Called by Spirits: The Hidden Path of Shamanic Initiation

Navigating the Stages of Becoming A Shaman.

There is a road that winds between the worlds. You don’t walk it by choice — but by necessity. The earth begins to call you. Ancestors whisper their songs. Illness haunts your body. Your heart and soul ache. Dreams become doors. And one day, you are no longer who you used to be. The old version of you might seem like the easier choice — a more convenient mask. But you can’t fit into it anymore. This is the path of the initiate: the healer, the shaman, the witch, the wisdom keeper, the medicine weaver.

A sacred calling begins—Spirit whispers through signs and visions.

In my Slavic lands, she might be called Znachorka (one who knows / the medicine keeper), Guslarka (wisdom keeper of old stories), Wolchow (the wise one) or Szeptucha (the whisperer)… all are the bridge between the spirits and the living.

Elsewhere, she may be known as curandera, shaman, sangoma, babaylan, or medicine woman. The names shift. The landscapes differ. But the path — though ancient — feels uncannily familiar across time and place.

Whether you’re called by dream, spirit, illness, or crisis, the soul begins a journey that is not a career or lifestyle — but a deep becoming. A remembering.

Below, I share the stages of shamanic initiation, blending some fragments from my own experience. These are not the center of the story but small windows into what this process can look like:

1. The Calling (or Crisis)

2. Withdrawal and Dreaming

3. Descent and Dismemberment

4. The Return with Gifts (Integration)

5. Walking the Path in Service (Continued Testing and Initiation)

Though the stages are presented here in a linear way, the journey itself is anything but. It’s a spiral. A rhythm. A weaving. But before diving into the nonlinear dance of initiation — which I’ll explore more deeply in another wisdom sharing - let’s begin here.

The Calling - Stage 1 Of Shamanic Initiation:

In the midst of confusion and fear, the path begins to whisper through the cracks of certainty.

In Slavic lore, the Znachorka or Guslarka is often chosen through illness, accompanied by strange and vivid dreams. Elders may observe the signs and help affirm the clarity of the calling. In many cultures, this experience is known as the shamanic sickness — a sacred unraveling. The Siberian Evenki speak of it. The Sangoma of South Africa live through it.

For me, the preparation began in childhood. It wasn’t a sudden awakening, but a slow and steady walk toward something I couldn’t yet name. At the time, I didn’t recognize it as a path at all.

The real revelation (the shamanic crisis) came later, through a collapse I could no longer avoid. My purpose was revealed in the harshest, most hostile way imaginable. And still, I resisted. I refused the call. So the crisis stretched on for nearly a year.

I felt the ground crumble beneath my feet — and even more terrifyingly, within my mind and heart.

All the stories I had told myself about who I was began to fall apart. My beliefs. My masks. My illusions. Even my ambitions and aspirations. The crumbling wasn’t metaphorical — it was cellular. A raw and uncompromising death of an old identity.

This is how the call often arrives. It is not a punishment — it is a passage. “You are not broken,” the spirits say. “You are being emptied to be filled.”

Withdrawal and Dreaming - Stage 2 Of Shamanic Initiation:

In sacred solitude, the shaman turns inward—to meet her shadows and remember her medicine.

During this stage, the initiate retreats from ordinary life. Sometimes complete solitude is required; at other times, it means stepping away from social roles, relationships, and distractions that no longer serve the path. The one called may study under a master shaman, a mentor, or be guided directly by spirits through dreams, visions, or illness.

It is a time of intense purification, fasting, solitude, and study. A period of deep dedication, where both the internal landscape and the unseen realms begin to open. Here, the initiate begins to perceive the inner wiring — conditioned patterns, wounds, illusions — that must be dissolved. It is a confrontation with self, shadow, and the sacred.

This stage is not just about learning the shamanic arts — though that may come. More than technique, it is a time of learning cosmic laws: how to walk the middle path, how to stay humble while recognizing your gifts, how to navigate the ego without being swallowed by it, how to embody your truth while holding space for mystery.

It is a delicate stage. Some fall into the trap of ego — believing they are already fully formed healers. Others are paralyzed by doubt and imposter syndrome, never trusting their readiness. True initiation asks for both courage and humility, fire and surrender.

After I surrendered to the path, I entered nearly three years of deep withdrawal and solitude. I lived alone, with very limited contact with friends or family — perhaps 10 to 20 days each year at most. The rest of the time: no distractions. No roles to perform. No masks to wear. Only solitude.

