UNTOLD MEDICINE
Come with me on a journey to the unexplored side of medicine where we speak with rebel doctors, radical herbalists, unorthodox healers, and patients who have healed themselves. Explore the intersection between science & spirituality and discover the power within you. Hosted by Dr. Michele Burklund
UNTOLD MEDICINE
Dr. Rosita Arvigo: Embracing Maya Shamanic Healing and the Secrets of the Belizean Rainforest
Venturing deep into the Belizean rainforest, we're guided by the wisdom of Dr. Rosita Arvigo, a visionary in the realm of natural healing and ethnobotany. Our latest episode paints a vivid portrait of her life-altering journey to an apprentice of Don Eligio Panti, a revered Maya shaman healer. Through Rosita's narrative, we trace the delicate dance of blending ancient Mayan practices crafting a holistic approach to wellness that thrives on the synergy of spiritual and physical healing.
The tapestry of stories Rosita shares is rich with the threads of cultural exchange, the spiritual depth of Maya traditions, and the laughter that often accompanies healing. Picture the morning ritual of collecting jungle herbs and the intricate art of Mayan abdominal massage. Rosita's recounting of her mentorship under Don Eligio is not just an academic study; it's a heartwarming journey through shared humanity, where humor warms the soul, and the wisdom of the ancients is infused into every treatment and teaching.
This episode is a treasure trove for anyone interested in the intersection of tradition and science, as Rosita also delves into her contributions to ethnobotanical research and the global dissemination of Mayan healing techniques. From the unveiling of "Rainforest Remedies" and "Messages from the Gods" to her passion for teaching and preserving this rich heritage, Rosita's conviction in the power of nature's pharmacy is as inspiring as the lush backdrop of Belize itself. Whether you're drawn to the spiritual, intrigued by plant medicine, or simply in love with the idea of a life intertwined with the natural world, this conversation is a gateway to a different perspective on health and healing.
Want to watch the video version of the interview? Click here.
Welcome to the podcast Medicine Untold and come with me on a journey to the unexplored side of medicine, where we speak with rebel doctors, radical herbalists, unorthodox healers and patients who have healed themselves. Explore the intersection between science and spirituality and discover the power within you. I'm your host, Dr. Michele Burklund, licensed naturopathic doctor, botanical alchemist and practicing physician. Everyone welcome today. Today we have Dr. Rosita Arvigo with us. Today we have Dr Rosita Arvigo with us and I am going to introduce you to our audience so they can get an understanding of your whole background.
Dr. Michele Burklund:So Dr Rosita Arvigo is a doctor of naprapathy, ethnobotanist, spiritual healer and author of six books on traditional healing of Central America. Dr Arvigo has lived among Maya in San Ignacio, Belize, for the past 35 years. For 13 of those years, she apprenticed with the most famous Maya shaman healer, Don Eligio Panti, who was born in Guatemala. Not only has Rosita's life kept Maya medicine alive, but she has been instrumental in cataloging and preserving thousands of healing plants and trees of Belize through her work in the New York Botanical Garden and the Belize Ethnobotany Project. So welcome today. I'm excited to have you. Thank you.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:I love being here. Thanks, the monkeys outside just started. So if you hear that, it's not a monster, it's just a howler monkey.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Oh, that's great. Now, that adds to the ambiance, I think. So that kind of leads me into the first question too. So I want to hear about how you ended up in Belize, because I know that you moved your family, you purchased land and you had a vision. So I want to hear about how you ended up in Belize, because I know that you moved your family, you purchased land and you had a vision.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:So I kind of want to hear about how you ended up where you are in Belize after living seven years in Guerrero, Mexico, with the Nahuatl people, where I first began my serious study on healing and medicinal plants after graduating from the College of Naprapathy. It was in the 1980s and in 1980s there was a push by the FDA to discredit and arrest alternative healers and I just felt like that was a very uncomfortable environment for a newly graduated doctor of an alternative type of medicine, naprapathy, even though we had been granted licensure since 1910, it really felt oppressive politically and so I said to my new, brand new husband at the time you know, I really feel like I want to go live in a country where medicinal plants, traditional healing and alternative medicine is not against the law. Also, as an alternative physician, I am a dedicated vegetarian, natural food advocate and I feel so serious about organic food. I'm willing to do what it takes to grow food all year long, and in the tropics you can't do that and I'm sure you know that in other parts of the world and in other parts of America that's not possible. There's too much winter. So for a year-round growing season and medical freedom.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Then I had a friend in Belize who said you know, right next to us is a jolly piece of land, as this British gentleman said, and we'd love for you to be our neighbor. So my husband and I actually bought 32 acres of uncleared jungle along the Macau River along the Macau River unseen before we arrived in Belize after graduating in 1982. And so we have been here ever since. So it's about 42 years that we have lived here together.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Wow, what an adventure to think you were. You were the original pioneers. Like.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:You bought it sight unseen and then you went for it there, yeah, and then it was a very, very long, arduous process of clearing the trees, clearing the land, and this was a high bush rainforest. It's so emotionally painful to do that. As a plant lover, it was really hard for me to spend a couple of months killing plants and trees, but I learned that you must do it. If you live in the tropics and our house to this day is still in the middle of a jungle, and if you have trees too close to the house, when a big wind or a hurricane comes, the tree falls on your house. So had to have a home with trees that are no further no closer to us than the length of their of their trunk, if they were to fall yeah, so that's.
