Traditional Mexican Folk Magic & MORE - Rev Laura Gonzalez

Reverend Laura Gonzalez, a spiritual luminary and community healer, takes us on a heartfelt journey from her beginnings as a tarot reader to becoming a beacon of empowerment in her community. Her rich tapestry of knowledge in traditional Mexican folklore, Native philosophies, and North American paganism shines through as she shares her experiences at the Parliament of the World of Religions in Chicago. With a deep commitment to education and advocacy, Laura's voice resonates with the call for unity and support for indigenous, pagan, and LGBTQIA communities. She unveils her latest endeavor, Blue Witch Org, a digital sanctuary for learning and connection, underscoring the transformative power of reclaiming personal strength.

We explore the captivating myth, and the celestial bodies, revealing the poetic allegories that mirror our connection to nature. These narratives offer more than ancient wisdom; they provide educational opportunities through classes and community circles that foster understanding and cultural appreciation. Laura's message of love and positivity serves as a powerful reminder of our inherent worth, urging listeners to rise above negativity and foster a supportive network. This episode invites you to embrace the spirit of community and share in the uplifting journey of empowerment and belonging.

Chapters

• 0:00 Belief and Beyond With Laura Gonzalez
• 17:19 Mythology, Community, and Learning Together
• 29:46 Never Forget You Are Loved

Transcript

Granddaughter Crow : 0:00

Welcome to Belief, being and Beyond with your host, granddaughter Crow. Hi everybody, granddaughter Crow here with another episode of Belief, being and Beyond, and today I have the wonderful honor of interviewing and spending some time with and allowing her to share with you her wisdom, laura Gonzalez. And it is just. Let me just tell you a little bit about Reverend Laura Gonzalez. She is a spiritual and community healer, priestess, minister, specializing in traditional Mexican folklore. If you want a little bit of Mexican folklore, follow her. She's got classes, we'll talk about it.

Granddaughter Crow : 0:49

Also Native philosophies and North American paganism within the goddess tradition, and I can't wait to get into that. She also holds a leadership role at a Chicago-based community practice of Nahuawa tradition of Mexico. Please correct me if I'm saying it wrong. That's correct. Yay, where she provides guidance, support community harmony. Laura also advocates for indigenous pagan LGBTQIA communities, with a focus on women's rights and diversity. And I am so honored because, laura, I have met her and she is my sister. She is my sister, she is my sister. I'm pretty sure that our ancestors knew each other at one time. So everybody, please welcome Laura Gonzalez. Say hi, everybody. Say hi Laura.

Laura Gonzales: 1:47

Hi, hello and welcome and thank you for being here, yeah.

Granddaughter Crow : 1:51

My honor and pleasure. Oh, good, I'm, I'm interested in.

Granddaughter Crow : 1:56

Laura I mean you have a new website, bluewitchorg. Bluewitchorg. People Go to bluewitchorg. Blue Witchorg people Go to Blue Witchorg newsletter straight away. Sign up for that newsletter. Do you know why? Because then you get to know different parts of the community that you get to become a part of and rely on. Because that is what we need to do in this time is community. So tell us a little bit. I mean you've got so much stuff on your website, but tell us a little bit more about you. Changed it or what happened? What?

Laura Gonzales: 2:33

happened is I started my business about 13 years ago as a tarot reader. I've been reading tarot since I was 14 years old, 15 years old, but I started as a business um in 2011 and something must have been in the water in 2011 because I started doing a lot of things. I started podcasting and I started my business and um. You know there was a lot of changes and and I had a website that was for tarot right for just the tarot readings. But the truth of the matter is that I am much more than a tarot reader. I've been an educator my whole life. I have. If I learn something, I immediately turn around and then start teaching people, and that was, back in Mexico, the way it was when I was younger. If you have a certain degree of education, you can actually teach the younger degrees of schooling. So at one point in my life I was teaching uh, first graders and third graders uh, mostly English and history, but you know general sciences, and it was a short period of time and I always knew that I love teaching. I love everything that I do and everything that we do for our communities, right Like to be there to conflict resolution, to help with activism, to help empower people and to to remember who we are and to remember that we own the power and we own the power and we own the power. And so I have always translated that into teaching. Let me teach you this. Let me teach you about that, you this, let me teach you about that, let me, yeah, and so my desire, since I started my tarot business, was let me introduce myself as a tarot reader, and then you can come to my classes and come to my workshops and all of that. And at certain point, I don't know what happened and I kind of lost the plot and and a lot of people knew me. It's so peculiar and and a lot of people knew me. It's so peculiar and funny because a lot of people knew me as a tarot reader, luckily, but online it did translate it into she's a teacher, she's you know. So I always have like this kind of like this two communities separate. So there was a website Please don't look for it anymore. It doesn't exist, but it was. You know the Blue Witch. So there was a website Please don't look for it anymore. It doesn't exist, but it was. You know, the Blue Witch, it was, pardon me, it was Bruja, laura Gonzalez and, of course, years go by, you learn more things, you teach more things, you do more things. You know a lot of things happen on 2023.

