Ayahuasca

Quick reference.

The Great Vegetative Mother, in every cell, in every thought; She is the air itself, which is also your stomach and spine which hold the history of all humans all in one sacred and humorless Truth that walks you through to the End. The Holy Shadow is heard. The Endless Night is grown. The First Cause will demand much of you with the answers falling endlessly into your skull.

Again.

R2 So, you’ve partaken?

Well, I finally could say I'd been to me - and it was hideous.

It's all about San Pedro cactus.

I ordered some San pedro cactus seeds. They didn't grow. It seems like 100x steps to grow any life changing drug.

Maybe I can lick a toad.

You can buy the cactus online.

I had it at a place near Cuzco. It tastes like very thick soy sauce with ashes mixed in. Will write more later, but the first experience, with a rather small dose, was better than subsequent experiences days after with more of it.

Wonderful place. Doctor, nurse, psychologist on staff for your safety.

Is it legal to partake?

Legal in Peru.

Only legal in one country?! r11 Are they dangerous ,damaging or easy to overdose on?

I've done four trips to Peru. Changed my life forever, for the better. I also microdose mushrooms and go on macrodose trips a few times a year, too. Got rid of antidepressants and therapists and dark moods ever since. I'll never go back to western big pharma bullshit.

I've had two breakthrough trips on DMT. It is the most intense experience I've ever had, and affected me in positive ways for moths afterward. It was as if my mind's "cache" had been cleared.

I would love to try ayahuasca someday.

I look forward to reading about your experiences, R8.

R13 Please share more.

R15, will do. R14's cache-cleaning captures a bit of what I experienced.

R14 Tell us more!

I really want to try it. But it's meant to be particularly good if you have some past unresolved trauma that you want to address, and that doesn't really apply to me - I'm pretty happy to be honest so I'm not sure how transformative it would be.

I read this as “Anastacia”. I need coffee. LOL

R19 It could retraumatize you if you’re not properly guided. Ayahuasca is no joke.

Here' s a link with several documentaries about Ayahuasca that are helpful.

Another documentary that is annoying, amusing, and sad... about a privileged prep school kid with rich doctor parents, who went to South America to live a live of ayahuasca apprenticeship to find hearing. The Shaman eventually migrated to the big city to work in a factory. So much for paradise and it's chemical entry tickets.

Use of San Pedro cactus is what may have kick-started some of the great, complex civilizations down in Peru.

R23 Did you mean "kicked down", that is destroyed, or "kick started, there down in Peru"?

Here's the documentary about the Philips-Andover kid who sought ayahuasca to stop trying to kill himself:

A friend of mine did ayahuasca and stuck two butter knives into her eye sockets because she no longer needed eyes to see!

R25 I know Officer Bob. Give him a few 'shrooms and he squeals like a banshee when his prostate gets hit.

R24: That poster makes him look like he has a very ugly boil on his cheek.

R24 I never was able to finish that doc; it irritated me for some reason. Is it worth revisiting and finishing?

R28 Yeah, it was extremely annoying - the young prep school kid creating a whole narrative about his suffering, with the hoped for "breakthrough" of his psychic/chemical vision quest... and the production process for the film was so calculating. But things went off the rails... unexpected endings. Life interrupted the pre-conceptions. Worth seeing the end.

Is this the stuff that reveals The Machine Elves?

R24, I meant like a jump-start. Just a theory, but there's evidence that use of San Pedro was a common link amongst the Andean civilizations. In other words, some of those ancient people were definitely trippin' balls!

R31 They also chewed coca leaves all the time, so there's that. They had a lot of energy for "development" of a culture.

R30, yes.

R8 here. Here's what happened, as far as I can recall:

You go into the huge hut with everyone else, and you get a mat and blanket to lie on. They prepare the drink and do a small ceremony during its preparation. You get it in small cups, with the amount determined beforehand while meeting with the psychologist, nurse, and shaman.

It tastes terrible - like I said, very thick soy sauce with ashes. The worst thing I've ever tasted.

Everyone takes it and lies down on their mats about 8 feet apart. You can hear dogs howling in the distance. They turn off the lights. The shaman burns tobacco and makes the room smokey (didn't like that) and chants on and off for long periods each time, though it's quiet after a few hours.

The entire experience is ... six hours? Something like that.

During the first hour, you're just lying there. Some people are throwing up, and others already have started experiencing stuff, but that's rare.

After the first hour, things should start happening.

