Recently, I was invited as a speaker for the International Spiritual Women Scientist Summit.
International Spiritual Women Scientist Summit
A couple of days after the talk, I received a message from one of the participants. She said,
Your session was so powerful. It is because of your voice, not just your teachings, that I kept the video on all along.
This came as a bit of a surprise to me, because historically, my voice has always been judged. People have found me aggressive, arrogant, blunt. They have shamed me for my voice, isolated, rejected and misunderstood me.
So I had developed an imprint that I did not like to hear my own voice. But, that imprint has been slowly changing. And this feedback is so heart-warming that it has made my heart really, really full.
This also makes me realize that all the self work that I have been doing is really paying off.
Many of you may think I must have worked on moderating my tone or taming down my expression in order to be accepted and not judged. But that has not been the case.
Do you know what my real work was and has been?
It was not about changing who I am, but it was about accepting fully who and the way I am.
It was about my connection to nature and allowing it to continue to heal me so that I can be my own true nature. I can be in full acceptance of who I am.
Even today, I find myself judging my own rawness and authenticity. But as time goes by, I keep coming back to my own wisdom that if we have to shine in the glory of our soul, we have to unabashedly continue to be who we are.
And that, in my opinion, is the journey of self love.
If there is one thing that my journey walking the shamanic path has taught me, it is self acceptance.
Shamanism as a way of life teaches us simple tools and ways to help us understand, accept and embody who we are. Most importantly, it teaches us that in this journey, you are not alone. There are a lot of helpers, guides and allies, besides Mother Nature, to help you come into your full glory and splendour.
Are you ready to be unpopular?
Are you ready to shine in the true glory of your own soul?
If yes, then my medicine or my wisdom and teachings are for you.
We begin with a 1-month Foundations of Shamanism on 21st June 2025. To read more about the mentorship, click this link. Or WhatsApp me on 9979901933 to register.
An article on Shamanism written by Paul, co-founder of Shamanic Vision, several years ago. Paul is now in the spirit realm.
Shamanism is NOT a quick fix magical solution. Sometimes though it may provide a solution that hits at the core of an issue. It all depends on the guidance that comes through from your Guides and your Soul itself.
Remember, we are working on your Soul here—what the soul wants and does not want.
Sometimes, our souls take on contracts and agreements, a life plan to fulfill. Because of these agreements — which the soul has made prior to its birth — the only understanding that may come through in a shamanic journey is why this situation happened. We can then ask what needs to be done to resolve the issue from your Guides and/or your Soul itself.
Shamanism is not always about fixing the problem. It is about “understanding” the situation.
What is Shamanism about?
Sometimes the Soul can heal and the Guides will suggest what to do. The work post guidance has to be done by the client. The shamanic practitioner is just a medium to show you the mirror about what is going on and what needs to be done.
Sometimes, though, accepting a situation, may be the only solution as this is what the Soul wants and has agreed upon.
Although understanding and awareness may throw a lot of light on the issue, post shamanic work is equally important or rather more important. This could be anything from working with your energy bodies to belief changes, working with power integration, building a relationship with your Guides and Power Animals, soul healing and other aspects of health as guided.
Spirits are outside the realms of time and space and hence how much time a particular resolution takes, is an individual situation.
Yet, if one sticks to the guidance and keeps treading the path, miracles are possible.
Transformation is a process. Shamanism is not like taking a pill for headache. One has to feel into it and through it to allow it to transform your mind so you can feel and fully embrace the gifts of your soul. Energy is thick right now with so much warfare upon the planet. You come into this world to elevate that energy and this takes time.
Listen to the whispers of your soul. Think how far you have come instead of seeing as “nothing is happening.”
Once the guidance and next steps have been shared by the practitioner, their work is over. It is difficult to say how much time you will take to embrace, allow and deepen the healing.
The only thing between you and the healing is the will to heal. Allow it. Feel it.
The old seed has been weeded out and the new seed has been planted. It takes time to grow in to a fully nourished tree. Ask your Guides and Power Animals how you need to work at emotional level and with your belief systems to see the results. Continue working with your Power Animals.
Say to yourself again and again: I release the resistance to heal. All is unfolding for my highest good. I allow and am open for the healing that my Guides and Power animals bring me.
Implement the guidance and absorb the lessons which are involved. That’s is the true path to healing.
On the Empowerment Circle WhatsApp group, for the months of April, May and June, we’re doing FREE 1-hour webinars on various topics. We have one on 3rd May from 6-7 PM IST on Shamanism and Purpose. Do join the group for updates here.
