Licensed Professional Counselor, Clinical Hypnotist, Shamanic Healer, Teacher, Author
Interview with Colleen Deatsman By Christopher Blackwell

I heard about Colleen Deatsman from a member of one of the forums I take part in. He described her as awesome shamanic healer and teacher. So with that recommendation I contacted her and asked for a interview.

Christopher: Could tell us a bit about yourself and perhaps how and why you got into counseling? Do you follow any particular religious path?

Colleen: It was destiny that brought me to counseling.

I am an avid outdoor enthusiast, growing up camping, mushroom hunting, hiking, snowmobiling, cross country skiing, hiking, fishing, hunting and exploring the wilderness with my family and friends.

I entered college with dreams of being a wildlife biologist. After a difficult experience with a less than helpful professor in college calculus my vision shifted toward other outdoor careers. As fate would have it, Central Michigan University had an outstanding program in Parks and Recreation Administration so I jumped into the dream of being a park naturalist or park ranger.

About a year later the bottom fell out of the state and federal park system budgets and naturalist, life guard and park ranger positions were terminated in huge numbers across the nation. Again, destiny turned me to a bit different direction.

I continued in Parks and Recreation Administration adding an emphasis in working with special populations. This would broaden my horizon and ensure employment with at least some outdoor exposure.

After college, and working two different placements as Recreation Director, I shifted focus yet again an obtained employment as a Case Manager working with people with developmental disabilities at the Community Mental Health Board in Ionia County.

While there I met a mentor whose faith and belief in me changed my world forever. He helped me see my brilliance, talents and self-worth and I entered the Rehabilitation Counseling Masters Program at Michigan State University and shortly there-after obtained employment at a larger Community Mental Health Board.

Near the end of my graduate program I transferred into a part time Outpatient Therapist position and began to build my private counseling practice. One year later I was working full time as sole proprietor of Circle of Life Counseling and Healing Services

Nature is my religion. Though we attended the First Congregational Church during part of my growing up years I didn’t find anything of substance there once the dynamic pastor of my adolescence was transferred. I suppose one could say I have always followed a nature oriented, shamanic path. I followed my heart and soul and the guidance of my soul-self and Helping Spirits long before I knew anything about this way of living or what was actually guiding me.

Christopher: I note in your back ground material that you are a licensed counselor, clinical hypnotist and a licensed social worker.

Sounds like you started out with the traditional training and skills.

Did you enjoy your work? How did you view your work?

Colleen: I view my work as the reason that I am on the planet right now. I am honored to be of service. I have always loved my work and loved working with people. I found that I had a natural gift of connecting heart to heart and soul to soul with people that creates comfort and trust for them to share deeply with me, and be open to hearing the sometimes difficult questions and insights that are necessary for deep healing to occur.

Christopher: What triggers the change in you methods, why the move into alternate methods of healing? Didn't health problems have a lot to do with what you discovered?

Colleen: Actually it wasn’t so much health problems that triggered the change but witnessing the shifts, changes and miracles of self- healing and alternative healing that again shifted my work by first adding hypnotherapy, then Reiki, and eventually shamanic healing and energy movement (clearing and power-filling).

Christopher: What did you do and what did you learn in the process on working on self healing?

Colleen: Well, this is a long story, but here we go. For nearly ten years I struggled with the then unidentifiable degenerative monster of Chronic Fatigue Immune Deficiency Syndrome (CFIDS) and Fibromyalgia. An illness that is characterized by chronic debilitating symptoms including; sore throat, swollen lymph glands, sleeplessness, extreme fatigue, low grade fever, below-normal body temperature causing a frozen to the core feeling, headaches, heart problems, mental confusion, muscle weakness and pain, neurological disorders, and depression, to name a few.

Every symptom with this illness was chronic, painful, and often changing, therefore defying diagnosis and treatment. For me, each of these symptoms was excruciatingly debilitating and combined they created the crippling loss of my life as I had known it. I could no longer do all the things I wanted and needed to do. My active life diminished to mere survival and many days I was unable to get out of bed or function at all.

This was so unlike me. Before the illness, I had been full of energy and enthusiasm for life. I ran marathons and I bicycled centuries (100 mile rides). I did intensive speed-work training runs and competed in 5K running races, often winning awards in my age group. I drove myself to be a super athlete, an involved and loving mom, the perfect wife, and an exemplary therapist. Then this monster slowly sucked away my active life.