Here's what happened with me the first night:

My eyes were closed but 1 or 2 hours in I could see something like an opaque greenhouse roof, but very crystalline and moving - green, white, gray. Just kind of moving with crystal panels moving this and that way, like huge gears with something that springy clock-gear movement. Or something.

Then I saw sparks (eyes closed) and it was like "working" on my brain to fix it. Then I heard something like "OK, we've done what we can, see you, you'll go on to experience other things now!"

Then I lay there for another hour, then my body started moving by itself and I was laughing. I could hear people vomiting and being attended to by the nurse and assistant. It's cold now because it's, what 11 PM?

(Other people were there to "see stuff" but I was there because I had depression. They definitely saw stuff, but I didn't really except that greenhouse-made-of-crystalline-gears thing.)

I'll write what happened next later (when my body started moving by itself). Gotta work again.

R29 Thanks for letting me know. I might throw it back on while completing menial work.

What are The Machine Elves?

Are they real?

R35, here.

The Google Images results for "machine elves" are terrifying.

I did a bunch of acid and mushrooms in my late teens and twenties. I'm 42 now and think I'd like to do ayahuasca around my 50th, just for the ceremony of making it to half a century. Do you have to fly to Peru to do it?

R38, I would. Etnikas at R9 is excellent, in my opinion. Very safe and respectful to the native traditions.

R38, it's legal in Ecuador for ritual/ceremonial purposes, as well. But given the choice between traveling to Ecuador or Peru, I'd choose Peru.

Go online and buy one for your...garden...cough...

This song was based on a Ayahuasca trip - it also inspired her third album, “Boys for Pele” - Amos underwent.

What does ayahuasca taste like?

R43 Verdant cunt.

It is horribe - you get violently ill and it's pretty much the same as an acid trip. Do some shrooms.

Acid is sparkly, eclectic, sharp edges, fast, light, transparent, air and fire.

Ayahuasca is rooted, deepening, timeless, dark and corrective, opaque, earth and water.

R46 You keep teasing us, granddaddy!

Has anyone tried DMT and broken through?

That's the one where you see God. Supposedly the most powerful one of all.

On these trips do you really feel like reality there is more real and you've been there for years?

As long as we are sharing our curiosity, and data from experiments, sex on acid is possible and even remarkable. I don't think sex on ayahuasca is possible (beyond the vomit and the soiled diapers). Any reports or opinions?

R48 DMT is the main engine of ayahuasca.

R43, foul and bitter.

It wipes away bad AND good memories so be careful.

R53 Explain! You bitches are just teasing us with hints about these trips when you should be regaling us with details of your experiences!

Micro-dosing. The future of our mental health and consciousness caretaking.

I would love to go to Peru for this experience. But I’m fat, have high blood pressure (a no no from what I’ve read- I think because of the altitude) AND I’m on a few psych meds.

I’m afraid of giving up meds for the detox prep, only to be rejected for my bp.

I do vicariously enjoy the accounts here though.

All the repetitive memories that your mind skips to involuntarily at the weirdest of moments will not trouble you anymore. It's a reset. But be sure you want it.

R56 Aw! I swear, your post makes me want to hug and kiss you on the cheek.

I've heard mostly great things about it. But also scared because one acquaintance said it's opening a door you can't close again.

Wachuma San Pedro looks wild

I took when I was touring the Amazon with a group of Americans and Europeans and some Brazilians and Bolivians.

The stories in the group varied from people talking to angels and ET races to people vomiting their ass off and "cleansing" oneself.

I talked to some ETS that told me they'd massively appear on the skies across the world in the next 5 years, no joke, that's the experience I had.

I've had many conversations like that afterwards. it does open a door...

on my bucket list

R60, San Pedro Cactus is mother nature's MDMA, very positive and empathetic

R61 What year...?

I haven't used Ayahuasca, but I have used DMT (main active ingredient in it) on three occasions.

Not for the faint of heart, but I am very glad I did it.

R33/R8/R9 here.

So when I started moving by myself, my arms were going everywhere, raising by themselves, massaging each of their respective shoulders (right hand just bending towards right shoulder, left to left) accompanied by the message "see you can comfort yourself". Very strange. Then my mind split into multiple voices: 1. confused depressed me, 2) a trickster, 3. a godlike voice who explained things, whom I was compelled to believe (I had no choice; actually, I was quite servile to the voice, and just agreed along, and in agreeing it somehow made perfect sense).

