Michael Winkelman > Quotes

“The cross-cultural manifestations of basic experiences related to shamanism (e.g., soul flight, death-and-rebirth, animal identities) illustrates that these practices are not strictly cultural but are structured by underlying, biologically inherent structures. These are neurobiological structures of knowing that provide the universal aspects of the human brain/mind (Laughlin, McManus, and d’Aquili 1992). Neurognostic structures are the inherent knowledge structures of the organism that predispose and mediate the organization of experience. Universal shamanic characteristics reflect these neurognostic structures, such as those of archetypes, the primordial organization of the collective unconscious.”
― Michael Winkelman, Shamanism: A Biopsychosocial Paradigm of Consciousness and Healing

“The process for producing the experiences of contact with the spirit world involved submission to conditions requiring considerable personal endurance, sometimes withstanding extreme pain for extended periods of time. This included the use of purgatives, prolonged fasting, self-imposed isolation, exposure to temperature extremes, exercise to exhaustion, extreme physical pun
ishments like whipping and scourging the body, and other austerities, including extensive self-inflicted wounds in some cases. If these procedures were successful,
they produced experiences that were interpreted as a vision or a visitation from
the spirit world. The spirit allies encountered in the vision experience provided powers, strength, fortitude, or good fortune represented in an object that symbol
ized and served as a source of power.”
― Michael Winkelman, Shamanism: A Biopsychosocial Paradigm of Consciousness and Healing