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Speaker 1: Before saida Rivera and I sat down to talk, we
Speaker 1: did something well, kind of unusual for an interview. She
Speaker 1: asked to cleanse our recording studio.
Speaker 2: Any energies that were in this room before this moment
Speaker 2: be cleansed.
Speaker 1: And that's because Zaida is a Bruha. She's a witch.
Speaker 2: Today, I call on benevolent ancestors to enter this room
Speaker 2: and join me.
Speaker 1: Once the ancestors had been invited to join the space
Speaker 1: and the room had been cleansed, I stepped in and
Speaker 1: I also did something unusual. I took off my six
Speaker 1: inch platform heels. Our interviews started with a limpia, a cleansing.
Speaker 1: Let us begin. Zaida is performing an egg olympia.
Speaker 3: I was gonna ask if you ever had one.
Speaker 4: My mom did a linka awaivo like when I was
Speaker 4: a little girl.
Speaker 1: But There are, in fact, many different kinds of lempias,
Speaker 1: because all of this has been around since before the
Speaker 1: colonization of Latin America.
Speaker 4: But I haven't had one in several decades. Okay.
Speaker 1: At their core, lempys are indigenous health and spiritual practices,
Speaker 1: and lemphys are good for a lot of things. You
Speaker 1: can get a limpia to help you get over a
Speaker 1: breakup or to remove bad energy around you. So I'm
Speaker 1: lying on the floor and Zaida kneels over me. Now
Speaker 1: she's rubbing her hands together and prepping the egg.
Speaker 4: Are you okay with me? Suestion, you totally okay.
Speaker 1: Zaida lets the egg guide her hand over my body,
Speaker 1: and it's believed that the egg is absorbing negative energy
Speaker 1: and leaves you with a sense of being cleansed of
Speaker 1: whatever bad thing you had going on.
Speaker 2: I asked the egg to pull out any energy that
Speaker 2: no longer serves you.
Speaker 1: The egg guides Zaida from my feet to the crowd
Speaker 1: of my head.
Speaker 2: Opening up this beautiful center for creation, removing any self doubt.
Speaker 1: Sometimes, as Zaida explains, a spot on your body will
Speaker 1: call for more attention and the egg has to hover
Speaker 1: for a little bit longer.
Speaker 2: Misag is removing and cleansing her aura ad.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you can take a tea, breath in whenever you
Speaker 4: feel called.
Speaker 1: You can open your eyes combat.
Speaker 4: The seating position.
Speaker 1: I gently open my eyes and then I see Zayda's
Speaker 1: big brown eyes, and Zaida is helping me off the
Speaker 1: floors so I can get back to standing.
Speaker 2: I've never started an interview with them, so the first
Speaker 2: time for everything.
Speaker 4: Okay, I try to love it.
Speaker 1: But we're not done yet. There is a final thing
Speaker 1: that needs to happen.
Speaker 4: I cracked the egg.
Speaker 1: Now the raw egg splashes into a clear glass of water.
Speaker 2: Now, I'm just going to leave that egg in the
Speaker 2: water for about ten minutes before we read that egg.
Speaker 1: From Fudro Media. It's Latino USA. I'm Maria your Hoosa.
Speaker 1: Today we're going to practice the ancient tradition of Bruhetia.
Speaker 1: We're going to learn about the history and stop second
Speaker 1: guessing ourselves. All of that with Za Rivera. For twenty years,
Speaker 1: Zaida was an entertainment journalist.
Speaker 3: This is your girl.
Speaker 2: Saya Rives couldn't wait for John like Guizamo to take
Speaker 2: off his clothes.
Speaker 1: But after two decades in the business, she felt a shift.
Speaker 2: You're having this conversation with the universe that not everybody's
Speaker 2: tuned into.
Speaker 1: It was an inner voice, an inner knowing, you might
Speaker 1: call it, that she was meant to be doing magic.
Speaker 1: Her body was telling her that she was meant to
Speaker 1: pursue brukhetiet and mysticism. But of course there were a
Speaker 1: lot of critics.
Speaker 2: You've been an entertainment reporter for how many years? Now
Speaker 2: you're a mystic. This is a joke, You're a joke.
Speaker 1: It hurt, but I got it.
Speaker 3: I understood how on the outside that might look that way.
Speaker 1: Zido was confident in her choice. She trusted that feeling
Speaker 1: deep within her.
Speaker 3: I'm so sure of my connection.
Speaker 2: And so I finally said, well, they don't see it,
Speaker 2: and it's okay.
Speaker 3: Maybe they never will.
