Spiritual warrior in Buddhism and Shamanism

"Generally speaking, we regard discomfort in any form as bad news. But for practitioners or spiritual warriors- people who have a certain hunger to know what is true- feelings like disappointment, embarrassment, irritation, resentment, anger, jealousy, and fear, instead of being bad news, are actually very clear moments that teach us where it is that we are holding back. They teach us to perk up and lean in when we feel we’d rather collapse and back away. They’re like messengers that show us, with terrifying clarity, exactly where we’re stuck. This very moment is the perfect teacher, and, lucky for us, its with us wherever we are."

- Pema Chodron "When things fall apart" full chapter online

The concept of a spiritual warrior has connotations in almost all religions and nowadays the new-age movements. Yet I find in shamanism a close link to the Shambhala warriors.


The only person who can survive the transformative path of the shaman is the Spiritual Warrior. The average human seeks comfort, safety, wealth, and a “healthy distance” from the true realities of life. The spiritual warrior actively seeks change, the facing of his fears and demons, and truth in all its starkness. A large proportion of a shaman’s training is learning to take full responsibility for his incarnation on Earth, and acquiring the qualities of a Spiritual Warrior.
The student learns the way awareness works and is taught to make a strategy for his life. By applying himself to these principles on a constant, everyday basis and by developing the profound qualities of impeccability, the student will activate the qualities of the Spiritual Warrior within. Once the Spiritual Warrior has been birthed, the student will then have the tools to enable him to walk the path towards total freedom.  source

Here are some of my favourite shamanic meditations from Kenneth Meadows wonderful book "Where eagles fly"

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Adversity is not a punishment of an anrgy deity, but an interplay of energies that provides an opportunity for growth in a new direction.

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Celebrate each day as it comes to you as if it is the only one in your entire existence. Compassion comes through a recognition that all living creatures are our "relatives".

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Detachment does not mean retreating from the world to escape its responsibilities. It is being in the world but not of it.

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Follow your heart, for what you feel is nearer to the truth than what you think.

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Innocence is not that which is separate from moral wrong, for innocence is not divisive. An innocent child lives for the moment. The past is forgotten and the future does not exist. Only the moment has importance. That is innocence.

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Look to a way, that is not a route to a destination but rather a journey itself, for you cannot become what it is you aspire to unless you can be it where you are now.

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Rainbows are a demonstration of all colours combining together into a wholeness, and illustrate that separateness is an illusion. A rainbow indicates that all paths that are harmonious are ways to wholeness, all races are part of a greater unity, and all paths that create beauty are deserving of respect.

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Take anything to its extreme and you lead it to its destruction.

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The most joyful sounds are heard not with the ears but with the Spirit. Only by finding the solitude of our personal Quiet Place can we experience the sound of silence.

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To love Nature is to love your Real Self, for Nature itself is an expression of the essence of what you are.

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Truth wears many masks in order to teach us not to mistake appearances for the reality.

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Zero is the Nothing that precedes creation, out of which an infinity of numbers and combinations is possible, and to which everything returns, for it shares itself with all that can be numbered and contains within it everything in existence. An apt symbol for Great Mystery.

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You alone have the power to make something of yourself simply by choosing to do so.