The Transformational Nature of 2013 and Beyond

Throughout history one of the functions of shamanism has been to look ahead and forecast upcoming changes whether it be weather forecasting or simply seeing events unfolding in the near future in order to be better prepared. In keeping with that tradition, now that we are over half way through 2013, it is time to assess where we are in terms of the planetary shift and to define the nature of the obstacles and opportunities. To review a little bit from former forecasts 2012, 2013, and 2014 represent a turning point for the planet, a paradigm shift for humanity moving us from the consciousness of childhood through puberty and the beginning of adolescence. No wonder these times are so turbulent.

As I have stated before, when asked, not too many people would be willing to repeat ages eleven, twelve, thirteen and fourteen. These can be some of the roughest years in anyone’s life what with hormone tempests and the identity confusion of going through puberty. Most of us were a little crazy during those years and for sure our parents thought we were from mars. So you can get a sense of the times when you consider that our whole planet is now moving through this phase as a species. Now this does not mean everyone is going through this shift at once because like a flock of birds or a school of fish some are ahead, the bulk are in the middle, and some are bringing up the rear end. Nevertheless when the bulk goes through such a change, everyone participates just like families all go through the rigors of puberty when several of their members are in the throes of it.

The paradigm shift can be summarized by a change of mottos. The motto of the past two thousand years was “there is me and there is you and I am going to win.” This can also be summarized as “He who dies with the most toys wins.” The motto of the coming paradigm is “There is me and there is you and I know how you feel.” Therefore the shift is from success orientation to relationship orientation and this is a profound shift indeed. In the last paradigm I did not care what happened to you because I was not able to know how you felt. I was in competition with you and I would do anything to defeat you. The game was “king of the mountain,” a favorite among ten year olds. However the minute I know how you feel I can identify with you and am no longer willing to be abusive toward you or harm you because that is too painful. I now include you in my experience of who and what I am. This is the kind of shift we are in right now.

Now you might ask, “How can this be when I look around and see the wealth concentrating in the top one percent of American society and around the world. That sounds like the old paradigm taking over. The reason for this phenomenon is that there is always a delay factor when there is change. Inertia causes the old paradigm to keep going for a while before it collapses. Another way of saying this is that it gets worse before it gets better just like the process of working out or fasting. Meanwhile the vast majority of human beings are sensing its coming collapse. They have shifted already. This accounts for so many rebellions and revolutions especially in the Middle East. So what happens to those who are even less mature in their consciousness during these momentous times of change? They too are subjected to enormous pressures and they are more likely to break down and fall into extreme violence due to their fear. So think about it for a moment. Those who are the most afraid of losing control are attracted to extremely controlling belief systems. These are the people attracted to religions and government structures that have a huge agenda to control people in every aspect of their lives. As so often happens it is those very people who desire so much control, who lose all control and destroy others with bombs, firearms, and genocide. The sequence is: Fear of losing control; look for someone to control you; at the same time seek to control others; end up losing all control. This is the paradigm of a two year old. Notice that it is only a handful of people on the planet that actually are behaving this way, but like a two year old they can be very noisy and attention grabbing.

On the other end of the spectrum are people who are already very mature and have been waiting a long time for the game to change on this planet. They are actually feeling relieved and excited about the changing times. They don’t like “He would dies with the most toys wins.” They did that and are done with the lessons it offers and they can’t wait for a more cooperative, loving, and supportive paradigm where all lifestyles and cultures are tolerated and people coexist in a friendly way.

Future historians will mark 2012 as the last year of the old calendar. Coinciding with the Mayan calendar’s long count coming to an end, a very long sequence ended on December 21, 2012. The Mayans never said that would be the end of the world. That was the news media exploiting the drama that made that up. In fact what the Mayans really were saying was that the old paradigm was coming to a close and the new one was arriving. Even more specifically, they calendared this and said it would take approximately sixty years until 2072 to accomplish the shift. First would come collapse of the old and then would come construction of the new and of course there would be plenty of overlap in between. For those attached to the old paradigm this is indeed the end of the world, the end of that world. “So long Maryanne” as Leonard Cohen puts it and it’s time, say I.