Laura Gonzales: 5:20

Okay, I was part of the Parliament of the World of Religions and it was in Chicago and I was invited to be part of the opening speaking event, the opening plenary, and also to march with the parade of religions, and I was incredibly honored to be asked that and I thought, you know, I'm going to march with, like the whole lot of people. And then I come to Parliament, which was here in Chicago at the McCormick place, and I have my regalia on because they suggest, they asked me, you know, if I could have my regalia. So, through my tradition, you know, we wear white and red and my face painting and I have some smoke medicine with me and all that you know. So I was nervous because I've never been in Parliament of the World of Religions, let alone have to speak. Nervous because I've never been in Parliament of the World of Religions, let alone have to speak.

Laura Gonzales: 6:30

And I asked where does the procession begin? And they asked me what's your name? And I say I'm Laura Gonzalez, and then they say, oh yeah, you're first. And then everybody lined up behind Laura and I was like what? I'm like, can you repeat that? She's like, yeah, you're first, you're first. And then I have a person whose name I didn't get, but he is a man the liaison of indigenous affairs for parliament and he came near me and he told me there's two elders that are going to join you once you approach the door, and one of them was none other than, um, grandmother mary. God, I'm blanking on the names lions, grandmother mary, lions. And and then another lady whose name I can't remember, but she was on a TV show Reservation Dogs.

Granddaughter Crow : 7:33

I love Reservation Dogs. I love Reservation Dogs.

Laura Gonzales: 7:37

She played the grandmother of one of the kids and she was there on the parade with Grandmother Mary Lyons, so I had the incredible honor to walk with all of them and we walked into the parliament and then, when it was my time to speak, I had been asked to speak in Nahuatl, and then in Spanish and then in English.

Laura Gonzales: 8:01

And unfortunately, I do not know Nahuatl, because colonization was for do not know now what, because you know, colonization was, for lack of a better word, so effective in Mexico that they detrabalized a lot of us and we, a lot of us don't know our languages or original languages, but I know a couple, I know a couple of songs and I know, you know, I know a few, a few words, and so I I sang a song on now what? And then I said a goddess prayer in Spanish and then in English, and I also happened to be the first women who spoke on the opening. Uh, 30 minutes after the the started, there was nothing but men, and then the first women who spoke it was me. So that was an incredibly life-changing event and honor. And so, after that happened, a lot of things started happening in my life, happened in my life, and I got a very clear, very, very clear message from ancestors from the land, from from Chicago itself.

Laura Gonzales: 9:12

Um, in my pagan practice I used to do paganism and I keep my indigen, my indigenous um practice and my indigenuity I always kept separated and I've been a pagan priestess and I've been practicing paganism publicly teaching, etc. But the indigenous part was always like, kept on the side right and after this event she, he, it. Whatever they are the message was very clear and the message was oh, I need you whole and I need you to work all of it, yeah. And then I was like, but isn't it, isn't it a mistake to put paganism and the goddess and indigenous stuff? And then what I heard was basically like, did I stutter? Right?

Granddaughter Crow : 10:15

Right, I love it. Did I stutter? You heard me, little girl, you heard me.

Laura Gonzales: 10:21

Yep, and little girl is right, because I had a tendonitis in both my hands and I could barely do anything with my hands, so it was like you are not to work with your hands. Okay, right, your medicine is not. Yes, you do have medicine in your hands, but your medicine is not in your hands. Yeah, right, here, that's, that's, that's where your medicine is. That's right, and and and I'm like okay. So, because of all that this, I know this is a window, that's answer, because I, that's me. Um, so all these changes happen between last year and 2023, the ending of 2023, 2024. And I have a lot, a lot, a lot of work, and all that work was spread out into like 20 pods and I met this wonderful person whom has been my apprentice for a long time and has been helping me physically when I go to places and I do classes and workshops and whatnot. And because another person learned that I have this person helping me, they offer to help.

