Hello and welcome to The Shaman Podcast. 

I am Mark Ashford.

I am a Registered Usui Tibetan Reiki Master Teacher, a Shaman and author of books and online courses on Reiki and Shamanism.

Weekly, I post a video on YouTube and a podcast for the Shamanic Energy of the coming week. The reading is general; please take what resonates with you.

Please take a moment to hit the Subscribe button and Ring the Bell if you are on YouTube or subscribe if you are on a podcast platform. This way you will receive notifications of new Podcasts and videos.

In addition to the weekly events, I also produce books, online courses, podcasts and videos on all things Shaman and Reiki. So! Watch out for them!

For legal purposes, all videos and podcasts and other materials are strictly for entertainment purposes. Viewers and listeners have free will and are entirely responsible for any interpretation they place on the readings. I take no responsibility for individual viewer or listeners interpretation or actions.

These show notes contain information on the card decks used in the readings and where to get more information on my websites, books, and courses. Please check out the links below.

Mystical Shaman Oracle Cards used in reading. Amazon link. - https://amzn.to/3fRG5Ow

Queen of the Moon Oracle Cards used in reading by Stacey Demarco https://shrtm.nu/uj5f

Sacred Destiny Oracle cards by Denise Linn – https://shrtm.nu/58hG

Gateway Oracle Cards by Denise Linn – https://shrtm.nu/DHkr

Music from Epidemic sound:

Referral Link: https://www.epidemicsound.com/referral/x4pe9m/

To learn more about my work, click here https://bit.ly/3h3E6I0

Thank you.

Wind

Wind is air. Air is one of the Five Elements important to a Shaman and Shamanic Tradition. It is a unique element. It is all around us yet we cannot see it, touch it and is the medium that keeps us alive and allows us to speak, sing, laugh, communicate and spread our ideas and wisdom. It allows us to experience and to be heard.

Just as we can be heard through the air, so are things brought to us by it. Bird song, the whispers of a partner or a pet and music. But air, the wind, also brings the opposite, anger, distrust, and violence.

The wind may blow gently as a whisper or like a tornado. You can stand with your back to it and try to resist it or turn and face and feel the message that wind is sending you.

The wind always means change. Nature, the wind, blows down branches and trees that are dead or weak. It may even blow down homes and buildings that are unsound. It is your challenge this week to understand what the wind is blowing down. Why it is blowing the way it is, and what is dead or weak in your life.

Depending on how you are attached to what is leaving your life, your existence, the wind may blow gently, encouraging you, or like a storm and sweeping away things violently. The more you hold in to what needs to leave, the stronger the wind will blow and the greater the force it will apply.

Do not hold on to what you do not need, what no longer serves you. Be prepared for the calm and clarity of fresh air after a storm. Good things are coming.

The Vision Quest

A vision quest is a way to come to terms with yourself and where you are spiritually. It is a journey through our feelings, our hopes and desires, what we want to manifest and our feelings about potential, opportunities and the sacrifices we are prepared to make.

A shaman will undertake a vision quest to speak to souls and spirits to gain knowledge and perspective, good and bad, and what is useful and what is not. They will do this for their own benefit but also for the benefit of people they are asked to help. By undertaking vision quests, the shaman will understand how to unlock new possibilities and close the door to ones that should end to allow the person to move on.

If you do not have a shaman, you can look into your hopes and desires and the fears and anxieties to see the direction in which you should be going. The Vision Quest is asking you to undertaking this personal vision quest when you feel stagnant, not progressing, or it is too hard to progress. If you are finding it difficult, perhaps you should not be going in that direction?

The Vision Quest asks you to find some quiet time and get out of the house, join in the life force of nature. A house and a car keep you away from growing things. This quiet time will help you understand and tune in to what it is you need to be doing, not what you are doing. When you are outside, perhaps just in your backyard or garden, still busy mind, stop thinking tirelessly and consuming your essential energy. You will need all the energy you have for the new opportunities and the changes The Vision Quest will open up to you.

The Sweat Lodge

Think of the Sweat Lodge and think of a modern sauna. They have many things in common. In a small space, volcanic rocks from deep in Mother Gia are heated until they are red hot and then life-giving water is sprinkled over them to make steam and humidity. In the sauna we are often, but not always, naked. Being naked, we can hide nothing and be who we truly are. We sit in dim light, not darkness. In a native Indian Sweat Lodge, you would be in darkness.

It is a personal moment in a personal space. Our insides, through sweat, become our outsides and can be shed. It is a time for old habits and beliefs to go, drip from us in the sweat that comes from the pores in our skin, the largest living organ we and all animals have.

Now is the time for a new start, a second chance, a moment of peace before change. Now is the time to be ready to adopt new habits, beliefs and thoughts and prepare to move beyond what we have been before we walked through the door of the Sauna or Sweat Lodge.

Observe the ritual of the sauna. Use more water to create more steam from the hot rocks. Be patient as the heat and steam draw out the physical toxins and the spiritual. Recognize them for what they are. But spend little time on them.

The Sweat Lodge, the Sauna, is a place of new beginnings, new opportunities if you truly and freely shed the things that are not working for you. As you release, think of the hot steamy space you are in as being somewhere where the new opportunities can take root and grow.