It’s been a while since my last ceremony using the master plant Ayahuasca, and I am still feeling fortunate that I found such an incredible lady shaman, Kuyay, here in my country, Costa Rica, who will later become my master.
She likes to avoid the use of the word shaman, which is reserved for high Amazonian authorities,
and since she doesn’t live there anymore, she considers herself a spiritual guide.
From the first moment that I read about Ayahuasca I knew that is was my call, that I needed to look for it no matter what. Something very powerful in me was awakened.
My country was in Kuyay’s destiny, she was in other central-american countries, but it seems that she finally chose Costa Rica as a place to stay. Reasons seem more spiritual that rational.
Some people say Costa Rica it’s like a tiny Amazon, the energy that comes from the south and the north is all mixed here and some investigators say that there is a lot of places with different kinds of energy that can be used to improve the vibrations in a ritual like the Ayahuasca one, or simply to get better results when growing or meditating.
Getting to Kuyay’s house, where the Ayahuasca retreat takes place, is itself a memorable journey: Her house is located at high altitude, and surrounded by lots of green mountains; yet, the best part is when you arrive. She receives the guests with a warm hug and a trusty smile. Feeling the vibe of the place is astounding, it feels so balanced with nature, so natural, so quiet.
The area is called “El Cerro de la Muerte” or The Peak of the Death, it’s interesting because you literally go to die when assisting a ceremony like this, your ego can die for some time, allowing the soul to fully come out.
The temple where the ceremonies take place it’s very beautiful and you will feel entities that will help you during the ritual, by giving you their energy and you have to receive them honorably. They can be birds, squirrels, a deer or a snake, or maybe some sort of spiritual protectors that look just like those animals. The Ayahuasca spirit can especially appear in a vision in the form of a snake, a woman, or like in one of my visions, some sort of nurse-snake that was injecting me with probably a magical substance, not from this dimension. You can sometimes feel it, like a huge snake rolling around your body.
In this first experience, Kuyay was letting us know how she works in ceremonies, and she likes to call them “Ceremonias de Luz” or ceremonies of light, in which she will only invite light spirits to join. She says that we don’t need to see horrible or disgusting things when drinking the medicine, still, sometimes it could happen and she will expel the spirit right away. Sometimes could also be necessary depending on the case.
She also explained to us, why these dark energies want to come through and how we can prevent it to happen. She emphasizes in the diet, good meditation, walk in nature with no shoes and avoid getting angry or upset. She calls this last part the emotional diet, in which you also should avoid strong emotions or extreme events. These entities feed on our fear, our weakness, our thoughts, our emotions and our habits. The ayahuasca always takes care of us in the spiritual world, and a well-trained guide can manage this energy to help either way to understand them or remove them from your psyche.
The vine of the death
It's called “the vine of the dead” because of Peruvian traditions say that when you drink Ayahuasca, you visit the world of the death. It’s the Ayahuasca vine that allows you to enter these worlds, without losing your spirit, they say.
Everything is very symbolic in the ceremony, I can feel respect from other people towards the medicine, the participants getting along, which is very important, we smoked some organic tobacco and chat for some time. In that first ceremony, everything was in a total dark, she eventually improved with putting a candle in the middle of the room, in future ceremonies, but I still think it’s better with total darkness when possible.
We will start the ceremony with abuelita Ayahuasca and abuelito Mapacho, the two main energies that will guide us and help us tonight, she said. Then she called one by one to go and sit right in front of her. She blesses the brew with a particular sound and sings small pieces of icaros, to give specific intention to the work.
She checked on us during the whole night, asking nicely if everything was fine, if we needed more medicine, and will also sing full icaros, which are beautiful songs dictated by the Ayahuasca spirit. They help certain situations and traumas.
After drinking the medicine, I was struggling with the effects, basically not knowing what do to. She said to me that I had to pay attention to my breathing, and that was the key. I was able to control it way better after, by that time I was not in touch with meditation or healing arts, so she became my first meditation teacher too. I started feeling like I was floating among many stars, I could see them and I could see the space, then the purge came. I started vomiting tons of fluids, that felt like snakes, insects, pieces of trees, and it was very releasing actually, I was putting all my effort into it. It really went deep into my body. I started having very trippy effects and a lot of love feelings, I was very happy that I assisted the ceremony and was very thankful. Then the second purge came, my bucket was full so I asked permission to go outside and vomit. When I was outside I remember Kuyay’s father putting his hand on my back repeating the word “healing” while I was almost on the floor vomiting all my senses. I understood why I was there, besides my desire of discovery, I was there on a healing experience, and could feel how many years of bad habits were cleaned, I release myself and all I was carrying. Bad eating, smoking, party, no sleeping, working too much, things that I have absorbed from others and so on. My whole life was being cleaned in front of me. Now I remember being outside as if it happens in the daylight, there was a lot of light, but it was very late in the night. It took me some time to see all these details and to recapitulate the experience, I was literally somewhere else, but here at the same time. You can be on both sides.
The mind can be inter-dimensional, and being “elevado” it’s the best way to travel. "Elevado" is the word that Shipibo people use to refer to the visionary state of Ayahuasca. Elevado literally means “high”, you are vibrating at higher frequencies. Being “elevado” means, sometimes, see what your eyes are seeing. You enter in some sort of outside perspective, that allows you to see yourself more clearly, and to see the universe.
After my first experience, I felt cleaned like never before, and was holding incredible energy, I was glowing purity and was very happy with my life in general. It really helped me to accept myself and to accept the world, and the use of compassion. I will always be thankful to the people and plants that allow this to happen, it was a beautiful experience with Silvio, a mastermind who later invited us to his private natural hot springs and showed us his ayahuasca from Costa Rica. Also Rhandall, who is a unique artist, Eric, who later become an Ayahuasca guide like me, Silvio's son, and the girls for bringing their beautiful energy.
“You carry my soul to the deepest places in the universe,
you are curing me, you are illuminating me, you are loving me”
“To a distant dream you are taking me, ayahuasca of my soul, to show me the mysteries of life.”
Ama Sua, Ama Lulla, Ama Quella
(don’t steal, don’t lie, and don’t be lazy in Quechua language)