Core Shamanism, as distilled by anthropologist Michael Harner (1929–2018)
and taught through Foundation for Shamanic Studies, that he co-founded,
is a cross-cultural synthesis of shamanic practices stripped of any single
cultural tradition. Its central tool is the shamanic journey
a disciplined, intentional shift into what Harner called the
Shamanic State of Consciousness (SSC).
In the SSC, practitioners travel to "nonordinary reality", specifically the
Lower World (realm of power animals and nature spirits)
or the Upper World (realm of spirit teachers and compassionate beings),
or the Middle World (realm of "ordinary reality" as viewed from a "nonordinary state),
where they seek information, insight, and guidance.
Harner was explicit that this information is empirical within its own frame:
"The person interacts with it, sees it, touches it, hears it, and feels it...".
Nonordinary reality is "very person-specific — the information obtained is
tailor-made to the individual."
This is precisely what makes a Journeying Collective so interesting:
when 10 practitioners journey to the same question,
the responses are individually unique, yet a synthesis often
reveals a coherent emergent answer, produced by the group...
one no single journey would produce alone.