Roots and Bridges

Feb 8-15 2026

An immersion into trauma healing in Guatemala

People walking and riding bicycles on a cobblestone street near a church, with the sun shining behind the building and casting long shadows.

What to Expect

In a world plagued by trauma, inequality, and climate disruption, Crossroads Acupuncture and Qachuu Aloom / Mother Earth Association invite you to step into the work of barefoot grassroots healing in the America.

You’ll have the chance to do your own healing, while walking with the everyday heroes struggling for the dignity of their communities in the highlands of Guatemala.

A man wearing a blue shirt, smiling, inside a bamboo structure with wooden beams and walls.
A woman in traditional colorful attire sitting in front of a wall decorated with children's photographs and drawings.

Global Solidarity & indigenous Wisdom

You’ll build meaningful relationships with our Barefoot Health Promoters serving some of the most vulnerable groups in the Americas. You will dive deep into indigenous traditions of resilience, trauma-informed care, and nonviolence. If you want to learn how to cultivate sustainable grassroots health projects, and/or apprentice with Crossroads, this immersion is for you.

Daily Practices for Embodied Healing

You’ll learn mind-body practices to support your personal healing journey. You’ll leave with simple, trauma-informed tools you can carry forward in your life and work.

A person sitting in a kneeling position on a rug on a wooden deck, facing a sunset view of trees and mountains, with the sun shining through the window.
Group of five women sitting and standing in a classroom, with religious images and a chalkboard in the background, illuminated by natural light from a window.

Apply to join Roots and Bridges:

An immersion into trauma healing in Guatemala

Early Bird Rate Discount!! Apply before September 31, 2025: : $2,200.00

Apply after September 31, 2025: :$2,500.00

Email all of your materials to crossroadsacu@gmail.com

How to apply

✅ 1000 + word essay about why you’re interested in this work, any experience you have working in overseas and/or community projects and what you hope to contribute to our cohort of students and the communities we serve.

✅ Resume resume outlining your relevant international and community health experience, all the licenses and certifications you hold as a health provider (including your license #), and at least one professional reference.

✅ Please include where in the world you live and work.

✅ We will email you within 1 week if you have been accepted.

A lush green tropical landscape with mountains in the background, two rustic huts with metal and thatch roofs, and vibrant greenery under a partly cloudy sky.
A woman with a child riding on her back is smiling while washing clothes in a river. The scene is outdoors with mountains and cloudy sky in the background.

“​Without solidarity,

the noblest of achievements

will be washed away.”

Paul Farmer

who can join us

✅ Harm reduction, recovery, or community health workers (New Mexico-based or international)

✅ Nurses, doctors, acupuncturists

✅ Acupuncture/Acudetox educators and providers hands-on experience with Community Acupuncture and the NADA protocol

✅ Community organizers and social entrepreneurs working in trauma recovery or public health
✅ Students or practitioners seeking hands-on experience in grassroots and global health settings

Cobblestone street in a historic town at dusk with a mountain in the background.
An elderly man wears a beige striped button-up shirt, blue jeans, and a cap, sitting on a wooden bench in a rustic, open-air setting with bamboo and wooden structures.

to the roots of barefoot medicine in Guatemala

In 1978, a doctor taught local Mayan youth in Guatemala how to use acupuncture needles. Years later, death squads forced many to flee into the forest, taking their needles with them.

Our immersion program this year will trace the roots of the Barefoot movement in the Americas to the Rio Negro region of Guatemala, where you’ll get hear first hand about their heroic struggle and partner with them as they continue to aid survivors of the genocide.

A group of women walking across a long, narrow suspension bridge over a river in a lush, green landscape with mountains in the background.
A woman with long black hair and colorful traditional clothing is touching the forehead of a young man with black hair, who is seated and wearing a gray hoodie. They are in a rustic, open-air setting with other people sitting in the background.

FAQ’s

  • Includes:

    1. Lodging and Food for 6 days far away from the tourist spots in the Guatemalan Highlands Baja Verapaz

    2. Daily acupuncture, meditation, yoga, breathwork, and guided somatic release work

    3. Transportation from the airport to the immersion sites

    4. Clinical internship and apprenticing opportunities for acudetox/NADA protocol and community acupuncture (Pending applicant qualifications and experience)

    5. Recovery day in Eco lodge in Antigua

    6. 6 Free Webinars with Dr. Bemis and the Barefoot Acupuncture Movement before the journey, to help ground you in Barefoot Acupuncture, Community Acupuncture, and Acudetox (aka 5np, NADA protocol)

    Does not include:

    1. Lodging and food on final recovery day in Antigua

    2. Optional adventure to Tikal, Coban or Lake Atitlan

  • 🌄 Sample Daily Schedule – Roots & Bridges Immersion

    (Subject to variation by day)

    7:00–8:00 AM – Morning Meditation & Mind-Body Practice
    Begin the day with grounding practices such as meditation, yoga, qigong, breathwork, or guided embodiment sessions led by facilitators and guest healers.

