Art of the Shaman

Fu-Ding's multi-faceted career began as an architect and continued as an artist and graphic artist (Heart's "Dog and Butterfly," Chicago's "Live at Carnegie Hall."). As an award-winning independent filmmaker, his first film, Ethero, was shown at the Whitney Museum in New York, and his most recent one, The Winged Cage won a gold prize at the Houston International Film Festival. He was the recipient of the prestigious Independent Filmmaker's Grant from the American Film Institute with which he created another prize-winning film, Flight of Ideas. In 2001, his children's book, Dream-House, was published by Hampton Roads, and that year, the Hammer Museum and LA Filmforum presented a retrospective of his pioneering mystical adventure films, Zen-Tales for the Urban Explorer.

At the same time for the last twenty-five years, Fu-Ding has been teaching spiritual and shamanic practices through his art, films, books, and workshops. In his continuing efforts to bring together art and spirituality, he pioneered in 2001 the class, Shamanic Tools for the Filmmaker at the N. Carolina School of the Arts, and recently, Shamanic Tools for Creativity at Otis College of Art and Design. In 2015, he condensed a lifetime of spiritual experiences into Map of Desire, Shamanic Tools for Self-Fulfillment. This unique book features maps of our inner landscape, our psychological terrain. In 2019 he was selected to be one of fifteen shamans who participated in Shift Network's Shamanic Global Summit. In response to the crisis and uncertainty of our day, he has now made these teachings available for the first time in an online course, "Shamanic Tools for Changing Times." With his passion as an artist and filmmaker, students find the lessons come alive with colorful pictures and stories.

Fu-Ding's teachings are based on timeless wisdom traditions East and West, and Fu-Ding’s life-long spiritual quest. This culminated in his breakthrough awakening with a world-renowned shaman, don Miguel Ruiz (The Four Agreements). Apprenticed to him in 1995 in Teotihuacan, Mexico, Fu-Ding underwent a momentous ritual called Jump to the Sun, and woke up from the “dream of the planet.” For months, he'd wake up every morning in utter euphoria and wander the neighborhood park feeling blessed just to walk on this magnificent, perfumed planet. Since that ritual, nothing has been quite the same. Though it would take years to fully assimilate the full value of that ritual, one thing was clear: he had woken up and gained personal freedom!

Since then, Fu-Ding has devoted his life to spreading the deepest wisdom to the widest number of people. His workshops, books and courses are relatable because they've been tested by adversity; his life was not always easy. Beginning with years of hardship through childhood tragedies, violence, and foster homes, his struggles eventually led him to insights and extraordinary experiences that transformed his tragedies into the greatest treasure he could imagine for anyone––waking up and gaining personal freedom.