NAFPS Forum
General => Frauds => Topic started by: kuljamu on July 12, 2013, 09:44:46 pm
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here's another twinkie with a "shamanic institute" claiming a go ahead from a half native man (who she doesn't identify) and claims a connection to Barbara Means-Adams and her family. Is this for real? Looks like the typical new age and phony native teachings. Inquiring minds want to know.
http://sundustoracle.charsundust.com/soi-w/about/
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Her name is Charlotte Goodrich. According to the book "With the Sun in My Eyes: The Story of Char Sundust" her mother told her that her father's mother was Cheyenne. And that her mother's mother was Apache "but she won't talk about it much".
Book details a difficult childhood, military family, home often in Washington state. "Keith, whose native name was Koheehut" said to be her Cheyenne teacher from her age 14, also "shamanic apprenticeship" with Sheila Belanger.
http://books.google.com/books?id=jcoeoAuOn7IC&pg=PA6&lpg=PA6&dq=%22with+the+sun+in+my+eyes%22+goodrich&source=bl&ots=5aO_hbRgcy&sig=XJZitZz-d9U2mkGRP77wjprpSQM&hl=en&sa=X&ei=jY_gUcGIOajNiwLR8oHACg&ved=0CCsQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=koheehut&f=false (http://books.google.com/books?id=jcoeoAuOn7IC&pg=PA6&lpg=PA6&dq=%22with+the+sun+in+my+eyes%22+goodrich&source=bl&ots=5aO_hbRgcy&sig=XJZitZz-d9U2mkGRP77wjprpSQM&hl=en&sa=X&ei=jY_gUcGIOajNiwLR8oHACg&ved=0CCsQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=koheehut&f=false)
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She describes her teacher as half Cheyenne half German. It would be an incredible coincidence if this were not Charles Storm, or she was using Storm's story to make up her claimed Cheyenne teacher. We have a thread about Storm and all his abuse and falsehoods.
She also learned from one of the core shamanism people, Harner.
This book about her shows quite a hodgepodge of beliefs, Greek goddesses like Demeter, Hindu goddesses like Kali, Christian angels, Tarot cards, frauds like Laduke/Sun Bear and Kenneth Meadows. The medicine wheels in the book do seem like Storm's usual teachings.
http://books.google.com/books?id=jcoeoAuOn7IC&pg=PA138&lpg=PA138&dq=char+sundust+fake&source=bl&ots=5aO_hbSjhD&sig=pX38I2lU1sbmdX0Mt2XmMQag
mX8&hl=en&sa=X&ei=2ZTgUe_THcX64APvrYBY&ved=0CDYQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=char%20sundust%20fake&f=false
She teaches at Bastyr University, a naturopath institute.
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http://www.quackwatch.com/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/Naturopathy/naturopathy.html
The leading naturopathy school, Bastyr University, in Seattle, Washington, was founded in 1978. Besides its N.D. program, Bastyr offers a B.S. degree program in Natural Health Sciences with majors in nutrition and Oriental medicine; a B.S. program in psychology; B.S. and M.A. programs in applied behavioral sciences; M.S. programs in nutrition and acupuncture/oriental medicine; and a certificate in midwifery. Bastyr has also provided health-food retailers and their employees with home-study programs that promote "natural" approaches for the gamut of disease....
Naturopathy schools receive much of their financial support from companies that market dietary supplements, homeopathic products, and/or herbal remedies.
In 1987, the U.S. Secretary of Education approved the Council on Naturopathic Medical Education (CNME) as an accrediting agency for the full-time schools. As with acupuncture and chiropractic schools, this recognition was not based upon the scientific validity of what is taught but on such factors as record-keeping, physical assets, financial status, makeup of the governing body, catalog characteristics, nondiscrimination policy, and self-evaluation system. NCNM, Bastyr, and Southwest became accredited.
In 1999, the U.S. Department of Education staff and the National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity (NACIQI) asked U.S. Secretary of Education Richard W. Riley to deny CNME's application for renewal of recognition. The recommendation was based on evidence that CNME did not respond appropriately to violations of its standards at Southwest College....
In January 2001, Riley agreed that CNME's approval should not be renewed, which means that naturopaths in the United States no longer have a national accrediting agency recognized by the United States Education [14]. Curiously, none of the naturopathic college Web sites mentioned that CNME lost its recognition.
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Bastyr has been less than well run. There was a scandal over faculty voting themselves high salaries.
http://www.aaup.org/report/academic-freedom-and-tenure-bastyr-university
And the founder is not exactly ethical, charged with harming two patients through negligence and then violating probation.
http://www.quackwatch.org/11Ind/steenblock2.html
http://www.quackwatch.org/11Ind/steenblock1.html
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Bastyr has turned out some very good naturopathic doctors. I had one who helped memore than the western medically trained docs did. However, she told me she was unhappy that Bastyr was allowing frauds like Andy Rodriguez, aka, walks with thunder, access to campus and he was being promoted by faculty. She even went and argued with them over that. And got no where. :(
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thanks for the info. Does anyone know what this connection to the Means family might be. Is it a tacit approval of her work?
thanks
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This claims to be a bio of Ms Goodrich.
http://books.google.com/books?id=jcoeoAuOn7IC&pg=PR15&lpg=PR15&dq=char+sundust+real+name&source=bl&ots=5aP_k7Qhky&sig=RYqlK-E5j6foXBm-M-G3i-gLuxE&hl=en&sa=X&ei=eRp9Uq-ZK-Xh4APko4DYCA&ved=0CFQQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=char%20sundust%20real%20name&f=false
Much of it claims to show Goodrich's training as a healer. It reads like a Nuager who doesn't know much would imagine what Native healing is, arbitrary and mysterious, ie "He made me do this and I did not see the purpose."
One of the more amusing points is near the start when she mentions a Bear Tribe leader in Japan did not want her there because she didn't have much ancestry. I suppose the reader is being asked to feel sympathetic, "oh those Natives were persecuting her because she was mostly white." But since almost all the Bear Tribe cult were whites, this doesn't make sense.
And of course you have this supposed Native psychic trained by a supposed Cheyenne healer who had her make Apache dolls, plus Goodrich claiming to be a psychic who mixes together pagan Greek, Christian, and Nuage ideas like power animals, very confused.
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Sundust is the medicine name given to Char by her first teacher at sixteen years of age after two years of intense training. It is an Apache family name.
http://www.eco-res.com/eco-res.asp?page=groups_assemblage (http://www.eco-res.com/eco-res.asp?page=groups_assemblage)
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She legally changed her name in 2005, Washington state, to Charlotte Monique Sundust.
