Continuation of Commitment To Mastery
The first few days of being in the Amazon Rainforest, I was not sure what to expect. A group of us were staying in the jungle, as part of a summer field school. I was there to learn Quichua and study knowledge. I’ve had several events in my life, turning points, where I am questioning something and I come across information in a book or in story-form with a person, and my mind was immediately altered. I gained some insight that permamently changed who I am and my perspective in life. This happened again in the Amazon.
One of the first days there, I heard a shaman tell the story of his “becoming a shaman,” which started when he was 15 years old. I did not believe the story literally, but I believed I was hearing a story with real information about the person, so I listened and payed attention. While he told his story about becoming a shaman, his training, and his power acquisition with the spirits, I felt something in my body changing. I heard “a translated version” of the story by a professor who knew Quichua, and when he related the events of this person’s life, I felt something powerful. So powerful, it stayed with me even after the shaman left. I was trembling and emotionally impacted greatly.
I was so impacted, I decided to explore this situation more, so I invited the shaman to dinner with two other people, both fluent in Spanish and one in Quichua, and I treated them to a meal and drinks. I wanted to know more about this man’s life and training. We talked most of the evening, and I listened to him talk about his own imagery and his own knowledge and symbolic framework for becoming a shaman. I told him about the impact his story had on me, and how I felt afterwards. It was the first time in my life, someone was completely relaxed with discussing things “beyond the 5 sense” so openly. He also confirmed my experience of his story was not imaginary. It was real, and we did not discuss it any further. I just kept thinking about it.
Later, while relaxing in the jungle, I was feeling and thinking about the impact of this man’s story. He was over 10 years older than I was, he was a Quichua man in the Amazon Rainforest, he lived a completely different life in the jungle. I was from a small community in the Midwest, in the United States. I was caucasian, blond, and female. I spoke English (and Spanish). How could I understand this man’s story in any way, to the point it could alter my awareness? What allowed this to happen? These were my questions.
In the middle of everything, I had an insight where I realized “my body” was allowing me access to this man’s story. “My body” was allowing me to comprehend, and even receive the power of his words. This is when I realized the “magic of the body.” I realized how our bodies are vehicles and sources of knowledge and information, that guide our understanding of reality AND connect us to an even greater reality beyond our senses. This, in a limited form, ended up being the subject of my thesis in graduate school.
This was also the knowledge base that I brought to the founding of Groundwork Promotions. It provided the building blocks for our process and philosophy that we use, when working with clients. And this gave me vital pieces of the puzzle, which allowed me to more greatly understand mastery beyond the 5 senses.
When we work with people, we are listening to their stories, their words, and their symbols. We are listening to how they understand their lives and reality. We are listening to their goals and desires. We are using all of that information to create media and plans-of-action that utilize this information, and give them insight into themselves in the process. They get to benefit from hearing and seeing themselves. They get to be altered by their own images and perspectives. They get to be their own shamans, telling stories that give them what they need to be more successful professionally and become healthier in the process. That is what I learned to do, by understanding the “magic of the body.” I learned to use images, symbols, and words to guide us towards what we want most. And at a deeper level, they can guide us to who we really are, if we have never lived it before.