Dr. Michele Burklund:That's some clearing. But yeah, it makes sense too, you can't take that risk, right.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:So we had to do it. We did, and then, ever since then, we've always been extremely careful about how many, how many trees we take down, because we're in the middle of a 500-acre rainforest reserve. But occasionally it's necessary Building a road, building a house, expanding your space.
Dr. Michele Burklund:So do you have a clinical practice still down there too?
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:I did so do you have a clinical practice still down there too. I did. My husband and I practiced together for about 42 years in San Ignacio. We had a family practice as doctors of nephropathy but because we're in Central America, women prefer to be treated by women. It's body work and there's some undressing involved, so it's obvious that women would prefer to be treated by women. It's body work and there's some undressing involved, so it's obvious that women would prefer to be treated by women. So I always treated women, infants and children. My husband treated men and boys. Occasionally there was a crossover, but not very often, and we ran our clinic in the small town of San Ignacio as family practitioners and using our skills as naprapaths. My husband is also a doctor of naprapathy the Bach flower remedies and herbal remedies and a lot that my mentor, don , taught me as well lot that my mentor, Don Eligio Panti, taught me as well.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Wow, that's great. So you could integrate a lot of the treatments and modalities that you used during that time as well.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:In freedom as well. That was really extremely important to both of us, and we actually did have a nephropathic colleague who was arrested by a government agency for practicing medicine without a license, even though he was a licensed doctor of nephropathy. So it feels like old fashioned news now, but it was a big deal in the 1980s for alternative physicians and that's primarily why we left the country. Yeah, and the wanderlust.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Yeah, I mean, the adventure sounds fun too. I know I was down in Belize, in San Ignacio I think, back in 2009, 2010. So I searched for you then but you were actually in the States giving a speech, so I missed you during that trip. But I got a feel for the town and everything and how amazing it is there.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Yeah, about 10 miles outside of San Ignacio, on the same river that runs through San Ignacio, the Macal River. So when I was studying with Don Eligio it was a walk across the river, or get canoed across the river and then walk a mile through the jungle and then five miles on the logging road to get to San Antonio from where I live.
Dr. Michele Burklund:And did you walk most of the time?
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Okay, oh well, I've never been a driver, I have always walked, and I walk most everywhere I go to these days.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Yeah, I mean, I think, I think that's the best way. It's impressive too. So my, my next my next kind of question kind of ties into that, because I want to know how you crossed paths with and how you found him or he found you, or you found each other and you started that apprenticeship.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:I think we found each other. I was asking around who could teach me about the medicinal plants of Belize. I had learned a lot of medicinal plants of Mexico, but always been an American herbalist self-taught of Mexico, but always been an American herbalist self-taught. And now that I'm living in a foreign country and I actually have a clinical practice, I needed to study with someone who was really an expert. And everyone gave me the same answer oh, you have to go see the old man in San Antonio, you have to go see El Mero, which means the very one, he's the most authentic, he's numero uno, he's number one. And then the ladies all said watch out, he's a lecher, don't get too close to him, watch out, that old man is a lech. And that never was true. So within a matter of weeks of opening my clinic, I come back from the marketplace carrying a bag of mangoes and there's an old gentleman sitting on my veranda outside my clinic and I thought he was there to see me as a client and I said I'll be out in a moment, let me put down my bags, freshen up and I will come back out. And so I greeted him and when our hands touched I shook his hand. I have to say there was an electric charge that transferred between us and that hand was so calloused and hard and it just felt like such an expert hand. I never forget the feeling of touching that hand. So I invited him in and I thought he was there for a treatment and he said no, no, no, I'm not here for a treatment. I came to see if you have any flor de tilo. I came to see if you have any flor de tilo. I heard that you're an American herbalist in town and I wonder if you have any flor de tilo, which is linden flower. Tilia americana happens to be one of my favorite herbs and so I still had some that I had brought from Chicago with me.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:However, there was a real problem with the herbs molding in these glass jars because of the climate. So I said I do, actually I do have fluoridated, and I pulled down the jar and he looked at all the other glass jars of herbs in my clinic and he said hmm, tienes problema, you've got a problem. Your herbs are rotting. And he said you can't keep them in glass jars. He said don't you see the moisture inside there dripping down on your, on your herbs, and that's why they're molding. You must put them in paper bags and take them outside to dry in the sun every once in a while.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Well, I was so impressed and I said well, hello, I mean, that's really wonderful, thank you so much for that piece of advice. And he said oh, I'm , I'm the old Maya herbalist from San Antonio. Maybe you've heard of me. Well, I certainly had heard of him, and so we had a lovely conversation and then he looked at my treatment table and he kind of went oh my neck, oh my neck. And I said get on the table, I'll give you a napropathic treatment. So I did, and I felt like he was very happy and impressed about that. And then I gave him his bag of linden flower tea because he said, now that he was a widow, he was a widower, he was having a very hard time sleeping alone at nighttime.