Future historians will see 2013 as year one in the new world and what a year it has been. This year has been a year of marked chaos, of identity shift for tens of millions. Many citizens are noticing that their countries are no longer what they thought they were, no longer what they wanted them to be. Many are discovering they can no longer rely on the old structures to keep them secure such as retirement plans and government programs. They see their governments paralyzed, no longer functioning, no longer able to solve problems, no longer able to come to any consensus on anything. People point fingers and blame each other but is it anyone’s fault? No, it is puberty and things will change no matter what, like it or not. Shamanically speaking this was all highly predictable but no one wanted to see it. They were too busy looking backward. In a word, it was inevitable.

So what is in store for us for the rest of this year and the next? Remember that 2012, 13, and 14 are the years of greatest change. The next 57 years will simply play out what was decided in these three most dynamic years. Well, there is no rest for the weary. We have just ended one sequence of chaos and after a very brief respite we are entering another even stronger one. A sequence of chaos is a period when there are many spontaneous events and much happens that is unpredictable. Things happen on a grand scale that no one anticipates such as the removal of Morsi from the presidency in Egypt and the sudden shift in attitudes toward gay marriage in the United States. These types of things play havoc with the economic market place that tends to want stability and predictability. No wonder. They want what sells today to sell tomorrow but that is not the case anymore. Trying to predict what people will want is very challenging now because values are changing fast.

When a chaotic sequence occurs, and these days they are happening with regularity, people have the opportunity to change their identities quickly. Let us examine this a little more closely. A grand frequency shift is occurring that has caused a paradigm shift. This is occurring on all the planets in this solar system including of course the sun. It is as if someone turned a dimmer switch up and the light in the entire solar system is becoming brighter and brighter from the subatomic level right on up to whole heavenly bodies. This means absolutely everything is affected including all the cells in your body including your DNA. This is occurring in plants and animals as well causing them to behave strangely or perhaps struggle for their survival. With this frequency change, everything shifts so that climates change, weather patterns change, behavior changes, values change, and indeed perception changes in a big way.

Now let us use a metaphor to try to describe the effect on humans. If you turn up the heat in a pot of water, soon little bubbles will appear at the bottom of the pot and they will begin to percolate upward. Eventually they will create turbulence as they move into a rolling boil. In chemistry this is called a phase change as water turns to steam or an element turns into something else.

Well, right now we are turning into something else. As the frequency goes up (heat) we (the water) begin to experience percolation way down deep in ourselves. This percolation causes what is down deep in our subconscious (unexamined stuff) to rise up to the surface (come into conscious awareness) and it causes turbulence (anxiety, panic attacks, worry, depression, apathy). The fact that so many people are experiencing these things right now is not their fault. These consequences come with the territory we are in. In order for us to evolve, anything down deep in ourselves that is of a lower frequency must be brought to a higher frequency. In the process it arises and we become aware of it and in many cases it freaks us out. In some cases we might say “I thought I dealt with this already.” Then we might feel badly that it seems to be still there when in fact it is just the dregs of it, the last hurrah of it coming up to be transformed. In other cases we might be completely shocked at what comes up. Witness all the celebrities, well known athletes, and politicians who have been deeply embarrassed lately by something terribly racist they said in public without even realizing it.

From now on these things could happen to any one of us because we don’t always know what lurks beneath the surface, what fears we might hold, what resentments we carry, what prejudices may be rising up for review. Now lest you panic that you might be caught doing something terrible, just relax. This is most probable in those that lead unexamined lives. If you are use to doing your homework then you might be mildly disturbed as something shows up you didn’t know you were capable of but you are likely to catch it before it becomes destructive. It might be a feeling of revulsion toward someone or a strange fearfulness that overtakes you in a vulnerable moment. On the other hand those who are not used to observing themselves, who don’t know themselves are the ones who are really vulnerable. They are the ones that might tend to explode into violence or blurt out something totally inappropriate in public. There will be a lot more politicians with egg on their face in the coming times. Many careers will be ruined and public personas lost as these things percolate up to the surface for expulsion. In some cases they will overtake the persons ordinary controls, and they will then be out of control. Therefore you are more likely to suffer a difficult moment in the presence of someone who loses their social decorum than being the one to do it yourself. You may see people lose it right and left at the work place, at public gatherings, at family reunions and so on. Sometimes you will need to be tolerant of others who are losing it and other times you may have to absent yourself in a hurry.

