--- title: What is the Land of the Dead? description: "The Land of the Dead is where the middle-world**Middle-world.** Ordinary physical reality together with its energetic layers: the realm of individuality, separation and mixed intentions, and the only realm where harm is possible. \"If there is a hell, then it…" url: "https://www.therapeutic-shamanism.co.uk/wiki/what-is-the-land-of-the-dead/" updated: "2026-11-10" category: Death, dying and the dead tags: - death - heaven and hell - land of the dead - "middle-world" - psychopomping - "under-world" --- # What is the Land of the Dead? The Land of the Dead is where the middle-world**Middle-world.** Ordinary physical reality together with its energetic layers: the realm of individuality, separation and mixed intentions, and the only realm where harm is possible. "If there is a hell, then it is the middle-world." [Read the full answer](/wiki/what-is-the-middle-world/) part of us should go when we die. In Therapeutic Shamanism it is a part of the middle-world, not the Lower-World, partly shaped by our own stories, and, like everything in the middle-world, not eternal. It is no place for the living: unless highly experienced, we should never go near it. ## What is the Land of the Dead? Put most simply, it is "Where the middle-world part of us should go on our death." When we die, our Spirit and Soul remain unchanged and our body goes back to the [Stone People](/wiki/what-are-stone-people-and-what-gifts-do-they-bring/). "So, what of our middle-world ego/soul? This should leave the land of the living, and pass over to the land of the dead." What the land of the dead is, and what happens there, is outside the scope of *Rewilding Yourself*.^[1](#note-1) 1. Paul Francis, [*Rewilding Yourself*](https://www.therapeutic-shamanism.co.uk/book/rewilding-yourself/), Glossary and Chapter Seven, 'What Happens When We Die?'. ## Where is it? In Therapeutic Shamanism, the Land of the Dead is a part of the middle-world. Because it is middle-world, it is partly shaped by our own stories, so it has places like the ideas of heaven, hell and purgatory, and like everything in the middle-world it is not eternal. In time everything there fades, sometimes described as dissolving into the light. The same is true of the whole middle-world: "All middle-world things are subject to the passage of time. Nothing in the middle-world is permanent." See [What is the middle-world?](/wiki/what-is-the-middle-world/)^[2](#note-2) 1. Paul Francis, [*Rewilding Yourself*](https://www.therapeutic-shamanism.co.uk/book/rewilding-yourself/), Chapter Seven, 'What Happens When We Die?'. ## Is it the Lower-World, or the under-world? Neither. The Lower-World "is often misperceived as being a dark place, a place where evil spirits live", mainly because of "our cultural conditioning of hell being 'below', and heaven being 'above'". In reality, "like the Upper-World**Upper-World.** The realm of Father Sky and of Spirit: spacious, rarefied and clear, layered in tiers, offering not escape but perspective. Not better than the Lower-World: we ascend rooted, and bring the gifts back down. [Read the full answer](/wiki/what-is-the-upper-world/), it is a place of love and healing".^[3](#note-3) The under-world**Under-world.** The realm of our repressed and disowned psychic energies, personal and collective: Jung's Shadow and the unconscious, mapped shamanically. A part of the middle-world, created by the Fall, not the Lower-World, and psychotherapy's proper territory rather than shamanism's. [Read the full answer](/wiki/what-is-the-under-world-and-how-is-it-different-from-the-lower-world/) is something else again: "the realm of our repressed and unconscious middle-world psychic energies", and it too is part of the middle-world. See [What is the under-world, and how is it different from the Lower-World?](/wiki/what-is-the-under-world-and-how-is-it-different-from-the-lower-world/)^[4](#note-4) 1. Paul Francis, [*Rewilding Yourself*](https://www.therapeutic-shamanism.co.uk/book/rewilding-yourself/), Chapter Two, 'The Shamanic Realms'. 