4th Annual Shamanic Convergence

Ignite and reclaim your passion
September 27-30, 2012

@ Dorje Denma Ling
Retreat Centre,
Tatamagouche, N.S.

~ where we are privileged to continue our Shamanic/Shambhala connection.

From 2009 “Returning to Our Roots” (Air), 2010 “Returning to the Mother” (Earth), 2011 “The Great Weave” (Water), we now awaken the challenging 4th element, Fire – the dragon of change and protection;
the Fire that strips away, contained by Water that heals, fueled by Air that buoys us up and Earth that nourishes us.

As a deeply connected Shamanic community, we will ignite the alchemy of the dragons’ energy to melt our hearts, and fuel our passion for right living.

Indigenous fire wisdom ~ healing ritual ~ transformative movement /dance
Drumming/journeying~ singing/chanting ~ Sunrise ceremonies
Fire walking ~ sweat lodges ~ prayer & purification

Images from the Grandmothers’ Dreaming:

~Something beyond us is possible and imminent-sun sparking on the water;
the river as a snake and a dragon.

~Fearless, Intent, Precise. You are wiser than you know. Updraft of dragon wings into eagle tail feathers. Surrender to the power of this.

~Remembering Self/Being. Bones floating down river to be cleansed, then reclaimed new.

~Seeing all the pieces coming together as a whole- the male/female and also the children.

~Just full on urgency-excitement. A launch into ascension is about to happen. Getting beyond our reluctance and sinking into the teachings. A circle of luminaries.

~We’ve known each other a long time and it’s not the first time. We know how to raise the energies of the elements. It’s a power we’ve been given to use and be brave with, putting on the mantle of warriorship.

For four evocative days we will feel ourselves melt into the heart of the dragon, bringing our selves to the mystery and magic of the Shamanic world.  Convergence experience resonates deeply beyond the four days, becoming a spark to alight your world and reclaim your place!  Come and BE with us.

Hosted by the Shamanic Grandmothers Council of Nova Scotia

Participants from all cultures and traditions are welcome at this gathering.

“An annual shamanic gathering to foster an expanded concept of shamanism and how shamanic practice can be used for healing individuals, communities and the planet.”

We also enjoyed presentations by Eileen O’Hare and David Hickey who are both returning for the 2012 Convergence.

Presentations by local shamans Nancy Sherwood, Armand DeGrenier, Sula Paris, Theresa Thomas and Carla Silver helped us experience and celebrate an impressve spectrum of the wisdom, beauty and healing to be found in Nova Scotia’s shamanic community.

Sharing all of the above and more with our Shambhala hosts deepened and broadened the intention of the Great Weave.

Participants of any year are welcome to submit their experiences. David Cameron, site chef, email hidden; JavaScript is required.

As we packed to leave and rushed around for final hugs goodbye, the sky filled with Dragons; portents of things to come in 2012?

Participants of any year are welcome to submit their experiences. Use the comment box below or email them to David Cameron, site chef, email hidden; JavaScript is required.

A raging shape-shifted bear rampaged at a workshop that had been hijacked by a dead mink.

Coyotes held a loud party behind the Convergence site one night. Clouds told stories of wind, rain and bright fall weather.

Great food was had by all and all contributed to the smooth flow of chores, workshops, sweat-lodges and circled delight.

Participants of any year are welcome to submit their experiences. Use the comment box below or email them to David Cameron, site chef, email hidden; JavaScript is required.

What a marvelous convergence of energy, ancestors, tribes, shamans, Grandmothers and ideas!

Participants of any year are welcome to share their experiences. Use the comment box below or email David Cameron, site chef, at email hidden; JavaScript is required.

Here is what Caitlin had to say:

‘Returning to our Roots: the First International Shamanic Convergence in Nova Scotia’ was an extraordinary gathering of contemporary shamans, medicine people and seekers for planetary solutions.

Those who are working towards the healing and the transformation of our planet in their own ways were both supported and inspired by this convergence which helped extend the skilful ways in which we can create and maintain community.