Sundust, Charlotte Monique
New Name
King County District 55-008750 10-19-2005
Goodrich, Charlotte Monique
Old Name
King County District 55-008750 10-19-2005
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2002
Char Sundust is a shamanic practitioner of Iroquois and German ancestry.
http://web.archive.org/web/20020531051443/http://charsundust.com (http://web.archive.org/web/20020531051443/http://charsundust.com)/
2008
At the age of fourteen, Char began her training where she started learning medicine work in the Cheyenne tradition taught by her stepfather.
http://web.archive.org/web/20080821103547/http://www.charsundust.com/char/ (http://web.archive.org/web/20080821103547/http://www.charsundust.com/char/)
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Charlotte Sundust is vice president of this non profit charity called Village. http://www.sos.wa.gov/corps/search_detail.aspx?ubi=603077928 (http://www.sos.wa.gov/corps/search_detail.aspx?ubi=603077928)
Village Wellness & Birth Center
http://www.sos.wa.gov/charities/search_detail.aspx?charity_id=34006 (http://www.sos.wa.gov/charities/search_detail.aspx?charity_id=34006)
Village is a collective impact healthcare & research mosaic that transforms people's experience of birth, family & community wellbeing.
... this organization devoted 67% of its total expenses to program services during the year reported.
The president Tara Shelby is a ND.
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As Charlotte Goodrich she has Sundust Oracle Institute LLC http://www.sos.wa.gov/corps/search_detail.aspx?ubi=603102031 (http://www.sos.wa.gov/corps/search_detail.aspx?ubi=603102031)
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I'm skimming through a Kindle copy of With the Sun in My Eyes: The Story of Char Sundust, Psychic Healer and Shamanic Practitioner. I find it disturbed and disturbing.
The author writes that she's "partially fictionalized' the earlier years of Char's life to "make the story readable, to round out the facts that were relayed to me by Char herself, her mother, and her brothers.". Author claims that the portrayal of Char's healing power as an adult are all true. The author also writes that Char, as a healer, has unimpeachable integrity.
Char claims she learned shamanism from her step father Keith, starting when she was 14 years old, this would have been in about 1977. He was tall and had "striking blue eyes inherited from his white father". Char in this book says that her own father was white also. Keith took her to his home in Wenatchee, Washington. He named her "Little Fawn" in a cerermony. He took her out of school and kept her locked up at home.
"Keith, whose native name was Koheehut, was known in certain circles as a healer.". People came to the house for healings. Keith also used the chanupa "with different herbal mixtures for different situations". He could read minds. He was a Vietnam vet, a binge alcoholic, abusive and violent. He molested Char often and told her this was his way of transferring information to her. Char says he died when she was 21, about 1984.
Char claims to be incredibly psychic and gifted. She claims that she can find missing children and adults, and that police often consult with her. She claims that a PI consulted with her about a death of a young woman who had died in New York, he brought a box of bloody sheets from NY to Char in Seattle, she stuck the box in a closet for a few days and then when she took the box back out, the bloody sheets smelled like roses.
She describes witnessing a healing of a mentally ill woman by Kenny Moses "last of the real West Coast medicine men".
Char also drops Johnny Moses' name, says he lived in an apartment building she managed.
Char claims a connection with Yemaya, which is an entirely different culture and spiritual system, so she is ripping that off also.
She sees dead people too.
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I am sorry to have Kenny Moses' name associated with this. He would heal anyone who asked and was a good man. Johnny Moses is known for associating with twinkies. He is still a respected storyteller.
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I am sorry to have Kenny Moses' name associated with this. He would heal anyone who asked and was a good man. Johnny Moses is known for associating with twinkies. He is still a respected storyteller.
Char claims she could see what Kenny Moses did during the healing, "in other realms". Char says she was impressed, wanted to learn how to do that work herself, and that she eventually decided that much of what he did was a "soul retrieval". She says Barbara Means Adams was at the healing also.
So Char is pretty much trying to buff up her reputation by connecting herself in some manner to Kenny Moses.
If Char really did do what she claims in this book,she could be charged with false imprisonment, she claims she locked up a suicidal, psychotic woman in a house. Also in a later event she claims she treated a homicidal, psychotic woman.
Other ways that Char claims she is special and cool is by claiming that she knows how to deal with people in the throes of crack addiction, also that gay men love her. All of this reads like she is trying to claim street cred, that she is cool and hip. Much of this supposedly does take place in Seattle and rings true for the actual preoccupations of some white Nuager women in Seattle, in my own experience.
Char's stuff is a mish mash of Nuage fakery. "Letting go of scarcity mentality", praying in medicine wheels, power animals, tarot cards, psychic powers, poltergeists, speaking with spirits, goddess worship, astral realms, possession, "Lakota buffalo rattle", spirit allies, shapeshifting, pseudo hinduism, auras, crystals, and more, all mashed together.
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Sundust is the medicine name given to Char by her first teacher at sixteen years of age after two years of intense training. It is an Apache family name.
http://www.eco-res.com/eco-res.asp?page=groups_assemblage (http://www.eco-res.com/eco-res.asp?page=groups_assemblage)
:D ;D
My impression is she must be a very dumb naïve hippie to think that...
Apache names are mostly Latino. Or Anglo, both given by missionaries. If they still have the original name meaning, they keep the name in the Apache dialect, not an English translation.
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Char claims that one day while sorting through animal hides in a leather store, one of the hides told her to make prayer dolls out of it. Char had seen Apache dolls before and the hide itself told her what do do. She eventually made tribes of dolls. "Each one told her how much to charge. They might say, 'The person who is going to buy me needs to spend $230... ' "
Char says she was asked to show these at the Seattle Art Museum.
On another note, Char says then when she worked as a certified nurses's aide at a nursing home - "A number of other very sick people died while she worked there, perhaps because she gave them permission to depart.".
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I personally know Char. I have not read this book that is quoted here so frequently, mostly because Char was never happy with it and says it is full of distortions and errors. Char is one of the most loving and generous people I know. She has many students but I have never been one of them. She is my friend.
That said, this is what I know of her. If she does not have psychic abilities then she is one of the most intuitive people I have ever met. Who knows, maybe that is what being psychic means. She just plain knows things about people. I happen also to know Johnny Moses as mentioned here and am best friends with his younger sister. I have sometimes been critical of the hold Johnny has on some of his followers and how they willingly sacrifice sometimes for his comfort. I have never seen Char do anything like that in more than 2 decades of knowing her and she has had many opportunities.
I have been an observer at her school and I wouldn't say what she teaches amounts to ripping off traditions or mixing and matching. From what I see she explores different traditions in order to find the commonality in them. Her students are not trained in any specific tradition so much as given skills to find their own path. Frankly, I see no harm in that. Her classes have more to do with personal empowerment than anything else and her students almost universally report transformative change.
When people talk of fraud the implication is they are selling something that has no actual value or promising something with no results. Since her students stay with her for years and her clients endure long waiting lists for sessions with her it seems to me the public does not agree that her work is valueless or ineffective.