Laura Gonzales: 11:40

So now I have now I have two people that work with me as the Blue Witch team, so Sani and Andrea. Sani is basically my personal assistant and Andrea is my business manager, and Andrea went and did a whole lot of work to put the website together. If you ask Andrea if we can launch the website officially and tell everybody about it, she will say no, we're still working on it. We're still working on it because andrea's constantly adding things and working, uh, with so much honor, with so much gusto. You know putting everything together and again helping me reflect on all the work that I've done and all the things. So you can go now to BlueWitchorg and then you can find all of my classes, you can find all of my services, you can find all of learning programs that you can learn on your own pace. These are pre-recorded classes and you can join our live classes.

Laura Gonzales: 12:47

So I have classes that are pre-recorded right of a tarot course, like an introductory tarot course that I taught in like 2021, I think, and then you can learn that at your own pace. Right, then I have a spells course that I taught all of 2022. So all of the year 2022, or rather I'll say 2023, I think it was the spells series and same you can learn on your own pace. And same you can learn on your own pace and, um, I I suggest people's spells, but I focus more on like this is the technology behind doing a spell for fill the blank, none is. It's not a class where I'm going to tell you yeah, we grab deserve, we grab herb, we grab this.

Laura Gonzales: 13:46

In this class, I teach people like what do you need? How do you focus on what you need? What are the tools that can help you? This is the technology and this is how you use it. And then, of course, towards the end of the class, there's always going to be a couple spells, but it's not a class of spells. It's like how to craft your own spell. Yeah, and then on 2024, because of the old, you're not working with your hands anymore, and so I started the decolonizing the goddess class. Yes, in 2024.

Laura Gonzales: 14:22

and and this is it, this is the indigenous knowledge. We focus on the indigenous knowledge of these details, this goddesses, and we focus on them and we do a little bit of a comparative to like pagan goddesses or more mainstream goddesses. So I grab the first 12 goddesses that are very well known for people, even for both for indigenous people who are not really knowledgeable of things, but also for pagan people who I'm sure have heard or have seen these icons. And so the first year of the Color Nights in the Goddess it was Chalchitlique, quatlique, citlalinique, chantico, xochiquetzali, chico, mecoat, you know, like all the usual suspects, the ones that people know more, and for people who don't understand what I'm saying or don't know, it's like Tlaliniqa is the star goddess, so she's like the sky and the stars, like you're painting behind you we have Xoch, she get sally who is the goddess of flowers and beauty, but it's also related to like completion and renewal and self um actualization. Yes, chantico, chantantico, chantico, come to us.

Laura Gonzales: 16:07

Chantico, chantico is the goddess of fire, protection and the fire of the house, the fire of the heart, the hearth, yes, but she's also the warrior goddess that protects the realm and protects the house, oh, and protects the community. So, chantico, please, chantico, yes, come to us and um, and then you know, like we have, like koyoshoki, the moon goddess, and we talk about the moon, and you cannot talk about Koyushauki without talking about Quatlikwe, who's mother earth, and Huitzilopochtli, who is her brother, and there's the whole mythology, one of the best known myths of the Nahuatl people the birth of Huitzilopochtli. That happens in winter solstice and is basically the birth of the winter sun. But have you ever heard the?

Granddaughter Crow : 17:15

myth no tell. Can you share yeah?

Laura Gonzales: 17:19

So her name is Cuetlipue and she is cleaning her house. She's sweeping the floor and then she finds this beautiful bundle of hummingbird feathers on the floor and it's so beautiful and colorful and mesmerizing that she picks it up and she put it on her skirt. You know, she tucks it into her skirt and next thing you know she's pregnant on her skirt. She tucks it into her skirt and next thing you know she's pregnant and she's pregnant with the feathers. She became pregnant and her daughter finds out. Her daughter is called Shauky the Moon. And her daughter finds out and that's not right, because we don't have a father and how you have a child like, yeah, what happened?

