What is Karma in relation to shamanic healing?
Fundamental to understanding shamanism and spiritual healing is the concept of Karma. Because of the central role it plays in our lives, it is crucial to understand what it is and why it’s important prior to receiving healings from Jude.
The idea of Karma permeates eastern and western cultures, is present across many religious teachings, and is often casually referenced in pop culture. Yet many still don’t fully grasp exactly what it is or why it exists.
In the simplest terms:
- Karma is a natural law governing all energies in existence
- It exists to create a perfect balance of energies that shape your experience
- Your experience is the mechanism through which your soul can learn and evolve
We all need experience in order to learn. This principle is evident when one has more empathy after having experienced a wrong, for example. Karma’s sole purpose is to create experiences necessary for us to expand our awareness and understanding through life’s lessons.
Prior to our birth, we choose certain circumstances we will encounter in this lifetime to learn specific lessons. This is why bad things can happen to good people, or why children get sick for example. It is the reason human suffering exists. It is as Buddha explained, that the human condition is suffering.
In this way, each lifetime we have on earth can be thought of as a classroom, teaching our souls lessons it takes onto the next lifetime and so on.
Some people may not believe in Karma due to religious preconceptions. Regardless of the religion you subscribe to, Karma still plays a role in your experience.
In science, Newton’s laws of physics show us that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction – these are forces we can directly measure in the laboratory. Similarly, there are external forces we cannot yet ‘prove’ to exist in a laboratory, that follow this same principle. These forces are not seen with the eye or touched with the hand. They are subtler energies that are sometimes ‘felt intuitively’ or ‘known’.
You can understand this energy if you’ve ever thought of someone you haven’t seen for years, and soon after they call you, or experience a coincidence that was infinitely unlikely to occur at random.
It is these energies that Shamans, through years of dedicated spiritual practices, are able to detect and work with, which allows profound healing to take place during a spiritual healing session. Working with spiritual energies to bring about healing of physical ailments, challenges or situations via physical and spiritual methods is at the core of a ‘spiritual healing’.
Though our karma and spiritual forces shape our experience here, we also have ‘free will’ to make our own choices in life. Every choice we make affects our karmic balance; a thought, an action, a spoken word, an event. In this way, Karma can be thought of as a ‘Divine ledger’, recording the good and bad to influence outcomes with the ultimate goal of teaching us in the classroom of life. Everyone on this earth has karma; this is why we have incarnated into this dimension.
It is helpful to think of this life as a video game, in which you can make choices that affect the level you are able to advance to. Our guides, angels and spiritual helpers can subtly influence you via your intuition, however it’s ultimately up to you to become attuned to the signs we get from them.
Most often, we know if an action or thought is ‘good’ or ‘bad’ with respect to its Karmic balance by our intention behind it. Yet there are times when we may not know how an action will tip the karmic scale. Most often our circumstances will reflect our karmic balance; addiction, accidents, sickness, worries, bad relationships, frustration, lack of spiritual motivation etc. If you find yourself experiencing these circumstances and find them unpleasant, it is an indication that you have incurred ‘bad’ karma.
It’s important to note that Karma does not exist to punish or reward, but rather to teach and give opportunity. The simplest definition from Dr. George King is that ‘Karma is pressure’. This pressure shifts forces and energies to bring about what is right for you.
When you become aware that this law exists, you can start to bring your thoughts, actions and energies into alignment with it. You’ll then begin to see its perfection unfold and understand how it can work for you in your life.
Once you recognize the effects in your own life, you can appreciate that what is true at the individual level is also true on a larger macro level. You may have heard the phrase “Be the change”. This is the very same idea. What you do in your life is part of a bigger picture and its Karmic necessity tips the balance for the collective consciousness.
It’s important in our understanding of Karma to note that we are affected by karmic patterns that go beyond our own actions:
- We are born into this life with a karmic pattern, and carry with us karmic balances incurred in our previous lifetimes
- Additionally, we are affected by other karmic patterns beyond our immediate control, such as those:
- of our parents (and their karma from past lifetimes)
- of our families
- of those we have close friendships or sexual relationships with
- of the physical city, state and country in which you live
- of the collective actions of humans at this point in our evolution (both past and present)
Can I change my Karma?
Suffering as a result of ‘bad’ Karmic patterns can be balanced through thoughts/actions/words that are ‘in service’ to others. Every ‘good’ action has 2x the effect to balance the ‘bad’. Examples include:
- Watering a plant
- Thinking about the good in others
- Giving food to the homeless
- Offering a ride to a friend when needed
- Joining a peace group that promotes good in the world
It’s possible for any person to help others if so motivated, even in the smallest of ways. Actions ‘In service’ to others include doing something as small as picking up a piece of debris in your neighborhood, to more dedicated volunteer efforts such as homeless outreach, donating your time in a hospital or hospice or church.
There are instances of suffering that are perpetuated by the individual’s mind. Sometimes those desperately in need of help will reject it because they ‘enjoy’ being trapped in a negative mindset. This form of suffering is not the result of bad karma conferring a lesson to teach the soul, but rather this occurs due to the individual’s free will to maintain this negative mindset, and the person is engaging in a form of self-hate.
If your life is plagued with problems you would like to resolve, helping others through selfless service provides a mechanism to feel more positive about themselves. Helping others positively changes one’s Karma and also changes world Karma.
If you trade your daily expectations for appreciation and thankfulness for whatever outcomes you experience, the karmic deficit we have will manifest itself into a brighter future for you because of this positive attitude towards life.
During a spiritual healing session, Jude connects with divine intelligence, or universal spiritual energy known as ‘prana’. This is the energy that enables us to inhabit a physical body, for our heart to have a beat. In a healing session, Jude is able to become a conduit through which this energy can flow to you. In other words, Jude is not the healer himself, but is being used by angels and spirits to bring energy that the client needs at this time allowed by the client’s karma. This spiritual energy will help you by enabling the body to heal itself, and bringing that which you need at this moment in time to resolve problems in your life or for your highest good, according to your karma.