This week’s episode of The Sober Shaman Podcast dives into a big one — possession — and how it connects to the experience of addiction.

We explore how this is not the Hollywood version with demons and exorcisms… but rather the more insidious and self-perpetuated kind. The kind that happens when our own addictive thoughts, beliefs and feelings grab hold of the wheel and take over the driving. Looking back, we wonder exactly when it was we handed over the keys.

In this episode, we'll go into:

• What possession really means in shamanic and recovery terms
• How thought forms — energetic creations born from focused intention and strong emotions — can take on a life of their own
• Why addiction is predictable and cyclical, and what it means when we lose choice
• How to dissolve these patterns and begin feeding the helping & compassionate spirits of healing, gratitude, and recovery

It’s a subject that causes reflexive reactions and that's exactly why I'm diving in. This is a conversation about reclaiming power through awareness and by taking responsibility earlier in the process of manifestation. We go into exactly where these parasites of possession begin their attachment to our thoughts, beliefs, and feelings, and explore how we can disentangle ourselves from them and their destructive outcomes.Links referenced in this episode:

• randallyons.com
• spirit@randallyons.com

Welcome to the Sober Shaman Podcast, where we explore ways to make the spiritual practical and apply these medicines to the recovery from addiction and trauma.

Thanks for joining me on this episode of the Sober Shaman Podcast.

This week I've had some conversations and have been exploring the topic of possession, the shamanic idea of possession, the spiritual idea of possession and the common place, the Hollywood version of possession, specifically, as it relates to addiction, and it definitely relates to addiction.

But it also needs some clarification, some clarity around terms, and let's hopefully introduce some ideas for you and.

And bring some insight into this idea of possession.

What exactly does it mean, how it relates to addiction, and why is that important?

Well, the first thing is let's start with what possession generally is not.

And possession is not, in my experience and with the people I've worked with, like what happens in the Hollywood movies, the exorcist, and so on.

There was a. I believe it was a Catholic priest on the Sean Ryan podcast a couple of months back that was talking about exorcisms.

And in his experience, and it was over 400, 500, 700 exorcisms that he had done sanctioned through the church, there were only one or two instances where it would.

He would have classified it as this commonplace idea of what possession actually is by this Hollywood idea, this, this common, this idea that we have in our heads through the movies, through myth, and, well, so what are the rest of them?

And he classified the rest of them as being something that has more to do with the person's beliefs and their psychology.

And while he did not have, using the Catholic terminology, a model for these.

What are these other.

Are they spirits?

What's going on here?

Is it really a possession?

It was more of a relationship between the person who was being possessed and this other that was doing the possession.

It wasn't it?

In their.

In his opinion, in the church's opinion, not this idea of a demonic, evil entity.

All right, so then what the heck is it?

And for me, it's more about classifying this in terms of, well, some.

Is it a spirit or what the heck else is it?

So let me just get to the.

The comparison we can make there.

A thought form, for lack of a better term.

And one of the traditions that I study is through the researchers of truth, through the Descalos, The Magis of Strollo Strovalos tradition became popular in the 80s through a series of books.

And he and their tradition offers wonderful models and explanations of things.

And.

And that's his term, as far as I know, thought Form.

And so the idea that every thought we have, every charged emotion we possess is expressed into the world, into the noob.

No, the ethereal realms, let's put it that way, the, the energetic realms in Chinese medicine, these, these realms of chi.

And the idea that thoughts and emotions have a life outside of us after we've projected them outside of us is interesting.

So let's just put that out there.

And so what ends up happening in addiction is principle number two.

Addiction is a cycle.

So we go round and round.

So it's not that we are inventing new thoughts and having new emotions.

We are going around and around, when in active addiction, with the same thoughts, with the same emotions, powered by the same beliefs, all leading to repetitive actions, which then just feeds right back into the origins of the pattern and the limiting core beliefs, and around and around it goes.

So one way to think about this and, and I love this metaphor that I learned in Chinese medicine school for the.