We are an embodiment of nature. Nature lives inside our bodies and minds. We can allow expression of nature and it’s cyclical nature within us or we can bypass its currents that flow within us.
Nature is circular and cyclical. Through her seasons and elements we understand and experience different shades of our own existence. We can relate with our own self better if we understand nature.
Source: Pinterest
Nature in the season of spring brings hope, aliveness, freshness, joy, cheer, inspiration and new beginnings. We seed what we wish to bring to fruition.
Nature in the season of summer brings culmination to what we might have seeded in spring. It is about culmination of our own actions, work, passions, purpose, coming together of what we started and enjoying that. It’s about blossoming and fruition. The seeds sown and brought to life in spring come to full expression in the season summer.
Nature in the season of autumn begins the process of slowing down and shedding. It evokes the sense of reviewing our lives, how far along we have come, what do we need to do next, where do we let go, where do we need to slow down and what closures await us. It begins the process of retreating. Nature in her letting go and shedding phase brings it’s own beauty.
We never judge a tree that has slowed down its growth and is shedding its leaves. We stand in awe of this beauty of nature.
We become admirers and are awed by her magnificence at every turn.
We appreciate this slowing down. We stand in wonderment of this process of dying.
We admire nature in her birthing phase. Our heart sings when she is in her blossoming phase. And our bodies stand in childlike wonderment during her slowing down phase.
After autumn, nature makes her presence with winter. In her nude, barren state, when all the leaves have shed and all the growth has died down, she rejoices and stands tall in her void and emptiness, patiently awaiting her rebirth.
In this void, in this stillness, in this death, there is still a feeling of being complete and whole. I personally have rejoiced barren empty trees as much as I have been in awe of a tree pregnant with hope and desire and birthing new leaves, new life.
Death and Rebirth…new beginnings, life to its full bloom, slowing down and death. Nature’s glory in all her seasons and cycles teaches us humans so many things.
We often tend to question our existence or our worthiness when things take a turn or slow down or don’t go as desired. When cycles end – of work, relationships, money, career, passion or purpose, it makes us very uncomfortable. It makes us question our sense of worthiness and adequacy. We have glorified progress with work and stillness or emptiness as being unproductive and hence unworthy.
Winter may become present in different areas of our lives individually and collectively. Sometimes we experience an ending of a relationship or sometimes a career. The emptiness makes us question our existence. We grieve the death of these areas and we question the little deaths we have undergone all our lives.
We may often look at nature whole and complete, still and beautiful in her barrenness and yet we may question and fight with, be uncomfortable with this emptiness and barrenness inside of us.
We adore, admire and honor nature. We know we are nature. And yet, our yearning creates a sort of friction and perhaps a subliminal resistance to accept our own winter, in its truest sense.
Can we use the winter of our lives to just BE? Can we honor the beauty of stillness, stuckness, slowness, pause, barrenness and emptiness?
Can acceptance of this void – fully, make us pregnant with hope and desire again?
Can we patiently wait and most importantly accept this phase of our cycle without having the desire to rush through or bring completion to this death inside or outside?
Can we grieve fully what we perceive we may have lost and yet rest in the beauty that is, of winter?
“Make no mistake about it – enlightenment is a destructive process. It has nothing to do with becoming better or being happier. Enlightenment is the crumbling away of untruth. It’s seeing through the facade of pretense. It’s the complete eradication of everything we imagined to be true.”
When our soul chooses to embark on this journey, all that we hold so dearly and attach ourselves to, begins to be scraped off.
The journey of our spiritual evolution or rather the journey of our unbecoming is similar to that of the snake that sheds its skin.
We are called to unbecome/shed all the skins /masks that have become an intrinsic part of our identity.
Over several lifetimes and generations, we pick up imprints, samskaras, ways, attitudes, beliefs, attributes that begin to define who we are and we unconsciously keep operating out of those imprints quite involuntarily over and over and over again.
Neelam may feel she is aggressive or behaves in an aggressive way, but is being aggressive her true nature or is that a defense she learnt in her childhood to feel safe?
Is that a coping mechanism she learnt from her mother?
Is that how women in her lineage were?
Is that the story she picked up in her mother’s womb?
Is that the way of being she learnt in her upbringing years as a consequence of certain events which unfolded in her life?
If Neelam is not all that happened to her which now constitutes an integral part of her identity, who is she?
Can Neelam really become her authentic self and HER TRUE NATURE until she involuntarily keeps operating out of old programs?
