The shaman told us that if we felt that we needed to escape the grasp of the ayahuasca he could run us to an icy-cold shower to take off the edge but he made one thing as clear as the mystical crystals that twinkled in front of us that night—there is no escape.
Yes this was real and this was going to happen with or without me in the driver’s seat. I was past the point of no return once I swallowed that thick vile brown vine sludge—a pungent-metallic taste that is otherwise indescribable yet at the same time unforgettable. That was only the first 30 minutes of what would be an all-night ceremony, the first of several actually.
Shit was getting crazy fast and I wanted out.
A Trek Into the Amazon Basin
I arrived the day before and as the plane approached the microscopic airstrip near the small town of Iquitos, Peru it felt like this little pocket of civilization was one of those hidden treasures deep in the Amazonian rain forest as the green canopy of the trees seemed to stretch to infinity. I would have the rest of the day and night to explore and relax before that next night’s ayahuasca experience.
Iquitos is actually quite a charming little town although a bit run-down from the glory days of the rubber boom at the end of the 19th century where thousands of trees were tapped for the rubber resin before the seeds were stolen and smuggled to China where the infrastructure was more conducive to moving product. This benefit of China heavily contributed to the fact that the labor and cost were far cheaper than Peru effectively bringing the the local economy of Iquitos to a dead halt.
China was not the only country with an influence on Iquitos. Who would have known that the common link to Iquitos and Paris is the La Maison de Fer (Iron House) claimed to have been designed by Gustave Eiffel then shipped from France and carried piece-by-piece through the deep jungle, that to this very day still stands prominently in the town square as a proud beacon of a time and generation long past.
Sleep did not immediately come that night. In fact at that time I had still not fully accepted the gravity of my situation and the psychedelic journey to the “antipodes of the mind” (as Professor Benny Shanon calls it in his book with the same name) that I was about to embark on. Many dozens have gone before me and many dozens would come after me. How hard could this be? I was only slightly comforted by the fact that in the place of ceremony that I had signed-up for a month prior, Blue Morpho that there were no reported deaths during an ayahuasca retreat ceremony. I felt a bit chilly that rather hot spring night.
There was no turning back now.
Preparing for the Darkest Night of My Life
I woke-up that morning feeling fresh and whole especially since I was not entirely eaten alive by the friendly local Iquitos mosquitoes. The shuttle had arrived ready to take me to the Blue Morpho Shamanic Ayahuasca Center, a place where the claim is to let one experience the realities of the mystical world. If I only knew then what an understatement that was.
The Blue Morpho camp is situated about an hour out of town in an almost hidden location deep in the Amazon rain forest. When I asked why this particular isolated location was picked one of the shamans told me that it was to be “closer to the tree spirits”. Had it not been for that serious twinkle in his eye I may have just chucked it off as some mumbo-jumbo New Age response—but over the next four days I began to understand exactly what that gleam in his eye was all about.
I finally settled into a shared bungalow with folks whose reason for being there is as diverse as the countries that they are from. It was a motley crew of Americans, Canadians, Europeans and even Africa; male and female; old and young; healthy and some not so much. The sun was beginning to set and most folks were headed over to the main house to acquaint and socialize.
That evening I decided not to join. Perhaps it was something to do with the the social anxiety I always had for larger groups and the social pressure that somehow got nailed to my subconscious mind. It wasn’t until days later and personally witnessing myself and others in situations of chemically induced rock-bottom states that I began to open up and learn that we were all in this journey together.
Ayahuasca and What It Does to You
People decide to take the ayahuasca journey for different reasons however the medicine is generally known to bring about substantial spiritual revelations about yourself and the universe, deep insight to your most compelling questions of existence and altogether bring about a metamorphosis in guiding you to be your best self and to live your best life.
Before my trip I did some basic research on the “plant medicine” or “spirit vine” or “vine of death” or “yagé” as the indigenous Peruvians have called ayahuasca for hundreds of years. Its typically made by mixing the Banisteriopsis caapi vine with the leaves of Chacruna (a plant containing the psychedelic compound dimethyltryptamine or DMT—one of the most powerful hallucinogens in the world) along with other native leaves into a large pot and brewing for hours.
SAFETY NOTE: Ayahuasca contains MAOIs (monoamine oxidase inhibitors) therefore medical consultation is essential if you are taking antidepressants (i.e. Prozac) or similar prescriptions affecting serotonin levels (such as serotonin selective reuptake inhibitors (SSRI). These SSRIs block the reuptake of serotonin in the brain. Since MAOIs inhibit the breakdown of serotonin the combination of MAOIs and SSRIs can lead to dangerously high levels of serotonin in the brain. When in doubt just ask your doctor to verify.
