#64 Learning From The Incas About Healing – with Dr. Doni

The information provided in this podcast is educational and not intended to diagnose or treat medical conditions. Dr. Donnie Wilson struggled for decades to solve her numerous health issues and heal her body. But with focused determination, she healed herself. And in doing so, she discovered the Dr. Donnie stress recovery Protocol. On this show, you're going to hear from doctors, nutritionists and Experts along with Dr. Donnie, who will give practical advice and wisdom to help heal your body. This is how humans heal.

Hey, it's Dr. Donnie. And I wanted to share with you a little bit today about my recent trip to Peru. I flew in to Lima and then to Cusco in the mountains of Peru. It's at about 12,000ft elevation. And I don't know if any of you have been to Cusco or to Peru, but I definitely suggest it. It's really an amazing place. I've traveled. For those of you who may not be familiar, I've traveled a lot around the world. I just love to travel. And I had this opportunity to go to Peru and I have to say it's at the top of my list now of favorite places to go. So I got this hat on that I found in the nearby Tikusco. This is a, you know, kind of a cowboy hat, kind of a look. But what you'll find whenever, when you're in Cusco, you see or shopping in Peru, you're going to see all of this kind of like woven patterns. And so this is all handmade, the butterfly and everything has a significance, everything from, you know, whether you're looking at a sun or a person or oh, here's a sun over here. It's so amazing how they can make these different patterns in these handmade wool designs. And so I just love, I just love everything that, that I found in Peru. These are the ends of the tassels. And you also notice that I have on a poncho, which is a woven from alpaca wool poncho, which is, you know, really, I mean, once you're in Peru, you really understand why you would want a poncho. Because it's. It actually gets pretty cold up in the mountains.

Like in the evening, even when I was there. And even though in the daytime it gets nice and warm, it's sunny and warm. And so you really go through a lot of layers with your clothes. But then as soon as the sun goes down, it gets chilly and you're going to want to have this, this llama or alpaca wool sweater or poncho, and you're going to want to have A hat and gloves.

And warm socks on because it does get chilly in the mountains. Now. When I first landed in Cusco, I definitely felt the altitude. I don't know if some of you have felt altitude sickness before, but I thought, oh, I'm doing just fine. And then out of nowhere it hit me. For me, it definitely caused fatigue but also vomiting for several hours. Then I just had to get hydrated and get some sleep. And I would say within six, definitely within 12 hours, I was feeling much better. I actually found a friend of mine who was there with me, found a clinic that had hyperbaric oxygen. So we're able to get hyperbaric oxygen treatment, which I think really did help on the second day there at elevation. It's amazing though, when you look at the hills and you think, oh my gosh, how could I even walk up a hill? I'm going to be out of breath. But by the time I had been there for a couple weeks, then I was used to it and I was fine walking up hills. In fact, I did get the chance to go to Machu Picchu a lot of times. That's what you hear about when you hear about the mountains of Peru, as you'll hear about the ancient Incan city called Machu Picchu, which was built on top of a mountain, so even higher up than Cusco. And it's quite a trek to get there. You have to drive to where the mountain is and then you take a train, which is really a beautiful train ride. Oh my gosh, the most beautiful scenery from this hour long train ride into this little town in the mountains. And then once you get to the little town in the mountains, which is so cute, you can walk around and look at the shops and eat, the restaurants are all amazing. And then you take a bus ride and the bus takes you to the top of the mountain that Machu Picchu is on top of. And from down on the ground level, you would never guess that this ancient Incan city is up on top of the mountain. I was, I remember looking around because there's a bunch of mountains. So I kept thinking, I wonder which one that Machu Picchu is on top of. And you, once you get in the bus to go up, then you finally find out, oh, this is a mountain that Machu Picchu is on top of. So many times when I heard people mentioning Machu Picchu, I really didn't understand what it was. And maybe it's hard to understand until you really go there, but I, and I highly recommend it, but really what it is is that the Incans and the Incan civilization, they were really masters at taking rocks. And they would shape the rocks and then form them into walls and, and buildings and staircases and temples. And so they built their cities out of rocks and their fortresses. And much of when you go to Cusco, you'll see the remains of the temples and the walls that the Incans built, which is really amazing. And the same thing with Machu Picchu. You see the remains of the rock, just the whole city that they built on top of this mountain. But the thing is, so you're thinking, first of all, how did they work with these stones, sometimes quite large stones, to form them into walls, into buildings, but not only that, but they were doing this on top of a mountain. So they would have to climb up the mountain and then move the rocks around on top of the mountain at high altitude. So that also seems like quite a feat. And then they also, the Incans were very focused on understanding the world around them and the universe. So they were looking at the stars, and they spent a lot of time mapping out and understanding the different constellations in the sky.

