Aspies as Shamans ... and "Shaman's Disease"

Post Reply New Topic

When I was young, the one thing I liked to do more than anything else was to study the "whys" of the world. I sought out people from all over the world - BEFORE we had the internet - and had conversations with them. Sure, I am not a good conversationalist but these were very specific conversations aimed at certain topics. I would ask questions, but most of all I'd LISTEN to everything I heard from these wise people. I didn't seek out just anyone, but I had a knack for picking out "special" people; my intuition pointed me straight at them. Anyways, I learned so much and I owe most of what I know and what little wisdom I do have to many of these people. They helped me grow. They were my teachers, as it were.

Anyways, the point I'm coming to is that I was told by all of these people that I would have been the equivalent of "shaman" in the old days of their respective cultures. Being intersexed, I most definitely would have been a shaman in my ancestors' Native tribe.

I don't think this applies to all Aspies by a long stretch. That's a huge generalization. To me, the traits commonly seen in a shaman could be due to other things, too. There are certain things in your description that don't fit me, either. For one, I'm incredibly well groomed.

It's a good observation and I really like this discussion.

I do wish I could have been a shaman. That is something that seems very natural to me and I wouldn't be struggling to fit into this world that doesn't seem to value my gifts or perspective.

Like Kousuku, when I was young, the one thing I liked to do more than anything else was to study the "whys" of the world. Unfortunately, this was before the Internet (Arpanet was just a rumor, as far as I was concerned).

Equally unfortunate, I gravitated toward a local "psychic". She taught me everything I needed to know to be a "psychic" just like her - cold readings, business and criminal law, keeping two sets of books, and mining data from actuarial tables based on age, gender, marital status, education, and profession.

She also taught me sleight-of-hand, how to deal from the bottom of a tarot deck, how to pick pockets and locks, and how to forge someone else's signature.

Needless to say, I never did learn how to read minds, see the future, or summon dead relatives for chit-chat.

Fnord, I was a target for those types, too. I learned, just as you did, that they are full of it.

At least we have some skills to fall back on during retirement, eh?

Tarot readings at the retirement home! Every Wednesday night after Matlock!

"You seem to be feeling concern for ... affairs of the heart ... no ... chest pains ... I see you clutching your chest ... a heart attack may be in your future ..."

Tarot cards in a retirement home ... easy money! BuhuwaHAHAHAHA!

Last edited by Fnord on 12 May 2013, 11:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.

You have the Sight!

I have vision!

Cynicism is its own reward.

Tarot reading for anything except personal reflection is balls, though.

No, tarot reading for profit takes balls, especially when you know you're just scamming someone for their money.

I took the time to read it since I was intrigued, and I'm glad I did. That's a really interesting thought. I think we should look up to societies that value people for what they were and not just try to "fix" any differences.. maybe people with neurodiversity are there for a reason. Our alternate viewpoints and thinking would be of great value in jobs, if only people would stop seeing the lack of social skills and nothing more. It seems like the perfect world; the ideas of the Native Americans. I hope society wakes up and sees what they're doing soon. They shouldn't be correcting the differences, but instead allowing them to grow. What use would a society full of the same thinkers be, anyway?

Except Floki did manage to hook up with quite a hottie.

As someone who has firsthand knowledge in this area considering my grandmother was one, and my cousin still is one - I can tell you first hand while *most* of the adults will be accepting of it, there are still some who will not be. Certainly children are not - these kids are given hell growing up just the way you are here. That treatment will only change once you are an adult - instead of outright bullying it will be more avoidance than anything else, at least until they need something.

The whole "shamans are male" thing is very argumentative. It depends on the traditions of the people you are in. In our culture - shamans are only women. In mapuche culture, shamans are almost always women too, they are called machi's. Up north, it is more common for them to be men. But down south, it can be either, and in some places is only women.



Mind altering drugs are not always necessary. There are cultures that use them (the Shuar and Achuar) and cultures that don't - I assume you are referring to things like Ayahuasca.
One of the unspoken rules of being one in many places is that you do not use drugs, apart from medicinally or with a set spiritual or religious purpose. In that case, drugs such as caffeine are included in that unspoken guideline.



That's correct. Natives don't usually call themselves Shaman - unless they are speaking to a outsider and that is the only term by which they can be understood.
Generally they will refer to themselves as medicine men, or as healers.

The word Shaman is a term that outsiders have applied to them, not what they call themselves.

Most of those who go on to do that are identified as young children (as my cousin was) and trained all their lives for it. Once they are adults they take it more seriously, but that amount of learning that you did as a kid is useful beyond price if you choose to follow that path. Very few are talented enough to be solely self trained - and those who are only usually master the basics and foundations, nothing too advanced. It would be rare that you would be able to do anything after a few months or years of self training without a proper teacher.

Thank you for sharing this (all of you)--a lot of it does make sense. Seeing and otherwise sensing things differently, being "outside" of "conventional" society but still having much to offer to it...and, in some cases, experiencing great suffering because of it:

Question (and this does involve some spiritual-type speculation, so be forewarned): if there are those who are "spiritually gifted" in this way, is it "necessary" that their brains be wired differently in order to process and make use of those gifts? With that being said, are "normal" people, therefore, unable to access such gifts (and I hope that didn't sound elitist--I did not mean it that way--just hypothesizing)?

Just a thought...stuff that rambles through my head on the bus to and from work.

Differences to the brain's wiring contributes to the differences in perception, which simply makes it more likely that people will notice things that others don't. 'Normal' people are more set in their ways, and as such, just as adults aren't usually as creative as children, 'normal' people will more likely miss the "gorilla walking through a game of basketball".