I've noticed that in recent years, that I'm leaning more towards psychological explanations for spiritual things, though these have always been important to some extent. This comes as no surprise to me. I haven't entirely abandoned the concept of a relatively objective, autonomous spiritual reality of some sort. I've been down the road of entirely and exclusively embracing the psychological model of magic, and found it to be emotionally and spiritually unfulfilling. Additionally, there have been experiences I've had in my path that have given me enough evidence to believe that it's not just in my head, that to an extent I'm interacting with something other than myself, but interacting in a subjective manner.
I am less likely to surmise about the reality of spirituality outside of my own experiences through the lens of my subjective perception, however. There are certain caveats, admittedly. Some author's like Michael Harner claim that journeying is safer than dreaming (which, if you've ever read Eliade or any other accounts of traditional shamanism, there is much evidence to the contrary). Perhaps HIS journeying is safer but even so, I also factor in that my own experiences with journeying are filtered through my own mind, and so have to be subjective to some extent out of sheer necessity.
Even if Harner's claims are valid for himself, though, there's a certain amount of leverage that psychology provides my basic argument against his claims. Let's limit, for the moment, my shamanism to my psyche, regardless of what may or may not be going on outside my brain. In dreaming, most people are simply processing the events of the day. We may have nightmares, but most people are not trauma survivors dealing with debilitating flashbacks. For the majority of people, ordinary dreaming is a relatively benign, if occasionally weird or unsettling, experience. We can say that it's "safe" for the most part.
Journeying, however, is something entirely different. Psychologically speaking, a shaman is a person who alters hir state of consciousness (usually, though not always, deliberately), often through potentially hazardous methods--entheogens (which, at the wrong dosage, may be very harmful), dancing and other physical exertion, deliberate mortification of the flesh, etc, as any reader of Huxley will know. Apart from the physical effects this may have, if you assume journeyers travel inwardly instead of outwardly, you are talking about someone who is exploring the depths of their own psyche. The archetypes and motifs experienced along the way are the brain's method of structuring the psyche.
In many indigenous societies, shamans are trained by their predecessors. This includes methods of not going batshit insane (and yes, these cultures generally know the difference between a shaman/holy person/medicine person/etc., and someone who is simply mentally ill to the point of impaired functioning). However, most core shamans don't have a psychological background of any sort, and core shamanism such as it is is a an inadequate substitute, comparatively speaking. While this doesn't render all core shamans ineffective, it does mean that often the seriousness and potential danger of journeying is underestimated.
Part of why I study as much as I can about psychology is to be a better shamanic practitioner. It's also because "therapist" is one of the roles in this culture that approximates that of the shaman in indigenous cultures. However, honestly, I study psychology for the significant reason of my own mental health. Specifically as a shaman, I know that I'm doing a lot of dissection, evalution, and exploration in my head, regardless of whether that's all there really is, or whether it's a bridge into another reality external of my mind. Journeying is definitely not as safe as dreaming is for me.
I don't see psychology as being diametrically opposed to spirituality; on the contrary, I see the latter as necessarily including a healthy dose of the former when it's at its best. And, because I don't agree with the claims that core shamanism is "culturally neutral"*, I believe that I need to have a paradigm for working as a shaman in this culture, the one I am a part of--and core shamanism doesn't have the perfect fit. Yes, I know there are core shamans who are also psychological practitioners. That doesn't mean their approach to shamanic practice is one that works for me.