The trickster tried a few times to say "This is pointless and silly; it's not going to work" but somehow confused depressed me was able to ignore him and I think maybe say "Whatever - go away". Eventually the trickster went away and it was just the godlike authority and me.

More later.

It causes you to give up a successful career on a daytime soap to pursue a multi year journey of spiritual enlightenment.

Excuse for 40 and 50 somethings to trip again.

R66 Are you sure the trickster trickster isn’t talking to you know because you’re definitely playing with us, daddy!

Ayhuasca is legal in all South American countries. Some countries restrict its usage to religious group, but most groups will accept foreigners or outsiders to partake for a fee, that's how they keep it running.

Source: took it in many different countries legally.

[quote] [R61] What year...?

This talk was in 2017, it was addressing 2019-2022.

[quote] I really want to try it. But it's meant to be particularly good if you have some past unresolved trauma that you want to address, and that doesn't really apply to me -

You're wrong. As mentioned above, i've taken it many times and I had no major trauma to address, I had a very happy and loving childhood and great parents and siblings.

My trips were very fun and filled with lots of laughter and joy. You don't need to be in a dark place for this to change you.

[quote] It could retraumatize you if you’re not properly guided. Ayahuasca is no joke.

Same could happen on a Zoom call. Stop terrorizing people with mindless stupidity, you sound like a church lady warning about tarot cards.

Most groups, specially in Brazil and Bolivia vet everyone. You can't take it if you're under deep depression or if you're taking some kinds of anti depressants.

[quote] They also chewed coca leaves all the time, so there's that. They had a lot of energy for "development" of a culture.

If you knew anything about chemistry, you'd know coca leaves are extremely beneficial, it doesn't turn into a problem until it's refined into a powder.

My God some posters here are so idiotic I can't even...

[quote] It is horribe - you get violently ill and it's pretty much the same as an acid trip. Do some shrooms.

BS. Stop lying.

The biggest difference between Ayahuasca and many other plants and drugs is that even though the trip could be wild, if you open your eyes you're back to reality.

A friend of mine never had a trip on it. Took it many times. So this terrorizing fantasy that it can fuck you up blah blah sounds like old people in a nursing home talking about Elvis and his threat to music back in the day.

R73, I don't get where that poster said anything about it being a problem. He said chewing coca leaves gives energy -- and it does.

Coca leaves unprocessed are harmless. You just put them in hot water and it's like mildly caffieinated tea. They have them at every hotel in Cuzco.

R77, yep -- they help with altitude sickness as well, and if you are in Cuzco, you will need time to acclimate to that crazy altitude.

R72 Bitch, you just proved my point..

Detailed documentary shows the preparation, the effect, and associated rituals.

How long does the high last? I'm very curious about trying this.

R73 Clearly you read something the original post that you wanted to see.... to provide you an opportunity to complain. Nothing in the original post said that chewing coca leaves was wrong or anything remotely like (I suppose you want to say) free basing cocaine.

Chewing coca leaves both helps adapt to very high elevations AND gives you a bit of energy, hence the assistance to develop great civilizations.

Documentary portrays several Westerners going thru the experience in great detail, explaining their motivations and the result.

'But also scared because one acquaintance said it's opening a door you can't close again.'

More like closing a door you can't open again.

I have taken it five or six times and it changed my perception of life and permanently ended my lifelong suicidal ideation. It completely transformed me.

I have written a lot about it on this site, including in this thread I started a while back.

R8/R66 here. I have a particular cause I want to leave all my money to. I don't want to name it here. The authority voice ("he") was explaining that I just need to focus on that, and even if what I leave to the cause helps the cause just 1 mm out of a million miles to its goal, that's enough.

He said I might come back after death in another form, and he showed me that I might become an ocean animal, way down deep in the ocean, where he took me very briefly, showing me the world through a fish's eyes. The water felt heavy. He said don't be scared of death. He was slapping my face by making me slap my own face gently in a friendly "boy, don't you get it?!" way. I was nodding and laughing throughout in an "Omg why didn't I realize this before?!" way. I was quite the kiss-ass towards the authority voice.

He helped me with my sexual problems — obsession, distracting sexual desire, etc. He said I can put all of that in this glass cube he "gave" me. He said put it on the nightstand and call it [a male name I won't put here -let's say John]. He said I can visit John whenever I want (porn, mastubation, escorts, etc.), but I can safely and with confidence compartmentalize my sexual desire in ways that don't make it a distraction from my goal of earning money for my cause.