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Now, hilarious, funny, funny person. He truly was the archetype of the Dr Clown. And he said when my wife was alive, I slept in the hammock with my blanket of guts and when I turned around, she turned around and pulled me close to her and kept me warm all night long. Now that my wife is dead, I sleep alone in my hammock. I have a blanket, but when I turn over, that blanket falls to the floor and there I am, old Eligio, all alone, shaking alone, cold at nighttime, where it used to be when my wife was alive. I was caressed and kissed all night long. So now I can't sleep. That's why I need the linden flower tea.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:So I gave him his tea and I said well, , could I come visit you in your village? And he said see, yes, you can come there. I will be neither more nor less than you see right here in front of you. So I went back the next week and he didn't remember me. I went back the next week and he didn't remember me. I went back the next week, he didn't remember me. He had already had pretty serious cataracts, so he was not able to see faces very well. He said by that time the face was kind of like a cloud. It was difficult to make out the distinguishing features. So I continued to go one day of every week just to visit. I swept out the courtyard. I would carry a bucket of water.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Sometimes I could go out and collect herds for him, because I was already familiar with a lot of the plants of Central America not specifically Belize, however so I might go out and get a pasote. I remember, for instance, when it was raining, he was already arthritic and somewhat rheumatic. He was 90 years old when I first met him, so he wouldn't go out in the rain, but I would go in the rain and collect a pasote, which is the Mexican worm seed for childhood parasites, and he was impressed that I could find a pasote. I collected firewood, and so this goes on for an entire year and several times without being a pest. I asked if he would teach me and he said no. And I said why? Why not? And he said because you're a gringa and everything that I teach you here will be lost up there. And he said the Maya spirits can't speak English and you can't study my medicine if you can't communicate with the Maya spirits. I said yeah, but I speak Spanish, and he said well, they don't speak English.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:So the year goes by and I arrive almost to the day when I first arrived, and was very early this morning. Usually I got there around 11 when he was coming back from the jungle collecting his plants. This time I got an early ride and I was there by 6.30 am standing at his doorstep, and when the door opened I stood up and he kind of gave me a look that was oh my God, she's here again. He kind of gave me a look that was oh my God, she's here again. And when I saw that look, of course my heart sunk and I said I'm never coming back again. This will be the last day.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:I certainly had no intentions of being an annoyance to this charming, delightful old man and so I said where are you going today? What are you doing? He said I don't have time for you. I said what are you doing and where are you going? Maybe I could help? And he said I have to go harvest my corn. I've had so many patients all week long there hasn't been time to harvest corn. It's going to rain, the corn will start sprouting, I'll lose my whole harvest.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:90 years old and he's still harvesting corn, carrying it home on his back. So I said well, don Aligio, I know how to harvest corn. And he said you, he gave me one of those Maya baskets with a hand woven belt here and the basket hangs down. Basket is just about below your sacrum. He has the basket and I have a basket and we trudge probably it was more than 60, 75 minutes outside of his little village to get to his cornfield. And we're standing in front of the cornfield and all I can see are trees. And he said, well, here's my corn, and I'm like corn. I don't see anything but forest. And he said, no, we have to get on our bellies and crawl through this piece of forest. I keep it hidden because people steal corn and pumpkins. So, okay, so we're down on our bellies now, crawling through this piece of jungle, and I'd say it was 20 or 30 feet crawling.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:And then when I came out, I stood up like this and there is his cornfield, which is an entire mountain, a mountainside of corn that he had cleared, planted, cultivated, and now he was willing to carry home basket by basket. He could no longer handle a horse at the age of 90. So that didn't stop him from growing a full crop of food for his family. He had a grandson with nine children and his wife, so his harvest was the food for 13 people for an entire year. So we begin harvesting corn.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:He points to a row and he goes down another row and all morning long I'm pulling corn, throwing it in the basket, emptying my basket, making a pile. He's doing the same somewhere else in the cornfield. And then at one point he's coming this way down the same corn row, and I'm coming this way and we meet in the middle and he looks at my pile of corn and he looks at my basket getting empty, which is as full as his, and he said are you married? Yes, domino, I'm married and I have three children. And he said, oh, like that. Oh, so we continue harvesting corn.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:And then it's about maybe 11, 1130. So we continue harvesting corn and then it's about maybe 11, 1130. And because we're standing on a mountaintop, the sun is just coming up over that mountain and , was sharing an orange, peeled it and I gave him half the orange and he said to me when he stood up, and when he stood up there, the sun rose. Here's him and here's the sun just behind him, and it was an absolute golden medallion of beaming light behind him. It was quite magical. And he looked at me and he said do you promise, if I take the time to teach you, you will take care of my people when I'm gone?
