Sweat Lodge.

mysticmanth

I saw this in my soul and spirit magazine, once a month they do this sweat lodge thing overnight in a park in Brighton.
Anyway i was wondering if anybody has ever been to one, what their thoughts are etc.
They are supposed to be good healing for problems, emotional issues etc.
x x
 

MsRubyRain

mysticmanth said:
I saw this in my soul and spirit magazine, once a month they do this sweat lodge thing overnight in a park in Brighton.
Anyway i was wondering if anybody has ever been to one, what their thoughts are etc.
They are supposed to be good healing for problems, emotional issues etc.
x x


Hi Mysticmanth,

I have participated in a sweat lodge ceremony and it was one of the most profound things I have ever experienced. Just the way it all came about for me to be there in the first place. I did have an amazing personal spiritual experience.

I feel if you are being pulled to go, there is a reason.

~Blessings~
 

mysticmanth

Yes i am rather tempted to go, but i wouldnt want to go alone so i must find somebody who would also benefit from it.
What exactly do they do as the magazine only briefly described it x x
 

Demon Goddess

Intense would be the word I would use to describe a sweat lodge.

For starters, a proper sweat lodge will be unisex and all of the sweaters will go into the lodge nekkid.

The sweat occurs in a series of ceremonies... you could easily liken each ceremony to a meditation. You will not want to imbibe any alcohols or drugs of any kind, including prescription prior to going into the sweat.

There is a fire pit with lots of drinking water and washing water (sometimes holy water is used) and the lodge itself.

The ceremonies each begin the same way. You enter the lodge, take your seat around the fire and when everyone is seated, the door is sealed. It is very very hot and very very humid and aside from the steaming coals in the middle of the floor, very very dark.

The lodge remains sealed until the end of a certain period of time... which I will admit to someone like me is an eternity!

Sometimes the Shaman speaks, sometimes they chant, sometimes they are silent. The silent times are very heavy and very ominous.

Finally after what seems like forever, lots of sweating and thinking, the sweat door is opened and everyone piles out... Steaming, they all cerimonously wash the sweat, drink lots of water, and then they return to the lodge. The door is sealed again and the session repeats.

I have never successfully managed to survive more than three sessions in the sweat myself. Although I've seen people go in again and again, so many times that I lost count and I believe that some Shamans limit the number of sessions, but the idea is that as long as someone is willing to return to the sweat, the Shaman will take them.

I cannot tell you how you will react to the sweat. I suggest though that you see a doctor prior to attending your first and ensure that you do not have a heart or lung problem that could become aggravated by the sweat.

I dunno what else to tell you, except that I have spoken to people after the sweat who tell me that they hallucinated and met spirits and all sorts of things, but none of that happened to me. What I do know from what I've heard is that no two people truly experience the same thing in a sweat.

I highly recommend doing at least one in your lifetime. They're intense.
 

memries

I wanted to go but toooo hot for me ! Naked ? That does it.. lol
 

GreenMoonBeam

I know of a family whose daughter was dying and they attended a Sweat Lodge. Although Taylor was very very ill, she managed one session and the family said the occasion was moving. This young girl came to accept her death
and could reach out to help her family through the stages of dying.
 

mysticmanth

At this sweat lodge i heard of, you wear a bikini if your a lady, and obviously shorts if you are a male...i wouldnt like to go naked.
But yes i feel very drawn to going to one so im sure sometime soon i shall eventually go, just need to find somebody else who would benefit from it and would be willing to go, but i think i know of somebody who would like it.

I have always heard good feedback from it x x
 

HOLMES

the sweat lodge

I been to a couple a few times.

1. naked

no one around here goes naked, we men go in in shorts and the women wear night growns.

there was a lady who asked if she could take her shirt off when we were in the lodge but the answer was no

2. it is differnt

it is differnt whever you go in the native communties as they all have their traditions,
even up here in ojibwe country the sweat lodges are done diffently from sweat lodge caretaker to sweat lodge caretaker.

example one is in a building and the rest is outside.
one uses clean water, and one uses medicine water to splash the grandfathers.

you have your healing sweat, your eagle sweat where you sing four songs ,, and probaly some i haven't heard about

3. the mother womb

when you are in the lodge,, the teaching here is you have returned to the mother womb and you are safe with the spirits,,

many times i been in there and i thought it was just an hour or hour and half and it turned out to be 4 to five hours during the night.

but for proper sweat lodge,,

not all lodge are unisex,, there is the woman sweat , the men sweat, the children sweat,
lodges for a woman who is undergoing her first woman time
lodges for people who are about to go on spiritual fasts, and for afterwards.

all these lodges are proper at least here.
 

ravenest

We have them. we dig a pit in the river rocks, cover with half dome bamboo frame, cover with blankets, skins whatever. Have a fire outside and pass the hot rocks in for the water pit. It's great, and especially great if there isnt some wanker there telling you how it should be done and what you are doing and how you should be feeling. One 'professional' held one at or pl;ace for the women, it was a hot day in the middle of summer, she wouldnt let them drink and applied peer pressure to anyone who wanted out before she thought they should go ... of course a few women were ill from dehydration.

I find it best at night when the river is cold, lodge, river, lodge river. Get up a sweat. purge, wash the gunk off in the river, rinse and repeat.

WE had them at festivals we put on. One, we were all naked, as I crouched down to go in I noticed the pierced and tatooed, feral woman in front of me had a large flat huntsman spider on her shoulder, not wanting to announce or tell he, to avoid any potential panick or disruption, inside the dark lodge, I waited a bit and then casually walked over to her, she was giving me a wierd look, I tried flicking the spider off but it wouldnt move, she freaked out, I guess she thought I was molesting her or something. I treid again "Piss off you freak" she said, then I noticed, as my eyes adjusted better to the dark, that the spider was a tattoo - of course the exxplaination didmt work.

next festival the women wanted their own sweat lodge, the men said it wasnt fair so we had to build them one too, then the pople who didnt mind said that wasnt fair so we had to build a men AND woman one as well - 3 sweat lodges ... the women set fire to their one and ended up using the mixed one anyway ... I refrained from comment ... but it was hard :laugh:
 

mysticmanth

LOL about thinking it was a spider when it was a tattoo!!
But yeah thanks for sharing your experience with us x x