Amazon - The second Ayahuasca Ceremony

5^th August – my birthday
This morning I walk to the hut of the healers for a healing consultation. I sit on the deck with the Maestros and Maestras and the temple manager Sascha and medicine interpretation assistant Didier. I share my pain, my fears, my desires and intentions. I bare my soul. First my English is translated to Spanish by Sascha then from Spanish into Shipibo by one of the Maestros. Ancient healers listen to my woes and prescribe plant medicine and treatments for healing on a physical, emotional and spiritual level. To heal anxiety, I have been prescribed a herbal tea to bring me out of my head and into my heart. I will receive massage for my bones and body injuries. Again I am blessed. Every morning at 7am then again at 7pm, myself and my fellow passengers line up at the healers hut, waiting our turn for healing, including herbal elixirs prepared from the surrounding rainforest, eye and wound washing and dressing, and healing body work massage administered by traditional Shipibo healers. I feel like I am living in a by-gone era, I give thanks for the honour of participating in this ancient act.  


Waiting outside the healer's hut



Didier receives the elixers from Maestra Rosa to share with us



The beautiful healing art of the Shipibo

Night approaches and again we take to the Maloka for the second of seven ceremonies. Tonight I have brought with me some deep stories from my past. I believe I have a fear of abandonment resulting from separation from my father at an early age. My parent’s divorce caused separation anxiety, approval-seeking, fear-of-failure behaviour and ongoing emotional issues with my father. Following this, my childhood was forged in an oppressive religious-based home life causing me to flee from my mother’s home in my teenage years and dive into a period of rebellion. I have learnt that if you have not healed or learnt a life lesson, it will be repeated. I have surmised that damaging relationships I have experienced with key male authority figures in my adult life may be a reflection of issues I am yet to heal in my relationship with my own father. So tonight, I bring these intentions:

let go of fear of abandonment toward myself or my future children
heal the trauma of my childhood
remove any in-ground patterns of thinking or behaviour that has come from that

My previous experience talking with a psychologist proved that therapy can assist one to discover and name underlying issues – but truly healing them? Well that’s what I have come here to do.

The same ceremony takes place. I lie on my mattress in patience. The medicine comes on very strong, I felt as if it was too strong, and it was pulling on some very deep pain. One of the grandmother healers sung a purge out of me. I tried to resist it and found that allowing the pain to come out took courage. It was vile plant medicine releasing some deep hurt from deep inside me. Then I felt calm. The hallucinations reduced and clear visions began. I was a child again at home in the backyard playing with my brother; it was a repeat of reality however, now, I looked on through non-judgemental eyes, non subjective eyes. I saw events for what they were without the pain of being a child in need. As this occurs, I feel no fear and only feel in a state of observation, gratitude and love as if a kind, earthly grandmother is gently holding my hand as I explore the trigger points of my deepest fears.

Maestras Rosa, (a Maestra assisting the others for this course), Amelia & Marina

The Maestra seals her song by dousing me in flower water. It isn’t long until one of the Maestros is in front of me and with great strength sings to me of life, of earth, of Tanah. I feel so empowered and break into tears in gratitude.

My right arm pulsates by itself. I feel that the right side of the body represents letting go, masculine energy, men, the father. I have had a fear of my own masculine energy related to my father leaving issues. But now, I balance my masculine energy easily and effortlessly. I see my father for the man that he is, carrying his own history and ills. I see that my Dad is present in my life now because this is when I need him. I see that I no longer am a victim of my parent’s divorce as it did not ‘happen to me’ but rather ‘happened for me’, I feel empowered by this. I am willing to forgive my father for not being the father I wanted him to be. I set him free. And in doing so, I am free.

I see that there were other guides and people supporting me, helping to provide what my father and mother did not when I was young and I give thanks for this.

I learn that there is a personal way for all of us to heal and for me it is through dancing.

I see that all spirituality and traditional mystics come from the same original spirit, none are more enlightened than the other. There is great worth in exploring all spirituality.
Irake – thank you in Shipibo. Thank you for the healing.

Maestros Elias, Sesa & Weila