In this feature, we dive into the world of shamanic healing with Tina D’Amore, a seasoned shamanic practitioner and teacher at 3 Crows Healing. With over 16 years of experience, Tina has guided countless individuals in transforming their relationship with chronic illness through deep spiritual work. Her own journey with a life-altering illness and “Shamanic Sickness” serves as the foundation for her healing practice, which emphasizes the importance of reclaiming one’s innate radiance and breaking free from the binds of illness. In this interview, Tina shares her profound insights into the shamanic path, how she helps clients shift from helplessness to empowerment, and the spiritual tools needed to heal on all levels.
Please share a bit about your background and what inspired you to follow the path of becoming a shamanic practitioner?
I was pre-verbal when I realized that I could communicate with animals, the wind, and the trees. My first memory of being visited by the Fair Folk was around the age of three – it was the first of many incredibly memorable experiences in my life! As the years passed, I experienced visitations by many types of beings and found that I could also sense when a home was haunted. At the age of nine, I discovered that I held healing gifts when I comforted my stepbrother, who had a cough and fever. I instinctively put my hand on his back, and being too young to understand medical jargon, I remarked, “There’s a lot of stuff in your lungs.” He was diagnosed with pneumonia just days later.
After more than a decade of teaching pre-K to grade 3 multiage classrooms, the spirits decided that it was time for me to pay attention to my Calling. I became ill with a mysterious illness, and after several years of misdiagnoses, painful tests, and appointments with over 25 specialists in New England, I still had no answers. Some doctors either assumed I had a progressive form of multiple sclerosis, non-Hodgkins lymphoma, or even the fatal Huntington’s disease. Other doctors told me that there was nothing wrong at all and stated that my mind was “playing tricks” on me.
One day, my acupuncturist at the time said, “I think you need to see a shaman.” I didn’t know any shamans during that time in my area at that time, but I called the number on the piece of paper she handed me. During my first healing session, this elderly shamanic practitioner saw the same beings who visited my dreams and my waking life. Beings I hadn’t told anyone about. Because I frequently ran fevers, I assumed I had been hallucinating – or perhaps losing my mind. “No,” I was told, “you are not going crazy! You are experiencing a Shamanic Sickness. It would behoove you to apprentice with me. If you don’t follow this Calling, I fear you’ll die.”
Needless to say, that was the beginning of my two-year apprenticeship with her! In my first training weekend, the practice felt like home to me, as if I was recalling something from long ago. Through the guidance of several teachers, I began to accept my Shamanic Sickness and the Call in which the spirits who were chosing me to become.
Although one would expect that the illness would have dissipated by then, as I continued to train, I had become incapacitated with intense pain, cognitive issues, dyspnea, severe migraines, chronic insomnia, severe lymph node swelling, tremors, chorea, ataxia, dyskinesia, transient seizures, as well as another rare neurological condition called acquired generalized dystonia. At the lowest point of the illness, I was at Nursing Home Level of Care and needed a wheelchair to mobilize. I was not yet 40 years old. There was a point that I could not feed, bathe, or clothe myself, and I lost the ability to coherently speak at times. I also experienced several Near-Death Experiences. Over time, I continued to integrate advanced shamanic techniques and strongly focus on envisioning myself in the future completely healthy. Eventually, the symptoms of my illness abated. But before that time I realized that in exchange for my wellness, I had to commit myself to be of service to my community as a practitioner. Because of the weight of that responsibility of holding peoples’ souls in my hands, it took me a long time to agree to that Call.
You’ve trained in advanced shamanic techniques. Could you explain what shamanic healing involves and how it differs from other spiritual or energetic healing modalities?
Shamanism is the oldest healing modality we have. It existed in every corner of the world, going back tens of thousands of years. What intrigues me is that some healing ceremonies are quite similar, even though the people have been separated by land and sea. It speaks to the way the Spirit World has been speaking to shamans no matter when or where they lived.
The major difference between shamanic work and other energetic healing modalities is that the information and healing comes from the practitioner’s helping spirits, who reside in the Otherworlds. The shaman enters into an altered state of consciousness with the use of rhythmic sound to allow part of their spirit to travel into the transcendental Otherworlds of the helping spirits. Drums, rattles, bells, and other instruments have traditionally been used all over the world to support the shaman’s journey. The shaman then returns to this world to bring back guidance, wisdom, and healing. Through the eyes of the helping spirits, a well-respected shaman can sense the spirit of illness and loosen the grasp it has on the one who is sick. It is from this place that the work begins in shifting one’s relationship with the spirit of the illness.