Speaker 2: It's not going to deter me from continuing to open
Speaker 2: more and more and more.
Speaker 1: And one day she was now saida la brucha.
Speaker 2: In the words of my Taino ancestors, an ankatou anankatu
Speaker 2: anhan catu, so be it.
Speaker 1: And well, that gut feeling has worked out pretty well
Speaker 1: for Saida. She says she feels more in line with
Speaker 1: her purpose in life, and that resulted in her debuting
Speaker 1: her young adult guide. It's called Being Bruja. The Spanish
Speaker 1: translation of the book is bivi Bruga. It's a one
Speaker 1: oh one guide for young Latinas to help them get
Speaker 1: in touch with their inner Brucha self and to learn
Speaker 1: how to decipher the messages that come from beyond. So
Speaker 1: let's get back to the studio, but this time in
Speaker 1: front of the microphones and not on the floor doing
Speaker 1: a limpia. Here's our conversation. What does it feel like
Speaker 1: when you get those messages?
Speaker 2: It's it's really just in all the years of work
Speaker 2: in this it's trusting. It's not second guessing. I've gotten
Speaker 2: enough confirmations to say, Sitha, stop second guessing. You're connected
Speaker 2: and you're receiving these messages, and.
Speaker 1: You know, I've had a lot of reading, spiritual etc.
Speaker 1: But no one has actually said stop the second guessing
Speaker 1: so clearly and in English.
Speaker 2: Which is why this book was so important. This is
Speaker 2: the book that I wish I had when I was
Speaker 2: a little girl. I feel like I've always been connected
Speaker 2: in a very deep way spiritually, but didn't know what
Speaker 2: that meant.
Speaker 3: But I had my grandmother, my maternal grandmother.
Speaker 2: Who I respectfully say bruha. And I say respectfully because
Speaker 2: I don't know if she would feel like that's a
Speaker 2: respectful word. But she would do bruha things all over
Speaker 2: her house and I would watch her do it.
Speaker 3: At Florida water. She introduced that to me IgA de Florida.
Speaker 1: What is flora the water?
Speaker 2: So it's like a spiritual cologne, if you will, but
Speaker 2: like it's more than the spiritual work is Like when
Speaker 2: we were younger and would tell my grandmother we have
Speaker 2: period cramps and she would be like, mihah, bring us
Speaker 2: to the bathroom, tell us to move our hair over
Speaker 2: and pour it on the back of our neck and
Speaker 2: go take a nap. Every time it worked every time.
Speaker 1: I love that. So yeah, so take me Saia too
Speaker 1: when you were a little girl, because those were the
Speaker 1: very first moments. What was that like with Esosentimiento's.
Speaker 2: It was interesting because I was in and out of
Speaker 2: different houses of worship with different family members.
Speaker 3: So I went to Catholic.
Speaker 2: Church with my grandmother, Baptist church the big choir and
Speaker 2: everything with my Titi Julie, and Pentecostal with my dad.
Speaker 2: But I just felt like the connection wasn't there. So
Speaker 2: I talk about it in the book. Unfortunately, I came
Speaker 2: from a house that had domestic violence, and so as
Speaker 2: a little girl, I would run to my room to
Speaker 2: escape those moments, and without even knowing, I would just
Speaker 2: sit in meditation.
Speaker 1: I was just breathing, breathing through it.
Speaker 2: But on multiple occasions I felt like someone was rocking me.
Speaker 2: I remember one day distinctively opening my eyes to look
Speaker 2: at my knee and see if I'm really rocking, my
Speaker 2: knee won't be moving, and it was. And I knew
Speaker 2: in that moment, Maria, that there was something beyond what
Speaker 2: our two eyes could see that is here guiding us
Speaker 2: along our journey. And my journey has been amazing thus far.
Speaker 2: So I know that spirit is looking over watching over me.
Speaker 1: How often do you think that, in this case, young kids,
Speaker 1: but very specifically young Latinas are experiencing or practicing spiritual
Speaker 1: magic and they don't even know it.
Speaker 2: I think it happens a lot because I didn't even
Speaker 2: know what I was doing, and then I find out
Speaker 2: in a class that, oh, this is a spiritual tradition
Speaker 2: that's been around for generations. So I feel like a
Speaker 2: lot of a lot of Latinas there's an innate response
Speaker 2: to this because it comes from our ancestors. This is
Speaker 2: stuff our great great great great grandmothers was practicing.
Speaker 3: They were practicing this work.
