About a month ago I had met up with a friend I made at the Swiss ayahuasca retreat in Geneva. We went camping in a field on the side of Mont Salève with some of her friends and had a 1g dose of mushrooms. The mushrooms felt quite strong for such a low dose, but I fortunately did not go into an ayahuasca process like before.
I had a meaningful experience in that I found myself worrying about what the people I hadn’t previously met before thought about me, in spite of their obviously friendly natures (all ayahuasca disciples!). I then had the realisation that this was a projection of disliking myself. There it was again. I have had so much cleansing and yet I wonder how much deeper I have to go.
For a while I have had a heavy heart. My heart centre just feels blocked again in spite of the healing at the Ayahuasca retreats. I have felt this open up a little at times, through meditation or particular yogic exercises, but I know that there is still a problem. Maybe it is a problem that has always been there which I have now managed to bring into conscious awareness. Maybe the feelings of a heavy heart were unconscious and all the spiritual healing has brought my situation forth into the light. From the covert to the overt. From the obscure into the transparent.
Last night I took a 4g dose at home again, and going against the vow I made at the end of my last blog, I ended up going into a full Ayahuasca-like healing process. This time, however, I was not alone, and had a friend on the same dose. I began to get loud as I purged myself of some very dark energies around my heart centre. Throughout the entire process I was making animal-like shrieking noises again, but this time it was slightly different and was a sound that came almost from the roof of my mouth. Indeed, a short while into the peaking zone, I could taste blood in my mouth such was the ferocity of the force in which the energies released from me. Heaven only knows what the neighbours must have thought! Mushrooms are completely different since Ayahuasca. My friend had more of the kind of experience I would have felt several years ago - trippy visuals, closed-eye fractals and sweeping feelings of beauty and euphoria. Perhaps as new neural pathways develop with continued use, an evolution of sorts takes place.
At the beginning I felt a little out of control, and was beginning to regret that I was almost in a similar state to the 8g journey again. I had feelings of uncertainty, and kept finding myself wanting to escape, not to indulge the healing. In a sense, it was almost like there was a subconscious fear of what the healing was going to achieve for me, in spite of it being what I actually wanted. I kept telling myself, maybe I should go upstairs and have a lie down, or maybe this is too much and I should attempt to bring myself down from the trip like I did the last time I had a large dose. I wonder now whether this is due to some distant memory from another lifetime - a fear of experiencing the intense love that ended up hurting me so badly then.
I found myself fighting the healing. Of tensing up, and not letting go. I remember realising this and telling myself to let go and accept whatever I needed to, so I did. As that happened, everything immediately became peaceful once more. I was still going through purges, but everything started to get a little easier.
As the peaking zone began to wither away, I found myself in a lot more control and felt a lot more comfortable. But the purging was constant, and exhausting. I had a few short rests where I would lie down for a much needed break, but it was not long before I was walking around the room and allowing my body to purge again. I would focus on physical locations on my body such as the heart centre, sensing where the blockage was, and the energy would mobilise itself and leave me via a shrieking exhale.
Later on I had some interesting experiences looking into a mirror. Ordinarily I needlessly judge myself when I look in the mirror - I have a spot, or my face isn’t symmetrical when I smile. Things that are hardly noticeable anyway, but in spite of their relative insignificance, they cause a sense of self loathing in me - I am never good enough for myself. I was doing the same thing in the mirror last night, and right when those thoughts began to surface I felt the negative energies mobilise and exit me in the usual manner.
Interestingly, as the purging finally began to subside towards the end of the trip, my heart centre still felt blocked, in spite of all that cleansing.
When I woke up the next day, my heart centre felt much clearer. I had a magnesium salt bath to comfort myself, as well as my aching muscles. My neurotransmitter production facilities also found the relief for which they had been yearning. I listened to some gentle music and decided to do some more Spanish lessons with the app on my phone I have been using for a few months. Every week I score more points than the other members of my group, and understand the concepts very well - I usually get most of the answers right. However, as I got the odd translation wrong, I found those feelings of not being good enough creeping to the surface again. As this happened, I felt my heart begin to close once more! It is clear this is the area I will need to focus more on when I go to another Ayahuasca retreat in Spain next month. Hopefully 4 nights of an environment in which I can make all the extraterrestrial noises I need to will take me a step closer to resolving my issues. One can only hope.