A Vision Quest:

The Search for the Cultural Village

By Albeiro Rodas Inca Moyachoque

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A Vision Quest: The Search for the Cultural Village.
© 2024 Self Publication
Don Bosco Technical School, Media Communication Department
All rights reserved to the author. Any contact related to this document: albeiror24@gmail.com
Cite this document:
Rodas Albeiro, 2024. A Vision Quest for God within Indigenous Communities. The Search for
the God of my Life. A Journey of Faith within our Cultural Village. Kep Province, Cambodia, 17th
June 2024. Self Publish. For no commercial use.

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 A Vision Quest:
The Search for the Cultural Village

Albeiro Rodas Inca Moyachoque

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Content

Introduction: The Mayor Law, “because it will be customary again” 7

They will come back again 9
Territory 10
Ethnics 11
Aborigin and Mestizo: Remembering our roots 12
Peace, Justice and Reconciliation 14
A Vision Quest: Who am I? / Who are we? 17
Existential psychology and anthropology 19
The vision quest 24
First Mountain: My Cultural Village 30
Your name 31
Family 34
Village 40
Gathering of tribes 41
Second Mountain: Journey into the Wild 43
Third Mountain: Back to the Cultural Village 51
Fourth Mountain: My Mission 54
Conclusions 58
References 60

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 Dedication to:

Pacha Coya Inca

and her daughters:
Mencia de Collantes Inca
and
Eugenia de Sandóval Inca,
Catalina de Moyachoque
Mis abuelas antepasadas.

Fr. Wilfer Ángel Tamayo (Medellin, Colombia)

Fr. Cyril Niphot Thianwihan (Chiang Mai, Thailand)
Elders and Spiritual Guides

My brother Carlos Eduardo Castrillón Goez

Who went to the Grand Maloca on 6th July 2024, when I finished this book.
He was an authentic Tahamíe Warrior and one of my best friends during my childhood.

Circle of the Sacred Rice

My siblings.

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“Because they will come back again, they will walk these paths.”

Fogata Patrulla Tigres, Campamento junio de 1984, El Temprano.

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Introduction: The Mayor Law, “because it will be
customary again”
I believe that any discussion related to indigenous peoples, regardless of their location
on our planet, should involve a thorough analysis and understanding of the Law of Origin or the
Greater Right (known as ‘Ley de origen’ or ‘Ley Mayor’ in Spanish). This concept is rooted in
harmony and guided by principles of correspondence and complementarity” (Carlos Albeiro
Flórez Vargas, 2016.) The concept of the Greater Right serves as the foundation for discussions
about the human rights of indigenous peoples and the acknowledgment of their identity as the
original inhabitants, the aborigines, and the ancient settlers of a territory. According to Josep
Estermann’s studies on the Misak people1 within what he terms Andean Philosophy
(Pachasophy,) Westerners can grasp this intricate concept of the Greater Right by exploring the
native principles of correspondence and complementarity.” (Translation provided by me)

“To gain a clearer understanding of the Andean ‘worldview’ (a fitting term in this context),
we must consider the ‘logical’ principles of Andean rationality, specifically the principles of
correspondence and complementarity. In this sense, ‘worldview’ represents the symbolic
portrayal of the interconnected cosmos (pacha) through various cardinal axes. It is not merely a
‘vision’ in the Western sense of theoreia or visio. To avoid adhering solely to the Western
perspective that labels it as ‘worldview’ but not ‘philosophy,’ I propose the term ‘pachasophy.’ This
term encompasses integral reflections on cosmic relationality, serving as a manifestation of the
collective Andean experience of ‘reality.’” (Esterman Joseph, 2006, p. 158.)

In Esterman’s perspective, the principle of correspondence within pachasophy revolves

around how different aspects of reality harmoniously align. Everything in the universe
corresponds to an underlying unity, where the macro mirrors the micro and vice versa. Unlike
Western philosophy, which often dissects phenomena without considering their connection to a
holistic universal reality, pachasophy recognizes that nothing exists outside this interconnected
framework. Additionally, Esterman emphasizes the principle of complementarity, explaining that
every object or action in the universe maintains a unique complementary relationship with
something else.

It is crucial that all of humanity understands the philosophy and wisdom of indigenous
peoples. However, even more critical is that indigenous communities themselves do not forget
this knowledge or, if it has already faded, actively seek to remember it. This commitment fosters
a profound sense of belonging, respect, recognition, and mutual understanding. It entails that
indigenous peoples should uphold the concept of the Greater Right, while neighboring
1
The Guambiano or Misak are an indigenous people of the department of Cauca in Colombia. Their
language is known as Guambiano and is one of the Coconucan languages. The majority lives in the
western part of the Colombian Andes range (Cordillera).

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communities must acknowledge and honor it. This process of dialogue and understanding
bridges the gap between indigenous communities and those that followed them in history,
regardless of the circumstances.

For instance, within a modern state, the Greater Right should find recognition through national
legislation. Yet, the Greater Right transcends any specific state or era. National borders,
geopolitics, and political landscapes shift over time. Many of today’s indigenous communities
are direct descendants of ancient sovereign territories, even in more recent history.
Unfortunately, they now grapple with complex challenges such as dispossession, persecution,
violence, and displacement.

Across the globe, many indigenous communities transcend international borders,

existing within the sovereignty of two, three, or even four states. South America provides
numerous examples of such indigenous peoples who straddle multiple national boundaries.
Take, for instance, the Zio Bain or Siona community. They inhabit both sides of the Putumayo
River, which serves as the natural border between Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Brazil. While
these modern states view the Zio Bain as occupying territories within their respective borders,
the ancestral perspective differs significantly. For the Zio Bain, this land constitutes a singular
territory—an inheritance from their ancestors—one that predates the establishment of those four
contemporary nations. Their primacy in this context aligns with the concept of the Greater Right.

When considering territory, it becomes challenging to draw direct comparisons between

ancient traditions and those of modern societies, particularly in the context of globalized
cultures. In contemporary societies, we have a clear understanding of state boundaries,
geopolitical relations, and national identities. However, this was not the case in ancient
communities across the planet. Even powerful empires like the Tawantinsuyu (Inca Empire)
cannot be neatly compared to modern states. Their dynamics—such as power relations,
administration, and religiosity—operated under different paradigms that set them apart.

Today, we recognize the Republic of Colombia and the Republic of Argentina as two
modern states sharing certain elements defined by principles like democracy. We understand
that they each have a capital—the largest urban center—along with a central government
structure and other familiar features.

Even if we would like to compare modern states with those of Europe previous to the
origin of nationalities in that continent, we see how it was full of European tribes around kings,
queens, and nobles. France between the 10th and 15th century was not a country as we
understand it today, but a collection of tribes around a lord of the land: The king or the feud. This
situation persisted despite the ancient existence of the Roman Empire, from which the
European nations derived to some extent. In a certain sense, the European nations originated
from their own Law of Origins, where a certain group of tribes, sharing a territory and a
resemblance in their languages and religions, felt the need to unite in a single body that was
later known as a nation: Spain, Portugal, France, Italy, Germany, Russia, etc. Furthermore, the
creation of the European Union is based on their ancestral origins. The strength of such a

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political and economic body is rooted in their Greater Right, even if they assume that it is solely
based on modern principles associated with terms like modern civilizations. This is why a
country like Turkey is reluctantly accepted in the European Union: Because they have another
Greater Right, something in their history that sets them apart from the rest of Europe, at least in
their eyes. However, making comparisons between peoples from different latitudes is inherently
challenging. Each nation has its own identity, history, and ways of relating both internally and
externally.

Therefore, the Greater Right is necessary for our own development and dialogue with
other societies throughout all times. It transcends history. Probably, 500 years from now, the
societies of that time, which could be completely different from the modern and global societies
of today, should have their own identities and logics according to the elements that will give
origin to them—and perhaps we are among those foundational elements. However, even in that
distant future, our Greater Right will remain equally valid and powerful. Those future societies
should keep the dialogue open with our ancient roots. Regardless of how they perceive us, they
must know, understand, and promote the elements of our indigenous origins.

They will come back again

When I was a boy scout in Medellin, the city I grew up in Colombia, my companions and
myself were deeply inspired by the stories of our ancestors that in the Colombian Department of
Antioquia keep a mystical tone. Antioquia is one of those El Dorado spots of the Spaniard
conquests due to the presence of gold mines throughout a territory of mountains, valleys,
canyons and plains. This fact attracted gold searchers even from pre columbian times, where
our ancient gold mines were the quarries of Muiscas, Quechuas and even Mayas. After colonial
times, Antioquia was the destination of Spaniards, Italians, French, British, along with Africans
and even Asians, looking for gold. Today, after 500 years of exploitation, Antioquia continues
providing gold to the world, together with its neighbor Department of Choco, one of the main
Afro Colombian regions.2 It is important to remark that those gold mines areas are also, today,
the poorest communities of Colombia. Towns and entire departments like Choco, are not
territories of development. The providers of richness live in poverty. The attraction for gold put
down the ancient indigenous communities and created slavery and poverty.

Spaniard conquerors did very little to preserve the languages of many Indigenous
peoples of Antioquia and many groups were declared extinct by the 18th century, such as my
main native ancestor group, the Tahamíe.3 Today, with the development of indigenous rights in

2
Just the “Nechi Project” in Antioquia, is one the largest gold mines in Colombia, producing approximately
53.68 million metric tons per annum (mmtpa) of Run-of-Mine (ROM) and primarily produced gold (73.13
thousand tonnes) in 2021. The Nechi Project is owned by Mineros SA. The second largest mine with
approximately 27.53 mmtpa of ROM, was the Cerrejon Mine located in La Guajira. The Cerrejon Mine is
owned by Glencore Plc, and is due to operate until 2035.
3
Tahamíes, Tahamí, Tohamines (López Lozano, 1968, p. 14), are one of the ethnic groups that constitute
the contemporary Antioquia or Paisa people. Although they are assumed to be extinct as a people in

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Colombia and in the world, we can see the efforts of many peoples to rediscover their ancestral
roots.

In my family, both from my father and from my mother, we have that identity of what is
known already in Colombia as the tree-ethnics. We come from Antioquia’s Northeast region, the
proper territory of the Tahamíe, where there are the main gold mines, and we keep already in
our family tree the names of Tahamíe’s women from the 16th to 19th centuries.4 Even if we are
considered Three-ethnic, the Greater Right is important, because it links us closely to the
peoples that inhabited the territory where we were born. We recognize the fact that we also
have ancestors from Europe and from Africa, but we were born in the land of our Indigenous
ancestors. Therefore, in our Mestizo’s identity, the indigenous belonging is stronger because the
identity is not only about genes and blood, but also about territory, traditions and spirituality. I
have always sensed that belonging to a group of ancient peoples that were said to be extinct in
books, but that are actually alive through us, through our contemporary families.

In the rediscovery of our roots, there are some elements to play an important role:

Territory

We are born and we live in the land of our ancestors. This land is not mute or silent. It
talks to us through many signs. In all South America we know about the Wak'a, the Quechua
word that is often associated with sacred objects or places of worship within the Inca culture.
The word Wak’a comes from the Quechua, which means sacred object or sacred place. In
Colombia, Wak’as are known as tombs of the aboriginals and are considered places of spiritual
power. It is commonly related to religious or ceremonial significance in indigenous Andean
cultures. When we find an ancient buried site, we call it Wak’a. They attract many gold diggers
that desecrate the ancestors’ tombs to look for treasures. The presence of hundreds of Wak’as
in our territory tell us about our elders, as well as uncountable indigenous sites, paths, pottery
and indigenous names for rivers, streams, hills, towns and many other things. My mother and
her siblings grew up at the site of a sacred wak’a in the Porce Canyon. For decades, my
grandmother talked about a burial in her yard and how she could feel it through the vision of a
bright light in the night. In our culture, we believe that the vision of a light pointing at the site of a
wak’a is an invitation to open it. It is a kind of gift provided by the ancestor or guardian spirit of
the wak’a. But there are conditions: Only those with pure heart, without ambition or greed, can
find it. Another condition is that only men can search for it and, in very rare cases, the spirit

themselves, in reality they are part of the ethos of a large part of the Paisa region, especially that located
between the Magdalena rivers to the east and Porce and Nechí to the west (López Lozano, 1968 ).
Certainly the Tahamí language is extinct, but it can be traced through geographical names and historical
figures and, in addition, it was similar to that of the Nutabe and the Catíos, because it belonged to the
Chibcha and Macro Chibcha linguistic family, relating them to peoples like the Muiscas of the Colombian
central east and with Central American peoples and even the Maya. In the case of a cultural and linguistic
rescue project, these languages ​would have to play a vital role. Their territory was the eastern region of
the Department of Antioquia.
4
We are descendants of Cacique Betuma, La Cancanera, Mencia Collantes Inca and Eugenia Sandoval
Coya, Saguamanchica and other indigenous ancestors.

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would give it to women. About 30 years after the passing away of my grandmother, the land of
her house was claimed by the government for the construction of a modern road. It was only at
that moment, when the bulldozers were breaking the dear stones and soil of our ancestral
property, where they found the wak’a as a collection of ancient pottery, gold and the venerable
relic of an ancient Tahamie ancestor. We do not know what the government decided to do with
our wak’a, but we are pleased to know that we grew near it.

Ethnics
Our own ethnicity reveals our ancient origins, as well as many family names that come
from ancient times and that survived Europeanization, as well as the whitening of genealogical
trees by individuals willing to get inheritances or that considered that being of European origin
was more important than showing African or indigenous ancestry.

In Antioquia, many families are keen to look for their European ancestors. It is indeed a
right of any person willing to connect with their ancestors and we should not look down if a
Colombian person feels more connected to the European conquerors of the 16th century than to
our evident African and indigenous ancestors too. As I mentioned already, we are mostly
three-ethnic people in Colombia, even those who claim a “ethnic purity.”

Following that trend of searching for my own ethnic origins, very much interested in the
indigenous and African origins of my own family, I did a genetic test in 2015. The results were
very much affirmative of my own previous research and conclusions about the origins of my own
family. We were, indeed, three-ethical people, sharing equal genes from four continents:
Europe, especially from the conquerors of the 16th century, who took indigenous women (our
grandmothers,) and some other European migrants into the Americas; West Africans who were
kidnapped as slaves to work in the South American mines; and, ancestors from both North
America and South American ancestral indigenous peoples, especially Chibcha and Quechua.
The modern country of Colombia is located in the northwest of South America, in the place
where our continent connects to North America through an ancient geological bridge: Central
America. Pre-columbian Colombia was, therefore, the meeting place of indigenous North
American and South American civilizations in a fascinating journey that today is the interest of
archeologists, anthropologists and any field or discipline interested in our origins. Panama's
isthmus is a geological bridge, where its southeastern part belongs to the South American
plateau and its northwest is part of Central America. It is, therefore, the link between two
different worlds and two hemispheres. This fact is important in the comprehension of the
identities of what was, for example, the Tawantinsuyu, the civilization of the Inca in South
America and the world of the Maya and Aztec in North America. Two distinct continents that the
Spanish Empire named as a single one: America. Today, in the Spanish speaking countries, we
still hear that the western hemisphere, from Alaska to Fireland, is a single continent: America. In
English the distinction is more exact from the perspective of geology, biology and anthropology.
Two continents.

In 1975 the Bolivian Aymara activist and leader Constantino Lima Chávez, known also
as Takir Mamani, proposed the use of “Abya Yala” as a name for the Americas. The first time

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that the name was used in an official event was at the 2nd Continental Summit of Indigenous
Peoples and Nationalities of Abya Yala in Quito in 2004. On that occasion he said: "Placing
foreign names on our villages, our cities, and our continents is equivalent to subjecting our
identity to the will of our invaders and their heirs." Every indigenous nation in the Americas have
their unique ways to call their ancestral lands and the ones of others, like Turtle Island in North
America, the Anahuac, the Tawantinsuyu and so on. But choosing a common name would open
a sense of belonging for unity amongst cultures that shared a similar pachasophia such as the
relation with the territory, the Greater Right and the struggles with colonialism and
neocolonialism.

The name Abya Yala comes because it is an indigenous voice of the Kuna, a Chibchan
nation whose territory is between the northwest of Colombia and the southeast of Panama, right
at the place where the North American and South American worlds meet. It means that the
Kuna has lived in the middle of those two huge territories for centuries. So far, there is no proof
yet of the awareness of the Inca and the Aztec over the existence of each other. But the Kuna
knew of a vast extension towards the north and a vast extension towards the south. They called
it Abya Yala, "land in full plenitude", "land of life" or "land in maturity.". The word Abya means
blood, which for the people was synonymous with life, and Yala means mountain. Overall, the
concept is named the "living land", the land of flourishing.

