Kene Kuin

Kene Kuin, the true design, is an important motif of Huni Kuin identity. The shunu kene (tree of life) below, has eight paths defined by both positive and negative space; and like all kene represents ancestral knowledge. For the Huni Kuin, these designs are a crucial element to the beauty of people and things. 

Huni Kuin motifs are applied in the form of body art, jewellery, clothing and crafts of all kinds. These designs are inspired by the forces of nature and a particular cosmology, which are received by the shamans in ceremonies through the plant medicines. Each sign has associated rituals, songs, myths, cosmologies etc.

As such, these designs are inspired by the forces of nature. The motif is transmitted by the 'spirit entity' and its representation embodies the spiritual strength of that being. In the case of an animal, the motif can be considered a 'pattern' arising from the 'genetic code' of the animal and emitting a 'frequency of force' or spiritual function to which it is attached.

Kene are painted on Huni Kuin bodies and faces with genipap (vegetable paint) during festivals, when visitors arrive or for the simple pleasure of dressing up. Small children are not painted with designs, but are blackened from head to foot with genipap. Boys and girls have just part of their face covered with designs, while adults paint their entire face. 

Painting with genipap is an exclusively female activity. On days without any festival, women walk around unpainted; but when one of the men brings genipap from the forest, there is always someone eager to mix the paint and invite the others to paint themselves. Young women are the most likely to be seen painted with designs; men less frequently, unless they are acting as hosts.

The kene kuin style contains a variety of named motifs. When a motif has two or more names, this is generally because of the ambiguity between the figure and grounded reality typical to the Huni Kuin aesthetic. The same motifs (or basic designs) used in face painting are found in body painting, pottery and weaving, basketry and stool decorations.

Just as not all bodies are painted, or not some bodies all of the time, not all keneya (kene objects) have designs. Cooking vessels are not painted, though the plates for serving food may be. Painting is associated with a new phase in the life of the object or person, a phase in which it is desirable to emphasize the smooth and perfect surface of the body in question. 

The design calls attention to new visual experiences, which announce crucial life events. The design vanishes with use and is only reapplied during festivals. Hence, things with design occupy a special place in Huni Kuin culture.

Sananga

Sananga is a powerful medicine taken as eye drops. Made from the mashed roots of the Apocynaceae shrub; a cousin of the Iboga tree, which produces the active compound ibogaine. Traditionally Sananga has been used by the Kaxinawa for hunting; to help sharpen their vision, awareness and extra sensory perception. These sacred drops heal panema; the psychic illnesses that manifest as lack of drive, motivation or focus, laziness, depression, sadness, bad luck and negative energetic influences that attract difficulties and disease. 

On an energetic level Sananga works to open up the vision of the third eye, by helping to decalcify and activate the pineal gland. This clears negative thought patterns and mental confusion. By cleansing the physical, emotional and energetic fields, Sananga dilutes the thought forms and negative, disharmonious energies that envelop the energetic body of the eye. By clearing the energetic channels, one’s inner, outer and higher vision is restored; aligning us emotionally, mentally and spiritually.

Kaxinawa shamans believe that, panema is a conglomerate of lower energies that stay present in the energetic bodies of people - accumulated through a sedentary, negative life full of bad habits and thoughts that are harmful for the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual health of a person - that weigh heavily in the energetic body of the individual, making them sad, depressed, stressed physically and mentally, while making it impossible to find success in relationships, work and life goals. Through Sananga this energetic charge is automatically eliminated, as if the person went through an energetic shock; later on making the person feel capable, happy, invigorated after the application.

Sananga eye drops cause an intense burning sensation, this experience persists for a number of minutes, during which the participant is directed to breathe deeply and into the pain. Sananga is said to also burn the inner anger residing in the individual, leading to an intense state of relaxation following the period of pain. The pain caused by Sananga causes the release of endorphins, produced by the body to ease the pain. These endorphins stay in the body after the pain subsides, leading to a feeling of utmost relaxation.

