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Posted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 1:05 am
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I'm in a bit of a strange situation. I'm generally very picky about what I use in practicing any paradigm, but I also prefer very practical hands on material over books that are mostly theory and dogma with no direction or examples for ritual and practice.
Thus against my better judgement I picked up Christopher Penzack's The Inner Temple of Shamanic Witchcraft. Essentially I picked it up because I previously bought his Instant Magic for the exercises, of which many are useful.
So unsurprisingly, the exercises and practical side of The Inner Temple of Shamanic Witchcraft is great. There's alot of stuff in there that works and is open ended enough to be easily modified as necessary. It's about as ecumenical as anything like that could be expected to be.
However, the theory side of things is almost pure weaboo. Even if I didn't have the dedication to follow up on any claims he makes that I don't already know the veracity of, you can see the bullshit coming a mile off and it comes in thick. I couldn't help but laugh when I was watching a talk given by Douglas Rushkoff and Daniel Pinchbeck in which Pinchbeck reminds the audience of how misappropriated shamanism has been by the New Age movement in that shamans are not viewed in their native cultures as being these carebears who radiate healing energy and poop psilocybin, that in many cases they're shunned and feared despite their important contributions to the society because of how blatantly Penzack follows that ridiculous notion. Not that I needed Pinchbeck's reminder.
I can't honestly say I'm in any way concerned about the ethics of using the book because I have absolutely no intention of taking his anthropology or absurd spiritual notions seriously, I'm only interested in using the rituals presented as a template for building a more refined and informed practice (a practice that I will not identify as shamanism unless I find that path opened to me).
So my question is thus; have you ever, to borrow a phrase, panned for gold in the cesspit of the human psyche? What limits do you place on potential sources of information, theory, and practice in your chosen paradigm? Is there a point at which there is enough fluff to invalidate the complete work for you, and if so, what is that point?
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Posted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 1:48 am
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Posted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 2:15 am
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Posted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 5:57 am
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Posted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 6:52 am
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Pelta Gideon Starorzewski So my question is thus; have you ever, to borrow a phrase, panned for gold in the cesspit of the human psyche? Quote: Yes. I think the internet is a great example. In this case, over 99.9% of everything is crap, but doing so also led me to the little gem of sacred-texts.com. Not a bad find after all the sifting... I agree with you on this on because that is one of the main problems that I have. I have to look up all that I want to reserach on the internet because I am trying to finish school, so I don't have money right noe to buy books. Quote: The same thing applies on a smaller scale to some books. The educated reader knows to read skeptically when researching. So a book full of bollox can have a few gems. This is true also. You can research all that you want to, however if the things you find in you research are full of bollox, then your time was just wasted.
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Posted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 7:46 am
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Posted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 11:45 am
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