Everything Under the Moon

You can't choose to be a shaman. There isn't really a choice in the matter. You're more talking about hedgewitchcraft.

This is interesting to me, because I don't know a lot about hedge witchcraft, and have wondered as to what exactly its relationship to shamanism is. Are you insinuating that hedgecraft is the use of shamanic techniques by someone who hasn't had a shamanic calling? Shamanism for the non-shaman, as it were?

Traditional shamans do not typically use crystals like new agers do. We are animists, but we don't keep hoards of quartz around.

I worked with an ayahuasquero in Peru, someone for whom I have a tremendous amount of respect, and who was a serious shaman, trained in a respected mestizo linage - not a new age charlatan, as far as I could tell - and he kept a large number of crystals that were present during his ceremonies. Just as not everyone who has a crystal collection is a healer, not everyone who heals with crystals is a fraud.

You can't choose to be a shaman. There isn't really a choice in the matter. You're more talking about hedgewitchcraft.

This is interesting to me, because I don't know a lot about hedge witchcraft, and have wondered as to what exactly its relationship to shamanism is. Are you insinuating that hedgecraft is the use of shamanic techniques by someone who hasn't had a shamanic calling? Shamanism for the non-shaman, as it were?

Traditional shamans do not typically use crystals like new agers do. We are animists, but we don't keep hoards of quartz around.

I worked with an ayahuasquero in Peru, someone for whom I have a tremendous amount of respect, and who was a serious shaman, trained in a respected mestizo linage - not a new age charlatan, as far as I could tell - and he kept a large number of crystals that were present during his ceremonies. Just as not everyone who has a crystal collection is a healer, not everyone who heals with crystals is a fraud.

Actually yes, I would say it like that. Shamanism for the non-shaman is an apt way to phrase it. Hedgewitchcraft often employs spiritwork, energy work, astral projection and/or astral travel, etc. Other terms relevant are "crossing the hedge" I believe.

Just because one traditional shaman chooses to keep crystals around in his ceremonies doesn't mean the majority of traditional shamans do. It doesn't change that crystals are primarily used by New Agers.

How about Traditional Witchcraft, EDIT. It's as if there is a flip side to the Craft that we Wiccans never discuss, and yet it is the roots out of which our methods came.

In Shamanism, how is it that plant spirits communicate, literally speak to the seeker and inform them of their uses? And yet...my rose bush spoke to me once, saying it needed water. While I was recovering my wits I heard a thud from inside my garage. I looked and saw the watering can had fallen off it's secure hook & onto the floor. hint-hint give the rose some water. Well, why not?

We two-leggeds are creatures of the same Earth as a rose. We seek spirituality and miss the life force beneath our feet that ensouls us...or it could, if we'd listen. EDIT I feel like a beginner all over again. Never be afraid to start over.

Traditional shamans do not typically use crystals like new agers do. We are animists, but we don't keep hoards of quartz around.

Hmm, then how do you use them?
The shamans I've met all were some sort of crystal or gemstone necklace or bracelet or etc.