Over my years exploring with Mama Cacao, I’ve come to see that this ancestral medicine offers several doors in, each one matching a different energetic or spiritual need. This is wisdom I received through channeling, and confirmed through my own direct experience.
Cacao is an ideal ally for lucid dreamers and experiencers!
The 5 Portals to the Spirit of Cacao
1. The Sacred Drink: Circulation and Energetic Flow
This is the form we all know, but let me share what I’ve come to understand about what it really does. The drink moves like volcanic lava, straight into the heart, connecting to our inner waters, our own movement, our own flow. It helps when we feel blocked or stagnant, when something in our physical or spiritual body needs to start moving again.
My personal practice: I use this form for ceremonies, obviously, for opening the heart, releasing stuck emotions and energetic knots, and creating fluidity wherever there’s been rigidity. It’s especially transformative during transitions, or whenever our energy feels stuck.
Conscious preparation:
20–30g of ceremonial cacao
Hot water (70–80°C)
Mix or whisk with sacred intention
Drink slowly, in full presence
The effect: an immediate opening of the heart, emotional fluidity, and better energetic circulation.
2. The Raw Bean: Grounding and the Blossoming of Intention
The bean is a sprouting, a blossoming intention. A new seed, something meant to grow. Its energy is deeply grounding, and it needs to be organic, and from an heirloom variety, to carry its full strength.
My personal ritual: I love biting into a raw bean whenever I have access to a fresh pod, to carry a new project forward, honor a new lunar cycle, or set an intention of expansion. The grounding effect is immediate, and it lasts.
Different ways to use the bean:
Raw beans with their white pulp: if you have fresh pods, savor the sweet pulp and its almond-like heart. Pure, divine nectar.
Roasted beans: more bitter, perfect for a daily grounding practice, or an energy boost before exercise.
Essential criterion: choose only heirloom varieties (Criollo or Nacional), organically grown, to get the full energetic strength.
3. Solid Cacao: Structure and Energetic Foundation
Let a small piece of cacao block melt directly under your tongue, exactly like eating a square of chocolate. This form carries a more structural kind of energy, ideal when you need to set a strong intention and a solid base.
When I use it: whenever I don’t have beans on hand, or the time to prepare a liquid brew.
Simple technique: I cut a 15–20g square and let it dissolve under my tongue, eyes closed, until it’s completely gone, then I give myself a few more deep breaths, or a chant.
The effect is subtle but remarkably steady: deep grounding, energetic stability, a solid foundation for your projects.
4. The Whole Pod: Protection and Sacred Gestation
I discovered this form of connection as a birthday gift from Mama Cacao, when I got the chance to harvest fresh pods straight from the tree.
My personal realization: the pod represents maternal protection and sacred gestation. Its oblong shape echoes the heart, and its tough shell holds pure love inside, the beans wrapped in sweet white flesh. It’s Mama Cacao made physical: a protective mother holding her children, the beans, in a cocoon of love.
What the colors mean: pods show off beautiful colors as they ripen, tender green, golden yellow, passionate red, earthy brown once dried. Each color carries its own medicine, and lines up with a different chakra.
In Maya tradition: ripe pods echo the female body; their red-violet color and white sap symbolize fertility, the essence of femininity, and the womb. In Maya iconography, the pod represents the female reproductive organ and the capacity to create.
How I use it personally:
Keeping dried pods on my altar as permanent offerings
Holding one during meditations on creation and fertility, whether for projects, intentions, or new life
Meditating on the gestation of a project while holding a closed pod
When to use this form: for anything related to creation, protection, the gestation of a project, a need for maternal safety, or connection to the sacred feminine.
The effect: a deep sense of protection, connection to the divine feminine, and grounding in the natural cycles of creation and manifestation.
5. Pure Spirit Connection: Beyond Matter
Here’s the secret few facilitators share: you can connect with the spirit of cacao without any physical matter at all. Beyond matter, you open a direct relationship with the energy itself, with the subtle, simply by connecting to the spirit of cacao through meditation.
Connecting with the plant: once you’ve connected with sacred cacao through its physical form, you build a lasting bond with its spirit. The spirit of cacao becomes a guide, a companion for inner journeys, one you can call on the way you would an ancestor.
Meditative practice:
Sit to meditate and chant
Connect with your altar dedicated to this medicine
Call the spirit of cacao through thought and intention
Open your heart to its subtle presence
Connect through representations or effigies of this plant spirit
This form is ideal when you don’t have physical access to cacao but still feel the pull of its medicine. It also helps develop your own natural intuitive abilities.
→ Accompany these subtle moments with my chants, meditations, and prayers, available on Insight Timer.
“We feel that the world is changing, that the old prophecies are unfolding. Sacred plants like cacao are opening the way.”
Other Traditional Forms Worth Exploring
Through my travels and explorations, I’ve come across other ways of welcoming this medicine that I wanted to share with you.
Cacao nib tea: these crushed bean pieces, steeped in hot water, offer a gentler connection, perfect for daily drinking. It’s what you’ll often find in artisanal teas labeled “chocolate flavor” or “cacao.”
Cacao husk tea: the skin left over after shelling the beans also makes a delicate infusion, similar to nib tea.
Cacao tepache (traditional fermentation): in Mexico, I discovered this fermented drink, where beans are fermented together with fruit. Its naturally low alcohol content (2–3%) makes it a medicine used in certain ancestral shamanic rituals.
Cacao shavings: once you’ve cut your block with a knife, these shavings can be sprinkled over fruit or blended into smoothies, a delicious way to bring this medicine into your daily food.
Listening to What Your Soul Needs
What I’ve learned over time is that our soul instinctively knows which form it needs. Here are a few markers I’ve noticed:
Each cacao shows up for you at a particular moment in your personal development, almost as if each variety matched a different stage of your spiritual evolution.
For specific intentions:
Emotional release → hot sacred drink
Grounding and new projects → raw bean, with intention
Stability and structure → solid cacao under the tongue
Spiritual growth → pure spirit connection
Daily integration → nib tea or roasted beans
By time of day:
Energizing morning: nib or husk tea, one or two roasted beans
A mindful day: a piece of cacao under the tongue
Sacred ceremony: traditional drink, up to 45g (for experienced practitioners)
Meditative evening: traditional drink, 20–30g
Whatever form you choose, keep this sacred attitude: create a clear intention, thank the spirit of cacao and the ancestors who protected this tradition, and stay present enough to receive whatever comes through.
Plants respond when we speak to them, and open ourselves to their wisdom. Cacao, in all its forms, teaches us the many faces spiritual connection can take.
As you keep exploring, you’ll naturally find your own dance with these different forms. Trust what you feel, experiment with curiosity, and let Mama Cacao guide you toward whatever your soul needs.
May this diversity of connection enrich your spiritual path, and deepen your relationship with Mama Cacao. 🌿
If this post resonated with you, nearby or planning a trip to Portugal, follow me on Instagram, where I share ceremonies and updates from the land. Further away, you’ll find me on Insight Timer instead, with meditations, chants, and cacao journeys wherever you are in the world.