One of the seven negative emotions, and I use that term loosely, the, the pathological expressions of a particular emotion is rumination in the earth element.

So when our focus, which is not negative, but when our focus is aimed in a negative manner in the earth element, in the spleen organ, in this system of the body, we take that energy and we focus it on rumination.

And the metaphor that I love and I still hold in my mind is when an irritant, a grain of sand, lands in an oyster, that oyster, in essence, ruminates it into being.

A pearl manifests over and over and over again.

It's trying to remove the irritant with a process that isn't working.

So, so over and over and over again through the cycle, it turns into something physical.

It's made a pearl.

And while we can talk about the.

The validity of that metaphor, the point of the metaphor is when we have an irritant in our mind, when we have an irritant in that has caused a bifurcation into our belief systems.

Where before there was only one passage of truth, and now there's other path, paths we can go down because maybe that truth is now painful to try to get around it.

When we have emotions that repeat themselves, we can cause patterns, especially in addiction, that emulate this kind of rumination.

And when we go around and around and around with these mental, spiritual and emotional irritants, eventually we will create a pearl.

We will create a manifestation in the body that eventually will show up on some kind of Western medical imaging and.

Or test of some kind.

So the idea that we can catch Disease before it turns into a pearl, before it shows up on a lab test, before it shows up on in imaging somewhere.

We can catch it during this rumination phase.

Because ruminating is kind of obvious when we go around and around in these particular patterns, Especially with addiction.

Addiction is a cycle.

Addiction is predictable.

So now let's take that same metaphor of creating a physical pearl from this rumination of thought.

So down the ladder of manifestation from thought, the most fine aspect of matter, the thinnest coagulates into belief and spiritual.

And spirits is a little bit more.

There's a thing, there's a spirit, there's some kind of coagulation of thought through belief that has taken some kind of form in that realm on down the ladder into then the emotional, which now we're shooting off physical juices in the body.

Emotions cause responses that can be measured.

So we're starting to get these physicalities that can be measured and seen and felt emotions.

And then it eventually lands into physical behaviors, patterns, actions, pearls.

So when we.

This process of man manifestations goes down that same ladder.

Mental, spiritual, emotional, physical.

When we begin ruminating thought around and around like a pearl.

And it.

It coagulates through our beliefs.

What's good, what's bad, what I am, what I am not, what we now have, if we stop it right there, from the realm of thought into the realm of belief before it gets into the realm of emotion, where it starts getting even more physical, much less when it shows up as action, behavior and.

Or a manifestation in the physical body, body down in the physical, there are different realms of beings, coagulations.

When I would say these things in treatment centers, when I. I was not allowed in some places to touch upon spirits and.

Or the spiritual, I would just call them bank accounts.

Which is a lovely conversation with people about the archetypes.

I won't go down that avenue right now.

That's a big one, right?

But the idea of a bank account in the Bible, there's a quote about this that Jesus says, spirits deaf and dumb and blind.

In Daoism, there are the.

The three worms that feed upon certain thoughts, beliefs and emotions.

And they reside.

Each one resides in one of the three Dan Tiens.

Lower Dan Tien in our pelvic region, the middle Dan Tien in our heart region and our upper Dan Tien and our head.

Thoughts, feelings, spirits, and then emotions and physicality from top to bottom.

And so these coagulations, different spiritual traditions see them as different things.

In shamanism, in the shamanism that I learned, core shamanism, we have three reasons for all of disease, power, loss, soul loss and spiritual intrusion.

So this idea of spiritual intrusion will be the one that we'll talk about today with this idea of thought forms and possession.

So going back to the beginning, if it is not, as the Catholic priest said, one of these rare, super rare conditions where it is some kind of evil entity that is possessing the possessed person, then what is it?

It is.

We would ex.

Explain it in these terms that I've just gone over now as possession by one of these thought forms, one of these worms, one of these coagulations of thoughts, beliefs and or emotions.

Now that Daskalos tradition that I love, they see them as two different kinds of thought forms.

