First Day of Hilot Training with Lani Brown

I am very delighted to see people in person and face-to-face specially those whom I met online during the Time of Pandemic. Yesterday, I have welcomed and Hug in person Lani Brown of California. She arrived here in the Philippines last Saturday- January 14, 2023 and she will be here for about a month and we are so blessed that she will spend 8 days with us, starting on January 16 to January 23, 2023. She is supposed to take the 16 days Hilot Training Program with Hilot Philippines Development Center at Silang, Cavite but there are problems that happen on HPDC part thats why Hilot Academy came in to accommodate and compensate for HPDC.

Sharing the knowledge of our Ancestral Healing Arts and Science is very important to me. And students who signed up for any of our training program are valuable specially to the Filipino in Diaspora who desires to reconnect themselves with our Ancestral Land and wanted to learn our Philippine Traditional Medicine.

When I started Hilot Academy, I intended to share this knowledge that I obtained from our Ancestors to our local kababayan who is residing in the Philippines. Though before I started this, I used to work as Tesda Trainer and Assessor on Hilot. TESDA is a Government attached Agency of Philippine Department of Labor and Employment that provide Scholarship skills training on Hilot. But as I notice, the knowledge that we share through TESDA are just superficial and was limited on the practice of Massage and the healing process and methodology that Hilot has was not been covered in the training. The goal of Tesda is just to provide skills to the learning where they could be employed in a Spa or send them abroad just for the sake of being Employed.

Skills on Hilot can be easily learned but the principles behind it is very complex that it requires time to be explored such as the doctrine about souls, why people get sick so as the teaching about pilay.

Hilot is our Medicine and the treatment methodology it employs does not limit on just providing Massage

There is also one issue that I make clarification with and that is who should I take as student of Hilot. I first encounter this issue when I was still working at TESDA but the issue back then was who will be a Certified and Accredited Hilot Trainer and Assessor? The policy way back then is only limited to Filipino Citizens and foreigners are limited to obtain certification and accreditation on becoming a Hilot Trainer and Assessor. I understand that the agency wants to protect our Healing modality to be benefited by the Filipino people, but if we are going to contemplate on the Healing Principles of Hilot, it will not be exclusive but it is Inclusive.

When a person ask you Hilot, will you ask that person of their nationality first or their religion or if they have money? No! We provide Hilot to anyone who ask us whether they have money or not, male or female or any Gender they identify themselves, nationality or religion they practice, Young or old deserves to receive hilot from us.

And Hilot Teaching is not only about promoting the Philippines and all the resources that can be found in our Country, but it is about our attitude and connection with the land, with the country where we are now, with the planet. Being a Manghihilot is not about wearing Traditional Filipino Clothes, Accessories, plants that is endemic in the Philippines and so on, but it is about your knowledge and attitude on how you connect yourself to the place where you live right now. Our Filipino Pride is not about the rich resources of our land, but our attitude on how to adopt in different situation.

Teaching Hilot to the Filipino in Diaspora is about bridging the Gap of Colonialism and Nationalism but instead making everyone realize that all of us are all Human. As Manghihilot, we do not focus alone in dealing with Physical Illness but we become a Bridge to the People in finding the right solution and relief to their problem.