. But if you regard it gently with the respect you would accord a relationship you value, it will become like dura mater—a tough mother—and you’ll know the voice the way you know your mother’s voice calling in a roomful of mothers—and you come running. You become familiar with its every tone and timbre and respond to its call. You know the voice is yours, and you belong to it.
You recognize how it speaks to you: not just in words, but as awareness, intuition and inner knowing. You feel a deeper connection to the sacred and recognize the sacred in all things, because your voice is sacred. Your commitment to be present and listen to your voice, giving it your undivided attention, is a gift that demonstrates your love and respect.
Listening, and being listened, is a sublime privilege. You remember how it felt when someone really listened to you, the feeling of being seen and heard. It’s the same for your voice. When you listen deeply and wholeheartedly, something opens, a memory is returned to you. You remember who you are and why you are here. You realize you cannot hide your light, no matter how hard you’ve tried. You want to be seen and heard. This may be difficult to accept if you’ve been hiding in the dark. But even then, you have been watched over, guided and protected. You are never alone.
There were times when I was afraid my voice would leave me; that one day, I’d wake up and it would be gone. Then I realized that I’m the one who leaves, not my voice. When you strengthen the connection withyour voice it becomes stronger and clearer. You communicate with your voice in a language that can only be described as love. When you listen deeply, your voice will share its secrets with you, and then you knowit has become your Teacher.
Your voice will go with you to places where you have felt inadequate, unworthy, and afraid. It will speak of things you may not fully understand, like trust and forgiveness.
Forgiveness is more than forgiving people for the things they’ve done to hurt you. It’s forgiving everything you made up about yourself that wasn’t true, and others too, and the distorted way you’ve looked at the world. Instead of placing your own judgment on what you see, really ask to see the purpose of the universe and how to look on all things with love, appreciation, and open mindedness. When you remember only loving thoughts, the rest will be forgotten, and all that will remain is a blessing, a blessing you gave.
Trust is an indication of your willingness to surrender all you thought you knew, in exchange for the truth. Your voice shows you where you haven’t trusted, and gently reminds you to choose again and to trust more deeply as a way of being in the world.
There will be times when your voice takes you right into the heart of grief to heal your sense of loss, purify your heart, and help you to let go. Grief can make you lose sight of any gift at all and take you to the depths of hell. But if you suspend your grieving for a little while, the gift will reveal itself in light, peace and understanding.
It takes courage to be who you are, to know you are loved, and to know the case you have built against yourself has been dismissed. You are innocent, and so is everyone else, which may come as a relief.
Your voice, if you let it have its way with you, will take you right to the edge of truth and illusion and ask for nothing less than your devotion. You decide, even thought there’s really only one choice. But you get to choose anyway, because your choice means everything, even if you kick and scream the whole way. As you follow your voice, you will realize all you’ve ever wanted was the truth. Not a hand-me-down version, but your own hard won truth. The one you discovered when you held your feet to the fire and broke your own heart to find the truth in the last place you would ever look to find it. You want to know the truth that lives within you.
You’ve seen flashes, and sometimes long stretches, of the light in all things, especially yourself. When that happens, you see yourself as you truly are and become willing to move beyond appearances, including your own, to see more clearly the underlying truth of all things. You understand nothing was ever withheld from you—you just thought it was.
Finding your voice does not mean that now you must undertake the never-ending battle for truth, justice and the American way. It means now you listen. Listen in silence. Listen expectantly. Listen with intention. Listen with the certainty that you will discover your own source of wisdom. No one can hear what is yours to hear.
Listening with every fiber of your being is a practice, a discipline. You must quiet the noise of the outside world and turn to the quiet voice that beckons you, willing to open your mind and heart for the messages that await. This is all you can do—and it takes everything. What you do with the messages your voice gives you is up to you, of course. Follow the thread of this sacred conversation and embrace its gift.
Love and Blessings,
Tom
This article originally appeared in EPIC Magazine in the Sept./Oct. 2020 Edition.
Dr. Tom Garcia is a shamanic teacher, spiritual guide and mentor who helps you find your authentic voice and true purpose on the earth, at the fire, in sacred ceremony.