They could be thought.

Let me start with the first one.

Emotion thoughts, where because of strong emotions that leads the thoughts, the thought.

The emotions just overwhelm anything.

You know, whether it's anger or worry or it's anxiety, the emotion is driving the thoughts that.

That can create an emotion thought form.

And then the other one would be where we have focused intention of thought and then the emotions charge that to create a thought form.

My model slides in belief in there because I really like the.

The four aspects of the whole person.

My first principle of treating addiction.

Addiction affects the whole person.

Mental, spiritual, emotional and physical.

And for me, that spiritual is the realm of belief and beliefs for me are between the thoughts and the emotions.

And they are that.

That.

That judgment meter of good or bad and identity.

And so it takes the thought and judges it and adds a little more flesh to its etheric substance, adds a little thickness of the chi down the manifestation ladder before it gets to the charge of the emotion.

So these thought forms, these are the things that then can possess an individual during the cycle of addiction.

And again, that term possession, it's.

It's a charged term.

And it does have different connotations to different people.

And there are of course religious connotations implications.

And most people, I would think that they go immediately to the Hollywood version of what it means.

And what it does mean is quite simply the removal of choice, which to me is a very slippery slope and something that I push back on pretty hard.

And one of the things that I get pushback on pretty hard from clients when I hear the I can't because or there's no way I could ever because, oh, you don't know about this new diagnosis.

And that's the reason why I have a get out of jail free card, because so the dance between practitioner helper guide and the one who is Asking, seeking help.

The do it for them versus the I'm here to just offer my advice and guide you best I can with a generous heart and an open, curious mind.

And the years of experience I have, that's all I can do.

They're the best, most powerful medicines you can only do for yourself.

And when you do those things, nobody can take it away from you and nobody can give it to you.

That's the beauty of that kind of medicine, which leads to power, which leads to wisdom.

Okay, that all said possession.

So Randy, wait a minute.

I thought we're talking about possession, which means that it's the elimination of choice.

I don't have a choice in this matter.

I'm possessed.

All right, the courtroom dramas, you know, guilty, but with a plea of insanity.

It's kind of that same idea, isn't it?

The.

So I guess in this case I am the attorney pushing back on that where.

Okay, it's possession.

And what are we talking about here?

A thought form.

Well, where did this thought form get created?

Most of the time, this thought form is created by me, not as a practitioner, but by me as an addict.

It's created by the addict.

It is created by the person.

We all do these things according to certain cultures, religions and beliefs we are all emanating based upon this one particular model.

Our thoughts and emotions all the time.

And talking with people then about, you know, plugged into the Matrix, using the Matrix, the movie as a model and that idea of energy, this fits into that very nicely.

Also were batteries.

Batteries for what?

Well, the charge of the emotion.

Think of the charges of certain emotion.

That's a lot of energy.

The charges of thought, especially when it rumination over and over and over is involved.

So possession by a thought form created by the individual, emotionally charged by the individual.

What is the emotional charge?

Well, you know what?

Let's back up.

Let's go down the cycle of manifestation.

Mental, spiritual, emotional and physical thoughts, beliefs, feelings and actions.

So thoughts the ruminating thought is going to come from in my model, some form of trauma, abuse, heartbreak and loss.

Tall Tahl.

Trauma, abuse, heartbreak and loss.

Because of that, as a result of that, of that not being healed, expressed.

Boom, we've got the void.

You guys have heard me talk about it.

I love drawing pictures and illustrating it.

Because of that, right here, right now, in some kind of way, I am limiting core belief.

Fill in the blank.

Not enough.

Exactly the way I am here and now.

Well, if I'm not enough, what kind of thought does that give rise to?

I got an Idea, I'll go fix it.

I'll go get enough.

I'll go do something to be enough.

That's how a thought passes through the judgment of belief.

In other words, I use the example in the program on the path, you know, Randy, Randy, you are skinny.

When I was a kid, and so that's just a thought.

When that thought comes into me, it's just a thought.

