About a year ago, we noticed with intrigue that Daniel Foor was offering an ancestral healing retreat in Belfast, Ireland. The recent history of Northern Ireland shares many parallels with that of Bosnia & Herzegovina (where we live) – colonial oppression, sectarian violence, and lasting scars and tensions that remain today. We messaged Daniel to ask if he’d be interested in holding a similar event in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and he replied, “Yes – I’ve been waiting for someone to invite me.”
After much planning, our ancestral healing retreat in Sarajevo took place earlier this month. Over the course of three days, 45 participants and 10 facilitators from all over Europe, the U.S., and beyond came together to invite healing with our ancestral lines, ritually support the surrounding lands, and tend to the spiritual well-being of people who were violently killed in the war in the nineties.
For those who are less familiar with the history of the region:
In 1992, a brutal war broke out between three former-Yugoslavian states, when Serbian forces attacked Croatia and Bosnia & Herzegovina, in an attempt to dominate the region and create a “Greater Serbia.” Prior to the war, people practicing different religions lived and worked together harmoniously, intermarried, and regularly celebrated each other’s holidays together. As the old communist system collapsed, politicians used ethnic/religious identities to gain power, and utilized fear, propaganda, and nationalism to turn neighbors against each other.
The war lasted nearly four years, with fatalities totaling around 100,000 people. Genocide, ethnic cleansing, forced displacement, and systematic mass rape were enacted by Servian Paramilitaries against the Bosniak (Muslim) population in particular. Sarajevo was under siege throughout the duration of the war (the longest siege in modern history), subject to constant shelling, sniper fire, and food/water shortages. War crimes were committed throughout the region, with Serbians responsible for 90% of war crimes, Croatians responsible for 6%, and Bosniaks responsible for 4%, according to reports compiled by the UN and the CIA.
The end of the war was met with celebration and immense relief that the fighting was over, but very few support services were offered to survivors, resulting in lingering unhealed trauma over 30 years later. Genocide denial and Serbian and Croatian ethno-nationalism persist in the region today, hindering healing and productive forward movement.
Unsurprisingly, new visitors to Bosnia & Herzegovina find that they encounter a mix of energies here.
The nature is gorgeous and powerful – our tour guide fittingly referred to this region as “the Amazon of Europe.” Sarajevo is surrounded by mountains covered in greenery, and the entire country is abundant in lush forests, mineral springs, churning rivers, fertile soils, and even claims a tiny, bustling sliver of the Adriatic coastline. Bosnian people are warm, welcoming, loud, irreverent, proud, and silly all at once. Mixed in with all this buoyancy, heart, and vitality are buildings that display damage from snipers and shelling, several history museums focusing on genocide and other war crimes, monuments to children killed in the war, and of course the personal memories of countless families who continue to feel the weight of trauma, terror, unimaginable abuse, loss of limbs and loved ones, and other devastations of war.
In addition to inviting participants from anywhere in the world to join and heal their ancestral lines, our retreat provided a unique opportunity for Balkan people from different nationalities and religious affiliations to come together for the purpose of healing inter-generational and collective traumas, as well as tend to the land itself where so much blood has been spilled over the past several centuries.
Prior to the retreat, Daniel held a free talk in Sarajevo that was open to the public and live translated into Bosnian, serving as an introduction to ancestral healing work (recording here). We also devoted a pre-retreat day to sightseeing, learning about the history and culture of the city with the help of a brilliant and hilarious tour guide, visiting the City Hall’s exhibitions on genocide and war crimes, and experiencing local specialties including Bosnian barbecue, deserts, and traditional coffee. The retreat facilitators led honoring rituals at a cemetery of civilian war victims, the river Miljacka, and the top of Trebević mountain. These offerings served to express our thanks for the supportive energy of the lands holding our retreat container, garnering their support for the transformational work that was to come.
The three retreat days were a mix of teachings from Daniel, spending time in altered states directly connecting with our well ancestors, and breaking into small groups to share our experiences. Some of the participants were surprised that it’s not only mystics, sages, and religious masters of the past who have the ability to feel a direct connection with spiritual beings – this is a teachable skill that’s available to each of us. With live drumming and song to help us enter a receptive state of consciousness, we reached back into one of our ancestral lineages until we made contact with a “well” ancestor. Well ancestors are those who are healed and don’t need anything from us; rather they can offer us support in our lives. In most cases they are animistic/indigenous people who lived hundreds or thousands of years ago, in balanced relationship and spiritual communion with all life forms around them, within tight-knit communities who practiced ritualistic rites of passage to celebrate birth, death, and other significant thresholds of life. These are the types of ancestors we can build a bridge with, working together to heal the more recent, unwell ancestors in the lineage.
While the participants were moving through these steps, some of the facilitators were using flowers, plants, grains, seeds, and nuts that the group had brought as offerings to the ancestors, meticulously arranging them into a gorgeous mandala in the center of the room that would serve as a collective offering. This mandala also became our focal point during a powerfully felt ritual to help any wandering souls on the lands of Sarajevo (such as those who had died violently) to depart from this realm, and continue their soul’s journey onward.
The Balkan people in the room shared in circle about their memories of the war, its lingering effects, and their experiences of ethno-nationalism today. Some Serbian participants felt shame about what their people had done in Sarajevo – even feeling guilty setting foot in the city – and conveyed what a shock it had been to find their way to the truth of what happened, after being fed propaganda by their government for much of their lifetimes. Bosniaks of Muslim faith shared stories that were tragic, such as the betrayal of neighbors and lifelong friends refusing to help during the war, leaving them in life-threatening situations that they and their families narrowly escaped. There were also examples of Serbs, some of whom were practically strangers, smuggling Bosniak families to safety at great risk to themselves. Knowing how much ethnic and religious tension is perpetually stoked by politicians in this region, this vulnerable and productive conversation felt extremely precious to us.
The retreat ended on a joyful note, with participants joining together in traditional Balkan dances on the morning of the final day. Having ushered some of our ancestors through healing, many of us left feeling palpably changed. The support of the well ancestors offers a distinct layer of protection – a feeling of a more solid foundation, and a wind at our backs. A few days after the retreat, one participant reflected that Sarajevo is not the same city that it was before our group came.
If you’re interested in learning techniques for connecting with your well ancestors and enlisting their help to heal your lineages…
… we encourage you to read Daniel’s book or take an online class – both of these options will walk you through the same healing protocol that we used at this retreat. We will continue to partner with our well ancestors to fully heal our lines, as well as ritually tend to the land spirits in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In our experience, ancestral healing is something you never knew you needed, until you’ve done it and wonder how you’ve ever managed to live without it.
