Plant Spirit Shamanism by Ross Heaven

Author:Ross Heaven
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Inner Traditions/Bear & Company
Published: 2011-09-14T16:00:00+00:00

The herbs that are attractive to spirits tend to be hot and spicy:

Cinnamon

Clov

Coriander

Damiana

Cactus

Chili pepper

Fig

Garlic

Ginger

Hawthorne

Mustard

Paprika

Peppercorns

Wormwood

A selection of these is made (it is not necessary to use them all, which is what accounts for the variance in paket mixes), and the herbs are mixed with rum and Florida Water and allowed to dry. A roughly orange-sized ball of the mix is then placed in muslin and tied to make a bag. Around this a second skin of silk or satin is created, using colors and decorations such as sequins, feathers, lace, shells, and beads to reflect the qualities and preferences of specific protective spirits, and to energize the package with the ashe (power) of these spirits. The colors used correspond to the archetypal qualities we tend to be familiar with (see chapter 1, on mojo bags), so that red is for Ogoun, for example—the warrior spirit whose particular gift is power—while green is for Gran Bwa, the healing spirit of nature.

In Haiti, pakets are always made at night, usually beneath a full moon, and are dedicated to Simbi Makaya, the spirit of transformational magic. They are used in healing by passing the paket over the body of the patient, slowly, from head to toe, seven times. With each pass, the paket grows heavier as the herbs absorb intrusive energies while transferring healing to the patient. At the end of this, the paket is placed on the altar, which is a gateway between worlds and will discharge the intrusive energy back to the spiritual universe.

Used in this way, the power of each paket will last for seven years and is equally effective when used in a modern urban setting as when it is used in rural Haiti. Deirdre, a therapist from London who made a healing paket during one of our workshops later wrote, for example, that: “I had an amazing session today using the paket! It has powerful and different qualities—clearing and soothing. My clients also comment on it and remark about its powers.”

SOUL LOSS: THE FRACTURED SELF

Soul loss is in many ways the exact opposite of spirit intrusion. In the latter, some alien force is injected into our spirit-selves; in the former, it is a loss of spirit, a depletion of energy, that causes the illness.

In the West, we know something of soul loss, though we use different terms for it. We talk, for example, of “psychological dissociation” and “stress-related syndromes,” which arise as a result of traumatic, abusive, and hurtful experiences and may have a number of physical, mental, and emotional symptoms associated with them. In shamanic cultures, the same symptoms are diagnosed as a fracturing of the soul, or simply as soul loss, where an individual’s spirit, faced with pain, has split into many parts, some of which have taken refuge in the otherworld, away from the harshness of everyday life.

In some ways, then, soul loss can be seen as a positive act of psychological and emotional self-protection in the face of great pain and distress. When we are

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