One of my favorite Boy Scout’s excursions was always to walk the ancient indigenous
paths, many of them crossing the Valley of Aburra where I grew up, as well as many paths along
the Porce Canyon. In those years of my childhood, I felt that connection with those ancestors
and I remember that once I said with my companions, sitting down near one of those ancient
paths: “Because they will come back again, they will walk these paths.” Some decades after that
moment, I can feel that such a prophecy, the prophecy of a child, is being fulfilled. That child, at
that moment, did not realize that the come back of our ancestors would be through our own
selves, through our own Abya, blood: We are back and we are ready to walk throughout our
ancient Yala, our mountains!

Aborigin and Mestizo: Remembering our roots

The concept of Mestizo comes from the European colonization of Abya Yala, starting the
16th century. After the findings of Cristopher Columbus in 1492 in our territories, it took time for
the Europeans to realize many things: First, to confirm the already forgotten fact that the Earth
is round, something that ancient Egyptians and other ancient peoples knew centuries before,
including peoples from the territories they claimed to discover like the Maya. And, second, to
realize that the claims of Columbus over arriving to the Asian continent by sailing towards the
west, was not correct.

He arrived in an unknown to the Europeans territory and a very vast land, hundreds of
times bigger than Europe. Instead to correct the mistake to label it as India and to call
thousands of indigenous peoples as Indians (Indios,) they sticked to their error, because they

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felt so superior to themselves that they could not get down to recognize nothing to nobody - and
we were right a nobody to the conquerors and after to the colonialists. They continued calling us
indios and, to be a little accurate, Western Indians, while the name "America" was first used on
a map created in 1507 by the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller, where it appeared as
a Latinized version of "Amerigo" to label the new continent. No European of the time was really
interested in using a native name for it.

The mixing of races started from the first incursions of conquistadores in our lands. In
wars against our ancestors to look for gold and to take our lands, they mostly massacrated the
male populations in the entire continent. It brings us to the fact that too many peoples declared
extinct by European historians, are not really correct, because they did not count the survivors,
mostly women and children, as part of those peoples. Women were given to the conquistadores
as prizes of battles. The daughters of caciques or indigenous lords, were of special attention.

The daughters of Manco Capac Inca, were distributed to the different conquistadores
that took over El Cuzco in 1537. One of those daughters, Pacha Coya Inca, was kidnapped,
when she and her sisters were running away towards Ecuador after the fall of Cuzco. The
conquistador Sebastian de Belalcázar (my ancestor too,) gave her, as a prize, to Diego de
Sandoval y la Mota, who brought her to Bogotá. Her two daughters, Mencia de Collantes Inca
and Eugenia de Sandóval Inca, are also ancestors in the line of my father and mother’s lineage.
It means that our being as mestizos have to see with this kind of stories: The kidnapping and
most probably rapes of our indigenous grandmothers. Searching for my own ancestry, most of
the indigenous ancestors with factual documentation or reference are of women, who were
given to Spaniard conquerors.

This fact gives us another interesting clue: If most of those women were married to
conquerors, most of those women were daughters of brave indigenous chiefs that faced the
bloody battles against the conquerors. They were princesses from the western point of view. We
are descendants from princesses. It is interesting to see how many contemporary Colombians,
especially those of white skin, are too keen to demonstrate that they are descendants from
Spaniards or other European nations. This attitude is not new and it can be traced since the
same time of the conquests and colonization, when many descendants of a conqueror with an
indigenous women, were doing what we call in Spanish blanqueado de sangre (to show an
evident preference for the ancestry of the European father or grandfather, ignoring the
indigenous family tree of the mother or grandmother.) This is why, when I was looking into the
biography or my ancestor, Sebastian de Belalcazar, it is impossible to find much information
about his many indigenous concubines, like my grandmother Catalina Mateos de Belalcazar, a
Sutiaba woman from Nicaragua that, surely, did not have such a name as a native. I could boast
of Sebastian de Belalcazar as my ancestor, a Spaniard man, who defeated many of our
ancestors to take possession of their lands and to impose slavery and tears over our peoples. I
prefer to boast about Catalina, the Sutiaba woman, who was the daughter of one of those brave
indigenous men that dared to face an invasion and imposition without much success. But in the
end, I am not proud to be the descendant of ancient indigenous chiefs, but I am definitely proud
to be the descendant of my own people. I am an indigenous man.

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 This reflection is our quest for life, especially of those who are mestizos in Latin America.
When we see the saden situation of many indigenous communities, suffering exploitation,
displacement, discrimination, abandonment, forced migration, we also see that many of those
elites are made of mestizo groups. Therefore, calling for conversion means to rediscover who
we are. If you are in any kind of power, political, social or religious, and you realize of your
indigenous ancestry, including the Africans, you will change the ways you do your politics, your
business or even your preaching. You discover that our ancestors are still living in us. It is not
only those indigenous groups that have stuck together for centuries, following the traditions,
spirituality and languages of our ancestors, but also we, mestizos, are descendants of those
same ancestors. The difference is that we were eradicated in colonial times and immersed in
colonial societies, under false assumptions like that of the extinction of the indigenous, to
ensure the brainwash and to ensure that our indigenous souls remain dormant forever, while we
become complicit in a system of indigenous destruction.

This book is directed to the mestizos, rather than the indigenous peoples of today. This
book is written by an indigenous man of today, who has passed through a long period of his
vision quest, to discover who I am and to share it with others. I believe certainly that in the
indigenous resistance against conquests, colonization, exploitation, discrimination and attempt
to extinct our indigenous identity, the mestizos must play a radical role. You have to choose your
part, to have your option. It is not, definitely, an invitation to violence or wars, but to love, and,
today, it is a cry for help, to join the resilience of indigenous peoples, because, the global and
technocratic society of our times is putting the entire Planet at risk and with it, the same
existence of all humanity. Indigenous wisdom is one of those elements that could save us,
because indigenous peoples live in harmony with Mother Nature. We have to unlearn all the
rubbish that this technocratic society has put in our brains and to relearn the ancient paths of
our ancestors.

Peace, Justice and Reconciliation

This is a journey of reconciliation. We talk about topics that are difficult to remember.
Some people would prefer to ignore historical facts and think only about the future. But historical
memory is important in the reconstruction of our face, our identity and who we are.

We have to be careful, therefore, in not losing our sight on the Love we are called to. We
are not looking for revenge, for a fight of social classes, for a certain racism where indigenous
peoples were discriminated against in the past and now they are the subject of discrimination
against other peoples.

We have to talk about colonial times, especially the one that has to do with Europe. It
includes post-colonialism, neo-colonialism and neoliberal economy. We need to go deep into, to
understand its origin and consequences, in such a way that we can act on it. But in our search
for justice, we are pursuing peace and reconciliation. We all are humans, the same human

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species with a common origin traced in Africa more than 6 million years ago, doing a journey
through all our planet, surviving millenia of challenges, massive extinction, natural disasters and
many other things, known and unknown. But all of us, all the human inhabitants of Mother Earth,
are brothers and sisters, sons and daughters from the same ancestor in Africa, from the same
mother.

In our world journey, we have made mistakes, falling into the traps of greed, ambitions,
power, selfishness and violence against our own species, as well as against Mother Nature in all
continents. By doing so, we have even created philosophies and ideologies to back those
actions, as well as using religions and ideologies as instruments to manipulate peoples in favor
of particular interests. This is also true in our indigenous world and histories. Therefore, we have
to bring lights to our darkness. In our vision quest for our own identity, it is also important to
recognize our failures and to guarantee that we can be more aware for the future.

I want to mention something about western cultures and societies. In our time of
historical revisions and inviting critical thinking about our actions as humans, inhabitants of one
single planet, we associate western civilization with materialism and technocracy. It is because a
lot of data shows us that such a style of living, where Mother Earth is seen merely as an object
of exploitation, is causing crises such as climate change, global poverty, migration, wars and
violence. Definitely, we can not conclude that the way of living of the indigenous nations are the
cause of global warming. Tons of garbage, especially plastic, into the oceans, come only from
societies that considered themselves advanced and civilized. Massive deforestation in all the
world's jungles is linked to high consumption of energy to sustain the standard of life of
megacities. We can boast about the medical advance of the west in defeating old diseases like
flu, yellow fever and others, but modern diseases like cancer are related to that break of
humanity and Mother Nature.

In our critical reviews, we have to include the same critics as objects of revision. It is not
possible to dismiss an entire civilization (the western) as the demon of our troubles. It would be
a mistake. The tendency to focus on a single cause or scapegoat during a crisis, while
disregarding other contributing factors, is often referred to as “simplification bias”. It occurs when
people seek straightforward explanations, even when complex situations demand a more
nuanced understanding. Recognizing the interconnectedness of various elements in any crisis
is crucial for effective problem-solving and decision-making.

Certainly! In the 21st century, Western culture encompasses the diverse heritage of
social norms, ethical values, customs, belief systems, political structures, artifacts, and
technologies of the Western world. It traces its roots back to ancient Greece, the Roman
Empire, and Medieval Western Christendom. Major contributions also came from Christianized
Germanic peoples and other influences. As for Western civilization, it has experienced
transformative episodes such as the Renaissance, Reformation, Enlightenment, and Industrial
Revolution. That is the fact. Either we demonized the western world or we try to work with it and
even to heal it. Today we can see how many people from western societies of Europe and North
America are traveling to the Amazons for healing. Many are curious and look for experiences,

15
but you can also feel the need of many for healing and the search for meaning. They are in the
quest for life. It is a right and it is important to note. Healing the west should be our mission as
well, in a simbiosis of positive interchange. It comes to our ancestral territories for oil, wood,
gold and it destroys the environment and the living conditions of our peoples. But it can be
healed also. That is reconciliation and it is the mission of Love.

One fact is real: Every single human achievement of humanity in any field of knowledge,
it is a heritage of all humanity. We cannot say that electricity is a “western invention” and,
because the west is putting the entire planet into trouble, let us reject electricity. It would be silly
and ignorant. We are not for that.

At the same time, in our critical revision of the west, we have to recognize that the west
has not been created alone and independent from the rest of the human constellation of
cultures, traditions and knowledge. We, in Abya Yala, believe in the interconnectedness of
everything. It is not about Europeans being more clever than the rest of us. Civilization
advancement has to be seen also with historical circumstances and situations. For centuries,
Europe was an isolated region of the world, while the center of human advancement was in
places like Babilon, Persia, Egypt and even the Tawansituyo. Every civilization is the collection
of knowledge and wisdom that is previous to that civilization. The European thinkers that
opened the way to Renaissance, Reformation, Enlightenment, and Industrial Revolution, were
not creating things out of the blue. They were taking ancient knowledge from other regions of
the world. Even the exploitation of Mother Nature in other continents like Abya Yala, Africa, Asia
and Oceania, were needed for those European periods of exploration and western knowledge.

Just take western medicine. It is not that European scientists in the UK, Germany or
France started to make experiments in laboratories since the 18th century to discover medical
properties to fight diseases. No. For your information, western medicine is also based on Mother
Nature. Every single molecule, property, chemical, comes from Nature. Those who are, in fact,
more near to Mother Nature, are the indigenous communities all over the world. All those
European botanists, visited jungles and deserts during those colonial times and they could do
so through the help and understanding of indigenous peoples, who knew the plants, medicines
and their properties. However, there is little credit to all those anonymous indigenous medicine
people that helped in the investigation of those European scientists. Here is the point! The
commitment and even courage of those European explorers of science are welcome and
needed and we are grateful, but the real critic to the west does not come from an intention to
dismiss it, but on a claim and reclaim: The committed request to be humble enough to recognize
that those European scientist did need the guidance of our indigenous knowledge. It is justice.

In our pachasophy, we underline the value of respect and asking permission from Mother
Nature. If you want to pick something from the jungle, you have to ask for a sort of permission
that comes from the spirits, from the ancestors or from God. For example, in the Amazons, we
talk about “the owner of the wild animals” (el dueño de los animales.) It means that we believe
that everything is connected and in relation. If you decide to cut a tree, you are affecting many
other beings with that action. In order to preserve the harmony of the universe, you can ask

16
permission in a proper way and every culture has its own ways and wisdom. Some people
argue that western people come to the indigenous communities and steal things. It is not only
about scientists exploring forests with indigenous medicine people to steal their experiences in
Nature in order to synthesize the right molecule. Then, the name of the doctor would be
published on international platforms, getting a lot of money and recognition for the scientific
achievement and contribution to humanity, ignoring totally the names and identities of their
indigenous helpers or, probably, authentic masters of such knowledge. It is without a doubt a
theft that has to do with intellectual theft. It is dishonest and disrespectful and there are plenty of
cases about it. But it is also about artists getting “inspirations” (theft) in indigenous musics,
handicrafts, oral stories and even ritual ceremonies. What if a western musician comes to an
Amazonic tribe, records their traditional, sacred music and puts it on the fame in New York with
their own names, as if they were the authentic artists. That is theft and injustice.

But the point is this: We insist on telling westerns to learn to ask for permission and show
respect for our traditions. We want to let them know that if they come to our territories, they have
to ask for permission, as it is that westerners assume that they can take anything right available
as theirs, as if westerners were thieves. The reality is that in western societies there are plenty
of laws and rules for a common living together. Just the copyright is extensive for almost
everything possible on Earth, from intellectual to artistic creations. Therefore, for westerners it is
not odd to ask permission and to show respect for the works of others. Then, in this case, it is
not about that they do not know it, but that they assume that indigenous peoples do not enjoy
the same rights of other western subjects. You cannot copy the music of Michael Jackson, even
if he is dead by now, because you know that you are getting legal consequences for it, when
you violate the copyright legislation and, even further than that, it would be seen as something
out of taste and tone to show how unprofessional you are by copying someone’s else creation.
But it is not the same with an indigenous artist, who lives in a small village in the Andes or in the
Amazons and that would not have the enough funds and possibilities to defend himself in a
court. Therefore, it is not just a theft, but a hideous discrimination, a show of arrogance, power
and a colonialist mind. By doing so, you are not less than those conquerors who, five centuries
ago came to our lands and said: “Here there is nobody! All this land belongs to us!”

A Vision Quest: Who am I? / Who are we?

My own vision quest began during my childhood. I was born in the town of the Tiger /
Jaguar, Amalfi, Antioquia, in a mountain of Andean tropical jungles. Amalfi was founded in 1846
during the so-called Colonización Antioqueña that brought many gold diggers from all the
corners of Colombia, Latin America and Europe. The founding families of Pueblo Nuevo, as he
was called in the beginning, worked in mines of the region, while creating a typical Antioquean
town with a Spanish plaza and a Catholic community that integrated everybody. When I was
born in 1970, the town was still without a road to connect to Medellín.

The vision quest is a figure that is popular in North America, with our siblings of the
North American ancestral territories. It has become popular, especially after the upcoming

17
hippie movement in the 1960s and the interest in psychedelics like peyote. The development of
the image of the indigenous people in the Hollywood movies is of great interest: From the
portrayal of our indigenous ancestors as savages that were opposing the expansion of the
civilized European world (the stories of the Wild West) to a sudden interest in the ancient
spirituality of our peoples. Normally, the image of the Spaniar conquistadors is shown as cruel
and devastating, while the British conquests and colonizations are seen with a more pleasant
view. In fact, former British colonies are portrayed as more developed and progressive than
Spaniard ex-colonies such as Latin America. The name of Latin America seems to be a
synonym of poverty and underdeveloped nations with a great level of violence and political
instability.

But is it true? Is it true that ex-colonies from the British empires are more powerful than
those of Latin America? When we check the list of British ex-colonies we can enlist only a few
that would be today successful societies: Canada, United States of America, Australia and New
Zealand. There are, though, some inconsistencies:

Canada is Canada more because it was more influenced by the French; the United
States of America was not totally under the British: Only 13 British colonies did the declaration
of independence from the British empire: New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island,
Connecticut; New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North
Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. The rest of what today is the United States of America
belonged to the Spanish Empire and to the Indigenous Territories. Australia was considered by
the British a jail and the economic success of what is Australia today is not thanks to its
troublesome British origin but to its own process of consciousness and work. The most loved
colonies for the British empire were of what is today India, Myanmar, Nigeria and South Africa,
where they had the most important natural resources.