There is no problem with that thought.

And if I let that thought pass through me and I look at my body and I go, yeah, I'm skinny.

Okay, no big deal, okay?

Thought passes through.

I go on to the playground and I ignore that kid and I keep doing what I'm doing.

But if that thought, when passed through my belief system, then is judged by to be bad.

I am skinny.

Skinny is bad.

All of a sudden now I've become a magnet.

I've just that judgment causes the yin yang split about that thought.

Is that thought good?

Am I positive?

Do I go into love or do I go into fear?

It's bad.

I'm not enough.

I'm broke.

And that's what trauma, abuse, heartbreak and loss does to us.

It affects our beliefs in that way.

We're one way or another way after it flips the switch of our belief from love into fear.

From the positive side of a magnet, that kid running around on the playground, just positively from love, playing, playing, playing, to the negative side being called skinny.

And it's a judgment of bad.

I've been seen as bad.

People found out my secret.

It's gone through my belief system.

It is now negative.

Moving down from thought, belief.

The next one is feeling.

How does that feel?

How does that feel in my body?

How does that feel in my mind?

How does that feel everywhere?

Awful.

I'm not enough.

When these limiting core beliefs power us, especially unconsciously, and we do whatever it takes to fill that void, fix that wound, satisfy that need.

We are powered by filling the void, fixing the wound, satisfying the need.

Those things keep us searching out there somewhere.

And then that leads to our actions round.

And interactions of course, lead us to using, which only works for the magic moment, which is a fraction of second in time if you're using cocaine and maybe a little longer with opiates, but still the point is the next part of the cycle, which is the morning after the day after.

Repercussions, consequences.

What have we just done?

We've just proven that the belief is correct.

I am no good.

I am skinny.

No matter what happens.

That's the belief that powers me.

Even if I Go to the gym and I work out and I put on weight.

If I'm still driven by the belief, if all I've done is try to prove that belief to be wrong instead of dismantling the belief, I'm still driven by that thought form.

I'm still possessed by that belief.

Get it?

We need to dissolve the energetics of these thought forms.

We need to stop feeding these thought forms with our thoughts, with our emotions, because that's what they feed off of.

And then that Taoist tradition even goes into the grains as a way of causing to feed those worms, which is an interesting thing when looked at from the perspective of carbohydrates and sugars and fire in the body and doing things.

Yes, that kind of fuel, that kind of fire causes impulsivity to come from emotions, to come from cravings, to come from thoughts that are just going very fast, as opposed to unplugging, unplugging consciously from those thought forms, seeing them for what they are.

And this is where I would say the treatment language becomes clear for me, is realizing our part in the relationship when we are ruminating, when we are spinning around the cycle of addiction from the subconscious rise of that nasty feeling of the belief, or maybe it is conscious.

And then right into the ideas of I know how to make myself feel better.

And then right into the.

All of the, the things we do to the acquisition phase.

Lying, cheating, whatever it takes to get our stuff, and then we have our stuff.

And then the magic moment before we do it, and all the rituals that go into that, and then, of course, that's over.

And then the consequences that feed back into the limited core beliefs.

And around and around that goes.

The amount of energy, the amount of thought, the amount of emotion that is fed into these thought forms.

Are we possessed?

Huh?

Let's use that language and see what happens.

I say to people, you know, what are the chances if I'm just going to use myself, if all of the idea making that it took for me to go, how am I going to get the coke?

What am I going to do to get money to get there?

Because, you know, as a starving musician, you know, money, money wasn't readily overflowing and available.

And so, oh, I got a plan, all right.

I put that plan into motion and I do all of the things that it takes to actually acquire.

And then in the moment of acquiring, I have the stuff in front of me and I've gone through the rituals of I chop, you choose, and I'm.

I've got so much that, hey, I've squashed my limiting core belief for a moment of I am a loser by sharing with everybody in the band, hey, look at me.

I'm not a loser.

I'm a winner.

I'm Charlie Sheen over here.

I'm winning in that moment.