2. Paul Francis, [*The Shamanic Journey*](https://www.therapeutic-shamanism.co.uk/book/the-shamanic-journey/), Chapter Nine, 'The Creation of the Under-World'. ## Should the living go there? "The Land of the Dead is not a healthy or safe place for the living. It's not bad, it's just death, okay?" This is why so many stories tell of its entrance being guarded. No. When the Guides**Guides.** The Lower-World and Upper-World beings a practitioner works with and learns from, of whom the Power Animal is the first and foremost. True Guides are ethical to their core; the shaman's power comes from the depth of these bonds, not from the shaman. [More about this](/wiki/who-are-the-guides/) psychopomp one of the unquiet dead**Unquiet dead.** The middle-world self become ghost: the ego that, having no body left to anchor it, lingers among the living instead of moving on to the Land of the Dead. Unhealthy for the living, and moved on by psychopomping. [More about this](/wiki/who-are-the-unquiet-dead/), "Unless you are highly experienced though, in order to stay safe and not risk being possessed yourself, you must in no circumstances go with the Guide who is doing the psychopomping**Psychopomping.** Guiding the dead on and away to where they belong: one of the shaman's oldest tasks, and the exact opposite of mediumship, which draws the dead back. [More about this](/wiki/what-is-psychopomping/) or go anywhere near the land of the dead yourself. I really do mean this. Seriously." Very occasionally, Power Animal**Power Animal.** The Oversoul of a wild species, met as a single Lower-World being and bonded with in a deep, committed, usually lifelong soul-bond of unconditional love. The practitioner's first and foremost Guide: Panther, not "my panther". [Read the full answer](/wiki/what-is-a-power-animal/) may go ahead somewhere "too dangerous for you to enter, like the Land of the Dead", but it will always leave us somewhere safe and come back for us.^[5](#note-5) 1. Paul Francis, [*Rewilding Yourself*](https://www.therapeutic-shamanism.co.uk/book/rewilding-yourself/), Chapter Seven, 'Why the Dead Hang Around (And Why It Is a Problem)'; Paul Francis, [*Rewilding Yourself*](https://www.therapeutic-shamanism.co.uk/book/rewilding-yourself/), Chapter Five, 'Example One'. ## How does it relate to the unquiet dead and the ancestors? The unquiet dead are those who have not reached it: "middle-world souls/egos that have not passed over to the land of the dead, but are instead hanging around the land of the living." Psychopomping is the practice of helping them there.^[6](#note-6) The ancestors who have died, with a small 'a', are not the same as the Ancestors**Ancestors.** The human Oversoul: the whole of humanity held as one Lower-World being. Distinct from individual dead ancestors (small a), who are not worked with in this approach. [Read the full answer](/wiki/what-is-the-difference-between-an-ancestor-and-an-ancestor/) with a capital 'A', who are "not a single twig but a whole branch" of Human. See [What is the difference between an ancestor and an Ancestor?](/wiki/what-is-the-difference-between-an-ancestor-and-an-ancestor/)^[7](#note-7) 1. Paul Francis, [*Rewilding Yourself*](https://www.therapeutic-shamanism.co.uk/book/rewilding-yourself/), Chapter Seven, 'What Happens When We Die?'. 2. Paul Francis, [*Rewilding Yourself*](https://www.therapeutic-shamanism.co.uk/book/rewilding-yourself/), Chapter Three, 'Branches on a Tree'. - [How does Therapeutic Shamanism understand death, and what happens when we die?](/wiki/how-does-therapeutic-shamanism-understand-death-and-what-happens-when-we-die/) - [What is psychopomping?](/wiki/what-is-psychopomping/) - [Who are the unquiet dead, and are ghosts real?](/wiki/who-are-the-unquiet-dead-and-are-ghosts-real/) - [What are the three shamanic realms?](/wiki/what-are-the-three-shamanic-realms/) - [*Rewilding Yourself*](https://www.therapeutic-shamanism.co.uk/book/rewilding-yourself/) - [*The Shamanic Journey*](https://www.therapeutic-shamanism.co.uk/book/the-shamanic-journey/)