Coming back to North America - a continent that is not only USA - we can find that the
main activities of conquest were done not by the British colonialists, but by the same new
independently “Americans” that in Spanish we called estadounidenses. The invasion of the
indigenous territories was done after the independence and the displacement of entire
indigenous populations occurred during the conquest of the west. All those Hollywood movies
that we called Wild West movies revealed those actions of subjugation of indigenous
communities under the ideologies of development, civilization expansion and white superiority. It
is widely evident in Hollywood movies where indigenous peoples are shown as savage,
barbarians, pagans and inferior. In the story The Lonely Ranger that appeared for the first time
in 1933 in Texas, the Lone Ranger is a white cowboy that lives his adventures with Tonto, the
indigenous character. “Tonto” means silly in Spanish and from here we can bring our
conclusions of how the White American society saw our ancestors.

18
Existential psychology and anthropology

When I was a student of social communication and journalism at the Bolivariana

Pontifical University in Medellin, I was invited to participate in a group of Universitarian students
to lead a mission team in villages around coal mines in the municipality of Amaga. We were
invited by Fr. Ignacio Alvarez that we call Padre Nacho, at that time he was a real old man, but
with a splendid heart that conquered the difficult hearts of youth following professional careers in
that Catholic private university, where many of the students come from the Antioquean’s elite.
My chance to study in that university was rather the efforts of my father, who encouraged me to
apply, even if it would be really difficult to maintain the semester fees, too high for our workers'
social class.

Padre Nacho invited us to join his mission club to do something for others from our
intellectual perspective, from our own talents and privileges. For me, coming from one of the
poorest quarters or comunas of Medellin was mostly easy to get sensible to the possibility to do
something for those living under poverty or exploitation. For many of my companions from
middle and high class it was an adventure that would open their eyes to the reality of many
Colombians. The coal mines of Amaga were engaging children because their small bodies
could fit inside the caves. It became afterward a real scandal in Europe, especially by those
buying Colombian coal like UK, prompting actions to stop such a child labour. Years after my
participation in Padre Nacho’s mission excursions to the coal villages, I knew that the Salesians
opened a center of education for the miners’ children, joining the campaign to prevent child
exploitation.

We used to go during religious holidays like the Holy Week and Christmas. Every
universitarian student organized any activity with the miner communities according to their skill.
The students of medicine did general health checks, including oral health and training about
sexual health and other things. The students of social work visited the families to assess their
situations, to recommend solutions to practical problems. The students of engineering created
lessons of mathematics and other fields to children who were slow learners or to propose
solutions to the community like a broken bridge, a house that needed repair, etc. As a social
communicator, with my colleagues, we organized cultural events for children, sports for young
people and things like that.

It was action. We were involved with communities that we would never reach for our
own. If you pursue a career, they expect you to get a job in the city and build a life around it,
while ignoring communities living in the margins of development. Fr. Nacho opened the doors
for us and broke the walls created by an industrial society where miners, miners’ children,
farmers, indigenous communities, afro Colombian peoples, do not count.

It was in that action that I began to think of another path for my life. I did not want to
become just a social communicator or journalist to help in the feeding of a consumer society,
working for the elite and the political powers of our time. Being a journalist in Colombia is rather

19
a difficult profession, especially due to the long term political and social conflict with the
ingredient of narcos. It brings us to two options in Colombia as a journalist: 1) You have to be
always on the edge of martyrdom by being a honest journalist, reporting what it is real,
investigating plenty of cases of corruption and putting in evidence many criminals or, 2) To join
the elites, working for them and being under their protection, but being a corrupt journalists that
manipulates information for the people in such a way that people would never be awaken, while
supporting the official establishment.

In my last semester as a student of journalism in Bolivariana, I applied to work as a

reporter at El Espectador. It was in 1994, right at the worst moment of that newspaper, a target
of the terrorism by the mafia. El Espectador suffered so much violence from mafia and
paramilitaries that today I wonder why I did choose to apply for it.

Getting into the missionary universitarian group of Fr. Nacho put me in contact with many
other diocesan priests. Before Nacho, the only priests I knew were the Carmelite fathers of my
parish in Barrio Doce de Octubre: Pedro, Alberto and Javier. Priests that were completely given
to the theology of liberation and living with the people in a simple life. If you would ask me the
profile of a Catholic priest I have in my heart today, it is about those priests I knew since I was a
small boy in a Medellin comuna. My experience of being a Catholic when I was a boy has to do
with those three Carmelite no-reformed priests (Order of the Brothers of the Blessed Virgin Mary
of Mount Carmel) that lived like Jesus Christ and were full time interested in our fights for
survival in a city that was divided by social classes. But Fr. Nacho broke it a little and made me
enter into the terrain of a more regional church, when I accepted his invitation to the coal mines
of Amaga.

One day I got another invitation from another of those diocesan priests of a very special
kind. He was Fr. Wilfer Angel Tamayo, another fruit of the first stones of Liberation Theology. He
was then a professor in the University of San Buenaventura in Medellin and he organized some
special encounters for Catholic universitarian students he called “Encuentro Cristiano
Universitario - ECO” (Universitarian Christian Encounter.) It was an authentic workshop of
spirituality and healing of three days in Monte Alvernia, a Franciscan retreat house in the top of
the western range of the Aburra Valley, so high in the mountains that the climate was completely
freezing.

Fr. Wilfer Angel (he died in 2013 in Medellin,) was a psychologist and he based his
encounter on this idea - something he described in his book La sexualidad humana, un regalo
(Human Sexuality, a Gift) and in the article Psicología y antropología existencia (Existential
Psychology and Anthropology) :

The objective of this article is to confront psychology with anthropology, as anthropology

shows a way of living to human beings, their personal dimension and how to become conscious
that every human being, every human group, every human culture lives and feels human
according to the anthropology he/she has internalized. Besides, behavior and conduct affect due
to the anthropological dimension. It is also undertaken the task of confronting properly the two
types of anthropology existing in the world, the existential one, based on the Semitic or eastern

20
 one; and the western one, which takes and assumes all its knowledge and understanding from
Greek culture. Moments and situations of western anthropology and its repercussions on the
psychological life of human beings are described. At the same time, moments and situations of
existential or Semitic anthropology and its repercussions on human conduct and behavior are
punctuated. Finally, some conclusions about the paragraph are presented, and a kind of
workshop is offered in order to make the reader feel questioned about his/her behavior, if he/she
is guided by a Greek anthropology (western) or by an influence from existential or Semitic
anthropology (Wilfer Angel, 2009, p. 96.)

For Fr. Wilfer Angel, the human body (Soma as we call it in Greek) cannot be put out of
the game in any spirituality or healing process. The development of the western thought
throughout the centuries, followed the Platonic concept of dualism, where the physical body is
seemed as the jail of the soul:

In the Hellenic idealist world, the somatic condition was experienced as a kind of “strange
prison”, since the body was not only the seat of the base instincts and passions, but also the
barrier for the soul, since it was considered the matter, as the cause of evil, disorder and error.
“You look like a man who is ashamed to exist in the body. If you know that your body is your
enemy, and an enemy of God, in his glory, being the enemy of your sanctification, why do you
treat it so softly? (Platon, 1994) These phrases show how the dichotomous interpretation
continues to occur in contemporary anthropology, to realize the negative influences whose
consequences abound in current education, and to remove this anti-corporalist attitude or
disposition, which is causing so much damage in our environments, social, family, religious,
cultural and educational (Wilfer Angel, 2009, p. 99.)

Rene Descarte stressed even more this Platonic conception of the human body that was
widely accepted by the West and that became also a guiding principle for the institutional
religion like the Catholic Church for centuries:

This philosopher affirms that the main attribute of matter as a corporeal substance is
extension, so it is possible to imagine a body without the other attributes, but not without
extension, that the laws that regulate the physical world also explain life. vegetable and animal,
so the human body has a mechanical nature; that man is distinguished from other living beings,
by the action of the soul or rational power. From this point of view, Descartes understands
sexuality, for example, as a passion, a bad body, which must be mastered (Wilfer Angel, 2009, p.
101.)

Fr. Wilfer Angel was dedicated to denouncing this philosophy that is part of the western
world even today and that we understand as dualism, where the human being is seen as “an
angel or a demon”, following his own words. Dualism removes the transcendence of matter,
forgetting that humans are incarnations of souls. Dualism is a reduction of anthropology.

There is another anthropological vision of man and his body, it is the semitic or existential
one, which presents us with a real, unique, unrepeatable, singular, individual, total, insumable,
indivisible, corporeal, psychic, social, spiritual, sexual, sexed, human being, sexing. It is a
visualization of man in which matter and spirit are considered as constitutive dimensions,
inseparable, and linked by mutual and reciprocal connections. Semitic or existential anthropology

21
 allows us to connect with human reality and appreciate ourselves as an integral and unitary
existence. In it the body is not one part among others, but rather it is the entire personal being,
which enjoys the corporal dimension; The soul is not a part either, but rather the entire human
being exults in being alive and personal, himself under the dimension of interiority, capable of
reanimation, of reacting, that is, of being psychic or psychological. In Semitic or existential
anthropology, the spirit does not designate a part of the personal being but, on the contrary, the
same person, all of it in the most secret intimacy and integrity of it. The spirit makes the whole
being aware of the existential reality of it.

Fighting the dualist conception, Fr. Wilfer Angel explained to us during his healing
workshop of the Universitarian Christian Encounter at Mount Alvernia, that the human being,
made of body and spirit, was like an onion, a being made up of different layers. Therefore, you
cannot divide such a being and describe it by its different layers, but as a whole. Our work was
to discover our different parts, but understanding it as a unique being, one that is somma and
soul at the same time, but also consciousness, sexuality, spirituality, dreams. In this quest to
discover our own selves, we find happiness and the recovery of the harmony that would bring
us to our own mission.

However, in this explanation from dualism to a holistic vision of the human being, I would
propose a third part: The indigenous cultural village. The fight between Platonic dualism and
holistic existential anthropology, is itself dualism. Today we can see polarization everywhere
between rightist and leftist, atheists and fundamentalists, peace makers and war defenders,
vegetarians and the others, technocrats and gnostics, those who think that they have reached a
high level of consciousness and those who do not mind. Real peace is needed.

In our Colombian history, throughout all our history, since even before the Europeans
arrived, we have always been in a conflict. I understand the permanence of violent conflicts in
my country due to the great quantity and quality of natural resources, one of the most biodiverse
territories with mountains, forests, seas, lakes, rivers, plains and peoples. In a certain way,
many have always been interested in dominating it and the same happens with the other sibling
territories of Latin America. Following a dualistic hope, the other extreme is the actions of
peace. As we know, peace can be appreciated very much by those who have lost it. Many
people call for war very easily, especially those who live in the security of their residences or first
class urban clusters, where war would not affect them directly. Even if it seems very obsolete,
many people in the world consider that military solutions are properly necessary and normal,
especially with the support of big and always developing super technologies. We know that
technology has been always at the service of warlords throughout human history. Many great
events were created actually with the goal to defend themselves from real or fictional enemies.

In Colombia we can see many workers for peace engaged in bitter discussions and
battles. As the old Roman saying goes: If you want peace, prepare for war.

But in our ancestral indigenous and even African traditions, we cannot find dualism at all.
The onion example of Fr. Wilfer becomes of greater meaning among our ancestral conception of
the human being.

22
 We are a community that includes our ancestors. We are tradition and spirits. We are
language and territory. We are individuals, made of those onion layers and we are in connection
with the elements of the universe, with Mother Earth and Father Heaven. We are the four
elements or La Mesa: Earth and Water, Fire and Air. To all these I call the Cultural Village that is
also immersed in the jungle or in the desert or in the ocean. It has to be seen with pachasophy
and the principles of correspondence and complementarity of the universe, where as above, so
below and everything is united, everything is in connection, everything is one. That is the
cultural village.

When you arrive in a territory that you have never been before, you ask permission from
the spirits (angels?) to the ancestors and to the elders of that territory. There are many rites to
do so and every indigenous nation can teach you a method. In the Bible it is written: “When you
go into a house, say, ‘Peace be with you.’ If the people in that house welcome you, let your
greeting of peace remain; but if they do not welcome you, then take back your greeting”
(Matthew 10:12-13.)

In this conception of the cultural village, we are a bigger onion. Normally, western
cultures tend to work in the individual towards individualism, working with the private towards
privacy and working with human rights, without stressing the duties, towards a big self
importance. In this tendency, even spiritualities that are supposed to guide people towards
liberation, became trapped in individualism, privacy and self importance. Many people follow
East Asian religions and spiritualities in search of the enlightenment of Buddha, but their
ambition is guided by their own egos, behaving like the Buddha to show themselves as masters
or models of spirituality, but doing precisely what the Buddha opposed all his life: His own ego.
Others do yoga for themselves, despising the rest of humanity as “inferior beings.” Some
people, who are masters in spiritualities, think that the rest of humanity are ignorant and live in
an underdeveloped consciousness, while they live in a superior stage of spiritual development.
It is very problematic, because you are teaching about how to defeat ego, but you have to use
that same ego to look at others from above. It is dualism and a problem with ego, even if you
think that you are on the right path.

We find it inside main religions as well and many religious leaders, including the Catholic
Church, of personalities that see themselves as morally superior to the rest of us and the
favorites of God. There is always a need of conversion that is not the sort of conversion as to
join a religion or to change your religion into another, but as to search for a true, for your true,
for your experience of the world and of the spirituality, even if you are an indigenous person, a
Catholic, a Muslim, a Buddhist, etc.

We need the vision quest, as our ancestors did.

23
The vision quest

I want to use the concept of “vision quest” that is popular in the English language thanks
to our siblings from the North American indigenous nations or Turtle Island. In South America
we find many ceremonies of similar meaning. It brings us to the fact that the indigenous cultural
elements belong to a great constellation of ways and ideas. It is not possible to take a cultural
element out of its context and create a sort of hypothesis that is universally applicable. For
example, the concept of Shaman and Shamanism as we understand it today, is a western
anthropological construction, when some European scholars did observations in a particular
indigenous nation in Siberia and opened the doors to a universal concept of what would be the
cultural phenomena of Shamanism.

It would be as some Buddhist scholars from Cambodia would visit a Catholic country
and, studying the religion would define the cultural and spiritual meaning of what is a Catholic
Priest. Then, upon visiting another country, where the major religion is Protestant Christianity,
would look at any cost the figure or the person that would occupy the role of the Catholic priests
in those communities. Then, after some time, they would conclude that the Protestant Pastor “is
the Catholic priest of this community.”

The concept of Shaman, belonging to a Siberian indigenous community, cannot be found

in any other indigenous community around the world. The medicine man or woman, the spiritual
leader or the spiritual link at the Zio Bain communities of the Putumayo river, are not “Shamans”
but the Zio Yai, the Jaguar-Man or Jaguar-Woman. In the cultural village, meaning a particular
ethnic group, there are many people with different missions. The Shaman is not a position, but it
is an action and a responsibility that can be shared or not. What about the witches and
warlocks, the healers and chiefs, the hunters and corn growers, the artisans and the teachers?
You can find them all at the cultural village, because everybody has a mission to fulfill, a duty
that is a responsibility for the community. Even animals, plants, minerals and spirits have duties
and responsibilities. The vision quest is realized in order to get that mission.

There are similarities between the Shaman of Siberia and the Zio Yai of the Amazons.
Those similarities can be understood in our common human contact with Mother Nature and our
wonder for the Divine. Carl Jung explained it as the archetypes that are innate patterns of
thought and behavior that strive for realization within an individual's environment. These
archetypal forces influence the degree of individuation, which refers to the development of an
individual's unique identity. These universal themes and motifs appear in myths, dreams, and
everyday narratives, serving as the fundamental blueprints of the human psyche. Jungian
archetypes transcend cultural boundaries, manifesting in various forms such as art, stories, and
religious myths. They whisper to us from the depths of our unconscious minds, shaping our
perceptions, behaviors, and relationships both consciously and unconsciously (Laura Copley,
2024.)

24
 We all, all humans throughout all our history and journey throughout our Mother Earth,
have been in contact with the four elements (Earth, Water, Fire and Air.) The elements produced
similar effects in all humans and, therefore, in our cultural villages. We all have been hypnotized
by the Moon and we all have praised the rising and fall of the Sun. We all have been in a special
relation with Mother Ocean, the place all life on Earth has started first. Our physical bodies are
made mostly of water. We are water. At the same time, we all feel that going up to mountains
puts us physically a little closer to the Divine.