It works, right?

So in that moment that I've chopped, you guys choose.

The line comes around to me.

Everybody else's partake.

Do I have a choice to not snort that last line?

That is mine?

Well, of course I do, right?

How many times have I chosen not to?

I think we can say 0, 0% chance now.

I love speaking to people who are brain scientists about what happens to the neural pathways in that moment, right?

We still have a choice.

We've never chosen any other choice.

So you can use the language of the brain and neural plastic neural pathways.

We can use the language of humor and just addiction 101, like I described me in the band, in the room.

Or we can use this language of spirit and say, is it safe to say that with a zero percent chance of me not snorting that line, I'm possessed?

Is there a degree of possession, maybe that's a way of backing it down a little bit to get agreement in a conversation?

Or is it just, you know what, damn it, you're possessed.

It's a zero percent chance.

That's the way it is.

Because addiction is predictable.

So that term possession, sure, it's slippery, and sure, it has connotations that are etched into our psyche, thanks to Hollywood, which are over the top, like much of Hollywood, right?

And at the same time, there are elements of truth to this that are really important.

What's really important about this idea of a thought form, however it lands with you, is this.

It's about relationship.

It's about, okay, there is an idea, the idea that we're turning into language, thought form, okay?

Spirit.

The deaf and dumb spirits, as I think it was in Mark in the Bible that this quote comes from, however it works for you, the worms.

I love that idea of the Taoist thought.

These thought forms, these spirits, these repositories of energy are absolutely.

Think of it like a parasite, right?

At what point is the parasite in charge, right?

Another way I use humor and people get this is the stereotypes that I poke fun of based upon different addictions to particular substances.

In other words, oh, like, how many alcoholics in the room?

It's like, yeah, people raise their hand.

It's like I pick one out and rather obvious, like, oh, you know what you broke things, cars, relationships, promises, bones, you broke things.

Yeah.

Everybody laughs.

Alcoholics breaks things.

All right, who's the heroin and the opiate addicts here?

Okay.

Yeah.

Okay.

You guys, you know, things.

Things went missing over long period.

Cars, money, guitars.

They just go missing.

You know, it's like the disambiguous kind of.

I don't know what happened to there.

They kind of laugh.

Yeah, they got sold.

Okay.

Marijuana heads.

Okay.

Yeah.

You guys.

You guys sat on the couch and came up with great ideas.

You had big plans.

You ordered a lot of pizzas.

And also, guess what, There's a lot of plates in the sink.

Nothing ever got done.

And the place needs a deep clean.

Yeah.

Everybody laughs.

Okay.

You know, meth heads, speed people.

It's like, you guys, suddenly things were lost, and they all can be found at the local pawn shop.

Computers, phones, children's electronic games.

And they all laugh.

Now, why do we laugh?

Because these.

There's an element of truth to these things.

Why is there an element of truth to these things based upon different substances?

Because we could say that specific substances cause specific thought forms, Specific, emotionally charged forms.

Specific spirits are attracted to specific substances.

There's a reason why they call alcohol spirits.

Right.

And, I mean, just think of the.

Let's make a polarity between, like, a person who uses methamphetamines and a person who uses opiates.

Just looking at them, do you think you can see a difference?

Right, right.

And I'm not talking about the.

The maintenance, opiate, heroin people.

I'm talking about when they've decided to kick it and, you know, like, really relax.

It is as obvious a difference between somebody who's running super fast and somebody who's idling very, very slowly on the couch.

Yes.

And the spirits are that obviously different.

The thought forms are that obviously different, and addiction is predictable.

These things can be disentangled.

At what point, using the alcoholic, speaking for myself, at what point is the alcohol in charge and Randy is in the backseat?

Sure, in the beginning, my personality is prominent, but at some point, that stereotype that spirit possesses.

I think that is a fair statement to stay to say.

I think at some point we can say that the product is in charge.

Is that the state of possession?

For me, I would say yes.

I would say that at that point, the person is obviously possessed and their personality is in the backseat.

