What I learnt from my Ayahuasca Retreat in Peru!
12 days, 7 ceremonies, 1 Amazon Jungle.
For 2 years I have umming and ahhing whether to do Ayahuasca or Aya as I refer to her. I can’t exactly remember where I came across the info on the benefits but I know it had something to do with a number of VERY successful people recommending it. Success leaves clues, so I followed the yellow brick road, all the way to the Wizard of Ayahuasca.
If you don’t know what Aya is? Here is the wiki definition. Essentially, it’s a plant medicine native to the Amazon which involves drinking a ‘cocktail’ of two plants a Shaman or medicine man cooks up. One plant helps the medicine enter the blood-brain barrier, the other helps release a chemical called DMT. DMT is also released upon death and is thought as the spiritual molecule. You drink this and you can have hallucinogenic experiences, purge (in my case a fuck ton!) and much more.
For the sake of this post. I am going to mention the things no one online talks about. But I will get to that later.
Intention
My intention doing Ayahuasca or Aya was to Know God. For a long time I’ve had the belief that we are God. You and I are God. God to me is unconditional love as the expression of light and dark. Animals, plants, air, all races of people we are the Infinite masked by an Ego or as Wayne Dwyer wisely suggest an Ego stands for Edging Out God.
SOOOOOO I have this belief or a knowing as I like to call it, but I wanted the experience of God. I didn’t trust my knowing was enough. Imagine this. You are a blank canvas with no borders. You expand out everywhere in every direction. You are everything. At the same time you are nothing (there’s nothing on the canvas right). Dichotomy yeah.
You the blank canvas want to Know thyself. But you are everything, so you know everything about anything. You decide it’s a good idea to put a border around yourself and start splashing colours to make the canvas vibrant, beautiful and learn what you are cable of. In doing so, you put a boundary around your Infinite-ness and forget what you are.
That’s how God-Ego works. The ego is the border that helps give contrast to the infinity that you are. You can not know day without night. Night gives contrast. Same with the God thing. Forget you are God to realise that you are God. Dichotomy yeah.
Anyways, I digress. Long story short, I wanted to have the God experience, learn more about shamanism, plus I had some emotional baggage from an ex girlfriend who was a blessing and wound and nothing seemed to release me from the mental chatter. It was like a mosquito in your bedroom when you are trying to sleep. We all hate that right.
2 years later, one day I catch up with my gym training partner who is also my ‘entheogen experiment buddy’ which is another way of saying his the guy who is ok doing drugs. Don’t do drugs kids. Unless they are spiritual. Ultra Spiritual ;) We asked ourselves “Are we going to do this or not?”
Interesting the word entheogen means generating the divine within. Yahtzee!!!!
One week we’re looking at retreats, accommodation and did I mention that I had no money for a holiday and I just started a new businesses! BUTTT instead of making excuses, I committed and ask for help from family, friends and clients. Funny how that happens, when you really commit, not like 80/20 commit Tim Ferriss fans, like 100%, burn the fucking bridge commit. Then life rewards you. But don’t BS yourself that it’s only you that is involved in any decision.
In the end I bank rolled it on a credit card that allowed me to pay it off over 6-12 fucking months interest free! Thank you. Booked a flight that was $600 cheaper than the one I was booked on and Premium Economy on Qantas who never discounts anything, even their used toilet paper and ended up booking myself into a 12 day, 7 ceremony retreat at Refugio Altiplano. https://www.refugioaltiplano.org/
Thanks for the recommendation The Certified Health Nut - Troy Casey, if you are reading this.
It’s taken me about a month since I returned to see my experience for that it was. I really feel that I am integrating a lot of things that are still unknown to me. I think this process is still happening, they say Aya is constantly working on you, if you with it. Which means that tomorrow my opinion on all of this could change. Like any of my blog posts or thoughts, they are a snap shot in time of where I am. Not the be all, end all. Life is constantly changing and beliefs are subject to change.
If you asked me after my Aya experiences what it was like I would have said I was no different and it was shit. I was just sick. Like really sick. If you asked me the first week I came back to Australia, I would have said, not much as I was emotionally volatile as some people found out first hand and I didn’t want to share something so private with everyone. If you ask me now…well sir, I would say something completely different. I don’t feel words can really convey this, so I decided to do a video.
It’s a short 4 part video series, so if you’re interested set aside some time. I start off by giving you the context how the ceremony goes down. Give it a bit of time, then I get into the juicy experiences.
Happy watching.
ps. As I say in my video, Ayahuasca is not a party drug. It’s a medicine and needs to be seen and respected in such a way. Please don’t do it unless you feel you have invested time in working through your shit and are ready to see the parts of your personality you might not like. Don’t do Ayahuasca or any hallucinogenic medicine if you are taking medical drugs for any mental illness. The two don’t mix well together.
Part 1 of 4 - Make sure you click the title so it opens in Youtube, that way you can watch all 4 videos.