As the symptoms lingered and worsened with each passing year, my spirit and passion for life evaporated. I lost my power, my energy to live, and I lost my self.

The numerous and mysterious chronic symptoms continued to worsen and deteriorate my body and life for years. After countless visits to the doctor, I was finally diagnosed with Epstein-Barr virus and Cytomegalo virus (two viruses purported to cause CFIDS and

Fibromyalgia) and was advised to go home and rest, since there was no known medical treatment. I went nuts inside! Was he crazy?!? I was a wife, a mother of three, a Counselor with a full-time career, and an athlete in my “spare” time.

I couldn’t just go home and rest. I refused to live my life a victim of this illness, so the fighter in me woke up, and I became motivated to start looking for healing alternatives. I tried everything in an attempt to heal. I tried every herb and supplement that claimed to boost the immune system. I received massage, acupuncture, chiropractic, and energy bodywork, to name but a few. All of these were very helpful for keeping me functioning, but yet, did not cure this beast of an illness for me. Something was missing, something deeper.

Years went by and the chronic symptoms worsened still further, leading to severe depression and intolerance of pain and sickness,

driving me to the brink of suicide on several desperate occasions. And then one day, with gun in hand, sitting on the edge of my bed, I looked up at my darling daughter’s kindergarten silhouette and I finally understood.

I realized that in all of my roles and responsibilities, in all of my “doing” and “busyness” I had lost connection with me, the spirit essence of my self, my soul-self. In shock, I lowered the gun, called a friend that did energy/body work and began my search to find myself and my health.

What began as an external search for healing from somewhere, anywhere out there, brought me home to the internal self-healing techniques that I share in my sessions, books and classes. We all have the ability to heal ourselves. We just need to know that we can, and learn how to tap into our inner healer and inner wisdom.

The first technique I learned, Visualization, facilitated a major shift in consciousness for me. Visualization is an attention focusing technique of creating visual images in the mind. This is accomplished by harnessing the ingenious power of our focused imagination for our own creation. Since the mind reacts physiologically to imagined events the same way it does to real events, we can create health by visualizing health, just as we can manifest anything else we desire in this way.

I created a vision of myself going to a beautiful place in nature on a warm and sunny day. In a safe and protected area in this beautiful place I would lie down, rest, and feel the warm sun penetrating into my frozen sick body. I visualized the warming sun melting into my solar plexus, the glowing warmth spreading out from my center into my chest and thighs and then radiating out to the tips of my toes and fingers, to the top of my head. I experienced warming glowing sunshine moving all through my body, healing my body, nurturing every aching muscle, every stressed cell.

By practicing my intentional visualizations on a regular basis, my body became stronger, less fatigued and far less pained. I also began to get in touch with the old me that used to be so strong, healthy and fun loving. Intentional Visualization is the doorway that began my process of reconnecting with my soul-self, life force and passion for living.

About a year later, I added Self-Hypnosis to my repertoire of therapies after becoming professionally trained as a Clinical Hypnotherapist. Hypnosis entails being guided into a relaxed alpha brain wave state through muscle relaxation and visualization in a serene environment.

I have worked to adapt the technique of hypnosis for self-healing, and achieved success by self-recording tapes with a series of body

and mind relaxations, visualizations, and suggestions for healing. The tapes I have created were expanded versions of the visualizations where I imagined myself in a peaceful and beautiful environment, boosting my immune system and warming my body.

Building on the success of these visualizations, I have added the inductions that facilitate deep relaxation and the suggestions I wanted for symptom relief and overall healing.

The rest was simple. I created a warm comfortable environment with no interruptions, played the tape, and just allowed myself to flow with the suggestions, taking me to beautiful relaxing far off places where my body was warm and healthy. Listening to this tape on a regular basis facilitated even deeper healing and my body grew stronger.

Once I became accustomed to the feeling of being in an altered state of consciousness I began the of practice meditation to open myself to communication with the divine. This is a skill that was difficult for me at first.

I am a very type A, busy, busy, person. It was a struggle for me to quiet myself down enough to be successful, but with practice and focus, meditation has become a very important component in my healing practices. The common theme in all meditative practices is concentration and focus of the mind.

Some meditations may focus on the breath, others a movement, still others an object. The actual object the mind is focusing on varies with the many differing forms of meditation, but the goal of mind focus, including or excluding any other action, remains essentially the same.

The goal is to free the mind of mental dispersion, thus creating the state of mindfulness or bare awareness. In this state of bare awareness, we have the ability to connect with our inner soul-self and the divine energy of the universe. I have found that by shifting my focus away from my busy external life with meditation, a reawakening of my personal energy occurs that heals my body.