What else ... I'll look through my notes, which I took when my body automatically walked me to my room. It was moving my arms about 80% to write the notes. I have to dig them up.

But that was the first ceremony. Two more followed and sucked because I had too much ayahuasca those two things. Will explain those later.

Re the cache reset someone mentioned above, I experienced something like that in that, before, I would instantly cry whenever I thought about the cause I'm dedicated to - the victims of what I'm dedicating my life's earnings fighting. I was able to control that after "la medicina": I can cry anytime when I think about the victims now, but it's a choice now. It felt like a lot was cleared up and reset. I felt really good the morning after, and carried a sense of peace for a while even after I got home.

I said I'd never do it again after the second and third ceremonies, but now that I've thought about it again, I'm tempted to at least consider going again, perhaps for just one or two ceremonies, two days apart. The shaman was a very lovely kind old woman. I remember her and have a picture with her. They rescue dogs there, too, and I loved this sweet black dog there who has a messed-up front leg from being hit by a car and never having had the bone reset. I love him and I remember his name and have pictures of him. I hope he's still doing OK.

Oh and the hotel I stayed at for two nights before the retreat started (to adapt to the altitude and just get settled) was very decent — a good value — and the staff were very kind as well. If anyone wants the name, I can dig it up.

So the cause is about abused animals or children? What are they victims of?

Thanks, R85!

R88 Don’t be pushy, Rose.

Dear Lord in Heaven!

Again this was the excellent place I went to near Cuzco. Stayed in Cuzco 2 nights to adjust to the altitude (coca leaf tea helped), then went to their in-town clinic for health checks (blood pressure) and a required cleans (volcanic water with salt, to flush out the system; tedious but not embarrassing: everyone had to do it, and all the intakes where there).

And here's the excellent, great-value hotel.

Tierra Viva Cusco Centro

R85 here. I am on my computer now instead of my phone, and so I can type more readily and will share a little bit of detail, since I see a variety of comments above that match and depart a bit from my experiences.

I'll post a separate comment for each of a few different notable experiences. This will be about my first experience.

The first time I took ayahuasca, I very little of the desired effect, but there were effects. I drank it, gagged on it, felt disgusted. After 15-20 minutes, I would get a strange sensation that my body was riding a swell of water, on and off. I found it interesting. My leg began to visibly twitch, and the twitch moved up my leg, and that freaked me out. It made me feel like some kind of parasitic creature was crawling around inside me. But it wasn't really that big a deal. I noticed that a digital light had a trailing effect when I moved my head, and I became afraid of impending hallucinations because I had never taken any kind of (non-psychiatrist prescribed) mind-altering substance before.

So then I began to panic, worried about what I was in for and if I had made a mistake. I regretted it, even though I had spent 18 months researching both scientific literature and personal experiences about it and had a good idea of what to expect. I had read countless times that "set and setting" matter, and I knew my mindset was resisting and that that was not good. It wasn't good.

I had a sudden flash of panic, for no good reason thinking an airplane was going to crash in my direction. I knew it was crazy, but I couldn't get it out of my mind. I became obsessively worried about it and I felt like I was going to die.

Eventually (hours), I calmed down and lie down to try to sleep it off. I kind of slept. I waited eagerly for the "light show" and there was none. I saw the faintest little green spots in mosaic-like swirls moving slowly, but that was it. And I thought, "of course I would fail at a psychedelic experience. I'm such a freak." (I was very ill at the time, very depressed and also drank a lot. This will come into play through later experiences.)

I fell asleep and dreamed that I was moving in a strange way through a dense, dark sort of medium. It was really weird. I was just sort of pushing my way through it. It took some effort, but it was comfortable to be surrounded by such a dense atmosphere and I felt safe. Out of nowhere, I thought "WORM" and then I realized I had the vantage point of a worm crawling through soil. It freaked me out and I realized I wasn't asleep at all. My heart raced. It continued for a while and I calmed down and started thinking, "this is so interesting. Isn't this nice? I'll never think of a worm the same way again. I wonder if living beings can project themselves into other living beings and gain their experiences?" I thought things like that, and then I woke up in the morning, having fallen asleep at some point.

I was shocked that I didn't feel hung over or any effect at all. Actually, I woke up completely refreshed feeling and I told myself I was insane for having never taken any mind-altering substance before and then taking one of the most potent psychedelics known. I swore I would never do it again. I had learned my lesson.

