What is your spirit guide?

Shamanism:

Is the belief that we can interact with the spirit world, we can learn, and communicate with what they call animal spirit guides. The guide helps and watches over you in your life, but they can also misguide or harm you, as there are good and bad spirits. Shamans have the ability to communicate with these spirits and use there knowledge or energy to perform healings for the individual or to help a group of people.

Everyone has a spirit guide and I would like to know if you know what yours is? and how you came about knowing or seeing?

Trance:
There are several ways for you to find out what your spirit guide is meditation, dancing, singing, medication, and basically anything that leads to a trance type of state. The methods range from exhaustion to pain. Once you are in the trance state your spirit guide should be revealed to you, and hopefully guide you to some knowledge or wisdom you need to know.

Shamanism has been with humans since primeval times and is still with us today.

Are they just hallucinations from pushing your brain and the rest of your body to the edge or are they really spirits you interact with?

reply to post by LDragonFire


I'm just coming into Shamanism and I find it to be a very enlightening experience. I do not believe I am at a stage where I can decipher what I see on my journeys effectively but I am definitely aware of a guiding force. From my own experience the first time I travelled to the Lower world I encountered an owl. The owl did not speak to me or interact me directly (I was not there for long, just an attempt at reaching the Lower realm) but I believe it was the energy being that took me safely to the Lower world. The realm I entered on this journey was a forest/swamp looking area so I do not know if I just associated what I saw with an owl or if I placed the owl there myself (at the time I was very excited to try to find and identify my spirit guide.)

From what I've read it is much easier to identify your spirit guide in an isolated natural place, rather than laying in bed like I was . Next time I'm out camping I intend to spend a night on my own on a hill and hopefully have that experience.

EDIT TO ADD: I use a calming meditation to enter trance state (sometimes with drumming, sometimes without) so I do not believe I am putting much strain on my body that would cause my mind to hallucinate.

[edit on 22/7/2008 by Scurvy]

reply to post by LDragonFire


I have no idea what my spirit guide is as I have never attempted to find out.

What about you, LDragonFire, what is your spirit guide?

Originally posted by LDragonFire
Shamanism:

Is the belief that we can interact with the spirit world, we can learn, and communicate with what they call animal spirit guides. The guide helps and watches over you in your life, but they can also misguide or harm you, as there are good and bad spirits.

My personal opinion is that the so-called "animal spirit guides" are a term used to describe the various insights and self-protective abilities that stem from an intuitive and instinctive "reading" of the world around us, i.e. from our own mind and its connection to the Mind, the net of conenctions that binds everything and everyone.

I prefer to call it my "autopilot" myself.

N.B. I am NOT implying that "spirits" of other kinds do not exist.

reply to post by sc2099

You don't have any interest in knowing what your spirit guide is?


reply to post by Vanitas


From my research it is tapping into your sub-conscience mind, this is what allows you to communicate with spirits, but I'm a amateur here and would like to hear from others who have more experience.

Does anyone here consider themselves a Shaman?

reply to post by LDragonFire


It's not that I don't have any interest. I've just never made any attempts before. That's not to say I wouldn't in the future.

reply to post by LDragonFire


mmmm, spirit guides..... this just happens to be the first time I have herd of Shamanism and spirit guides and all that in the one post.

Anyone care to enlighten me? Looks like a really interesting topic

-fm

Cognac is my spirit guide of course. (local)

My other spirit guide is primarily ME.

Why trust something or someone before yourself?

We (humans, animals, plants, rocks, stuff etc) are ALL eachothers guides?
It's up to us upon each encounter to use the knowledge given as we wish whether it's an encounter with a flower, a shadow, a book or a loved one.

A guide or guides are only as good as the led. Why show wonders to a blind man?

After many years, I'm at the top of my pyramid with everything below. There's loads of groovy beliefs and quirks around all of us, but I do the choosing and will brew my own spirit from infinate sources, not just one or a few.

Life is a constantly growing thing and trying to follow set paths just doesn't seem natural to me. Can't do it anymore.

Freedom = natural.....good and bad.

[edit on 22/7/2008 by nerbot]

Well the most common reference to spirit guides are Native American vision quests. By definition of the word shaman it does classify medicine men, wise men, seers, etc. as practitioners of shamanism. The Native Americans used vision quests to find their spiritual alter-ego/guide. Your spirit guide is connected to you but it is not you nor is it a part of you. In fact your spirit guide can leave at anytime if you do not entertain them and appreciate their assistance; most shamans have more than one spirit guide in their life. There are also "power animals" which serve similar purposes but there is not as strong a connection and you cannot draw as much energy from your power animals, they are more for special situations (as a metaphor it would be like Tylenol helps relieve pain but does not treat one specific symptom, that's your spirit guide, where power animals would be more like a prescription drug aimed at treating a certain condition).

Any effective shaman basically HAS to have a spirit guide or he will not be able to understand or navigate most of the spiritual realms. A very powerful shaman will also have an aresenal of power animals at his disposal as well.

