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DAVID WILEY'S WORK

David Wiley is a Marakame (Shaman) in the Huichol Indian tradition of the northwestern Sierra Madre of Mexico and is a Granicero (weather Shaman) and healer in the Nahuatl Indian tradition of the highlands of central Mexico. In these roles he serves his community as a counselor, community and ceremonial leader along with being recognized as a spiritual conduit for the elemental deity of fire known by the Huichols as Tatewarí or Grandfather Fire (along with many other names in various other cultures).

Marakame
Through Tatewarí's guidance, David was sent to study with Don Lupe Gonzales Rios (pictured at right). Over a period of more than 6 years of instruction and pilgrimages to prescribed sacred sites, David completed his apprenticeship to become a Marakame. During the end of this time, Don Lupe's age and declining health began to limit him, and Eliot Cowan (at left - another Marakame who apprenticed under Don Lupe) took over most of Don Lupe's role. Shortly after Don Lupe's passing in 2002 at the age of 78, Tatewarí introduced both David and Eliot to another Huichol teacher, Don Jose Sandoval de la Cruz (at right), who continues to support David in his work.

Granicero
David was also led to Don Lucio Campos Elizade (below left), a well known Nahuatl Shaman who recognized him as being called to become a “weather worker.” David continues in this role and has become a ceremonial leader under Don Lucio's guidance, along with being a teacher of various aspects of the Nahuatl healing path. The day before Don Lucio's crossing over in May of 2005 at the age of 93, he passed on the stewardship of his altar to David and placed him in charge of guiding and identifying future Graniceros that are being called by the Weather Beings to continue Don Lucio's work. David is responsible for leading seasonal rain rituals in the central highland area of Mexico.

David is a healing Shaman in the village of Tepoztlán, leading Temazcallis (ceremonial sweat baths) as a Temezcallero, treating local Mexicans and a ritual leader conducting baptisms, coming of age initiations and funeral rites amongst other rituals. As a central piece of this work, David is the keeper of a new Huichol ceremonial center (a Tuki or Caliwayh) in Tepoztlán. He also travels to the United States and other countries for healing work and counseling. He is authorized to lead pilgrimages to special locations and has a limited number of apprentices by application and approval.

Community Leader
David is an elder of the Sacred Fire Community, an international community that is working to rekindle mankind's relationship to each other and the world through the universal and sacred spirit of fire. They are also working to preserve and promote the wisdom of ancestral traditions while teaching how these perspectives and processes can be integrated into modern life to generate balance, openness and health. He also serves as an advisor to the community's executive organizational committee.

David makes regular trips to the Huichol Sierras to visit and work with the Huichols. He also assists them in selling their sacred art to others through the Huichol Art Project, sponsored by the non-profit Blue Deer Center in New York, where he currently serves on its board of directors.

Click on one of the links below to find out more about specific aspects of David's Shamanic work.

Healing and Counseling
Weather Work
Heart Connection

HEALING AND COUNSELINGtop

As an initiated Shaman in both the Huichol and Nahuatl traditions, David has a variety of healing and medicinal approaches available to him. Through his training with Tatewarí, Huichol and Nahuatl elders and his experience with many community, ritual and personal healing programs, he brings with him a level of experience in life counseling.

Appointments with David for Healing are generally 45 minutes in length but may vary depending on the situation and the location. Contact David to make an appointment. See the Appointments page for more details.

Cost per appointment is $90.00 USD per session. Non-monetary exchange is possible for some if approved in advance.

David is available for appointments regarding:

• Personal healing
• Individual, couple or family counseling or spiritual guidance
• Dream Interpretation

Rituals and Ceremonies
As a ceremonial and ritual leader David can be called upon to conduct the following:

• Baptisms
• Coming of Age Initiations
• Healing Rituals
• Supervising individual or community spiritual ceremonies
• Funerary Rites for the Deceased

Fees for Rituals and Ceremonies vary from situation to situation. For these arrangements and costs please contact David's Oficina.

Talks Around the Fire
It is also possible to sponsor David to give talks on Shamanic work. For these arrangements and costs please contact David's Oficina. See the Appointments page for more details.

WEATHER WORKINGjump uppage top

Being called by the Weather Spirits to become a weather worker is an ancient and time honored type of “work” in the Nahua indigenous tradition of the central Mexican highlands. Weather Workers are sometimes called weather Shaman, a Tiempero (worker of the climate), a quiatlazque, pedidor de agua (petitioner for water) or a Granicero (preventing hail from damaging crops). In this path, which is still alive in Mexico, many villages have Graniceros that help start and end the season when the rains arrive, bringing bountiful precipitation so that crops may grow, orchards are productive, aquifers are recharged and people and animals have water to drink. It is well understood that the Weather Beings (clouds, wind, rain, sun, etc.) choose a person to become an emissary for their people, to present their requests to these great beings and build relationship with them through devotion. Weather workers don't force, command or control these magnificent beings but work for Them to bring needed water and mitigate violent weather through a special relationship. Therefore this work isn't a product of ambition and a desire for power or control as some people romanticize. It is a matter of service and humility from being called by Them to serve.