    8:00–9:00 AM – Nourishing Breakfast
    Enjoy a locally sourced, communal meal with time for informal connection, reflection, and preparing for the day’s work.

    9:00–12:30 PM – Core Workshop Sessions
    Interactive, hands-on learning focused on:

    • Foundations of trauma-informed grassroots healing

    • Introduction to the NADA protocol, Barefoot Acupuncture, and somatic release work

    • Additional frameworks and practices for collective and individual healing

    • Practice of basic acupuncture, acupressure, and ear seed techniques

    • Group dialogue, case studies, and integrative discussions

    12:30–2:00 PM – Lunch & Rest Time
    Shared lunch followed by space for rest, journaling, hammock time, or quiet personal reflection.

    2:00–4:30 PM – Outreach & Cultural Exchange
    Service-based experiential learning including:

    • Volunteering in local wellness spaces or community centers

    • Participating in intercultural dialogue circles

    • Listening sessions with elders, healers, or community organizers

    • Visits to grassroots projects focused on justice, healing, and resilience

    4:30–6:30 PM – Integration & Open Time
    Unstructured time to rest or choose from:

    • Supervised clinical practice or mentoring

    • Somatic journaling or integration exercises

    • Nature immersion, swimming, or contemplative time in silence

    6:30–7:30 PM – Dinner
    A communal meal shared in gratitude, featuring regional ingredients and space for connection.

    7:30–9:00 PM – Cultural Immersion & Community Ritual
    Evening activities may include:

    • Temazcal (traditional sweat lodge ceremony)

    • Fire circles, music, or storytelling nights

    • Guest presentations from indigenous leaders or local wisdom-keepers

    • Silent meditation or community ritual closure

  • ✅ Harm reduction, recovery, or community health workers (New Mexico-based or international)

    ✅ Nurses, doctors, acupuncturists

    ✅ Acupuncture/Acudetox educators and providers hands-on experience with Community Acupuncture and the NADA protocol

    ✅ Community organizers and social entrepreneurs working in trauma recovery or public health
    ✅ Students or practitioners seeking hands-on experience in grassroots and global health settings

  • email all application materials to crossroads@gmail.com

    ✅ 1000 + word essay about why you’re interested in this work, any experience you have working in overseas and/or community projects and what you hope to contribute to our cohort of students and the communities we serve.

    ✅ Resume resume outlining your relevant international and community health experience, all the licenses and certifications you hold as a health provider (including your license #), and at least one professional reference.

    ✅ Please include where in the world you live and work.

    ✅ We will notify you within 1 week if you have been accepted, after which you will need to pay your deposit within a week after you have been accepted

  • Early Bird Application for Roots and Bridges 2026

    Sale Price:$2,000.00 Original Price:$2,500.00

    Apply before July 10, 2025 to qualify for the discounted rate of $2000

    $2500 after July 11, 2025

    Immersion Dates: Feb 8-15 2026

  • Ryan Bemis, DOM Director of Crossroads Acupuncture and the Barefoot Acupuncture Movement.

    Dave Maybee, RMT: Director and lead instructor at the Canadian Institute of Auricular Medicine (CIAM).

Rooted in the Experience

  • Build meaningful relationships with local indigenous leaders and fellow participants—grounded in mutual respect, learning, and solidarity.

  • Train with Dr. Ryan Bemis in Acudetox and trauma-informed acupuncture as practiced in recovery centers, global health, refugee care and disaster relief settings. Educators welcome to gain real-world teaching experience at the grassroots level. You’ll also learn advanced auricular techniques, and how to do group based community acupuncture.

  • Explore Somatic Release techniques, including TRE (Tension & Trauma Releasing Exercises), Qi Gong, and discover how to integrate them into community-based care as well as into private practice acupuncture and trauma therapy.

  • Partner with indigenous community health workers supporting survivors of genocide and underserved populations in the Guatemalan Highlands. Learn from their stories, resilience, and ancestral healing practices.

  • We’ll be tapping into our inner resilience with meditation, qi gong, breathwork, yoga, and acupuncture—for you to take with you on your personal healing while learning to also apply these tools in community healthcare settings.

  • Explore the history of community-based acupuncture in Latin America, from its origins in the 1970s amidst civil war to its role today in global health. Meet the heroes in Guatemala who have carried this tradition forward—using acupuncture as a tool for survival, resilience, and grassroots empowerment.  We will learn how they have—and how we can—use simple, accessible mind-body technologies to respond to violence and trauma in our world today.

A group of people gathered around a young man, with a woman holding a marker and drawing or writing on his face.
Group of nine people smiling and standing together outside a building with a sign that reads 'Crossroads Acupuncture'.

