Finding Faith, Spirituality, and Inner Healing Through Ancestral Knowledge
Words by Mariana Cid de León Ovalle
For a long time, I had a complicated relationship with air travel. I’ve gone from curiosity to excitement, to bewilderment, then ended up at downright fear only to circle back to curiosity and repeat the cycle the next time I fly.
I’ve gotten better at keeping a grip on my emotions since adding medicine and meditation to my mental health treatment. Gone are the days when I grasped for anything to stop my worries from growing so tall that I can't see the forest from the trees. Or when I'd forgo sleep before a flight because my body was too keyed up to rest.
This is what’s on my mind when boarding my flight for my very first visit to Cabo. But it isn’t until I’m 10,000 feet in the sky and rising that it hits me. The reason I feel like something is different this time around is not that the world has changed since the last time I flew on a plane (in December 2019). It's because I have.
And looking back, it started when we were first notified about COVID, and I was working full-time remotely, with two kids doing at-home school, a partner doing full-time undergraduate school, and eventually, while watching my mother beat Ductal carcinoma in situ (a rare form of breast cancer).
Unsurprisingly I started seeing a therapist. She would go on to recommend me to a psychiatrist who diagnosed me with high-functioning anxiety and high-functioning depression. I had no way of knowing this was the start of a metamorphosis.
I was already a few years into deconstructing from White Evangelical Christianity but this is when I began healing my inner child and connecting with my ancestors.
As a result I spent the last 3 years grappling with my ever-evolving views of generational trauma, boundaries, and my own inner demons. Essentially, I opened myself up to what metaphysical spiritualists call shadow work. I stumbled again and again. I still do. But I was dedicated to reconnecting with my intuition not only because I felt called to do it, but because the Universe flooded my mental space with this very subject matter thanks to my job. I took that as a major sign to keep going.
Closer to the end of 2021 I felt another shift looming and instead of turning to the Evangelical Christian God or even to the Universe as a whole, I turned to my own ancestors for comfort, guidance, advice, and reassurance.
On November 1st, 2022 the hypothetical rug was yanked from under me at record speed and I got laid off. It should have been one of the lowest moments of my year — I was out sick that day. So how come I wasn’t falling apart? After ending the call with my former employer, how come I immediately stepped outside into the sunny and dewy Texas morning so I could smile at the skies? How come all I could think about was the fact that it was Día De Los Muertos? Why did that make me believe that my abuelitos had played a role in the divine timing?
I didn’t rage when I got laid off but rather celebrated by honoring my ancestors for the first time ever with my own altar on Día De Los Muertos for the same reason I found myself firmly grounded at 30,000 feet on a turbulent flight. It’s because, for the first time in my life, I was okay with not knowing how things would turn out.
Let me stress this: I did not get on that plane feeling anything short of antsy. My palms were clammy, my heart was thudding, and my stomach felt like lurching. That is until I heard a voice from deep within say, “Just because you don’t know what’s ahead, doesn’t mean it’s going to end badly.”
I was stunned. For years, I yearned to feel the presence of my abuelitos again. I have deeply missed their soothing energy and the wisdom they carried in their bones. I’ve always suspected I have intuitive abilities. But I hadn’t known what getting a message from my ancestors felt like in practice. Not until this moment.
As a result of trusting my intuition and ancestors, I could now soothe my frightened inner child and hold space for my anxious teenager to find comfort in my arms. It was what I needed to hear to stay grounded while 30,000 feet in the sky.
I now feel I can approach life with the knowledge that just because I don't know what’s ahead doesn’t mean it's going to end badly. And regardless of the outcome, I will persevere because I have faith in the process and in my ancestors.
There is a lot my abuelitos sacrificed. But the wisdom they gained is something that no amount of time or circumstances could ever take away because their energy remains here in the same Universe as you and me. Just because I was too young to understand the knowledge they shared with me in their lifetime doesn’t mean I don’t have access to it now. I know it isn’t the end when someone leaves the physical realm because that’s a colonial construct. A tactic to disarm us of ancestral power. In truth, we can still access this ancestral wisdom and knowledge.
And that’s what brings me to why I’m sharing this message. I believe spirituality is a Universal right. We all have ancestral knowledge, and to disconnect from it is to shut yourself off from your own power. It is to sentence yourself to commit the same mistakes of your ancestors. As long as you remember that then no weapon formed against your right to a spiritual experience shall ever prosper.