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In this episode, hosts Joe and Kyle interview Hamilton Souther, Shaman of Blue Morpho. In this episode, they cover Hamilton’s incredible journey from Western life into becoming a Shaman and the spirit teachings that he experienced along the way.
3 Key Points: Hamilton Souther, a Shaman of Blue Morpho, shares his experience from living a normal Western life to his journey of his calling, learning and training to become a Shaman. He shares amazing examples of connectedness and spirit while living amongst the natives.
A common concept that comes out of an Ayahuasca ceremony is that the plants care for you. The teachings that come from the plants are peace oriented and resolution oriented and opening of creativity and problem solving.
Shamanic training is a long and extremely difficult journey. Training comes to the people that feel the deepest calling, because you have to commit your whole life to it.
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Show Notes About Hamilton He grew up in Silicon Valley
He went to CU Boulder for Anthropology He was interested in humanity
He wanted to travel and had opportunities to
He had some near death experiences and accidents when he was younger
The year after he graduated from college he would go into spontaneous awakenings and altered states of consciousness while totally sober He would have really intense visionary experiences in those states
Those experiences were so powerful which led him into training and into his Ayahuasca experiences
He felt without purpose and gave himself up to something greater
He turned to shamanism to try to explain the nature of those experiences
Spontaneous Awakening Kyle mentions that this can happen, that substances are not always required for an ‘awakening’
Hamilton says he wanted to connect to something other than himself The path took him to Peru, and there was a possibility of meeting people with Ayahuasca
He was being called to it and knew they were real and it led to his ‘apprenticeship’ as a Shaman
It wasn't by accident that he was there, he had visions that he was supposed to stay there and to learn
Discernment Coming from a scientific background, he demanded (from the spirit guide) that the process be practical and grounded in reason and logic He used doubt in a way that he was able to use a lot of proof and truth toward his belief system rather than just being naive and believing these messages too early
He couldn't envision how to evolve from the vomiting, defecating human on the ground to the composed shaman in the room
Even though he spoke the language, he couldn't understand what the people were saying when they shared their stories It seemed like a different world to him
The first few years were learning how to survive in the jungle and learn how to live off of the food He says it was like reliving his childhood, he had no idea how to walk through the forest like he knew how to walk down a street growing up
The first house he lived in out of college was one he built himself with locals
These experiences were so far from what he grew up in
Toward the end of his apprenticeship, ceremony started to look less impossible and more of something he would dedicate his life to
Spirit In the indigenous communities, everybody sees spirits, especially at night
And not just in the Ayahuasca culture, its everybody. They thought the jungle was literally alive with spirits
They would say things like “call me if you need me” and they meant it telepathically
Hamilton says “sure enough, they do answer when you call”. He was in Southern Peru at a pizzeria, and they were in ceremony, and they started to call to him
He had to excuse himself from the table and go outside and sit with himself and went into an Ayahuasca vision and the two men in ceremony said to him in the vision “we just wanted to call to say hi”
So Hamilton, using his doubt, wrote down the place and the time of when this happened, and when he returned from his travels and got back to the community, the two men gave him the coordinates and time where Hamilton was when they called him. It matched perfectly
He realized then and there that they had a very different understanding of the forest and of space time and they were tapped into another kind of knowledge and wisdom
That's what he was looking for when he came down to the Amazon in the first place
“The mysteries of consciousness are really unexplored and are not studied by science at all” - Hamilton
For Westerners, reality and how it is experienced is just a tiny slice of total consciousness
“When you're in the amazon, and you're living in the forest and you're participating in these visionary experiences, you see the interconnectedness of life.” - Hamilton
“Globally we've all agreed that education, literacy and participating in the economy is worth it. I think it's worth it to really address on a massive scale what were facing collectively. It's a part of our natural evolution.” - Hamilton
The plants have a very specific role to play, and that they care That's a common concept that comes out of an Ayahuasca ceremony, that the plants care for you
The teachings that come from the plants are peace oriented and resolution oriented and opening of creativity and problem solving
Especially with the environmental crisis, people who turn to Ayahuasca start to care for the environment
Psychedelic plants have a huge role to play in global life, individual growth and collective change
Blue Morpho Its a center that Hamilton and the shamans that he works with created
They did a ceremony to talk with the plants to make sure that this was okay to use as an offering to everyone
It started in 2003 and evolved over the years to practice traditional ceremony and now San Pedro
People come from all over the world to visit them
The majority of the people are really coming for the right reasons, with clear intentions for transformation, growth, exploration and personal healing
Over 17 years they have focused on bettering services and professionalism and they believe they have truly succeeded
Ayahuasca is just one aspect of Amazonian plant medicine There are hundred of plants with medicinal healing properties
The Dieta is a period of time where you go into deep individual isolation and connection to a specific medicinal plant where you create a relationship with a plant
Then you go into the Ayahuasca ceremony and Icaros are sung and you drink the Ayahuasca
Then the Dieta is a time where there are restrictions such as abstinence, no alcohol, strict food diet, no medications, etc. and you go into a meditative state for healing for a time of a few days, to weeks to even months
Shaman Training Training comes to the people that feel the deepest calling, because you have to commit your whole life to it
Then, you find a lineage of shamans that are willing to accept you (if you aren't born into a lineage of shamans)
It's a journey, and you have to find a group of people open for training It's different from any kind of training from the western world, it's a tremendous journey, and it could take years to decades
Its meant to be a test, and incredibly difficult
When Hamilton trained, he was told that 1 out of 100 make it to be actual shamans
It's really a job of service, not an exalted one The reason the training is so incredibly difficult, is so that you can sit with people, who are going through extremely difficult, and transformational experiences and you can be there for them and love and support them unconditionally with the strength gained through the training process
“Its a role of service, you have to be able to deal with any form of suffering that people come to you with.” - Hamilton
Final Thoughts Stay open minded
He warns about a dystopian world
We need to be the change makers, and there is a lot we can do We are incredibly powerful, especially when we are united in common goals
Whether they are about human rights or the climate
There is something mysterious about life itself
Links Website
About Hamilton Souther
Hamilton focuses his work on Universal Spiritual Philosophy. He is bilingual in English and Spanish, has a Bachelors degree in Anthropology, and has studied shamanism in California, Cusco, and the Amazon. Hamilton was given the title of Master Shaman by Alberto Torres Davila and Julio Llerena Pinedo after completing an apprenticeship under Alberto and Julio. He guides ceremonies and leads shamanic workshops, in which he shares Universal Spiritual Philosophy.
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