The word “shaman” is derived from the Evenk/Manchu word šamán or samaan, which loosely translates ‘to heat up,’ to ‘get excited,’ and ‘to have sacred knowledge’ {Breeze Wood, Nicholas. Walking with the Tiger: Deepening Your Shamanic Life (pp. 45-46). 3Worlds Books. Kindle Edition.} The shaman-to-be would have had to survive an intense shamanic initiation, sometimes called a “Shamanic Sickness.” Once initiated, the shaman is considered “reborn” as the Hollow Bone, and is then tasked with the job of serving others in the community. It was not enough that the individual went through these severe trials, but that they were able to ground themselves enough in this world to be able to translate and bring through the energies from the Otherworlds of the helping spirits. The survival of the community rested upon the success rate of the shaman. If the individual could not correctly divine information or perform successful healings, the individual was not recognized as one.
In my tradition, it is frowned upon to self-refer to oneself as a shaman, as that is seen as boasting. However, the community may refer to the individual as as shaman if they are successful in helping them. So, this is a life-long training! It takes a commitment to the helping spirits as well as a commitment to moving through continuous initiations, deaths and rebirths. One who is chosen by the helping spirits to serve has committed to a life-long journey of ongoing trials and teachings that are more intense than someone who is not being chosen as a shaman.
How do you guide people in transforming their relationship with chronic illness from one of helplessness to empowerment? What are some key steps in this journey?
Unlike wellness coaches who focus mainly on mindset, the shamanic approach is not quite linear. Every person’s illness differs, even with the same diagnosis. This is because on the subconscious level, we are in some sort of relationship with our illness. In shamanism, everything is perceived as being alive and having consciousness. We acknowledge that everything has a spirit – including our house, the trees, the land, the birds, and animals. Even the aspects of the weather are spirits. And, our relationships with others are also spirits.
When I approach chronic illness with someone, we address the relationship formed with the spirit of the illness. When we address the underlying spiritual causes of the illness as well as the grasp the illness has on us, the relationship between us and the illness weakens. In addition, when we begin feeding our innate radiance rather than the spirit of illness, we further disempower the spirit of the illness.
I use advanced shamanic healing ceremonies when prompted by my helping spirits in-session to support the shifts one’s spirit needs in order to energetically “lift” themselves out of the vibration of illness. In my practice, I am highly trained in and and teach others in performing Power Animal Retrieval, Extraction Work, Soul Retrieval, Depossession, Ancestral Healing, Wound Work, Psychopomp Work, and communing with land spirits and the Fair Folk. I typically use several healing ceremonies while working with people who struggle with chronic illness. In working with my helping spirits for almost 17 years, I have begun to see illness as a tough-love teacher, one that can serve as a big catalyst in our life path. Over the course of working with me, clients receive a restoration of their inner power and welcome wholeness back into their being as I perform healing ceremonies focused on empowering their essence with the particular soul therapy I provide. I also work on severing the ties one has to the spirit of their illness with other healing ceremonies as well as assisting clients in forming relationship with their helping spirits to support them. I also encourage people to find their own natural rhythm. Often the onset of illness can be brought about by the capitalistic, fast plastic pace of our culture. Our spiritual burn-out can often be “the last straw” when someone succumbs to illness. When we begin listening to our bodies and following our natural rhythm, we can allow the healing done in-session a better chance to integrate.
The helping spirits don’t see spirits of illness as “bad” or “good,” but they do see the spirit of illness as an incoherence or some sort of a conflict. As one’s soul awakens to the hidden potential held within the shadow of being ill, people naturally recalibrate and a shift ensues. The illness no longer has such a hold over them. Because the spiritual root cause of one person’s illness may differ greatly from another, there is not a real linear sequence of steps taken to regain health, but there are some milestones.
Because my own path included a long and severe illness, I created exercises for clients of my Rise to Radiance Program to complete between sessions to address mindset in how people relate to their illness. When people are ill for a long time, they lose sight of what it feels like to be well and whole. They forget who they are without illness overshadowing their life. My focus is on helping them see and ignite their innate radiance that still lives and breaths within them. Over the years, I have realized that one of my special gifts that the helping spirits have given me is being able to shine a light on the parts of people that need to be fed in order to disentangle their energy from illness. It’s all about feeding that innate radiance.