Held in the heartland of Nova Scotia, with its links to both native Canadian traditions as well as the lore of Scottish ancestral settlers, this was a high-point of cultural meeting and exchange that transcended barriers of faith, race and difference. I have never experienced such a harmonious and healing event. The sharing of prayers, songs and healing ways, the symposia and practical learning available at this event made it a university of spirit in which all could join.

I hope and trust that this may become an annual event, calling people worldwide to return to the special healing of Nova Scotia and the ancestral wisdom that assembles when soul-friends gather.

from Caitlín Matthews, British author of Singing the Soul Back Home, Sophia Goddess of Wisdom and Walkers Between Worlds. www.hallowquest.org.uk

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The Shamanic Grandmother’s Council of Nova Scotia has given the world a gift.

Through their work, people from around the world gathered at Indian Harbour, Nova Scotia to create a Path for Personal and Global Transformation; and create a path we did.

The invitation went out and it was answered by many; some who knew exactly where they came from and what they had to do and it was answered by people like me. I read the news and listen to the reports but I can leave it “out there”. However, still knowing we cannot continue on this course of global destruction and irreverence for the sacredness of all things.

This convergence has opened my eyes, but more importantly, it has opened my heart to the ways and teachings of our ancestors. We must listen to the cries of the universe and reply with love, healing, and a commitment to change. To do otherwise will have catastrophic repercussions.

The Shamanic Grandmother’s Council will be forever blessed for their efforts and I pray they are able to continue their work with this type of gathering as an annual event.

Ann Chaffey, RN
Corner Brook, NL

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Hi David, Nancy and the Grandmothers Council,

I just wanted to email to express my deepest thanks for being able to participate in the Shamanic Convergence. It was a wonderful experience that so connected spirituality, the environment and community…..three factors that are so essential for this time of moving forward towards a healthy and whole planet. I especially appreciated the manner in which there was no ‘right’ way being expounded, but truly a connective web in which each of us could find our own, unique way to contribute to the learning and the teaching that so embodied the Convergence.

I have come back to my life and situation in Cape Breton feeling thoroughly revived. Not just through trust and knowledge of a new-found community, but in my connect to spirit and the re-membering of my courage. I had become quite worn from the previous few years of reaching out, teaching, facilitating, always in isolation from a supportive human community (it is with my great gratitude that I can write that the spirit community was always present). Through the community built at the Shamanic Convergence I feel that such necessary energy is revived and re-inspired. Thank you for your far-reaching vision and for your hard work and determination to bring the vision to actuality.
with much love and gratitude,
Prune

I can not believe it has been almost a month since the Convergence.. Wow.

I feel forever changed..every moment spent was golden, every word spoken was filled with profound meaning. I feel forever connected to everyone of you. I am still coming down…from this beautiful beautiful experience.

Thank you, Thank you, Thank you.

Love and Many Many Blessings until we meet again.
Lori Folkins

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Hi all,

I am wanting to share with you this message I just posted on the Art of Hosting list serve — it has been inspired by my journey, by the Shamanic Convergence, by conversations I am in around an Art of Hosting shamanic practice training ground. Thank you all for your inspiration and happy Hallowe’en!

I am inspired to write a bit about a question I have been exploring over the last couple of months. It has come out of my journey – my personal, professional, spiritual journey that has generated a depth of unprecedented learning and significant transitions in my life in the last few months – one of which is the birth of Shape Shift Strategies Inc. – the company and banner under which I now do my hosting work. As I contemplate the work that I and Shape Shift will do I wondered how to bring my spiritual path and my work path together…. and still have credibility, and still make a livelihood … as if they are two separate and distinct things and that acknowledging the sacred will somehow be an impediment in some of the client work I do – not all, but some. Then a good friend thoughtfully said to me, “I think you are making a distinction where none exists.”

Hmmmm. Powerful. Nice pause. Deep breath. You are making a distinction where none exists!

