Toxic Cacao and Emotional Detoxing: Cacao's Bad Name in the Raw Diet World

This blog post is an excerpt from the original writings of Keith Wilson, the Chocolate Shaman, which were first published in 2012. For more recent info on all things Ceremonial Cacao, visit our main blog For the Love of Cacao.

While some people who are into raw diet extoll the virtues of Cacao, others consider it a toxic, addictive stimulant to be avoided. Here's what often happens: Cacao, as one of this planet's teacher/medicine plants, brings messages from inner reality needing healing to the surface and into consciousness. Raw foodies are trained to use their bodies to monitor dietetic choices. They understand the negativity they feel through their bodies as feedback about the physical toxicity and unsuitability of the food they consume. 

Consider this: Are the symbolic messages/keys to your emotional toxicity, which are urging you to "dig here for inner healing gold." likely to feel like the yummy coconut I had for lunch today? Of course not! Yet this is how the messages get completely misunderstood - and it gets blamed on 'bad' Cacao. On the other hand, just like everything else, Cacao does not work the same with everyone. Hence, others on a raw diet experience "the best day ever" when they drink/eat Cacao.  

A raw food diet physically cleans up your system. Then, your consciousness moves on into emotional detoxification, as the next step in a standard progression, from cleaning the physical body to cleaning the emotional body. Like all of us, people on a raw diet also may have emotional and psychic channels clogged or disconnected. The difference is their physical bodies are cleaner and, therefore, more discerning. Through this clear pathway, Cacao flows a map of their next step in healing. Suppose one does not understand Cacao's mapping personally, or their raw support system tells them that this emotional cleansing process is harmful toxic feedback symptoms. In that case, they will have no idea what to do with the metaphors for their inner healing that Cacao and other levels of their being are presenting them with. Yet these are essential keys in the process of 'Knowing Thyself,' which are crucial in almost any spiritual system. 

"If you won't feel it, you can't heal it." The emotions will be blocked from exiting you, which is what is happening.

Understanding Symptoms as Metaphors

Take, as an example, people who have had the experience of doing a liver detox and having someone tell them that their cleansing reactions are a sign that the detox program is bad for them. I get this exact reaction from qualified raw food instructors not trained in emotional and energetic/spiritual detox. Raw food teachers tell me about students who become 'toxic' after a Cacao ceremony. And I tell them about people who, when shown how to cooperate with 'what's up' and follow their 'toxic' symptoms, are able to use those messages to lead them into their next step of life-changing inner healing and growth. The belief that negative feelings always equal physical toxicity is too simplistic and does not allow one to swim in the metaphors of the subconscious pond. As Carl Jung pointed out, communication with your subconscious mind will occur through symbols, images, and metaphors.

With Cacao, as in life, if you don't listen to the messages, they get louder. Unfortunately, a few raw food teachers share stories on their websites about why they stopped using Cacao: the unwanted, unfollowed, and misinterpreted-as-toxic messages eventually became intolerably loud, and the obvious option was divorce. Perhaps they have played out the same scenario in other life arenas, like with their romantic partners, not understanding that issues are scripted from within and are never about whoever is playing the other end of that script for their own purposes. Instead, they blame their damn ex, labeling them a toxic, addictive bitch, just like the Cacao. Without the training I received to clean up my inner act and then teach – long before my introduction to Cacao – I wouldn't have understood what to do with the friggin metaphors either. 

If you are unwilling to hear what your caring subconscious mind has to say to you – for consensus reality teaches us all to ignore or repress these messages – you may not like Cacao. And She may see to it that you keep your distance. Cacao works with you where You are. If you want an addictive stimulant, if you use Cacao that way, that is what you will get! Is that about the Cacao, or is it about you? Perhaps you are not familiar with native teaching styles that have so much respect for who you are as an individual on your sacred journey that they trust and allow you to find your own way on that journey, with guidance always available if you ask, and this is unconditional love. It is the same teaching method God-Goddess always has, and still is, using with you today

Emotional Releasing

I really appreciate the preparation work that fasting and raw food teachers have done for many of the people who come to me! Cacao is a beautiful assistant in the progression from using a physical substance like food to do your detox and healing work to partnering in meditation with a multi-dimensional divine light energy to take that detox and healing to deeper levels. Yes, in traditional shamanism centuries ago, Cacao was considered a divine energy. Today, we understand it as a multi-level facilitating consciousness - the divine energy and resultant empowerment are your own. Old age and new age. Old and new shamanism.

Cacao or no Cacao, clearing emotional and belief system issues gets you out of your own way, so that who you truly are and the gifts you have can come through. One does not go into the 'next dimension' while carrying all that emotional and belief system baggage. All that 'stuff' needs to come 'up' because it must, because it's time, and because you made this choice before you were born. A facilitator like Cacao is going to present you with it and, with higher connectedness, allow you to move it in more elegant ways than playing it out as externally manifested dramas in the feedback called reality. As with raw detox, many need personal assistance (I certainly did) in understanding the process, because it is outside of the consensus reality box and easy to judge as something you do not want to go through, despite how wonderful it is in the long run. 

Some people do not want the stimulation from Cacao in their day. That's fine. Maybe the message for them is to stop overdosing and use less of it. I know a non-indigenous Cacao healer who gives people one morsel - just a taste - of her chocolates, and they often go into spontaneous emotional release. I have ceremony regulars who often just nibble a few beans, and that is all they want. And then there are those for whom what surfaces in emotional detox is not something they want in their day, because the conditioning to repress such issues prevails. That's fine too. Their path or timing is different. Finally, some discover that emotional or density detox is a logical extension of physical detox, and they are drawn to Cacao and these understandings. My experience is that this is where so many are today. Raw dieting has prepared them well. Cacao is one option among many; for some, it makes an excellent partner in this portion of the journey. 

Still, there are those who project the issues that the Cacao brought to their attention as attributes or liabilities of the Cacao itself rather than understanding them as their own. Some even take it further, creating content on their websites about the toxicity or ego inflation of Cacao.

For more of Keith's wisdom, visit Keith Wilson's Original Blog on Keith's Cacao Blog Directory.