Therefore, only through that path that Jung called archetypes and I would call the
cultural village, we can find the common elements of humanity that make us all brothers and
sisters. Remember, at the end, we come from the same ancestor.

The Peruvian singer, songwriter and guide of ceremonies Alonso del Río wrote this
(translation is mine:)

Expanding Jung's theory on the collective unconscious of the human being, we can arrive
at the fact that each kingdom and each species of nature possesses "collective
consciousness"—I prefer to call it that. For this reason, the human being, through introspection,
can access a common space of collective consciousness, where the exchange of information
between all the kingdoms of nature and between all its species is real and verifiable. It seems that
the human being is the only species that has this relative individual consciousness, while the
others only have it collectively.5 (Alonso del Río, 2013.)

The vision quest is one of those archetypes and it belongs to the indigenous cultural
village. By willing to go back to the cultural village, we have to pass through the vision quest.
Jung would view the vision quest as an archetype—an innate pattern that resonates across
cultures and generations, reflecting our collective human experience:

1. The Seeker: The individual embarking on the vision quest embodies the seeker
archetype. They yearn for deeper meaning, purpose, and connection.
2. The Wilderness: Nature itself becomes an archetype—the wild, untamed
landscape symbolizing both challenge and opportunity.
3. The Vision: The transformative vision or encounter represents the archetype of
revelation and inner wisdom.

Jung believed that engaging with archetypes leads to individuation—the process of

becoming one’s true self. The vision quest allows the seeker to integrate aspects of their
unconscious, bridging the gap between conscious and unconscious realms. In the vision quest
we have to understand our true nature as the combination of our own self, as individuality and

5
“Ampliando la teoría de Jung sobre el inconsciente colectivo del ser humano, podemos llegar a que
cada reino y cada especie de la naturaleza poseen «conciencia colectiva» —prefiero llamarla así—. Por
esto, el ser humano, a través de la introspección, puede acceder a un espacio común de conciencia
colectiva, donde el intercambio de información entre todos los reinos de la naturaleza y entre todas sus
especies es real y comprobable. Pareciera que el ser humano es la única especie que posee esta
relativa conciencia individual, mientras que las otras solo la tienen en forma colectiva.”

25
this individuality as our physical body, our mental body and our soul, inside the cultural village
that is community.

I already mentioned about the western society and how we should work with it. It is not
about demonizing it. I would say we need to purify it, because it is a world heritage as well. We
all have the right to enjoy the benefits of technological and scientific advancements, but we
have to bring balance to it, because when we say “we all have the right to enjoy the
benefits…” we are not talking only about we humans, but we are including all the elements of
the Creation, the whole Nature. In the Bible it is written (the emphasis is mine:)

“For even the whole creation [all nature] waits eagerly for the children of God to be
revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration and futility, not willingly [because of some
intentional fault on its part], but by the will of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation
itself will also be freed from its bondage to decay [and gain entrance] into the glorious
freedom of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been moaning
together as in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only this, but we too, who have the first
fruits of the Spirit [a joyful indication of the blessings to come], even we groan inwardly, as we
wait eagerly for [the sign of] our adoption as sons—the redemption and transformation of our
body [at the resurrection] (Romans 8: 19-23.)

Therefore, any technical advance on Earth must benefit not only humans, but even the
single cell on our Mother Planet. One of the heroes of my adolescence is the astrophysicist Carl
Sagan (1934 – 1996,) whose TV series Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, I enjoyed in the 1980s in
Colombia, in the Spanish version. His characteristic deep and explanatory voice in English was
geniusly dubbed into Spanish by the Spaniard José María del Río. Exploring with Carl planet
Mars, he said something I would never forget. He said:

If there is life on Mars, I believe we should do nothing with Mars. Mars then belongs to
the Martians, even if the Martians are only microbes. The existence of an independent biology on
a nearby planet is a treasure beyond assessing, and the preservation of that life must, I think,
supersede any other possible use of Mars (Carl Sagan, 1996).

This sacred respect for life is what we need from western science. It is rooted in that
sacred respect and admiration for the being of others, even if those “others” mean that they do
not have brains like us or that they do not use language as we know it or that their physical
bodies are totally strange to us. The high reverence we show for the territory of others, for their
identity and culture, for the environment, is explained in that attitude of asking permission. If we
do it with our Mother Earth, we must do it the same with other planets and during the eventual
finding of life in alien worlds.6 What would be of those conquerors of the 15th century if they
would have the same attitude of Carl Sagan, when they met our ancestors in Abya Yala? But as
we cannot change the past, let us change the future. Others could say that humans are more
important than animals, plants and minerals and that we have to focus on saving humans first.

6
In this sense, I want to mention the movie Avatar, where humans find another distant exoplanet and,
imitating their history of invasions and exploitation, intend to exploit the planet despite the fact that it is
inhabited by indigenous civilizations.

26
In such a concept, animals, plants and minerals are only objects and humans are the owners of
it - although not all humans, as we can notice, but a small group of privileged humans with
heavy weapons and the control of all resources of the planet. But this idea is not only wrong but
also silly. Here, the Tonto is not the silly indigenous companion of the Lonely Ranger, but the
Lonely Ranger who thinks that he is a powerful being that can live without the rest of Mother
Nature. In the Bible it is written (the emphasis is mine:)

“I said in my heart, "Concerning the condition of the sons of men, God tests them, that
they may see that they themselves are like animals." For what happens to the sons of men
also happens to animals; one thing befalls them: as one dies, so dies the other. Surely, they
all have one breath; man has no advantage over animals, for all is vanity” (Ecclesiastes
3:18-19.)

If we realize it, we get consciousness. Then, we conclude that any advance in our
science, technology and, even in what we call spirituality, must include us all: Humans, animals,
plants, minerals, the whole Planet, the entire Cosmos in our Personal (Communitarian - Cultural
Village) Journey.

As a social communicator theorist, I study the concept of Global Village of Herbert

Marshall McLuhan (1911 – 1980.) The name of Canadian media theorist McLuhan is very
important for our time, because he forecast the rise of Globalization.

I want to explain in the most simple way the concept of Global Village, because we need
this concept in order to explain our own goal as a Cultural Village. By the way, Global and
Cultural Villages are not an opposition. The Global Village can destroy and, eventually, it is
almost doing it, the Cultural Village, while the Cultural Village can redeem and purify the Global
Village. Let us work:

There are four main propositions of McLuhan:

1. The Medium is the Message: It seems illogical, because we would assume in a first
moment that the Message is more important than the Medium. For example, if you
receive a letter in a paper sheet, definitely, the paper sheet has been a useful Medium
for the transmission of the Message, including all the postal service that brings letters
from one place to another. But McLuhan proposed that the Medium is not just a passing
tool, especially when we talk about electronic Media such as Television and the Internet.
Today we can see how cell phones became an important tool for almost everybody on
the planet. There are people who feel that their cell phone is almost a part of their
physical and mental body. Therefore, the Medium greatly affects the Message and,
eventually, it becomes a part of the Message and, even, the same Message. It affects
the way we perceive the Message.
2. Media as extensions: Following the first proposition, we can conclude also that the
Media becomes an extension of our own self. Especially in the digital era, people are
becoming completely dependent on Media. There is a deep psychological impact on
how people behave now, because they are able to access a big quantity of information

27
 that provides them a sense of security. If somebody arrives at a new place, the first thing
they worry about is the Internet connection (the Signal access.)
3. The Global Village: McLuhan used the concept of village, because everybody in a
village is well known, the space is small and communication among the villagers is easy.
Now, how could the inhabitants of a complete planet enjoy such village qualities?
Through Mass Media interconnectivity that breaks distances and time.
4. Media Ecology: Now we reach the fourth point and it is very important. How technology
and culture interplay in a Global Village. As we are not talking about the Cultural Village,
where there is a defined culture and identity, we have to see the interaction of thousands
of villages, the whole of humanity with so much diversity. But the Global Village affects it
to the point of attempting against diversity, altering the fabric of society and how we
perceive the world.

Carl Jung would likely approach the concept of an indigenous cultural village as an
archetype with depth and nuance. While I can't channel Jung directly, I can offer insights based
on his theories. But let us compare it with McLuhan’s Global Village as well:

1. Archetypal Patterns:

● Jung believed that archetypes are universal, innate patterns residing in the collective
unconscious. They shape human experiences, behaviors, and cultural expressions.
● An archetype represents a fundamental theme or motif that transcends individual
differences and resonates across cultures and time periods.

2. The Village as an Archetype:

● The indigenous cultural village embodies several archetypal aspects:

○ The Collective: The village symbolizes community, shared values, and

interdependence. It's a microcosm of human society.
○ The Ancestral: Villages often honor ancestors, rituals, and traditions. These
connect the living to their roots and collective memory.
○ The Earthly: Villages are grounded in the land, reflecting our primal connection to
nature and the cycles of life.
○ The Sacred Center: Many villages have a central gathering place—a symbolic
hub where ceremonies, storytelling, and communal activities occur.

3. Shadow and Light:

● Jung emphasized the interplay of light and shadow within archetypes. The village
archetype has both positive and challenging aspects:
○ Light: Harmony, wisdom, cultural richness, and sustainability.
○ Shadow: Potential for conflict, exclusion, stagnation, or romanticizing the past.

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4. Individuation and Integration:

● Jung's concept of individuation involves integrating conscious and unconscious

elements. The village archetype invites individuals to:

○ Explore Roots: Understand cultural heritage and ancestral wisdom.

○ Navigate Complexity: Acknowledge both light and shadow aspects.
○ Bridge Past and Present: Honor tradition while adapting to change.

5. Cultural Healing:

● Jung believed that cultural healing occurs when archetypal patterns are consciously
engaged.
● The indigenous cultural village, when approached with awareness, can foster healing,
resilience, and ecological consciousness.

1. Indigenous Cultural Village:

○Symbolism: The indigenous village represents community, ancestral wisdom,

and a harmonious relationship with nature.
○ Archetypal Aspects:
■ The Collective: The village embodies shared values, rituals, and
interdependence.
■ The Ancestral: It honors ancestors and cultural heritage.
■ The Earthly: Grounded in the land, it reflects primal connections.
■ The Sacred Center: A hub for ceremonies and communal activities.
2. McLuhan’s Global Village:
○ Concept: McLuhan coined the term “global village” in the 1960s.
○ Meaning:
■ Overcome physical distance through media, making Earth a connected
village.
■ Maximal disagreement due to diversity and interdependence.
○ Archetypal Aspects:
■ The Networked: The global village symbolizes interconnectedness.
■ The Discontinuous: Diverse viewpoints, cultures, and communication.
■ The Technological: Electronic media bridging boundaries.
3. Comparison:
○ Nature:
■ Indigenous village: Rooted in nature, sustainable practices.
■ Global village: Technologically mediated, transcends physical space.
○ Unity vs. Diversity:
■ Indigenous: Unity, shared values.
■ Global: Diversity, maximal disagreement.

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 ○ Time:
■ Indigenous: Ancestral time, continuity.
■ Global: Real-time, rapid change.

In summary, the indigenous cultural village emphasizes harmony, tradition, and

rootedness, while McLuhan’s global village highlights diversity, connectivity, and technological
transformation. In this comparison, we are not demonizing the Global Village at all, but we are
working towards a purification of intention (Mente Fuerte or Strong Mind, as our elders of the
Amazons would say.)

We are not proposing the destruction of the Global Village, but the sublimation of its
virtues by the interaction of our ancestral wisdom. Both technological advance and ancestral
wisdom belong to the Human Inheritance.

There are four mountains:

1. Looking for my Cultural Village: Who am I, who are we?

2. Going into the Wild: What am I doing?
3. Back to the Cultural Village: Here I am.
4. My mission: What to do?

First Mountain: My Cultural Village

In our time, with the popularity of indigenism, we can find even a market for indigenous
rituals, medicine and traditions that are entering in that market of new-age or therapies and so
on. There is much to say and analyze about that. We should not enter into a dualism, praising or
condemning. There should be positive elements and there are plenty of reviews to do.

With a critical mind - in our tribal Amazonic traditions, we would say a Strong Mind or
Strong Thought (pensamiento fuerte,) we become more analytic and careful, especially putting
up the word respect as one of the main values when we deal with indigenous traditions. We are
in a context of Pachasophia, ancient traditions and ancestry, talking about spirits. In my
experience of life, I have known many peoples that use, for example, indigenous ceremonies,
including sacred plants, without a real faith in God or in the spiritual world. They assume that
those ceremonies belong to the realm of psychology, neuroscience, self motivation, self
hypnosis and everything related with therapists.

Walking inside our indigenous traditions, we are stepping on our own philosophy or
Cultural Village, where everything is seen with great respect, admiration and even fear. If we
respect the elements and cultural manifestations in our own village, with more reason we deal
with respect with elements from other peoples.

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 In the many rites that are becoming popular for the vision quest, you can find the
description of many methods that seem very well based in ancient indigenous traditions.
However, the first element of work, if you are really interested in it, has to do with your own
Cultural Village.

Who are your people, your ancestors, your history? Where is the territory of your
ancestors? These questions are really meaningful for us in South America, especially of our
ethnic background as mestizos. We, as mestizos or three ethnic like in Colombia, are
associated with Europeans, Africans or Indigenous?

My preparation in my own vision quest or the finding of my cultural village, took me

years. I found that even if I am a three ethnic, the indigenous element is the strongest one,
because I was born in the territory of my ancestors, the Tahamie. Then, the Tahamíe,
considered extinct by the historical elites, lives in the land of a bigger family, the Chibcha that is
considered a North American people. Then, my ancestors were also in relation with the
Quechua. It is the resume of how I found my Cultural Village. Being an anonymous mestizo,
working, studying, living in the outskirts of an industrial city, without history and identity, brought
us poverty, ignorance and the target of manipulation. Walking to the search of our Cultural
Village helps us to rebuild our being: As Fr. Wilfer Angel would say: We become the onion, the
holistic conception of a person that is physical body, mind and soul and, I would complete,
immerse into a bigger reality as the member of the cultural village. Only when you find your
cultural village, can you be ready for the vision quest.

Your name

Looking for My Cultural Village is a fascinating journey of looking for our own identity. In
the Global Village, there is an offering of identities for you. When you are born in a family,
people tell you what you are and what you should be. First, it is your family that gives you a
name that belongs to society. Indigenous families and villages choose names for new born
children from natural situations and events. For example, if a child was born during a full moon
night, the child could have that name, Full Moon. In Cambodia, where I live, and in many places
of Southeast Asia, I have found many persons with that name, Mr. or Mrs. Full Moon - logically,
said in their aboriginal names, like in Khmer it is Chan Boromey. In Muisca language, Moon is
Chié and there is a Colombian city with that name (Chía, Cundinamarca.) It means that many of
our ancestors brought that name before colonization. In Christianity, children were given the
name of the saint of the day. If you were born during the day of St. Hilarius, that was your name.
St. Polycarp would be very popular with Pokémon. In Asia, you can find that sense of honor to
the ancestral cultures in what they have to see with names for people. But in Latin America you
can feel the tendency to name children according to the social expectations of our peoples. In
the Global Village not everybody is the same and some origins are preferred to others. The
Euro-American culture, mostly with English dominion, is seen as somehow superior, modern,
technological, civilized to any other indigenous proposal. For this reason, you can find that even
the traditional Spanish names for people in Latin America, have been replaced with English
names. I was once visiting a very honorable elder of the Zio Bain in the Putumayo river some

31
years ago and I spent hours with him, talking about the ancestral customs and the indigenous
philosophies. He likes to talk a lot and I feel his need to transmit his wisdom before it is too late.
In a moment he said: “All my life I have tried to pass my knowledge to my older son, so he feels
proud to be a Zio Bain and to remember the path of before.” Then, I asked the name of his older
son and he said: “William!”

It shows us what is happening in the Global Village. Even our ancestral names caused
embarrassment to the new generations. Our indigenous youth are using cell phones and being
connected with the young people of other latitudes of Mother Earth. But the “correct, sounded
names” are William, Jerry, Thom, Harris…

What is your name? Do you know its meaning? Why did your parents give you that
name when you were born?