It was a time of facing my fears, my shadows, and long-buried griefs. But it was also a time of uncovering strength I didn’t know I had—resilience, clarity, and my deeper voice.

Loneliness became my teacher.

Silence became my mirror.

Illness became my guide.

Everything that was false or borrowed — reflections of other people’s expectations or societal scripts — began to fall away.

Dreaming became my lifeline. Each night, I was visited by ancestors, guides, and aspects of my future self. They revealed to me that this waking world is the dream — and the dream is where the deeper reality begins.

I received symbols, songs, and instructions. I was told what herbs to gather, what prayers to speak, what fears to release. I was shown forgotten healing ways and gifted knowledge that I had never read or studied — yet somehow remembered. I was told not only what I was ready for, but also what I was not.

In Slavic traditions, this kind of dreaming might unfold in the forest’s embrace, near sacred springs, or at threshold places — crossroads, riverbanks, the edges of fields. Among the Shipibo, initiates enter the plant dieta, listening for the songs of the plants. In Saami traditions, the drum and wind become the teachers. Across cultures, the outer silence opens the inner gateway.

This is the place where vision begins — not as fantasy, but as direct transmission from spirit. It is not a performance. It is not an escape. It is a sacred remembering.

Descent and Dismemberment - Stage 3 Of Shamanic Initiation:

Through dismemberment, the old self dissolves—the shaman is reshaped by spirit

This stage is a symbolic — and sometimes literal — death. It is the unmaking of the self as we knew it. The initiate may experience terrifying visions: being dismembered, dissolved, or stripped down to bare bones. One might descend into the underworld, into deep silence, into the void. These are not just archetypal dreams — they are psychic and energetic ruptures where the ego dies, and something older, wiser, and more whole begins to emerge.

In many cultures, this is considered the true gateway to becoming a healer. The initiate must die to who they thought they were — to their ambitions, their coping patterns, their identities, and even their spiritual ideals. This stage humbles and remakes. It takes away certainty, security, and personal will, replacing them — eventually — with alignment to something larger.

In Buryat shamanism, the spirit ancestors dismember the future shaman, cutting open their body and reconstructing it. In Amazonian plant medicine traditions, especially with ayahuasca, visions of the body decaying, dissolving, and reforming are common. In Inuit culture, vision quests are undertaken in extreme cold and solitude — where survival itself becomes the teacher. In some traditions, initiates are buried underground for days in complete darkness, undergoing a ritual death. There are countless ways to be broken open.

I’ve learned that descent isn’t a single dramatic event — it’s layered. Repetitive. Necessary.

I had dreams where I was torn apart limb by limb, or split in two, only to be killed and reintegrated again. I underwent a ceremony where I believed I had truly died. I met Death herself — no longer a figure of fear, but one of grace. As I surrendered, I felt my final breath, watched the world dissolve, and entered a void so complete I shrank into a single point of thought… then even that vanished. I became nothing. And then — rebirth, I just woke up into a sunrise, a new day. Not as I was, but as something clearer, quieter, more true.

That death gave birth to freedom — from illusions, from old roles and masks, from inherited identities I no longer needed to carry.

It’s important to say: this isn’t always instant. The process unfolds again and again. These deaths are cyclical. The spiral turns. Sometimes we expand outward; other times, we are pulled back to the narrowest center. The descent revisits us, and each time we are asked to surrender more deeply.

Some of my most intense initiations came through Elemental Spirits. I would be swept away by a tsunami in dreams — drowned, consumed, and reborn by Water. Other nights, I would be set ablaze — engulfed by Fire, burning through skin, through beliefs, through memory, until only ash remained. These weren’t metaphors. They were visceral rites, orchestrated by Spirit without apology or softening.

In Slavic stories, the initiate might be devoured by wolves, struck by lightning, or dismembered by Baba Yaga — then reassembled, stitched back together with golden thread. In Mongolian traditions, spirit blacksmiths forge the new bones. In Norse mythology, Odin hangs from the World Tree, pierced and alone, to gain true sight.

Death, in initiation, is not the end. It is the threshold. A place of surrender, where the old is laid to rest, and the soul begins to remember who it truly is.

The Return with Gifts (Integration) - Stage 4 Of Shamanic Initiation:

Integrated and transformed, the shaman walks with new tools: spirit allies, healing songs, and profound wisdom.

