• Open circle by calling in the spirits
• Do a quick introduction and check in around the circle
• Journey on a topic as a group (or if an individual person prefers he/she may use the time for a personal journey)
• Share the journeys we did (for those who choose to share). We may break into smaller groups to do this if the circle is large.
• Close circle

This is a chance to journey in a powerful, supportive circle. The circle of spirits helps keep us focused and gives juice to the experience. Please joins us, and please tell your friends about it!

The calls are on the SECOND MONDAY of each month. We are asking a $5.00 fee per call, however, if that is out of your budget you may join the call for free. (I realize that in hard times some of us are having a trouble scraping together even that little bit of cash!) You will have to pay for the call to the bridge line. To join the next call, click the link below to Pay Pal. After you pay you will be given an auto responder email with phone numbers and logistic for the next call. If you want to join and can’t pay, email carla@spirithealer.com and we will send you the logistics letter.
Click here to register for the next call.

We signed up for a Dolphin Encounter, where we interacted with a mother, Marena and her yearling calf Kyle. They did all the tricks with us, including Marena towing us around the pool hanging onto her dorsal fin. What a complete blast! These dolphins are caring gentle and love to play. Matt is really the one to tell how it changed him.

Matt approaches understanding his encounter from the evolution based frame of mind.  “First off, just coming into such close contact with another earthly life form that is so intelligent, more so than other domesticated animals. And you just can’t help but think that these beings didn’t follow the same chain of evolution as us, because they are as intelligent as us, how can this be unless it is a parallel path to us?” Matt went on to share his amazement at how the dolphins teach each other the behaviors, and how closely knit they are when doing group tricks like leaping and spinning.  Most of all I was taken by how curious the dolphins are about people, just as we are about them. They just sat and watched us, just as we do them. We appreciate each other as equals.

I was taken by how much they delight in our delight, in delight itself. My horses are clicker trained, and I have seen the reciprocal joy first hand, but not to the extent that I felt it here. These sweethearts want nothing more than for all of us to be in love and in joy. I believe it is a reflection of two things: the Dolphin Research Center is positive and  honoring, and the dolphins themselves are powered by native joy.  A crappy place could probably diminish this passion in them. Certainly dolphins are indeed wild animals with their own ways. I have known divers who were beaten up by wild dolphins. Maybe this was just the dolphins not realizing the diver was a fragile playmate. Maybe it was the dolphin expressing territorial rights. Or maybe the dolphin mirrored the diver’s attitude.

My communication with these dolphins was straight forward.  “Who is your favorite trainer?” A thin blond woman (There were two of them, but Matt thinks it was Jessica, who was very enthusiastic and sweet.) “Tell me about what makes you happy?” Getting a spin perfect, sliding on a slick surface (like a seal), sex, the quietness of night, a low whistle that one of the trainers gives when he comes out alone and gives back rubs, helping small kids who are “special needs”. This came from a large dolphin named Delphi.

In Bonaire this February I spent a morning interacting with a wild pod. They told me where they would be and when, and I went to greet them, and was always just a little bit late. Finally I was able to see them, swim out to them and be with the trailing members of the pod, a mom and her calf, as they dove beneath me. Nothing even close to touching distance. The Dolphin Research Center discourages all interaction with wild dolphins because it causes dolphins to loose their wariness of people. They cited cases where moms teach the babies to approach boats for food hand outs (the center implied that this was in replacement to teaching them to fish) and that the offered feed wasn’t the correct food for them. The more serious concern to me was that the dolphins would then be unafraid of the wrong people – people who would molest them by plugging their air holes, and worse. This is a concern that I must ponder as I head for Hawaii in August, with the hope of connection with spinner dolphins.

I spent 50 minutes swimming with the pair today. I got so close that I could see the smallest color patterns, even on their super thin tails. They were not put off in anyway, not in the least bit shy. I was close enough to touch them, but I didn’t attempt it. It just seemed incorrect to try. I have petted shanks and sting rays before. They didn’t seem to mind. I’ll have to journey to the Rays and ask them how they would like it.

Yesterday I did several sessions before starting my diving day. One was for a dog in Holland, and Spotted Eagle Ray came as a healing spirit. There are times when I want something so much that I figure I must be creating it. I thought that I had succumb to ego and was forcing the journey, but the Ray assured me I was not. And then to prove the point, the spirits started my next journey by merging me with an ostrich embryo who was trying to hatch. It was so vivid and bizarre. I was struggling to peck the shell, and felt exhausted and wanted to give up. Then I felt a surge of power in my abdomen, and I gave it one more hard peck and POP! I saw sunlight. I felt air, and my mom was there in all her glory. My siblings were chirping and I had all of life before me. How glorious! Clearly I didn’t create that – I didn’t have the foggiest idea how it connected to the client, and no sense that it was important to me. But maybe it was. Maybe I am hatching a new way of working by connecting with these reef animals.