The combinations of additional ingredients to the brew can be exhaustive so it really depends what shaman you see and what supplemental plants they decide to spice up the brew with. The result is a brownish sludge that when drunk produces hallucinations that are so real its like you were locked in a dream that you cannot awake from even if you realized that you were only dreaming. In other words it will not only alter your perception of reality it will allow you to know more than you ever imagined. How is that possible? As the shamans explain it the brew opens you to a “collective consciousness” or universal consciousness that is claimed to be shared by all humans which your conscious mind cannot tap into. Rather the brew takes you into a chemically induced alternate reality which I thought was bullshit until what happened to me after spending four nights with the brew.
Besides a little weed in college I’ve never done drugs before. No judgement on those that do its just not my thing. This was perhaps my biggest hesitation before considering this adventure. Another question I had is how will this experience help me in a practical way in my everyday life? Does it have long-term effects? I had so many questions but before we get to the answers let’s continue the story.
Although ayahuasca is illegal in most countries (because of its active ingredient DMT which is considered a Schedule I drug under international agreements) it is not a drug that you’d find the average hipster doing among friends. In fact this medicine is so powerful that most people only do it one time and never need it, crave it nor desire it ever again—and for very good reasons. Note that technically the drug part is the DMT however the shamans do not see it as such in fact they refer to it simply as medicine. This medicine has a deep history and spiritual context for them.
There’s a reason that your favorite local drug dealer doesn’t carry this stuff—its not addictive in the sense that you develop a dependence and need to come back for more. Perhaps the other more compelling reason is that this medicine will be one of the most frightening experiences of your life. It literally scares the shit out of you.
Why Try Ayahuasca?
I’ve always been interested in testing the limits of my life—whether it’s learning to read a lot faster, fasting for seven days, or hitch-hiking 300 miles I have never been a fan of limitation, people telling me “that’s not possible” or relying on other’s opinions when I could instead embark on my own path of personal experimentation.
Learning by doing has always worked best for me. I’ve read dozens of books and have seen as many movies and documentaries on the human mind, consciousness and ways to cultivate a more enriched life. Along my personal journey I’ve picked up many positive habits and mini-transformations including the wonderful world of meditation, gratitude, fasting, and trying to be as productive as possible while exploring and quenching my curiosities.
I have always had a problem with anxiety which is still not totally gone today. This anxiety takes many forms but usually revolves around what others think of me, talking in front of new people without them thinking that I’m a total idiot, and worrying about how much of my life I am wasting on obsessing on all the negative thoughts that my subconscious mind plays back like a broken record over and over and over again. I was tired of this because it let to stress and totally zapped my energy.
After my ayahuasca experience something changed in me that is hard to describe. It was a subtle something so perhaps the best way to explain is by what actually occurred. I found myself taking more chances. I mean after the ayahuasca experience I had literally been to hell and back and my threshold for risks and other people’s bullshit changed almost overnight.
Should you partake note that you may get something totally different of out it. You may even get absolutely nothing but crap in your pants. The trick for me was to go into with an open mind. I can’t stress this point enough. If you go in and try to fight the experience and hope that you will somehow be magically transformed for the better you are mistaken and you will only be kidding yourself. You don’t have to be religious or even believe in some higher power or universal force but if you do great. If not no worries just focus on your intention and the reason that you decided to go on this journey.
What Happens To You During the Experience?
We sat in a dark room in the jungle hut with two master shamans and a couple of shaman apprentices as the ceremony was about to begin. A shaman is a person who is very experienced in navigating altered states of consciousness and is there to safely guide you every step of the way. The shamans are said to be able to communicate directly with the spirit world after imbibing the medicine. This also provides the shaman with insight as to the guest’s malady.
Don’t get it twisted—you do all the work and you go through the process of what seems like death, hell and rebirth—but the shaman is there to enter these states with you to guide you along that journey and ultimately help you heal whatever ailment or excess baggage you came to get rid of.
There is really no such thing as a standard ayahuasca ceremony but there are common events that occur at most. After the local Peruvian assistants situated us all (in my group there were about a dozen folks) and other formalities by the master shaman our ceremony began with guests individually approaching the master shaman and after a very short but intense once-over you give the shaman your cup and he pours the amount of medicine that he feels that you need. In later ceremonies that week you were allowed to ask more a bit more or a bit less depending on where you were in your journey. Even though our cups held only about 8 oz. my first cup was filled about a quarter of the way. This was TOTALLY all that I needed.
