Finding your own answers. Through direct experience.
There are decisions where you wish you could ask someone who knows more than you. Someone who has already walked this path, a wise elder who knows the terrain. Sometimes that person does not exist, because you are navigating new ground, because no one has made this particular decision before, because you are the one furthest ahead.
Harner Shamanic Counseling offers a structured space for situations like these. You bring a question, turn your attention inward and work with images, sensations and symbolic experience. The method opens another form of access: direct, embodied and less filtered through analytical language.
What is Harner Shamanic Counseling (HSC™)?
HSC is the structured path on which you learn a skill of your own and come to master it yourself.
Developed by Michael Harner on the basis of Core Shamanism, it places self-perception, inner imagery and symbolic experience at the centre.
Following Michael Harner’s protocol, you learn to carry out the shamanic journey for divination yourself, independently and with confidence. You turn your attention inward, clarify a question of your own and find direction. The meaning of what you experience remains yours to determine, in relation to your question and the context of your life.
How it works
Accompanied by rhythmic drumming, you learn to direct your inner attention, hold a question, notice what appears, and integrate the experience afterwards. A steady drum rhythm measurably changes the frequencies, connections and activity in the brain. There is nothing occult about it. The method is clearly structured and relatively easy to learn. It requires no special prior knowledge, but it does require a genuine willingness to look and to engage with what you find.
The underlying mechanism is more familiar than it sounds. Counselling and therapy have long worked with inner images and inner figures, for instance when an inner critic is given a voice or an image emerges from a bodily feeling. The shamanic journey uses the same movement, in a more connected and more immersive form.
A session, in practical terms
A session lasts about 90 minutes. You lie down or sit comfortably with your eyes closed while a steady drum rhythm helps you turn your attention inward. Holding a clear question, you enter an inner journey, usually for 15 to 30 minutes.
Afterwards, we talk about what you experienced. I do not reinterpret it for you. You record what appeared and bring it into relation with your question. From one session to the next, you become more confident until you can use the method independently.
The counselor’s role
I teach you the technique, guide the process and hold the frame. I do not interpret your experiences for you. In the conversation afterwards, I help you place what you encountered in context. Meaning arises from your own experience and the life in which it occurred.
The process
HSC usually comprises six to eight sessions. Over the course of the process, you practise the shamanic journey following Michael Harner’s protocol, so that you can use it with increasing independence. Supervision or deepening sessions can follow if you want to continue exploring.
What you learn
How to enter the shamanic state of consciousness reliably. How to formulate clear questions. How to notice what is shown to you. How to build a direct relationship of your own with what you encounter there.
The aim is for you to be able to explore your own questions yourself, whenever you need to.
Who it is for
This work is for people who want to learn shamanic journeying in a clear, experience-based way, without cultural overlays or spiritual inflation. Openness and the ability to concentrate are more useful than prior knowledge.
HSC can be particularly useful for people navigating genuine uncertainty: founders in early stages, leaders without a blueprint, and anyone who has to cross a particular threshold before others and finds no one on the other side who has already made the crossing. Openness to non-ordinary forms of perception is helpful. No previous spiritual experience is required.
Practical note
This work is not a substitute for medical, psychiatric or psychotherapeutic treatment.
If you would like to explore the background of the method in more depth, read “Harner Shamanic Counseling: When Analysis No Longer Helps”.
Curious?
If this speaks to you, let’s talk. In a short first conversation we look at your question and whether HSC is a fit for you. You can write to me or call directly.
If you would like to experience the journey first: from time to time I offer guided trance journeys, drum journeys and meditations as part of events. Write to me if you would like to hear when the next one is coming up. You can also book a guided drum meditation directly, as a first taste, if you have not encountered this before.
FAQ
What is Harner Shamanic Counseling?
The structured path on which, following Michael Harner’s protocol, you learn to carry out the shamanic journey for divination independently and with confidence. Developed by Michael Harner on the basis of Core Shamanism.
What happens in a session?
A session lasts about 90 minutes. With a clear question and accompanied by a steady drum rhythm, you enter an inner journey for 15 to 30 minutes. Afterwards, you record the experience and relate it to your question.
How many sessions are involved?
HSC usually comprises six to eight sessions and is designed to help you use the method with increasing independence.