My first experience with Ayahuasca
How far does it go… the rabbit hole that is?
Apparently that’s not even the right question. The right question is why in the hell would anyone want to find out if it means going through the emotional ass fucking that I just went through.
After 8 years of running Body Mind and devoting much of my energy to sustaining and growing the company I am finally letting it go. 2 more day and I will no longer be the director. 2 more days and it will be a new year… a new decade.
I thought that journeying with Ayahuasca would be a great way to open myself, to learn and experience something to help with this transition in life.
All I’m sure that I’ve learned so far is that 2 ounces of this concoction is significantly stronger than I am. After the experience I feel more emotionally drained and beating up than I have in a very long time. My body feels like it’s only partly mine; if it were fully mine I would be able to make the nausea, the trembling and the short bursts of pure terror stop running through my body.
However, I apparently don’t have full control over my body yet. She is still holding on. I look forward to that ending…
I went into this journey with no fear of what might happen, with complete acceptance for the process, knowing full well that I had no idea what was going to occur and being okay with that.
I wanted to experience everything she had to offer to the fullest extent I could so I took the heavy does (In hind sight that wasn’t such a good idea). As the journey began so did the fear. My stomach started gurgling, I became both light and heavy at the same time and then the world began to blur. First, the flames in the fireplace became fuzzy, then they began to merge with each other. Then the fireplace and the flames began to merge, as did the rest of the room with itself. It was right around this time that one of the members of the group began to purge (Vomit).
I realized I was probably next.
My eyes became incredibly heavy and my body weak. I went from sitting on the couch to lying on the floor. With my eyes closed the visions, sounds and feelings began to intensify. The shaman was standing near my feet, chanting and playing this instrument that made a sound like you would imagine if you mixed the sound of a UFO landing inside of a wind tunnel with the harmonic rhythm of a heart beating 140 times per minute. My body, my process seemed to get in sync with this sound and as the sound sped up so did my trip. I quickly lost all sense of reality as I began to see sound.
The shaman transformed into an elderly Native American man with long grey hair and feathers all around. He was dancing by the fire that was all around me, inside of me, part of me. So were the coyotes – several of which had goat heads. Then more people appeared and began dancing around the fire. They were covered in the skins of goats and fluidly transformed back and forth between man and animal. I could hear the most vivid sounds I have ever experienced. The sounds of the coyotes breathing in my ear and dancing all around. The sounds of the jungle creatures that I could not see with my eyes but with my ears I could see them clearly.
The sounds, the rhythm, the vision continued to intensify until I found myself back in reality, puking into a bucket as the shaman guided me to sit up and breath.
Shortly there after I found myself in the bathroom trying to let go of whatever I could while asking myself why I took the heavy dose as I slipped in and out of this trip that was being further facilitated by the flickering light of the candle that I’m almost sure actually existed.
After I stood up I looked in the mirror and I can’t remember being able to see myself. I went back to the floor in the main room to continue the journey. I went through another cycle of intense tripedelic experiences for which I can’t remember the details other than to say it was an E-ticket ride.
Shortly after this journey, which felt like several years, the shaman was offering for people to take a booster dose if they wanted to. By this time I was sitting up again and my vision had come back. I thought that the experience was coming to a close if I didn’t take more.
I knew that the trips I had just been on were more intense than I wanted to experience again right away but I thought that a more mild experience might be nice so I asked for a small dose.
Little was I aware at the time that my journey was not complete but instead I was just being given a short recovery break. By the time I realized this it was too late because I had already drunken the booster shot.
Now the heavy does that I had originally taken and the new, smaller dose both got to kick in at the same time. This is when the most intense time warp occurred for me. I stayed lucid for a little while before going back in. As I started to go back in, Dana was coming out of her experience and offered me her spot in front of the fire, which I gladly took because I was feeling so cold and couldn’t seem to get warm.
I thought that 1.5 to 2 hours passed before I went back into the full trip again. I found out later that it was only about 15 minutes.
As I went back in this time the process sped up so much that I couldn’t grasp onto the images, feelings, thoughts, any of it. Everything was coming at me so quickly that I couldn’t do anything other than try to hold on for the ride. Except, I stopped existing for a large portion of the ride so all there was, was the experience. Once again I got pulled back to vomit. This time I got to see Dana’s blurred face and she looked at me with terror while I slipped back and forth between this world and that world.
This was the first time that I began to have fear come up that maybe I had somehow overdone it. I felt a physical and emotional exhaustion equivalent to staying awake for days on end in the midst of an argument with someone you love deeply. I wanted so badly to go to sleep and get the rest my body so calling out for but the Ayahuasca wouldn’t let me go. She kept me spinning, floating, falling, pulsating until I gave up and stopped trying to find my way back.
Shortly after that I started to come to, and once again the room began to become normal. By this time everyone else had come back and it appeared that the main journey was coming to an end. We did our closing prayers, talked a little and then got up to get some food. Once I stood up I started to feel a little light headed and was still having some nausea. I figured that getting a little food in me would help to calm everything. I ate a small slice of bread and had some carrot juice to try and bring my blood sugar up. Around this time the nausea started to get a little stronger and my eyelids began to feel very heavy again. I could tell that she wasn’t done with me and wanted me back.
I told the shaman that if there was a way to stop it I would like to because I felt too exhausted to go in for another round. He gave me some aloe vera gel to calm my stomach and I sat up, focusing on my breath to keep it at bay. As the nausea continued I felt a gurgling in my belly and got up to use the bathroom. As I sat on the toilet my consciousness began to pulsate and I realized that she wasn’t going to let me get out of this experience yet.
I sat back down and my eyelids became heavier and heavier. I began to get weak again and had a hard time mustering up the energy to keep deep breathing. The room started to pulsate and so did my innards. My stomach began to constrict and found myself making friends with my purge bucket again. So I sat there… pulsating and purging and cursing the Ayahuasca for taking me again while everyone else tried to eat.
Then I found my way back to the couch and laid down. I was fortunate enough to be covered in numerous blankets to help combat the incredible cold spells that kept happening. As I laid there I went in and out of tripping, sleeping and waking up to make sure I was still there.
This continued till approximately sunrise before I finally fell asleep… an experience that could not have been more welcomed.
Now, about 13 hours have passed since I woke up from that trip and I am beginning to feel like myself again. However, I still feel more fragile and vulnerable than I can remember feeling in several years.
And for some very strange, inexplicable reason I am beginning to think back upon my trip with great fondness and have a desire to encourage others to explore the dark regions I just came back from. I don’t know exactly why because I felt traumatized by the majority of the process but for some reason I feel as though this would be a good thing for seekers to experience.
There were beautiful parts to the journey but I find myself unable to explain them. There were many times throughout the journey where I found myself in total bliss, laughing and smiling at everything that was occurring. I just don’t know why I was laughing and smiling – but I was.
I’m not sure exactly what I learned yet and I won’t be rushing back to do it again but, as fragile and shaken as a feel right now, I’m glad I did it.
Aho