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Incidentally Char isn't Cheyenne and I have never heard her claim to be. She has family from the Cheyenne River but they are Lakota. I suppose that is an easy thing to be confused about. Also, I met Barbara Means Adams through Char and was introduced to this venerable lady as her second mother. The woman frequently referred to Char as her daughter. I would say any claim to have been a student of hers is valid.
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Ravenspeaker, are you Ravenspeaker / Robert Frederiksen? You and Solana Booth run Natives Rising, based in Seattle, and do some events with Char? Could you please introduce yourself in the Member Introductions section? Thank you and welcome.
http://citylivingseattle.com/main.asp?SectionID=22&SubSectionID=167&ArticleID=89468 (http://citylivingseattle.com/main.asp?SectionID=22&SubSectionID=167&ArticleID=89468)
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RS, I'm glad to see you here as well. I hope you can help us clear these matters up.
I know Ms Goodrich joined us this past week and hope she will speak also.
As best you know, what exactly is inaccurate about that bio? Is it the claim of sexual abuse? The alleged Cheyenne teacher? The account of being a psychic in childhood?
I hope either you or Goodrich can settle just what ancestry she claims, as well as what her teacher claimed. So far we've seen Apache, Iroquois, and now Lakota for her. Which band is her family from? And why would a Lakota learn from alleged Cheyenne, take a name she has the mistaken idea is Apache, and mangle it all together with pagan, Nuage, and Christian mysticism?
I should also mention what Goodrich does appears to be the old con artist technique called cold reading. Anyone can do it, look it up.
If she is genuine, may I suggest she go to a researcher such as James Randi, who offers a million dollars for genuine proof of psychic ability. (I'm not suggesting she's solely motivated by money, but anyone could think of great uses, including charities, for a million dollars.) Her alleged ability would be as famous a discovery as splitting the atom were it actually true.
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Educated Indian, thank you for your questions and your welcome. Piff, I posted an introduction and I want to thank you for the link to a news story about Solana and I and Natives Rising. That was unexpected. Thank you.
When I clicked on reply I lost the post with the questions on it so I will do my best to recall them. I understand the precision behind calling her Charlotte Goodrich but I believe she has a right to call herself what she likes and with me would ask everyone refer to her as Char Sundust. I am no expert whatever on psychic phenomena and can't claim to speak on it beyond what my people call "Echoes".
I think Char receives Echoes, whatever they may be, in the way that they are defined by my ancestors. Specifically, she understands things without having to be told. Whether this is a form of a sub conscious reading of body language or ESP does not really matter to me. I have observed it. I have also observed she is not always right and she admits that.
I propose this is why it would be pointless for her to submit to some kind of lab experiment. My impression of these sorts of "tests" is they require an extreme level of accuracy that isn't possible. Further, I think it is not fair to call her a con artist because she doesn't use this skill to take advantage of anyone. She honestly tries to help people which I think is all we can ask of her and I certainly can produce people who feel they have benefited from her counsel.
Frankly, Char does not really know where her ability comes from all the time and simply credits Creator and her spirit guardians. I choose not to argue the source. I care only about the evidence of my senses.
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Educated Indian, I don't know what is inaccurate about the book. Char complained that it was so I never bothered to read it. I know that she isn't Cheyenne and I have never heard her claim to be. Her mother is of Lakota descent and her father Apache. I have never met her dad or step dad but I do know there was trauma there and what that trauma was. Not sure if its appropriate to discuss details in a public forum here.
Her biological mother is a delightful woman and one can easily see where Char gets her lovey nature from. I can tell you that Char is eligible for tribal enrollment and has drug her feet on this for years. I have been pushing her to do so lately and feel this posting about her is probably going to be good ammunition for me to get her to finally do it.
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Research on the surname Sundust:
US Federal census
1940 census 24 Sundust counted , all Maricopa Arizona
1920 13 counted , 12 on Gila River Indian Reservation, one in Prescott
1910 11 counted, 10 Gila River Indian Reservation, one in Osborn
1900 4 counted, Phoenix, Arizona Territory
U.S., Indian Census Rolls, 1885-1940
Sundust name counted 378 times, 375 Pima, Pipaash, and/or Maricopa, 2 times Maricopa and Klamath. 1 person, a 10 year old girl, counted in 1934 as Maricopa-Apache on Gila River Indian Reservation, Pima Agency - Sacaton, Arizona. Her father Apache, his surname Norton. Her mother Maricopa, her surname Sundust.
(Federal census data from Ancestry.com.
U.S. Indian Census Rolls, 1885-1940 from Ancestry.com, original data Indian Census Rolls, 1885-1940, National Archives, Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs )
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I understand the precision behind calling her Charlotte Goodrich but I believe she has a right to call herself what she likes and with me would ask everyone refer to her as Char Sundust. I am no expert whatever on psychic phenomena and can't claim to speak on it beyond what my people call "Echoes".
I think Char receives Echoes, whatever they may be, in the way that they are defined by my ancestors. Specifically, she understands things without having to be told. Whether this is a form of a sub conscious reading of body language or ESP does not really matter to me. I have observed it. I have also observed she is not always right and she admits that.
I propose this is why it would be pointless for her to submit to some kind of lab experiment. My impression of these sorts of "tests" is they require an extreme level of accuracy that isn't possible. Further, I think it is not fair to call her a con artist because she doesn't use this skill to take advantage of anyone. She honestly tries to help people which I think is all we can ask of her and I certainly can produce people who feel they have benefited from her counsel.
Frankly, Char does not really know where her ability comes from all the time and simply credits Creator and her spirit guardians. I choose not to argue the source. I care only about the evidence of my senses.
What you describe is much simpler than being psychic. It's called guessing. Perhaps, as you say, she's very good at reading body language. If the story of childhood abuse is true, that may suggest why she wants to believe she's psychic. Abuse survivors often feel disassociated, like their body isn't theirs, or talk about feeling their spirit is outside of their body. And abusers often tell the victims they're worthless, so imagining herself with a special ability might help them cope.
All that I've seen so far points toward someone with distant ancestry very out of touch with her heritage, and so she grasps at straws. Her appearance shows she does not have much Native ancestry, and her own accounts say maybe an Apache grandmother that her mother won't talk about and a Lakota great grandmother. So she latches onto anything, a claimed Cheyenne teacher, an abusive stepfather claiming to be a healer, a name she imagined was Apache but as you can see is O'odham.
Her intentions may be good, but she is spreading a lot of confused ideas. And I don't believe simply wanting something is reason enough to support it. Goodrich's faux Apache name is one of those.
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What you describe is much simpler than being psychic. It's called guessing. Perhaps, as you say, she's very good at reading body language. If the story of childhood abuse is true, that may suggest why she wants to believe she's psychic. Abuse survivors often feel disassociated, like their body isn't theirs, or talk about feeling their spirit is outside of their body. And abusers often tell the victims they're worthless, so imagining herself with a special ability might help them cope.
