Master Plant Dieta with Sacred Mapacho
During the magical dieta with Mapacho I was blessed to experience, what I felt most when Mapacho came in was this overwhelming sense of coming Home. There was something incredibly comforting about his spirit and presence, like a blanket of smoke and sense of being completely held. For years I had been feeling his call and telling him that when he made the path, I would follow him. Then this summer, that path opened wide and I found myself in Costa Rica in a maloka with a phenomenal indigenous maestro and tabaquero and an amazing journey with Grandfather Tobacco.
The Magic of Grounding and Protection
We began the week with a couple of Mapacho purges to clear us out, and after the first one, his ability to ground us hit me heavily. For most of the day I moved incredibly slowly, often having to lay down. Sometimes during the week, when he would come in strong, I would find myself laying on my mat immobilized. While this may sound frightening, it was not. His immense field of protection was holding me safely as I lay on the earth, and never did it feel forceful in a threatening way. I was simply being asked to be still and feel myself glued to the ground, to allow myself to feel the earth beneath me and remember that I was always safe.
Mapacho was protecting me and still is to this day. As soon as I ever feel ungrounded or like there is an energy that I need to clear, he is the first ally that I reach for. Not only will he usher in clearing and safety, but that wonderous feeling of being held in his arms returns along with that vibration of feeling home.
The Magic of Connection
The beauty of his ability to ground and protect us in this way is that it’s directly related to his astounding capability to help us connect- to ourselves, to other plants, to the earth, to the cosmos, to all of the earth beings and spirit world that we have come to feel disconnected from. It is the remembrance of these connections that invites in the state of being that creates protection. When we remember our oneness with all of the beings of earth and sky, there is nothing outside of us that can hurt us.
Within this capacity, my favorite was how he welcomed in so many of the plants to support our work together. He knows that when a plant I’m dieting welcomes another plant momentarily in to teach something in synergy with the plant being dieted is my favorite thing ever, and as a plant with the superpower of connecting us to other plant spirits, he is an absolute master at this. Time and time again, throughout my experience with him, he would invite another ally of mine into the space to contribute to what we were working with.
How Mapacho Connected Me with Another Plant Spirit
One example of this was with Bobinsana. She was my first master plant dieta, and most of us often feel like we did that one wrong or didn’t go as deeply as we could because we are new to the process and learning to understand the ways in which plants communicate with us. I had always felt like I could use a redo of that dieta. But she was actually growing on the retreat property, so I saw her growing for the first time in my life.
Then, during the second purge, he invited her to come in and let me know that our connection was actually stronger than ever. She burst my heart open by saying that all this time we’ve had since our dieta together was time that we continued to grow our relationship, and I felt such love from her that I could barely handle it. Then it burst open more with gratitude for mapacho for inviting her in, and I could feel his happiness at my understanding that these relationships go on forever, and the connection is never gone. While I knew this intellectually, the way that they partnered to allow me to feel experiential was absolute heart-opening perfection.
The Magic of Intention
Another superpower of Mapacho is his ability to work deeply with intention and remind us of its importance. As mentioned earlier, most of the week, when I was feeling Mapacho strongly, I would walk astoundingly slowly, barely moving one foot in front of the other. Finally, at one point, I asked him what was the purpose of this?
His response was that you should move as slowly as you have to such that each step is intentional. In every step, you are aware of the earth beneath you and what your intention is with each movement. This is how you are being made to walk so that you learn to walk this way through life.
Again, in medicine circles, you often hear people discussing the power of intention, but to feel this power in your body aligned with every single movement that you are making was a whole other experience. The impact of this simple statement from him has shifted the way that I approach everything in my life. Being constantly aware of your intention and grounding it into the earth as you walk is a fabulous way to consciously embody and manifest what you want to create in this life and how you want to connect with the other beings on it.
Curious to learn more about Mapacho / Tobacco? Check out our blog, “How Long Does Rapé (Hapé) Last?” and discover his healing power through Rapé.
About the Author
Lindsay Calliandra Rose is a Medicine Carrier, an accomplished herbalist, Plant Medicine integration specialist, and a woman with a profoundly sacred relationship with nature. She began her Plant Medicine journey many years ago with Ayahuasca and Huachuma, and she has completed multiple Master Plant Diets with beings like Rose, Bobinsana, Juniper, Jurema, Cacao, Oak, and Blue Water Lily. Lindsay is an initiated server and carrier of Hapéh. She now works as a preparation and integration guide for those answering the call to work with sacred medicines, and she is apprenticing in the art of guiding Master Plant Diets as well. She is a passionate advocate of safe and transformative experiences with the plants, and she loves helping people navigate these mysterious spaces with grace, love, and support.