For some persons, their parents gave to them the names of international soccer players,
actors, singers, politicians, religious leaders, Biblical names or feelings. The parents commit the
first act of imposition on ourselves. Nobody can ask for your real name. They just choose a
name as their personal privilege. “My son will be named “Maradonna”, my daughter will be
named “Madonna '' and so on. Discovering the history behind your name is part of that
knowledge. My name was given by my maternal grandmother, the one that built her house at
the side of the wak’a on the Porce Canyon. She decided that I should bring the name of my
father, Reinaldo and the name of one of her sons, Albeiro, so it is Reinaldo Albeiro. My grandma
wanted to pay honor in myself to my own dad, who she admired and to her dear son. But she
did not know the meaning of the name. Reinaldo is a predominantly masculine name of
Germanic origin, also Reginaldo, which comes from the words "ragin, regin" which means
"council", and "waldan" which means "to govern, to command". In Portuguese it is Ronaldo that
is very popular with the Brazilian soccer player. The name Albeiro is also of Germanic origin and
has a strong historical and symbolic load. This manly name has become popular in Colombia
and Venezuela over the years (there is also another soccer player of fame, Albeiro Usurriaga.)
Some experts suggest that it comes from "Alberic," a Germanic name meaning "noble ruler" or
"king of the elves." In Germanic mythology and folklore, elves (plural: elves) were supernatural
beings. They were thought to possess magical powers and supernatural beauty. These
enigmatic creatures had an ambivalent relationship with everyday people—they could either
help or hinder them. Their presence in medieval Germanic-speaking cultures inspired tales of
mischief, wonder, and otherworldly encounters.

Here you have your first journey towards the discovery of your own Cultural Village: The
name you have is a social construction, basically from your own family. In the course of my
adolescence, looking for my identity, I took the decision to use the second name that my
grandmother gave me, Albeiro, over the first name that was of my dad. When I arrived in
Cambodia in 1999, I asked the students of the Don Bosco Technical School of Phnom Penh to
give me a Cambodian name that I could use as a way to enter into their own Cultural Village
and they gave me the name of Samnang that means Good Fortune.

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 When I got enough information about my own ancestors, especially as a descendant of
Pacha Coya Inca (Quechua) and Catalina de Moyachoque (Muisca,) I decided to use a name
that would reflect those origins: Inca Moyachoque and I said: No me siento orgulloso de ser un
descendiente de reyes, sino de ser descendiente de mi pueblo.7

Finally, to end this part of the name, we ask again What is your name? It is not that
social and family name they gave you when you were born and even that name you yourself
gave to you.

In the Bible it is written: “For what person knows the thoughts and motives of a man
except the man’s spirit within him? So also no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit
of God” (1 Corinthians 2:11;) and it is written also: “His eyes were like a fiery flame, and on his
head were many royal crowns. He has a name written on him that no one knows but he himself”
(Revelation 19:12;) and, “All things are delivered to Me by My Father, and no man knoweth who
the Son is, but the Father; and who the Father is, but the Son and he to whom the Son will
reveal Him” (Luke 10:22.) Then, we also have the interesting first dialogue between God and
Moses and, this last one asks the Lord this: “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them,
‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I
say to them?” God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” And he said, “Say this to the people of
Israel, ‘I am has sent me to you’” (Exodus 3:13-15)

In the Bible, the name is associated with deep meanings in relation to the mission of
somebody. It is very similar to the intention of the Indigenous Cultural Village when a child is
born. The name is an intention, a mission. In the Bible, names often carry significant meanings.
They can symbolize a person's character, destiny, or divine purpose: Adam, earth or ground;
Eve, life or living; Abraham, father of many nations; Sarah, princess; Isaac, laughter; Jacob,
heel-grabber or supplanter; Moses, drawn out and Jesus, God is salvation.

Taita Héctor Yaiguaje from the Putumayo River, gave me a name in Coca language and
that name's secret. That name, according to him, is known only by him, by me, by God and by
the Bain of the Sacred Jungle. That name can be said only by God and by those who are
intended to do so. Therefore, in our indigenous ancestral traditions, names are sacred and they
are related not only to our relations with society, but also with the mystery of the divine.

There is a question I ask to those looking for their identity, for the Cultural Village. That
question is Who are you? This question is very easy to ask, but it can take a whole life to
answer. If you believe in the spirit world, probably you believe in Eternity. It suggests an
everlasting or timeless quality, devoid of beginning or end. It encompasses the notion of
permanence, continuity, and immortality. In classical philosophy, eternity is defined as what
exists outside time—a state beyond temporal constraints. Think of it as a realm where time
ceases to apply, where the past, present, and future converge into an unending existence. Our
ancestral indigenous peoples in Abya Yala expressed in their traditions the concept of Eternity.
For example, the Wak’a, associated mostly with a burial, reveals the idea that our ancestors
7
I am not proud of being a descendant of kings, but of being a descendant of my people.

33
believed in the afterlife as a permanent journey. Time, therefore, is not a linear factor made of
three moments such as past, present and future, but it is linked to the natural cycles and
Rhythms like the changing seasons, celestial movements, and life processes. Their actions
align with these rhythms, emphasizing continuity and the processes that sustain life. Rather
than abstract seconds or hours, time is rooted in the heartbeat of the land. Our ancestors in
Abya Yala used the phrase “Since Time Immemorial” to describe their deep connections with
ancestral lands. It spans thousands of years or just a few generations, emphasizing their
enduring relationship with the Earth. Time intertwines with cosmology, spirituality, and creation
stories. Indigenous peoples honor ancestors, spirits, and the land through rituals and
ceremonies that transcend linear time. In essence, time for indigenous communities is not a
linear march but a dance with the natural world—a rhythm that echoes across generations.

Within this perspective, I can ask you: Were you, somehow, before you were born? It is
an invitation to reflection and a proposal to search for your real, authentic name, the one that is
secret, kept by God, in order to be revealed at due time, at mature time, at the season time.

Family

In my journey throughout Mother Earth, I have had the opportunity to know many people
from around the world. There are many things I have seen. There is one thing that calls my
attention: Most people are presented with the concept of family as their main cultural
cornerstone. I have heard it from Italians, Jews, Arabs, Chinese, Spaniards and everyone. They
say things like “The family is very important to these people.” They say it as if that were the main
characteristic of those people and as if the rest of the world didn't experience it that way. To me,
in our ancestral traditions of every nation, family is a cornerstone. There is only a time, in our
modernity, where family seems to be put at the back of our yards: In the Global Village.

Also religions give a lot of importance to families. Even concepts such as celibacy or
chastity in any religion with that offer, finds a debate over that because of the possibility or
impossibility to generate a family. They say “we have to get married and have children.”
Therefore, celibate religious people always cause a discussion with someone.

Our indigenous ancestors gave a big importance to family as well. They didn’t stress
celibacy because they viewed sex as a natural, creative act, something that is actually a positive
view, because sexuality is seen as a sacred virtue. This importance to family and the view of
sexuality is persistent today, even with indigenous communities that have embraced
Christianism. We are not discussing now about the type of family, if it is monogamy or polygamy
or any other form. For the purpose of reflection, we stick to the idea of those who are near to us,
sharing mostly our own genes, including those who are adopted.

What is important is that for all humans, family is a basic element of their lives. The
Global Village is affecting it terribly. We see children getting far from parents, parents too busy
for their children, relatives becoming total strangers to others and all of this in the time of great
technological interconnectedness. How is it possible that a young person in La Paz, Bolivia

34
knows what happens in the streets of Tokyo, but does not see his dad for weeks and does not
mind about him? What happens to that mother that is well informed about Wall Street’s financial
movements but knows nothing about the whereabouts of her adolescent daughter?

Even worse, today we see smaller nuclear families with one or two children, living
together in silent apartments with zero interaction, different to those numerouses rural families
of decades before where everybody came for meals, organizing outings together, having
conversations and telling stories to one another.

Many people, coming from the Global Village to participate in indigenous medicine
plants’ ceremonies, face many traumas and emptiness in their lives and, almost all of them, can
trace all those traumas to family’s affairs. In the Global Village, the human family is traumatized.

The second group of questions have to see with it:

1. Who is your family?

2. Where does your family come from?
3. How can we forgive each other?

There are many people who pass their lives suffering from old hates and grudges related
to their own parents or other members of their family. Even persons who are very adult, can
have old grudges with relatives that have passed away decades ago.

Certainly! Let’s explore the archetype of the family from both Indigenous perspectives and
Carl Jung’s psychological framework.

1. Indigenous Perspectives on Family:

○ Families in Indigenous Cultures: Families are the heart of Indigenous nations.

They extend beyond nuclear units to include all relations—multiple generations,
extended family, community members, more-than-humans, and the lands and
waters of their homes.
○ Interdependence: Indigenous families reflect a complex web of
interdependence. They shape identity, cultural belonging, and community bonds.
The extended family is as crucial as the nuclear family.

2. Jungian Archetypes and the Family:

○ Archetypes: Jung proposed that archetypes are primordial patterns ingrained in

the collective unconscious. They evoke profound emotional responses and hold
deep significance across cultures and generations.
○ Family Archetypes:
■ Mother: Represents nurturing, protection, and the maternal instinct.
■ Rebirth: Symbolizes transformation, renewal, and growth.

35
 ■ Spirit: Connects to spiritual aspects, ancestral wisdom, and inner
guidance.
■ Trickster: Portrays playfulness, disruption, and unexpected change.

In summary, Indigenous families embody interconnectedness, while Jungian archetypes

provide insights into universal family themes. Both perspectives enrich our understanding of the
family’s profound role in shaping human experience.

I want to work with the natural cycle of a family that is made of a male and female
generator. I call it “natural cycle” because it is based deeply in the organic world to make a
distinction with the social concepts of family, especially today that it is a target of many
discussions. Somebody can say that the pet is part of the family and I will say, yes! According to
our indigenous traditions, all elements of the Creation can be part of the family and I will explain
it later. But for now, in order to reflect on the archetypes of family, following our indigenous
traditions, let us stick to the primordial combination of two energies: Male and Female. It does
not necessarily mean that the Male energy represents a man and the Female energy represents
a woman.

In our pachasophia, duality and opposition were some of those founding elements in the
generation of the Cosmos, as well as the organizers. Many people see indigenous stories as
mere children's tales and say things that “those stories are primitive.” But modern science is
proving that our ancestral stories actually have sense. For example, the concept of
wave-particle duality in physics is fascinating. In quantum mechanics, particles (like electrons)
exhibit both wave-like and particle-like behavior. This duality expresses the inadequacy of
classical concepts (purely waves or particles) to fully describe quantum objects. For instance,
light behaves as both a wave (interference patterns) and a particle (photons) depending on the
experimental context. In the 17th century, Newton proposed that light consisted of particles,
while Huygens championed the wave model.

36
 In this representation, I put the Azimuthal quantum number that is represented by the
symbol (ℓ): Imagine an electron orbiting a nucleus. The azimuthal quantum number, denoted by
ℓ, tells us about the shape of the electron's path. It's like describing how a planet orbits the Sun.
The Orbital Angular Momentum: Think of the electron's motion as a spinning dance. The
azimuthal quantum number determines how fast it spins around the nucleus. Different values of
ℓ correspond to different dance moves (shapes). The Unique Quantum State: Each electron has
its own set of quantum numbers. The azimuthal quantum number is one of them. The others
are: Principal Quantum Number (n) that describes the energy level (like floors in a building),
the Magnetic Quantum Number (mℓ) that specifies the orientation of the dance (which way it
faces), the Spin Quantum Number (ms) that tells us if the electron spins up or down. So, ℓ
helps us understand the shape of electron orbits, like cosmic choreography in the microscopic
world! At the site of the Azimuthal, I designed an indigenous Colombian house with the help of
AI that combines the elements of all our indigenous cultures as how a house should be. In our
Tahamíe country we call it Bohio (from taino language.) There are plenty of documents studying
the pachasophy of our ancestral bohíos, like the ones of the Kogui in Sierra Nevada de Santa
Marta (Juan Pablo Duque, Óscar Salazar y Gloria Elsa Castaño, 2004; Fabio Gómez Cardona,
2010.)

Our ancestral houses represent the Cosmos. There are many worlds, but there are three
basic levels in our Cosmic Onion. I choose the Muisca, but it is similar in each indigenous
culture:

1. The underworld is Tina Quyca in Muisca.

2. The world as we see it, like the Earth’s surface, known as Quyca.
3. The highest heaven is Guat Quyca.

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 These layers must be represented in the ancestral house, as the human body represents
it too.

The Quechua talks about two dimensions:

1. Hanan pacha: The upper realm that included the sky, sun, moon, stars, planets and
constellations (of particular importance is the Milky Way) was called hanan pacha (in
Quechua) or alaxpacha (in Aymara).
2. Ukhu pacha: Representation of the Pachamama in Incasophy, according to the Aymara
chronicler Juan de Santa Cruz Pachacuti Yamqui Salcamayhua (1613), from an image in
the Temple of the Sun Qurikancha in Cusco.

In the Global Village, the house represents the expectatives of the people of this time.
Modern houses are completely closed spaces, bunkers protected from the rest of nature, where
the comfort represented by technologies prevails and the value of privacy reigns. The global
houses are closed, everything is electronic and there is no direct contact with the neighbor. The
relations of the cultural village are reduced to meetings of the council of the residential unit, and
the head of the village is an administrator who barely knows his neighbors.

There is an event that illustrates the meaning of loneliness and desperation of the Global
Village. It is the case of Joyce Vincent (1965 - 2003.) Her death was unnoticed for more than
two years. It means, she died alone in her apartment, watching TV in December 2003. The most
curious and macabre of this event is that the TV was on for all that time, until she was
discovered. Just imagine her dead body in front of a TV set that was permanently broadcasting
hundreds of programs about the splendor of our modern world, announcements about a happy
life if you have the latest in technology, travels everywhere and softoperas presenting perfect
physical bodies and so on.

When we talk about duality in our pachasophy, we do not have the Platonic, Plotinus and
Descartes duality sense of life as a radical opposition of forces, good / bad, positive / negative
as if there is one, the other cannot exist, like a sort of anti-matter. It is more like the yin yang of
the Asians. It is based on the idea that everything is formed from unfolding and successive
partitions. In Monotheistic religions, there is the idea of hell - heaven. It seems similar to our
own conception of the Cosmos, Tyna and Guat Quyca of the Muisca. But it is not. The concept
of hell and heaven are outside of the Creation, according to those same traditions. While
indigenous peoples see the Cosmos in a unity of diversity and, finally, the whole Creation as a
Family. As above, so below, what is in the Macro, it is in the Micro. When the male and female
energy combine together, they participate in the Creation energy, formed of both energies.

Every male human includes female energy and every female human includes male
energy. Every single human is a persona, an individual, but participates at the same time of the
collective, the great community of beings.

Every parent represents something for your life. Many indigenous traditions honor
Mother Earth, Pachamamma (feminine) as nurturing, fertile, and grounding, while Father Sky,

38
Pachacapak (masculine) represents expansiveness, vision, and inspiration. Your dad as the
masculine energy and your mom as the feminine energy, look for the balance of your being, the
combination of both energies in your life. Take care: It is not that everything must be like that.
Right now we need to meditate, to study, to analyze our own history, who I am and from where I
come from. What is lacking, what has been too much?

From the parents as one of the main origins of our persona, we jump to the
grandparents. Two men and two women. In many cases, the grandparents supply, support or
reject. In indigenous communities, the grandparents are very important, to the point that some
grandparents have more influence than the parents. In Colombia, Venezuela and Ecuador we
say Taitas and some of them, those Taitas, are the ones that western anthropologists would call
Shamans. The grandparents are the main authority in your vision quest. What if they are dead?
Even if they are, we believe in their presence, being it through religion (all souls) or through
psyche. They are present anyway in your subconscious. Knowing the personal history of your
grandparents is enlightening. In the Global Village, with so few children, the role of grandparents
has been obscured. Many older people are abandoned in the streets of those successful cities
or in shelters to die in loneliness. The worst nightmare of an elderly person is to be sent out of
his/her cultural village.

When I was a boy, I remember a Colombian love story on TV. There was a widow with
three daughters in a big mansion and she was also taking care of her own elderly father, who
was in a wheelchair. The grandfather was grumpy, but he filled the absence of dad in her three
granddaughters. But her daughter was the villain of the movie and one day she decided to send
her father to a nursing home against his will. She was determined to do so and pull the
wheelchair of the oldman towards the outside of that mansion, when one of her daughters stood
up in front to her and said: “Mom, you can do it, send grandpa to that place, but do not forget
this day: It is exactly what I will do when your time comes.” The resolution of her daughter was
wise and the woman suspended her decision.

