Healing Together : The Medicine of Todos Santos
Baja Sustainable / Be Well Mandala
by @Namaste La Onda Natural
How do you feel? What do you need? How can I help?; these are the three essential questions in any and all medicinal practices.
Todos Santos is known for being a town of yogis, meditators, farmers, surfers, artists, musicians, writers, filmmakers, designers, and famous people who choose to come here to nurture their bodies, their minds, and their souls in a family oriented, natural and free, lifestyle. Just like you and I, all in the pursuit of happiness and peace.
Healing is part of it, because in this life we are all healing something at one point or the other. Science has so far proven that a broken heart, a stressed mind, a lost soul, are all conditions experienced by human beings, and can fracture the electromagnetic field of the body/mind/soul triad making us vulnerable to viruses, bacteria, and fungus, who can then overload the human system and eat it away. It is not coincidence that ancestral medicine recommends to sit with a happy liver, and live with an open heart, honoring what we tend to forget, which is that the human body/mind/soul triad is the highest technology. Hence 2020, and the awareness of focusing our attention on the breath, so we can observe our sensations as they arise and pass away, obeying only the ultimate natural law of change, in the awareness, equanimity and wisdom that arises from your own personal experience.
Understanding that life and death are a natural cycle of being human, might be helpful when we get disoriented looking for the eternal youth and artificial intelligence to keep us immortal and free from illness.
To answer the inquiry of many regarding the medicinal practices offered in the land of Todos Santos, I, as usual, turn to you, the community. Medicinal practices are and have been through out history a result of the dynamic between people health issues and the wisdom that the land itself has to offer to those with a vocation of helping others, who in these modern times we call doctors.
The doctor archetype has taken many forms through time; in México we have called them curandero/as, huesero/as, hierbero/as, shamane/as, abuelita/os, nahuales, y la santísima virgen, before we came to integrate the concept that arose from the west, the Doctor in Medicine. Doctor is he or she who has long time knowledge and experience, who has study the medicine, practice it, and has the confidence to rely on what he or she knows to offer help to those who have forgotten how to heal themselves. As a collective, we all have forgotten as a result of the Industrial Era, that collected all wisdom and applied it into what we know today as the pharmaceutical industry. It is known that those in power, greedy for the richness and control that power can give you, actively dedicated themselves to deny the value of natural medicine, natural immunity, and the understanding on the human cosmic nature. This effort eventually erased all awareness about the nature of humanity; when in harmony, it heals itself. You know? Like when a child cuts its skin, and the skin regenerates immediately.
Certainly, pollution of nature, toxic products of the era, and ignorance of how to take care of the body, as a temple, play its role in the deep issues we as people try to heal. The elephant in the room cannot be ignored, and the so called pandemia brought to light many unbalances currently dominating society. Topics such as food intake, body activity, mind balance, wrong beliefs, and the practice of charlatans who organize as institutions and make medicine a market came to light.
Todos Santos energy magnetic field, the landlines that go through it, the minerals that make its land, the electro-conductivity of the ocean water and its crystals, are known to have an impact on those who visit and eventually return to stay. Some say it is the family principles that locals take as their order of things, some say it is the retreat from the business of the cities, some say it is simply the ability to walk barefoot on the sand as you move from one place to the other (as many places in Baja, we in Todos Santos still manage to keep the land undeveloped avoiding the illness that are brought by cement. Blessed be.
But if you ask me, I will tell you that it is all about its people and their volition to help each other. That is why I reached out to the community to ask: What medicinal practices is Todos Santos practicing today?
Here is what I found out: Workshops dedicated to sexual healing, by Rachel; Offerings, mostly in English, in a wide spectrum of prices. (Everybody mentioned the need for more Bilingual offerings that locals can afford); Yoga community classes in Spanish at 50 pesos a class, by Marimar; Shamanic practices with psychedelic plants to go with the trend of deprogramming and connecting again with nature; Nutrition and remote healing; medical astrology and herbalist treatment; therapeutic massages and chiropractics, a stupa open to all kinds of meditation; music, surf and arts festivals; FITT (Functional Integrated Training and Techniques, by the House of Healing Waters; Fisioteraphy and Rehabilitation with Arial acrobat Dulce Cháves; energetic temazcales, alternative medicine; float and sauna by Baja Bliss who treat Lyme diseases, arthritis, recovery from surgery, mold toxicity; yoga positive vibes by Dooley from Sal Y Sol Baja; Kirtan Jams and Sound Baths at La Dicha; joyful community at Munchies; and last but not least allopathic medicine, and clinic services, and great body/mind practices at Cuatro Vientos.
From all the great people who reached out in kindness to help our research, the answer of Dr. Mark Waters arose as beneficial. Dr. Water, a Board Certified Doctor of Chiropractic and aso Board Certified Physical Therapist, he has practice his medicine in Todos Santos for the last 17 years, and offered his perspective regarding the changes he has experienced in Todos Santos since then. He said: “As you can imagine in the nearly two decades I have been here, I have seen a great deal of changes in both the patients I see, and also the things I see them for. In the early years ie before the mass explosion of humanity here, the people were coming in for many physical reasons as they were building, creating, growing things in this emerging zone, they would get physically and mentally exhausted; and we would focus on things that would reverse those stresses. More physically than mentally. Remembering that we honored our siestas and understood that everything can’t always happen immediately. Now with all the technology and increase in Expats able to operate under a new business model and the increased demand on services and expectations of how they should be delivered has changed people’s mental state and shifted to a more mental health issue. People are generally being more sedentary and staying too connected to the technology and its causing obvious physical weakness due to the inactivity. I see failed movement patterns that are becoming more common due to the excessive siting and fixed head gaze to the screens that people use. And of course due to the lack of physical movement and the over usage of the internet the body build up an imbalance in the physical, mental, and biochemical balance and then disease starts up and reeks its havoc on the being. Applying that to our lives we need to look at how we use our time, are we balanced ie our business and personal live."
As a person still in the journey of healing, I would not dare to tell you which is best or what is better for you; if something I have learned through my own healing it is that only you know how your body/mind feels and what is that you need to feel whole. What I can tell you is that it is true that, as terrestrial beings, we are all gifted with a body which in its natural state is constantly healing; its biological system constantly regenerating and re-organizing in a way that heals all conditions, when the body/mind relationship is in balance, and the soul lives with an open heart. How do you heal? Be sure to reach out to us and share your favorite medicinal practice when you visit Todos Santos, or any other place in our Earth; write us and let us know what has been your experience and how it has helped you feel better; those of us who love La Baja know by experience that it is united in unconditional friendship and peace, freedom and harmony, supported by the very community we cultivate and care for in honor of its natural cycles, that together...
...we heal.
THE ENLIGHTENMENT TODOS SANTOS STUPA
"The Enlightenment Stupa is the power point for our community gathering center. Both continue to take shape. Our most recent project is the completion of a tent structure that will house our kid's weekend at the end of this month as well as our weekly practices.
We are bringing a diverse group of children together for playful activities with art, the earth and each other. We will be doing more of this, as well as hosting Spanish and English classes and other activities that welcome all - all languages, all cultures, all skin color, all socioeconomics.
Our weekly sangha practice (in Tibetan, Spanish and English language) is on Sundays at 10:30 am in the tent on the land (part of it growing organic strawberries) here in Pescadero. We also host a Vajra dance on Mondays at Cuatro Vientos in Todos Santos. We would love to have you join us, and/or a simple visit to our humbly expanding location.
The best way to help us is to write about us - who we are, what our intention is in being here in El Pescacdero, in this unique time and place. We are happy to meet you in person."
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