Spirit names

[auroraglacialis]

Originally Posted by Pygmy-Na'vi

There are personal yoiks (wordless chants) among the Sámi which describes the spirit and/or personality of an individual, but they are not secret. It is considered a great honour to yoik another person, but one cannot yoik oneself, it's seen as hubris and lack of common sense to brag about oneself like that

Interesting. It seems to be related. I am aware that there seem to be different social rules about these intonations that represent ones spirit. Some cultures seem to put some emphasis on secrecy - usually because that intonation is said to have power (magic, mystical power, power over the one whose intonation it is,...). sometimes the secret name is then revealed to people one trusts with that power. In other cases it is something everyone knows and is just used as the regular name. In some cases the name can be found only by oneself, in other cases only by a shaman and in others one has both options. But the concept of some intonation - some form of sound that somehow represents ones spirits seems to be quite common.

Too much old knowledge has been lost.

Indeed. It saddens me deeply as well. We do not know anymore what was once common. Many people of our times look thus for the remaining indigenous peoples, often native americans for guidance on that because they still have that knowledge. But we get confused by the different rules each culture has - who are we to follow if we have lost our own roots, can we/are we allowed to choose? To create something new? I heard the most appropriate way is to listen to the nonhuman world for what is appropriate for oneself, ones locality. So for me the feeling was, that I should not share it and I followed that, even though I did not know at that time about the existence of these different social rules.

Originally Posted by Moco Loco

How would I know if I had one or not, or does everyone have it?

I think the "cheap" answer for this is, that everyone has such a name, and that one would recognize if one has knowledge of it.

Originally Posted by Pygmy-Na'vi

The usual way to find it is through a drum journey (guided by an experienced shaman if you haven't done it before), sweat lodge ceremony or similar. There are probably other ways too, but I don't know them.

Originally Posted by Moco Loco

So basically, I can't figure out what it is unless I do one of these sweatlodge things?

I think there are different ways, I think the most common one is that "shamanic journey", but others do include sweat lodges or vision quests (basically you sit without food and sometimes without water in a spot in the wilderness for several days). In a physical sense these practices are borderline experiences - experiences that work towards a dissolution of the ego. If the ego is getting small or vanishes, ones soul can more freely connect to the world. One does not see anymore the rock as a stupid lump of crystals as the ego tells us. In that state I believe that the world can talk to us and we are more able (because we are not hindered by our egos) to listen. Personally I believe that also teacher plants (usually called "psychedelics") certainly fulfilled a similar role in some cultures as they also have a tendency to blend out the ego.
So i am not suggesting now to do any of these just out of interest for that spirit name or sound, but I think that it would be very rare to gain knowledge of it without going on a search for it in some way. What way this would be for you, I cannot tell you. Maybe you already know. In these things usually there are no recipes - no one can guarantee you that one specific practice works for all.
One important thing when searching is to be open and full of awareness - sometimes it seems one gets things that one did not expect or ask for in these experiences. One might look for an answer to some question and get an answer to a question one has not even encountered yet. Or one might search for a spirit name and instead gain knowledge of ones empathic animal (totem animal, spirit guide animal,...).

Greetings