Power Animal is your first and foremost GuideGuides. 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 in every journey. It goes with you wherever you go, leads the journey, teaches you by doing and showing, and keeps you safe as long as you pay attention to it; you are its apprentice. It also takes part in the transformation practicesTransformation practices. The family of journey-practices in which the self is deliberately taken apart, reduced to something formless, and reformed: burials, burnings, dismemberments, sky burials, dissolvings, cocoonings, poisonings, shapeshifting. A mini death-and-rebirth: cleansing, loosening of identity, and preparation for the greatest transformation of all. Read the full answer, and it stays with you in everyday life, not only in journeys.
Should my Power Animal lead my journeys? #
Yes, always. Depth in shamanic work means getting out of the way and allowing your Power Animal to lead the journeys and work through you.1 It is your Power Animal, not you, who should be leading the journey. Always.23
The relationship is an apprenticeship. “You need to develop the habit of constantly asking your Power Animal what to do next; of constantly checking in with it and watching its behaviour and reactions. You are the apprentice and your Power Animal is your principal teacher.”
Why should it lead, rather than me? #
Because the power in shamanic work is not the shaman’s. “It is important to realise that a shaman’s true power comes not from within themselves, but from the depth of their connection with their Power Animal (and other guides). It is not the shaman that does the healing, but the guides.” A Lower-World Power Animal “is infinitely wiser than you are”, and so “If you develop the habit of you leading the journeys and you being in charge of the healing, rather than your Power Animal, then your shamanic work will always be severely limited.”4
The reason holds however experienced someone becomes. As a Lower-World being, Power Animal is “not subject to ego and the other limitations of the middle-worldMiddle-world. Ordinary physical reality together with its energetic layers: the realm of individuality, separation and mixed intentions, and the only realm where harm is possible. “If there is a hell, then it is the middle-world.” Read the full answer”, so “they will always be more skilled and infinitely wiser than you.”5 This is what it means for journeys to be Spirit-led.
Does letting it lead mean it makes my decisions for me? #
No. Leading the journey does not mean running your life. Lower-World Guides “are not there to make middle-world decisions for you.”6 Shamanic healing is “categorically not about getting messages, advice or guidance”.7 Power Animal leads the work in the journey, but “This is your life and you still have to be an adult and make your own decisions when it comes to everyday middle-world issues.” That responsibility stays with you.
How does my Power Animal keep me safe? #
By being paid attention to. The Lower-World and 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 “are completely safe places in any case”, but safety becomes an issue in middle-world journeying, and in everyday life. “Your Power Animal, if you pay close attention to it, has your back. It is there to protect you and keep you safe as much as it can.”8
It also keeps you within your depth: “If you pay attention and trust your Power Animal, then it will only let you work within your competency. If something is outside your competency then it will advise you not to do it, and if you encounter something that is really dangerous in middle-world journeying then it will even haul you out of the journey altogether.” When something does go wrong, the cause is usually the same. Asked what their Power Animal was saying or doing, students answer that “they were not paying attention to it, or had decided to ignore what it was telling them. Every time.”
How does my Power Animal teach me? #
By doing and demonstrating, rarely by words. “It is my experience that Panther rarely teaches me by using spoken words. Words are limited, mostly left-brain and middle-world things. Rather, Panther teaches me by doing and by demonstrating.”9 Watching closely what Power Animal does when it heals you is how the apprenticeship begins.
It also teaches in stages. “Like any good parent or teacher, it will let you make mistakes, as mistakes are a vital aspect of any learning process. However, like any good parent or teacher, it will not let you make dangerous or fatal mistakes. It has a training programme for you, literally an apprenticeship, planned and mapped out for you.” Sometimes it does things you cannot yet see, “until such times as it knows that you are ready to learn that stuff.”
Does my Power Animal come with me to every realm? #
Yes. “Your Power Animal both can and should come with you to both the Upper-World and the middle-world too.”10 Without qualification: “your Power Animal should be with you all of the time. There are no exceptions to this.”11
There is one rare case. “Very occasionally, your Power Animal may go on ahead of you, if it needs to go somewhere that is too dangerous for you to enter, like the Land of the DeadLand of the Dead. The middle-world human place where the middle-world self belongs after death. Not the Lower-World, and not hell. More about this”, and then “your Power Animal will always leave you somewhere where it knows that you will be safe, and then come back for you.” You, though, never go on without it: “Do not go anywhere without your Power Animal.”12
What happens when I meet other beings in a journey? #
Stay with your Power Animal and check with it. In the first journeys, “stay with your Power Animal, even if other Animals and/or humans appear.”13 Later, when working for others, the same habit applies: “always keep checking with your Power Animal that everything is okay.”14
Anything that tries to come between you is a warning sign. “Anyone or anything that tries to separate you from your Power Animal does not have good intent and is categorically not to be trusted.”15 See How do I know whether an Animal I meet is really Power Animal?
What if my Power Animal seems uneasy? #
Take it seriously. On meeting a Human in the Lower-World: “If your Power Animal shows any ambiguity or unease whatsoever, then do not work with that person. Trust your Power Animal!”16 In one journey that went wrong, the Power Animal “might not have been happy about what was going on”, but the person was simply not paying attention to it.17 Its reactions are part of how it guides you.
Is my Power Animal only with me during journeys? #
No. The point of the retrieval is “to have your Power Animal with you here too”, in everyday life. Shamanism “is a way of living in the world, and of experiencing the world”, not only a matter of journeys.18 You will not always be aware of it, just as you are not always aware of what is in your pocket, but with practice it becomes “a familiar, real and reassuring presence that you can rely on, and turn to when needed and at will.” See How do I build and deepen my relationship with Power Animal?
Can my Power Animal take part in transformation practices? #
Yes, and it is often at their centre. In a dismemberment, you ask your Power Animal “to eat you and digest you, and then regurgitate you reformed and healed”, and “DismembermentDismemberment. A transformation practice in which the Power Animal takes you apart (classically: eats, digests and regurgitates you), reformed and healed. A practice of trust, cleansing and death-and-rebirth. More about this greatly strengthens the bond between you and your Power Animal.”19 A burial journeyBurial journey. A transformation practice of the Earth element: being buried in the Lower-World for grounding, and for the death-and-rebirth all the transformation practices share. More about this “may involve just you and your Power Animal and maybe your human Lower-World guideHuman Lower-World Guide. A face put on the human Oversoul: the Ancestors met through an individual form, genuinely other than us, chosen from pre-Fall hunter-gatherer humanity. Related to as a teacher, never a master. Read the full answer”, “burnings will be overseen by your Power Animal and maybe your other Guides too”, and being dismembered by it “is something that is worth seeking out on a regular basis.”20 See What are transformation practices and shapeshifting?
