Observations placeholder
David Lewis-Williams - Native American Indians - Shoshoni
Identifier
011558
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
A description of the experience
The Mind in the Cave – David Lewis-Williams
The dreams in which spirits appear are more vivid than other dreams; the Shoshoni say that they hold your attention and you cannot awake until they are over.
Visions may be mercurial; for instance, a ‘lightning spirit’ may appear as a body of water, then like a human being, then like an animal. Often frightening animals come to threaten suppliants, and they must brave them if their power giving spirit animal is to appear. During visions, questers feel that they leave their bodies – the sensation of out-of-body-travel