walsh and hughes

Walsh and Hughes

If you would ask me to diagnose a shaman, it would be simple. I’d tell you to walk out on the street, if you see a guy shaking, exclaiming he had visions, and talking to himself, he just may be a shaman. To me, a shaman is just another term describing a drug addict with visions. I honestly feel shamanism has no real significance in the world when it is aided for a different state of mind by drugs. Shamanists are not curing cancer with their visions, enhancing technology, cracking mathematical codes, or anything. They are seeing stuff like flying alligators, snakes, weird abstractions, and admit to feel like they are floating amongst their own bodies.
They believe in their visions and that they can see things that a person normally wouldn’t see. I don’t see how a shaman can be given a title, if people find other ways of finding altered states. Shamanism could possibly be useful, if not altered by drug usage. To me the real strength of a spiritual person is when a person can get himself or herself in a state of mind so strong, that nothing could alter their state of mind, whether they achieve that state by religion, or other acts. Just not by using the aid of “special roots.”
There was a picture of a monk known very famous for killing himself, during the riots of the Vietnam War. A photograph was published of him, when he lit himself on fire, soaked in gasoline, and he did not move, or yell at all. He just sat on the ground of the street in a fixed state. This is what I feel is the strength of an altered state is. Not the act of suicide at all, but how this monk was so fully deep in his religious beliefs, that he did not feel the physical pain. Supposedly, according to Walsh, the shaman people have been “demonized, pathologized, or sanctified with wondrous abandon.” I guess I can understand these people going through a lot, especially if these states of mind are not in the normal world, and through very extreme psychological states. But, how would you define that monk, would he be considered a shamanist? He did not use drugs, but was in a state of mind so powerful it did block out pain.
My big problem of not understanding shamanism is I don’t believe in drugs at all. Even when I am sick, I rarely take medication. I didn’t even take my pain pills after surgery when I got four of my wisdom teeth taking out. I preferred to just deal with the pain, instead of the side affects of using prescription drugs. That’s just the type of person I am, I believe in using natural methods to heal and better my state of mind. As you see on commercials daily, pills can help one thing but hurts other things. You always here about medications warning about heightening the risk of causing increase in blood clots, stroke, and heart attack.
The section further goes on to explain about how shamans through fits, almost like Epilepsy. Now this is blamed on lack of training, and is told to be “expressions of intense emotional agitation,” according to Walsh. I will have to remember that if my nephew throws a fit, it’s an expression of intense emotional agitation. I don’t believe this is really a good sign if a person is a shaman. And other characteristics include deceit, and trickery, which is said by Walsh only to be used on outsiders of shamanism, which I would be one of the people it probably be used on, as well as characterizes of spiritual emergency, initiation crisis, and development crisis.

As for Hughes, it was interesting to bring up the creativity topic again. I absolutely love art, so it’s definitely right up my alley. I enjoy drawing, charcoaling, painting, airbrushing, photography, and much more. It’s away that I can create myself to be totally happy, no matter what could be going on in life. I feel for me, it is the addiction for the adrenaline felt, after you created a work of art. Having someone shocked on how well I could charcoal something never gets old. I love taking an object, for example, and creating something that shows other people how I see it. That’s just how I’m sure Picasso, and Monet felt, even though their talent to show others is still far beyond my capabilities. Some people I feel are still very talented, just in other categories of art. I’ve seen great art by others in athleticism, mathematics, and instrumental playing. Art to me is simply the definition of being great at something, and being able to show others that greatness. It is not limited to paintings and sculptures, but far beyond in other categories.