John Perkins:

Author-environmentalist John Perkins is committed to changing the dream that we in the West have for our world. In the summer of1999, during the opening ceremonies for the first annual Gathering of Shamans in upstate New York , he told audiences,

"We are one of the wealthiest nations ever in the history of the world. We've also got the highest rates of suicide, family abuse, drug abuse, violence--you name it. We've got incredible statistics that show that we are very unhappy people. So what do we need to do? We need to move deeper into our hearts, into our happiness, into our ecstasy, into our feeling of connectedness and oneness with the elements, with the plants, the rocks, the rivers, the mountains, the animals, and each other."

Perkins had his first introduction to shamanism in 1968 when, as a Peace Corps Volunteer, he came to live with the Shuar tribe, the famous "headhunters" of the Ecuadorian Amazon. During his stay, the young business school graduate from New Hampshire became violently ill and came close to dying. A Shuar shaman performed a healing on him that saved his life, making him rethink the way he viewed their "primitive" lifestyle.

"John Kennedy, the founder of the Peace Corp had said, 'We're going to send young people off to these countries to teach [the natives] things.'" Perkins says, "Well, I learned very quickly that I had absolutely nothing that the Shuar needed. There was nothing I could teach them. Nothing. But they had a tremendous amount to teach me."

In the more than three decades since, Perkins has visited, lived with, and learned from indigenous shamans throughout the world. The lessons that he learned from them about living in harmony with nature prompted Perkins to found Dream Change Coalition, a non-profit organization dedicated to inspiring Earth-honoring changes by applying indigenous shamanic wisdom. In his workshops and study programs throughout the world, Perkins teaches techniques of shapeshifting and shamanic dream change. He is the author of a number of books on shamanism, including Shapeshifting ; Psychonavigation , The World Is As You Dream It, and The Spirit of the Shuar .

Hillary S. Webb: There seems to be an interesting paradox happening. The shamans of the indigenous cultures around the world are disappearing--mostly due to the influence of Western culture--and yet Westerners are becoming increasingly interested in learning the ways of these Earth-honoring traditions. Why do you think this shift is happening?

John Perkins: That's a really good question. Over the last century the influence of the industrialized world has gotten steadily stronger in indigenous cultures. Cultures like the Shuar of the Amazon, the Bugi people of Indonesia , and the Bedoin of the Middle East have been exposed to this whole new way of thinking that debunks the traditional wisdom and teachings of shamanism.

Whenever the priests and missionaries and medical doctors have gone into indigenous communities, they have brought with them the teaching that shamanism isn't important, isn't necessary, and, in many cases, that shamanism is evil. Along with that has come a very seductive message that if these people join our culture they will make money, they will get all kinds of material goods, medical facilities, teachers, and so on.

At the same time, in our own culture over the past several hundred years, we have seen an increasing acceptance of science--often at the price of spirituality. Many historians surmise that this started, or at least got a lot of impetus, during the Black Plague, during what we call the Dark Ages, because people's prayers were not answered. The plague wiped out one-third of Europe 's population--twenty-five million people--and prayers didn't get them anywhere. Finally, it was science that discovered that fleas were spreading the plague, and, in the end, it was science that eradicated it.

I believe the Vietnam War was a very critical event in terms of bringing us full circle, because the United States held out that this was a war of the all-knowing, scientific, rational culture versus the superstitious communist. The belief was that of course we would win this war, because we had superior technology to the Vietnamese. In the end, Vietnam was a fiasco. The great scientific power was defeated. From that point on, I think we have much more welcomed the idea that there is something beyond science. That the heart is important, not just the mind.

Right now we are at a very unique point in history where, while we have incredible science and technology and amazing methods of communication, we still have a desire to integrate shamanic culture. True, the indigenous shamans are disappearing fast, but I think that's starting to reverse itself as we all become much more interested and welcome the shamanic views into our lives.

HSW: In fact, there seems to be a merging of science and spirituality starting to happen. Just over the past sixty years or so, the works of quantum physicists such as J.S. Bell and David Bohm have begun to reflect what shamans have known for thousands of years: that everything and everyone are connected in a very intimate and immediate way. And, yet, despite this scientific "proof" of our interconnectedness, we still continue on this path of destruction--both of the environment and ourselves. Are we going to be able to reverse this pattern before it's too late?

JP: Well, that depends on people like you and me and how committed we want to be to this. We know that in order to accomplish anything, we first have to have the dream. We have to have the vision. Before I can physically pick up a pencil, I have to visualize myself picking it up before my muscles can make that happen.

Right now we have the vision of a better world. Five years ago, people were questioning if there really was climate change or not. Today, I don't think anybody questions that--except maybe a few scientists who are paid by big corporations to dispute the facts. At this point, all legitimate scientists and even the US government agree that climate change is happening. But it's only been in the last few years that we've admitted to that. All of us--from the highest corporate executive to the most far-out New Age thinker--realize that there's a crisis and that we need to do something to change it.