Laura Gonzales: 18:11

And so koyoshoki goes and tells all her brothers and sisters, whom are 400 warriors wow, all this and son, since on sees nawa, and I can pronounce that name correctly, so please forgive me if you know how to pronounce it because I know I butchered it. So the 400 brother warriors. They know that mom is pregnant and that is not right. So Koyoshaoki starts this plot to kill the unborn child. And they don't want him to be born because it's like a sin or whatever Right.

Laura Gonzales: 18:56

And so Coatlicua is incredibly afraid because 400 warriors close in on her. Yeah, her daughter are coming to get the baby, and the baby is on her womb. And then she's trying to console herself. And she's there, like you know, trying to sit and contemplation, and then she hears the voice of her son from her belly, which is telling her uh, it's gonna be okay, mom, wow, hey, I'm gonna take care of you. Mom, don her, it's going to be okay, mom, wow, hey, I'm going to take care of you, mom, don't worry, it's going to be okay. It's going to be okay, don't worry about it, I'm going to be born and it's going to be okay. Wow, a full-on warrior with an incredible shield and a weapon, and he first goes to koyoshoki and cuts her into pieces. I can't remember the name of the of the weapon, but it's one of those wood things that had obsidian oh, wow, yeah, yeah, yeah, poking out from each side, yeah, wow the name is, uh, the fire serpent, shukwat, oh, wow, and he.

Laura Gonzales: 20:14

So he grabs the shukwat and he's, you know, fighting all the, and he, him and mom are okay, wow. So the myth is like what, right, there's betrayal, there's flooding, don't forget. What liquid is the earth? Um, koyoshoki is the moon, yeah, and the sense on, since now, what are the stars? Oh, and with silaposhli, is the sun he is your son.

Laura Gonzales: 21:00

So what we're talking about here is we're talking about the earth, yes, the myth and the movement of this, of the celestial bodies from an earth perspective. When you see the earth at night, the, the big sister, the moon, is there and the 400 brothers are the stars. And when we seeuitzilopochtli is born on winter solstice, though he is a baby because he's a small son, he's the tiniest son of the east. When the sun comes out, it kills the brothers and sisters.

Laura Gonzales: 21:45

When the sun comes out, you don't see the moon anymore, you don't see the stars. And our people were so poetic to do these allegories, to tell the stories, because even the dismemberment, which is so apparently violent for people who don't understand that this is an allegory, the dismemberment of Koyoshauki, it's actually talking about the faces of the moon.

Granddaughter Crow : 22:12

Right, I was thinking that, how it was chopped up into slices, and sometimes you don't see it. And yeah, all of the faces of the moon.

Laura Gonzales: 22:21

Sometimes you can see here how she's being cut up Wow. Sometimes you can see here how she's being cut up, wow, and. And sometimes she's whole, and sometimes she's half right, yeah. So so that that's. That's a little bit of taste of you. Know.

Laura Gonzales: 22:36

You come to my class, I tell you the myths, I tell you the story I tell you how you know, reclaim the, the knowledge of the myths and, more importantly, we recognize that these are not stories told about gods and goddesses, right, but through the little threads that they left us, we can see, we can pull that thread and understand that we're talking about human nature. Yes, threat and understand that we're talking about human nature, yes, and human nature that has been like every other culture before christianity anthropomorphizing the forces of nature. Yes, understand human nature and to understand our behavior.

Laura Gonzales: 23:21

So people can come and get these classes and they can buy the whole series with a discount and you can pay on like two payments, or people can buy on demand. Hey, I just want to hear about this, goddess, or I just want to hear about this, goddess, and people can still jump in on 2025. We're so early in the year so you still can jump and you can still buy 2025 the whole year. So that'll give you access to the live classes, which is fantastic, because people come to the live class and if they have questions, they can ask it at the moment. Ask it at the moment, but there are people who cannot come to live class, but they can now have access to the whole year. Yeah, so buy the whole year, buy on demand, pay in two payments or one payment and then do your thing. And we also are doing community circles. Yeah, I saw that.

Laura Gonzales: 24:20

Tell us about how we can join in yeah, and what we do is actually, uh, uh, sanseco tlisli. Sanseco tlisli now, what word for all of us to learn. Sanseco tlisli, which is basically a gathering of people, community coming in a circle. And it's a community gathering, so we come together. I give prompts for the month. For example, the one for February. The prompt is love and gratitude and radical self-love and unconditional love. And, you know, not just sexuality, not just romance, but how do we go about? Um, unconditional love, which is the of most important at this day and age? Yes, regardless of what is happening in the world, but now even more, yeah, absolutely because, yeah, and, and what that looks like is people come together.

