In Therapeutic Shamanism, possession is being influenced or taken over, as a whole person, by something that is not us: a substance, a thought-formThought-form. A human-created living being: an ideology, religion, corporation, conspiracy theory or platform that has taken on a life of its own. Genuinely alive, but soul-less in the deep sense: natural things alone are full of Soul. More about this or ideology, another person, one of the unquiet deadUnquiet dead. The middle-world self become ghost: the ego that, having no body left to anchor it, lingers among the living instead of moving on to the Land of the Dead. Unhealthy for the living, and moved on by psychopomping. More about this, or occasionally a malevolent spirit. Dramatic possession is very uncommon, but everyday forms are very common in our culture, and they rest on soul-lossSoul-loss. The sending-away of parts of the self in order to survive: through shock or trauma, or (the chief modern cause) exiling our own parts to fit in. With Power-loss, one of the two root causes of shamanic illness. Read the full answer and Power-lossPower-loss. Disconnection from nature, the web of life and our place in it: like being unplugged from the national grid. One of the two root causes of shamanic illness, healed by reconnection (not by soul retrieval), beginning with the Power Animal bond. Read the full answer. De-possession is the removal of what has taken someone over, best left to the GuidesGuides. The Lower-World and Upper-World beings a practitioner works with and learns from, of whom the Power Animal is the first and foremost. True Guides are ethical to their core; the shaman’s power comes from the depth of these bonds, not from the shaman. More about this, and it always comes after considering mental health.
What is possession? #
Possession is when an entity takes over somebody (‘I don’t know what came over me’). A possession “is something that is not localised, but which is influencing someone in a more systemic way. A possession can influence the host person as a whole, sometimes (although by no means always) to the point of taking them over completely.” An intrusionIntrusion. Something lodged in us that should not be there, having entered through the holes soul-loss and Power-loss leave. Four broad types: unhelpful thought-forms, introjects, foreign-body energetic intrusions, and entity possessions. More about this, by contrast, sits in a specific place in the body, though “The dividing line between intrusions and possessions is not a firm one.”1
See What is an intrusion, and what is extraction?
How common is it? #
“Because of the scale of soul-loss and power-loss that we are suffering from, possessions are extremely common in our culture. Most people have them to some degree.” They range from relatively simple and minor things to things that can be much more serious.2
What most people picture, the dramatic possessions of fits, contortions, super-human strength and so on, “are very uncommon. Other kinds of possession are very common indeed though.” Some we are so used to that we think of them as normal.3
What can possess us? #
There are several kinds:
– Substances and addictions. “Although most people do not think of these as being possessions, from a shamanic point of view that is exactly what they are.” Substances such as alcohol, tobacco and opium have strong spirits. They are not “bad”; they are “great teacher spirits”, but they can overwhelm someone whose energy body is weakened and full of holes. See Is addiction a kind of possession? – Ideologies. Some large, complex thought-forms “take on a life of their own. They are human-created intelligences”, including religions, political ideologies, nationalism and conspiracy theories. – Other people. “Possession by another person is actually very common”, through bullying, charm, seduction, emotional blackmail or any other form of manipulation. – Non-human spirits, including wetikoWétiko. The parasitic, cannibalistic thought-form of Taker culture (the term is from the Algonquian peoples of North America, via Jack Forbes and Paul Levy): it drives its host to consume, dominate and set itself above nature, and it infects all of us to some degree. Read the full answer. See What is wétiko, and what is co-wétiko? – The unquiet dead. See Who are the unquiet dead, and are ghosts real?4
First, “spirit possession is a middle-world problem.” No Upper-WorldUpper-World. The realm of Father Sky and of Spirit: spacious, rarefied and clear, layered in tiers, offering not escape but perspective. Not better than the Lower-World: we ascend rooted, and bring the gifts back down. Read the full answer or Lower-World Spirits will ever possess anyone against their will, and even in the middle-world, “The majority of spirits that you encounter have no interest in possessing a human.” When possession does occur, the spirit is not necessarily malevolent: it may simply be lost and confused.5
Why does it happen? #
“In looking at the different kinds of things that can possess us as humans, it is important to keep in mind the underlying causes of possession are soul-loss and power-loss.” The anthropologist Michael Winkelman found that hunter-gatherer societies generally do not experience possession, and Erika Bourguignon and Thomas Evascu found that possession experiences are generally found in agricultural societies.6
It is a matter of ownership and power-over: “Possession is a symptom of the Taker cult. It describes a relationship between things that is based on inequality, power-over and ownership.”7
The same holds for possession as a way of doing shamanic work. In some contemporary shamanic cultures the shaman works mainly by letting a spirit possess them, sometimes to the point of losing consciousness, doing the healing in a trance and remembering nothing of it afterwards, and many people take this to be what shamanism is. But indigenous cultures and hunter-gatherer cultures are not the same thing, since most indigenous peoples today no longer live by hunting and gathering. Looking only at actual hunter-gatherer cultures, Paul Francis, who has been looking at this for decades, knows of none that allowed voluntary spirit possession. It is a hierarchical relationship: it means handing one’s power over to another being, and original animism never does that. An animist works alongside an other-than-human spirit, but never hands themselves over to it. See What are pre-Fallen, Fallen and post-Fallen shamanism?
Is possession really mental illness? #
Sometimes. “Many people think that spirit possession is not a real thing, but a sign of mental illness.” Sometimes possession is very real, but “not all possessions are real. Some are delusions, or disowned parts-of-self. Sometimes the spirits are real and sometimes they are not. Always consider mental health issues before doing a depossession.”8
Getting this right matters. If a client’s demons are real and a therapist treats them as disowned parts, “the therapist would unwittingly be helping the demons possess” the client further. If they are disowned parts and a practitioner calls them real demons that need banishing, that “would be to greatly compound the client’s mental health issues.”9
What is de-possession, and who should do it? #
Depossession is the removal of an intrusion or entity that has ‘possessed’ someone, in the sense of taking them over and influencing them. It is most safely done in the Lower-World or Upper-World, and “The safest thing is to let your Guides do the depossession, rather than you doing it yourself.”10
The approach is compassionate wherever it can be. Spirits such as Tobacco, Opium and Alcohol “do not want to possess us”, and need to be “apologised to, thanked, and then asked to leave”. Many of the unquiet dead “can also often be reasoned with and persuaded to leave”, and are escorted “compassionately but firmly to the land of the dead”. Malevolent spirits, though, cannot be redeemed: “You can no more ‘redeem’ them than you can ‘redeem’ the malaria parasite, the Ebola virus, or wetiko.” What happens to what leaves is for the Guides to decide, and the person then receives whatever healing they need. The full protocol is not given here.11
Being aware of these things and being the person who deals with them “are not necessarily the same thing at all”. De-possession on someone else also needs their consent. See What does consent mean in shamanic work?12