During his last years Don Lucio Campos Elizada (1912 to 2005), David's teacher in this work, announced that the Weather Beings were calling more Westerners to this path and therefore these people, once divined as being tapped, needed an authentic spiritual doorway to be joined in this sacred relationship as a way to bring both beneficial weather and awareness to others of the special relationship that all humans have to these divine entities. Don Lucio saw this in the influx in Westerners being called to begin this path and therefore he organized this through David so that new weather workers could be initiated and supported.

Tell-Tale Signs
According to the tradition there are a few ways that the Weather Beings let Their calling be known. The most straight-forward and consistent method is being struck by lightning and surviving the event. This is the most common method. The second is having persistent dreams and experiences with weather phenomena. Even though either of these experiences can foretell other relationships with the Weather Beings besides being called to “work”, Don Lucio passed on to David before his death the method of divination for this calling.

Initiation and Strong Commitment
Once being divined as a calling a special initiation is performed in Mexico by David where the weather workers gather for ceremonies. This begins the commitment to start working in the tradition. Along with this work comes a commitment to make a return visit to Mexico around the first of May each year to participate in the opening ceremonies of starting the rainy season in the central highlands. In this way the person both learns and builds relationship at the sacred doorway where he or she was initiated and to undergo continuious training in this tradition. There is also a more optional ceremony at the close of the rainy season around the first of November.

If you feel that you are being called by the Weather Beings for this work and would like to investigate this further please contact David. See the Appointments page for more details.

HEART CONNECTIONjump uppage top

During his apprenticeship David was given the task of leading a special work called the Heart Connection Ritual offered and guided by Tatewarí. Many people have lost contact with their heart-guidance and therefore have difficulty finding their purpose and way in the world. Tatewarí as the energy of heart and fire, periodically offers this ritual to individuals through special application.

Beyond some basics it is difficult to give “details” of the heart connection ritual because of various realities, such as the Shamanic nature of the event and the wide variations of structure depending on the individual involved. However, here are some important things to consider if you are pondering this ritual as a possibility for yourself.

David offers some teachings about heart
This work is about “heart.” Heart is talked about as a catch-all of convenient ideas, usually referring to some emotion. Here in the connection ritual, heart is dealt with as a tangible phenomena that our ancient ancestors knew well. It is the capacity to connect and assimilate many emotions, circumstances and perspectives into one flowing, operating experience that moves us through life and relationship with all seen and unseen, known and unknown, felt and unfelt. Where the mind presents itself as a linear succession of perspectives struggling to make sense of being separate, fearful and uncertain with what lies before it, the heart is like a complex energetic organ that is better described as a symbiotic group of senses and perspectives, both within one's self and outside of one's self, tying all of this together into one flowing, operating view. Where the mind desires to land like a bee on one point in order to grasp what it considers one firm reality, heart is like a moving hive generating an amazing paradox, ambiguous in articulation but firm and certain in perspective. The mind's comfort lies in its house of ideas like an animal residing within its shelter. The heart lives and thrives in the open fields of experience and engagement. The mind desires to resolve uncertainty, develop predictability and insert control like someone searching for steady linear steps. The heart lives as a dance with mystery as its stage. This is why it is considered the supreme navigator, guiding you through the many venues and situations of life, taking you to your special life goals despite the mind's lack of certainty.

Experience versus Ideals
Therefore the heart connection ritual, with its preparatory work leading up to the ritual, is a journey into experience and how experience is processed by the heart. There is an aspect of dealing with the mind, because if heart is the navigator then the mind can be a large impediment, as difficult as that can be to believe given popular culture. However, the mind must be dealt with, and learning is often the treatment to bring it in alignment with the heart. When heart or your awareness of heart is operating in your life you exhibit the following signs:

• Becoming an observer of life as divine movement, including the movement of your own life.
• Feeling a full range of healthy emotions without negatively judging yourself for having feelings.
• Moving to a new relationship with fear - treating fear with courage and limiting its control over you.
• Diminishing the mind's negative judgments of mystery and embracing it as discovery.
• Accepting who you are as a finite expression in an infinite range of worldly expressions.
• Gaining a sense of your purpose in the world.
• Living with paradox not as a contradiction to a world that should be rationally ordered but simply as the way divine operates.

David says that this work is not for everyone. It usually involves a lengthy and sometimes difficult preparation process. And it requires an application. For more information please present your questions via the following e-mail address: heartconnection@keepsthefire.org

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