My guest this week is MALIDOMA SOME, a West African Elder, author, teacher, diviner, and healer. His life path has been difficult to say the least; from being born in an obscure village in West Africa; kidnapped at age 4 by a Jesuit Priest and sent away to be schooled in Christianity; escaping at age 20 to return to his homeland; having to learn his native language again; being trained to be a shaman; then on to higher education to earn three Masters Degrees and two doctorates at the Sorbonne and Brandeis University; and finally to teach at the University of Michigan.

OLGA KARITIDI, author of "Enter The Circle", will share her experiences of being born in Russia during the Cold War period, working as a psychiatrist in a Siberian mental hospital, and ultimately being drawn into Shamanism by meeting a kam (shaman) in the mysterious Altai mountains. This meeting utterly changed her life, and moved her out of the box of politically correct thinking about the cause of illness, both physical and mental.

CAROLINE talks today about the true essence of Shamanism, and its relationship to religion. Among the wisdom traditions, Shamanism is the premier method of bringing body, mind, and spirit into balance, and restoring power, health, and harmony to a person's life as well as to Mother Nature, and all our relations. It has been praised and vilified, misunderstood and condemned, but it has survived and weathered the test of time for over 40,000 years.

HANK WESSELMAN has been a Shamanic Practitioner for 30 years, but he is also a paleo-anthropologist with a Masters Degree in Zoology, and a Doctoral Degree in Anthropology. Over the past 40 years, he has conducted research with an international group of scientists exploring Eastern Africa's Great Rift Valley in search of answers to human origins. His fieldwork has allowed him to live among indigenous tribal people who have rarely had contact with outsiders and to encounter their traditional Shaman.