Laura Gonzales: 25:29

I give a prompt. First of all, we check in, and then I give the prompt, and then we all, you know, breathe and we do some kind of music. Um, I'll do a chant or something, or somebody else will lead a meditation, or you know, and then we talk about our grievances, we talk about our happiness, we talk about reflections that have come to us throughout the time that we have shared together. And sometimes a community gathering, a person is having like a heavier load than the rest of the community. So we come together and it could be, decide what the prompt was. It could be, you know it could be. This person needs us now, so we turn into just holding that one person. It has happened a couple of times when somebody in the community needs us to be there for them, and this community gatherings I've been doing with the same set of boundaries. The first boundary is that they are absolutely confidential.

Granddaughter Crow : 26:46

Yeah.

Laura Gonzales: 26:47

What is said on the community gathering. Don't leave the community gathering period. They're not recorded, they are not to be. The second boundary that we ask people to hold is that we're not there to fix anybody Right. I love that. We're not fixing people. We're not fixing problems. We're not making them better. People are excellent as they are. Nobody needs to get better unless they want to get better. Of course.

Laura Gonzales: 27:18

Sometimes people say like, like I was saying earlier, sometimes people help me right, sure, and the third and most important one, I think, is we are not there to give advice, like I'm not gonna give you advice. I'm not. I give you advice when you pay me for it. Yeah, absolutely, yes, you know, otherwise I don't give advice. I'm there to listen and everybody is there to listen and they are so incredibly rewarding and so incredibly spiritual and beautiful. I'm still learning the word means gathering, and not from ego to understand that we all learn from each other.

Granddaughter Crow : 28:06

Yes, absolutely 100%.

Laura Gonzales: 28:11

I always tell my apprentices you hold your bag of medicine, yes, and you can be on the lineup of 50 healers and each one of the 50 healers is going to have their bag of medicine right in front of them and the people that need to come and take from your medicine will be lying to you.

Granddaughter Crow : 28:33

Absolutely 100%, and I love that you are saying. You know, when I think community, I think that we all stand in a circle and I think that there is no head of the table Again. Bluewitchorg, sign up for the newsletter so that you don't miss any of this. Thank you, andrea, thank you Sunny, thank you to everybody in our communities that know us both. Shout out to Alohim Lifar I saw that you had written something in Dream Witchery.

Granddaughter Crow : 29:05

Aloe, Aloe Leifar, I saw that you had written something in Dream Witchery, as well, as you contribute to a lot of different books, magazines, etc. Yeah, absolutely, and I'm just like thank you for you know, it's funny too, because you and I have similar stories where we just kind of come out and we do one thing and then spirit and community say oh no, you're going to do this and it's like me, me, okay, okay, I'll say yes, I'll say yes and it's just, it's right in time. I'm so happy that I know you, cousin, I love you from depths of my soul and I really appreciate you being here on the podcast. Is there any last thing you wanted to say to the people?

Laura Gonzales: 29:52

I always sign off saying never forget that you were loved and I want you to believe me. Yeah, I want you the hype, don't believe the propaganda, don't believe the lies that are out there floating Me saying temporarily, momentarily, just came out today.

Granddaughter Crow : 30:17

Oh, wow.

Laura Gonzales: 30:18

I heard it loud and clear. Yes, so you and I know that it's spirit through us. Right, that's right, this is a moment in time. Yes, this is a snag on our tapestry.

Granddaughter Crow : 30:30

Yes.

Laura Gonzales: 30:33

We will move past it. So don't ever forget, don't ever, ever forget that you are loved.

Granddaughter Crow : 30:41

Yes, absolutely, you are loved, are loved. Yes, absolutely, you are loved. Audience, thank you so much for listening to another episode of Belief being Beyond. Like, subscribe, hit the bells and whistles, share this. If this inspired you and it made you think of someone, share this information. This is wonderful, empowering information that can lead us home, lead us to community, and you can text the show. If you're listening to this on a podcast, just scroll down, text the show. I don't know who you are, you can tell me or stay anonymous, but, just like Laura Gonzalez says, you are loved, I love you and we'll see you on the flippity flip.