Why do spiritual practitioners seek pain though? Considering the phenomenon of Sananga, its a substance which is used to induce pain or physical discomfort. As often noted, alternative techniques for the achievement of altered, visionary states of consciousness traditionally included various types of pain and discomfort such as sleep deprivation and prolonged fasting. Yet the question remains… why? Why do spiritual seekers seem so keen on experiences involving intense pain or discomfort?

Before we try and answer this question, it should be noted that the experience of pain and discomfort can be seen as an inherent part of the psychedelic experience in general, and not just in Sananga. As with ayahuasca, its expression reaches its peak in spiritual death/rebirth experiences; in which the individual must 'die' in order to be 'reborn' again i.e. death as the ultimate form of illness leading to rebirth as the ultimate form of healing.

It’s also almost as if psychedelic use supports a kind of spiritual protestant work ethic in some participants; who believe one has to suffer in order to rise and soar. This is particularly ironic and interesting since the protestant work ethic was one of the major reasons why people in the West came to distrust psychedelics in the first place. Participants in the psychedelic debate argue about whether relishing the view from the top of the mountain is the same, whether you got there using a ski-lift or after a long and arduous hike; the top of the mountain being, of course, the mystical experience, arrived at through sustained spiritual work, or through the use of mind altering substances. 

Does a chemically triggered spiritual experience have the same value as one arrived us through hard, laborious work, and is it even legitimate? Jerking our bodies out of their comfortable state of rest and equilibrium is often necessary for transcending our limits and achieving a greater degree of wholeness and wellbeing. However, the choice, in most cases, is not between getting to the top on the ski-lift or getting there hiking. Rather, it is getting there and observing the view after riding the psychedelic ski-lift; or never getting there at all. 

Spiritism Versus Shamanism

Spiritism leads to damaging and malicious states like panic, terror and madness. The low-level practice of spiritism attracts negativity and sorrow. The way to identify these lower order levels in ceremonies, is when spirits try to offer you attractive things - do not accept. Attractive, and therefore desirous, objects become attachments; which trap you in these lower realms.

Conversely, celestial beings bless with their calm presence; and allow us to merge with only the highest universal spirits. Spirituality leads us to just and pure things. It invites us with the highest spiritual origin; with justice, rectitude and service. Justice, rectitude and service bring peace; and peace allows for the higher realms to manifest.

The problem is that, novice drinkers of medicine and uninitiated facilitators don’t recognize the point at which they become trapped by evil; not realizing that spiritism requires far less skill and personal discipline than shamanism. The master drinkers of medicine and their students clearly distinguish between the dualism of good and evil.

Thus, choosing to always follow the path of goodness, selfless service and virtue is at the root of the authentic and original form of shamanism. However, some practitioners and facilitators - often lacking appropriate training and a good ceremonial guide, and possibly having experienced many negative incidents in their lives due to hardship and despair - have deviated from the spiritual path and operate with a nebulous distinction between good and bad.

Lower order facilitators and practitioners only know the lower levels of the cosmos; they “only know the sky up to the house of the sun.” They have never seen the celestial immortals; instead they make contact with inferior beings, including the earth spirits. For their part, true healers don’t linger at low levels of knowledge, but drink medicine continuously. Not for the pleasure of it, as it’s a great sacrifice, but because they desire greater knowledge.

This is the fundamental challenge for modern urbanized people in following the medicine path. We are removed, either physically or spiritually, from the source of the medicine. We don’t live among the plants in the forest. The further away we are from the forest, the closer we are to a material and egocentric existence. Some practitioners and facilitators can avoid becoming trapped by this world, others can’t.

To give the benefit of a doubt to some of these wayward practitioners and facilitators, perhaps they consider helping someone to be an act of goodness; even though what they are colluding with may be evil. Some may simply be trying to make a living, clearly unable to see the harm they are causing. Others may be trying to satisfy egoic needs, such as inferiority complexes or narcissistic disorders.

