Curanderismo.

Used by many Mexican-Americans to supplement conventional medicine, curanderismo is a mind-body-spirit healing approach steeped in tradition and ceremony. Although meant to enhance wellness at many levels, curandersimo especially targets the soul. Because of the growing societal role Hispanics continue to play, it is important to integrate culturally attuned methods such as curanderismo into our healing spectrum.

I received training from several leading curanderos, including David Atekpatzin Young and Elena Avila. Reflecting curanderismo's mestizo (Spanish and American Indian) origins, Young, hailing from New Mexico, is of Spanish, Apache, and Pueblo Indian ancestry. Avila, originally from El Paso, Texas, is of Spanish, Aztec, Mayan, and Zapotec ancestry. Although trained by many traditional folk healers, both Avila and Young have extensive experience in mainstream health care. For example, Avila has a master's degree in psychiatric nursing, and Young was trained as a psychotherapist and ran an organization targeting Native American health problems. Both believe that curanderismo does not substitute for but supplements conventional medicine.

Curanderismo was long suppressed, starting with the Spanish conquistadors, who ruthlessly imposed their cultural values on indigenous populations. In contemporary times, health authorities dismissed curanderismo, in part because its philosophy clashed with modern medicine's core belief that our body parts can be fixed in isolation of an overriding, integrating soul.

Because of the opposition it faced, curanderismo wisdom was preserved by being passed down from teacher to apprentice for generations outside the medical mainstream view--that is, until relatively recently, when people such as Young and Avila stepped forward to bridge the ancient with the modern. One of the results of this thrust is Avila's book Woman Who Glows in the Dark.

Many people seeking curanderismo training are conventionally trained health care professionals. Although deeply committed to their healing roles, they believe modern medicine--as shaped by economic, high-tech, and pharmaceutical concerns--does not foster the deep relationship they desire with patients. For example, Avila gave up nursing, in part, because she believed patients, especially Hispanics, often could not achieve lasting benefits with traditional approaches alone.

Indigenous Contributions

Curanderismo sprang out of ancient Mesoamerican civilizations, whose contributions, although largely ignored, have greatly shaped today's world. For example, many drugs have origins in botanical medicines, and a huge portion of today's food staples were foods enjoyed by these civilizations. The inclusion of these edibles significantly improved the overall nutritional value of the European diet. Given such examples, it follows that their healing principles also have relevance.

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Historical Origin

Curanderismo stems from the Spanish word curar, which means to heal, and is practiced throughout Mexico, Latin America, and the southwestern United States. Specific procedures may vary, depending on regional influence. For example, what is emphasized in Texas will differ from practices in northern New Mexico with its unique Native American influences. According to curanderismo, disease is caused by social, psychological, physical, and spiritual factors. A mix of healing traditions, the practice is grounded in ancient Aztec medicine. When the Spanish conquered the Aztecs in the early 1500s, they rejected the healing practices that evolved into curanderismo, partly because they emphasized non-Christian spirituality. As a result, many spiritual components changed to forms more palatable for the conqueror's Catholic faith. For example, anthropologists suggest that that the Virgin of Guadalupe, whose image is a ubiquitous presence in curanderismo rituals, is a Christianized version of the Aztec lunar mother goddess Tonantzin.

Over time, Aztec healing traditions were influenced by Spanish medicine, which itself was shaped by Arabic medicine practiced by the Moors, who, at the time of the Spanish conquest of Mexico, had been only recently expelled from the Iberian Peninsula. Considered the most advanced at the time, Arabic medicine's influences dated back to ancient Greece and Egypt and, given the extent of the Arabic contact into Asia, reflected oriental healing principles. Finally, African slaves and Native American cultures wove their insights into this culturally rich healing tapestry we now call curanderismo.

Specialists

As in modern medicine, curanderismo has specialists. Curanderismo specialists have a don (a God-given gift) in one or more areas:

  A hierbero (herbalist) uses plant remedies to treat disorders and
  ailments. For example, chamomile is used to sedate; mint or rosemary
  to relieve indigestion; prickly pear cactus or nopal to reduce blood
  sugar in diabetics; and cow parsnip to treat injured nerves and
  stimulate regeneration. Many fragrant herbs, especially rosemary, are
  used in rituals to call in spiritual assistance.

  The sobadoro's don is loving-touch massage, which is used for both
  physical comfort and reaching out to one's psyche and soul to initiate
  higher-level healing.

  The partera (midwife) guides expectant mothers. For example, as
  discussed in La Partera, Young's aunt assisted in more than 12,000
  births in northern New Mexico. A perinatal nurse I spoke to said she
  studied curanderismo to be more sensitive to the needs of her Hispanic
  clients.

