Heritage of Healing

Curanderismo for Stress Relief

• Michelle Rios Rice and Liz Howard • Season 1 • Episode 3

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What if you could unlock the secrets to managing stress through ancient wisdom and modern science? Join us as we sit down with master mystical healer Michelle Rios-Rice, a renowned curandera, who enlightens us on the intricate ways stress affects our emotional, physical, and spiritual well-being. Michelle delves into the ancient practice of curanderismo, teaching us how to recognize early signs of stress and create a personal "medicine bag" filled with tools like music, dance, nature walks, smudging, prayer, and meditation to achieve a higher state of well-being.

Discover the harmony between tradition and contemporary science in our discussion on natural stress management techniques validated by recent psychological studies. Learn about a 2019 study from Frontiers in Psychology revealing that a mere 20 minutes in nature can significantly reduce cortisol levels, and uncover how Stanford research shows music's potential to alter brain functioning similarly to medication. By integrating these effective strategies into your daily routine, you can navigate modern life's stressors with greater ease and balance. Don't miss this episode packed with practical advice and ancient wisdom for a more peaceful, balanced life.

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Speaker 1:

Large-scale national studies on stress show that Americans are plagued by a variety of stressors, with issues as large as the future of the nation to more granular topics like daily work stressors. It's challenging to think that there could be a remedy to address such a broad range of causes for our attention. To address such a broad range of causes for our attention. But could the ancient ways be holding the secrets to handling any type of stressor? Stress is a natural part of life, but there is a point where too much stress becomes dangerous. According to the 2024 results of the American Psychiatric Association's annual mental health poll, 43% of adults reported feeling more anxious than they did the previous year. 53% of people say that stress is one of the biggest factors impacting their mental health. Our master mystical healer, michelle Rios-Rice, shares that as a curandera. People consumed by stress often come to her for help. Generally, they come to her when the stress has become so extreme that they are plagued by emotional, physical and spiritual symptoms.

Speaker 2:

It's unfortunate because people could catch things sooner if they learn how to come into that place of recognizing. Oh my God, I have anxiety, or I'm really stressed out, I'm not sleeping at night, I can't rest enough, or I'm gaining weight, or I have inflammation and my body is starting to feel aches and pains in different places which I didn't feel before. There's all these subtle signs. I have mild headache, I'm getting vertigo, All of that. Those are mild. Those are symptoms and they're mild and they compound over a period of time if you don't take care of things sooner rather than later.

Speaker 1:

When we have pain, illness and a sense of distress, then the stress has already manifested itself. I asked Michelle how do we begin the process of shifting back into a more peaceful and aligned state?

Speaker 2:

We have to learn to honor a different way of being. It comes back into a place of saying what is it that I want my life to be about? What is it that I want my life to be about? What is it that I value as an individual and how am I going to cultivate that? And when I step outside of what I want to cultivate as an individual, if I start getting these signs, these things that are happening with the body, then you have to come back into what I call your alignment. You have to come back into what you value and what brings you health and well-being.

Speaker 1:

Of course, as previously stated, we are not offering any medical advice on this podcast, but I wanted to know what is the ancient way, the way of curanderismo, in addressing stress.

Speaker 2:

When we look as a curandera, when we look at a person or we look at ourselves, we're looking at what's going on spiritually and energetically. We're looking at what's going on mentally, what we're thinking, what we're saying, how we're perceiving things. We're looking at what's going on mentally, what we're thinking, what we're saying, how we're perceiving things. We're looking into the emotional body. Are we in peace and joy and harmony? Are we in a kind of plateaued satisfaction or are we in the negative emotions? Are we in anger? Are we in jealousy, distress, anxieties, that kind of thing? Are we balanced or imbalanced in the emotional body and then in the physical body?

Speaker 2:

When we have signs in the physical body, we've already filtered through those which I just mentioned. We have something separate from that which is our heart radiance, and that's our love and that's the flow of our love. And if that's blocked because of pain or trauma, we're definitely not in harmony, we're not balanced where we need to be in a good space not perfect, but in a good enough space. And so if you are having physical symptoms, that means already that you've neglected those levels. I would say the second that a person starts feeling, not just once, but let's say you feel like my back is bothering me again or my neck or my head, if it's coming to visit you more than once, coming to visit you more than once, you better stop, pause and take heed and do something about it Saying create that harmony that you value, the things that bring you into good energy, good frequencies, good vibrations, higher frequencies, higher octaves. That will restore your body pretty quickly. It's all about frequency and bringing yourself back into those higher frequencies and those places that produce well-being.

Speaker 1:

Accepting that stress is problematic should come easily to most of us. However, making changes can prove to be a bit more challenging. So, using the ancient ways, how can we start to shift into a higher frequency?

Speaker 2:

So you want to have I like to call it the medicine bag, your own medicine bag. And this is very empowering because when you think about your medicine bag, because when you think about your medicine bag, these are your tools that are specific to you, that you use to shift your frequency. Higher frequencies of energy can heal cancer. It can heal and transform anything. So you think about things that you really like, let's say, music. Music can shift somebody's mood in an instant Dance or twirl or spin under the sunlight. If you take a walk, if you go to a river and get in the river, if you take a bath, that's going to shift your frequency. That's going to shift your frequency.