And now I am finding myself intentionally bringing this conversation to many places. There are a few of us in conversation about bringing Art of Hosting and Shamanic Practice very intentionally together in a retreat next spring and this conversation about the sacred and work and credibility and magic is permeating our conversation bringing a richness and depth to it.

Just today in a conversation at Envision Halifax where we are exploring an ongoing series of conversations around civic engagement and the restoration of community in Halifax the topic of the sacred and work also surfaced – because I am now giving voice to it in a way I might not have thought about just a few weeks ago. I also just wrote about it in this Shape Shift blog and I’ve posted the blog on Facebook.

I am struck by the thought: What if the essence of who we are, the work we do in the world and the sacred are not all separate things but that we have been making distinctions where none exist –feeling like we need to leave the sacred on the shelf while we show up at work and other places where it might not be too well accepted? Imagine if we intentionally bring a sense of seamlessness and integration around work and the sacred EVERYWHERE, all the time, and people understood it to be normal rather than an edgy conversation! Imagine the sense of harmony and ease we would bring into all the places we touch. Every time we do this, we bring a bit more healing to ourselves and others.

What does the world need right now? Healing. Where do we start – or where am I starting? With what I used to think of as an edgy topic in some settings or as “outing” myself – by intentionally bringing the sacred – and magic – into everything I do and every place I go. I’m seeing and seeding magic. I know Art of Hosting training and work also seeds magic. It already has a sense of the sacred about it when we really pay attention to the conditions we are fostering and now I find myself on a path to a next level and being prepared to be surprised.

A few thoughts from a stunningly beautiful fall day in Nova Scotia.

Kathy Jourdain
Shape Shift Strategies Inc.

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Dear Convergers

I wanted to witness to another Convergence impact. Three members of our Ontario full moon drumming group, whose origins were birthed by EarthSea in Nova Scotia, were at the Convergence: Allison, Lucie and David.

Driving home, (1) we had a feeling that the Convergence energy would help move our drumming group to a new energy level, and of course that was partly why we were there. Certainly it acted as a point of comparison to confirm that we are on an appropriate path in a good way and should continue in respect and confidence. (2) Perhaps more surprising to we three, each got a message about a sweat lodge that our group built but for various reasons we stopped holding sweats. Here is what happened:

A group member, who was not at the Convergence, raised the sweat lodge issue, and we have ended the silence and begun respectful conversations about how to resolve the stagnant energy around that.

Another group member, again who was not at the Convergence, hosted the most recent full moon drumming, which was of course near Hallowe’en, Samhain, All Saint’s Day and thus at a time of year recognized by various cultures as appropriate for Ancestor connections. That person led us in song, dance and we shared a short ceremony from the Convergence about talking to your ancestors. We were encouraged to bring momentoes or tokens for an Ancestor shrine. In the past, we have not usually done these types of extended ceremonies, we just drum.

So this is to confirm the energy transmission. The two messages we got at the Convergence have in fact become manifest, in each case the spark coming from someone who was not even there.

Thanks again to all Convergers, to the supportive spirits, to the safe container at OceanStone, to the grandmothers, to the inspired presenters and the elements.

Ho!

My declaration at the Shamanic Convergence, September 2009:
From this place of deep rootedness in my spiritual lineages, I boldly bring my healing gifts to the shifting shape of the world and the regeneration of its people!

Caitlin is also a Celtic Shaman in her own right. This will be Caitlin’s first presentation in Canada and we are most honoured that she can join us. www.hallowquest.org.uk

