In the Shamanic State of Consciousness : Shamanic Journeying Technique in the Context of Contemporary Occulture
Abstract
While conducting my research into the area of contemporary spirituality, I encounter many practices and techniques traditionally associated with the idea of "altered states of consciousness", "trance" or "ecstasy". In this paper, I intend to point out that these analytical concepts may obscure the nature of many of these practices, because they do not facilitate the description of the complex dynamics between spiritual experiences, their interpretations, teachings of the given spiritual movement, influence of religious group, and other aspects.
These very dynamics are - in my view - crucial for understanding neo-shamanic practice as well as many other spiritual practices. Furthermore, the concept of altered states of consciousness is rich with many additional associations which are passed on from anthropological discourse, to emic discourse of contemporary spirituality, and back again.
Over the course of this communication, both parts adapt these ideas to their own needs, which causes confusion also addressed in this paper. For me, the most important notion implicitly contained in the idea of altered states of consciousness is that all the techniques work similarly and are merely interchangeable ways to induce identical experiences.
My research findings are not in accordance with this view. Therefore, I want to describe specific features of the neo-shamanic journeying technique which differentiate it from other techniques used to obtain spiritual experiences.