The Taitas are the link to our origins. They know even more than our parents. Even if we
did not know them because they died when we were small, we need to heal that connection.
Behind them, we have 16 great grandparents! Then, 32 more and 64… What does it mean? In
order to create myself, I needed all those people! I descend from an entire village. It makes me
a cousin, brother and sister of practically everybody in town. I am a community. I am a village,
my cultural village. Give names to those anonymous grandparents.

All my life I have spent time making my genetic tree. For me, it is not a hobby or the will
to feed my ego and to show that I have some important people in the ancestral album of my
family. It is a sacred ceremony, a talk with my elders and they have come to meet me. They
have taught me many things and they continue doing so.

39
Village

From the family, we go into the village. Now we know that we are brothers and sisters of
all our neighbors. All the elders of my village are my grandparents, my uncles, my aunts. One
thing I admire about living in Cambodia is that in Khmer everybody is called with relative titles:
Brother, sister, cousin, uncle, aunt… Somebody can say that it is just a cultural element and a
curious way to talk. But we already know that it means something deeper and that it is literally
real.

In the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37,) the expert on the law asked
Jesus: “And who is my neighbor?” The question is deeper than what you can imagine. My
grandfather, the father of my dad, was a very loving man. When I was a boy and I visited my
birth town, Amalfi-Antioquia, he liked to walk with me and show me things around. I remember
that he greeted everybody along the road, without exception. After we walked away, he used to
mention something about that person to me. I enjoyed it very much for two reasons: The first, to
hear his stories and, the second, that he talked to me like I was an adult. One day, after he
greeted somebody, he kept quiet and said nothing about him. Then I asked him: Papito, who
was that? He was silent for a moment, like thinking and then he said: “I don’t know, but I am
sure, he is one of my cousins.”

We can meditate in the parable of the Good Samaritan. We understand that he felt pity
for the man that fell into the hands of robbers, but, from where that pity comes from? For me, he
saw a brother. Maybe he came to the place, saw him in the middle of the road and thought: “My
Goodness… who is this man?” Thinking for a moment, like my grandfather, he would conclude
that he did not know him, but that, anyway, was HIS BROTHER.

Where is it in the Global Village? Where is that connection to our own ancestral roots,
where we see each other as strangers. Too much connected, but too anonymous. Even in our
own nuclear family, we become strangers. Joyce Vincent is not the only case of somebody
dying alone in her apartment and getting to be found two years after, while her corps watch the
illusion of an UNNATURAL SOCIETY. How many elders die alone in shelters, in the streets, how
many migrants walk towards the delusion of societies that discriminate against them for their
ethics, language, religion, how much loneliness, just because we forgot that we are brothers
and sisters, not as an utopia, a good will, another illusion or a good will of a religious system,
but because it is in our own veins. We come from a SINGLE MOTHER and A SINGLE FATHER:
Pachamma, Eva, Bachué… our Mom, Mother Nature, Mother Earth, Gaia… That is it. When we
awake, we will recognize our own selves as brothers and sisters and we will not need to ask
Jesus again: “Who are my neighbors?”

40
Gathering of tribes

The Cultural Village is a big gathering. Strange: The Global Village seems to propose the
same. Every village and person on Planet Earth is interconnected through the Medium, making
time and space an illusion. But the Global Village is not defending diversity. It is destroying
diversity and imposing a single paradigm, a unique way of being human.

Like Estermann says, the dominant western conception of ‘philosophy’ argues that there
are not African or Indigenous philosophies as it is in the West and that there were not
pre-Western philosophies such as pre-columbian or pre-colonial philosophies. Therefore, when
you talk about ‘philosophy’, you can talk only about Western Philosophy and any other
‘philosophy’ can become such if it is adapted to the Western criteria that means a rejection of
their own culture, the denial of their own Cultural Village (Estermann, Josef, 2006, p. 27.)
Therefore, continuing with Estermann in his Filosofia Andina, what we knew for decades as
‘Latin American philosophy’ was just a mimesis of the Western standard.

My father, as a teacher of philosophy in high schools in Amalfi-Antioquia, has been all

his life an admirer of the Greek philosophers and he mentioned to me once a story that I could
never prove. He told me that years ago, two Latin American journalists went to visit French
philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre (1905 – 1980,) who was the philosopher of existentialism and
phenomenology, focusing also on post-colonial theories. The two journalists, one from Colombia
and the other from Brazil, asked for an interview about philosophy, but, as soon as Sartre
realized that they were from Latin America, he rejected the interview saying: “There is no
philosophy in Latin America.” I do not know if it is a legend or a story created by my father to
illustrate me with something he said then: “Anybody, by listening the attitude of Sartre, would
conclude that he is an arrogant and racist man, but no,” explained my father “he was giving a
lesson to all Latin Americans, inviting them to be authentic and to work in their own philosophy,
no in an imitation of the Western one.”

Also Fernando González Ochoa (1895 – 1964,) our Colombian philosopher, insisted on
the lack of authenticity in a Latin American thought. He said that we, Latin Americans, are the
result of a moral, religious and scientific reduction and, being three ethnic people, we only want
to demonstrate how Europeans we could be, hiding our Indigenous and African bloods that
means to hide our own mothers, while living with a feeling of sin and a complex of illegitimacy:
“For this reason the South American people simulates Europeanism, because they are
ashamed of the black and the Indigenous” (Fernando González Ochoa, 1936.)

Both Sartre and Ochoa call on the search for our own philosophy, challenging that
Western assumption that there is and that only can be a Western Philosophy. But it is not that
we have to invent something. The way to put in evidence that we have a philosophy, that is not
the Western philosophy and its criteria, is to discover who we really are. We have to go back to
our ancestors. The authentic inhabitants of our territories and cultures. Without shame and
remorse, without the fear of demons and rejection. For centuries, they said that we were
unauthentic, inhumans, without a soul, barbarians, inferior, ugly, lazy, poor, negligible and many

41
other things. Our first step is to go back to our origins, what I call as going back to our Cultural
Village and learn to recognize our ancestral values and dignity. Love yourselves and what you
are. They said we were poor and we believed it. We are rich - beginning with the fact that we
are standing on the most biodiverse countries of the Planet. In order to steal our wealth, they
put in our mind the condition of poverty. Now, with the Global Village, the process is accelerated
through the dominion of mass media and the digital world. We are named in the Global Village,
the third world countries, the Global South and so on. Instead of recognizing their historical
mistakes, the same concepts are underlined now by technologies, increasing global poverty,
global migration, global wars, global corruption, global crisis… all of these things are paid by the
poorer countries.

American ethnobotanist and mystic Terence McKenna, who advocated the

responsible use of naturally occurring psychedelic plants, said in an interview:

“I am not abdicating any kind of role back or anything like that. I think we had to go much
too far for that to happen. I am found to say that the only escape, it is called the forward escape.
We cannot reject technology, we cannot pretend that we are 5 billion strong, but we can accept
and explore the styles of that previous era, obviously the feminine, which give a much more
balance and emphasis in that previous situation. Obviously the spirit was an accepted and
recognized part of life. I like to think that the whole rise of Gaia comes and is related to the
awareness that Nature is a kind of Minded World and the awareness and the ability to connect in
that Minded World is what we lost when we descended into history” (Terence McKenna, 1980.)

We already have our philosophies. Our indigenous philosophies. I support this

proposal of Estermann to call it Pachasophia. The word "philosophy" comes from the Greek
words "philo" meaning "love" and "sophia" meaning "wisdom". Therefore, philosophy is literally
defined as "the love of wisdom." How can you say that only Westerners can create philosophy
and that the rest of cultures cannot do it, calling their WISDOM as cosmologies, worldview,
mythology, just stories…? We talk about the Wisdom of our Ancestors and we do not divide the
concept in two: Love and Wisdom, but both belong to the same aspect. Wherever there is
Wisdom, there you find Love. Wherever you get Love, there you have Wisdom.

The Wisdom of our ancestors are showing the path of salvation to the peoples and
nations of this time. They live in harmony with Mother Nature, what we call in Abya Yala as
Pachamama, the physical reality of our Planet and the entire Cosmos, the feminine energy, the
ancient source of life. While the Creator is Pachacamac, the masculine energy, the one who
creates and helps to preserve his Creation. Both make the Sacred Unity, where there is
diversity, same like Quantum Mechanics, matter and spirit that can have mass but also can
become a wave of energy. The sacred duality, as below, so above; everything is related and
corresponds.

Diversity is a power, a Sacred Energy. Like we appreciate diversity in our Planet,

eco-diversity in flora and fauna, diversity in the mineral world and even diversity in technology,
diversity in society (democracy?) We too appreciate human diversity, ethnic-diversity.

42
 We come together, from our territories, from our conceptions, ideas, sophias, ways of life
and we meet around the Bonfire. It is the Bonfire of the Tribes. In ancient times, in our
indigenous territories, we also lived among conflicts, wars and trivialities. We are humans, we
are not better than others. Those who want to present Indigenous Peoples as better than others
cultures, are wrong and they are not really helping Indigenous Peoples. But the Tribes make
peace, when they understand that the others are also their brothers and sisters. They were
invited to the Bonfire celebration to dance and to drink sacred plants. Each tribe brought to the
Bonfire their own customs, songs, language, beliefs and we shared our being, our identity, our
territory. Do it. Be a leader of your community and invite the other tribes to your tent. It is peace,
it is love, it is wisdom, it is Pachasophy.

Second Mountain: Journey into the Wild

The experience of immersion into the wild is another important archetype. In this one,
your experience can be only possible when you belong to your Cultural Village. Even those who
come from other cultures and live a particular indigenous ceremony, when they get the Vision,
there is one Message: Go back to your Cultural Village. Where are you coming from? Who are
your people? Which ones are your ancestors?

Many people talk about fasting (in the Amazons and the Andes we talk about dieting…
La Dieta) Then about Meditation or Praying in ways that are influenced by the religion or
spirituality of their own Cultural Village. Those elements are important, but they are not the real
meaning of the Journey into the Wild.

First of all, let us speak about the Wild. What is it? The deep scenery of an Amazonian
jungle or the lonely view of a desert?

Many people from around the world are coming to South America in search of spiritual
revivals and healing ceremonies that include sacred plants. We can also find many centers
offering such services in the Amazonian regions of Peru, Ecuador, Brazil and Colombia, but also
in Costa Rica and Mexico. Each center and their leaders have their own ideas, experiences and
methods and we hope only that they would keep in account the Ethno-Ethics and the respect for
the ancestral traditions of our cultural villages. But there is a point: Most of those centers are
inspired and built in the middle of forests or wonderful tropical gardens. This inspiration supports
the context of any ceremony. But it is not the Wild itself or Mother Jungle.

Mother Nature allows us to work with her and she is present wherever we want her
present. But the Wild is her realm. The wild is that place where humans are not the masters at
all, be it a jungle, a desert, an island or an arctic stone. Even in your more tropical and prolific
garden, the idea of Wild would be just a resemblance.

This element is very important because it touches everything that has to do with our
ancestral beliefs. It is in the Wild where the vision quest takes place. Everybody at every

43
moment could have visions and dreams. In fact, that is also important. But when we are talking
about the Vision Quest following our ancient traditions, we are talking about that Wild and lonely
place.

It is Wild because it has never been manipulated, controlled or touched by humans. Its
loneliness means no humans around, but it is not alone at all. In our pachasophy, we are never
alone. The feeling of being alone or being accompanied has to do with Faith. If you have the
Vision of the Divine, you will never feel alone.

A person alone into the wild is open to transcendence. He or she is far from any other
human influence. In the searcher there is only one goal: To find the Vocation, the Vision and the
Mission in life. All beings are immersed in wilderness, alone with your thoughts, worries, fears,
anxieties. It is not about methods of meditation or religion’s practices. The Vision Quests of
Jesus in the desert, Siddhartha under the Bodhi tree and any other master, belong entirely to
each one of them. They got the vision and from that vision they derived their Mission. To imitate
the conditions of their Vision Quest could get you into something, doubtless, but we are in the
search for the Interior Master, the one residing inside your heart, what I call the Great Taita.

It is not about fighting your ego, your emotions, your vices or your anxieties. You enter
into the wilderness with all that you are. As we said before, we are not a dual being made of a
physical body that became the prison of your soul. We are the onion of layers. You enter into the
Wild with all your being: body, mind, soul and your Cultural Village that supports you. It includes
your EGO and everything that it means.

These modern scientific concepts such as ego, consciousness, subconsciousness and

so on, are discoveries of modern science. They are there, in fact. But those descriptions are
also attracted by the dualism conception of life. Is there a frontier between consciousness and
subconsciousness, between ego and superego, between being wrong and being right, feeling
happy and feeling sad? Our ancestors did not talk that way. I am who I am. I am the one that
exists. It is not the conclusion of Descartes, who said “I think, thus I exist.” With that sentence,
Descartes destroyed the transcendence and possibilities of existence of many things in the
universe. It made humans see animals, plants and rocks like mere objects, without any
condition of intelligence, consciousness or spirituality.

Our ancestors did not talk about the EGO. The concept of the ego has its roots in
psychoanalytic theory, particularly the work of Sigmund Freud. Originally, Freud used the term
"ego" to refer to the sense of self, but he later expanded its meaning to include various psychic
functions such as judgment, tolerance, reality testing, control, planning, defense, synthesis of
information, intellectual functioning, and memory. In Freud's model, the ego coexists with the id
(representing primitive drives) and the superego (the ethical component of personality), forming
a dynamic interplay within the human mind. When referring to the Ego, I am referring to a
dissection of the being, according to what a scientist proposes in the development of
psychoanalysis. It is normal in modern science, where the world is seen as a mere object of
analysis. The human being is divided into things: Physical body, Mental body, Spiritual body…

44
Each part is divided into more things: The Physical body into organs, the Mental body into layers,
the Spiritual body into whatever. The personality into things: Ego, Superego… That is the work of
modern science. That is its method. We can say that the method is clear and that helps us to
reach verifiable conclusions. Are the conclusions that are verifiable totally true? Are they
effective in the evolution of the human being and the entire Creation? All these modern sciences
have been able to stop global warming, the climate change, famine, violence, wars, corruption
and exploitation of our times? If psychoanalysis is so modern, why the rates of suicide are so
high in our modern, globalized societies?

Many people relate the concept of Ego, instead to the work of Freud and his followers, to
Eastern religions like Buddhism. It is also easy to relate the concept to any religious system like
Hinduism, Christianity, Taoism and Islam. By doing so, when you take that psychological
concept proposed by modern science, to ancient spiritual ideas, there is an immediate reaction
like when you pour a chemical into another chemical, creating a fusion. Put attention to this:
Spiritual systems, being it a major religion or even an indigenous one, tend to remark on a
relation between what we understand as evil and what we understand is good. That relation can
be of an eternal confrontation, a Biblical war or it can be of a simbiosis of what the Cosmos is
made of. Some people accuse Judeo-Christianity of being Platonic, associating matter with evil
and dissociating the spirit from the Creation. Just at this point we can enter into a discussion,
but, as such marking has its logic, for now I can say that every religious system is evolving too,
meaning changing and, hopefully, going into Sacred Wisdom. Just the idea of
Judeo-Christianism assuming ideas from Platon and Plotinus means that those ideas do not
belong to the core values of Judeo-Christianism, although it resounded on it for some reasons.

Therefore, pouring psychoanalysis into religion creates the association of Ego with the
religious concepts of Evil and with the idea of weakness in humans. Many Westerners embrace
Buddhism and pour psychoanalysis and Platonic ideas into it, without realizing. It is why they
feel that Buddha was talking about Ego, like Freud and about Illusion (Māyā) in the same way of
Platon and Plotinus. They do the same as always: Make Buddhism talks like Western
philosophy, following the same trend: Only Western philosophy is valid and other philosophies
can be valid if they imitate and use Western philosophy criteria.

I want to dedicate some part to Buddhism because it is one of the spiritual systems that
I have studied ever since and that fascinated me and because I live in a Buddhist country. For
this reason, I can say that there are many schools of Buddhism and there is a Buddhism for
Westerners. I will share these conclusions in another book. Also because I want to prevent or get
to that critical mind idea that the same happens with what is called by the West as Shamanism.
One is the core of indigenous spiritual values in their native territories and in connection with the
Wild and another is when a Westerner takes it out of its native context and brings it to the Global
Village for a successful business.