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Yes yes, I promise. And so that was the day that it all began. And on the way home he said this little plant is called the. Now you recognize it by its little red flowers that come out in August. That this vine over here is is Ishkibish, and we use that one for excessive menstruation. This is the gumbo limbo tree. We use that for bad skin conditions. And it was like music. Literally it was like being in an orchestra hall to the most gorgeous music and all the way home he just kept planting up, pointing out trees and plants.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:And so after that I was there for the next seven years, three days, four nights and three days of every week. Thank I'm grateful that to my husband who kept our daughter. She was still probably seven at the time and my neighbor would let her go over there and play with the other kids a lot, so it would not have been possible without someone to look after my child, my last little child, my daughter Crystal. So four nights and three days of every week after that. For seven years I was with him collecting his medicinal plants, helping him take care of his clients, doing a lot of the work that requires young eyesight because he also had cataracts. So he was rheumatic arthritic and he had cataracts. So he truly needed an assistant to be there as often as possible, and because I was fluent in Spanish, I was able to also communicate with his clients.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:So then that was the first seven years. After that I returned every one full day of every week until finally Don Eligio passed away at 103. So it was a full 13 year apprenticeship with him, and the number 13 is a very high spiritual number. In the Maya system it's considered one of the major cyclical endings cyclical endings?
Dr. Michele Burklund:Wow, and it seems like he was waiting for the right person to that.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:He he tested you and he wanted to see. The spirits tested me as well. Because the very, very first day that I'm now his official student, at his clinic shows up the very worst, scariest client I saw in all the 13 years. It was like you think you want to do this. Well, let us know if you're ready, because Don Aligio worked very closely with the benevolent, the nine benevolent Maya spirits. They were his mentors really. They taught him because he never went to school, never learned to read or write, so they taught him a great deal in dream visions and it always came from the benevolent Maya spirits. So on the very, very first day, the very first client that shows up, don Alicio said was possessed by the devil. El Principio de la Oscuridad, the Prince of Darkness, has possessed this woman and I have to tell you she was very scary. Her eyes could not focus, she was drooling and kind of growling, not focused. She was drooling and kind of growling, growling like a dog, and I could feel the hair on the back. I never felt that in my life before. I've read about it, but I never actually felt the hair on the back of my neck stand up and quiver like that. All the hair on my arms stood up and quivered, and it was so he treated her. He was sprinkling her with holy water from the Catholic church. He brought Copal and he said prayers for her. He sent his, her family home with plants to do spiritual bathing.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:And that night, sleeping in the hammock in his little cement house that was probably 10 by 10. And it's divided into two rooms, I'm sleeping on one side of a curtain in a hammock and he's sleeping on the other side of the curtain in a hammock. And in the middle of the night I kind of wake up and I'm aware of feeling quite frightened and that really I should go home. In the middle of the night I kind of wake up and I'm aware of feeling quite frightened and that really I should go home in the morning, that this is not what I signed up for. I'm not interested in the prince of darkness, I only want to learn about medicinal plants at night. So I'm lying in my hammock and I'm just like full of consternation, fear and worry.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Finally I fall asleep and I have this dream. And that was one of the magnificent things about being in Don Aligio's presence and in his little thatch hut was the presence of these magical beings that were around all the time, little earth spirits, maya spirits, and they bring dream visions. So I finally fall asleep and in this dream I see, first of all Don Aligio used rue, that he squeezed in water to give her to drink. He used copal and he sent her home with batches of marigold flowers to do the spiritual baths. So in this dream I'm lying in the hammock and I see myself all my face crunched up and worried, and suddenly these four giant angels appear all around me. One is kind of shimmering green, and I know that's the angel of Ruth. One on the other side is golden, and I know that is the angel of Kopal. And then there's a yellowish one, green, yellowish green, and that I know is the angel of or the spirit of miracle. And then there's one at my head that's kind of like a saint michael figure. He's got a shield and the staff and he's kind of like guarding, as though he's saying just take one step, just take one step toward her and you'll see what happens. And nothing was said, nothing was done, except this vision. And all of this light of all four of these angelic beings was beaming towards me, lying in the hammock, all tightened up and worried, and I never worried again after that. I felt, whatever happens, that was a very clear message that I will be protected.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:It was a lot of the spirituality of very difficult to comprehend in the beginning, not being a Maya person, not being familiar with the concept of benevolent spirits, with the concept of benevolent spirits as opposed to malevolent spirits, and so, yeah, that took quite a bit of time to adjust to the reality of his practice, being both spiritual and physical. He had as many clients for spiritual healing as he had for physical healing. In the physical realm it was very much like anybody's clinical practice Lots of tummy ache, lots of skin conditions, high blood pressure, diabetes, backache what you'd see in any natural healing clinic. Then, on the spiritual side, there was a lot of PTSD, which is called susto, which is considered a proper spiritual disease, the PTSD that we think of here. It's, in this lady's case, possession by evil spirits.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:So all of that was a big bucket of new things all at once in my life. But I had come to so admire him, I totally trusted him to be a good person and that all of those stories that were told about him being alleged. None of that was true at all. He was always, always a gentleman, a delight and a very entertaining personality what an amazing experience.