This is exactly my own experience in the past as a young woman who had a rough childhood. In order to survive abuse I'd learned how to disassociate. Under the influence of the Seattle New Age scene as a young adult I thought something psychic and mystical was going on, when actually what was going on was PTSD symptoms. I even worked for a time as a "psychic reader".
People with PTSD from abuse can be hypervigilant. They can be good are reading body language, in that they are always scanning for possible danger. For survival we can cultivate an active fantasy life. Eventually we need to get proper help, definitely not from a New Age practitioner. We need to learn coping skills and how to focus ourselves safely in the here and now.
Ravenspeaker, the fact that students stay with her for years, and that clients endure long waiting lists - this is not at all necessarily a good sign. This could be a sign that people have developed an emotional dependency.
I, as a person who has experienced abuse, could never go to Char for treatment. Because she isn't licensed, she isn't supervised, she talks about her own abuse freely even in what should be a professional setting, and because her treatments are unsafe.
If as described in the book, she has locked up people who are psychotic, rather taking them to the hospital - this is very serious and unsafe.
A person may be charismatic, lovey, motherly, passionate, creative, they may believe that they are specially tuned in, they may honestly mean well - all while doing actual damage to their clients.
I may come across mocking or a little harsh earlier in this thread, this is because I'm from the Seattle New Age, I know the territory well. Whether a person is a con artist, a traumatized person dealing with delusions, or a mix of both, they need to stop taking clients and get themselves some help.
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So we have a woman who is making money from damaged people again.
that is fraud
Then she claimed to be Cheyenne, Lakota and Iroquios
and puts Hopi Progency on her site. Which she is not.
If she can enroll which tribe? What is her really name that is
up for enrollment,
just because Barabara Mean call her daughter
does not mean that she is anyway related to my people.
We have no-one who is trained as a (shaman) let alone a girl
who is at the age menstration, can tell you if she is so powerful why
lie about who she is?
Why make up stories OH WAIT! to make money right.
So Please tell what name she would enroll under.
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Some of the critiques here are referencing things I know nothing about. I can not comment on what someone said about Char. I can only comment on my experience with Char. Why someone says she is Hopi, or Iroquois or Cheyenne or whatever else I have no idea, she never has claimed these. The use of the word 'shaman' is a bit loaded because there are different traditions. I can't say I have ever heard Char call herself a shaman though so again, not sure where that is coming from.
I am a bit discouraged about the general dismissiveness evidenced in the posts here. We come from cultures that generally accept that spirit is more than just an interesting word. I am not sure it is reasonable to dismiss someone or something with authority without personal investigation. We no longer live in an age where it is safe to read a book( or even two) and say you know all about a subject. You have to check something or someone out for yourself. That is the world we live in.
It has been suggested that we should despise her because she makes a living helping people. I have watched, with personal observation, literally millions of dollars spent on so called professionals in fancy white coats work with "damaged people" to no avail. If Char is a fraud then a very substantial portion of people with doctorates are as well. Not just because they work with damaged people, which has been the suggested standard here, but also because they get little or no result in spite of their fancy degrees. At least Char's people report feeling happy and attended to after her work. Maybe all they needed was someone to care about them. If her clientele is happy paying her for this why should anyone not involved in the transaction object?
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The use of the word 'shaman' is a bit loaded because there are different traditions. I can't say I have ever heard Char call herself a shaman though so again, not sure where that is coming from.
About Char Sundust:
Char Sundust is a shamanic practitioner
http://www.charsundust.com/who-we-are.php (http://www.charsundust.com/who-we-are.php)
Hopefully Earthw7's questions will be answered. What name would Char enroll under, what tribe?
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Why someone says she is Hopi, or Iroquois or Cheyenne or whatever else I have no idea, she never has claimed these.
I don't think people are saying she is a member of those Nations. They are saying she has made those false claims to them, then changed her story when people didn't buy it. How do you know everything she has ever claimed?
You are saying that people here haven't been at every conversation she's had. Neither have you. Um, unless you are Char.
Anything you'd like to tell us?
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actually I have encouraged Char to make her own case here and I believe she has already posted something or is about to. I haven't checked so I will let her answer the most personal things about herself. Its a fair point to say I haven't heard everything she has ever said but after knowing her twenty three years I think I can say she has always been consistent with me.
What I am hearing is someone says Char said this or that and then changed her story. Does "someone" know Char and observed this behavior personally? Also, I think its fair to ask again by what standard are we calling her a fraud? Is it because some of us believe there is no such thing as a psychic and therefore anyone claiming to be (or what amounts to the same thing) must be a fake? Is it because of the word shamanic (which is related to but not identical in meaning to shaman?) If so, are all people who make use of shamanic ideas and practices frauds?
I have heard it said that since no cure is ever 100 percent effective anything which produces better results than doing nothing can be considered effective treatment. If a certain segment of the population through faith can find comfort and courage to face life's challenges who are not reached by the "experts" then who is anyone to say these real results are illegitimate because Char doesn't wear a lab coat?
I have been a counselor for ten years and I have observed that your doctors of this and your doctors of that do not have all or even most of the answers that people need. faith works wonders that medicine often can't even touch and there is plenty of real world evidence to back this up without me having to cite some learned tome on the subject.
So again, if you don't believe in her why does that automatically make her a fraud?
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I have to say one more thing about this... I have always regarded it as offensive when Westerners refer to my cultural traditions as superstitious. My people believe we are not our bodies but where bodies like a coat. as yoda would say... "luminous beings are we"
I have yet to hear anyone explain why I have consciousness in strictly material terms. To my way of thinking denying the possibility of spirit and the different phenomena associated with it is just as speculative as the various ways people try to define the supernatural. The only thing that matters at the end of the day is not whether Char qualifies as a shaman or a psychic or a Kalahari Antelope. The only thing that matters in the question of whether she is a fraud is does she get results.
I say she does. I have seen happy clientele. Even if she doesn't get perfection it doesn't matter because no one on this forum can point me to a doctor of any kind that has a 100 percent or even an 80 percent success rate, especially in the field mental health which is rife with phony science.
I am making a passionate defense for my friend and am sorry if in my passion I say anything to offend anyone. Its not my intention and hope you will look past that.
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Educated Indian, I don't know what is inaccurate about the book. Char complained that it was so I never bothered to read it. I know that she isn't Cheyenne and I have never heard her claim to be. Her mother is of Lakota descent and her father Apache. I have never met her dad or step dad but I do know there was trauma there and what that trauma was. Not sure if its appropriate to discuss details in a public forum here.