Speaker 1: So let's talk about colonization and Catholicism. They're injuxtaposition to
Speaker 1: our indigenous ancestral roots, right, But how do you put
Speaker 1: those two things together.
Speaker 2: I want these young people or anybody reading it to
Speaker 2: realize that they're not alone in any confusion there.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 2: So, just like I mentioned, my grandmother devout Catholic, but
Speaker 2: when she came home, she would have bowls of water
Speaker 2: above her refrigerator to soak up negative And so that
Speaker 2: is how I make sense of it. That bringing Christianity
Speaker 2: into areas of indigenous people that did not practice it
Speaker 2: and telling them this is what you're going to practice.
Speaker 3: It's not a choice.
Speaker 2: It's either this or you're going to suffer great consequences.
Speaker 2: So a lot of it happened in shadows, behind the
Speaker 2: doors at night, where it wasn't under the watchful eyes
Speaker 2: of colonizers, and then they would show up in the
Speaker 2: houses of worship. Now we get to my grandmother, who
Speaker 2: still believes in these traditions from the island of Puerto
Speaker 2: Rico from Borinquin, right, but also feels so drawn to
Speaker 2: the Bible and the Catholic Church and feels safe in
Speaker 2: both spaces.
Speaker 3: And that's what I feel.
Speaker 2: I could go to a house of worship and absolutely
Speaker 2: feel God in that space, But then I can go
Speaker 2: and sit by a body of water and I feel
Speaker 2: God there too.
Speaker 1: You're not gonna want to miss what comes next, because
Speaker 1: when we come back, Zaida will read the egg and
Speaker 1: find out what it tells her after the limpia that
Speaker 1: she did on me.
Speaker 2: There's not a lot of fogginess, which is nice, but
Speaker 2: there is some fog around the yolk, and you see
Speaker 2: those three big bubbles right there.
Speaker 4: Yeah, people talking crap gossip.
Speaker 1: Stay with us, Yes, hey, we're back. And before the break,
Speaker 1: zaidivera author of Being Brucha, was about to read the
Speaker 1: egg in the glass cup. All right, let's get back
Speaker 1: to the story.
Speaker 3: I'm going to stand up to look at it.
Speaker 4: So as we look at the cup, it looks pretty clear.
Speaker 2: There's not a lot of fogginess, which is nice, but
Speaker 2: there is some fog around the yolk, and you.
Speaker 4: See those three big bubbles right there. Yeah, people talking
Speaker 4: crap gossip. Dude.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So small bubbles usually mean the cleanse took place.
Speaker 2: Everything's good. But the bubbles are big. It's like, ooh,
Speaker 2: there's some haters in the mix, so keep doing what
Speaker 2: you're doing. Mightey because we people are watching now. One
Speaker 2: thing I see as a string right here is kind
Speaker 2: of floating by itself.
Speaker 4: That was a cord cutting of some sort.
Speaker 2: You might have had an energetic connection to somebody that
Speaker 2: you didn't want that anymore, and the egging.
Speaker 4: Yet cleared that.
Speaker 2: Sometimes I'll see the strength still sort of attached, and
Speaker 2: it shows me, oh, we should schedule a chord cutting.
Speaker 4: But in this case it seems like it's already detached. Nice.
Speaker 4: Otherwise it looks beautiful.
Speaker 2: It just seems like there might be a little gossip
Speaker 2: happening around.
Speaker 1: Your book being Brucha. I do love the title in Spanish,
Speaker 1: almost a little bit.
Speaker 2: More vv brucha, which I mean live it live brucha.
Speaker 1: I mean, but you know, I'm sure the publishers are like,
Speaker 1: what do you mean, live bruka. That's going to be
Speaker 1: too much. But you did decide to write it's a
Speaker 1: it's a young adult book one and it's not only
Speaker 1: in English. It's in Spanish.
Speaker 2: Yes, why it was so important. The traditions, the rituals,
Speaker 2: everything that I'm speaking about come from those countries that
Speaker 2: Spanish is spoken. You know, how could I write it
Speaker 2: and not have a young person in Mexico that doesn't
Speaker 2: speak English not feel seen. So you know, I credit
Speaker 2: my publisher a lot. They were very excited to do
Speaker 2: it in Spanish, and so was I. And coming from
Speaker 2: somebody that Spanish is not my first language, I've learned
Speaker 2: over the years in my adult life, how to write
Speaker 2: in Spanish, how to speak in Spanish. But it just
Speaker 2: you know, Maria, I I manifested this years ago.
Speaker 3: I was in.