At this stage, the shaman begins to return — not as the same person, but as someone who has walked between worlds and survived the burning, the breaking, the unmaking. Now, they carry new tools: sacred songs, spirit allies, healing wisdom, and a deepened capacity to serve.

They do not return to “normal life.” They return with new eyes and a new heart, able to navigate both the visible and invisible realms. The trance is no longer forced; it is an attunement. The healing no longer efforted; it flows through alignment. Community may begin to recognize their medicine. Spirit tests grow subtler, but still come. Yet the apprentice no longer resists the path — they walk it with increasing grace and presence.

The shaman now understands that their life is no longer their own in the old sense. Their time, energy, and gifts belong to a larger dance. They enter into new relationships — with the land, with the spirits, with ancestors and people they were once separated from. Life is not necessarily easier, but it becomes more integrated. The sacred is no longer sought — it is lived.

In many traditions, this is when formal recognition begins to occur.

In Andean Q’ero cosmology, the initiate receives their mesa — a sacred medicine bundle of stones and objects charged with spiritual power. Among the Lakota, after vision quest and deep testing, the shaman receives their medicine bundle, filled with items gifted by the spirits. In Siberian cultures, the drum becomes an extension of the shaman's own soul — often built during or after dreams of instruction from the ancestors.

In the Saami tradition, the shaman learns to sing the joik, a powerful form of soul-song that channels memory, place, and being. Among the Shipibo-Conibo of the Amazon, the healer receives icaros, medicine songs taught by plants and spirit allies, which they sing to weave energy and heal.

In Slavic lands, this is the moment when the Znachorka begins to whisper zagovory — incantations, sacred charms, spoken softly over water, wounds, or herbs. The Guslarka may begin to sing again — but now the stories she carries are no longer inherited from culture alone; they come from spirit, shaped by her own descent and return.

In time, the dreams stopped breaking me — and began to teach me.

I began to look forward to sleep, knowing I’d meet another spirit, receive a new teaching, or even be healed. My dream travels became maps and messages. I was given medicine songs — not from books or living teachers — but directly from the voices of my ancestors.

I received names of plants I had never heard, complete herbal recipes, rituals, and healing ways I never studied, but somehow remembered. The veil between forgetting and knowing lifted. I was shown visions of the karmic cycles, the hidden patterns that govern collective belief systems, and the pathways between worlds. I remembered gifts I had spent my whole life suppressing — and they started to flow freely.

But this stage is not about power. It is about presence. It is about listening. It is about humility, and the willingness to serve what flows through you.

A shaman does not graduate.They deepen.

Walking the Path in Service (Continued Testing and Initiation) - Stage 5 Of Shamanic Initiation:

In humble service, the shaman becomes the living bridge—guiding spirits to people and people to spirit.

At this stage, the calling is no longer an abstract force pulling from afar — it is embodied. It breathes through the work, the walk, and the way the shaman lives. The journey does not end here; if anything, the learning deepens. Mastery doesn’t mean perfection. It means knowing how to stay in the right relationship — with spirit, with community, and with self.

The shaman begins to refine and expand their gifts. New skills may be learned, new spirit alliances may appear, and new forms of service may emerge. This stage is not static; it is ever-flowing.

Importantly, spirits will still test the practitioner — this time not only through crises, but through more nuanced invitations:

• Can you stay humble when people put you on a pedestal?

• Can you hold your boundaries with spirits as well as humans?

• Can you step back and let the person heal themselves?

  
  

The sacred is no longer sought in ceremony alone — it is recognized in the everyday. The shaman is no longer trying to fix people, but rather to hold space for their remembering. The paradox becomes clear: the less you “do,” the more the healing moves.

In Slavic traditions, the shamanka (shamaness) now fully embodies her medicine. She may whisper charms to protect infants, sing to water to restore balance, guide others through grief or illness, or help people navigate their dreams. She no longer questions whether she has “become” the healer — she simply lives it.

In Siberian Buryat and Evenki traditions, the shaman may receive the final set of spirit helpers and sacred tools — such as the full regalia, including iron mirrors and antlered headdresses — each object ritually bestowed as part of community recognition. The Altai shamans speak of “kamlanie”, the final integration of drum, voice, and vision, where the shaman becomes the hollow bone through which spirits act.

In Huichol cosmology, the initiated continue to walk the path by returning again and again to sacred pilgrimage sites — offering corn, feathers, and prayers to maintain cosmic balance. In Mongolian lineages, the blacksmith ancestors continue to guide the shaman in dream - forging tools that assist with weather - working, soul retrieval, and lineage healing.