Her biological mother is a delightful woman and one can easily see where Char gets her lovey nature from. I can tell you that Char is eligible for tribal enrollment and has drug her feet on this for years. I have been pushing her to do so lately and feel this posting about her is probably going to be good ammunition for me to get her to finally do it.
http://sundustoracle.charsundust.com/soi-w/about/
"Char trained for about three years with a half-Cheyenne half-German man. Soon after, she was taught by a Lakota woman for years through story-telling, ceremony, practice and prayer. She was adopted into the Means-Adams family. Barbara Means-Adams, taking on the role of mother, had a strong influence on building their relationship through daily practice of visionary skills."
Doesn't really add up with what you believe to be true about her. She's also quite high priced for her services. Around $1500 per person per year of "classes"(the further along you go the higher the price gets)...or you could buy her CD's....or pay individually @ $45 per class.....or call her in for special services such as weddings or house blessings.....
Seems like quite a bit of commercialism going on there and she's using a 3 year encounter with an unnamed Half-Cheyenne and a Lakota adoption as selling points....not to mention the old bios claiming other tribal ancestry and the legal name change. None of it makes her look very good....just expensive....IMHO....
Superdog
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I have to say one more thing about this... I have always regarded it as offensive when Westerners refer to my cultural traditions as superstitious. My people believe we are not our bodies but where bodies like a coat. as yoda would say... "luminous beings are we"
I have yet to hear anyone explain why I have consciousness in strictly material terms. To my way of thinking denying the possibility of spirit and the different phenomena associated with it is just as speculative as the various ways people try to define the supernatural. The only thing that matters at the end of the day is not whether Char qualifies as a shaman or a psychic or a Kalahari Antelope. The only thing that matters in the question of whether she is a fraud is does she get results.
I say she does. I have seen happy clientele. Even if she doesn't get perfection it doesn't matter because no one on this forum can point me to a doctor of any kind that has a 100 percent or even an 80 percent success rate, especially in the field mental health which is rife with phony science.
I am making a passionate defense for my friend and am sorry if in my passion I say anything to offend anyone. Its not my intention and hope you will look past that.
Ok Raven let start at the beginning! i am Lakota born on my reservation; live on my reservation; follow my traditional way of life, I understand spirit and healing with my people, i know my way of life lives, I am objecting to a WHITE woman who is making claims to who she is and we know its a lie. No one learn for three years to be a (shaman) let alone a woman, it takes a life time. It is nice that this woman is helping people and making money off them. I object to her using Native people as her
verification to what she does. I would like to know the names of this Cheyenne man and who gave him permission to do this.
Plus Mrs. Means does not speak for the Lakota Nation she speaks for herself for that matter either do i but I do have the right to question people.
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sundust huh? where do these twinkies get these names from? the women are more ridiculous than the men...........maybe im just jealous.
i have an ndn name but mine is nobody's business.....just know i really am ndn and that name was given not by a medicine man, nor in a ceremony, but by my grandfather.....AND like most tribes its a very private matter
i'd like to have a cool indian name......"blue star spirit wolf woman with a fist" sounds kinda cool....too bad im a male
i guess this post can be inserted in more than half the threads on here.....i just picked on this one because "sundust" is pretty corny and if i ever had any doubts on an ndn name this would be the one
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I am not techy enough to keep track of the different replies and do them justice. I also want to remind everyone that I am not one of Char's students or a client. The perspective you get with me is that of a life long friend. I have my own spirituality and haven't been looking for much additional guidance on it. We pal around.
I can say this, If anyone objects to a tuition of 1500 bucks for a year long program they haven't taken classes at the local community college recently and those are state subsidized programs where the student does NOT pay the full price of the tuition.
I recognize that some traditions don't like people to make money. Spiritual advisors are supposed to live in abject poverty or they are not spiritual according to some. This isn't my tradition so I recognize that some will object that Char maintains a fairly middle class lifestyle, but from my viewpoint it is not a salient issue. My people basically wouldn't trust her unless she were rich (which she definitely isn't) so chalk that up to different strokes...
I don't know who these Cheyenne people are, Char has only talked of certain mentors Barbara Means Adams being the most important but I can mention folks like Barbara's son Mel and Kenny Moses. Since Char shares her knowledge of many cultures I don't think its fair to charge her with pretending to be or speak for the Lakota and not all traditions require a person to study for decades before they can do healing work. And once again I have never heard her call herself a shaman. I have heard her describe some of her ceremonial work as shamanic but maybe its the writer in me I don't see that as the same thing.
My people describe a process not unlike being struck with the Holy Ghost and a person is fairly instantly indoctrinated in this way. A faith healer is a faith healer and if you don't believe in it so be it. they are a fraud if they don't produce anything of any value. That was the question put on the table and frankly discussing all these side issues while ignoring the main one is getting a little frustrating for me.
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milehighsalute,
Just wanted to tell you that the surname "Sundust" IS a native name. I met a guy years ago, who was fullblood, from Arizona and that was his actual last name. Now, why Char uses it, I cannot tell you.
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http://www.id.mundia.com/us/Search/Results?surname=SUNDUST&birthPlace=United%20States you are absolutely right....i was mistaken.....i apologize
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More details on the surname Sundust http://www.newagefraud.org/smf/index.php?topic=4132.msg36114#msg36114 (http://www.newagefraud.org/smf/index.php?topic=4132.msg36114#msg36114)
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If she can enroll which tribe? What is her really name that is
up for enrollment,
So Please tell what name she would enroll under.
And again
Hopefully Earthw7's questions will be answered. What name would Char enroll under, what tribe?
And yet again: What tribe, what band, what name?
If Char were really who she's told you she is, these would not be complicated or controversial questions.
There are many people here who follow the traditional spiritual ways of our respective cultures. There are others who do not, but who are respectful of those of us who do. If you think this about not believing in spiritual ways, you are arguing with the wrong people.
What it's about - what is fraud - is stated on the main page of our website, in most of the pinned threads, and repeatedly, directly to you, in this thread. Her claims to be working in an Indigenous healing tradition are not credible. She's a newage ceremony-seller who admits publicly to putting people in situations that could be very harmful. We can see by her own claims and practices that she's a fraud. But it would be good to find out who gave her the idea to do these things; though I think it's fair to assume she just made most of it up.
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1. actually I have encouraged Char to make her own case here and I believe she has already posted something or is about to....
2. What I am hearing is someone says Char said this or that and then changed her story. Does "someone" know Char and observed this behavior personally?
3. Also, I think its fair to ask again by what standard are we calling her a fraud? Is it because some of us believe there is no such thing as a psychic and therefore anyone claiming to be (or what amounts to the same thing) must be a fake?
1. She joined several weeks ago but hasn't yet posted.
2. No, we're going by what she has posted herself online. It keeps changing. And apparently the people she works with also keep changing her story. A healer should be ethical, and should be responsible for trying to refute false claims that others put out on her behalf.
3. RS, I think the biggest problem is she's claiming psychic traditions among people who don't have them. There is no such thing as an Apache psychic tradition.
