Eoten

Animist poet

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energy medicine

Animism is not Alternative Medicine

Alternative medicine is a range of “systems of healing or treating disease not included in the traditional medical curricula of the US and UK”.*

It includes many methods that you’re probably familiar with, from vitamins to reiki, and it can overlap with some animist practices, notably energy medicine, herbalism and folk magic.

Alternative medicine is a big umbrella containing everything from relatively scientific osteopathy for backache to fermented cabbage for homosexuality (no really*). Saying that a practice is ‘alternative medicine’ tells us very little about it’s origins, function, effectiveness or intent.

But a common misconception is that animism itself is an ‘alternative medicine’ like reiki or herbalism. While animist practice can include methods that have healing effects, like herbalism or energy medicine, a person’s animist practice doesn’t have to include any of these. And it’s possible for an animist to use these methods without any intent of healing or treating disease.

Animism is a highly practical path which focuses on effective solutions over ideology. Animist methods rarely conflict with traditional medical treatments in the way that alternative medicine can. Because practical and effective solutions are the goal in animism, refusing treatment in favor of unproven methods is very unlikely.

This means that if a medical treatment is the best solution to a problem, that’s the solution we use. Conversely, if it means that combining animist practices with traditional medicine is the best solution, that’s what we’ll do. Often, in Western animism, this means that animist practices are used to support the patient or prevent illness in the first place.

For example, animist methods can reduce stress, which has been proven to cause ill health. They can also be used to change destructive behaviour, such as smoking, or to support a patient in following their medical treatment more reliably.

And animist methods of working with psychoactive plants are becoming more and more recognised for their potent healing potential in social, psychological and terminal illness.*

Rather than an alternative medicine, animism is a personal and communal spiritual stance. It offers no guarantees and endorses no experts, rather demanding that we accept the uncertainty of life as it is.

Depossession

Depossession encompasses the methods to remove a harmful, intrusive spirit from a host’s energy system. It is is very specific tool that has a lot of different forms in animist traditions worldwide.

Depossession is related to the practice of exorcism, which is seen in many religions, but it has a healing rather than religious focus. It can be practiced in diverse ways, from common extraction practices to spiritual mentoring.

It’s connection to exorcism makes it a controversial practice which many Western animists are uncomfortable with; nevertheless, depossession is an ancient animist practice that is potent and helpful in certain situations.

Depossession is useful when:

Depossession works through either extraction, where the intrusive spirit is removed during energy healing, or through power reclamation, where the power loss, trauma or contracts that have allowed the possession to progress are gradually resolved. This effectively pushes the intrusive energy out of the energy system.

Depossession is an advanced animist practice, and it requires solid experience of ceremony, spirit communication, altar work and trance work. It also requires a deep relationship with helping spirits, and that the practitioner has resolved much of their own power loss, shadow loss and spiritual doubt.

Please read the contraindications page for details of when advanced practices like this are not helpful.

*Please note: depossession alone is not an effective treatment for illness, please seek medical help before using spiritual healing methods.

Extraction

Extraction is a practice for removing harmful energy, emotion and thoughts. It’s found in many animist traditions around the world.

Extraction is a form of energy medicine, where problems are addressed at the energetic level of a person’s being rather than the physical or mental. It works through using various tools or pure intent, to draw the harmful energy from the subject’s energy field or body.

Extraction is helpful when:

  • We are having trouble letting go of an unhelpful pattern of thought or behaviour.
  • We are have left a difficult relationship and want to end it’s influence on us.
  • We can’t shake an old trauma or wound.

Extraction can use smoke, stones, breath, touch, the earth, water and many other channels for removing the unwanted energy. The removed energy is then released, often into an element such as fire, so that it returns where it’s needed.

Extraction can be used as part of an energetic healing or on it’s own, and it while it’s a very specific tool it’s also very powerful at the right moment.