Hollow Bone Medicine: When Life Says It’s Just Time
At some point on the spiritual path, you may come across the phrase “become a hollow bone.” I heard it in a shamanic ceremony ages ago—and it has stayed with me ever since.
At first, it sounds sort of lovely and mystical, you know? Hollow bone. Until you realize what it actually means: life is about to hoover the crap out of your entire sense of self.
What a Hollow Bone Actually Is
A hollow bone is the shamanic way of describing a person who’s cleared out enough inner clutter that wisdom, intuition, and guidance can flow more easily through them.
It’s not your overthinking mind.
It’s not your inner perfectionist gremlin.
It’s not the part of you still trying to make your family proud or fit in with whatever tribe you’re trying to fit in with.
Hollow bone = open channel.
Unfortunately, getting hollowed out can sometimes feel . . . well, a little brutal. It doesn’t have to be, but if you’re resisting the letting go? Buckle up.
Hollow Bone Symptoms
Your energy collapses
Everything you thought you wanted suddenly feels like it no longer fits
You’re exhausted, confused, emotional (sad, angry, you name it), and allergic to small talk
Your identity is molting off your body like a pair of jeans three sizes too small
The mind will say: What’s wrong with me? What happened to my excitement about life? Why do I feel like someone has punched the stuffing out of me?
Congratulations. You’re not broken. You’re being hollowed.
When Life Brings Out the Hoover
The hollowing is when life comes in with its turbo vacuum cleaner and starts sucking out all the debris that no longer serves you:
The old roles you overperformed
The caretaking contracts your soul never signed
The family or workplace dynamics that require your entire life force just to stay in the room
The identity you built to feel safe
The version of you who needed to hold everything together
The pressure to be “on,” “inspired,” “sparkly,” or “successful”
Life says: Nope. Out it goes. All of it. Let’s make some space in here.
On your better days, you think, Cool cool—this isn’t my first rodeo. I got this rewiring thing in the bag!
And on the sucky days, you curl up in a ball questioning everything, including your very purpose on the planet.
The Wildly Inconvenient Truth
You can’t be a hollow bone and full of old identities at the same time. You just can’t.
Something has to go.
The hollowing is the initiation.
It’s the ego detox.
The emotional garage sale.
The Craigslist-ing or Marie Kondo-ing of everything you used to cling to.
What Begins to Emerge
Once the clearing settles—even just a little—you start to feel something new take shape:
A deeper groundedness.
A voice that actually sounds like you.
Creative impulses that feel clean instead of performative.
Guidance that shows up with ease, free of force.
A kind of excitement that’s not necessarily fiery, but steady, quiet, and real.
That’s the hollow bone.
That’s the channel.
That’s the version of you that doesn’t need to try—because she just is. She always was.
If You’re in the Hollowing…
And you’re reading this thinking, This hollowing phase blows and I want out—let me just say: I get it. Welcome to the club. As Alan Watts says, “Freedom is not the absence of pain. It’s the absence of resistance to it.”
All we can do is try to remember: when you feel like you’re falling apart, it’s likely because you’re preparing for something even more true flow through.
You’re not losing yourself.
You’re just shedding the parts that were never you to begin with.
Amen.