Dr. Michele Burklund:And you had, you had those signs early on to the, the visitations in your first, your first day, which yeah, can. One of the most powerful dreams I ever had in that little um magic hut and um, yeah, to me it's so interesting because I feel like spirituality and and medicine and healing go together. They can't really be separate and I'm not too familiar with like the Maya philosophy that. Can you explain that a little more of? Yeah, that blends together, sure.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:It comes about Always done. Alicia had to determine if a person's ailment whether it be headache, tummy ache, backache was due to a physical cause or a spiritual cause. Sometimes he could determine that by interview, asking questions, getting answers. But he also was in possession of the magic instrument of the Maya spirits called the Sastun. Sastun is the name of the book that I wrote about sastun, my apprenticeship with the maya healer. So sas is a word in maya that means light, and mirror tune means stone or age, so light of the ages or stone of the ages, and it is a translucent crystal ball and that is the instrument that get. That gives don gives o the ability to contact the maya spirits, to be the um, the intermediary between the physical and the spiritual, and to request very uh you know, very special healing from the maya spirits for his clients. Through that he used that sastun for for divination, to determine if this is a physical ailment or a spiritual ailment, and also for incantation. There he had a.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:It had always been a practice in Maya medicine to do enchantments over photographs and primarily most of what I saw him do was to enchant young people who wouldn't study. Usually it was a grandmother who brought a picture of a teenager. In Belize everybody has to pay for their education, so it's often a great sacrifice for the parents and the grandparents. So the grandmother would bring a photograph of young Jose who's 15. His parents are making a great deal of sacrifice for his education but he's lazy. And so the grandmother would say this boy is lazy, I want you to make him study, I want you to make him a serious boy so that he grows up and he has a good career because he got a good education.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:That was mostly what I saw the sastun for enchantment, as well as blessings on people who were ill through photographs. And then he also made amulets, little sewn up pieces of black cloth with sacred objects in there. And when he twirled his sastun inside of a little clay jar with a special Maya chant around and around that amulet, it gave it a very special spiritual charge. That was a protector or something that could protect you or something that could draw good fortune and ward off evil. You know that old term we read in the old herbal books the ward off evil. So that was also the purpose of those enchanted amulets.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Wow and I was reading somewhere, I think I heard it that both of you saw quite a bit of patients per day, Like there was a lot of people coming to the clinic that you saw.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Yeah, a regular day was anywhere from 10 to 30 clients, so over a week, over a week, there would be, you know, over 100 clients, all kept in bean sacks in one little hut that was separate just to store his herbs and for a place for clients to sleep. Some clients stayed with Don Aligio three or four days was very common. He was also a shelter for battered women. Women knew they could go live with find protection. So while I was there there were a series of women who came to live with Don Elichio , until things sort of, you know, resettled back at home if they ever did. But he helped them, you know, with the food, he gave them a place to stay and comfort and spiritual baths, and so, yeah, he was a charming, delightful, generous, lovely person.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Yeah, it sounds like I mean, that's real medicine, helping people in that sense. So yeah, that's a really beautiful thing. Yeah, so how did you guys collect? Did you collect the herbs too, if you went through so many herbs per week? So you saw all the patients and then you had to go out into the jungles and no, we went out in the morning.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:We couldn't do it in the afternoon.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:It's too hot, so we would leave at six or 6.30.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:He would have a cup of coffee and milk with a few biscuits, I would have a cup of hot chocolate and I don't know, maybe usually I had some cinnamon crackers with me and that's what we ate for the morning.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:And then by 7.30, we're in the high jungle and so we would collect vines, roots, barks, heavy work up in the high bush areas and then carrying it down on our backs in those Maya baskets. And then on the way home we had a sack each of us to collect leaves for the herbal baths. So in the basket was vine roots, roots and barks, the heavy medicine, and then in the bags we carried home it would be a 50 pound sack full of leaves. Doesn't weigh 50 pounds but it's big. All the way home we would be collecting plants, and every time we took anything from a plant we had to say the prayer of faith and thanksgiving. He always said if you don't say the prayer of faith and thanksgiving to the spirit of the plant, the spirit of the plant does not follow you home but stays in the earth and therefore, the healing is never as effective without the prayer.
