Shamanism is witch doctoring in the Animist religion.  Animism views all created things -- humans, animals, plants, landscapes, elemental forces and seasons -- as having an intelligent, communicative life force or spirit.  It is similar to modern Buddhism which also worships the planet and everything on it.  

Shamanism is an intentional effort to develop intimate and lasting relationships with familiar demons.  It is consciously going into controlled visionary experiences to connect with these spirit beings who guide, guard, instruct, bless and in the end drag their soul to hell.  Demons can appear as all sorts of things.  These demons can appear to be spirits of nature, animals, plants, the elements (earth, air, fire & water), ancestors, gods, goddesses and teachers from other religions.

For Shamans to be effective must have a strong personal relationship with these demons.  Ultimately, the real healers are not the Shamans but the demons.  The Shaman functions as a conduit or channel of spiritual energy and power received from these spirits.  But the Shaman is the source of power for these demons through fasting, sweating, vision quests, drumming, rattling, chanting, dancing and being possessed by these demons.  This soul power generated is then directed by the demons for their own use -- and also to aid the Shaman.

Any supernatural assistance comes with a price on the demon's terms.  No exorcism is possible, since Satan is not about to drive out part of his own kingdom.  All that is done is a negotiation for the replacement of one malicious demon for a more powerful demon.  All physical healing, fertility or blessing comes at a spiritual cost.

One seductive trap the demons offer is to assist the shaman on a spiritual journey that is partly imaginary and partly soul traveling.  The demons offer fantastic trips of seeming great importance, offering enormous secrets that only they are privy to.  There is just enough truth in it to make it look valid.  All of this leads to great delusions of grandeur that this person couldn't reproduce in real life.  Sometimes it leads to insanity.

These people started out seeking the truth, but they had no direction to turn to find truth.  Everywhere they looked, all they ran into was Satan's schemes.  Usually, the Shamans are still seeking truth when you run might across them.  We Christians have the Truth they never found.  We can heal and drive off demons without it being a Faustian bargain.  They are often the first person in the tribe to become a Christian when the Gospel is presented to them.

They may not be able to hear the gospel due to being heavily infested with these demons.  You first need to bind the demons of blindness, deafness, confusion and scrambling over them so that they can hear your message of Hope.

When they become Christians they will need a lot of deliverance due to the demons they have submitted to.  They will also need protection .  Satan is possessive of the people he owns.  He will send his demons & slaves to try to reclaim them or attack them.

An ex-shaman Christian can clean themselves up using the Shaman self-deliverance page.

One case:
Two years ago I went to a healing ministry to check out their bookstore.  It is in their waiting room.  There was a woman in the room that radiated demonic power.  I asked her how things were.  She had come to be ministered to, but the prayer ministers had told her to leave.  She was waiting for her ride.

She told me about her ex-husband that had been a Satanist.  She then told me as a youth she had been sent to live in a hut on an Indian graveyard.  One night she levitated out of bed and two spirits posing as Indians had come to her and entered into her.  She then dropped back on the bed.  When she told her grandmother about it in the morning, her grandmother was excited.  "You have the power!"

Ever since then she had occult powers.  But she wanted to be a Christian.  I asked her, "Is Jesus Christ of Nazareth your only savior and master?"  She said yes.  I started to write up a self-deliverance sheet for her to use, since she was a Christian.  But the occult power radiating from her was confusing me.  After I walked six feet away from her I finished writing up the self-deliverance. 

I handed it to her.  She read/prayed her way through it.  When she finished, there were no demons anywhere around her.  She was clean.  One of the prayer ministers came in, to see what I was doing.  She had discerning of spirits and was stunned at the difference.

What I had written up for her was an abbreviated version of the powwow self-deliverance.