  A consejero (counselor) uses heart-to-heart talks called platicas to
  bring up repressed issues or problems that need to be released before
  the client can constructively move on in life.

  Similar to a chiropractor, a huesero does spinal adjustments and sets
  dislocated joints.

  An espiritualista channels advice from helpful spirits, such as Nino
  Fidencio, a folk-saint healer who died 70 years ago. In her case,
  Avila states that when in a trance state, she does not channel any
  specific entity but often feels God's energy coming through her.

  Finally, some curanderos are energy workers. Believing that our
  physical body and all of its defects are secondary to our all-
  pervasive energetic nature (energy fields), they sense dysfunctional
  energy, get rid of it, and direct beneficial energy to where it is
  needed, sometimes even at a distance.

Disorders

Curanderismo treats categories of physical, emotional, or soul dysfunction. Although defined in a traditional way that seems out of place compared to modern medicine, all can be interpreted in a broader healing perspective. Physical categories include bilis (rage), with ailments aggravated by our frenetic fight-or-flight lifestyles; empacho (blockage), associated with digestive disorders, as well as emotional blocks; and mal aire (bad air), causing ailments in children such as earaches or chills.

Consistent with scientific studies that suggest that negative consciousness can adversely affect living systems, traditional emotional categories of curandersimo include envidia (envy); mal puesto (hex or curse), in which negative energy directed toward a person creates havoc or disharmony; mal ojo (staring), in which children become ill because they cannot handle excessive adult attention; and mala suerte (bad luck), in which adversity fuels a vicious-circle creation of bad luck.

With susto, we become blocked from or lose access to aspects of our higher self that are needed for healing. Because we all face in life, as Shakespeare said, "the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune," we all experience susto. You lose a job, your wife leaves you, or a parent dies: you have susto. We define ourselves with certain "who-am-l?" criteria, and when life's inevitable entropy destroys that criteria, we lose aspects of our soul.

Curanderismo in Literature

A richer appreciation for curanderismo can be gained through reading contemporary Chicano literature. For example, author Rudolfo Anaya, who was honored by President Bush with the 2002 National Medal of Arts, emphasized curanderismo in Bless Me, Ultima (1972). The Nation magazine described this book as "the most important and influential Chicano novel ever written." The novel's title character, Ultima, is a wise curandera who nurtures a young boy's soul in New Mexico in the 1940s.

Anaya's Tortuga (1979) is about a teenager nicknamed Tortuga (turtle) due to his body cast. The book describes his survival and spiritual evolution as he recovers from a spinal-cord injury in a "crippled" children's hospital in the 1950s. Anaya based Tortuga on his own experiences overcoming a paralyzing diving accident. In Shaman Winter (1999), Anaya created a neurologically compromised, wheelchair-using detective, Sonny Baca, who relies on curanderismo for strength and healing and to combat the evil brujo (witch) Raven.

In preparing this article, Anaya related the following to me: "More and more of us seek integrative or alternative medical/spiritual care. Curanderismo is one answer. Years ago, I suffered a spinal-cord injury. During that trauma the soul suffered as much as the body. I worked to get my body back in shape, but it took me years to learn that in order to cure the trauma (susto) I also had to go back and reintegrate my soul. Teachings such as curanderismo helped me greatly."

Because curanderismo is grounded in spirituality, it must be explained within that context, just as conventional medicine needs to be discussed within a surgical and pharmaceutical framework. For example, Baca's never-ending conflict with the dark forces is reflective of a core curanderismo belief that the universe's duality-based energies--such as good versus evil, male and female, physical and spiritual, etc--all exist in sacred union as a part of God's greater whole. In this context, when one recognizes that they are a part of, and not distinct from, this oneness, they can access previously unavailable healing energies. Given this belief, curanderismo prayers or chants are concluded with the Nahuatl (Aztec) expression Ometeotl, meaning sacred union of all.

Ceremony

To further understand curanderismo, I attended a workshop at Ghost Ranch retreat center in a magnificent northern New Mexico setting where artist Georgia O'Keefe did much of her painting. Led by curandera Elena Avila, participants were mostly conventional health care professionals desiring to expand their healing insights.

Most curanderismo procedures are couched in a rich ceremonial context that is virtually absent in Western medicine. According to Dr. Lewis Mehl-Madrona, author of Coyote Medicine and many other books, "at one time in their history, all cultures have had beneficial healing ceremonies; unfortunately, most modern, white-culture ceremonies have become so sterile they are not conducive for healing." As a biochemist, I equate the ceremony to a chemical catalyst. The difference is instead of accelerating the transition from one chemical state to another, it catalyzes a shift to a more health-enhancing consciousness.