Unfortunately there will continue to be unpredictable violence as poorly socialized people, psychotic people, and zealots go out of control and act out. Not to worry. If you are not meant to be in the vicinity when they explode you won’t be. Your experience and your lessons are always a choice.

Now returning to your own emotional baggage coming to the surface, let’s be clear. Just because it is not your fault that things are bubbling up inside, you still have to take responsibility for all that arises because after all, it is your stuff whether it be from former lives or earlier from this one. You can’t just say, “Oh it was the energy that made me do it.” So, for the next year and a half be prepared to work fairly hard on yourself and make a commitment to be responsible for your own garbage. This does not mean you cannot have fun and enjoy yourself too but it does mean, prepare for change because that is what you are doing like it or not.

Remote Healing

Each month, around the new and full moons, Jose, Lena or Anna leads a remote shamanic healing session. These approximately 30 minute sessions are designed to be experienced in a quiet, safe place free from distraction. Even if you cannot join live they can be very powerful, and always include a good clearing and beautiful icaros. Recording access is included for a short time afterwards. See the product description for dates and times.

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The good news is that this time of unpredictability is a time of great opportunity to transform in ways that you may have always wished for. If you are ready you can make quantum leaps, leave your old fears and habits behind, and find yourself blossoming like never before. While others might be going down in flames you may be flying higher and higher on your path with heart. You may find that tired old ways of being simply drop away and that you experience a fresh perspective and a new outlook that feels expansive and inspiring. This is a time of feast or famine and it would be best to feast. The better you feel and the more fulfilled you are the more you support the collective to veer in that direction. Do your best to combat depression and apathy as these are highly destructive in times like this. You cannot be passive when it comes to these stuck energies. You have to fight them off any way you can. They are parasites and should not be tolerated in any way. If you are desperate you can find some relief in medications but remember that these mostly bury the problem and you will have to deal with whatever it is eventually. Seek out happy people, inspired people, those who have clarity and see the big picture. At all costs avoid those who want to complain, whine, or feel sorry for themselves at your expense. Above all do not be afraid. Your being is invulnerable and completely safe at all times. The body does get a little scratched up through the course of living but that is minor. This is also what happens to cars as they age but they can still be in service for a very long time.

As the earth along with our solar system sails at great speeds through space in a grand and beautiful spiral movement, and as the entire galaxy travels at enormous speeds through the cosmos, we are literally traveling through territory that we have never been in before. Everything is fresh and new. Bear in mind that space is not empty but filled with geometric forms that carry vast amounts of information in the form of a variety of frequencies. We are literally on a grand adventure sailing through the logos, great knowledge, and toward an undisclosed unpredictable destination of great magnitude. So, the question is, are we totally out of control or does a deeper part our essence know exactly where we are and where we are going? I sense and know that it is the latter. And yet even though we are traveling through fresh terrain we are also paradoxically paralleling and revisiting cycles that we have been through before. You can understand this by visualizing a giant spiral and as we loop up the spiral we are always passing a lower adjacent area where we have been before and another adjacent area just above where we will be in the future. One such cyclic spiral has a 2000 year trajectory, in other words it takes 2000 years to make a complete rotation around one ring of the spiral. On this spiral, right next to us is the gradual decline of the Roman Empire and just above us is as yet uncharted terrain 2000 years hence that will have some similarities to these times we are in.

In addition to the two millennium cycle, worm holes to the golden ages of Atlantis, Lemuria, and Greece are now opening. What this means is that much knowledge is being made available to us and is transferring over into this time frame from these other time frames, informing, influencing, and impacting current events. The opportunities are phenomenal. Any lifetimes you may be having in these other time frames are becoming activated and able to transfer the knowledge you had then to the now point and vice versa.

Let us take a look at the themes that are arising that were similar during the 1960’s, another parallel time to right now. Notice that these themes are currently arising in the news in a big way. Some of these themes were also significant 2000 years ago in ancient Rome.