My second experience:

As the day went on, I debated with myself. I had spent so long reading about ayahuasca and I really did know what to expect, including the backlash from fighting its effects. I was disappointed in myself.

That evening, I decided to try it again. This time, I felt EXTREMELY humbled and respectful of ayahuasca, and I did what seemed silly to me before this experience: I meditated on my intentions before I did it. I wanted to stop being so ill, but that was magical thinking to expect it to heal me. If I couldn't heal, and if whatever was wrong with me was indeed breaking down my body as it seemed to be doing, then I wanted to find a way to make peace with it. I definitively wanted to break my drinking compulsion. I was drinking a hell of a lot more than I was comfortable doing, and throughout the work day, I would look forward to going home and having a drink. (More than one.) So those were my intentions. I drank it.

The same things happened again--the twitching, the "riding a wave" feeling, of course the nauseousness. Oh, I forgot to mention: yes, it makes you purge. It doesn't make me throw up, though; it gives me explosive diarrhea. I didn't look forward to it but I had been through it the night before. This time, after I purged, I realized how lightening it felt. It was really a good feeling, and that reassured me.

I didn't have a panic attack. I didn't have any visual hallucinations of the sort I expected--colorful, geometric--with my eyes closed or open.

I lay down again and just decided to surrender to it and let whatever was going to happen happen.

I could write way too much about it and so I will summarize.

I "heard a voice" in my mind, and I debated whether it was indeed "a voice." It was more like a thought, but not my thought. The only sufficient way to describe it would be telepathic communication--some other entity entering my mind and communicating with me without language, but clearly. It provoked me to ask personal questions about myself, to sort of take an inventory of my behaviors and motivations. At the same time, as someone described above, my body felt like it was being "inspected" physically. This was really weird but not at all uncomfortable. My foot wiggled and moved around. Then my lower leg, then my whole leg. My hips gyrated. I thought "what the fuck?" I could stop it and control myself at any time, which was very reassuring. I could open my eyes at any time and just see the space around me, which was very reassuring. So I would relax again, and the physical inspection would continue. My torso would lift and then fall, lift and fall, lift and fall. Then my fingers would wiggle, my hand would move at the wrist, my arm, my shoulder, my neck--and then what happened really did freak me out. My eyes started opening and closing, my jaw did the same, and then the right side of my nose started running spontaneously and my right eye was tearing. I had been tracking it all but when this happened, I realized it wasn't my subconscious controlling my body and really felt like someone else was sharing control of my body. Then all the same stuff on the left side, including the left nostril and left eye running.

That ended and I was subsumed into some other state of being. It was not "psychedelic" in the visual sense we expect. But I was asking all these questions. Just one example: (my voice) You said you wanted to stop drinking. Why are you drinking so much? I don't know. [it's voice: Yes you do.] I...don't know. [Yes.] I do it...I don't know. I don't want to, but I started doing it when I moved into the city and it seems to be the only social activity. [Yes. And.] I think that's it. [No.]

This went on and on and my head started nodding or shaking with affirmative or negative responses from "that voice."

I really felt like someone had inhabited my body and my mind. It felt feminine, like a grandmotherly type of personality, very direct and uncompromising but also very loving and supportive. And I can't explain this, but it also felt like it "poked" me sometimes.

R95 Cont.

It felt like it had a sense of humor, which is maybe the weirdest thing about it to me.

Anyway, this Q&A process went on and on and I got a lot of answers through the interrogation.

And when the answers came, they were so genuine and coming directly from the deepest and most honest part of me that there's no way ever to get away from them.

This was the bulk of this experience. I had a drink the next day, and with the first sip, I was as nauseated as I had been from taking ayahuasca. I almost threw up. I kept drinking. I also kept hearing that voice saying, "Why are you poisoning yourself?" I stopped drinking after that one drink. I have not had a drink alone since that time, not because I avoid doing it but because I don't want to. The most I've had in social situations since then is two drinks, but I feel so sick while I am drinking now that I actually don't want to do it.

I think this happened around 2012 or 2013.

These are exhaustive, I know. I will post only two more.

The third time I took ayauasca, everything that happened the second time happened again. It was becoming comfortable and fascinating.