When people begin working with me, we begin by signing a Commitment to Self. The first step to wellness of any kind is really committing to the health of ourselves on every level. It’s not just what foods we put into our bodies, but who we allow into our arena and what messages (on tv or social media) we allow in to our energy body. We also begin looking at how we can feed our Light. It’s a very specific form of self-care.
The other big milestone to hit in healing from chronic illness is to begin getting curious about who we are without the illness. This is crucial, especially if we’ve been sick for a long time. When we begin delineating between who we are and what the illness is, we can help ourselves feed who we are rather than the energy of the illness.
Another key step is in really grieving the life one had before illness. This takes a tremendous amount of courage, and I typically suggest people do this with as much support as they can, which includes my support too. I believe that not being able to grieve can keep us stuck. We don’t have that space held for us in our culture, but without deep grief work we cannot come to a place of acceptance – even if it is a radical one. We can only bring ourselves to a state of dreaming up a new life when we grieve the old one and accept things as they are in the present. If we are full of grief and anger for what has been dealt to us, we cannot make enough room in ourselves for the new life awaiting us on the other side illness.
As we begin shifting out of grief, we need to pay attention to the story we tell ourselves. It is necessary to feel the impact of being completely overcome with the illness and all the devastation that comes with it in terms of turbulence in our family life, career, financial obligations, and even our friends. We may have even stopped trusting our own bodies because it doesn’t feel like a safe place to inhabit, especially if the symptoms are unpredictable. When we can rewrite our story with ourselves as the Hero, we begin rooting for ourselves again. We begin to really have compassion for our experience. We might be able to see how the conflict in our story has brought out some qualities in ourselves we may have otherwise never have discovered. We might be able to glean some precious pearls in our experience that we get to string together and wear with pride. We might even begin seeing ourselves looking back at this time in our lives as something we have overcome, where we have closure – where we have our victory.
People may not have a choice in being ill and in pain. However, they can choose how to be in relationship with it. With mindset approaches as well as the specific soul therapy I perform, accessing innate radiant wellness is totally possible! People who work with me begin to see visions of themselves on the other side of illness without feeling like it’s an intangible dream. Step by step, they begin to alchemize their life from fantasy to non-fiction.
What advice do you have for someone who feels stuck in the vibration of their illness and is seeking to break free into healing?
My advice to those who struggle with chronic illness is that if you believe it’s possible to recover without the shadow of your illness over your life, then I am 100% behind you! I already believe in you! But you must believe in yourself too. It’s your task to muster up your belief in your latent powers. It’s your task to find the hope in your body, and in your heart, and spirit. When you empower yourself like this, you are in a “perfect” place to break free of the binds of illness and reclaim your life. My greatest wish for those who struggle with chronic illness is that they start becoming clearer about what they believe is possible and begin feeding that. Years ago, I was facing a life of severe disability and being completely dependent on others. I had nothing to lose, so I began believing that the impossible is possible. Many alchemists throughout time did as well, and I drew from that possibility. It’s from that approach that I guide others.
What do you think is the most important mindset shift someone needs to make when they begin the journey of spiritual healing alongside a chronic illness?
Although shifting mindset is part of the process of healing from chronic illness, it isn’t the entirety of what’s keeping someone stuck in it. This is where shamanic healing comes in. There can be a multidimensional puzzle that is not on our conscious radar that is keeping someone sick. A person may be metaphorically spinning their wheels with a great trauma-informed therapist because the energetics of the illness have not been addressed appropriately in the Spirit World. For some people, Soul Retrieval is vital to heal from their illness. For others, they may be carrying the vibration of illness in their body from ancestral unwellness, and so addressing that with Ancestral Healing will help them shift illness. For others, there can be multiple root spiritual causes for their illness, so we take the time to address each aspect. Some people I’ve worked with were experiencing their own Shamanic Sickness and needed foundational spiritual guidance to be able to understand who their helping spirits are and to navigate their way through that intense Calling. The only real mindset shift one needs is to believe is that healing is possible, even if at first they don’t believe it. It may seem like a the work of a sci-fi fantasy novel, but if a client keeps actively feeding the vision and the feeling of health and wellness, it’s only a matter of time before they make fantasy into non-fiction and shift into the world of wholeness and radiance.
