Isuini is a project founded by Yunuen Rhi in 2015 that combines native medicine pathways, and internal martial arts from China into a training program. The focus is on awakening the self-healing potential of individuals and collectives through ancient physical and spiritual movement wisdom. The practices are taught with deep respect to the lineages they come from so they can be traced back to their roots.
Isuini means inside a deer’s heart in the Mixteca language of Mexico.
Isu (deer) Ini (inner spirit/heart)
The half wolf half deer logo represents the meaning of the Yin Yang as earth wisdom. The wolf hunts the deer and the deer eats a special moss off of wolves’ bones. The wolf and deer ultimately fuse into one transmuting essence.
According to Mexican Traditional Medicine the deer is a powerful life force that symbolizes humanity’s first foods, first medicines, and a higher truth to live by. For many native nations, the hunter of the deer’s spirit is a warrior of higher consciousness and “the hunt,” is a dialogue between them.
Martial arts are a parallel to the medicine route of native wisdom.
The website’s font, “Viko”, designed by Diego Mier y Teran is based on the Mixteca Ancient Scripture. Please click here to learn about the design process behind his beautiful typographic study.
Yunuen, founder of Isuini, is a martial arts philosophy and movement instructor, as well as an anthropologist, artist and healer based in Los Angeles, California. Her roots are in Mexico, the United States, and Korea.
She started training in Baguazhang and healing arts in Beijing, China in 2008 with her first Master, Liu Xuyang and was initiated into the 6th generation of his lineage in 2010. Since 2015, she trains under her second Master Li Baohua (holder of the 4th generation Magui Bagua lineage) based in Japan.
In addition to Bagua, she has cultivated herself in eastern, western and native medicine ways of North America. She is certified in Taoist stomach massage and Fire Therapy in Beijing and holds a master level three in Usui Reiki. Tuina massage was part of her Bagua training in Beijing. She worked as a Registered Dental Assistant and has advanced training in humanistic psychology methods such as Logotherapy and Family Constellations. Her applied research in anthropology provides a direct relation to Native Healing Traditions and Elders in both the US and Mexico.
The convergence of her diverse healing techniques has equipped her to be a translator of eastern and Native American healing systems to the west to help better understand our place within our societies and ecologies.
Yunuen’s experience informs the pedagogy of her teachings and the quality of her therapies. She shares her practice with artists, activists, and the community at large since 2011 through workshops in Mexico, the United States, and Germany.
Please contact Yunuen for online/live training or healing sessions.