The stereotype of that substance or action is driving.

And it's obvious for everyone to see.

And because addiction is predictable, we can see where this is headed because we know what the next steps are in that Cycle.

So now, after the usage, is there still an element of possession?

Yes, because even though things may have peaked as far as the product and or action was driving the show and running things and was prominent in its possession, maybe last night at its peak, now the next day in the light of day, in the aftermath and consequences of usage.

Well now is there still possession?

Yes, because the next parts of the cycle are just as strong, which are, how does it feel to know that I did it again?

I did what again?

Basically, I proved the limiting core belief that I'm not enough, I'm broken, that I'm a loser, to be correct.

That's how the spell continues, that's how the cycle continues, that's how the possession continues.

That's how the thoughts, feelings, spirit, thought form, repository of energy, whatever you want to call it, the bank account keeps getting fed.

Because now in my remorse, or lack of remorse, remorse in my guilt, in my shame, I have those predictable thoughts and feelings to feed into the possessing spirit, thought form, bank account.

I show up at work hiding the fact of what I did last night and proving that I am a loser as best I can from you guys.

But it's obvious because my performance at work is not up to par for one reason, because I'm still feeding the spirits of guilt and there's a part of me that is already fast forwarding to you know what, when can I get out of here?

Is there any way?

Somebody's leaving early today and I get to happy hour, so I'm already into the next phase of the cycle, doing planning and how am I going to get there and go around one more time?

Is that possession?

I would say yes.

And to use this term to our advantage, we can break it down to.

For me, the most important thing is there is an aspect of me that is separate from the thought form.

In other words, I am not the thought form.

I am not the black wolf, to use the white and black wolf story.

Right?

It's something different than me.

And if I can tap into that higher self observing ego, the part of me that goes on the shamanic journey and enters into the shamanic rights exercises that we undertake on the path, if I can enter into that place of objectivity of I, I can see the part of me that feeds the thought form, that feeds the spirit, that engages in the active cycle of addiction, and that's how it gets its energy.

Huh?

Isn't that interesting?

So now we have three parts.

We have the spirit and or thought form or bank account.

There's the part of me that feeds the spirit.

And then there's me that's able to see.

Huh?

Well, you take a look at that.

That part of me not I am bad guilty, because that'll just suck you right back into the cycle again, right?

But.

Oh, isn't that interesting?

There's a part of me that feels guilty.

And because I feel so guilty, I am willing to X, Y, and Z fill in the blank there.

And that's not healthy.

And then because I feel so guilty, there's a part of me that wants to then obliterate that feeling with more of the same thing that caused the guilt.

There's your definite definition of addiction right there.

Right?

Oh, how interesting.

I can see that part of me versus I can't wait to get to happy hour to obliterate those feelings.

Oh, I can see there's a part of me that can't wait to happy hour to obliterate the feelings and engage in the cycle of addiction and then feed this parasite of possession.

When we can view the model, when we can see this whole schematic as these three parts and not just me against the parasite, things begin to fall apart.

Already we've pulled the curtain back on the wizard.

Hey, you're not a wizard.

You're a guy.

Behind the curtain, we start to disentangle the Matrix, but I'm using that term both as everything that the movie talks about and the.

The physical constructs from the ethereal matter and the energetic charges of emotion and the strands of thought that weave it all together into a thought form that starts falling apart because we can see truth.

We start disentangling ourselves from the thoughts, from the beliefs, from the feelings and from our actions.

Because I am not my thoughts.

I am not my beliefs, I am not my feelings.

I am not my actions.

To quote that last.

What is it?

The last Mission Impossible movie.

We are.

We are the sum of our decisions.

Yeah, okay, it wasn't that good.

Last Mission Impossible kind of fell flat.

But anyway, I'm not my thoughts.

What an interesting idea.

Well, then, if I'm not my thoughts, well, then what?

Is there a way that I can be better with my thoughts so I don't feed the thought form?

I am not my beliefs.

