Frances Ulman

Previously a clinical psychologist in the USA, Frances Ulman is now initiated as a shaman in Mongolia. She lives in Sápmi (the indigenous land of Northern Europe, in Troms, Norway side) with her partner, while also living nomadically within community in Greenland, Mongolia, and the Carolinas USA. Living with sacred healers across many cultures, not as a researcher but as someone on her own sacred path, Frances has lived a life less common. In Sápmi, the sacred healers known as noaidi are more the focus of stories and legends than a person known by name. It is often said that real noaidi never name themselves as noaidi. But this is not true on all lands. The secrecy of sacred healers to outsiders, in Sápmi, and in indigenous and native cultures elsewhere, comes from a story many centuries old. To be known was to put yourself and your community at great risk from invaders and their clergy. Frances’ motivation for filmmaking was sparked by seeing how this internalized silence is no longer always bringing protection to sacred healers or their communities. Now, in the space left barren from the loss of remembering who and what sacred healers truly are, people no longer understand that sacred healers are magical powerful beings, who connect their community with the power within themselves. When we no longer remember, we become fragile. Our minds are easily occupied by stories that serve others in power, instead of connecting communities with their strength and purpose. In this loss of remembering, clinical psychologists slipped in and asserted their power over us. They told us we were sick, and we believed them. They told us the source of our sickness was to be found in something they called “the individual.” Treatments offered to us asked us to politely talk in therapy, or take a pill, instead of teaching us how to reconnect with our ancestors and the land, and be wild. In this loss of remembering, new age spirituality - a product of colonized minds - has grown like an invasive species. Because we no longer remember how magical and powerful real sacred healers are, we aren’t able to stop the flood of charlatans and confused among us, proclaiming they can heal. In this loss of remembering the old sacred ways, we remain unwell, unconnected, and disempowered. Frances makes films to connect us with rare, real sacred healers and their wisdom, so we may all remember the true magic they carry. Their purpose was, and remains, to connect all people with the power and purpose each of us possess in our own lives.