What they would do when they're on top of the mountains is they're looking at different mountain peaks and they're looking at the stars and the sun. And they were noticing how the sun, of course, changes positions throughout the year and changes the way the light shines. They were able to even figure out the winter and summer solstice. And they built the rocks in such a way where they could tell when the sun was just at the right location to shine through.

Just the right angle. And that's how they identified their own calendar and the solstices in the calendar. So they were not just building rocks, they were building rocks and fortresses on top of a mountain. And they were doing it in such a way where they were allowing them to really understand and use sun and sunlight and the stars as well, and connection to the universe and the. And the world around them. So they also would notice the shapes of the mountains and how that then reflected in their understanding of themselves and the world around them. So they, the Incans, and I only learned so much about the Incans while I was in Peru. It's just so interesting and inspiring. But the Incans, really, a lot of their focus was on understanding themselves. They're really, their goal in life was self understanding and awareness and then to understand one's purpose and then to understand one's connection in the world and the universe. And so when they were looking at the world around them. They would see and connect with different animals. So they thought of the kind of underworld as associated with a snake and they thought of the human beings, human sort of 3D world that we live in, as associated with a puma, which is a type of cougar or large cat. And then the upper world or kind of the spiritual realm associated with the bird called the condor, which is. I saw condors when I was in Peru and they're just huge magical birds with such a big wingspan. And also we were able to, I was able to sit right next to a condor. So they were not, you know, gonna attack us or you know, they were from my experience, gentle, you know, giant birds. And so the Incans were associating the. They would associate symbols and they would associate animals with their understanding of the world around them. And then they would associate even like the mountains, they would think of the mount, one mountain as being like the condor and one mountain being like the puma for example, they created. Here on this ring you can see this is called the Andean cross, which is a cross that has three stair steps and those are associated with self awareness and development, understanding your purpose and understanding your connection with the world around you and the universe around you.

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And so this culture of the Incans is really predominant in Peru. Even though about, I think it's a little over 500 years ago that the Spanish came in and took over from the Incans. And a lot of Incan history and civilization was destroyed at that time by the Spanish, but some of it remains. And the Peruvian people I find really bring forward this original culture from the Incans and the civilization before the Incans. So that was really magical. And when I was there, I spent quite a bit of time in what's called the Sacred Valley, which is kind of over the hill from Cusco. And the Sacred Valley is just this beautiful place where there's a lot of farms, in fact, a lot of organic farmers, where they grow all different vegetables. Oh, my gosh. And fruits. When you go to the market, you could see every different kind of vegetable that we're used to seeing and tons more fruit than we're used to seeing. The cool thing I thought was because of the climate there, it's relatively dry, so you have cactus, but right next to the cactus, you're going to see plants like geraniums and roses and lilies growing right there with the cactus. So it's kind of amazing that you have kind of a combination of plants that we normally see kind of in a coastal area, along with plants you might see in a desert. And.

There is just beautiful and such an opportunity to connect with nature. Even though there was some cell service there, it still feels like they live very much in a simple, simple way where you're going to grow your food or go to the market and get your fresh food, and you can.

Just have a very simple way of living there. In Peru, there were times where we got to go to. I went for hikes by the rivers. We. We were at a retreat center with a beautiful garden and flowers, and I worked with a shaman there. Shamans are really a historical healer also from different countries in the Central America and South America.

And they really work, I would say, on a. To some degree, on a spiritual realm. So they're really helping to understand energies and to guide us more in self development and connection on a spiritual realm, which fits in with a lot of what I was just talking about with Peruvian culture and Incan culture. It was really amazing to get to work with shaman as well as to get to meet the different leaders and elders from the mountain communities in Peru, where they do a lot of ceremonies and offerings, their offerings and ceremonies to honor nature, things like the mountains, the rivers, the wind, the fire. So it's very much of an honoring of what's in our world around us and what is in nature that really provides for us and allows for us as humans to survive and to thrive. And I think it's just such a beautiful way to remind us of that, because it truly, you know, sometimes we lose track of nature and what exists in nature, even food and herbs and animals that we exist with here on earth as humans. And it also helps us to really recognize our humanness, that we are human and what do we do as humans and how do we connect with each other and how we can be energetically related to each other as humans. It can then really be quite a reset, a stress reset. This is part of my research on stress, is to understand how different cultures and different communities look at stress and address stress. Because when we're caught up, even, even in Peru, people could be caught up in their daily stresses, right? Our daily to do list and all the things we need to get done and our jobs and our families and our, you know, the things that.