Across all these landscapes, the mature shaman becomes a vessel — not of ego or title, but of sacred responsibility. They live in dialogue with the unseen, continually attuning, refining, listening.

For me, this stage didn’t arrive with fanfare or vision. It arrived quietly — through the way my work began to change.

I stopped trying to rescue others. I stopped believing I had to have the answer. I began to listen more deeply. To trust more fully. To become the bridge — not the builder.

People came into my space not looking for a fix, but to remember something in themselves. I began to see their wisdom sometimes more clearly than my own. And in that mirror, I was changed, again and again. Each person was also a teacher.

I continue to weave the web. I continue to listen — to the spirits, to my ancestors, to the more-than-human world. I carry my Slavic roots in one hand, but in the other, I carry the threads gifted to me by other wisdom keepers, from various traditions, who have chosen to open their paths to me.

The way I see it now, my path is not a road — it is a spider’s web. I am one of many weavers. I don’t own the thread. I move with it.

On a practical level, sacred service can take many forms. In my tradition, it might mean singing to rivers, guiding others through dreamwork, blessing homes with juniper smoke, wrapping babies in protective red thread, or holding spaces of silence and grief.

In other traditions, it may mean holding sacred ceremonies with plant medicine, channeling spirit through voice or dance, conducting divination, storytelling, or trance healing. Whatever the shape, the heart of it remains the same:

To walk between worlds with integrity. To remember who you are. And to help others do the same.

A Final Word to the One Being Called:

The initiation rite: a shaman welcomed by elders, mentored by masters, embraced by their community

This path — though deeply rooted in my Slavic blood, and shaped by the influence of Siberian shamanism, with echoes from other ancestral streams — is not unique to one people or place. The call, the descent, and the rebirth form an ancient pattern within the human soul. It doesn’t belong to any single culture. But the traditions that carry it must be honored — not romanticized, not taken for granted, and never misappropriated or colonized. These ways are sacred and must be approached with humility, respect, and reverence.

If something stirs in you — a quiet ache behind the ribs, a strange pull in your dreams, a flicker of knowing in your belly — you may already be walking the path.

And if you’re doing so without a teacher or lineage, know this: You are not less sacred. You are still called. Many modern initiates live in exile from intact traditions. Some are adopted by spirit directly, apprenticing through dreams, through illness, through direct revelation. This, too, is valid.

True initiation doesn’t arrive through title or ceremony alone — but through surrender. Through your willingness to be broken open and reshaped. Through your devotion to listening. Through walking your own soul into remembrance.

That said, this road is long — and not meant to be walked entirely alone. Having a guide, a mentor, or a grounded tradition can be medicine. Not to override your path, but to help you walk it with more clarity, more rootedness, more trust in what you already carry.

I now walk with others like you. I offer mentorship for those called by dreams, by crisis, by soul. For those standing at the edge, unsure if what they are experiencing is madness or a message. And if my path can support yours — you are welcome to reach out.

This journey is never truly finished. It doesn’t move in a straight line. It spirals, contracts, expands. Some stages return again and again — each time with deeper teaching.

Initiation is not a one-time event. It is a lifelong unfolding, a rhythm of remembering and becoming.

And somewhere inside you, perhaps quietly for now, the Guslarka, the Medicine Woman or Man, the Healer, the Dream Walker, the Shaman, or The Wisdom Keeper is already rising. Are you ready to release the old skin, walk through the fire, and awaken into your true form? With love and blessings, Sun Deer (Natalia)

from Sacred Gaia https://www.sacredgaia.co.uk/shamanic-mentoring ﹌﹌﹌﹌﹌﹌﹌﹌﹌﹌

Disclaimer: This post weaves together personal experience with examples drawn from a variety of indigenous and ancestral traditions, including Slavic, Siberian, Amazonian, Inuit, and others. These references are shared with deep respect and for illustrative purposes only—not to claim authority or ownership over those practices. I acknowledge that many of these paths are rooted in specific cultures, histories, and lineages, and I honor their continued living transmission.

My intention is not to generalize or appropriate, but to reflect on universal archetypal patterns of shamanic initiation as they have shown themselves through both lived experience and cross-cultural echoes. If you belong to any of these traditions and feel called to share feedback or perspective, I welcome that with an open heart.