This articles bears direct relevance to the one preceding it. It attempts to answer the question of what enables some obviously traumatized, seriously disturbed members of a sociocultural group to attain the important stabilizing identity of a shaman or faith healer, while others succumb to their unresolved conflicts and become identified as "sick." A metapsychological proposition is offered by the authors, implying the existence of an "ethnic unconscious." Those individuals who are capable of communicating their idiosyncratic primary process productions in symbols that resonate with the symbolic system of the ethnic unconscious retain their capacity to remain integrated with society. Also, their defensive structure must be "culturally sanctioned," their role corresponding with that of an artist in our society. A detailed presentation of a Philippine female faith healer comprises the bulk of the article.