Dr. Michele Burklund:I've been thankful for the plant and everything it gives to the people each day too, yeah, and I really.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:I spent a lot of time on that concept, thinking about it, and I feel like, yes, every plant that we're looking at is a spiritual being in a physical body, just like us is a spiritual being in a physical body, just like us. So he introduced me to that concept back in the 1980s when I first started working with him, and I've held that ever since. Since then, I have never, ever, taken a leaf or a flower from a plant without giving the prayer of faith and thanksgiving. It would be like I couldn't do it. I don't know whatgiving. It would be like I couldn't do it. I don't know what it would be like because I couldn't do it yeah, no, that's, that's really beautiful.
Dr. Michele Burklund:I remember, um, in some of my botanical medicine classes, some of the teachers would say, like take a piece of hair, take something, and have it as an offering to to the plants too.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:So kind of similar in that, when he introduced, introduced me to the goddess Ischel this is one of her images as a young maiden, because the first day we went to collect medicine, he was looking for his zorio, the skunk root that he used a great deal of, and he found a plant that was the biggest one he'd ever seen in 50 years of collecting on the same mountainside. And he said what good fortune. And that's because you're here, like me, why is it because I'm here? And he said because the goddess Ischel smiles on the man herd collector if he walks the jungle with a womb.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:And I said who's Ischel? I had never heard her name before and that set me on a 25-year journey to discover as much as I could about this wonderful goddess Ischel. She's the goddess of medicine, healing, medicinal plants, the moon goddess, the earth goddess. She's the goddess of fertility, childbirth and also the creator, the creator goddess, with her male partner, itzamna, fascinating that the Maya faith believes that the creator is a man and a woman. I mean, how could it be otherwise? Exactly exactly.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Yeah, that's a beautiful introduction too, and I know I read something about like the skunk root and how he that was one of his favorite plants also and had a lot of spiritual significance and maybe tied into that too, or you guys collected it together yeah, the skunk root was a plant that he used a lot of and it could only be found in the very high, high bush jungle.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:You would never find it in second or third growth forest, could only be way up in the primary forest there, where you know it's. It's real rainforest with 40 or 50 for trees, undisturbed for generations. And the skunk root um um tai che in maya. It is used for those very serious type of spiritual ailments like curses and the long-term effects of envy and jealousy. And it is very much like that dark angel that I saw in that first dream. That might even have been the spirit of zarrio in that first dream. That might even have been the spirit of Zorio in that black suit with the shield and the spear. So because in Central America, unfortunately, envy is very common and when people are the objects of envy it really does make you sick. You feel quite depressed, you feel discouraged, you can be physiologically sick, you can be emotionally sick, you can lose sleep, can't digest properly all the effects of envy and jealousy and in fact some people can die from it. It's that serious but the remedy is to say a series of Maya prayers into the pulse.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Old Maya doctors were always referred to as pulse doctors because he could do his diagnosis and treatment with the pulse. He, like all of us in clinical practice, would take a general history from a client. I remember a lady who came for a reproductive disorder, menstrual disorder, and he asked her several questions and then he took her pulse and he said well, you didn't tell me, you had surgery three months ago. And he could be from the pulse right. So into the pulse.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:For this concept of the spiritual disease like envy, jealousy and curses, he would say three prayers in maya to the in the right pulse, three prayers in the left and three prayers over the forehead. Burn kop often have a drink of rue squeezed in water and then given herbal baths to take at home. So that was the treatment for the spiritual disease. But the and drinking sorry, drinking the Zario tea as well for nine days, sometimes one cup a day for nine days, sometimes three cups a day, depending on the length and the severity of the curse that a person had or how much jealousy one was exposed to. And that was quite a revelation to me at how devastating it is to be the object of envy and jealousy. It is really emotionally and physiologically devastating to the system. And worked. And then it would be time to give the amulet that would be enchanted with his sastun, for protection against envy and jealousy.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Yeah, that's so interesting too. I learned about that a lot when I was living in Greece, because the older women there would call it the evil eye and it would be just as destructive and they would discuss it in the same caliber as you're discussing too, of how destructive it can be for that person and be careful of the evil eye, and so it's evil eye is right in there, in that, in that category, and then skunk root because it was so eliminating, so cleansing and eliminating.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:He also put it into the female tonic formula for women with difficult menstruation, into the female tonic formula for women with difficult menstruation, for women who were having trouble conceiving so often gave it to people for other purposes, but its primary purpose was as an organ eliminator, as kind of like an organ flush, almost like a purge, but not an intestinal purge, and then also for those spiritual diseases. And I still use it and collect it to this day.
Dr. Michele Burklund:So do you always take it internally, or do you leave it around the house, or always internally?