“Offering acupuncture is like planting a seed of peace

Msr Rene Blanco, Vicar, Diocese of Cd Juarez, Mexico

A man walking with two children and a dog outdoors near a building with hanging laundry and power lines.
Two young women appear to be in a moment of concern or distress, with one woman gently touching the other's ear or head in an indoor setting with wooden furniture and a view of greenery outside.

"I used to just be a housewife. But now I am a health promoter. Now I can learn other things to improve on myself.

– Cecy, Barefoot Health Promoter, Cd Juarez, Mexico

Be a part of our vision for the world

Where people have the tools and capacity to care for themselves and for their own communities.

An older man, a younger man, and a woman are engaged in a close conversation outdoors. The older man is holding the younger man’s ear, possibly to remove something or for a health check. The scene appears to be in a casual setting, with other people visible in the background.
Three women standing in a kitchen, holding corn, dressed in traditional colorful clothing and skirts.
Three people standing together outdoors in a forest with green foliage in the background. The woman in the center wears a colorful traditional dress, the woman on the left wears a pink top and jeans, and the man on the right wears a plaid shirt, cap, and backpack, all smiling.
Two women sitting on plastic chairs against a teal wall, talking and smiling. One woman holds an open folder, and the other holds an open book. There is a bookshelf with books and some furniture in the room.

“Under the surface of glitter & trash in the midst of all the mess of traffic, there are the people:  sick & distraught, drunk, mad, melancholy, anguished or simply bored to extinction.  It is the people I love and not the roles in the city, not the glitter of business and of progress. Can’t we give them something more than air conditioning?”​

-Thomas Merton

building bridges of solidarity

Through shared stories and hands-on experience, you’ll gain a deeper understanding of how grassroots healing unfolds in communities responding to trauma, systemic violence, and historical injustice—and how you, too, can be part of this living legacy.

Listen to Ryan Bemis’ commencement address at the Oregon College of Oriental Medicine’s graduation ceremonies, to learn more about our work in Latin America.

Barefoot acupuncture in the americas

Stories from our past projects

Featured
Culturs Magazine Features our global project
Culturs Magazine Features our global project

Crossroads Acupuncture not only works in Las Cruces. Our non-profit is the center of an international acupuncture project serving underserved groups. In this Culturs Magazine feature, you'll meet some of these amazing acupuncture providers and teachers that are at the heart of our Barefoot Acupuncture Movement.

Liberation acupuncture and the road of recovery ahead</a>
Liberation acupuncture and the road of recovery ahead

On the eve of the Coronavirus outbreak in the Americas, the Barefoot Acupuncture Movement’s Solidarity Immersion program travelled to Nicaragua, and gathering with a group of community workers and famers, we reflected on the question: How does solidarity show up in your world?

Madness Radio Interviews </a>Crossroads and Rahrami tribe
Madness Radio Interviews Crossroads and Rahrami tribe

Are psychiatric treatments, experts, and medications the best way for traumatized communities to heal their mental health problems? Could indigenous practices, including traditional Chinese medicine and acupuncture, offer a different way forward — through grassroots community development?

Madness Radio’s Will Hall explores these questions in his podcast “Borderlands Acupuncture” airing December 8, 2016. Hall joined the Barefoot Acupuncture Movement during our 2016 Immersion in Mexico, where we trained local health workers in the NADA ear acupuncture (acudetox) protocol.

“Ryan Bemis and Crossroads Acupuncture offer an amazing auricular acupuncture course and NADA certification. The class was bilingual, which added greatly to the experience. Ryan’s presentation was evidence-based and highly engaging. I count this training as one of the best clinical experiences of my career. As a social worker, I gained deeper insights into cultural humility and strengths-based practice.”
— Suzanne Stern Brant, LCSW

about barefoot Acupuncture

A woman in a blue top receives a facial massage or treatment from a man in a pink shirt inside a brightly lit room.

The Barefoot Doctor movement offered care for millions of people in rural and underserved areas in Asia starting in the 1950’s, filling a need where urban-trained doctors would not work.  ​The World Health Organization adopted this model and started similar community health training projects. Over the past 50 years, a variety of global health programs cultivated this model in addiction and recovery, refugee, and community health projects.  ​

Our project grew out of Barefoot Doctor projects in the Americas, including the National Acupuncture Detoxification Association (NADA) and the Guatemalan Acupuncture and Medical Aid Project.   Replicating these models of popular acupuncture education, we have designed and refined a core curriculum to replicate these models within global healthcare. 

breaking down

barriers

to integrative healthcare

As a 501-3-c non-profit organization, Crossroads supports the growth of clinics for the homeless, for people with addictions and psychiatric problems. We also train nurses and counselors how to offer acu based care within jails, hospitals, recovery programs, refugee care, and disaster relief.