Opening to my soul-self just 15 to 20 minutes a day helps me become aware, alive, and intuitive. The calm, quiet connection I find during and after meditation also facilitates an awareness of my body that I have not experienced in the past. With this awareness I am able to check in with my body’s feelings and needs so I can better take care of my self.

A short time later, I attended training in Shamanic Journeying.

Journeying for personal growth and healing is a technique I call Personal Journeying, and it is the most profound healing technique I utilize. Each journey is personal, deep, and healing on all levels. A strong healthy body is but one of the many benefits I reap.

Listening to steady drumming or music, a person journeys into an altered state of consciousness. The body relaxes and the mind shifts into the deep relaxation of theta state.

In this trance state, the journeyer travels inward to the world of the soul-self and spirit guides, to a reality that is tangible and accessible, just outside of our daily perceptions. Ecstatic energy and inner truth can be experienced in this special state that creates balance within the body.

Nothing that I have tried in the past facilitated this deep and divine connection like journeying. Peace and calmness seep into my everyday life from this direct spirit and soul-self connection. Journeying on a regular basis is key in keeping my spirit and soul- self relationships strong, maintaining the calm, and deepening my physical healing. It is also fun to meet and interact with the many Spirits who are there to help us live life to the fullest, to explore new worlds, and to personally connect with the divine.

Recently while journeying, I was shown that many illnesses, including cfids and fibromyalgia, are illnesses created by a blockage in our energy field and/or energy loss. The energy field is the vibrating life force that surrounds and runs through the body. In a healthy body, energy is constantly flowing and moving. If our energy becomes stagnant or stuck it blocks the natural flow of life force and illness, disease, and pain may manifest as a result.

In addition to becoming blocked, we may unknowingly leak life force energy, depleting ourselves. We burn it away during periods of stress. We may give it away to loved ones who need support or to enemies during conflict. As our energy drains away, we are less able to protect ourselves from foreign invaders such as bacteria, viruses, and allergens that find a home in our bodies and make us ill.

The key to healing is to clear these energy blockages and prevent energy loss by re-igniting our life force with moving energy. The body has the innate ability to heal itself when put into balance.

The healing techniques I utilize create this needed balance in various ways. First, the physical act of entering into visualization, self-hypnosis, meditation, or journeying is one of trance and total body relaxation. For that period of time, and the quiet period afterward, the body and mind are allowed to go into a place of peaceful rest and revitalization.

Also, because the nature of these techniques is connecting with Spirit and our soul essence, we experience energy vibrations of a higher frequency than our normal human dense vibrational rate. I was shown in a journey that the vibrational rate of an ill person is slower than that of a healthy person. Therefore, it is essential to increase our vibrational rate to activate healing.

Using these integrated techniques of direct Spirit connection, we channel the high frequency vibrations through our physical body releasing blockages, exciting, energizing, and changing the body systems at the atomic and molecular levels. The more a person connects with this energy source the stronger their own energy becomes until they are fully healthy and vibrating at a higher rate.

In addition to phenomenal physical healing, these techniques connect us to the vast world of knowledge, wisdom, and insight of the great mysteries where we can find our divine spirit guides, our soul-self, our power, our health, and our passion for life.

In teaching these techniques, I have witnessed incredible physical healing and enlightenment for many people, and utilizing these energy- connecting methods on an ongoing daily basis.

I have created a full recovery from cfids and fibromyalgia in my body. My life is back and I am able to enjoy it more fully than ever

before. I am alive, awake and aware. I am strong and energy-filled. This summer I bicycled over 4000 miles and ran several days per week, while still having energy for working, writing, teaching, and living!

This journey has taught me that healing is a continual process and a way of life, not a one-time occurrence that is a happy by-product of any one treatment, book, or workshop. It is a process that unfolds and becomes a part of us as we integrate all of our searching and learning into our being.

This integration into our core essence and our lives constitutes true and lasting healing. Continued deep healing and prevention is achieved by opening and reconnecting with the energy of the life force that flows through and around our bodies. Open to this energy. Let it flow freely through your body, mind, and soul. I'll help show you how. Healing will happen.

Christopher: How long did it take to distill the techniques down into a form that you could teach others?

Colleen: I began teaching the techniques that I found helpful for me to others right away. As a counselor I was working with people everyday who were in various stages of healing. I shared the techniques with my clients and together we made adaptations to the techniques to meet their specific needs.

