Spirit Journeying, also referred to as just Journeying is undertaken for multiple reasons including help and guidance from the spirit world, Spiritual Healing, inner exploration, personal growth and direction along the path of life and soul retrieval. A Spirit Journey is often undertaken by a Medicine Man or Shaman in order to communicate with the spirit world. A Medicine Man will undertake a spirit journey as one of the rituals he undertakes to protect men from evil spirits - his role is that of opponent to the bad spirits and the guardian of the ordinary man. Every spirit journey is a quest, a search for help and answers.

“Solar Eclipse"
by Diane Glancy

Each morning
I wake invisible.

I make a needle
from a porcupine quill,
sew feet to legs,
lift spine onto my thighs.

I put on my rib and collarbone.

I pin an ear to my head,
hear the waxwing's yellow cry.
I open my mouth for purple berries,
stick on periwinkle eyes.

I almost know what it is to be seen.

My throat enlarges from anger.
I make a hand to hold my pain.

My heart a hole the size of the sun's eclipse.
I push through the dark circle's
tattered edge of light.

All day I struggle with one hair after another
until the moon moves from the face of the sun
and there is a strange light
as though from a kerosene lamp in a cabin.

I pun on a dress,
a shawl over my shoulders.

My threads knotted and scissors gleaming.

Now I know I am seen.
I have a shadow.

I extend my arms,
dance and chant in the sun's new light.

I put a hat and coat on my shadow,
another larger dress.
I put on more shawls and blouses and underskirts
until even the shadow has substance”