WHEN YOU HEAR THAT SOMEONE IS A SHAMAN, as well as a sound healing artist, certified hypnotherapist, neuro-linguistic programming practitioner, and guide in energy balancing, spiritual healing, and Reiki—well, you might be excused for being a little skeptical. And in Santa Fe, where “healers” are a dime a dozen, it’s an ordeal to find the real deal. So, if you’re inclined to doubt this shaman, I’d suggest you drop into Wellness by Design on Luisa Street and sit in on one of Bastine’s Music as Medicine experiences. The singing bowls, didgeridoo, and other ancient instruments used. Rick’s sound healing practices (one reason why he uses the sobriquet, “Thunder”) will take you a million miles away, and a million years into the past.
Being a shaman is like being water…flowing through life, figuring out how to be more in tune with everything. Flowing, and resisting nothing. Being present. Because if you pay attention, if you are in tune with the energy around us, it’s all there for you…everything you need for well-being.
That’s what shamanism is to me…seeing everything around you, because you’re a part of everything and everything is part of you. Slow down and listen to stillness, and something happens: you become an observer, not a doer. You stop trying to figure everything out. You just sit, and the answers come. Not from someone else: from your silence.
I help people get unstuck. I’m a certified hypnotherapist and a neuro-linguistic programming practitioner, and employ modalities to move stuck energy, both physical and mental. I use lots of modalities. There are many paths to the same destinations, so I like to have a full tool bag. If it works, let’s use it. We get stuck because of patterns, usually from childhood trauma. We often think of trauma as devastating, but it can also be a small thing that causes you to start thinking a certain way, to fall into fight-or-flight mode.
So, I look at body language, eye movement, and emotional movement in the body. I look to see how involved you are in the story you are telling—that’s key in moving forward. If you keep telling the same story, you’re going to keep reliving the same experiences and experiencing the same emotional triggers, but if you can dig through that same old story and extract something positive, then the story loses power over you.
Self transformation happens through the art of practice. So, whether its trauma, self-image, motivation, or sleep issues, we can change them with practice. Because if we humans practice something, we get really good at it. The more you practice, the more you are present and self-aware, and the more you realize the times when you’re not.
I notice body flinches and emotional releases. I was doing energy work on a patient, and was moved to sing different tones. Instantly, the releases started.
I realized there was something ancient and powerful here, so I began doing it regularly. A few years later, I met a woman who played crystal bowls. We worked together and she told me that her bowl wanted to stay with me. I thought, “Oh yeah, right, sure,” especially when she told me it was $800. She offered to let me pay when I could. I still wasn’t sure, so I grabbed the bowl and sang into it. The sound sent a wave of energy through me. I said, “Okay.”
The didgeridoo is primordial. It produces tones and sounds that your regular thinking mind can’t deal with. It has no idea what that sound is. It’s trying to figure it out, but can’t, so it stops. Then the sound can take you where you where you really need to go, and that’s usually something ancient inside of you, something you are connected to. And that goes back to the beginning of time.
In many religions, it started with sound: “In the beginning was the Word”, or the Big Bang, or the “Ohmmm” that created everything. In Hinduism, akasha is the fifth physical substance, the quality of sound. It is the one, eternal, and all-pervading vibration, and is imperceptible.
Sound is the Creator. It’s all about vibration. When I talk to you, you receive energy based on my frequency, my tone, my volume. It’s how we communicate, and it’s how we share energy back and forth. Everything is energy, frequency, light, and vibration. My musical partner is Walking Star; we are called Music as Medicine. He’s self-taught on Native American flute. As he says, “When I drop in, it is wide and deep into my heart and spirit. It’s medicine. My medicine. It’s the voice of creation, of the divine.”
That is my practice. That’s what I do in daily interactions…listen deeply, keep the vibration so there’s no need for anyone to fear or feel defensive. Maybe you can help me raise my vibration, or maybe I can help you raise yours. When I am in tune, I am radiating what the planet is radiating. I’m receiving and sharing with the planet and with everyone on it.
I’ve lived in Santa Fe for 20 years, and see an expansive, strong community, but we always need to be thinking about how to share more with each other, how to accept each other more—even if we have differing opinions or ideas.
I like the land…the energy of the land in Santa Fe. When I lived in Santa Cruz, California, to me, it was more of a swirling energy. Here, it’s totally different; it’s more like a force, an uprooting. You see all the volcanic mountains here, with layers and layers of uprooted rock. Being here is like a collision of things that were beneath the surface getting thrust up, like those rocks. Some of it was dark stuff, shadow stuff that I needed to get out.
People say that Santa Fe either embraces you or kicks your butt. It did both to me.
Photo Bobbi Lane