Christopher: How many books have you written on this subject? Don't you have a CD on it as well?

Colleen: I have written four books. The latest, Seeing in the Dark: Claim Your Own Shamanic Power Now and in the Coming Age (Red Wheel Weiser 2009) demonstrates a practice of integral shamanism along with the strategy and approach for making a difference for oneself and the world.

It describes the discipline, tools, and way of living that comprise the extensive body of knowledge used to cultivate non-ordinary awareness and achieve personal freedom. Using journeying, ceremony, psychology, energy movement, and traditional shamanism, the authors provide the inner workings we need to evolve an unhampered clarity and live a life that makes a substantive difference. Seeing the Dark presents a means for connecting to soul and Spirit, and achieving the clarity necessary to express the agenda of one’s soul in the world.

Energy for Life: Connect with the Source (Llewellyn Worldwide 2006) Everything is made of energy, and energy is all around us. So, why do we have so little of it? This book will help you find the answers.

Learn about energy, how to cleanse and activate your personal energy field, and how to harness life force energy for dynamic health, vitality, and spiritual awakening. You will learn over 100 simple energy movement visualizations that you can do anytime, anywhere in your busy life, thus transforming any activity into a healing, energizing activity.

Inner Power: Six Techniques for Increased Energy and Self-Healing (Llewellyn Worldwide 2005) is an empowering program of effective, non- traditional, and self-applied techniques for increased energy, self- healing and personal and spiritual growth.

This book describes in detail, in an easy to follow step-by-step format, the techniques of Shamanic Journeying Visualization, Self- hypnosis, Energy Movement, Meditation, and Psyche Inventory. Readers will be able to implement this program right away to

* Manifest health and well-being

* Self-heal from illness * Reduce stress

* Heal mind, emotions, body and soul

* Increase vital life force energy

* Self-actualize

* Release, heal and gain better understanding of past experiences

* Master emotions

* Re-connect mind, body, & soul.

Naked To My Soul: How I Beat Chronic Illness (manuscript 2004) is a torch of light, giving hope for recovery to millions of chronic illness sufferers and their loved ones.

It is the detailed story of my illness, my search for wellness, my discoveries, adaptations and development of techniques, and demonstrates the power of the body to heal when placed back into balance and harmony.

I also have four CD’s:

Drumming for Shamanic Journeys,

Power Up with Energy contains guided visualization and energy movement exercises including 1. Shielding, 2. Energy Cleansing, 3.

Rainbow Waterfall, 4. Chakra Opening, 5. Rainbow Fountain, 6.

Grounded Tree, and 7. Inversion Awareness.

Energy Cleansing, Power-filling, Shielding & Cord Cutting - Imagine your body, energy field and soul being cleansed by a warm gentle waterfall of energy, your pure soul energy illuminated and power- filled, your energy boundaries fortified and then wrapped in a swirling energy rainbow cocoon surrounded by the power of the four elements. In this space of pure light and power you can easily free yourself from any attachments or dysfunctional relationships that may be draining your energy & compromising your vitality with cord- cutting. Feel the energy, feel the power, feel the PEACE 47.34 minutes,

and

Guided Journeying - Imagine a wave of warming, soothing, relaxation washing up over your body, and washing back down again, easing away all stress, tension & pain. Comfortably relaxed, you are guided through a beautiful wildflower meadow into 2 different journeys. The first, down into your Sacred Healing Medicine Place where you will receive healing energy, the second, up through the clouds to an opulent castle with exquisite gardens where you will meet Power Animals and Helping Spirits. Feel the energy, feel the power, feel the peace 21:42 mins. & 12:27 mins.

Christopher: What services, work shops and classes do you also offer?

Colleen: I offer individual healing sessions in person and distance, Reiki I, II and Mastership, Energy Movement for Self-Healing, and Shamanism, Introductory classes through Intensive Apprenticeships.

Christopher: Where can people learn more about you, your books and your other services?

Colleen: My website is a good place to begin to learn more about the healing sessions, classes, books and CD’s that I have available.

"http://www.colleendeatsman.com" www.colleendeatsman.com

Christopher: What else would you like to tell our readers?

Colleen: You don’t have to suffer with pain and illness. Deep healing is available to you and comes from within you. We all have the ability to heal ourselves from within. You may need to learn how, you may need guidance and motivation, or you may need to clear old patterns and beliefs that impede healing. Whatever the path, perfect health is your natural state.