And I'm not Lakota, but I've never heard of a Lakota psychic tradition either. Our Lakota members seem skeptical of that as well. I went looking for evidence of such a tradition but couldn't find one.
On another post you said your people don't have a problem with healers acquiring wealth. I don't think I've ever heard of any NDN tradition like that.
And again, that's not the tradition of the Apache, Cheyenne, or Lakota, which she claims to be or have learned from.
If she were to call herself simply another psychic, and not mention her alleged ancestry to try and draw people in to make money, I think most of us would have less of a problem with her.
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Greetings,
I found your website recently and want to clarify any misunderstandings or misrepresentations about my life work that your contributors seem to have. My work is the culmination of 20 years of research, study and practice. I also want to express my gratitude for your good work of checking people out and ensuring that their credentials are legitimate; and for trying to provide informative resources for people who are exploring either their roots or other traditions.
I am in the process of making sure that specific changes are made to the authorized book about my life you refer to on the site with both the author and the publisher. These changes should eliminate any misleading or incomplete information that could lead to certain assumptions that are not accurate.
The following should answer any queries about my ancestral heritage:
My adoptive father was Keith Leroy Meints. Keith was half Cheyenne River Sioux and half German. He was raised in Culbertson, Nebraska. My birth mother is Matilda Anne Goodrich who was married to Keith. She is of English, Irish and Apache descent.
When I was 21, Barbara Means-Adams (Russell Means’ second cousin) adopted me through the Lakota ceremony of Hunkapi…the making of relatives. She passed the women rituals on to me so that I could teach them. Barbara passed away in 2005.
Her son, and my hunka brother, is Mel Adams. His wife is an attorney, Lisa Adams. Mel had a New York pizzeria in Chadron, Nebraska and won the Minority Small Business Champion of the Year award from the SBA in 2012. Mel grew up following the traditional Lakota spiritual teachings. We all thought that was pretty wonderful. He is well regarded in the Oglala Sioux Tribe. Lisa is in house legal counsel for the Oglala Sioux Tribe. They are both remarkable people. I love and admire them so much. And there is James, Mel’s brother, who has a transmission shop in Chadron, too.
My name, Char Sundust, breaks down as follows: Char is short for Charlotte, which means, “strong woman” in England. Sundust was the name given to me by Keith, and it means, “passing one with the sun above all other obstacles.”
I also was given the Lakota name, napé wašté win, by Barbara Means Adams. To receive this name a ceremony was held. I love that she called me this. It means good hands woman.
This name impacted my work, which is to help people of many different lineages, because that is my background. My students carry lineages such as Yupik, Swedish, Mexican, Jewish, Japanese, English, Irish, Colville and Apache. For example, tonight I am teaching a class on relationships. I will open the class with a prayer and a poem from one or more of these diverse traditions, and then we will look at our criteria for being in a relationship. What are our requirements; and then, whether we are that person with those particular qualities (A Neural Linguistic Processing (NLP) exercise, I became a certified NLP practitioner because I appreciate the positive change I see in individuals through the NLP methods) This results in more self-respect and self-esteem. I also finish with a poem or prayer. This is an example of how and what I teach.
The core focus of my work is mentoring and educating diverse people from different cultures and of different age groups through my programs that are housed by Bastyr University in Kenmore Washington. I help others connect with their own lineage through seeking the common ground among us all.
Among the cultures we examine are Shinto, Christian, Mayan, African, and indigenous cultures including the Lakota and Apache – but only those passed on from Barbara and Keith. I practice and teach only what I have been given permission to which includes: drumming, singing and sharing about symbols and where they are found in different traditions, and their unique and common meanings. However, a lot of knowledge has been passed on to me that I do not share
In 1992, Barbara and I collaborated with Charles Jefferson on a cd project (IYAYE) for Everyone Has a Song productions.
I teach a program called “Spiritual Identity and Applied Spirituality” to empower others to connect with their own lineage to practice spirituality from a deeply personal place. I have developed a method of working with dreams and their meanings in a residential program called Dream Work. I also teach a year-long course on leadership and mentoring. I developed an internship program for mentors with experiential processes to assist others in reaching the next level in their personal and professional lives.
I support the Robert and Solana Natives Rising storytelling tour. I have been an advisory member on this board since its inception.
I am also on the board of Village which provides prenatal and birth services so all mothers have the best possible care.
I support Longhouse Media because I believe in the work Tracy Rector is doing in assisting indigenous peoples to use media as a tool for self-expression, cultural preservation and social change.
If there is any further information that you require, please contact me at: charsundust@comcast.net.
Sincerely,
Char Sundust
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The following should answer any queries about my ancestral heritage:
My adoptive father was Keith Leroy Meints. Keith was half Cheyenne River Sioux and half German. He was raised in Culbertson, Nebraska.
Welcome. I hope you will be able to have a further conversation here with us. I have some questions and concerns, others here may also. There are also questions through out this thread. Thank you.
Keith Leroy Meints, born 1939 Nebraska, died 1993 Washington state? Is this him in the 1940 federal census, Nebraska, with his family, all listed white, all born in Nebraska? https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/K9MQ-RZ8 (https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/K9MQ-RZ8) If so, I can see the German heritage on the Meints - Alberts side of the family, Keith's father. Do you know the surname of his mother, Elaine? If this is not the right family, could you tell us more about his Cheyenne River Sioux ancestry?
Your mother's Apache heritage, can you tell us more about this? What were the names of the ancestors with this heritage?
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Greetings,
...I am in the process of making sure that specific changes are made to the authorized book about my life you refer to on the site with both the author and the publisher. These changes should eliminate any misleading or incomplete information that could lead to certain assumptions that are not accurate.
The following should answer any queries about my ancestral heritage:
My adoptive father was Keith Leroy Meints. Keith was half Cheyenne River Sioux and half German. He was raised in Culbertson, Nebraska. My birth mother is Matilda Anne Goodrich who was married to Keith. She is of English, Irish and Apache descent.
When I was 21, Barbara Means-Adams (Russell Means’ second cousin) adopted me through the Lakota ceremony of Hunkapi…the making of relatives. She passed the women rituals on to me so that I could teach them. Barbara passed away in 2005.
Her son, and my hunka brother, is Mel Adams. His wife is an attorney, Lisa Adams. Mel had a New York pizzeria in Chadron, Nebraska and won the Minority Small Business Champion of the Year award from the SBA in 2012. Mel grew up following the traditional Lakota spiritual teachings. We all thought that was pretty wonderful. He is well regarded in the Oglala Sioux Tribe. Lisa is in house legal counsel for the Oglala Sioux Tribe. They are both remarkable people. I love and admire them so much. And there is James, Mel’s brother, who has a transmission shop in Chadron, too.