Shamanism is a great approach to that, because shamanism teaches us that if we give energy to our vision, the result will be a remarkable change. A shapeshift. And so the work that a lot of people are doing is about channeling energy into that vision so that the actions will follow and the change will occur on the physical level of reality.

HSW: Because you can't solve a problem with the same mindset that created it, can you?

JP: Right! As a culture, we've developed some very bad habits. And habits are hard to break, but it's not impossible to break them. Cultures have broken habits many, many times throughout history. It was not easy for those people back in the 1770s to go up against England . Not just because of the military might, but because there was a real habit there of the way the whole British government was set up. But they did break that habit, and we can break our habits, too. I think most of us really want to. Most of us would really rather not have a car if we could just see our way around it. The challenge is to figure out how to make that happen. Because if we want it to happen and we apply energy to it, it will happen.

HSW: How soon do you think this shift can take place?

JP: We are beginning to see it manifest right now. A third grade class in Newton , Massachusetts is teaching shamanic journeying to kids in that school from kindergarten to fifth grade. When things like that happen, we have a very, very good prospect of seeing a shapeshift occur within the next generation.

HSW: Earlier you talked about creating a "shapeshift." This is a term that comes up frequently throughout your books and workshops, but it's not a concept that most people are really familiar with.

JP: Shapeshifting is a process of transformation. It can happen on a cellular level where we can shapeshift the body to get rid of cancer and other diseases. It can happen on a personal level, where we change our personalities to, say, become more proficient as writers or artists or to drop addictions. A shapeshift can also happen institutionally by changing the way we govern ourselves and the way we run our lives.

Again, in each of those cases, it's having the vision first and then applying energy to it. That energy creates action to then bring about the transformation. Shamanism teaches us to look at the vision and decide if it is something that we really do want to have manifest, and then gives us some wonderful approaches for applying energy in order to create the shapeshift.

A lot of people think of shamans as healers. And while most of them do perform healings, not all of them do. But all shamans are shapeshifters. For many of them, shapeshifting involves changing the way one community relates to another community; relates to a river that it is starting to pollute; relates to the weather cycles or the crop cycles.

The ancient Mayans appeared to be a great microcosm because they built up this incredible civilization and then they abandoned it. Nobody really knows for sure why they did that, but one of the most predominant theories is that, while it seemed like they had all these technological advancements, they realized that their way of life really wasn't working. They had great architecture, great mathematics, great engineering, and yet they were finding it increasingly difficult to feed themselves. Eventually, they rejected all that and went back into the forest.

Today, we as a whole planet are discovering something very similar. We've created an amazing culture and technology, but the way we're using it is making it very difficult for us to live satisfied, fulfilled lives and to look at a future for our children.

HSW: Dave Foreman, the co-founder of Earth First!, has said that the defense of the Earth is not "Lord Man protecting something less that himself. Rather, it is a humble joining with Earth, becoming the rainforest, the desert, the mountains, the wilderness in defense of itself." Sounds like shapeshifting to me!

JP: Yes. That's the crux. Where did we ever get this idea that God has singled us out as the only species that can ignore the laws of nature and keep procreating, keep destroying the resources, keep destroying all the other species around us and still be taken care of? We act as if God said, "The lions aren't allowed to destroy all of their prey and all of their prey's offspring and keep on living. The birds aren't allowed to eat all of the grain, including all of the seed grain. But you people, you can destroy everything around you and I'm still going to hold you dear to my heart and let you continue." Whoever came up with that idea?

HSW: It does seem pretty egotistical.

JP: It's egotistical and it's outrageous. And totally irrational, but it still exists.

HSW: When we do shapeshift the collective dream, what do you think that the world is going to look like? Are we all going to ditch our cell phones and go into the jungle and live in yerts?

JP: Well, what I'm about to say is not very popular. One of the most important things that has to happen is that we have to recognize that the Earth's resources are limited; that space is limited, and that we human beings have to take responsibility for that. We have to recognize that we are the only species on this planet with no natural enemies, and, therefore, we have to do something to control our own population. We cannot continue to create medicines that prolong life, that eradicate illnesses, that cut back on infant mortality rate, and not do something that will balance that out. I don't know what that "something else" is, and I know that people don't want to face that fact. The reality is that we live on a limited piece of real estate and we're not going to be happy if we continue to have to destroy all other life forms in order to make room for ourselves. Seeing trees cut, seeing animals destroyed, seeing species going extinct is not a healthy thing for us to experience. We don't like it. It affects us deeply in our subconscious.

If we're going to succeed on this route, then we are going to have to take responsibility for our population. That's going to have a major effect on everything else that we do--our transportation systems, our housing, et cetera.

And we don't have to do away with technology to do this, either. Technology in itself is not bad--it's the way that it is used that's important. At the turn of the last century, there was a huge environmental crisis in this country in our major cities. The cities were literally swimming in horse manure. You can read reports about how incredibly deep the horse manure was in places like Boston , New York , Chicago . There were tremendous diseases coming out of this and there were huge arguments about whether the land outside the cities should be used to raise food for people or for horses.

