Maria Sabina

Mony Esquivel
Feb 9, 2023
2 min read

Updated: Feb 15, 2023

Indigenous sage and humble healer: María Sabina will always be linked to the history of shamanism and sacred mushrooms in Mexico. Mushrooms speak through the voice of María Sabina and her words lift up the sick. However, not everyone can "see" eating mushrooms. For Sabina, who were not born to be wise, cannot understand the language of mushrooms, even if they spend many evenings.

Who was Maria Sabina?

María Sabina Magdalena García, known internationally as María Sabina, was an indigenous woman who was born in 1894 in Huautla de Jiménez, Oaxaca. And who is currently considered one of the most important shamans in Mexico for her great knowledge in the use of hallucinogenic mushrooms.

In Huautla it is said that María Sabina came from a family of shamans and although she lost her father at a young age, her first contact with traditional medicine based on hallucinogenic mushrooms was when her uncle Cristino fell ill and they had to practice one on him. Years later, she earned a reputation as a healer in town when she cured her sister by herself by eating 30 pairs of mushrooms.

At the age of 14, she married Serapio Martínez, with whom she had three children, but at the age of 20 she was widowed and as a way of raising her children she decided to dedicate herself to shamanism. María Sabina said that by consuming mushrooms she was able to connect with her Gods and talk to them in order to find out about her patients' illnesses and how to treat them.

“There is a world beyond ours, a world that is far away, also close and invisible. That is where God lives, where the dead and the saints live. A world where everything has already happened, and everything is known. That world speaks. It has its own language. I report what he says. The sacred mushroom takes me by the hand and leads me to the world where everything is known. There are the sacred mushrooms, which speak in a way that I can understand. I ask them and they answer me. When I return from the trip that I have taken with them, I say what they have told me and what they have shown me”.

This healer from Huautla de Jimenez, a town located in the Mazatec sierra of Oaxaca, became internationally known for her experiences in healing people through the teonanácatl (sacred hallucinogenic mushrooms). Various personalities of her time came with her to be guided through these hidden worlds for the human being in his conscious state. From Jim Morrison to Walt Disney, passing through the creator of LSD Aldous Huxley, the musician Bob Dylan and John Lennon.