Armand DeGrenier, Nova Scotia

I have been guided in spiritual practice in this incarnation following the instructions of the pre-birth council of coherence … after meeting and studying the path of “Core Shamanism” with Michael and Sandra Harner in the early 1980′s, I began experiencing a series of co-incidences that could be best described as emanations from “non-ordinary realms” … these moments of awakenings have been like a map of a path of guidance which continues to unfold to this day … in the late 1990′s, after being curious about DNA-genealogy, I was drawn to Font-de-Gaume in the Dordogne region of south western France where I experienced a profound heart connection with the lineage of the ancient cave painters …
thus the 10,000 year old roots of my shamanic path became clear ! I am heartfully indebted to the many teachers, family, friends, sisters and brothers on the path I have met over the years … in particular when I review my sacred walk, i think back to the 1970′s and humbly honour the teachings freely gifted to me by Manitonquat (Medicine Story) of the Wampanoag nation in Massachusetts and more recently am sincerely beyond grateful for the guidance and sharing of tio (uncle) don Caesario, donna Maria, don Augustin and don Rojellio of the Secoya people of Ecuador and to sobrino (nephew) Jonathan Miller, at guaria de osa retreat centre in costa rica, ethnobotanist, inter-cultural guide and rainforest protector-activist for our shared vision of (inter)planetary wholeness.

Martha Lucier, Ontario www.shamanismcanada.com
“As I rekindle the indigenous spirit within myself I connect to my sacred roots listening to the voices of the ancestors while honouring my connection to the web of life. As a living prayer, I am both the weaver and the web and invite others to join me in igniting the flame as we return to the sacred fire. As global citizens we are all one tribe indigenous to the earth. Let us find ourselves together in one circle of deep peace dancing barefoot upon Earth Mother.”

Martha is co-founder of Northern Edge Algonquin Retreat Centre along with her husband Todd Lucier. Their mission is the promote peace on the planet through providing experiences in nature that help us rediscover ourselves, empower other’s and heal the earth.

Martha is a practitioner of Core Shamanism based on the work of Michael Harner, founder of the Foundation for Shamanic Studies. She has completed the F.S.S. 3 year program as well as a shamanic teacher training with Sandra Ingerman and is a member of the Society for Shamanic Practitioners.

Martha’s work as a teacher and healer is infused with her deep love of mother earth and desire to empower others to discover the gifts they came to the world to manifest. Martha conducts regular Basic Shamanism Retreats and offers a 2 year training in Advanced Shamanism each year at the Edge. Vision Questing in Algonquin Park is where Martha feels most alive!

Highlights of Martha’s shamanism training experience include workshop facilitation and orchestrating the closing ceremony for a gathering of over 200 participants at Findhorn, Scotland in 2002 and leading an opening ritual and workshops for Peace in Education Conference in Budapest, Hungary in 2004

Nancy “Dancing Light” Sherwood, Nova Scotia, www.travellersjoy.ca

Nancy has been encouraging shamanic transformation from the inside out, and from the outside in for more than two decades.

Co-founder of the ten year experiment in collective shamanic living that was EarthSea Shamanic Ecovillage, Nancy’s inspired and inspiring projects continue to be on the cutting edge of shamanic practice in Nova Scotia, including: spirit pilgrimages to many lands, many ancestors; assisting both First Nations people and Celtic people in their spiritual reclamation efforts; helping individuals reconnect to the land and re-collect their soul essence; establishing a Mandala of Peace through shamanic dance training; and most recently, creating a traveling spiritual banquet in Nova Scotia called A Sense of Place, that honours and celebrates exceptional appropriate stewardship of land, while calling forth and interacting with the life-enhancing essences of the land itself.

Nancy co-founded EarthSea Interpretations Unlimited and the Nova Scotia Shamanic Grandmother’s Council and is a sweat lodge leader and practicing shaman.

Theresa Thomas and Sula Paris , Nova Scotia.