My name, Char Sundust, breaks down as follows: Char is short for Charlotte, which means, “strong woman” in England. Sundust was the name given to me by Keith, and it means, “passing one with the sun above all other obstacles.”
I also was given the Lakota name, napé wašté win, by Barbara Means Adams. To receive this name a ceremony was held. I love that she called me this. It means good hands woman....
Sincerely,
Char Sundust
Hello, I'm also glad you're here and hope you can help clear these matters up.
You gave a long list of causes you supported. I don't think anyone is disputing your intentions are likely good, but these causes are not relevant to our concerns.
I think all of us are glad you're working to change that bio to make it accurate. But could you tell us exactly what was inaccurate about it?
Your own website used to say you are Iroquois, no mention of Lakota or Apache. That suggests you weren't sure of your heritage in earlier years. There's certainly no shame in that, but touting your ancestry now as a sign of your authenticity is troubling.
As I said to your friend RS, I think the biggest concern is your claim to be psychic and that it's touted as part of either Apache or Lakota tradition, when neither people had such traditions as best I know.
I'm not sure about the claim on what your name means either. I'm not a Lakota speaker, but I doubt it means "passing with the sun" etc. A quick check of an online dictionary shows their word for sun is wi, not sundust or anything close to it.
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i would like to ask what are these women rituals you claimed where passed down to u
and what right did Barbara have to pass down to you?
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I hope Char will answer the questions already asked, they are important.
Char says her mother's ancestry includes Apache. But her genealogy can be traced back several generations, and we only see white heritage listed in records.
Char's maternal grandparents are Conrad H Goodrich and Charlotte Irene Guinn. In the 1940 federal census Conrad Goodrich and his parents are in Wyoming, white, both parents from Nebraska. Also in the 1940 census Charlotte Guinn and her parents are in Wyoming, white, parents from Kansas and Wyoming.
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One more update about Char, her stepfather Keith Meints whom she claims is Cheyenne is white in the 1940 census and as is his parents goimg back several decades. And grandparents are also white.
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Greetings,
I would like to offer some points of clarification: I do have Iroquois and Mexican in my heritage. My great-grandfather, Edward Smith, was born in Mexico.
My specific and comprehensive heritage will be reflected on my website. As we know, there are, and were, many who do not enroll in census for their own reasons. My grandmother and grandfather chose to not participate for racial reasons. They also changed their names, which was common practice due to racial issues at that time. I trust my parents, grandparents, and elders in these matters and how they raised me to honor all their ways.
I have integrated and appreciate so much my mixed lineage and honor the spirituality of each lineage joined in me.
I am grateful to have had, and still have, mentors, teachers, and elders whom I deeply trust to clarify and guide me in the most beneficial directions for me to serve well.
Sincerely,
Char Sundust
charsundust@comcast.net
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Since the Iroquois are not a tribe but group of tribes which nation do you come from
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The tribes keep their own records. If someone and their ancestors are not known to the tribe, it means they are either non-Native or their family assimilated so long ago that they are no longer culturally Native. If the tribe doesn't claim you, you're not Native.
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As we know, there are, and were, many who do not enroll in census for their own reasons. My grandmother and grandfather chose to not participate for racial reasons. They also changed their names, which was common practice due to racial issues at that time.
Char, I have a different view of census than you, I would not use the word "enroll", in my experience censuses are a list of those counted in a specific area at a specific time. Not everyone is counted in each federal or state census, but many are. Census takers are people of their time, some information is inaccurate, sometimes because of the census taker themselves, sometimes because what neighbors report, sometimes because of what the families themselves report.
That said, census can help in genealogy work. They can provide possible pieces to the puzzle.
As Kathryn has said, tribes keep their own records.
You mention grandparents, are you speaking of your maternal or paternal grandparents? If your maternal grandparents are Conrad H Goodrich and Charlotte Irene Guinn, they are both in 1930 and 1940 federal census.
I do have Iroquois and Mexican in my heritage. My great-grandfather, Edward Smith, was born in Mexico.
You know, being born in Mexico doesn't necessarily mean anything other than being born in Mexico. Are you claiming that this ancestor's birth in Mexico means you have more spiritual insight?
Edward Smith, is this a paternal or maternal great grandfather?
Iroquois? Which Nation? Why do you claim any of this to promote yourself?
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I notice that Charlotte Goodrich AKA Char Sundust
(charsundust@comcast.net http://www.newagefraud.org/smf/index.php?action=profile;u=6269)
was active a couple of days after the questions in the previous post were asked (more than five years ago), but she chose not to answer them.
This woman is still very active. The URL of her homepage is now:
http://sundustoracle.charsundust.com/soi-w/ (http://sundustoracle.charsundust.com/soi-w/). ["Sundust Oracle Institute"]
Her bio has changed (again) and is now here, which I quote in full with my bolding:
About Char Sundust
Char Sundust is a spiritual director, mentor, teacher, and healer. She provides ceremony for convocations, graduations, and the celebrations and life passages all human beings experience. She has a healing practice integrating ancient and cutting edge technologies so more healing modalities, are available, as all healing begins with the soul. She works with many cross-cultural practices, including shamanism, as there are remnants of shamanic practice on all continents of the world. Char comes from a rich cross-cultural heritage which has inspired her to create programs for people to recover and discover their ancestral root, and spiritual identity and apply these learnings to support a deeply personal spiritual practice that can be applied to change our internal world which creates positive change in the external world. She has developed a program to assist those who want to access their inherent body wisdom and to cultivate and develop and recognize their intuitive nature and body wisdom, and to recognize the voice of Spirit in their own natures. She has developed numerous programs for personal, professional, and spiritual development, including a year-long Leadership and Mentorship course, a program for personal healing and soul work, applied spirituality program, a program for writers, writing as spiritual practice called “flow”, and a couple’s workshop for people in long-term, committed relationships, because we bring ourselves to any relationship we are in.
Char has been the resident spiritual advisor and mentor at Bastyr University and works with IT communities, corporations, businesses, and universities to create an environment of mutuality and humanity where everyone wins. She does one on one mentorships for personal, professional and spiritual development, mentoring individuals and groups to go to the next level in their health and wellbeing creative, emotional, spiritual, and professional lives.
Some of the places her work has been seen and heard are on KEXP, and KZOK, The Jeff Renner show, and Evening Magazine. Also on NPR, in collaboration with Charles Jefferson and her adopted Lakota mom Barbara Means Adams in Iyaye. She also has monthly podcasts that can be found at medicine media. She is the co-author of God, Death, and Poetry with William Whittman and contributing author to Altar-Making. She is an award-winning poet and her poetry can be heard on Thousands of miles with David Close.
