The Totemism is an anthropological concept that designates a metaphysical relationship between a man or a group of people and an animal, a vegetable or a mineral. Totemism was, and still is, spread in North America, Australia, Egypt, Oceania etc. The shamans of each tribe were responsible that through their visions, to find the animal, plant or mineral totem of each new-born. This is happening when there is an individual totemism and not a group one.
It is recommended for us to know who is our totem. Why? Because in the internal worlds, through meditation, if we call our totem mentally, this will help us enter in more profound stages of meditation. We must not forget that the totem is a part of our own Being who connects us with Mother Nature. Our Being sometimes dresses in the form of a totemic animal that corresponds to us. Normally this is the animal form that the soul, our essence, had a very long time ago when it was experiencing the Animal Kingdom and with which (within this animal form) we were very happy.
Thus, if we could have the totem in our own home, this would convert into a guardian of our personal life, of our home, that is why it is very important to know our totem. How can we get to know it? Therefore, the old Red Skins, the Apaches, the Creeks, when they wanted a youth who reached his sexual maturity to know his totem, they took him in a cave in the middle of the nature and they submitted him to a nine days fast. During these nine days this person had to ask the Great Spirit of Nature, called Wakan Tanka or Manitoba, that is the Eternal Father, to show him his totem. Then, some of these indigenous received images about their totem through dreams, for example, the great chief of the Sioux named Crazy Horse saw a horse walking like crazy, or running with speed; this was his totem and for that he was called The Crazy Horse. Without doubt that this totem was showing itself in this way to indicate the fact that this part of his Being had such a strength like a horse who went crazy. The great chief of the Apaches called Sitting Bull saw a bull that sat down and he assumed this name, Sitting Bull. And so on successively... White Feather, who was a great chief of another group, the Cherokees, saw a white feather falling from the sky and this was his totem, The White Feather. Certainly that this feather was part of an animal, a falcon or an eagle.
Therefore, if we would know our own totem and we would have it beside us, respecting it and caring for it properly, this would give us in return a lot of moral and spiritual strength, would help us in the better understanding of our inner nature as well as the exterior nature, in the practices of meditation and would confer us a lot of protection. It is good to know, for example, that all cats, basically, filter the negative of bad energies, for these malevolent energies not to reach their owners. Even if it seems incredible, cats are capable to sacrifice themselves, getting to give their lives when a malignant energy enters the house (they prefer to die before they see their owners die). We must know that a black tomcat has a lot of strength and can take a person in the astral world in a conscious state, that is helping that person to experience a conscious astral duplication.
All these things speak to us about a world which, unfortunately, the contemporary man ignores totally.
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Gnostic Anthropology 
