Tag: Self

Shamans, Race, and Story In Our Time of Occupation

by Michael Watson PhD, posted in native american, Psychotherapy, Shamanism, Social issues

Shamanism and, more recently, Narrative Therapy seek to challenge the authority of colonialism and its allies in the lives of those who seek healing. They use differing tools and strategies to do so, yet often their territories overlap. Together they provide evolving maps of the technologies, visions, and behaviors of colonial practice. They challenge the workings of class, race, and gender as constructs of domineering ideologies, and offer avenues of resistance that encourage individuals, families, and communities to become reconnected to ancestors, spirits, and ecosystems, while reclaiming the authorship of their lives. Together, they re-story lives and world.

On Hunting, Pilgrimage, and Caring For the Self in Others

by Michael Watson PhD, posted in First Nations, Healing, Psychotherapy, Shamanism

What are we to do when traditional practices, both Native and non, come into conflict with a rapidly urbanizing world, in which an ever growing list of creatures is endangered or threatened? How are we to continue subsistence practices that are essential to the maintenance of Self, both individual and collective? How are we to understand and resolve conflicts between traditional, subsistence practices, and the desires of a largely urban, increasingly resource hungry, population, when those very urban desires serve to further the agendas of racist and classist elements in the culture, to the detriment of Natives and rural families?