Speaker 2:

The smoke, the smudging, which is now very becoming into the mainstream the smoke has a frequency. Each person should have in their tool bag three to five things that they know that will shift their frequency when they're stressed out and they pick one of them in a given moment and they use that to shift their frequency, to heighten the frequency. Prayer, meditation, visualization also shift frequency. Those are more spiritual in line. When I look at our indigenous people, my people, when they drum and they're drumming for a ceremony, they're doing ritual and ceremony. They're telling you something about the ancient ways. When you're doing a ceremony and you're lighting a fire and you're connecting to something outside of yourself that's sacred, you're tapping into a different reality for yourself in those moments.

Speaker 1:

Though not all can be revealed in one short-form podcast, I asked Michelle to talk about some of the specifics that the ancients of her own culture have used to gain greater alignment.

Speaker 2:

One of the things that we also do in our ancient ways is we create a situation in which we fast. Some people might think, oh, fasting is just about food and they do a two-day fast or three-day fast or two-day cleanse or three-day cleanse or five-day cleanse. Fasting is not just nutritionally or with food. Fasting is saying I'm going to remove myself from the things of the world, I'm going to turn off the TV, put that away for a little bit, everything that I have to do, and I'm going to come inward. And when you fast and you come inward, you're disconnecting from that outside force, all of that outside stress, all of that, whatever it is, that's creating these symptoms inside of you. And that's the first step is to just like uproot and fast from the outer world. Am I taking in nonsense on social media? Am I taking in the nonsense of all of the stress, energetically, of what's happening politically in this country and in this world, the corruption? Am I taking that in? Is that frequency something I want in me?

Speaker 2:

Again, it goes back to saying what is it that I value? And what I value is what I'm going to let in and what I don't value I'm not going to let in, and those are spiritual. It's like a spiritual maintenance, it's a spiritual boundary. I'm not taking that in because it's not really producing peace and harmony for me and my children, for my spouse, for my world, for my parents in my home. So what do I want to create here?

Speaker 2:

And we think about that in reference to all of these levels. So if you go back to the ancients and you say, ok, they lived in nature and maybe their world might seem like parts of it were a little bit harder, but they had technologies, they had profound understanding of the manipulation of energy through frequency, and so they were tuned in and tapped in. If they would do their praying, if they would start drumming or chanting, they were opening and aligning to something more cosmic that was inside of them and outside of them and that transforms you. Not only does it transform you, but it connects you to I'm going to call them your supernatural, your gifts. It connects you to those gifts.

Speaker 1:

From personal experience, I have seen how some people push against ancient and nature-based healing strategies. There are always groups that have resistance to anything not currently in the mainstream. So why, then, from the perspective of a curandera, should we be taking these ancient ways seriously?

Speaker 2:

We need to live in those ways because we're magical beings. Should we be taking these ancient ways seriously? Magical beings and we're here to create a completely different way of how we're living as humans. We're here for that purpose. Right now, that's the shattering that's happening around us. So when you come back to your health and your body, when your body is saying I'm getting these migraines, or I have diarrhea, or I've got a stomach ache every damn day, or a neck ache or a back ache, you better pay attention. Your body is telling you hey, you're out of balance, get back in balance, which you can through the frequencies. So again, it's doing the cosmic fast of getting these things out of the way and then having your medicine bag, your tool bag when I use the word medicine, I'm not talking about Western medicine. I'm talking about the medicine that you are, the medicine and the power and the light and the magic that you are as an individual and you bring that medicine bag your medicine bag and mine might have different tools inside of it, but those are the things that work for you.

Speaker 2:

We want to feel good. People want to be happy. We want to be at peace. We don't want to feel like crap. We don't want to be stressed out running around. Think about it this way If you told everybody hey, take money out of the equation. Nobody has to work anymore, you don't have to work for money, take that out of the equation what would you be doing with your life? We waste our time on so much nonsense. Coming into that alignment is an essential thing that every person has to learn. We have to learn how to do it. We have to teach our children how to do it. We have to take charge and we have to say this is what I value and this is what I'm going to create. And we have to say this is what I value and this is what I'm going to create, how I'm going to live in what I value. And when your body says you need a break, then you take a break. Self-care is so important.

Speaker 1:

The old has a tendency to become new again in so many ways, whether it's a repackaging of something tried and true or a remembrance of something already established from a different time. As Michelle speaks of ways to cure chronic stress from the viewpoint of Okurandera, her strategies are equally wellorted in external psychological studies. A study in the April 4, 2019 Frontiers in Psychology edition found that spending as little as 20 minutes in nature can help lower stress hormone levels. Cortisol was measured from the saliva samples of the research participants. Cortisol was measured from the saliva samples of the research participants. The measured decrease in cortisol came after participants spent just three days per week in nature after an eight-week study. Additionally, researchers at Stanford have said that quote listening to music seems to be able to change brain functioning to the same extent as medication. Obviously, there's more to unpack there, but the point is that there is an opportunity through this podcast to learn about how many have integrated the natural and ancient ways into their modern lives to maximize their well-being. Listen in next week to hear more.