At this beginning of year, till not so long pretty far away, I think about the fifteen that have passed living this path of Amazonian shamanism. I started around my twenties and, well, no beginning is usually excellent. But my sincerity, strength and curiosity as a spiritual man, psychologist, teacher and therapist through the use of traditional Chinese medicine, took me far in the search of the soul.

When I arrived to the Amazon, I boasted of my knowledge as a doctor, but soon the people of the area, with their simplicity, taught me how misplaced I was, and how ridiculous my own shadow made me look. So I surrendered to loneliness, me and Natem: twisting in his sacred enchantment. I knew that if I fell, it was me the one who would have to get up, and I thought: either I learn or give up. But, where to get back ?, what would I repeat?, in what bloody wheel did I want to continue accommodating the underfed, rotting flesh? And how would I convince that dark, educated and justified mind that there was a noble heart, the one that Arutam electrifies?

So I didn’t take a step back, and I could feel Arutam, and I balanced myself on Him. How enormous is my gratitude to my teacher and friend Jimbikit! How he shuddered me, so creepy, to the last corner of my being for so many years! During many transmissions of power (tsentsak), he managed to lift my sacred touch to infinity. I made an effort just to learn how to live without losing a tenth of that great gift. I balanced myself by being heaven, earth and everything else that exists, every time I ate, breathed, watched, loved, taught, trained, healed...

At one point, after many years, he told me: now I am no longer your teacher, I am your friend. I already knew that moment had arrived, their transmissions were no longer different from what I always felt. But one last surprise, and a sample of his mastery, was to receive his last and wisest words at exactly the right moment.

I owe him a lot of what I am today. His "tsentsak", his power, his spirit,  transformed and reformed me. Those who know me in ceremony, can attest to the kind of wild and strange animal I became in the eyes of worldliness. Today I teach that intensely realized freedom, in the mind and heart, manages to redraw the nervous system and the body. With a good teacher -and in time- we can awaken the animal that was born one day in this world.

I remember my old uncle Nuninkia with a lot of affection. He taught me a lot about discipline and traditional care. I saw his love and he gave me love. He took care and accompanied me as I shared his knowledge with me, and he trained me by sharing his life with me.

I met many more people. Most of those relatives were very close, others were not. We're living dark times here, they are post-war times. The resentment of the Indians towards the whites is huge, it is hatred. White people keep despising the natives and using them. They cheat and destroy their habitat to exploit natural resources and literally devastate. There is no consensus. The young Shuar become weak as they desire what their "enemies" have. It's easy to end up buying them.

This confusing form of colonization has brought chaos to an entire community. Spanish soldiers perpetrated massacres hitherto unknown; the priests exercised their peaceful conquest, but not exempt from cruelty; multinationals used methods to create needs and poison every aspect and every part of the life of other cultures.

As a result of all this, shamans crossed in my path, some very close, since I was real family, for many years, with the Shuar people and, somehow, it'll always be. All of them were children of that past described, but some were better influences. The teaching of others was perverse, expert in lies and manipulation. No one can transmit the union in Arutam and his sacred touch, if he himself does not participate in that concidion. Of good and evil, I learned from my elders, and I learned a lot. As for the majority, all of them corrupted by the desire for power, money, sex and influence, I had to get rid of their presence as soon as possible and politely. I understand that if you are violently separated from your family when you are a child; if they teach you another language so you never talk to your elders; if they give you food only when you obey, if they educate you under the influence of the Catholic religion as if it were the only truth, if they constantly destroy the jungle for the raising of cattle or what is convenient in the name of God and the State, if your teachers or your cures violate you when you are a child and your only destiny is to teach that same to others in the communities, and you hate whites, you will probably want to fight them until the end and, in the meantime, you will continue sharpening the ill tendencies that you learned.

These individuals, self-styled "shamans", are usually the best known outside the jungle, because they are already known in their villages and their mere existence is lamented. They are the ones who do the most to attract attention and reach power (sex, money and influence) that may be in the hands of others, especially in cities. They have been seduced and corrupted by the world of the white man in a very sick way.

It is unfortunate that all these news are spread so quickly, and that the world of shamanism is being overshadowed by the action of corrupt beings, whether they are native or not. Sooner or later everything comes to light, and these scandals are becoming common in the public media, which expose them more and more.

I have dedicated too many years to take care of the union in Arutam feeling the Natem. I assure you that this teaching is perfect and unique and that it should be protected as a millennial and carefully transmitted art. In this New Year, though a little older now, I would like to present you the second part of the movie "The Great Chant of Shamanism. The Way of Ayahuasca and Tobacco ". I want to make the best ceremonies of my life. I want to teach all of this to a world that forgets, between abandonment and confusion, the true meaning of shamanism that my grandparents lived and transmitted. I want all this to survive. I want to leave an important legacy with the best of my people's tradition: my Amazon family.

Arutam Ruymán