Shaman Durek: My name is Shaman Durek and I am the people’s shaman. I’m here to assist and to put the power back into the people’s hands by giving them shamanic instruction to develop their emotional intelligence, mental acuity and spiritual refinement. By drawing upon ancient wisdom passed down from my ancestors, my approach to life encompasses the knowledge of health and wellbeing, social responsibility, inner personal development and energetic alchemy of the shamanic realm. I find fear is generated by the idea of not knowing or understanding another individual or having enough information. When one is without information they become threatened with the possibility of not knowing. For people to overcome fear they need to gather more information of the unknown. Fear challenges me to look at different perspectives of my thinking. Like a locksmith, I find different combinations and codes to unlock the fear inside of me and then stand triumphant over it. Comfort zone means to me that people are afraid of the unknown and what’s different than they know. They stay in the mundane existence and stay in that which is familiar. They follow the rules of society. For me to be a leader to support people in a greater way I need to find out what lies beyond the boundaries of their fear. For me I don’t believe in sitting in comfort. True comfort to me is breaking the rules and living on the edge, leaning into my aversions to gain power and insight to give back to the people. What says Los Angeles to me is the spiritual community, the movers and shakers within the arts collective as well as the media and creative types. It’s a place to see and be seen. I love Venice and the beach. I love the cool and hip restaurants. I enjoy the richness and nostalgia of old Hollywood. I love having the palm trees and the sun coming through my window and going to pool parties and meeting the most intellectual types of people from all different walks of life. Everyone is so excited and empowered to get things done. One thing that is out of my comfort zone is going to concerts and being around massive amounts of people at one time. Because I’m empathic, when I’m around that many people I feel everyone’s energy and it makes me feel claustrophobic. I wish I could go to a big country music concert and dance and sing with everyone in the crowd.