Curanderismo ceremonies are characterized by prayers and chants; the use of a resinous incense copal to cleanse or smudge toxic energy from a healing environment; and ceremonial altars containing symbolic sacred objects, such as candles with pictures of Saints (e.g., Virgin of Guadalupe, St. Anthony, etc). The altars are placed in the primary compass directions, which have symbolic meanings. The East represents new beginnings; South, youth and intuition; West, transformation; and North, ancestral wisdom. Offerings are often placed on these altars as symbolic food for the spirit world to enlist the help of ancestors.

Procedures

In her book Woman Who Glows in the Dark, (1999), Avila says "Curanderismo teaches that it is not enough to diagnose a physical problem, as so many modern medical doctors do without looking at what is going on in the heart and soul of the patient." She emphasizes that each patient has a unique story. Working with the patient, the curandera facilitates the story's revelation, which, in turn, opens a door in consciousness that leads to healing at some level. To open this door, the curandera uses a variety of procedures or rituals, including platicas, limpias, and soul retrievals.

Platicas are deep, nonjudgmental, often multi-session, heart-to-heart talks between the curandera and patient in a sacred environment of trust. Roughly comparable to psychoanalysis, platicas are tailored to the patient's unique situation and use a variety of mechanisms to help reveal the patient's story, such as acting out problems, dream interpretation, art therapy, or making masks. The goal is to gain understanding and bring out suppressed beliefs that need to be released to make room for new health- and life-renewing attitudes. According to Avila, patients needs to desahogar, an "undrowning" to get everything out of their heart. Likewise, curandero David Young says platicas attempt to get patients "out of their heads into a process that moves them past thinking into their hearts."

To further develop their story, patients often place personally relevant symbolic objects on the ceremonial altars. For example, symbols of our past are placed in the North, such as photos of deceased parents or children. In another example, the West is the graveyard of our belief systems. It is where we let go of compromising beliefs about, for instance, a failed marriage or career. It is also the place where we release limiting attitudes about what may be possible, accomplished, or achieved after disability. Avila simply calls it "energy that doesn't belong to us."

This energy release is facilitated by limpias, spiritual cleansings that can take a variety of ceremonial forms. These often incorporate elements perceived as still possessing life-force energy, such as raw fertile eggs, flowers, and fresh rosemary. As a crude analogy, consider unwelcome beliefs as food particles stuck on a frying pan (in other words our soul), and these living objects as the scouring pad that will remove them when used within a spiritual context.

I have had several limpias. The first, run by Young, used a sweat-lodge ceremony and ritually removed negative energy by the brushing the body with cut flowers. At my Ghost Ranch limpia, eggs (intact) and rosemary were rubbed over my body. In addition, Avila swept an eagle feather around certain body areas in an effort to push out the negative energies she perceived in my energy field. The egg, which had absorbed my negative energy, was later ceremonially buried to be transmuted by Mother Earth.

Finally, after the limpia-assisted release of the negative beliefs, attitudes, and perceptions brought out by the platicas, a soul-retrieval ceremony reclaims aspects of ourselves we have repressed through the susto created by life's trials and tribulations, such as injury, violation, or trauma. Through this process, the curandera guides the patient back to balance, allowing more full soul expression. Extensively discussed in Avila's book, the soul-retrieval can be mediated through many ceremonial mechanisms. For example, if a woman was sexually abused as a child, a doll may be used as a symbolic representation of soul aspects lost by such abuse.

Conclusion

As a detached scientist merely desiring to learn more about curanderismo, I initially viewed the incorporation of raw eggs and rosemary in the Ghost-Ranch limpia ceremony as just quaint cultural traditions As such, I was astonished by my limpia-induced perceptual transformation. This transient perceptual state was one of my most powerful life experiences. As Shakespeare stated in Hamlet, "There are more things in heaven and earth ... than are dreamt of in your philosophy." For me, curanderismo's eggs and rosemary will forever be among them.

This article was adapted from articles that appeared in the June and August 2006 PN/Paraplegia News magazine (with permission of the publisher).

After obtaining his PhD in biochemistry and molecular biology from Northwestern University, Laurance Johnston became an FDA regulatory scientist and later an NIH division director. He then assumed the directorship of the Spinal Cord Research and Education Foundations, Paralyzed Veterans of America. Dr. Johnston has written extensively on various therapies that expand the healing spectrum of people with disabilities, including as the author of Alternative Medicine and Spinal Cord Injury: Beyond the Banks of the Mainstream.

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by Laurance Johnston, PhD