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Always internally. Yes, I mean yeah, I carry it in a little pouch, sometimes as a protector it's multiple uses, but as a tea would be one and then also carrying it around in the pouch in an amulet. That would be protective as well.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Interesting. Can you tell me a little bit more about your most memorable experience? I know it's probably hard to come up with one. It sounds like you've shared quite a bit, but do you have like one story or one that you really want to share with our audience, something that really touched you? I wonder it is.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:It's very hard for me to put down one thing. I could tell a couple of stories. After I started working with of the word got out that I was working with this old Maya shaman, I was contacted by the television station if they could come and do an interview for Belize television, if they could come and do an interview for Belize television, and I told him what it would involve and what the request was and he agreed. So they came and we filmed all day long. And now Don Alijo down in front of a television in his whole life. He had a friend in another town. His area was a village. He had a friend in a town not very far from where he was, so he went to visit and she had a brand new television. So for the first time in his life he sat down to watch a television. And guess who was on? Dona Lucia. And he's watching the program. And he said that machine didn't forget a single thing. We said that day Just that Don Elichio was such a jokester.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:I'd say that would be probably my favorite part of working with him, besides meeting the Maya spirits. But he was such a funny guy and he always said over and over again most people think too much, get them to laugh and half their trouble and sickness will go away, and the blessed herbs will do the rest. So he loved to make people laugh. I remember one occasion where he had been rather ill. When I got there he had a bad cough and so I gave him a massage, I patted his chest, gave him some cough syrup and I put him to bed. And then a lady came to see him as a as a client, and I said I'm sorry he's sleeping, he hasn't been very well. You won't be able to see him today, maybe if you came back tomorrow. And she said Well, if he knows it's me, he'll get up. And I said no, I'm not waking the old man up. He's been coughing for days. He hasn't been sleeping for days. Finally he's getting some rest. I'm not waking him up. So she sat like this staring at me and I said maybe I could help you. I'm Don Alicia's student, I've already learned a lot. Maybe I could be of some service. And she looked at me with that big frown and she said no, I come to see the trunk, not the branch. She said it's so loud. She woke him up.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Don alicio gets up and he comes staggering out through the curtains and he's got his little white shorts on and the little shirt that his wife sewed for him before she passed away. And he, he says oh, rosita, rosita, I died, I died and I went to heaven. Now he starts his routine. I died and I went to heaven and in my dream, there there was St Peter at the gate and St Peter took one look at me and he said when have you been, old man? Get in here. Your number should have been called a long time ago. And I said to St Peter now, hold up. Just a minute. Before I walk through those gates, I have to ask you something Is there dancing? Is there beer? Is there women? And St Peter said dancing beer and women? No, no, not up here. And I said to saint peter forget it, I'm going back. And he looked at this lady. He said and now, what does this sweet, what does this good lady want? And she gave me this. See, I told you he'd get up if it was me, so I don't know.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:I think that was my favorite part about . There was so that his humor and the fact that dream visions were just an everyday aspect of life. You know, he often woke up and he said a spirit came to me last night and explained this about this lady's cough who's been here for three days. And in the dream, the Maya spirit said old man, you don't really understand this lady's cough. It's not just a cough, it's a lung infection, and you're not giving her the right herb. So this is the herb that you need. This is how much you should give her. So, yeah, the aspect of being taught in dreams and I think it's quite fascinating that these brilliant geniuses of Central America, who are traditional healers, who are the unlettered heroes of their generations, never learned to read or write, never went to school.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:When me taking notes in his clinic about what the patient had and what herb was given and writing down the prayers, and he said oh, they sent you to school. I said yeah, they sent me to a lot of school. I sent myself to school and he said you'll never learn. So what? What do you mean? I'll never learn, why would you say that?
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:And he said that stick and that piece of paper that makes your mind weak. I never had a stick. I never had a piece of paper. But up here it's full, full, full up here, no stick and no paper. But I did learn and I did use my stick and I did use my paper. I also think that one of the most important things I learned from service and how service was such a delight to him. There might be a few days where it was a straggle of one client and maybe one day out of a year when nobody came. When nobody came, he was kind of sad and he said have they forgotten me? Am I so old that I that I'm going to be forgotten? And but no, he was never forgotten.
Dr. Michele Burklund:So yeah, he, it sounds like he had so much intuition too. I mean I, I think the world of academia today and being so much in your brain, you lose touch with being in nature and intuition and filling the body too.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:He always said somebody comes to me and they say that they have diabetes. I might give this person one plant for diabetes, but the next person gets a different one because I listen, I listen to what's inside and when, soon as I look at this person, I get a picture of the plant that I should give them. That's his intuition, of course. But the next person with diabetes doesn't get the same plant because I listen. He always said I listen.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Yeah, that's such a beautiful experience and such an amazing trait to learn in medicine too. Is that side of it, Cause that's an important side?
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:To have faith in your own intuition. I don't think you could do spiritual healing without faith in your intuition.
