One of the great surprises that shamanism affords is the joy of the unknown and that the unknown is joyous. There is a sense of wholeness that proceeds from the creativity that is inherent in the shamanic journey. Although shamanism and creativity are not commonly thought of together, a relatively superficial survey of studies of creativity reveals that the shamanic journey speaks to two of the most unknown, mysterious, and abstract elements of the creative process, as frequently defined.

Further, recent research focusing on the relationship between structure and creativity1 can be directly applied to the experiences of shamanic journeying. Not only does the shamanic journey have elements of the creative process in it as a creative act, it can also be exercised in the service of productive creativity. Journeying increases access to creativity and stimulates its cultivation.

The word "shaman" in the original Tungus language refers to a person who makes journeys to nonordinary reality in an altered state of consciousness. Adopting the term in the West was useful because people didn't know what it meant.

What is Shamanism?
Terms like "wizard," "witch," "sorcerer," and "witch doctor" have their own connotations, ambiguities, and preconceptions associated with them. Although the term is from Siberia, the practice of shamanism existed on all inhabited continents.

After years of extensive research, Mircea Eliade, in his book, Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy , concluded that shamanism underlays all the other spiritual traditions on the planet, and that the most distinctive feature of shamanism — but by no means the only one — was the journey to other worlds in an altered state of consciousness.

Oil spills in the Gulf of Mexico and China, giant flood in Pakistan, fire storms over Russia: Pictures from the summer of 2010. Can the problem solving technique shamanism help here too?

Causes and connections are long known: The man of the industrial society is destroying nature, and thus the living beings, whether they benefit from this industry or not (1). No insight is to expect despite decades of increasing environmental movement and spiritual living. Neither the West nor in the growing economies of the East, China and India there is a salutary development for our common world. Native cultures are powerless. The warning call of their shamans are reaching us, but an effect on the common ecosystem is not visible.

Mystery and imagination arise from the same source. This source is called darkness. . . . Darkness within darkness, the gateway to all understanding.

From bees to Darkness - A Voyage Farther than the Eye Can See - by Simon Buxton

We are all familiar with the Icarus myth; a boy creates a magical pair of wings from bee’s wax and feathers, and begins to fly. He flies higher and higher and despite warnings to descend he continues ever upward towards the light of the sun. The more he is consumed and intoxicated by his drive towards the light, so the wax of his wings begins to melt, his feathers drop away and he falls into the Aegean Sea and drowns. We might sum up the moral of this tale with the words ‘too much light and your wings may be lost ’ and this is one of the challenges of the times we live in, where within spiritual traditions of many denominations there is often a largely unbalanced and unhealthy emphasis on embracing light and following the trajectory of ascension. But as the myth of Icarus informs us, the inevitable curse and course of the spiritual light-chaser is they must eventually fall back to Earth.

From time immemorial, the drum has become one of the principal tools of every experienced Tuvan shaman. In dealing with sickness the drum became indispensable.

by Mongush B. Kenin-Lopsan
Tuvans have been inhabiting the center of Asia since ancient times. They are nomads. There were famous and powerful shamans among the Tuvans, who first revealed the mystery of the healing feature of a drum’s sound.
The magic sound of a drum, accompanied by shamanic chant, cured sick persons. The character of a drum’s sound depends on the character of the patient or on the diagnosis of his disease. The drum sounds more universal according to its mysterious power and its practical meaning.