The basic function of a shaman is to be an active member of his community while providing healing, advice, and education in spiritual matters. The spirit guide assists in finding and collecting the "missing" parts of a person's spirit that will cure them of their ailment by making them whole again. It also serves as the Shaman's tour guide through the spirit realms, as well as several other purposes but those are the main ones.

Hope that satisfied your curiosity, if you have any further questions U2U me. I'm always happy to help in whatever way I can.

For reference my information is derived from sources published by the Society of Shamanic Studies. Michael Harner has published a book called "The Way Of The Shaman" that is a great educational tool. Wikipedia has a lot of good "facts" about Shamanism in reference to the ordinary reality, to understand the attraction to Shamanism though you need to talk to or be treated by a shaman and get them to explain what SSC (Shamanic State of Consciousness) is like.

I personally don't have a spirit guide difinitively known to me. I bought a book on how to reach your spirit guides, but a lot of it involves recording your voice into a voice recorder and playing it back, and I absolutely cannot stand that. I sound too different from the voice I hear when I talk, and it really just makes me cringe to a point where I know I would not be put in a relaxed state, just a frustrated annoyed state. Kurt Cobain is always in my dreams, though. Maybe my spirit guide has taken the form of Kurt Cobain. I dunno. I also hang out with Jesus and John Lennon in my dreams, too... so I dunno... but Kurt is the most prominent character, other than whoever I am, in most of my dreams.

Your spirit guide can appear in the form of a human or even an inanimate object, but the frequency of these accounts are very low in comparison to the number that see animal spirits.

The easiest way to reach your spirit guide is to go on a vision quest. You can be anywhere in nature as long as you are isolated from distractions. There is no set way to do a vision quest, but you HAVE to want to find that spirit guide; much like the law of attraction in that your spirit guide will not come to you unless you truly feel the desire to connect with it.

[edit on 22/7/2008 by Scurvy]

From my research it is tapping into your sub-conscience mind, this is what allows you to communicate with spirits, but I'm a amateur here and would like to hear from others who have more experience.

That's what I meant. (Except for the spirits in question here being outside the individual's mind.)
Only, I wouldn't call it "sub-conscious", rather it is the SUPER-conscious mind.
But even that is too limited a concept, so I prefer to formulate it in specific detail.

My Spirit guides are as follows the Hawk and the Wolf. I have been practicing in Shamanism for almost 15 yrs now. I have been on many journeys and have had many out of body experiences.
Within the last few years though I have found my mind to distracted, more an excuse than truth, that I could not concentrate on the answers they were showing me.
Every journey gives you something to take from it. It is up to you to decide what the meaning is. They can only show you the door it's once your in the door that it is up to you to decide what you take from it.

Whales, and raven/crows. My boyfriend (who has Native American blood) has a crazy connection to wolves.

Cats, too, because my mom's are cats, and I think it may have rubbed off a bit. People always say that my spirit guide is probably a cat, but they usually don't know me too well.

Ahh, I pretty much grew up on Eliade.
Shamanism, indeed.

I haven't discovered mine as of yet, I just personally don't know how to go about it.

In the scouts we did desert survival training with some Navajos. We were made members of the tribe after (for real) and we did the sweat lodge at the end. Hunger combined with hypoxia can be very powerfull for interspection.

Based on my time in the sweat lodge, my spirit guide is a desert mouse. I do from time to time have dreams that involve my spirit guide, but I have a hard time remembering them in any detail

Originally posted by bandaidctrl
I haven't discovered mine as of yet, I just personally don't know how to go about it.

Meditating is a good way, your guide will choose you

Mine would be vultures, specifically the turkey vultures and black vultures of North America, not the species that live in Eurasia or Africa.

That is a nice on to have because I get to see the physical "Guides" a lot, wheras someone with, say, a wolf or eagle, may never see that.

In some cultures, vultures and condors were regarded as especially potent animals, because they could appear to raise into the sky and disappear. Some people beleived that this symbolized prayers reaching up to God(s), or that the animals could actually transverse dimensions.

I think that plays into how, for me, it is very easy for me to look at history or current events, and see them as cycles rather than specific events.

I have dreams featuring these birds constantly, and in meditation, but I don't want to elaborate on this much as I feel it is very personal.

I have a TV feather that I found in my car. It is a funny story, because when I go on long trips I like to imagine that I can see the road from a vulture's-eye view and predict any trouble ahead. Then I found the feather on my front seat, and I am not sure how it got there, as the window was only down about 1/2".

[edit on 12-1-2009 by asmeone2]

Well, I am not sure if we are talking totem animals here, or spirit guides.

If it is "spirit guide" as in a spirit you reach out side of yourself to communicate with who brings you higher knowledge. I dont have one. I dont like middle men, too much room for hanky panky with the message. I go straight to the source if I have a question.

If it is totem animals we are discussing, mine is the blue jay. Not quite as "sexy" as a wolf or eagle or mountain lion, but thats what it is.

Like it was said before not sure if this is on totems/spirit guides.

My animal totem is the rabbit/hair.

My spirit guide(s) are two male entities that keep me on my toes.