When I was done with my clients’ journeys yesterday, I journeyed to the Eagle Rays to ask if there were anything I should be aware of when I was swimming with them. The Ray I was talking with said he preferred if I didn’t chase him. He said that it reminded him just a bit of a shark, and sharks are bad (the predator), and that he also didn’t want me to touch his tail. So I tried my best to stay along side. Once I got in front while the Ray was involved in digging, and that was a mistake. I must have startled him, as his eyes are all covered in sand when he is snouting through the bottom finding crabs. I apologized and we were fine.

I took my Reefmaster camera today, and it failed. It seemed to be taking pictures just fine, but not one recorded on the memory card. This is the third replacement camera Reefmaster has sent me in one year. As a side note, I do not recommend Reefmaster. Sniff! The pictures were so promising. I can’t replace the camera here on Bonaire. You will just have to journey to the animals to see them for yourselves. I did find some good footage on line though. Check this video out! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ohHgtyoiLY&NR=1

We begin a shamanic path by studying the ancient pathways that connect the worlds and teach us to work with spirit. Thanks to Micheal Harner and the Foundation for Shamanic Studies, these old worn paths, overgrown by modern culture, are being steadily cleared. Every day they grow more visible to us and are now fairly easy to follow.

Modern shamanic teachers take people first along the wide and clearly marked paths to teach them to journey. Think of the first few miles of a major trail right after the tail head. It is like a super highway and is populated by people of all types. Further into the forest the trails diverge and become less traveled, more rugged, and more adventuresome. Today’s shamanic teachers have cleared these paths for you into the specific areas of their interest: Celtic Shamanism, Shape Shifting, White Table, Animal Healing, Soul Retrieval, and so many more fascinating arenas.

I have opened paths that are about healing our Animal Partners (dogs, cats, horses etc) using shamanic methods. In my trainings I apply common shamanic techniques to animal clients. But I do so in a way that is unique to the trails I have uncovered. Over the course of 10 years of concentrated journey work and attention I have been taught a way of working shamanically that is very powerful, and is especially beneficial for working with animals and their people. I teach this method through telelclasses with the Animal Spirit Network, and through workshops worldwide and private trainings.

I am not sure exactly what cultural traditions I am following when I do my work. I am not much of a scholar. I am an explorer. I ask the spirits to show me how to achieve big results. I ask them to explain the cosmology of the world to me empirically: through shamanic journey experiences, results in my clients, and parallel experiences in my students. The results are profound for me and for my students. (By the way I enjoy taking workshops and connecting with other shamanic teachers. It is so exciting to learn the paths they have been shown, and to see if and how they overlap with the ones I am following.)

Here are the themes of the shamanic exploration I am embarking on today:

Spirals and the Nexus of Creation: At the center of the spiral is a place of brilliance. The place of creation itself. A client in that spiral can experience a transfiguration that explodes away the old and rebirths in pure divinity. The secret is in the preparation and the ceremony. I have two workshops that explore this : Healing in the Spiral of Time and Sacred Animal Masks. Sacred Animal Masks is offered in Phoenix and Chicago Spring 2008.

The Power of Ecosystems: This started with my desire to communicate with reef life (all the critters, not just whales and dolphins). Communicating with reef life opened up a new revelation for me in the power of using ecosystems as healers for clients and for the earth herself. As a result I see the earth totally differently today than I did even a year ago. I am currently exploring ecosystem work with my advanced private students. I will be birthing it in a week long workshop on private Caribbean sailing boat cruise in 2009. (Yes, we will swim with Dophins!)

Animal Tribes: Domestic Animals are very dependent upon their connection to their spirit tribes. The spirits tribes facilitate the death and dying process. They bring super powerful healing power. They give the animal a point of reference in the world. They hold any soul parts that were not fully committed to the body at birth. The tribal stories are the animal’s mythology, critical to the animal’s self concept. I am forever exploring these tribal connections and teaching about them in my trainings. There is more to this story too (there always is). Our power is a function of our connection to our tribes. Our tribes are our loved ones here on earth, our ancestors, spirit family, power animals and their tribes. We will be connecting to our Power Animal’s tribe in the Mask workshop – see the page links!

Please browse www.spirithealer.com to learn more about me, and www.spiritlearning.com to find out about studying with me.

My trainings are guidances. Your teachers are the spirits. Together we explore paths that are well worn, but over grown, and we rebirth that knowledge for the whole world!

In Spirit and Love – Carla