It is up to the adored children of heaven to use their acute discrimination and discernment, to distinguish between the lower and higher realms; as well as the practitioners and facilitators that occupy each respectively. More importantly, to recognize that all human beings are such children; even though some have chosen apparently easier paths, which have actually turned out to be far more dangerous and difficult.

Sacred Convergence

Much has been written about the juncture where psychology and shamanism converge. Both are instances of the same primordial image or instinctual pattern known the world over. Both shamanism and psychology acknowledge the importance of the sacred in healing processes. Both recognize how the sacred is manifest in wild nature and areas where modern humans have fallen out of consistent connection with wholeness. Both observe how loss of contact with the sacred results in loss of soul, and understand that recovery requires initiation and successful integration of direct experience.

Shamanism defines health as being in balance with the sacred, and lack of health as violation of the will of the sacred. Psychology characterizes the sacred as an experience of something that evokes rapture, awe, exaltation or ecstasy; something that is even dreadful in its intensity and power. As opposed to the profane or ordinary, the sacred is often perceived in modern culture as something alien or other; while indigenous and earth-based cultures make no distinction between the sacred and the profane. In urban life, at least, the sacred is not something we experience in our busy everyday routines; unless we somehow slow ourselves to witness a sunset or feel into a sudden sense of longing or love.

Only then, in the spaciousness of attention, are we aware we have generally tuned out the sense of something powerful and unknown. Something sacred often invokes a feeling of mystery beyond the power of words to describe. The term numinous is a connotation for the sacred, describing it as something which provides an experience or alteration of consciousness independent of human will; arousing, affecting, bedazzling or blinding one to other realities. Both sacred and numinous are words connected to the idea of soul; the creative, sacred life force that imbues all things with energy and meaning.

The soul is not just an element, region or dimension; but rather a perspective of deepening, noticing, penetrating and insight. The soul can extended beyond humanity to the world at large, to forms and objects around us, whether natural or man-made. Each thing has a spark of soul at its core. Psychology is deeply tied to soul; so much that we can refer to psychologists as doctors of the soul. Similarly, the province of the shaman [as technician of the sacred] is disorders of the soul. We can call shamans masters of ecstasy, they are great specialists in the human soul; they see it, know its form and its destiny.

Modern culture has repressed the contents of the unconscious and summarily forgotten it entirely; disregarding the magic and mystery there. Conversely, shamans rely on the power that issues from the sacred to conduct their healing activities. Yet, the enormity of the split between urban lifestyles and the vast depth of the psyche looms over modern humans. Modern humans do not understand yet that, the discovery of the unconscious means an enormous spiritual task; which must be accomplished if they wish to preserve their civilization. The only way to address the deep loss of connection to soul, they experience as a species, is to reestablish their connection to the sacred.

In the physical or material world, the sacred manifests through wild nature as an infinite source of life and creativity; waxing and waning in eternal cycles of death and rebirth. Shamans read nature, regarding and interpreting the elements and events that communicate through soul at all times and places. Modern humans’ increasing analytic thinking and desire for progress through the manipulation of the natural world is devastating to their well-being. Their lives are dominated by reason, who is their greatest and most tragic illusion. By the aid of reason, they assure themselves, they have conquered nature.

As humans, of all cultures, our connection to nature is ancient and undeniable. At the most profound levels of the unconscious, everything becomes less and less differentiated until our ego no longer exists as a separate entity. The deeper layers of the psyche lose their individual uniqueness as they retreat farther and farther into the darkness. Here they become increasingly collective until they are universalized, merging with the body’s instinctual and biological functions; and eventually with nature itself. Hence, at bottom the psyche is simply world.

Since psyche and matter are contained in one and the same world, and moreover are in continuous contact with one another and ultimately rest on unnameable transcendental factors, psyche and matter are two different aspects of one and the same thing. Whatever the external landscape, the internal psychic landscape mirrors it; inhabits it, gives birth to it but also dies into it. The degree to which we are able to perceive the sacredness of what is manifesting around us in nature is the degree to which we are able to believe in the divine aspect of what we commonly know as our own human nature.