The Temazcal ceremony
A few months ago we had the inspiration to apprentice with a real shaman. Deep in the woods in the far north of Ibiza lives Marga Luna, an old wise woman, who looks exactly what you think a real shaman should look like. Last winter I - together with 4 other brave women - isolated myself for a week on her remote property in a remote corner of the island. Without WIFI and without any contact with the outside world. This week was beyond all expectations and of course a lot more about this later, but today we'll start at the beginning. On the eve of this magical week, a so-called Temazcal ceremony took place, one of the many special rituals that we were able to experience during this ultimate back to nature journey.
A Temazcal ceremony is an age-old tradition that originally dates back to the Mayans in Mexico. In English they say sweatlodge and literally translated it is actually just a sweat lodge. The cabin itself is one on one igloo resembling circular dome. To warm up the room volcanic rock heated and then placed in a pit in the middle of the Temazcal, after which it was poured with water. This ceremony was already used in the time of the Mayans as a healing ritual and so every type of imbalance in physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health was treated.
Back to Marga Luna. At the end of the afternoon, about 20 people - from somewhat haggard hippies to extremely fresh-faced yoga teachers - slowly trickled onto her grounds. Part of the ritual is that we contribute together to the preparation of the ceremony and everyone is given their own task. For example, wood must be gathered for the fire, flower petals must be collected to build an altar and soup must be prepared for after the ceremony. The metal frame of the hut must be covered with cloth and a fireman is appointed to manage the fire (in which the volcanic stones are heated) carefully and with great precision.
Once all preparations have been made - with a lot of love and respect for nature and tradition - we crawl into the tent one by one, where we then sit (not entirely corona-proof, by the way) crammed quite close together and sweat for 4 hours. Songs are sung which seem to serve as a kind of mantras, making the heat bearable despite the fact that it is becoming increasingly intense. The trick is to surrender to this, and thus end up in a kind of meditative trans.
En yes, all of that happens completely voluntarily.
Because we also understand that you so far If you are probably not yet completely convinced, we saved the list Benefits for the last time. Benefits of using the Tamazcal are: It stimulates blood circulation, relaxes the nervous system and thus reduces stress, anxiety and insomnia, it tightens the skin, clears the respiratory tract and helps with flu, bronchitis, asthma and sinusitis, reduces menstrual discomfort, stimulates introspection and reflection, purifies the digestion, helps with weight loss, reduces liver and kidney diseases and stimulates metabolism.