Before you go back to your seat the shaman also uses tobacco to help call forth positive energies for your journey and literally smokes these homemade cigarettes then gently blows it around your head and upper body. There is also the chapada, or a bunch of leaves that are shaken making a rattling noise that helps to augment the concentration of positive energy. I don’t smoke so even though the room was quite full of tobacco smoke it didn’t really bother me. If you do not like tobacco smoke or are allergic you may want to weigh this against how much you really want to be there.
Next the shamans either individually or together begin to sing icaros which are traditional songs that are used to attract the positive spirits. These songs would continue through the night and somehow actually shape your hallucinogenic vision by influencing whether it was positive or negative. The positive icaros seemed to induce a state of bliss, enlightenment and love whereas the “negative” icaros brought forth very, VERY dark hallucinations and didn’t stop until people began to vomit. As a side note here this was like clockwork. When the shaman brought forth that somber tune you’d hear the first person puke then like a a boiler bursting in a dozen different places at once there is suddenly a chain-reaction of vomit from the entire group. The nauseous smell was the least of my problems at that point.
Within 20-30 minutes of ingesting the medicine you start to see insanely complex geometrical patterns and shapes, very vivid, bright, psychedelic-kaleidoscopic colors and begin to observe weird shadows and auditory distortions as you enter a state of increasing altered consciousness. The human eye can see millions of colors, 7-10 million on the high end by some estimates. That night I swore that I saw 10,000,001. From the deepest purples to silver-iris to periwinkle to crimson-orange to fluorescent magenta to phosphorescent green over to fluorescent chartreuse—my eyes were a fucking kaleidoscope!
Please note that everyone’s ayahuasca experience is highly unique. It depends on your intention, your maturity, your fears, your desires, your strengths, your weaknesses even your childhood experience. All that I can offer based on my personal psychonautic experience is that it will positively fundamentally change you one way or another but not before it totally kicks your ass and almost leaves you for dead. If you are not interested based on what you have read up to this point its ok. Its not for everyone. It’s not a badge of honor nor does it make you holy-than-thou. There is no judgement before, during or after the ceremony—everyone is equal even the shaman on this journey. If is sounds scary it is but sometimes what you fear the most is the one thing that you really need to do.
Well enough of my soap-box kumbaya—for those that still want a glimpse into what the mind goes through under the influence of this potent plant medicine the following is a detailed account of the four sessions that I went through each night. My words do little justice to try to explain the surrealness of what happened. It feels like I’m trying to explain what a three dimensional object looks like to a person that lives in a two dimensional world. Indeed the only way that the 2D person can “see” the 3D object is by the shadow that the 3D object projects against the 2D plane. Just length and width but no depth. To truly understand the ayahuasca journey you need to get out of Flatland and enter a higher dimension.
I felt like I was taken to the 7th dimension.
The First Night’s Experience
I explained earlier how I started with a quarter cup of the yagé brew but that had me “buzzed” until the sun came up seven hours later. Just before I started seeing the colors I had a subtle reptilian vibe come about me. At first it was a slight hissing noise then I began to feel my skin become very smooth yet scaly. Suddenly my eyes narrowed and I had the overwhelming feeling to want to hiss. I looked around the room from my eye slits, my tongue sensing out the environment and my breath became shallow—I then I actually hissssssed.
This was short lived and as the icaros started to change I started to feel lighter. The song suddenly became the most beautiful music that I ever heard in my life. Perhaps not quite the music that you would play at a dinner party or even listen to in your car—this was different. A bit later (I had no concept of time) the icaros changed again and this time it was the most majestic, royal music that shot me into the heavens as colors faded from psychedelic neons to pure white.
I do not consider myself a religious person—spiritual is where I am now, but that place I was taken to almost felt like I should be praying. I do not know why or how that compulsion happened upon me but it just felt right at the time. That first night was a series of ups and downs and let’s just say that by the time the first rays of the morning sun hit I looked at my now half-empty roll of toilet paper and realized that the only royal place that I had really been that night was my ivory thrown in the next room.