Sula Paris and Theresa Thomas carry the medicine and spiritual traditions of the Dagara people of Burkino Faso, West Africa. Both are initiates of Malidoma Some´, shaman elder and a well known and respected teacher of those traditions. www.malidoma.com/

Theresa Thomas
Born in Vancouver, B.C., Theresa connected with Nature in her youth. Faced with a debilitating illness in the early ‘90’s, Theresa’s healing journey spanned many modalities and practices, including several years of studying and assisting Sandy Levey-Lunden, teacher of deep personal courses based on the principles of A Course in Miracles. Theresa’s introduction to the East Coast Village in 2005 was a profound connection to community, which led to a deep joining to her ancestors and a commitment to the work of Malidoma to bring the teachings of the Dagara Tribe to the west. Theresa was initiated as an elder in 2006 and recently completed the Indigenous Ancestral Spirit Technology trainings. In 2008, Theresa co-facilitated the first Sisters of the Gates gathering, which is expanding to include a Nova Scotia event in 2009.

Sula Cindy Paris
Native of Truro, Nova Scotia, Sula lived in an intentional shamanic community for three years before joining the East Coast Village, a group dedicated to bringing the Dagara wisdom and technology to the west. Over the past eight years, Sula developed the Ancestor Speak Divination cards, traveled to Dano, Africa (home of the Dagara Tribe), assisted in many trainings including hosting Malidoma in North Carolina and volunteering for the year-long training in Harlem, as well as bringing Dagara ceremony to Youth On Purpose. In 2008, Sula co-facilitated the first Sisters of the Gates gathering, which is expanding to include a Nova Scotia event in 2009. Recently, Sula’s medicine work has elevated through the creation of sacred soap stones, which have brought transformation and healing to many people.

For more information go to: www.eastcoastvillage.org or write to email hidden; JavaScript is required

Nova Poirier is a shamanic healer living in Pictou County, Nova Scotia. She has worked in the helping and healing profession for the past 18 years. She is a graduate of the 3 year program in advanced shamanic training through the Foundation for Shamanic Studies where she was fortunate to train under renowned teacher Michael Harner and she has worked with other masters in the field. She also holds a degree in psychology and extensive training in psychosynthesis, a psycho/spiritual approach to healing. In addition to her healing practice, Nova has been leading nature based spiritual retreats and shamanic workshops for 10 years. She and her partner Billy MacDonald run Redtail Nature Awareness, a nature education center dedicated to helping people come into a deeper relationship with the natural world.

Louise Gauthier

Louise was introduced to the Native traditions as a child by a friend, Jean Juneau, who had been adopted by the Mohawks from the Kanesatake reservation. In 1992, she was introduced to core shamanism by Noëlle and Claude Poncelet from the Foundation for Shamanic Studies (FSS) in Montreal. She participated in all the advanced workshops that were given in Québec since then. She is now a member of the healing circle in Montreal and works as translator for most of the workshops given by the FSS in Montreal.
She followed the teachings of Grandfather William Commanda from Maniwaki, the spiritual leader of all North American Natives and also teachings from pipe carriers and grandmothers from the Algonquin, Atikamek and Mi’kmaq traditions. And the path never ends… She recently found out that she could call herself Algonquin metis, having an Algonquin ancestor (Weskarini).
People come to her for spiritual healing (Soul retrieval, extraction, psychopomp or depossession), for divination as well as for ceremonies such as sweat lodges (Algonquin tradition), marriages, welcommings for a new born, first step, and other passages of life.
Louise also works as a teacher in prebirth classes with hypnosis teaching couples how to give birth naturally in joy, comfort and awareness.
She also works as a naturotherapist with Biologie totale, hypnosis and other methods the spirits have put on her path. As a therapist, she is an active member of a group called L’Odyssée, le voyage d’une naissance, a group of women therapists around birth and rebirth.
Louise is a journalist/writer and is still collaborating regularely to a global health magazine in Québec, Vitalité Québec Mag (since the second edition in1997). She is very concerned by personnal health as well as the planet’s health, her heart being tied together with Mother Earth’s.
Louise lives in the Easterntowships area in Québec.