Preoccupy us and distract us. But really when we can, even anywhere that you are, get to spend time outdoors, spend time in nature, really get to connect with and just, you know, sometimes it's a matter of like laying on the beach or laying on the grass or going for a walk and just breathe the air and look at the trees and what the research shows us is how healing that is. But I really experienced it when I was in Peru because it just was so profound, especially at this retreat. And at the retreat we also followed quite a strict diet. It was a plant based diet except for eggs. I did have some eggs and it was so was avoiding even sugar, caffeine, chocolate, which is the toughest one for me probably because I'm such a chocolate lover. Now at the end of the diet I did be sure to try some of the Peruvian chocolate because they have cacao beans that grow in Peru that are unique and so delicious. So I made sure to try and bring home some of the cacao and chocolate from Peru. But during the diet I was avoiding chocolate as well as the caffeine and sugar and alcohol. And the diet was really simplified down to like brown rice and plantains and oatmeal and let's see.

Some like sweet potato lentils was the main protein source. And so it was a very simplified diet, including taking some herbs in the form of a tea from the Amazon. And it was amazing to me because while yes, it meant that maybe my energy level was lower than usual, but that was okay because I was doing a retreat and I didn't need the same energy level. I didn't need to be doing a million things every day. I could just kind of take it one thing at a time. And it was such an amazing reset. It also when you have follow more of a higher carb because it was more plant based, higher carb diet and lower calories it's like what we call fast mimicking diet, where the calories are lower, the carbs are higher, and it is promoting autophagy, which is turnover of unhealthy cells, really helping to renew the cells in your body. I knew that I was going through a process that was going to be very renewing and very much of a stress reset. In addition to the work with the shaman and the shaman ceremonies and the plant medicines that we use in those shaman ceremonies, including ayahuasca, which is a plant from the Amazon. It's a vine, actually, that they. They take the vine and they boil it with another plant called chacoruna. The leaves from this other plant, along with the vine is boiled for a couple days to create this liquid, a black liquid that has. It's a. Considered an entheogen, which means that it creates altered states of consciousness, which means that it's. To me, it means that it like brings you to a place where you can really connect with nature, connect with yourself, connect on a spiritual level and really understand yourself better. It is like a very gentle, gentle stress reset is how I experienced it because it really helped me to just let go of every stress and just be more myself. It was so powerful and yet at the same time important to. If you're going to do something like this, you're going to want to work with someone who is a master, who's an expert, which is what I recommended. What I did, I worked with a shaman who's been doing this work for decades and who learned from his father and his grandfather. So this has been in their family. And I was with a friend and colleague who also has been doing this work. So I felt very comfortable and safe and knew I was in the right hands to be experiencing this kind of diet and plant medicine. And so that was a period of time in the Sacred Valley and then went to Machu Picchu and then got to explore Cusco some more. And the history of Cusco, which was Cusco, is just so much fun because it's all these cobblestone streets and the people are just so amazing. Speaking Spanish it gave me such a great opportunity to speak. Speak Spanish. I learned Spanish back when I was in high school and college, but I really don't get that many opportunities other than when I visit Mexico and other Central American countries every so often. But oh my gosh, it was so much fun to have the opportunity to speak Spanish when I was in Peru and to explore these Incan ruins and understand more of that culture and the people who live there so many years ago and understand what did they know about existence and humans and health? What did they do to in their lives to just create fulfillment and enjoyment? And what did they create? It's amazing when you look even just at the stone buildings and fortresses and temples that they created, let alone all of this culture and meaning that they found in life from the mountains in Peru. So I hope that you enjoyed hearing about that. If any of you are ever thinking of going to Peru or are wondering about any of these things that I've just been mentioning, feel free to reach out to me. I'm happy to tell you more and explain and to help you to find if it's on your path to do something similar. So it's again, I mean, I love to travel and I'll share more of my travel stories with you because to me, each time I visit a new culture, I learned so much more about myself and I learned so much more about how to help my patients. Because it's the thing is we're all human, we're all interconnected and we have a lot of things that are very similar in our bodies, but also we have uniquenesses. And that's what I find in different cultures and different approaches to health and healing is just different, unique ways of looking at things. And the more we can kind of bring that together and understand each other, that's only going to be beneficial for all of us, right? So I just look at it that way. Like, how can we learn from each other and share with each other so that we can each and all really.

Achieve what we're hoping for in life, find ourselves, find our purpose, and really get to enjoy that community and connection that is so fulfilling to us, to us all. So thanks for joining me and I look forward to talking with you again soon.

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