Don Alejandro’s son, Joel, provided a brief description of Medicine and philosophy of indigenous peoples in the Amazon region of Peru. It has been translated as follows:
Western culture has lost its relationship or connection with the natural world and with supernatural forces. In the same manner [western] medicine has lost [neglected] the use of natural products in the treatment of physical and spiritual illnesses. Chemicals have replaced these [treatments] and ancestral rituals. Meanwhile in the Amazon one can meet groups of people whose daily life is strictly connected with their environment [where] forest plants are utilized in conjunction with rituals supervised by a spiritual guide or healer [called] (WATOPAKERI).
The Amazon is formed by elements that are wonderfully harmonized among themselves in a perfect and permanent equilibrium between flora, fauna, human beings and cosmic beings. This marvelous [quality] of the Amazon permits us to encounter our own equilibrium between body and spirit. All of us depend upon this equilibrium and upon the coexisting of human beings, flora, fauna, cosmic beings, and spiritual beings living together with the four cardinal elements of earth, water, air, and fire. People who live in these regions encounter these entities in perfect equilibrium and experience nature as a living organism and not as a biological laboratory. For the native all nature is alive [with being]. It’s what the ancient protectors of these ancient lands bequeathed to succeeding generations. [Nature] is full of wisdom and a religious, magical philosophy. Understanding these traditional values will help us to submerge ourselves in a magical, spiritual world where the primary thing is a spiritual connection [with nature] which helps us transcend and balance the four fundamental aspects of human being:
• the spiritual
• the physical
• the mental
• the emotional
This balance is achieved utilizing all that Mother Nature provides us, whether it be nuturing plants, medicines, or the energy of the great spirits connected with nature. By means of rituals [and] natural medicines we are taught to make use of our psychological faculties. Understanding of the spiritual aspect of nature brings us to that place where our eyes aren’t able to see or understand but are able to feel with the essence of the heart and the essence of the inner world.