Tom Pinkson’s path of exploration can be traced back to the death of his father when he was four years. Seeking deeper truth about the mysteries of life and death, he sought out and found numerous shamanic “medicine” teachers who initiated him into totally different realms than those from which he had come.
His journeys took him to the far reaches of the Amazon jungle, to the Andes mountains, and to an 11-year apprenticeship with a group of Huichol Indian shamans in the Sierra Madre of north central Mexico.
During this time, Tom also earned three college degrees, including a PhD in psychology. His doctoral dissertation, “A Quest for Vision,” described his successful work with heroin addicts in the early 1970s using a wilderness treatment program that included mountain climbing, river running, snow camping, ski touring, and vision quests in the High Sierra.
The quests continue to this day, more than four decades later, with people coming from all over the U.S. to join him on powerful experiences of solitude and adventure in the back country of Yosemite.
From working with drug addicts, he went on to help start the second hospice program in the United States, offering support services to the terminally ill. From there, he was invited to join Dr. Jerry Jampolsky at the Center for Attitudinal Healing in Tiburon, California, to work with children facing life-threatening illness, which he did for 32 years.
Tom went on to create his “Recognition rites honoring elders" along with a CD recording using music and song to open hearts and minds to the wisdom of deep being.
Walking in two worlds, the shamanic world of Indigenous spirituality, and the Western world of a psychologist, teacher, sacred storyteller, and ceremonial and retreat leader, Tom serves as a bridge-builder, bringing what he calls “the teachings of the elders” into practical applications within the modern, urban setting.
From major corporations to pediatric oncology units within prestigious cancer treatment centers, from the academic world to rites-of-passage work with children, adolescents, and adults, the dying process, and subsequent work of grief, mourning, and rebirth, Tom’s work has enriched countless lives.
His many books include The Psychedelic Shaman: The Wisdom Warrior's Path to Transformation... The Shamanic Wisdom of the Huichol: Medicine Teachings for Modern Times... Fruitful Aging: Finding the Gold In The Golden Years... and Do They Celebrate Christmas in Heaven?: Spiritual Rite of Passage Teachings From Children with Life-Threatening Illness.
Tom is the founder and director of Wakan, a nonprofit spiritually based community which offers a variety of programs and services that help people find and remember what is sacred in their lives.