Leila Bruno, Wyoming, USA

Leila Bruno has an undergraduate degree in ecology and a Masters in English. She helped to set the statewide system of rape crisis centers and battered women’s shelters in Wyoming in the 1970′s and co-founded a non-profit environmental group in Wyoming in 1980′s — this group is still working to protect habitats for endangered species. She lived in Buddhist dharma centers from 1999-2006, working as a coordinator, shrine-keeper, householder and meditation instructor. During a break from retreat centre work in 2004-05, she coordinated a statewide history project and edited and published the book, Ahead of Their Time: Wyoming Voices for Wilderness. In 2008 she spent time in the Amazon rainforest with the Achuar people’s of Ecuador. Currently she is living in Boulder, CO and travels widely as a facilitator for the Awaking The Dreamer symposium, (AWAKENING the DREAMER, CHANGING the DREAM of the NORTH), an initiative of the Pachamama Alliance.

Carla “Dancing Rainbow Dragon” Silver, Riversong Keep, Nova Scotia

Carla rekindled her relationship to Creator and Mother Earth through the ancestral wisdom teachings of Venerable Dhyani Ywahoo, and inter-wove these Peace Keeping ways with a degree in Environmental planning. She pledged to walk in beauty, to cultivate right relationship and to live in harmony with all beings during her first vision quest some twenty years ago. Her earth walk brought her to the intentional shamanic eco-village of Earth Sea, to live and study with her life long Teacher Nancy “Dancing Light” Sherwood. Carla is a carrier of Women’s Medicine and receives guidance through the divine feminine ways of the Celestial Grandmothers.

As an Earth Keeper she practices land stewardship with her partner at River Song Keep, a biodynamic farm, shamanic studies and experiential learning center in Chester Grant, Nova Scotia. Life at River Song evolves around the practices of honoring ancestral holy days and the celestial ceremonial wheel. As a long time student of Tom Brown Jr’s School of Tracking, Nature Awareness and Wilderness Survival and, Vision Quest Protector through the Earth Heart Institute of Vision and Healing, Carla offers nature based experiences and shamanic healing to individuals and groups. Carla is a Sweat Lodge Keeper and is a member of the Shamanic Grandmothers Council of Nova Scotia, Nova Quest Medicine Drum Society and the South Shore Meditation Center of Shambhala International. Carla owns and operates Shamanic Pathways Nova Scotia.

Ellen Hunt was born and raised in Bay d’ Espoir, NL. She moved to Lunenburg County, NS in 1977. She is married with a daughter and a son. She is a grandmother of two beautiful boys.

Nine years ago while enjoying a picnic on a special island off Riverport, NS, she received a calling from the Spirit World. Following this calling and teachings from Elder Charlie Labrador and Elder Rose Morris, Ellen took up the practices of Mi’kmaq ceremonies and traditions. She is very proud of her culture and heritage, shares with others, and is open to new learning with other cultures and traditions. She has been chosen to represent the Mi’kmaq as Elder in the community. She is chosen by the Spirit World to be protector of our ancestors and was given the Ancestor Bundle at a Give Away Ceremony in Gold River.

Ellen is the founder and president of the Mi’kmaq Burial Ground Research and Restoration Association. The mandate of this association is to work with land owners to research, protect and restore abandoned/ancient Mi’kmaq or Mi’kmaq mixed i.e.: Acadian, Irish, English burial sites. To date, the association has restored, erected and dedicated monuments in Bridgewater, Petite Riviere and Indian Point, Lunenburg County,NS. She also travels to Micous Island in St. Margaret’s Bay to work with youth.

Ellen is founder and coordinator of the Annual Mi’kmaq/Acadian Festival at Fort Point, Lahave. It is held the third weekend in August, (festival dates this year, August 21 &22). During the festival, she conducts ceremonies at the ancient burial site in Petite Riviere.

A Board Director and Mi’kmaq representative to the Lunenburg County Historical Society, Ellen designed the Mi’kmaq Village, artifact display and Mi’kmaq Resource Library at Fort Point Museum in Lahave, NS, and assisted with the Mi’kmaq Fisheries display at the Fisheries Museum of the Atlantic.

Ellen is writing a book ” All About Granny” in which she shares stories of her childhood and culture.