Spirituality and the Drum 

Drumming connects you with your bones, your heartbeat, and your natural rhythms. The beat brings you down-to-earth, out of your head, into your feelings, and your connection to the Earth Mother. The rhythmical beat pushes through the emotions, the intellect, and into the spirit, the most etheric part of our nature. Spirit intuitively recognizes the transporting qualities of the regular beat as it draws the spiritual awareness out of the mundane into safe ceremonies and rituals that have proved protective for the soul over eons. These ceremonies are sacred to the spiritof the people; with the drum, they draw the people together as one. Drumming can be used in the following situations.

When you feel into the spirituality of the drum, you must start by looking deep within you--it is from here that Spirit comes. It is behind your eyes, observing how you are living this life. It is listening from within your head to the sounds that enter. It is feeling through your fingers as you touch the skin of your lover. Your Spirit is the observer that is always there, always coming through--a silent voice that gently whispers your true name. Your Spirit knows your potential and seeks to be fed with light and truth. It feeds on prayer and meditation. Drumming, music, singing, and chanting are your Spirit's deserts, pure sweetness for the soul. It is your longing to gain a deeper connection that sets the intention into focus. You draw yourself out from within yourself your "natural authentic nature", that which you really are. You beat this feeling into the drum, pulling the feeling out with your sincereity. Where is your Spirit which lets this manifest? You were born with it; it was there while you were in your mother's womb. Your Spirit formed at the moment of conception, and before then was in the space that we call the Mystery. It developed and grew within your form as you became an embryo. Just as the tiny, flying seed of the birch tree contains a future mature tree, so you as a child and before were filled by Spirit. You will return to the Spirit world when you "drop your robe" and let go of your physical body at death. We all die, moving into the darkness of the west, and yet we become reborn as future generations. Therefore it is vital to respect the ancestors.

At the age of six STEVEN went to live with his family on Wikwemikong on the north shore of Lake Huron in Canada, where his father was the reservation doctor. Since then Mother Earth Spirituality has fascinated him. Learning with Ted Williams, Ed McGaa Eagle Man, and Grandfather Wallace Black Elk, he now runs shamanic and personal development courses, linking people back to the spirituality of these Isles. Steven is married to RENATA, a gifted healer and teacher, who uses music, earth and energy medicine and shamanic healing practices in her work with individuals and groups. Renata has been studying and practising Native American Spirituality for the past 12 years. Steven and Renata live in Surrey with their two children Joy and John.