Speaker 2: Meditation and I asked, God, please let me bring this
Speaker 2: work to young people. I don't know how, but I
Speaker 2: need the little girl, SAIDA that was nine on her bed.
Speaker 3: Seeing myself rocked.
Speaker 2: I need that nine year old to read this, and
Speaker 2: I'm going to share something really wild. I was guided
Speaker 2: through a past life regression meditation. And guess what I
Speaker 2: saw in that meditation, what myself as an adult woman
Speaker 2: walking into the room where I lived as a little girl,
Speaker 2: where I was sitting crying on my bed, and I rocked.
Speaker 1: Myself, Old, are you rocking younger you.
Speaker 2: So it was inner child healing work that was being
Speaker 2: done already. And when I saw that, I thought, wow,
Speaker 2: this makes so much sense because in that moment, as
Speaker 2: a nine year old, I felt so safe. I felt
Speaker 2: like whatever was happening outside of the room wasn't going
Speaker 2: to get to me.
Speaker 1: What I love about your book is that it really
Speaker 1: is a starter guide for Like, if you had a thea,
Speaker 1: who is going to tell you all about it? Great?
Speaker 1: But if we don't have a thea, you can read
Speaker 1: the book. So what do you think just if you're
Speaker 1: doing that starter guide for our listeners, what do they need?
Speaker 1: What is the what are the basic things that you need?
Speaker 2: I mean, it's really interesting because most of the stuff
Speaker 2: is in our kitchen. Like I use a lot of
Speaker 2: things that are right in my kitchen, cinnamon, rosemary, like
Speaker 2: these herbs. But if I was going to say, like
Speaker 2: where do you start right like this is a bluha,
Speaker 2: one on one kind of book, I would really start
Speaker 2: working with the moon. That's one way that you could start.
Speaker 2: It's a way to introduce that connection to nature and
Speaker 2: everything around us. The new Moon is manifesting. What do
Speaker 2: you want to manifest? The foll moons. What do you
Speaker 2: want to let go of? What is it that's in
Speaker 2: your way? What is taking up space that no longer
Speaker 2: needs to be there. That's one way, but also another
Speaker 2: way is manifestation. I would say, try some manifestation work.
Speaker 2: Grab yourself some crystals. You know, my oldest daughter, I
Speaker 2: can't wait for her to hear that she was the
Speaker 2: one anti all of this.
Speaker 3: I go in her room. Now, she got crystals.
Speaker 2: She has angel numbers on her mirror like it resonates.
Speaker 2: So even getting yourself some crystals, writing down something you
Speaker 2: want to manifest, folding it and putting the crystal over
Speaker 2: that piece of paper. The biggest thing and the biggest
Speaker 2: ingredient is trust. Trusting and believing that what you're saying,
Speaker 2: what you want is being heard and received. And if
Speaker 2: it is in line with your purpose, there's no stopping it.
Speaker 2: It's going to be yours. But the big key of
Speaker 2: this is making sure it's in line with your purpose.
Speaker 2: I don't think that if you failed at something, it's
Speaker 2: like I'm not magic, I can't make this manifestation stuff work. No,
Speaker 2: if it was a failure, that means there was a
Speaker 2: lesson in it.
Speaker 1: We're gonna take a quick pause, like, hey, we're back
Speaker 1: before the break. So I that was breaking down some
Speaker 1: of the essential items that she has in order to
Speaker 1: be Abrucha. But now she's going to guide me through
Speaker 1: some of the witchy items that she actually brought into
Speaker 1: the studio with us for the interview. So before we're
Speaker 1: going to get to the next part, right, you're going
Speaker 1: to do a quick little reading, yes, but before you
Speaker 1: do that, can you just tell me what you brought
Speaker 1: that's on the table in front of us.
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Absolutely, So I brought some crystals, and I believe that
Speaker 2: crystals have energy. They're from the Earth, they're pressed together
Speaker 2: to create these amazing colors and all of these things.
Speaker 2: And then of course I have the symbol of love, right,
Speaker 2: and then we have a just a clear quartz. So
Speaker 2: this is really like connected to the crown chakra, which
Speaker 2: was really powerful in your egg Limpia.
Speaker 3: I always bring Florida water, and then I always always
Speaker 3: travel with her. She is the Diosa Luna of the
Speaker 3: Tin tradition.
Speaker 2: She is the moon goddess and I love her little story.
Speaker 2: She like sits in a cave during the day and
Speaker 2: lets the sun just you know, shine and be in
Speaker 2: the spotlight. And then once that sun goes down, she's like, Okay,
Speaker 2: now it's my time to work, and she comes out
Speaker 2: of her cave and illuminates the night sky.