The Second Night’s Experience
That first night really took me through a number so I decided that I would try to take it a bit easier the second night. That was a mistake. Upon approaching the shaman for my cup of medicine I insisted that I could only deal with a tenth of a cup. My beverage was reduced accordingly however that night I had no hallucination. In fact I stayed up for most of the night in what seemed like some weird netherworld but totally aware of what was going on around me.
It was just enough to make me very restless however. For most of the night I felt a tickle in the back of my throat like someone or something was beckoning me to purge (as the shaman’s so poetically coin the alternative word for vomit). It was almost as if I was being punished for punking-out and being scared to face the range of emotion and depth that I experienced just the night before. I’m typically fine navigating around outside of my comfort zone but this—this was like I had just partied in Hell and now consciously turned-down an invitation to the after-party from the Devil himself. No sir I did not want to go back. I could not go back.
The Third Night’s Experience
I decided to go back to Hell. This time imbibed with a very generous half-cup ration. Almost as if I suddenly had gone mad, what felt like halfway through the night at some point I was on the floor just beating my feet against the wooden planks like a drum. I then started shaking as if I had just touched that big-ass electric fence in Jurassic Park and was going through the motions as if there were 10,000 volts of power going through me.
That night I felt like I was up to bat for the Purgeville Poopers. It came out the front, the back and just when I thought that I was going to puke out whatever was left in my empty stomach (yes we fasted before each night’s ceremony) I puked out that whatever. To me it reflected a purge of the vilest, evilest most concentrated manifestation of years and years of negativity, fear, doubt and anxiety. I had nothing left in me physically, mentally nor emotionally. I was free.
The Fourth and Final Night’s Experience
The last night I had about a third cup and this time although there was an initial purge early on a transformation happened. This was the most intense night of my life ever. I was taken through many experiences which I will try my best to explain. The following are passages that I have taken directly from the journal that I kept with me on the trip:
Flying:
At one point it felt as though I was floating off from my chair and flying nowhere in particular but just hovering. I do not recall whether I looked down or not to see if my body was still in the chair. That’s when I decided to instead lay on my mat so I could somehow feel more grounded.
Infancy:
This experience was synonymous to a baby just learning his bearings and with wide-eyes taking in his brave new world without the mature facilities to process and understand all this new data and experience is all about.
Funneling Love:
I was able to take love from the ether and funnel it to me (through me as well) and throughout the room.
Dissolving Issues:
I felt like a tree that upon getting rained on just lets it trickle on down while making me stronger. When one has issues or problems they can only cling if it has something to cling on to. By making myself translucent those things had nothing to hold on to me with therefore I was free.
Infinite Power:
I felt indestructible—like a bolt of lightning that could charge, form, strike then dissipate at a moment’s notice.
Telepathy:
I wasn’t sure but I thought that I could channel my thoughts to others. Although I can’t really say that I could properly hear other’s thoughts—just random voices around the room seemed to come to me at various points throughout the evening.
Insanity:
A few times I thought that I had flown over the cuckoo’s nest. This happened on the third night but again on the last night as if in order to find myself I had to first lose myself.
What I Took From the Experience
I never took the shaman up on his original offer of a cold shower in the event that I could not take it anymore. From what I recall no one in my group did but I can’t recall for sure being as though I was either flying or puking most of the time. Some brave souls (veteran drinkers?) actually went up for a second helping of the medicine but I stuck to my one dose each night. I cannot say that I had control over my mind nor body for most of the sessions but there were periods (primarily between icaros) that I would suddenly “come to” and start to look around the room. I’d see people staring up with arms outstretched like they were grasping something divine that was just beyond reach for the rest of us mere mortals. I heard one lady crying her throat out and endlessly apologizing to someone in her mind and asking them to forgive her. It was dark and in the faint flicker of the candle light most folks were just silhouettes sitting in what seemed like a transcendental trance.
The shamans did interact with us through each of the ceremonies to make sure that we were ok and in some cases helped us deal with the most intense of experiences. They would tell you to help make the evil spirits (or evilness that you were grappling with at any low point in the ceremony) go away to shout something that sounded like “zhuuue”—that helped A LOT.
It helped to at least feel that sometimes you had a bit of control. Just as in yoga or meditation there were also breathing techniques that were taught to help you calm down, catch your breath or slow down your sometimes pounding heart. On a few occasions for folks that were really in bad shape they would gather around the person and tell them to feel love. I didn’t understand this at first but later during some of the high points in my session and in the mornings that followed I felt a sense of love like I have never known. An intense, non-judgmental, unconditional love for everyone and everything. This was bliss.