45
 Among the many movies on Buddhism that I have watched all my entire life, there is one
called “The Little Buddha”8 My favorite part is when Siddharta faces Māyā (Sanskrit: माया, the
Illusion.) The dialogue goes like this:

“It seems as if Māyā has been defeated, but in fact, he has not given up the battle. Now it
strikes again.
Māyā: You who will go where no one else would dare, will you be my god?”
Siddharta: Architect! Finally I met you. You will not build your house again.
Māyā: But I am your house, and you live in me.
Siddharta: Oh lord of my own EGO, you are pure illusion, you do not exist. The Earth is my
witness.” (The Little Buddha, 1993.)

We can see that in this version of the story, Siddharta is using a term from Freud’s
psychoanalysis. It does not mean that it is wrong. Psychoanalysis is not wrong, but it is not
complete for one scientific reason: Science is always evolving and there is never a last word in
science. Any scientist claiming to have the final answer to everything, is already wrong. Albert
Einstein was looking for the Theory of Everything that would explain how the Universe works -
something he did not find. But he said something that is very wise: “Everything Should Be Made
as Simple as Possible, But Not Simpler.” (Quote Investigator, 2011.)

For Siddharta, who never knew the Latin word EGO (I,) the problem was Māyā (माया, The
Illusion.) Would you say, as I heard from somebody trying to explain Buddhism, that for
Siddharta the world or the Universe or the Cosmos is Māyā? Don’t you see that he touched
Mother Earth (Pṛthvī Mātā) and said “The Earth is my witness” (पथिृ वी मम साक्षी अस्ति - pruthivi
mam sakshi asti) that in Quechua is Pachamamaqa testigoymi. If the world is Illusion and he
puts Pachamama as witness, you get your deduction. Pachamama is not Māyā.

As all religions on Earth, indigenous traditions do not talk about EGO and it does not
mean that they do not have an idea about it. But we can explore our own conceptions of what
EGO is and how it affects us or empower us. Ego has to see with INDIVIDUALITY that is
definitely stressed by the Global Village (privacy, property…)

Individuality is the concept of EGO among indigenous traditions. As ego, individuality is

also a journey. It is not negative, bad or sinful, but it is a tool, a way to explore many things. But
there is a movement: From community to individuality and from individuality to collectivity. You
are born in a family (clan) and your Cultural Village. In the beginning, you are a part of a bigger
group of individuals. Growing, you are requested to have your own individuality, your own
personality, the construction of your persona, you get a name that is unique, even a surname
that reveals your clan and you are expected to do something for society that is the third

8
The Little Buddha, 1993, Bernardo Bertolucci, written by Rudy Wurlitzer and Mark Peploe, and produced
by Bertolucci collaborator Jeremy Thomas. The part I am referring to is here:
https://youtu.be/0Y6aeSuc-FU?si=9hNIgGAwMrC3KsAW&t=6137

46
movement. When you are ready in your individual formation (studies, career, training) you have
to go back to the community.

The other side of individuality is, therefore, community. From the nature of your own self
(Ego) to consciousness, emphasizing impermanence and interconnectedness with land,
community, and spirituality. Does individuality oppose community? It can be and in fact it is
happening where we are stressing individuality over community in the Global Village, creating a
multitude of lonely people. But the real nature of this duality, INDIVIDUALITY / COMMUNITY is
not just only as an opposition, but as a complement, a holistic dimension, a balance.

Therefore, you need the Ego too. It must come into the Wild with you.

One of my students in Cambodia, he is a Jarai young man and I knew since he was a
boy, in his Jarai village, living with his family, clan and tribe, learning how to hunt and collect the
fruits of the jungle. But we are also that crisis of colonists coming to the indigenous territories,
displacing the communities, land theft and deforestation of the Sacred Forests. To back up all
this situation, there is the promotion of the “development process.” Any criminal actions against
rural and indigenous communities in any part of the world is backed up by this dishonest idea of
“development.” They say “we are going to develop this territory, so you have to leave your
(ancestral) land and your traditions and your language and to migrate to our cities and become
our worker, our servant and dress as we are going to tell you by the Internet.” The most
vulnerable are the children and youth, because they have to go to the state schools, where their
language is not used, it is ignored and discriminated against and where education is made to
feel that “development” paradigm. Can you see this? It is a lie. There is no development in
colonialism and the destruction of our ancestral communities. My former student finished a
technical skill, but he did not go back to his village. He looked for a job in an organization,
working inside an office in his small provincial city. In a few months, getting a good salary, he got
a property in the city, with a house that is not Jarai and he married. He visited his village very
seldom and he behaved as a Western foreigner, looking down on his own relatives and making
recommendations against his own traditions. Now he has come to good terms with his own
community. He is going back to his Cultural Village. He understood that he was the victim of a
system that invited him to cultural suicide. If many indigenous children forget their own ancestral
roots, it would facilitate that fake “development” that I, frankly, called “destruction.” My former
student was attracted by individualism, where he was said that “you are important if you have
money, a house that is yours, a proper language and a profession, in opposition to the Cultural
Village, where you live in a community, sharing with others, being useful to others and searching
for the Vision.

On June 17, 2024, my father sent me this message:

Today, June 17, marks 70 years since Lalo Rodas, my father, withdrew me from the
Amalfi Boys' School so that I could accompany him and we could grow some agricultural products
in the El Jardín village, a place that was part of Don Victor's La Florida estate... Although it may
seem paradoxical, it was too important for me... Well, not only did I accompany Lalo and it went

47
 well, but such an experience was for me at school... I learned many things from the countryside
that later were fundamental in my personal growth...!”

This message from my elderly father was very much important for me, because I
understood it was his Vision Quest. In 1954 he was 13 years old, an age that is very important
in our ancestral traditions for both boys and girls. The fact that 70 years after he paid homage to
that moment, means a lot. Hacienda La Florida of Don Victor was at the time a property of
hundreds hectares around the Andean jungle of Amalfi. My father as a boy and my grandfather,
went to work inside a virgin jungle, the wild, for three years. Today we could see it as something
abusive and invasive: A father interrupts the schooling of his own son to bring him to the forest.
There will be many reasons to debate on what is more important: To continue the Western
curriculum or to get into the School of Pachamama. But there is not a teacher like Mother
Nature.

In 2023 Colombia came to the international news for a plane craft accident in the middle
of the Amazon rainforest. Four Indigenous children9 spent 40 days lost in the jungle. “The
children, including a baby, first survived a deadly plane crash, then managed to stay alive in the
rainforest until they could be rescued by the Colombian army” (John Otis, 2023.) Out of the
tragedy itself, where the mother of the children died, many people admired the fact that so small
children could survive the jungle. The only possible reason was that they were indigenous
peoples.

In the middle of so much technology and said advancement, the Global Village and said
development, the inhabitants of the Global Village admired the fact that we are part of Nature. It
is like those who live in big cities become aliens to the Planet, watching Mother Nature from the
safety of a screen. Limits, barriers, safety distances between the human world and the rest of
Creation. Some people are afraid of wild animals that they know only through screens and
hideous zoos, where wonderful beasts are jailed for their exhibition. During the Covid19s
pandemic, when most world’s cities were put on lockdowns and quarantine for almost two years
(2001-2002), we saw how the wild recovered its natural position. We saw wild enchanting
beasts roaming empty avenues of big cities, telling us that they disappeared because humans,
the authentic invasive species of our times, of the called Anthropocene, the reign of the homo
sapiens. We are the Planet of the Apes, but of a particular ape, to the detriment of the rest. In
the last movie of the saga, The Kingdom of the Apes (2024)10 At the end, when Mae visits
Noah’s village, this last one said to her that people are not reliable. Sadly, Mae insists that
humans are to be considered the highest dominant species on Earth and she remarks that
everything on Earth is ours. Noah asks her: “And what belongs to apes?” That is the same
question that all creatures on Earth are asking modern humans. Is it that everything belongs to
us? Some people try to accuse Judeo-Christianism of that arrogant attitude to think that we are
the owners of the Planet. However, in Biblical texts we do not find such a statement. It is written:
“The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it”

9
The children - ages 13, 9 and 4, plus an 11-month-old baby - are members of the Huitoto Indigenous
group.
10
The Kingdom of the Apes Film, 2024. Directed by Wes Ball. Release on May 2, 2024.

48
(Genesis 2:15.) Don’t you notice it? Working and taking care. At the same time, humans are on
Planet Earth of a very recent appearance of just 6 million years ago. It seems like a lot of time,
but in the extension of the age of the Universe, it is nothing. Carl Sagan used the comparison of
Cosmic Calendar as a method to visualize the chronology of the universe. In this calendar, we
understand that the age of the Cosmos is about 13.8 billion years and we compress it to a
single year. For example, the Big Bang took place at the beginning of January 1 at midnight,
while the present time takes place at the end of December 31 just before midnight. In this
calendar, one cosmic second is made of 437.5 years, one cosmic hour is made of 1.575 million
years, and one cosmic day is made of 37.8 million years (Carl Sagan, 1977.) This pedagogic
tool created by one of the heroes of my childhood, helps us to visualize how small we are on the
scale of time in our Mother Earth. If one cosmic day is made of 37.8 million years and humans
appeared just 6 million years ago, in that calendar we appeared just at the last cosmic seconds.
Therefore, when God put us on the Garden of Eden - the name may be derived from Hebrew
edhen (‫ )ַּגן־עֵ דֶ ן‬meaning "pleasure, delight",- to work and take care of it, He put us on the last
cosmic seconds of the cosmic years… What about the rest of the cosmic year? For almost 37.8
million years, who was working and taking care of the Creation? How a species that comes at
the last second of the cosmic year assumes that it is the owner of the whole Creation?

Mother Nature itself has taught us that she can get rid of any abusive species to keep
her balance. The mighty dinosaurs are the most sounding example. A small rock of just about
ten kilometers (six miles) in diameter struck Earth and put into extinction extraordinary beasts,
magnificent giants that ruled Mother Earth for about 243 million years ago (modern humans
have been around only 6 years ago!) In the cosmic calendar, dinosaurs lived just 0.23 cosmic
seconds - not even a half of a second.

How a creature like humans, so recently, thinks that it can do whatever they want with
the ancient Pachamama, disposing of very ancient minerals, plants and other animals? Who
told them that? Even if we think in the myths of Adam and Eva, why could we imagine that their
aspect was of modern humans?

In the heart of ancient tales, where the jaguar's eyes gleam,

Where the rivers weave secrets through emerald forests,
We find Pachamma—the wild, the sacred, the unseen,
Her breath echoing through leaves, her pulse in every crest.

Earth cradles our footsteps, firm and nurturing,

Her soil is rich with stories, etched in roots and stones.
We, mere caretakers, tend her gardens, sowing life,
As Pachamma whispers: "From dust to bloom, you've grown."

Fire dances in the hearth, in sunsets' fiery hues,

A primal force that warms our bones and ignites our souls.
Fear not its flames; they forge resilience, passion's blaze,
For Pachamma sings: "Within you burns eternity's coals."

49
Water flows—a river's song, an ocean's lullaby,
Carving canyons, birthing life, cleansing wounds anew.
Dive into her depths, embrace the currents' gentle pull,
Pachamma murmurs: "In fluid unity, all paths pursue."

Air whispers secrets, rustling leaves and feathered wings,

Breath of ancestors, wind-kissed dreams, and flight.
Breathe deeply, child of Earth, for in each exhale,
Pachamma sighs: "You're woven into constellations of light."

Beyond the canopy, where stars weave their celestial loom,

Pachacutec—the cosmic weaver—spins threads of time.
He stitches night to day, past to present, infinity's heirloom,
Guiding our steps as constellations rhyme.

Pachamma's Veil—a cosmic cloak of stardust,

Drapes over our shoulders, whispers of forgotten epochs.
We, wanderers, trace her patterns, seeking meaning,
As Pachacutec intones: "Eternity's dance knows no stops."

The Jaguar's Eyes—gleaming portals to realms unseen,

Guardians of thresholds, keepers of ancestral memory.
Fear not their gaze; they pierce illusions, reveal truth,
Pachacutec murmurs: "In darkness, find your clarity."

And so, dear traveler, shed your skin of fear,

Embrace the wild within—the primal, untamed core.
Pachamma's heartbeat echoes in every leaf, every tear,
As Pachacutec weaves: "You're woven into forevermore."

Pachamama—our verdant mother, ancient and alive,

Pachacutec—cosmic shaman, guiding us through night,
Together, they beckon: "Love the wild, for it is you,
And in this sacred dance, find your soul's flight."

May your footsteps echo Pachamma's song,

And your spirit soars with Pachacutec's light.

50
Third Mountain: Back to the Cultural Village

The third step is going back to the cultural village.

How the wilderness experience has to be? Place, days, diets, prayers? Well, there are
thousands of methods and I intend to write some clues, taking care of establishing it as rites or
ceremonies. Rites, ceremonies, methods, strategies, recommendations, exercises all are
important. Many produce them as massive objects of business, selling them everywhere, like
the plastic-shamans, but also many spiritual leaders in every religion and sect. The discernment
must be empowered to reach a good election, one that is rooted in an authentic vision quest.

It is curious to see how many spiritual leaders, by promoting their own ideas or
proposals, dismiss others' ways. The most noticeable examples are provided by the bigger
religions, where fundamentalism and dogmatism condemn the other religions as false. But it is
also in more informal systems of religiosity or spirituality. I have discovered that religion and
spirituality are the same thing, but the word religion is associated rather with institutions (like
hierarchies) than with God or spirits. In this sense, the Catholic Church is called a religion, while
the plastic shaman is a spiritual being. There are millions of proposals for spiritual paths.
Probably, what is transparent and authentic is really few, but every group thinks they are in the
right way. Proven that they are not promoting human (and animals) sacrifices, suicides or killing
others out of their faiths, I think that everybody has a part of the true divine.

It is very important to know your Cultural Village first. Go back to the first step. Those
who enter Wilderness without discovering the Cultural Village, could have that vision to go back
in search for it. Because after the vision of your vocation in life, you are called to realize it at
your tribe. It is in this moment that you leave wilderness as a whole being, complete and ready.

I would say that you should not be worried for the process itself, but for what happens in
your interior. I know about some free people who have been in jail for years. People with a deep
and spiritual freedom that are able to raise their voices to defend Justice and they end in prison.
Those who put them in prison are always corrupted by ambition or power. They feel threatened
by free people, because they cannot manipulate them. Therefore, they use all their political,
religious, economic or military power to catch those free souls and put them in prison. But
something happens: The corrupt persecutors are slaves of their weak ambition and they
strengthen the bars of their own cages, when they believe they can destroy the innocent and the
just. Those who are innocent, trapped in the hands of their persecutors, cannot be affected in
their own innocence and freedom. In the Bible it is written: “Blessed are those who are
persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Mathhew 5: 10.) Those
who are trapped like this, are living their own Vision Quest and being in that terrible situation is
the Journey into Wilderness.

Therefore, the Journey into the Wilderness should not be taken as a literal situation of
escaping into the Amazon rainforest saying something like “if 4 little children survived 40 days in

51
the jungle, so I have to do the same.” Imitating others, following written instructions, is not the
core of knowledge and wisdom. You have to look for your own path in life.

For me, the knowledge of your own Cultural Village will mean a big support in your
journey. A community is important for your support. Remember that Community is the opposite
and, at the same time, the complement of Individuality. It is the duality of Ego and Superego.

In our ancestral traditions, when a boy reaches sexual maturity, the elders prepare a
ceremony for him or for those of the same age to send them alone into the Wild. There were
ceremonies of cleansing, soplar, the smoke of the boy before sending him down to the Jungle
for days, without anything. The boy has to feel that loneliness, but in the deep of his soul, there
is the idea of belonging, identity and union with the rest of his tribe. Even in the Wilderness, he
knows that his tribe, his parents and elders, and his ancestors are with him. The four children in
the Amazons were waiting to be rescued for 40 days. That hope kept them alive. When the
soldiers arrived, they were in silence, but when they saw some indigenous rescuers with the
soldiers, a little boy looked into the face of one of the indigenous elders and smiled and talked.

Normally we talk about boys as going into the Wild, but what about girls? Of course, they
are going too. Girls are related to feminine energy. Males are naturally disposed to be hunters
and warriors. Females are the presence of Mother Earth and their energy keeps the connection
with Chié (Mother Moon.) When the girl had her first moon, she was prepared as well to be
alone, in silence, dieting, in a special huk.

Wherever is your Wild, you must go with your elders, with your ancestors, with your
people, with your Cultural Village.