A point may come in the journey of Neelam’s soul, where she may begin to question everything that she is or has become.
Is that her true nature? What masks has she worn upon herself to protect her wounded inner child? Where is her true self hiding?
If Neelam has to come into her true nature, a samudra manthan within her BEING has to happen. The churn has to bring forth the reality of all the unpleasant truths (the poison) which Neelam has chosen to believe or enact about herself.
Until this process of Samudra Manthan happens or keeps happening, the aspects buried deeply in Neelam’s unconscious will keep surfacing until she finally acknowledges, accepts and lets them go.
Once the process of this deep churning is over, the true gems (gifts, medicine, treasure) buried deeply within the ocean of her unconscious will rise and come to the surface.
All the buried stuff that comes to the surface cannot be bypassed or be overlooked by distraction. And there is no choice but to accept and embrace the vish (poison) rising in the process.
Samudra Manthan is indeed a huge metaphor for each one of our lives. And it can be a pain inducing process indeed. It can bring up conflicts and more chaos before it finally brings up peace and treasures.
Samudra Manthan is a journey similar to that of the journey of the underworld. The journey of the underworld is depicted and narrated in so many different ways where the seeker is often challenged to dive into the underworld, is lost, betrayed or killed only to be rescued, revived, re-birthed or resurrected again, to come back with new gifts and treasures.
Samudra manthan is a journey which goes on individually and collectively within all of our lives. Some are mildly affected by it while some have been given no choice but to ferociously jump into the process.
What kind of manthan/churn is happening in your lives? How has it impacted you positively or negatively?
When we embark on the journey of our spiritual healing, we often ask, “What is within me that has brought this to my doorstep?” This doesn’t mean that if someone abuses me, its because something is wrong within me and hence I have attracted this situation or challenge.
The premise simply is that we take full responsibility of and for our lives.
When we view life from this perspective, we stop being a victim of our situations. We introspect, what within me (thoughts, beliefs, emotions, imprints – karmic/ancestral, womb, birthing, society, religion, upbringing or any other) is bringing this to my doorstep.
What can I do to shed these imprints or beliefs or fears within myself?
More often than not, we desire that the outward situation (be it relationship, finance, health) changes. But the outward situation merely reflects our own hidden buried subconscious unconscious state/psyche.
We often (if not always) attract on the outside what we ARE on the inside. The contribution of our subconscious mind is 90% in what happens in our lives and the conscious mind just plays a 10% role. Our subconscious mind and what we store in our unconscious psyche is a sum total of our past lives, ancestral stories, stories we pick up inside the womb of the mother, our birth scenario and our upbringing.
All of this is formed through the journey of our soul in its evolutionary process from one life time to another.
The lessons and karmic imprints accumulate over a period of time and the challenges (if lessons not learnt) become harder.
We also tend to get influenced by the thought process and emotional makeover of our primary care givers. Whether we have had a functional relationship with them or a dysfunctional relationship with them, we tend to become like them out of our innate unconscious sense of loyalty towards them.
As lifetimes go by, we move farther from our own innate truth and Essence and we become someone who we are Not.
Lifetimes could go by until we realise what we have done to our own self. This immense loss of self, in a given life time stares at us, screaming for owning who we ARE.
We often do not know, how. But the soul is now ready to reclaim its innate power and truth.
And with this begins the journey of self realisation of the soul – realising who it truly IS and its innate Divinity and essence. However, for a soul to know itself, it has to first shed what it has become or the imprints and masks it has acquired through thousands of years during its evolutionary journey.
This descent of the soul begins the process of deconstruction. This is often known as the journey of the underworld or at times a dark night of the soul. It feels like every thing is breaking down and coming to an end.
The human experience feels full of misery because breaking down of what felt safe and familiar once, is all going away. We cling (at times unconsciously) and feel that the misery is not ending. We feel patterns are looping and we push harder and harder for things to improve.
What is perhaps needed is to not push but to pause and allow the process of deconstruction. Yes, it takes courage and this “Unbecoming” is an art. An art that we have not been trained into.
We have been trained to “Become Something.” What we need to perhaps learn and be in allowance of is this Process of Unbecoming.
Nature dies and nature is reborn. We are nature personified and should we desire to rebirth our Being, we have to allow this deconstruction, shedding and UNBECOMING – just like nature does.
Neelam Nanwani is a midwife to the soul and conducts talks, lectures, workshops, mentorships and retreats in this Sacred Art of Unbecoming. Join the WhatsApp Group for staying updated on free talks, circles and events.
