Yesterday I received a call that my friend Carol passed away. She called me a couple months ago and said she wanted a drum. “My cancer is back and I think I am going to die, I want to learn to drum before I go.” I sent her my HealingDrum I have used for the past two years. A week or so ago she emailed me and said she had been playing her drum. She said her dog really liked her drumming. I have a plan to go to Phoenix in a week I had two extra days to drum with Carol. I will drum for her in the other world and miss her very much. Today I received the email below.

Wednesday 24th March, 2010 was a very sad day for all of us. Carol decided that it was time to leave us all and passed on at about 11:45 AM. Carol left us, the way she lived her life – with such grace and style. Carol spent that morning with her loving friends Heather Jachowski and John Villinski at her side. A hospice nurse had just arrived at Carol’s home and within a very short time Carol died the way she really wanted to, at home in her bed. She put up a huge fight against oral cancer enduring the maximum doses of chemotherapy and radiation, and she soldiered on with incredible wit and style.

As little as 6 days ago, Carol was driving and choosing a new faucet for her kitchen, in addition to the granite counter tops that I helped her pick out just a week before. Her body became very frail during the last few days, but even so, the quickened pace of her fragility and her ultimate death was a shock to all of us caring for her. Carol died surrounded by loving friends. Thank you to all who supported her in this battle and thanks to those who did come here to visit Carol in Tucson.

My condolences to all of her family and friends at this difficult time.

With warm regards,

John Faux

Loving a Drum

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Today at 10:23am

I got my first hand drum about five years ago. I was absolutely helpless to resist its lure and so this oversize piece of African art followed me home from a conference. Once it took its place of honor in my home, I studied it intently but never played it – something I laugh at now.The deep carving around the stem depicts what seem to be okapis, but could just as easily be almost any African antelope. It is hand-carved from a single piece of wood by some anonymous African craftsman. The skin is made from the back of a goat and smells of the business end of one – despite my best efforts. It is marbled in browns and greys and it carries the line of the spine, which in tribal lore signifies that the animal was a willing sacrifice. I have since added a hennaed phoenix design to the skin as well. I did not expect that bringing this piece of Africa into my home would reignite my own passion to travel there. I would catch myself looking at it and inventing the story of the carver, the goat, the village and the people who crafted it.

It would be almost a year before I did more than pet this drum and I can still remember vividly the angst of playing it for the first time (mostly because that still exists). But a strong bond developed between that drum and me such that I came to love this instrument in its own right. My ‘playing’ is still fairly spotty and I play less these days than I did a while back. Definitely less than I should. And let’s just say that I will probably never make a living as a professional drummer. But there is a joy in beating on it long past the place where my hands throb. There is a freedom in not caring if I mess up, in letting my hands find weird new rhythms known only to them, in letting my spirit soar out with the wild booming.

According to the West African culture where the drum was made, the drum is one way that a person speaks to the Creator. The skin of the drum is the ear of God, the stem and bowl of the drum the birth canal and womb of the Mother. By playing we give our fear, anxiety, stress and hatred to them. Thru the drum these things are transformed and re-birthed into the world as love, joy, and healing. I have certainly found that to be so.

My collection of drums had grown to four – possibly due to my association with Toby Christensen and the steady influx of really beautiful drums from Ghana and the Ivory Coast. I gifted two of those so that someone I loved could have a way to transform his sadness, so that his son could find love in a life that contained so little. So these days I am down to just two and that feels right for me. One for me and one for you to come over and join me in a really bad ass jam session….or just a bad one. With the drum it doesn’t really matter. Guaranteed to make you laugh!

Curious? Get on over to Suzanne Singh’s (merlin@healing drummer.com) and get yourself a drum. Or maybe take in the drum circle with Toby himself at the Zen center in Hamilton! on Tues (info from Suz as well). It may just change your life.

Feel free to repost this note.

C’mon and drum

On his recent US tour HealingDrummer Toby Christensen taught courses on Shamanism and Sound Healing. He continues his practice as a practitioner as well. Because of his dynamic private sessions Toby’s gift as a teacher is not always acknowledged. Here is what Dr. Johnson had to say

Endorsement: Toby Christensen is so much more then a practitioner, and he is more than a brilliant “teacher”, in sharing his gifts – he introduces you to your own! I took my first workshop with Toby not knowing what to expect. After all, while I have known and appreciated him as a very talented drummer, I had no idea of his depth and clarity within Spiritual realms. What a joy to experience his insights, patience and practical application to the world of Spirit! I learned so much during this first class – techniques I use to this day -,  that I look forward to and take his workshops every time he comes to town.

Trust and Confidence

Some of the most important aspects of our healing work at HealingDrummer are, one, properly training practitioners to bring healing to the world with authenticity and proper ethical conduct, and two, listen to those who come to us for healing. It is a very big responsibility be trusted with the openhearted vulnerability of one who has come for treatment. It has always been our intention to honor this trust in the most sacred way.

Our founder, Toby Christensen is the cornerstone of our teaching and healing protocol. He has studied with many indigenous and western teachers alike. Although always able to teach, not all of his teachers have been shall we say, good examples to follow in their personal and professional conduct. As Toby says, “sometimes when you become close friends with your teacher, you see things you wish you hadn’t.” Robert Bly once said, “a mentor will never have you over for dinner. That is a different kind of relationship”. I see the wisdom in this boundary. This is why it is so important to live impeccably. Rumors will surface from time to time as we have seen over the years, but unsubstantiated rumors dissolve quickly so we don’t spend much time on them when they surface.

What we like to focus on is bringing the healing energy to the world –
ENERGETIC TRANSFORMATION IS WHAT WE ARE ALL ABOUT AND IT COMES UNIQUELY THROUGH TOBY CHRISTENSEN AND THE HEALINGDRUM!!

Here is a great commentary we received:

Toby Christensen, the Healing Drummer, is filled with passion and the spirit.

He takes African Drumming and all it’s primitive power and combines it with the style of a Rock Star. It is a blend of the very old and the right now. Modern and primitive.

It helps to unleash my energy to awaken what has been asleep.

This is a wonderful sexy wounded man child who has found his place in the universe and thus his power.
And it is this weird thing. I mean a white shaman! A white guy with the African drum beating over me. And yet it worked. How, I don’t know and do I really care? I believe him because he believes it, because he earned it. His own journey

Something deep inside me understood and circumvented my brain and I quit smoking. There is true power here, not to be denied. And it worked. I felt better. But later I felt calm and somehow that I was operating at a new level.

Some part of us deep down knows this one works. We respond to the beat to the rhythm.