The horse was a huge problem. Not that a horse in itself was a problem, it's just that there were too many of them. And so the car was looked at as a wonderful environmental solution. It didn't kick anybody, it didn't create manure, and it didn't seem to pollute--at least not in the way that people thought of pollution at that point in time. The car seemed to be this incredible solution. And it was, for a time. Now, however, we have too many of them. There's nothing wrong with a car per se--it's just the way it's used. And that's true for all of technology.

HSW: Let's talk about physical shapeshifting. In your books you write about witnessing a Javanese man transform into a bush, and a Shuar shaman shapeshift into a bat. If this kind of physical transformation is so common in indigenous cultures, why do we in the Western world have such a hard time believing it?

JP: Because it isn't part of our cultural thinking. At least, it's not part of our modern cultural thinking. When we talk about things like werewolves or Dracula, we make it sound as though it's totally absurd and ridiculous. We tell ourselves that because shapeshifting is always portrayed in a very evil way.

I think a lot of that came out of the Christian movement with the Catholic church wanting to debunk all the old shamanic beliefs, so they made all this stuff seem very scary. The fact is that our ancestors knew very well that they could transform into bats and wolves, just as the Shuar today know they can do it. We all come from cultures that could do that. Not until very recently did we begin changing that.

You know the story of St. Patrick chasing the snakes out of Ireland ? Well, Saint Patrick was a real person, but there were no native snakes in Ireland at that time. The "snakes" were really the Druids. Not only was the snake the symbol of the Druids, but the Druids could shapeshift into snakes. St. Patrick knew that in order to bring in the Catholic Church and all that it represents, he had to get rid of the Druids--people who could transform themselves into snakes.

The ability to shift our energy into another form is part of our own culture, but we've chased it away and we've convinced ourselves that it doesn't really happen. And yet, some of greatest thinkers are embracing the idea. Look at a guy like Carl Sagan. Energy transference is what the book Contact is all about. What Sagan is saying there is that we're not going to get to other worlds and other planets by firing ourselves off in a spaceship that can go faster than the speed of sound. That isn't realistic. What we can do is put ourselves in a capsule that transforms our energy and shapeshift through time and space. I think it's really, really significant that one of the greatest scientific minds of our century came up with the concept that we're not going to accomplish space travel using machines; that we can only do it by transforming the energy within ourselves.

HSW: You mention in your books that one of the things that holds people back from physical shapeshifting is fear. Specifically, the fear that they won't be able to return. How would one overcome this?

JP: In Shapeshifting , I talk about how I shapeshifted into a chair playing hide-and-seek with my daughter. In those days, I was struggling with the fear that one could get stuck in that other realm. Since then, I've done a lot more work on shapeshifting and talked to a lot of shamans about this. The conclusion I've come to is that each life form has a certain role to play, and we manifest into that form for a reason. And one of the roles that human beings play is that we have a tremendous impact on everything else in the world. Not because we're sitting at the top of some hierarchical pyramid, but because it's part of what a human being is in the same way that a bird has a huge impact by eating seeds and then depositing them someplace so that they can grow into trees.

We as human beings have a huge impact on a very wide assortment of life around us, and we come into this life in this form because we have a mission that involves that. We know this as we enter our lives, but in our culture we are taught to forget it. In shamanic communities a lot of time is devoted to recalling that mission and to realizing it--such as a calling of the shaman, for example. And the shamans have told me that you cannot shapeshift out of being a human being for any significant length of time until you've accomplished that mission.

HSW: So how do we determine what that mission is?

JP: We all know someplace in our hearts what our purpose is, even though a lot of energy and effort have gone into helping us forget that. One of the things that Dream Change Coalition does at the workshops is help people to journey to their mission. A lot of that discovery can be done by going deep into our hearts; by feeling our connection with ourselves, with the elements and with everything around us. We just have to break down those barriers and open ourselves to our hearts, to what the message of the universe is for us.

HSW: You've traveled around the world and met with shamans from many different cultures. How would you compare the role of the indigenous shaman and the shaman of the Western, industrialized world?

JP: I think that there is no basic difference between the shamans in our culture and the shamans in any culture. By my definition, a shaman is a person who journeys to other worlds and uses the energy and wisdom and power of those worlds to affect change in this one. A shaman is an agent of change. We all have the potential of being shamans. If you journey to other worlds and use what you get from those other worlds to affect change, then you are a shaman. I think that at this point in time it is very important that we honor all the agents of change in our culture, and that we recognize our own powers and our own abilities as agents of change.

The role of the industrial shaman is the same role as it always has been. It's shapeshifting. It's leading the people into the next shape. It's helping the culture as a whole to visualize the next dream and to apply the energy that is necessary to have that dream manifest.

We as shamans have to really look at what it is we want to create out there for the next generation. And by that I mean not just the next generation of human beings, but the next generation of everything that's out there: fish, flowers, cats, dogs, rivers, rocks. All the entities.