Speaker 3: I have a Tibetan sombol.
Speaker 2: I brought a smaller one today because I have bigger soundbols.
Speaker 2: I use this to cleanse the room. Sound is a
Speaker 2: wonderful way to do that. That wave that carries with
Speaker 2: the sound is going to move the energy around the room.
Speaker 3: So I do that and then my cards.
Speaker 1: So what's going to happen now?
Speaker 3: So let's do a little reading.
Speaker 1: Okay, do I have to do anything or no.
Speaker 3: Not at all. We're just going to pull three cards.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: The cards will from left to right. They signify past, present, future.
Speaker 2: So all I need you to do is just look
Speaker 2: at the cards as I'm shuffling, and just think about things.
Speaker 2: Think about whatever it is that you're asking these cards. Ooh,
Speaker 2: when cards fly out, they're met for you.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, this one fool out.
Speaker 2: So we'll put it to the side. What guidance? What messages?
Speaker 2: Mm hmm, okay, thank you great spirit. Okay, so we
Speaker 2: had cards fly out, and I'm going to show you.
Speaker 2: So you got nine of Wands for past. But nine
Speaker 2: of Wands is basically saying you're a work in progress
Speaker 2: and you know that they there's little blockages in the way,
Speaker 2: but you don't let that limit you. I love the
Speaker 2: imagery of this car too, because she's standing like behind
Speaker 2: a broken fence, so it's just showing she could step
Speaker 2: right over that.
Speaker 1: She's super tall, she could absolutely step right over.
Speaker 2: But this really resonates to me with your work present
Speaker 2: night of ones. If you got a page, it's more
Speaker 2: like thinking about it, but the nights is like, let's
Speaker 2: do it, let's live life. I'm feeling like you're you're
Speaker 2: happier in your life now than you probably have been
Speaker 2: in a long time. It's true, and at this time
Speaker 2: in your life, at this age, there's a wisdom that
Speaker 2: you feel that you haven't before. Correct Three of Swords says,
Speaker 2: you're still going to be disappointed by things. Three of
Speaker 2: Swords comes to say, heartbreak is real, but our bodies,
Speaker 2: our spirits are so resilient that the heart will heal.
Speaker 2: So I do feel like this reading has a lot
Speaker 2: to do with your work and that you have been
Speaker 2: feeling heartbreak in what you've been seeing Oh my god, yeah.
Speaker 1: Oh my god. Oof. Yeah, no idea.
Speaker 2: And this means in every way, not just work, but family.
Speaker 2: You are the lead in your story, not your children,
Speaker 2: not your partner. And that sounds funny to Latina's to
Speaker 2: say that, but you see that if you lead and
Speaker 2: you're at the top of your priority list and you're
Speaker 2: taking care of yourself like you do physically spiritually, that's
Speaker 2: going to resonate with everyone else around you, and your
Speaker 2: kids will carry that with them for the rest of
Speaker 2: their life.
Speaker 1: God, I feel so light.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And when I came in I wasn't you know, I
Speaker 1: was asthmatic and tight. But I'm feeling just completely different
Speaker 1: about it. So I'm just so glad that I had
Speaker 1: this time to sit and.
Speaker 3: Talk with you. Me too, I'm so honored.
Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you, saida thank you. That was saida Rivera.
Speaker 1: Her new book, Being Bruja, is out now. This episode
Speaker 1: was produced by Monica Moreles Garcia, who was edited by
Speaker 1: Maria Garcia. It was mixed by Leah Sean Damron. Fernanda
Speaker 1: Echavari is our managing editor. The Latino USA team also
Speaker 1: includes Roxanna Guire, Julia Caruso, Jessica Ellis, Rebecca I Vara Rinaldo,
Speaker 1: Leo Junior, Stephanie Lebau, Luis Luna Fri, mar Marquez, Julieta Martinelli,
Speaker 1: JJ Carubin, Adriana Rodriguez and Nancy Drujillo. Pennile Ramirez and
Speaker 1: I are co executive producers and I'm your host Maria
Speaker 1: jo Josa. Latino Usa is part of Iheart's mich U
Speaker 1: Dura podcast network. Executive producers at iHeart are Leo Gomez
Speaker 1: and Arlen Santana. Join us again on our next episode.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, I'll see you on all of our
Speaker 1: social media And remember, dear listener, if you want to
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Speaker 3: Yes.
Speaker 2: Joe Latino USA is made possible in part by the
Speaker 2: Tao Foundation, Skyline Foundation, and Druckenmiller Foundation