This starts really getting into the disentanglement of our ego, our.

Our identity of self.

And that's really deep, big stuff.

When we start disentangling those strands.

I am not my emotions.

These.

The emotions are the superchargers to these thought forms.

This is what gives them juice.

The emotions are Pure juice to these suckers, which really then feeds them and, oh, man, attaches them to us like an octopus.

And then, of course, we then go through the motions of the actions.

I am not my actions.

I take responsibility for my actions.

I may feel guilt and shame from my actions.

And those are big conversations, right, about what is guilt and what is shame and how can they serve me.

And I take responsibility for them, I learn from them, and I don't repeat those particular actions.

And you know what happens?

I can have different thoughts about myself.

I can begin to construct a different belief structure about myself.

I then have different connections with people that have me feel different about myself, which then makes it easier to go through the motions of action to validate all of that new construct.

Because the good news is the flip side of possession is a conscious choosing to feed a thought form with beauty, grace, ritual recovery, health, and healthy things.

Because when we create those thought forms, make deposits into those bank accounts, build our relationships with those helping and compassionate spirits.

Of course, everything changes.

Of course our lives are obviously different.

Big changes, big things.

And of course, those conscious choices can happen abruptly, but the cycles happen over time.

The cycles happen over days, happen over weeks, happen over months.

This is that idea that they say in the meetings, just keep coming back.

You don't have to figure it out.

I do love that aspect of AA where they have community.

You don't need to figure it out.

Just keep showing up.

Stuff happens.

Yeah, you got to take it past that.

And at the same time, I believe that is an amazing safety net for so many people.

God bless.

We'll talk more about how we build those rel.

Well, that's, you know, what we do every single week on the path when we do our lesson of the week.

This week, we're taught talking about the family tree and going a little further into inheritance and learning about our ancestors and maybe having empathy, maybe understanding why they did what they did, and all of this of what rolled on down the generations when we do these things.

And now we can come from a place of consciousness, creation, with clear intention, with greater understanding.

This is how we not only dismantle any strands of possession that may still remain, and we learn how to flip that into the positive side of recovery and build and build our relationship with the compassionate and helping spirits to keep moving in the right direction.

We'll talk more about how we do that as we do a follow up to this possession podcast and talk more about the idea of merging and the positive aspect of merging and how that is different.

Front Possession and how you can use that to your advantage.

We'll do that in part two.

This will be part one where we focus on the negative side of things and this idea of possession and how it works in addiction, thought forms, spirits, the worms, bank accounts, repositories of negative energy parasites and how it keeps the whole damn cycle rolling along.

And when is it in charge and when I take a back seat.

Yeah, that's a scary thing, ain't it?

When we think about when I hand it over to keys.

That's still is one of the things that scares me when I think back to times when I was not in control, I was zero percent in control and handed over the keys of what?

My actions, my spirit.

Yeah, scary very much for me.

And I don't ever want to go back to that place again.

So if there's anything that you know, needs to be reminded of.

Well, you know, it's been a long time, you know.

Do you ever think about using?

No.

But it does scare the sh out of me when I think back to some of these times when I handed over the keys and I became a cardboard cutout, stereotypical, fill in the blank, alcoholic, pill popping, speed snorting, whatever you was available.

Garbage pail.

Yeah.

Scares me.

Scares me enough to keep going and to stay charged, to stay emotionally charged, to help others to do the same.

Thanks for listening to this edition of the Sober Shaman Podcast.

Please, as always, send me any questions you have.

I'd love to get your comments about this idea of possession, how it lands with you.

Do you have different takes on the subject?

I'm always interested to know.

Leave them in the comments of wherever you're listening or watching this and shoot me the email@spirit randall lyons.com R A N D A L L y o n s.com I look forward to hearing from you.

Till next time.

Blessings.

Thanks for listening to the Sober Shaman podcast where we explore ways to make the spiritual practical.

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Send me any questions or comments you have.

Check out the website randallions.com I look forward to hearing from you.

Until next time, blessings.