During the week when we were not in the ceremony there would be Q&A group sessions with the shamans or one-on-one if you chose. These were opportunities to help each other make sense of our experiences and get better grounded. The conversations were open, non-judgemental and allowed folks to have space between the sessions and integrating the firehose of information that came at us in the sessions.
In the mornings after each session you are very weak and just want to sleep for most of the day—I know I did. Some folks immediately leave the ceremony room and others just stay there and sleep until they wake up again. You were welcome to do whatever you thought was right for you. One early morning after the ceremony ended but the night sky was still dark two guys that I had befriended and I had decided to go outside to look at the stars. For some reason at the time it felt like that was the greatest idea that I had ever heard in my entire life. We went out then looked up. I saw Van Gogh’s “A Starry Night” as I peered into the heavens. I mean I’d never seen stars like this before. Granted we were deep in the Amazon jungle and there were millions of stars out on any given clear night but with my medicine induced eyes these stars were absolutely beautiful. That’s when a realization hit me. Here I was weak as hell, smelling like puke and shit in the middle of the jungle and I was appreciating something as simple as the stars in the sky. I thought to myself what other little things in life do I take for granted? What else could I learn to appreciate more and to be more grateful for?
That is one core lesson that I keep with me to this day. I vowed to take life less seriously and to try to remember to always ask myself “How does this serve me?” before engaging in any adventure, relationship, career or change of direction in life. Usually when the answer is positive these are things that end up serving others as well. Some things you learn to hang on to, other things to learn to let go and then there are the things that you feel that you need to start. For me life is not static—it always challenges you but what ayahuasca helped me with most is to at least be open to the experience and realize that everything and everyone changes including and especially myself. Life is a constant cycle of keep, start, stop.
On the evening of the last day when at the airport I ran into one of the visiting shamans that was present in the ceremonies who was on his way to see his wife in Japan. I was sitting drinking coffee after quite a long abstinence. He took note and looked at me and said “I see that you are finally drinking a full cup”.
How to Prepare and Lessons Learned
I have been asked this many times so would like to share a few notes with tips that may be helpful should you decide to embark on a journey yourself:
I have been asked this many times so would like to share a few notes with tips that may be helpful should you decide to embark on a journey yourself:
The medicine is powerful so the more that you resist the more you will suffer. Just let your thoughts come and go and observe instead of trying to pass judgement or look for an escape route.
1. Be ok with not being in control.
The medicine is powerful so the more that you resist the more you will suffer. Just let your thoughts come and go and observe instead of trying to pass judgement or look for an escape route.
2. Only you and you alone can take this journey.
This is a very individual experience so mileage highly varies. Its ok to take a friend or loved one if that person decides to join but be sure that you are doing this for you and no one else. If that person also feels a compelling need to do this or to be there to support you its ok but keep in mind that most of the time you will barely have enough strength and soundness of mind to take care of yourself let alone another.
3. Be safe.
Do your research and check out many reviews not just on the experience but also on the facilities and the shamans if possible. Community-based websites like ayaadvisor.com is great place to start your research. Contact the facility and ask questions. If they claim that the information you seek is a “trade secret” or seem contradictory this is typically a bad sign and I would continue to seek other more open places. Do not hesitate to reach out to your social network with questions–that’s what friends are for right (even Facebook friends)?
4. Pay attention to what medications you should not use before or during the ceremony.
There are many medications that do not mix well with ayahuasca and can in fact be fatal if taken together. There is usually a waning period in which you cannot take said medication for days or even weeks before your ceremony. You may want to seriously weigh this as this may be hard especially if you depend on that medication regularly.
5. Be mindful of the necessary diet before your ceremony.
The following are foods that are recommended to be avoided prior to ingesting ayahuasca (typically 24-72 hours prior):
* Salt/pepper
* Red meat
* Meat that is not fresh (i.e. processed)
* Chocolate
* Sugar and sweets
* Cultured dairy products (i.e. yoghurt and buttermilk)
* bananas
* avocados
* fermented foods (i.e. sauerkraut)
* tufu
* nuts
* alcohol
* caffeine
See here for an exhaustive list of the foods and drugs that should be avoided prior to an ayahuasca experience.
6. No sex.
It is explained that ayahuasca can be a bit of a “jealous lover” so the traditional requirement of ayahuasca cleansing and healing is abstinence from sexual orgasm for three days prior to the ceremony as well as three days after the ceremony. This also preserves a certain life force in you that leads to a more powerful experience with more vivid visions.