What if Tulum’s decline didn’t start with tourism numbers, but with a broken ritual?
Gerry Sánchez, a coach and consultant known in the Spanish-speaking world for his no-nonsense approach to personal growth and relationships, has emerged with a striking interpretation of Tulum’s current state. Not economic. Not political. Spiritual.
In his latest phase, he’s swapped retreats and live events for a mobile, conversational podcast where he moves through Tulum’s shifting landscape, connecting environmental damage, social unrest, and economic downturns to something deeper. His theory isn’t a metaphor. It’s a system of understanding drawn from personal observation, esoteric traditions, and ancient Mesoamerican teachings.
And it all begins with a single premise: Tulum is a sacred accelerator, a place where everything, good or bad, unfolds faster than normal.
How energy works in Tulum
For Sánchez, Tulum’s importance isn’t just archaeological or ecological. It’s energetic.
In his view, the land sits atop converging points that amplify human and environmental processes. When honored, things blossom. When violated, things fall apart, and quickly. This isn’t just spiritual poetry, he insists. It’s observable.
That idea underpins his explanation of Tulum’s crisis. The visible decay, crime, overdevelopment, water contamination, failing businesses, is a late-stage symptom. The origin, he argues, lies in spiritual mismanagement.
Opening without closing
Tulum, Sánchez says, was once a ceremonial territory marked by astronomical knowledge, healing practices, and nuanced ritual codes. That legacy is not purely light. There were rituals of both reverence and danger, traditions that required caution, timing, and structure.
Central to that structure is a rule: when you open a sacred space, you must also close it.
According to Sánchez, this rule has been broken repeatedly in Tulum. Sensitive areas, caves, cenotes, ceremonial grounds, were opened to the public, to tourism, to development, without asking permission, without offerings, and without closure. This spiritual breach, he says, unleashed chaotic forces.
For those who don’t share his language, he offers a plain equivalent: when you disturb the invisible protocols of a place, you invite disorder. Illnesses, accidents, poor decisions, chain reactions, events that, when stacked, look like a crisis. But from his perspective, they’re just consequences of a deeper cause.
When ritual becomes performance
Another layer of the theory focuses on who holds spiritual authority, and who doesn’t.
Sánchez claims that over the years, true custodians of sacred practices in Tulum were displaced by public figures lacking lineage or depth. He calls this “spiritual narcissism.” Mass ceremonies, influencer-led rituals, drug-fueled festivals, and image-driven “transformational experiences” have replaced ancient practices that once required rules, context, and discretion.
It’s not just disrespect, he says. It’s dangerous. Because without proper grounding, sacred work becomes spectacle. The result: spaces get opened, but never closed. And that, in his framework, is a continuous source of energetic contamination.
“The volume, the speed, the hunger for spectacle,” he warns, “displaces the wisdom of silence and structure.”
Disruptive money and the power of intent
Tulum’s transformation also came with waves of capital. Digital nomads, crypto investors, international developers. But Sánchez doesn’t blame money itself. Instead, he looks at the frequency of intention behind it.
“Money amplifies what already exists,” he says. If money enters a sacred space with harmful purpose, greed, exploitation, erasure, then that harm multiplies. And in Tulum, where everything accelerates, the fallout comes fast.
Alongside that influx came prostitution, drug circulation, land trafficking, and increasing violence. For Sánchez, these are not just parallel developments. They are energetically linked. The land, he says, doesn’t ignore such patterns. It magnifies them.
The departure of the guardians
In Maya and Yucatec tradition, sacred places are protected by aluxes, spirit guardians who shield land and people. Sánchez believes these guardians have begun to withdraw.
He recounts local customs: asking permission before construction, offering thanks before entering certain places. To outsiders, these rituals might seem quaint. But within the worldview Sánchez channels, they’re functional protocols.
Without them, the protective layer disappears. Projects stall. Infrastructure fails. Things don’t “click.” Not because of incompetence, but because the unseen keepers have left.
Environmental crisis as a reflection
Sánchez draws no line between environmental damage and spiritual imbalance. They are, to him, different layers of the same problem.
Contaminated groundwater, vanishing fauna, deforestation, and collapsing cenotes, these aren’t isolated disasters. They’re the earth’s response to being misused without ritual closure.
And the signs aren’t always loud. Sometimes they’re cumulative: broken pipes, slow permits, businesses that can’t stay open, relationships that fall apart. Dozens of quiet failures that, together, form a loud collapse.
He doesn’t try to compete with hydrologists or economists. His view is simply another lens. A layer of meaning for those willing to see it.
The sacred land as a karmic amplifier
One of Sánchez’s most provocative claims is this: Tulum isn’t declining gradually. It’s collapsing all at once. Why? Because it’s not a regular town, it’s a karmic mirror.
If, for years, the place was abused, overbuilt, overpriced, spiritually commercialized, exploited for image, then the adjustment must be equally swift. It’s not a punishment, he says, but a mechanism. The system balances itself through its most vulnerable point.
In a tourist economy, that point is income. So it disappears. Visitors stop coming. Rates drop. Projects freeze. Debt mounts. Ownership changes hands.
To the mainstream eye, this might look like poor business planning. For Sánchez, it’s the echo of rituals undone.
A slow repair, out of sight
Despite the bleakness, Sánchez does not declare Tulum a lost cause. In his view, repair is possible, but it must begin with those who know how.
He believes some in the community, particularly in the tourism sector, have started working with traditional custodians to close open processes. Not with social media. Not with public ceremonies. Quietly. Slowly.
“There are no shortcuts,” he says. “No livestream access to this work.”
And while policy changes and promotional efforts may offer some help, they can’t substitute the spiritual component. Without it, the brakes stay on.
Visiting Tulum now: danger or invitation?
Sánchez doesn’t discourage visits. Quite the opposite. He sees this moment as an opportunity to witness the land’s signals.
Lower prices. Fewer crowds. Businesses need flow. Signs of retreat, but also of potential realignment.
He encourages visitors to walk with intention. To observe the state of the water. The unusual silences. The tiny offerings left in the woods. To learn to read the land. And to avoid, consciously, feeding abusive practices.
“Tulum is teaching,” he says. “But only if you listen closely.”
The path to reversal
According to Sánchez, any recovery must involve three fronts:
- Closure of what’s been opened
- Respect for traditional protocols
- Collective shift in intention
Closure is not a single act, he clarifies. It’s a process. Respect means more than symbolism. It demands time, patience, and letting go of urgency. And intention isn’t about branding, it’s about pricing fairly, eliminating predatory habits, and aligning projects with the true character of the land.
If these steps happen, the same energetic engine that accelerated the fall could speed up the return. Not by miracle. By causality.
If they don’t, he warns, the corrections will continue. Relief may come in waves, but so will relapse.
A different kind of map
Sánchez makes no claim to technical proof. His model isn’t a scientific framework, but a traditional one. It uses spiritual vocabulary, not metrics. But that doesn’t mean it lacks rigor. Or relevance.
To believers, his approach offers a blueprint for ethical and energetic reconstruction. Ask permission. Offer gratitude. Close what you open. Price with integrity. Stop feeding what extracts. Align your project with the land.
To skeptics, it may still serve as a metaphor. A reminder that underneath construction permits and marketing decks, something broke. And the fallout was real.
Because, in Sánchez’s words, Tulum didn’t fall because it was weak. It fell because it was powerful, and misused.
And if we want it back, we’ll need to rebuild with both hands: the visible and the invisible.
We’d love to hear your thoughts. Join the conversation on The Tulum Times’ social media.
Can healing begin where the damage was never seen?