Bushmen of the Kalahari practice the world’s oldest continuous tradition of ecstatic connection to the life force.

Bradford Keeney shares the hidden power of ecstatic movement. Shaking Medicine 

Bradford Keeney is a man on a mission. A renowned psychotherapist, Keeney found himself dissatisfied with traditional talk therapy as a way to transform human suffering; in response, he turned to the world’s oldest healing traditions. For decades, he has traveled the globe studying ancestral cultures and has emerged with a message that applies to us all: there are two sides to the healing equation, and so far, the West has only begun to accept one. The value of quieting the mind through meditation has been gaining mainstream acceptance since the 1960s; nowadays, even the most conservative physician will recommend quiet relaxation as a cornerstone to good health. What has been virtually ignored, and generally treated as taboo, is the other side of the coin.

The ecstatic shaking and uncontrollable dancing of indigenous peoples is the fundamental flip side to mindful meditation, and in primitive cultures, one doesn’t happen without the other. The implications of Keeney’s work are staggering. He’s not the least bit shy about turning centuries of religious and spiritual dogma on its head. “Our born destiny is the same as the first humans—to release our bodies, our whole beings, into feeling and expressing the deepest joy and ecstasy. In other words, dancing ourselves into heaven, enlightenment, peace, and love.” What he has found in all the cultures he has worked with and been accepted by, is that true knowing goes beyond language. “What is most important has little or nothing to do with words and linguistic understanding. As the Bushmen say, words can trick us into believing anything. With word trickery, we may end up worshipping a pile of elephant dung or a heap of metal.” Keeney suggests that humans have been misled into believing that words and theories are the key to salvation and happiness. “The word games,” he adds, “have led us to posit one form of gender, race, culture, nation, or religion as superior to others—thereby justifying any and all acts of arrogant greed, war, and destruction of life and planet.”

One theme that is central to Keeney’s explorations of shaking medicine is that it is available to everyone regardless of belief or heritage, and that it has roots in virtually every culture, no matter which words are

used to describe it. In China the name for this energy or life force is chi. It is called ki in Japan, n/om among the Kalahari Bushmen, tumpinyeri mooroop among some aboriginal Australians, kundalini or prana in India, yesod by Jewish Kabbalists, Holy Spirit by Christians, baraka by Sufis, Manitou by the Ojibway, and ha in Hawaii. Among many indigenous peoples it is simply referred to as “medicine.” Keeney points out that many native cultures conduct religious ceremonies as a way to stay in contact with their dead relatives. “This is not ancestor worship as the early anthropologists described it. This is a continuing relationship with those you have lost.”

Keeney has written more than 30 books, including Shaking Medicine: The Healing Power of Ecstatic Movement. In Ropes to the Gods (Ringing Rocks Press, 2003), Keeney notes that the Bushmen of the Kalahari shake and dance until they see ropes of white light dangling from the sky and those ropes connect them to everyone they love. “A lot of healing happens out of this love. The dancers break down in grief about losing their loved ones and then get up again filled with ecstasy. Strip away all the meandering discourse and you’ll find the religious traditions, the Christian mystics and Zen Buddhists are all talking about love.”

Keeney shares his theories through teaching and performance. He is on the faculty of the California Institute of Integral Studies and for the last decade has been Distinguished Scholar of Cultural Studies at Ringing Rocks Foundation. He is an Honorary Senior Research Fellow at the Rock Art Research Institute, University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, and director of the Bushmen N/om- Kxaosi Ethnographic Project at the Texas Medical Center in Houston. A selfproclaimed

“radical improvateur,” he also tours internationally as an improvisational performer and pianist.

Brazilian healer Octavia Alves Pimental Barbosa (left) gives Keeney

the shake. “A lot of healing happens out of this love.”

Ecstatic self-expression can energize the mind and body, nurture creativity, and trigger healing responses. “Look at the oldest library in the world—the rock art of southern Africa,” says Keeney. “What we see are images of people dancing themselves into ecstasy. Many generations later, the elders of the oldest living culture on Earth today, the Kalahari Bushmen, still know that the electrified body inspired by heightened feelings is the master key to being fully alive.”

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