Dr. Michele Burklund:And you have like a. You have a very interesting path in medicine too, because you've kind of created your own path with Mayan abdominal massage and and kind of taken a lot of his teachings and and taught it to other physicians and practitioners around the world too.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Well, I mean, I was so incredibly impressed with , which is a 5,000 year old massage therapy that dates way, way back to 3000 BC, and the fact that it was still in his hands and that he was willing to teach me. And I, as a doctor of nephropathy, naprapathy spent 10 full years researching, trying to figure out how that external massage on the lower part of the abdomen, around the pelvis, could reposition a malplaced uterus. How could that be? And it literally did take 10 years to figure out the anatomy, the physiology and the effects of an external massage on replacing the uterus into its proper position within the pelvis. So for reproductive ailments in women, numero uno, and then for all types of digestive complaints, it's often a great deal of tension in the upper abdomen, fear and anxiety. The diaphragm will tighten right around the solar plexus and while it's tightening it's cutting down the supply of the abdominal aorta that goes through, like that, through the muscle of the diaphragm. And then there's also the vena cava and there's the esophagus. So you have these three major vessels and I feel that how his massage was so effective was by relax, relaxing and releasing the squeezing and the tension around the esophagus and all the blood supply to the abdominal and pelvic organs was increased as a result of relaxing that area. And of course we know it's the solar plexus where everybody holds anxiety, even babies. So yeah, it was so impressive to me and I used it in my own clinic for 10 years before I began teaching it.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:And I began teaching it out of concern for women who suffer with so much menstrual disorder and it was just at the time where a lot of fertility challenges were showing up in clinical practice all around the world. It was quite a phenomenon in the 90s and in the early turn of the 21st century. So I began introducing it as a means of helping women to alleviate some of the menstrual difficulties. That I mean. I had clients who were in bed two days of every month because of menstrual pains and I know that happens all over the world and one or two treatments of Don Alicio's external pelvic massage adios dolor is what he would say and he also taught me about the vaginal steams, yoni steams. That was very important and I introduced those into the United States in the early 1990s.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Now it's kind of extremely popular, very de rigueur now, you know, very avant-garde I guess, but because it works Very, very effective. The massage, the herbal remedies that people drink for cleansing the uterus, and then also the Yoni steam together is a very dynamic treatment for all manner of female reproductive problems. Really works. So why I had to share? I had to share with other practitioners what I had learned, trying to help as many people as possible. You are a healer. You probably know how it is. Just, we love to help.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Yeah, I was always interested in that too, so I was always going to come back to you or find you at some point.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:We have teachers all over the world now through the abdominal therapy collective. Right now there are classes going on in Greece, in England, new Zealand, australia, the United States, belize. We did a class in Mexico this year for the first time. Last year in January in Nayarit for the first time last year in January in Nayarit.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Yeah, we have to post that on the website too, for everybody else to find and to find more information about this.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Yeah, my website is wwwrositarvigocom and then wwwabdominotherapycollectivecom. Abdominotherapycollectivecom abdominal therapy collective because we are a collective of 12 previous teachers, teachers who are involved with education, educating the on the abdominal therapy and Maya, spiritual healing.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Yeah, and it seems like it's at this point in the world now where it's even more of a demand, like it's growing and growing each day, from women's imbalances and fertility issues are. I think it's reached a whole new level, especially recently too.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:Because it works. It really works. It's the best tool and I've been a practitioner now about 50 years. It is the best tool that I have DElijio Elijio Don Elijio Don Elijio abdominal massage for digestive complaints, reproductive complaints and you're a clinic. If you're a clinician you know that that covers a lot. Outside of that is often a lot. You know other metabolic disorders but then also the emotional disorders. So with his spiritual healing and the massage it is a. It's a full clinical practice and you can help almost everybody.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Yeah, no, it sounds amazing and I want to know, kind of, what are you up to these days, are you? I know that's part of your focus and you put a lot of focus on help preserving and documenting the plants and and a lot of research in that sense too.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:So yeah, well, I completed rainforest remedies 100 healing herbs of Belize, which is a inexpensive pocket book for all Belizeans to be able to use and keep at home as a regular household reference. And then that was with Michael Ballick of the New York Botanical Garden. And then we also completed a book titled Messages from the Gods a guide to the useful plants of Belize, which is about 400 pages of more of a scientific documentation of the ethnobotanical research that was done over a nine-year period in Belize with Dr Balik from the New York Botanical Garden. So that and I continue I do a lot of forest bathing. I'm a forest bathing guide. I enjoy that very much and I still teach abdominal therapy and Maya spiritual healing around the world. I'm still active in that and spend a lot of time in around the area of Chicago with my family and here in Belize, keeping busy for sure, yeah it sounds like it.
Dr. Michele Burklund:Well, thank you so much for sharing everything today too, and we'll make sure everybody can find you, and we'll have everything set up for the lace.
Dr. Rosita Arvigo:So thank you very much.
Dr. Michele Burklund:It was a pleasure.