Then, there will be the time to be back. And they will be there: Waiting for you. There is a
big feast around the Taita Fire. There is a welcome of the new mature man or woman. It is the
feast of your village, because your being is a gift for all of us. You are a freeman, a free woman,
a free being.

Certainly! Crafting a song that celebrates the return of a youth from their vision quest
and incorporates Muisca cultural elements is a beautiful endeavor. Let's infuse it with reverence
for Mother Earth, ancestral wisdom, and the spirit of unity. Here's a poetic start for your bonfire
song:

Embers of the Vision

Beneath the moon's ancient gaze, we gather 'round the flames,

Youth returned from sacred quests, hearts aflame with newfound names.
In the shadow of our ancestors, we honor the path you've trod,
Muisca blood, Muisca soul, forever bound to Earth and God.

Embers of the vision, glowing bright against the night,

52
 Guiding us through time's veil, weaving stories of our might.
From the sacred lagoons to the mountain's lofty peak,
Youth, embrace your purpose—our village, our legacy, our mystique.
The jaguar whispers secrets, the condor soars on high,
In your eyes, their ancient wisdom, in your heart, their battle cry.
You've danced with spirits, tasted dew upon the dawn-kissed leaves,
Now return, O seeker, weave your visions into our tapestry.

Embers of the vision, glowing bright against the night,

Guiding us through time's veil, weaving stories of our might.
From the sacred lagoons to the mountain's lofty peak,
Youth, embrace your purpose—our village, our legacy, our mystique.

The elders' eyes are constellations, their voices woven stardust,

They beckon you to stewardship, to honor, to sacred trust.
Carry the fire within you, let it blaze across the land,
For the Greater Right, for harmony, we'll walk hand in hand.

Embers of the vision, glowing bright against the night,

Guiding us through time's veil, weaving stories of our might.
From the sacred lagoons to the mountain's lofty peak,
Youth, embrace your purpose—our village, our legacy, our mystique.

As the bonfire's flames ascend, our hearts beat as one,

Muisca blood, Muisca soul, under the eternal Sun.
Welcome home, O seeker, your journey's just begun,
In this circle of forever, we are woven, we are one.

When we return from the Wild, we come down to the center of the village, where there is
a great Bonfire, but alone. There is nobody around. The village seems to sleep. There is only
that fire, set by an unknown person. You can also see food and drinks prepared in jars. Where
are they? Who prepared it and for whom? Were they waiting for me or maybe they forgot me?

The youth sits down in front of the fire in meditation. Then an elder comes near to
him/her and asks: “Are you back?” The youth answers: “Yes, father/mother, I am back.” The
elder keeps quiet and throws something into the fire and asks again: “Are you back?” The youth
looks at the elder and realizes that it is part of the rite. He/she answers: “Yes, dear father, I am
back.” The elder throws something to the fire and looks at the youth, asking for the third time:
“Are you back?” To this point, the youth feels overwhelmed by the insistence of the question.
He/she looks at themselves and sees the marks of long days in the forests, marks on the skin,
tiredness, cold and heat, fear and trust, everything combined. He/she realizes that they are not
the same. They are somehow different. They looked at the eyes of the elder, those eyes
reflecting the flames of Taita Fire. The youth answers with a big smile: “Yes, father, I am back to
the village, I got the Vision.”

53
 At the moment all the members of the village come out of their hiddings. They are
warriors and wise people, magicians and shamans, midwives and artisans, hunters and farmers,
lovers and widows, priests and scribes, lawyers and judges, heralds and builders, dreamers and
artists, pets and wild beasts, plants and stones... an infinite variety of people, the Bain,11 the
inhabitants of the village, everyone is there, around him/her. A shaman goes ahead of everyone
and approaches the youth and asks: "And who are you?"

Fourth Mountain: My Mission

Once more we come to the place we were before. Who are you?

Do you think that you can escape from that question?

Let us talk about the meaning of time. In our ancestral peoples, we use to start our
stories with the phrase “a long time ago.” Normally, our stories are settled in very ancient times.
When colonizers settled in our territories five hundred years ago, our ancestors did not use the
Gregorian calendar. Each nation had their own calendars. The most famous is the Maya
calendar that today is somehow used by some people as a way of prophecies. But the Maya
calendar was created to register the cycles of the Cosmos, making that our Maya ancestors
know about astronomy and even physics at the same level and probably more than their
contemporary colleagues in Europe. The Maya civilization possessed remarkable astronomical
knowledge, particularly during their heyday in the 8th century CE. Here are some key
differences between Maya and European astronomical understanding during the 10th to 15th
centuries:

1. Maya Astronomy:

- Accurate Pre-Telescope Astronomy: The Classic Maya developed precise

astronomical calculations without telescopic aids. Their understanding of celestial events rivaled
that of other civilizations.
- Synodic Month: The Maya estimated the length of the synodic month (the time
between successive new moons) more accurately than Ptolemy.
- Tropical Solar Year: Their calculation of the length of the tropical solar year (the time
between successive vernal equinoxes) was more accurate than that of the Spanish when they
first arrived in the Americas.
- Writing System and Numerals: The Maya's fully developed writing system and
positional numeral system facilitated their astronomical record-keeping.

2. European Astronomy:

11
Bain are people in Siona language.

54
 - Julian Calendar: In 46 BCE, Julius Caesar introduced the Julian calendar, which had
365 days in a year and a leap year every four years.
- Gregorian Calendar: Pope Gregory XIII reformed the calendar in 1582, adjusting leap
years and aligning it with astronomical events. The Gregorian calendar corrected discrepancies
between solstices and religious dates.
- European Renaissance: During the European Renaissance, astronomers like
Copernicus, Kepler, and Galileo made groundbreaking discoveries about planetary motion and
heliocentrism.
- Telescopic Observations: European astronomers used telescopes to observe planets,
moons, and stars, leading to significant advancements.

In summary, the Maya excelled in precise calculations and celestial observations, while
European astronomy during the same period was influenced by calendar reforms and telescopic
discoveries. Both civilizations contributed to our understanding of the cosmos, albeit through
different approaches and contexts.

Both the Quechua and Muisca civilizations had fascinating insights into the cosmos,
connecting their understanding of the celestial realm with their daily lives and spiritual beliefs.

The Inca civilization, part of the Quechua cultural group, flourished in the Andes
Mountains from the 12th to 15th centuries. Their astronomical knowledge played a crucial role in
their complex belief system:

1. Sun and Moon Worship:

- The Inca revered the sun (Inti) and the moon as deities.
- They built temples and pillars with precision, aligning them to specific astronomical
events like solstices.
- Intimachay in Machu Picchu, recently re-designated as an astronomical observatory,
showcases their advanced understanding.

2. Constellations and Symbolism:

- The Inca identified constellations, often representing animals and elements from their
daily lives.
- Their sky-based culture influenced architecture, agriculture, and rituals.
- The Temple of the Sun at Machu Picchu likely served as both a solar observatory and
a sacred site.

The Muisca civilization inhabited the Altiplano Cundiboyacense (central Colombian

Andes) before the Spanish conquest. Their astronomical knowledge is evident in their
architecture and calendar:

55
 1. El Infiernito:

- El Infiernito, an archaeological site, remains one of the few surviving Muisca

astronomical sites.
- At solstices, the shadows of stone pillars align precisely with the sacred Lake
Iguaque, where the Muisca believed the mother goddess Bachué was born.
- The Muisca oriented their temples and houses east–west, following the rise and set
of the Sun, Moon, and Venus.

2. Agricultural Significance:

- Muisca astronomy influenced cycles of planting and harvesting.

- Their temples and structures were aligned with celestial events, emphasizing the
interconnectedness of their world.

Both the Quechua and Muisca civilizations integrated astronomy into their daily lives,
spirituality, and architectural practices, revealing their profound connection to the cosmos.

The word "Pachamama" originates from Quechua and Aymara languages. It combines
"Pacha" (meaning "earth," "universe," or "world") with "Mama" (meaning "Mother"). Pachamama
represents Mother Earth—a nurturing, life-giving entity central to Andean cosmology. Revered
by indigenous peoples of the Andes, Pachamama embodies mountains, fertility, and creative
power. She presides over planting, harvesting, and sustains life on Earth. Her shrines are
hallowed rocks or legendary tree boles. Pachamama is associated with harvests of potatoes or
coca leaves. Priests offer llamas, guinea pigs, and burned garments to honor her. Pachamama
is linked to the four Quechua principles: Water, Earth, Sun, and Moon.

The term "Pachacamac" comes from Quechua, meaning "Soul of the Earth" or "The One
Who Animates the World." Pachacamac was both a creator god and a sacred archaeological
site that is located about 40 kilometers southeast of Lima, Peru, in the Valley of the Lurín River,
and that was settled around A.D. 200. It flourished for approximately 1,300 years until the
Spanish conquest. Therefore, while Pachamama rules the Earth, Pachacapac rules the
Universe. This duality is present in many cultures from around the world.

Cycles are the basics of any calendar and the main cycles, important to our cultures, are
those associated with agriculture and with hunting. Our elders look to the skies to measure time
according to our earthly observations. By observing the cycles of the corn or potato, of the fish
and llamas, of the constellations, we get to know the universe and science is born.

In South America, the Incas developed advanced and important astronomical thoughts.
Due to their connection to nature, they perfectly understood the sky in order to perfectly
understand agricultural cycles. Let’s not forget that agriculture has been the main axis of the
Andean culture since their origin until today. The Incas recognized in the sky several animals who
walked over the Willka mayu (the name by which they knew the Milky Way in Quechua and

56
 whose literal translation is the Sacred River) and whose main function was to signal different
stages in the agricultural cycle (Salkantay Trekking, 2019.)

Many people find amazing the similarity of astronomical knowledge, symbols, stories and
archetypes between civilizations that are separated by distance on the Earth. For example,
many archetypes are similar among Chinese, Egyptians and Aztecs and they ask how such
knowledge seems the same if those ancient civilizations did not know one another. There is a lot
of material speculation that includes that ancient Abya Yala’s civilization was visited by
Japanese, Chinese, Africans and others or that our ancestors visited those territories millenia
ago. Being that true or false, speculation or sounding true, I find all that information fascinating
and I encourage all those who lead those discussions and, hopefully, authentic research, to
continue on the look for the missing links. Just remember that in science, we never say the last
word and that evidence should be really combising. The main importance in that discussion is
that we can appreciate and compare elements of different cultures, learn from that and be
amazed of common knowledge among humanity, confirming our common origin.

But ancient knowledge is linked to Mother Earth. There is only one Planet we know with
life so far and then, we are sharing it. A whole planet that is sharing the same cycles of nature
with all of us. In every corner of the Earth there are sunsets and sun raisins. Full moon nights
have been experienced by all. Tides, climbing mountains, walking through deserts and forests,
knowing agriculture or hunting… Those and many other things are common to all of us.
Everyone of our ancestors got the same connection to the cycles of nature: Two thousand years
ago, the Han Dynasty (206 BC – 220 AD) in China contemplates the sunset, right at the same
moment when the Romans were enjoying lunch, the Moche civilization in what is today the north
of Peru were contemplating the sun rise and the polynesians where fishing at midnight. They did
not know much about each other, but I think they felt their presence.

Here you are. After the return to the Cultural Village, after so much noise of the drums
and the joy of the bonfire, comes the Mission. You know who you are. It includes what you
know. If you know, you share. There are many roles in the Cultural Village, but out of any role
you choose, the main duties is connection with all. You have to protect your own sacred place
that is also the place of your community. Taking care of your own sacred place that is your
being, remember, the Onion layers, you are taking care of something of your community. Taking
care of our community, we take care of Peace and Justice, that is the higher duty in the
Assembly of the Nations, the Gathering of Tribes. We become knowledge in the cycles of
Mother Earth. Now we are ready to start to know the cycles of Father Sky.

57
Conclusions
Thank you if you reach this line.

A book can be read as we want.

I have mentioned two kinds of villages: One is the famous, powerful and successful
Global Village. Its main particularity is communication, interconnectivity and so on. We have
many things to thank Global Village. For example, thanks to it, we can publish this book online
and let people find it. 50 years ago the situation was quite different. If any writer wants to publish
a document, they have to invest a lot of funds and many steps to do so. Now we can just write
and post it online. I would like to know your opinion, corrections, suggestions, anything. One
virtue of this Global Village is that we can even correct in real time. Sorry for my English that is
definitively characterized by my Spanish. In some parts I tried to publish the text using AI. But I
want to keep the tone of the author, me, as a Native South American. All those things we can
say thanks to Global Village. Therefore, we all can use it, its tools. How could somebody say
that Global Village is evil and that we need to destroy it and roll back to pre-Industrial times?

Definitively, we need to forward and to purify this Global Village, whose main elements
are that Medium is the Message, Media is Extension, Global Village and Ecological Culture.
McLuhan prevented this decades ago, even before the Internet Revolution (1991.) Only those
who are not conscious, will be the main targets of this situation. How could a rational creature
confuse the Medium with the Message, to incorporate Media to their own physical body and to
be culturally affected by a society of the information to the point that any decision is taking over
virtual data and not over experience from the same Nature?

The answer is that we need a critical mind.

“I have encountered, both in training courses which analyze the role of awareness and in
actual experimentation with a truly liberating education, the "fear of freedom" discussed in the first
chapter of this book. Not infrequently, training course participants call attention to "the danger of
awareness” in a way that reveals their own fear of freedom. Critical consciousness, they say, is
anarchic. Others add that critical consciousness may lead to disorder. Some, however, confess:
Why deny it? I was afraid of freedom. I am no longer afraid!” (Paulo Freire, 2005.)

In Latin America the key is LIBERATION because we have experienced a history of

colonization and oppression. We talk about Liberation Theology, Liberation Philosophy,
Liberation Education, Liberation Art, Liberation Mind. For those who find that term as suspicious
- questions about if it is Marxism, heresy, ideologies, etc. - we need to answer that any theory
can be put into it, according to many contexts and groups, but the concept is free of all of that,
because it is rooted in our own experience. You can see how many critics seem so jealous
judging experiences that are unknown to them in a physical realm, opposing the same principles
of rationality. If you live and work in an industrial city, with all the comfort of technocracy, how
can you rise questions to topics such as taking care of the Common Home, following Pope

58
Francis’ words or how can you debate Liberation Theology without living any experience at the
Medellin’s communes or the Sao Paulo's favelas?

If we have lived in oppression for 5 hundred years, we have to talk about Liberation. It is
also well rooted in the Bible in a context of spiritual and social freedom. Moses led a liberation of
the peoples from bondage towards a Promised Land. Prophets advocate for social justice,
denouncing oppression, exploitation, and inequality. They call for liberation from unjust systems
like in Isaiah, who speaks of “setting the oppressed free” (Isaiah 58:6) and “loosing the chains of
injustice” (Isaiah 58:6). In the New Testament, Jesus embodies liberation. His teachings
emphasize love, compassion, and freedom from sin. Luke 4:18-19 records Jesus quoting Isaiah:
“The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the
poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free.” Beyond physical freedom, the Bible emphasizes spiritual liberation.
Jesus’ sacrifice provides forgiveness and redemption. Galatians 5:1 states, “It is for freedom
that Christ has set us free.” Liberation extends beyond personal salvation. It includes advocating
for justice, equality, and dignity for all. Christians are called to work for liberation in society,
addressing systemic issues and promoting love, compassion, and reconciliation.

Remembering our ancestral traditions is a way to Freedom. Once more, it is not a roll
back into the past and a rejection over the benefits of the same Global Village. But by calling our
ancestral wisdom, we will see light and work for a better world, where everybody, including the
same Mother Nature, is free from bondage, oppression, manipulation, development-destruction,
all those things transformed into Goodness.

I have written this book in English because some friends in Asia suggested it to me. It
comes from many notes and experiences, mostly written in Spanish. Thanks to all my elders
that approved this small project and the ones to come. I will put in English my documents about
the Catholic Church and indigenous peoples in Abya Yala, an analysis and meditation about the
major religions like Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism and Taoism, more about
Pachasophia and about an indigenous sophia in Asia and many other projects that I hope to put
together. For any comment, please send me an email to albeiror24@gmail.com. If for any
reason you want to have a personal contact with me to talk, meditate and work on a Vision
Quest using online platforms or visit me at the Don Bosco Kep Jungle Garden Center, let me
know and we will see how we can do it.

I send you all a blessing and Love, Love, Love.

Inca Moyachoque Reinaldo Albeiro Rodas Torres

Kep Province, Kingdom of Cambodia
Ended on 6th July 2024.

59
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