A few moments with Aya
Ayahuasca is a hot South American brew that’s delivered to you with the help of a shaman or curandera. When done well, it’s got the muddy gritty taste of pure earth causing even the hardened taste bud to choke a little at first. It’s made from a particular vine and leaf that have just enough DMT to get your senses going back to the start of the big bang. Or, that’s what I’d always been told and envisioned.
I was directed toward spirituality, particularly indigenous spirituality, following a bad breakup and the absolutely consumption of books on self help, introspection, astrology, spirituality, occult, and you know where this is going. Once I got my hands on the Bhagavad Gita, it was a wrap for me! I wanted to experience it all and I set out backpacking along the Pacific Coast of Central America, solo and without Spanish speaking capacity, just to see what I got myself into. It was tumultuous, sticky, staggered, thrilling, and divine. I found people at hostels that I worked at and was given books like The Ancient Secret of the Flower of Life and given drugs like, peyote. I consumed life as it was handed to me and I felt like I was flying in those early twenties years.
Following my stay in Chiapas, Mexico, I couchsurfed in Ciudad de Oaxaca with an interesting man [Juan] that gave me a heads up, I’m going to help a curandera to cleanse a woman with a terrible omen on her tomorrow. You can leave for several hours and meet us in the evening, or you can partake without judgement. You know I didn’t even let him finish his sentence before I made up my mind and the next morning began with a cold rinse in the bathtub with locally foraged wildflowers and purified water to get us all ready. I didn’t understand enough Spanish to keep up, but I was happy to be invited on the ride. Inevitably we all got into a small car to drive a few miles to the Tule Tree, a magical place that many Oaxacans believe has wonderful omens surrounding it.
The moment I got my five ten frame out of the car, I felt, seen. Someone nearby was diligently watching me and I glanced all around, meeting eyes left and right, before my arm was pulled by Juan saying we had to keep it moving. We walked past some sort of rock vendor and my head about snapped, this was the man. He spoke to me, but not in English or Spanish, something else → it felt familiar, but I didn’t understand. Juan’s jaw dropped and quickly spoke to the curandera, then looked back at me, and the two women continued to walk on. Juan translated the vision that this vendor was living in, of me! We must have been there for at least forty five minutes before I tearfully hugged the vendor, he gave me some rocks and told me I had to find the medicine.
It was another two months, in Nicaragua, before I found an opportunity to engage in this medicine that had overtaken my mind. I was told that, if the opportunity found me, then it was the most right pathway to saunter along. I anticipated: a dieta, purging, psychedelic hallucinations, hours of drool, being invigorated yet exhausted, and writing a lot. As it happened, either my intestines are made of steel or those kinds of experiences are not what the medicine had in store for me.
The first time, was with a few other people, me and my friend being the only non locals, which I found interesting. There was a curandera who hovered over a big cauldron, whispering enchantments, drumming, closing their eyes and singing/chanting aloud, and ensuring the incense was burning. After some seriously silent time, we were each handed a small clay cup with liquid in it and were gestured at to drink its entirety. My expectations were running wild and the only thing that lived up to its storyline was the nearly repulsive taste of that earthen concoction.
After some time, I became vaguely aware that others seemed to stand and walk around, some had bulging eyes, some were crying, and everyone, but me, vomited quite a bit. There was a part of me that understood logically what was happening, but another part that was rummaging around in some sort of cocoon. I had zero typical symptoms that the stuff worked on me, except that I was living inside a shockingly vivid scene. At some point, when everyone had already settled down and got into various chill positions around the room, it hit me that I was inside my mothers womb, rummaging around with my twin brother. It was a thing that would be morbid, heavy, and depressing in the real world, yet oddly I felt peaceful. My brother never made it into this world, he was miscarried and I survived. It was such a glorious moment, or hour, or hours, I’m not sure; I had peace with an aspect of myself which I didn’t know I needed.
And in the following moments with Aya, all without purging or psychedelic whirling hallucinations, I found grounding, peace, understanding, and even respect for areas of my self that I’d been blind to.
