I didn’t start Cacao Wisdom from a business plan or some grand vision.
It began in a moment that cracked my heart open in a way I could never have predicted.
It was 2020.
A year when the whole world was shedding, dissolving, remembering, rebirthing.
And I was right in the middle of my own unraveling.
I had moved to Bali during the height of COVID, following a quiet inner pull toward healing and simplicity and truth. I thought I was just beginning another chapter of my spiritual journey, but looking back, it was more like stepping into an initiation I didn’t yet have the language for.
One day, I decided to attend a women’s circle.
The flyer said they would be serving cacao.
I had no idea what that meant. I assumed it was just a chocolate drink, and since I had hated chocolate my entire life, I figured: “I probably won’t like it, but I don’t need to drink it. I’m just here for the circle.”
I walked in numb, disconnected, and doing everything I could to feel in control of my inner world. I had spent years surviving by shutting down my emotions. Dissociation was my safety strategy. Feeling wasn’t something I knew how to do. It was something I avoided without even realizing it.
But then the facilitator placed a warm cup of cacao in my hands.
She sang medicine songs and passed us the lyrics.
And somewhere between the first sip and the first breath of the song, something ancient inside me opened.
I started crying.
Not a soft, polite cry.
A deep, body-level release, bursting through the numbness I had held for so long.
I was shocked.
Stunned, actually.
How could this plant reach me that quickly? That gently? That deeply?
That moment lit a spark of curiosity so bright that it changed the trajectory of my life.
From there, I followed the thread.
I attended a cacao and self-love retreat.
I trained in cacao facilitation for a full year in Bali.
I traveled to Guatemala to learn directly from a Mayan shaman and to hear Mama Cacao’s origin story from the people who have carried this wisdom for thousands of years.
My relationship with cacao became devotional.
She held me through some of the hardest moments of my life.
She softened my armor, brought my emotions back online, supported my creativity, guided my intuition, and taught me how to feel again.
I never intended to start a cacao company.
But when I prepared to move back to the United States, I realized something was missing.
There was no place to source the cacao I trusted.
The cacao from the farms I had visited.
The cacao roasted over open flames by hands I had held.
The cacao grown in soil I had stood upon.
The cacao made with reverence, prayer, and lineage.
I wanted to drink the cacao that had changed me.
I wanted to share that same integrity with the people I loved.
And because I couldn’t find it, I created it.
Cacao Wisdom was born from devotion.
From relationship.
From the desire to honor the farmers, the land, the traditions, and the spirit of this sacred plant medicine.
It is my way of bringing this depth to my home country.
My way of honoring the Mayan lineage.
My way of sharing the one plant that held me through my own unraveling and expansion.
If there is one practice that has supported me more than any modality, ritual, or teacher, it is Mama Cacao.
My relationship with her is intimate and lifelong.
And it is my greatest honor to place her in your hands.
To offer you the same warmth, the same clarity, the same connection, the same gentle opening that she offered me.
This is the heart of Cacao Wisdom.
This is why I’m here.
And I’m so grateful you’re here too.
Xxx - Gabrielle Martorana, Founder of Cacao Wisdom