Psychology 2011A/B Chapter Notes - Chapter 6: Soul Journey, Quantum Mechanics, Pentecostalism
16 Apr 2014
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Trance: trance as the juxtaposition of apparent awareness without actual self-determination. May experience flying or falling through an opening of the earth, arriving at another reality, having imaginal adventures and encountering various spiritual entities in that realm, and remembering the events when returned. Involves fantasy: possession spirits work through the shaman"s body. Characterized by dissociation: study of 42 societies - shamans in 10 societies engaged in journeying, 18 societies used possession, 11 societies had both (such as tungus of siberia and the tamang of. Nepal) and 3 had some other different altered state. Initiation marked by ordeals of death and rebirth, whereby beginners are often isolated from society, subjected to deprivation, and experience exhaustion, suffering, and symbolic death, resulting in access to another realm of existence. Bhirendra"s described as encounter with ghost in cemetery who picked him with spears, pulled flesh of him until he was saved by a white light. Can include psychedelic drugs, changed sexual orientation.