The Rise of the feminine: During the 1960’s a feminist movement gained much traction that began to change the face of women’s freedom and stature in society. 2000 years ago in the Roman Empire women (excluding slaves) actually enjoyed a fair amount of freedom and privileges. Many were educated and enjoyed a high standard of living. They were free enough to realize in what ways they were not as free as they wanted to be and they began to demand more rights and more say in governmental affairs. There was a notable women’s movement during the later part of the Roman empire. This made the men nervous and so they marched off to many small wars that bankrupted the empire. Sound familiar. Notice that women’s rights are a very big theme right now around the world and getting stronger every day. Women in India are demanding more protections from rapists and mistreatment as are women in Pakistan, Afghanistan, all over Africa, New guinea, Egypt and so on. In a great many countries rape is no longer the status quo, no longer tolerable, and women are fighting back as activists.

The patriarchy is due for an over haul and this is the reason that so many warriors are incarnating as females at this time, to bring balance to something that has been so far out of balance.

Racism: Racism has once again come to the public’s attention and much emphasis is being directed toward the covert systemic racism that still raises its ugly head in the United States. The stand your ground law in Florida is a case of institutionalized racism and has raised the ire of tens of thousands of millions of people all over the USA. The racist comments by celebrities and politicians are not being ignored but instead are making embarrassing headlines and wreaking havoc on careers. Racism was not the problem in the Roman Empire that it is today. While the Romans were intensely chauvinistic, they were not particularly racist.

People are once again going public about the expense and ineffectiveness of wars being waged and the methods used to wage them such as the drone program, the National Security Agency data mining program, and secret undeclared wars being carried out through secret government budgets and departments.

Gay rights are once again moving forward in a big way, message music is returning, freedom from control and surveillance is a big theme, safe foods are being focused on, and environmental degradation caused by fracking is becoming daily news. In other words, it is once again an era of social activism but people will be going about these things in a different way. Rather than impotent marches, citizens are using the Internet to affect direct changes.

Having a heads up on the big picture of the times we are living in can be like knowing where you are on a map of a foreign country where you have been wandering around without direction. It can be a big help and is the reason why shamans, oracles, mystics, and astrologers throughout history have provided this valuable service to their communities. Knowing the opportunities as well as the dangers provides you with greater choices and options. Although I focused here on some of the challenges don’t obsess about how difficult it might be, rather focus on the extraordinary opportunities for transformation made available to you. You don’t have to worry about “if” we will make it as a species, rather focus more on “how” we will make it because many of those questions remain unanswered. Sometimes it will seem to you that nothing dramatic is happening and that the status quo remains in place. Other times you will be bowled over by the pace of change, the enormity of the transformation occurring. Remember that being uncomfortable is one of the greatest motivators for change on the planet. Prices rising and the dollar weakening are all part of that discomfort you might feel but when the public can no longer afford most things, the marketplace will be squeezed and the corporations will squeal. It’s still all about the money in certain sectors and that can be an impetus for big social change. Meanwhile take the bull by the horns and go for broke. There is no point in holding back now.

Many Blessings,

José Luis Stevens

Learn more from José at a wonderful workshop coming up at Omega in New York September 27-29, 2013.

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José Stevens

José Luis Stevens, PhD is the president and co-founder (with wife Lena) of Power Path Seminars, an international school and consulting firm dedicated to the study and application of shamanism and indigenous wisdom to business and everyday life. José completed a ten-year apprenticeship with a Huichol (Wixarika) Maracame (Huichol shaman) in the Sierras of Central Mexico. In addition, he is studying with Shipibo shamans in the Peruvian Amazon and with Paqos (shamans) in the Andes in Peru. In 1983 he completed his doctoral dissertation at the California Institute of Integral Studies focusing on the interface between shamanism and western psychological counseling. Since then, he has studied cross-cultural shamanism around the world to distill the core elements of shamanic healing and practice. He is the author of twenty books and numerous articles including Encounters With Power, Awaken The Inner Shaman, The Power Path, Secrets of Shamanism, Transforming Your Dragons and How To Pray The Shaman’s Way.