Monica Castillo says she’s always been pretty intuitive, able to read a room and could read people pretty well.
Early in her career, when she was solely a licensed massage therapist and primarily focused on massage and bodywork, she started getting these images – feelings, moments that would come to her whenever she worked on someone. This would happen in other moments as well.
“Especially in my twenties when I was studying yoga. I had some stuff that happened while I was meditating and I kind of shut that down,” she said. “ Until I got pregnant with my son. And then once I was pregnant with my son, it just opened up this whole world again to me that I didn’t really know what it was, what I was experiencing or how to handle it.”
So, she sought out mentors who could guide her through these moments. But specifically teachers of the Mesoamerican lineage.
“ My mom had mentioned that at some point there was sobadoras, or people that worked with the body in our family line, and I was really wanting to connect with that,” she said.
Soon after, Castillo began to incorporate these techniques with her clients and saw the benefits.
“ I found that the only way to help people really improve and not keep coming back every week was starting to mix in [to their treatment] a lot of intuitive stuff that I was starting to pick up,” she said.
Courtesy of Monica Castillo
She opened her own studio, Sol Solace Studio, in 2017 and expanded the holistics services with the addition of other practitioners in 2021.
“ So a lot of people come to us looking for relief, not just in the body,” she says. “But knowing that there’s something else stuck or needs movement. We’ve had referrals from therapists, doctors, chiropractors, all across the medical field. A lot of people refer to us when that person has plateaued or isn’t continuing to progress.”
Another aspect is clients looking for a deeper connection with the world around them, their place in the world, their roots.
“They come to us looking for something that’s holistic, that’s grounded in something that’s more energetic or spiritual – not just the massage,” she said. “So a lot of people here are looking for traditional practices that align with their ancestry or they’re trying to reroute back into their ancestry, and it’s not necessarily Mesoamerican lineage that’s coming in. It can be all over the world – ancestral connections to Ireland, Africa, Asia, you name it, people have come in.”
Part of her practice involves speaking with the clients, asking about their mental and physical state. Questions about the stressors in their life in order to get the whole picture.
“ And after we do that, depending on whatever technique we tend to gravitate towards, which for me would be the Mesoamerican lineage, I would start doing a sweep on them or a limpía, which using different herbs, different liquids, sometimes different elements, she said. “I’ll do a sweep on their body.
Castillo says that everything is always done with consent and permission.
“We check in on people throughout the whole session because we’re trauma-informed, and we sweep them and just try and get whatever energetic stuff that person has on them,” she said. “For each person that can be different – job stress, family stress, something they’ve experienced in the past that just has been lingering and kind of walking with them throughout their whole life.”
These techniques and beliefs of Mesoamerican medicinal practices are often connected with traditional Mexican folk healers known as curanderos and curanderas.
“[Curanderos are] well-versed in body work,” Castillo said. “They’re well-versed in a lot of different modalities, and it’s something that’s passed down generation through generation. People usually study or practice solo. They’re usually working out of their home or working out of one office.”
Curanderismo in history has been misunderstood and sometimes villainized in the U.S. As a result, many curanderos practice out of the spotlight.
Over the years, Castillo says she is seeing more practitioners emerge.
“I have seen more people come forward with their practice, whereas before it was something that was kind of hidden or just you had to know someone who knew someone who knew the curandero in the community,” she said.
“But I have seen a lot more people stepping forward and into it, which I think is really beautiful because I think there’s a shift in wanting to explore this side of our ancestry, wanting to let people know that we are still here, that we still practice this way, that this is still available to people.”
This is the first part of a new ongoing series on curanderismo, curandera and folk healers of the Lone Star state. What do you know about curanderas? Have you ever had a limpía? We’d like to hear from you. Reach out to us via our contact form of send an email to kcabrera@kut.org.