Char is deeply committed to the sustainability of nature and attending to the earth’s well-being. She assists individuals in achieving their destinies through spiritual practice and personal accountability. She is a bridge of the many cultural wisdoms we have access to at this time to create tangible, positive change in our internal and external environments. Char comes from a rich, spiritual background. She is grateful for the wisdom and learning passed down to her from her Apache, Mexican, English, Irish, and German ancestors. She also thanks her adoptive mother, Barbara Means Adams who was Lakota-Sioux. She is honored to be a protégé of Angeles Arrien and her work in transpersonal psychology and the four fold way. She thanks all of these ancestors and is grateful for all that has been given her to serve and preserve what is good, true, and lasting.
Then she is now on Facebook with two profiles:
https://www.facebook.com/charsundust [Char Sundust]
https://www.facebook.com/soi.sundust [Sundust Oracle Institute]
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From Yelp reviews: https://www.yelp.com/biz/sundust-oracle-institute-seattle
You may find her quite helpful in your time of need, but you are signing up to be manipulated, and vulnerable in ways you may regret later.
... I now have some significant concerns about the safety of those who would take her on as a spiritual teacher and mentor.
... I can see now that there were numerous times when she really overstepped her area of expertise and people let her amidst this air of specialness. She has no medical or psychological qualification, I recall numerous times when she gave (paid) medical or psychological advice to myself or others. For example, she told me assuredly that one friend's involvement in her classes would cure his new severe psychotic mental illness. (It didn't)... Another time that a tooth I had injured climbing would just heal. (It didn't).
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Several other parts from those reviews I think need to be posted.
"I was a student of Char Sundust and assisted with many of her programs from 2007 to 2015....
I was relieved when the day for talking finally came, to have a chance, I thought, to resolve a serious concern. I was wrong -- very wrong. She called me 15 minutes after our scheduled 15 min meeting. She lied to me within the first two minutes of the call. I let her speak first, thinking she would surely want to hear clarification on my concerns and the (verifiable) facts surrounding them, but that never came, even when I later asked for it directly. Instead, she berated me, threatened me that the whole community would think poorly of me and reject me for speaking out, claimed psychic knowledge of my (unbeknownst to me) evil motives, poked at what she believed to be my vulnerabilities, tried over and over to exert her "teaching" power over me and turn the conversation from its original purpose into an assessment of her perception of my weaknesses and the far too common new age lie that everything that I witnessed was really just a reflection of what was inside me. She repeatedly slung at me "facts" I knew objectively to be false and could disprove with objective evidence, and generally tried to undermine my sense of reality about what I witnessed (and she did not). Not surprisingly, none of this remotely resembled her noble-sounding teachings around accountability.
....I do not believe anyone should be involved with a teacher who will not be honest and accountable and avoid any temptation to control others through subversive tactics for their own self-interest."
Before I'd argued she was a naive woman with vague unproved claims of ancestry grasping at straws. Now she's become destructive and is building a cult like following with cult tactics and behavior. Moved to Frauds.
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[…]http://www.eco-res.com/eco-res.asp?page=groups_assemblage (http://www.eco-res.com/eco-res.asp?page=groups_assemblage)
I will quote this bio in full, to compare with later bios (my boldings):
Some of those who inspire us...
Char Sundust is a shamanic practitioner with strong ancestral lineage of medicine work and experiential training. Her love of Spirit and medicine began at her beginning - her work truly is to bring herself into the right relationship with the divine; and her work is to guide and mentor others in discovering the invisible in their own personal culture.
Char's mother encouraged her visions by asking if the ghosts Char began seeing at the age of five were friendly or not. Her mother explained that if the ghosts were friendly they were good allies. If they were not, they were invited to exit. People need to know how to set boundaries, and how to exit a spirit if they need to exit it. One of the things that Char has noticed is that people need support when they are seeing, hearing, or feeling the spirits around them. She had the gift of understanding people around her, and innately knew who was willing to support her, and to help her focus and hone her skills.
At the age of fourteen, Char began her training where she started learning medicine work in the Cheyenne tradition taught by her stepfather. As medicine work has been the focus on Char's life since childhood, she has performed psychic readings for nearly twenty years. In addition, Char is currently a practitioner of shamanic healing art and teaches classes and workshops at the Sundust Oracle Institute, a center for healing and teaching, founded in 2002. Char travels worldwide performing soul retrievals, house blessings spirit readings, and leading student apprentices on shamanic journeys. She guides others to discover the ability of each person to connect clearly, to develop all of his/her senses, to accept the challenge that is rich with contentment of healing and giving and receiving guidance. This discovery heals, loves and teaches in a way that makes a difference in both realities.
Barbara Means-Adams, a Lakota author and story teller was Char's mentor for five years. She later completed her two year apprenticeship with Sheila Belanger, a shamanic practitioner and astrologer.
Sundust is the medicine name given to Char by her first teacher at sixteen years of age after two years of intense training. It is an Apache family name.
(There are five more bios on that page, including big-time fraud Alberto Villoldo.)
The above bio also contains Char Sundust's claim of "Cheyenne tradition". Her claimed Cheyenne heritage has been discussed here in this thread, especially in posts beginning on November 20, 2013. It diminished from the "Cheyenne stepfather" to where she herself here in the thread claimed he was "half Cheyenne River Sioux and half German", while our genealogists found that he was not at all Cheyenne nor any other tribe. And note, all references to Cheyenne are gone in her present biography on her own page:
Her bio has changed (again) and is now here …:http://sundustoracle.charsundust.com/soi-w/about-char-sundust/ (http://sundustoracle.charsundust.com/soi-w/about-char-sundust/)
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I've followed this thread since its inception due to having friends, acquaintances, and colleagues affiliated Char Sundust, and I check on it every few years. I was taken one of her classes and never returned, put off by her trying to get us to connect to the earth by listening to new age music, her talk of her personal chef, and despite that, charging me $45 to attend when I wasn't financially stable.
I've since learned not voice any criticism I have about her to people who are still mentored by her, and who utilize Char as a mental health counselor despite Char's lack of training or professional oversight and accountability. I won't deny that SOME of these people have benefited and grown personally a bit from her help, but her power of them has never sat right with me. They've also mentioned that they do not share certain information with her for fear that other members of the circle will find out, which needless to say isn't right for a person who is in the role of mentor, therapist and guru.
I am the same product of the Seattle New Age scene that Epiphany, and know well how this kind of hodge-podge, culturally-appropriating and personal-empowering New Age spirituality is used to bypass the deeper and much harder work of processing personal trauma. I've met followers who have fallen out with her who have been lost and confused afterward, totally disassociated from reality after their immersion into her feel-good world of psychic powers, divination, and feeling of spiritual connection.
I'm posting this now to back up Educated Indian's post from last year. Be wary of her. One should always be able to think critically about a spiritual teacher, and if not, something is wrong. Also, I highly recommend seeing a qualified professional for mental health issues, in addition to a spiritual teacher if spiritual guidance is important to you. They are rarely one and the same, and it helps do develop a more stable sense of self not to give one person so much power and authority over of one's mind.