The following article is written by our favourite intuitive energy healer & guide, Corrina Choe. Corrina is a shamanic clairvoyant, spiritual healer and trusted mentor who’s helped so many people in the Head + Heart community heal deep wounds, discover their medicine, and step into their gifts. Here, she explains what a power retrieval is and how this specific ceremony can support deep personal reclamation. At Head + Heart, we’ve personally experienced this ceremony, and highly recommend Corrina. Enjoy this Q&A with Corrina Choe.
What is a power retrieval?
A Power Retrieval is a profound shamanic healing process that has been practiced by Indigenous and Earth-based cultures across the globe for thousands of years. Though names and rituals may differ from tribe to tribe. From the Q’ero of the Andes, to the Sami of the North, to the First Nations of North America, to Buddhism and Shinto the core principle remains the same: A restoration of lost soul energy and the return of your vital essence.
In the shamanic worldview, trauma, deep emotional pain, prolonged stress, and life-altering events can cause what is known as soul loss or “power loss.” When we endure suffering, pieces of our energy – our joy, strength, innocence, intuition, creativity, confidence, and even our ability to love – can fragment and become inaccessible. This soul fragmentation is not metaphorical; it’s an energetic reality recognized by ancient wisdom traditions.
These fragments don’t disappear, they simply step out of reach, retreating to protect themselves until it’s safe to return. The problem is, without these parts, you feel like something essential is missing. You may feel unfulfilled, anxious, disconnected, chronically fatigued, lost in patterns of self-sabotage, or unable to experience lasting joy. It’s like wandering through life with a piece of you that you left behind, always searching for something you can’t quite name.
Power Retrieval is the sacred act of calling those lost pieces home. When your power is restored, your energetic field becomes whole again. The spiral of suffering begins to unwind. You reconnect with your inner compass. Your life aligns. You feel more present, more empowered, more you. While this is not a quick fix, it is deep medicine. It is ceremony. It is alchemy.
How have power retrievals been used in different communities, historically, around the world?
As a ceremony, power retrieval has been practiced for thousands of years by cultures around the world as a way to restore lost energy or soul fragments caused by trauma, grief, or shock. Indigenous tribes across the Americas use shamanic journeying and ritual to call back these lost parts and bring a person back into spiritual wholeness. In Tibetan Buddhism, practices like visualization, mantra, and deity work are used to heal spiritual fragmentation and reconnect with one’s true essence. In Japanese Shinto, rituals such as misogi (spiritual purification) and ancestral offerings are used to cleanse and restore the spirit, rebalancing energy after emotional or spiritual disturbances. Though the methods vary, these traditions all share the belief that healing requires the return of vital energy and a reconnection with the sacred self.
In my practice, rooted in Core Shamanism and expanded through my own integrative approach, I’ve customized Power Retrieval to be a deeply empowering experience for the client. Through guided shamanic journeying and connection with a Spirit Guide, clients are supported in reclaiming their own lost power-retrieving it themselves and welcoming it home into their body, mind, and spirit.
Using my clairvoyant abilities, I’m able to see exactly where the power was lost, whether in this lifetime or another – and gently guide the client through tracking their energy during the journey. I hold space and offer subtle guidance as they move through timelines, memories, and soul layers, sometimes helping them reach the precise moment in the past where the disconnection occurred. My approach is always rooted in empowerment: I do not retrieve the power for them; I support them in becoming their own healer, reconnecting with their truth, and stepping back into their fullness with clarity, sovereignty, and strength.
On occasion, when a client is too overwhelmed or emotionally blocked to connect directly with their Spirit Guide, I will journey on their behalf. Even in these instances, I keep the client energetically included in the process to ensure that the retrieval is done with them, not for them. Once the soul part or lost power is located, we complete the integration process together, grounding it gently and intentionally into their system. Whether they walk the path directly or through guided support, the healing remains theirs to claim and embody.
How did you start working with this shamanic technique?
When I first began studying Shamanism, I felt an immediate pull toward soul and power retrieval. Looking back, I realize now that it was because I deeply needed that healing for myself. About five years ago, I experienced my first power retrieval session. It was undeniably powerful—but something didn’t fully resonate. The practitioner did most of the work, and while I was grateful, I felt more like a passive recipient than an empowered participant in my own healing. I knew then that there was another way—one where the client could be an active part of their transformation.
How has the ceremony of power retrieval shifted your own path?
I began exploring power retrieval in my own life, with the intention of creating a practice that blends clairvoyant guidance with deep client empowerment. Over the years, I’ve journeyed many times with my Spirit Guides, returning to strong memories and lost moments, retrieving pieces of myself I didn’t even realize were missing. What surprised me most was how often I believed I had already healed those parts—but during the power retrieval, something clicked, and I could feel my power returning. It was like remembering who I was before I had to forget.
Power retrieval is deeply transformational. I’ve even received them in my dreams – vivid, emotional moments where I found myself comforting the version of me who had been hurt, silenced, or unseen. In one dream, I ran toward a crying version of myself and wrapped her in love, reminding her she was worthy, seen, and safe. That, too, was a form of soul or power retrieval—meeting your own essence with compassion and bringing it home.
Having access to this sacred medicine has felt like a gift beyond words. It has saved me lifetimes of searching, lifetimes of trying to heal the parts of myself that once felt unreachable; the deepest wounds that many of us carry through time and space. These are the layers we spend lifetimes trying to unravel, and power retrieval has opened a pathway straight to the heart of that healing.
Through this work, I’ve stepped fully into both my human strength and my divine essence. It’s allowed me to access not only my psychic abilities, but a deep knowing that goes far beyond intuition – it’s a direct connection to truth, to spirit, and to the soul.
What I’ve come to understand is that we give our power away more often than we realize. We hand it over when we silence our truth to please others, when we abandon our intuition in favor of someone else’s opinion, or when we feel we don’t have a choice. It can be as subtle as nodding in agreement when we disagree inside, or as deep as lifelong patterns of people-pleasing and self-doubt. And it’s not about blaming anyone—our parents, our bosses, our friends usually don’t mean to take our power. But still, the fragmentation happens.
Every time I’ve done a power retrieval; I’ve felt a shift. More energy, more clarity, more life. It’s like your perception sharpens, your body feels more grounded, and the light inside you burns just a little brighter. Sometimes we don’t even realize a piece of us has been missing, until it returns.
This work isn’t just powerful. It’s sacred. And it’s available to all of us.
About Corrina
Corrina has been one of our long-time go-to guides here at Head + Heart. You can learn more about her intuitive and energy healing work on her website. Find her on Instagram. And book a private session with Corrina here.
