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Starting Shadow Work?

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Tinevisce:

--- Quote from: Crystal Dragon on March 07, 2016, 04:56:53 AM ---T, spirit guides tend to stay with us long term (they are guides and mentors) where power animals can change and may only stay for a relatively short time.  You'd asked specifically about contacting though, and the process for contacting either is the same.  My guess is that's why EM responded the way she did.  ;)

If you're being told that sparrow is a current power animal (and from what you've described I'd certainly say that sparrow is telling you he's there) then perhaps you should look into what sparrow represents and contemplate what that might mean for you.

--- End quote ---

Hi there! Well, sparrow showed up in an entirely non-witchy context back in the day when I wasn't even very into mysticism. This would be like 2004-ish when I'd just read Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials and very enamoured with the concept of daemons (physical manifestation of someone's soul as an animal). On one of the related fora, they described a meditation exercise to get your own daemon to appear. :)

It wasn't until years and years later that I realised the exercise was very similar to shamanic journeying to find your power animals- I have to say that I think sparrow is still around, although isn't as present as he was in '04. Then again, I had been actively trying to visualise him then.

Funny how life works like that.

earthmuffin:

--- Quote from: Tinevisce on March 07, 2016, 12:22:16 AM ---
--- Quote from: earthmuffin on February 08, 2016, 08:52:37 AM ---Hmmm, not sure, T. I would say contacting a power animal and contacting a spirit guide are the same thing except that a power animal is sure to be an animal. ;)

--- End quote ---

Oh, wow, forgot I hadn't replied to this. I always thought that spirit guides were external entities whereas power animals were metaphorical manifestation of your higher consciousness, i.e a part of you. Maybe I got that bit wrong?
 :confused:

An update on Dark Moon Mysteries, my copy came in a week back and so far it looks good. I had a question regarding the guided meditation exercises...the first exercise is about identifying a shadow mask; and what's got me confused is...am I supposed to be puppeting? That is to say, I have something of an idea of what my shadow mask is...am I supposed to be thinking of it consciously while doing the meditation...or do I just lay back and let the images come?

For example, while trying to do a guided meditation years ago to find...kinda sorta a power animal...I kept seeing a sparrow when I just let the images come, even though I have no conscious attachment/attraction to sparrows; like I do with dogs (say). I could visualise a dog quite clearly when I tried or wanted to, of course, but it kept turning to a sparrow when I wasn't paying attention- does that make sense?

--- End quote ---

Re. spirit guide vs power animal, yes, what CD said. :)  And yes, power animals are external entities that are a type of spirit guide AND also part of you.

Re. the book meditation, start with what you think your mask is and let images come. When you try to force an image  that is not the image you should be getting as in your dog/sparrow example, it will keep being overridden until you get the correct message.   

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