Phase 1: Purging

Phase 2: Physical inspection

Phase 3: Interrogation

Phase 4 was new. I felt like I was in some other kind of space that I can't really describe, and there, I was witnessing and simultaneously re-experiencing some upsetting events from my life. I didn't want to, and the ayahuasca somehow "held my hand" psychically and directed me to look at it and to go through it. All the while, it felt like I was being embraced and I felt totally safe. Instead of feeling victimized or injured, I related to people that were doing terrible things to me, and I felt so much love for them. I was only being hurt by what I felt motivating them. That was it. I cried so much during this process.

Eventually, I felt like I was in a really tight, confined space, and I realized that I had wrapped myself up tightly in my blanket like a cocoon, and I began pushing at it and stretching it from inside. I thought that I should get out of it so that I could breathe, but I felt so warm and comfortable that I didn't want to open up the blanket. I kept stretching at the sides and thought that I would have to get out of it because it was becoming so uncomfortable, but it was so warm and the air outside was going to be almost painful. And then just as I had thought WORM during that first experience, I thought WOMB, and I was like HOLY FUCK AM I RELIVING BEING IN THE WOMB? THIS CANNOT BE HAPPENING. The feeling was *the most blissful and comfortable* I ever remember feeling, though.

At some point, I felt my arms and legs pressing down really hard and I noticed how heavy my body felt. And it got heavier and heavier, like one of those gravitron centrifugal force rides. I liked the feeling for quite a while and then it became so heavy that I felt like stones were being piled on my chest and I struggled to breathe. I remembered to just let it happen and not struggle against it. But eventually I was really gasping for breath and thought I might suffocate. The heaviness continued beyond what I thought I could take, and then I felt this CRACK and an explosion from the center of my chest. It felt physically like my chest had exploded open, and I launched from my body into space. I mean, it seems totally silly to write this out, but I was out in space, weightless, and it was completely dark except shimmering lights and I was being propelled amid them as if I were swimming. They looked alive, like plankton swimming and free floating in the ocean, and I was moving at a breakneck speed, faster and faster and faster.

I saw a bright light from the corner of my vision. I should say I felt the light more than I saw it. It was so warm, so comfortable, and beyond comfortable. It really felt divine. I was in absolute awe and I tried to get a better view of it and it just moved slowly into my field of vision and I was absolutely awestruck and I wondered if that was "the light" or "heaven" or something and I affirmed that I never wanted to be out of its presence and wanted to be closer to it.

And then at some point, my eyes popped open and I couldn't go back. It was over.

Fifth and final experience. This time I did it several years later because my father was about to have a potentially life-threatening surgery and I was terrified, and I did it with a set intention of hoping to realize that life does not end with death, and hoping, if it were at all possible, to meet deceased family members through it. I didn't expect that to happen, but I was terrified of losing my father and I had always found solace in ayahuasca (except that first time...).

Steps 1, 2, and 3 all happened, as they reliably did. I was comfortable, but honestly, the moving of my limbs tired me out and felt tedious because I was anxious to get t the meaningful parts.

This time, I saw sudden flashes of neon-green pluses and opened my eyes in surprise. They were there, too, with my eyes opened. I opened and closed my eyes and realized I was finally having those classic DMT visuals I had never seen, and I was completely shocked and thrown off. The images looked exactly like Shipibo ayahuasca depictions, but they were moving/shifting at a hyperspeed that was completely overwhelming. And there was nothing the least bit organic about them. They felt electrical. I did not like it. I opened my eyes to get away from it but there was no getting away. The visuals were the same with eyes open and closed, and open was far worse because the visions were seen over real objects and I couldn't make sense of it. I worried I might be schizophrenic forever. And I realized I was resisting, the wrong thing to do, and tried to talk myself out of it.

But then there was no more "this reality." There were only the visions. I was lying down and a quiet buzzing not unlike the tinnitus I always have in my left ear became louder and louder and louder until it was deafening. And then it was all shapes moving in a way that sickened me at a pace that sickened me. Then this heavy rainbow stream of light pounded into my forehead from somewhere above and it felt good, but there were countless millions of colors I had never seen before and that was overwhelming to process. This rainbow entity that was entering my mind, I could feel it throughout my body, and it felt like a living intelligence of some kind. I welcomed it and then I panicked when it occurred to me that I could have thoughtlessly granted access to my mind and body to someone with ill will. That really was not a good thought to have.

I went on agonizing for a long time.

Cut to: I was free floating in a vast, empty space. There was *nothing.* No kind of sensory input, no feeling, nothing. It was coldly barren and I was completely alone. It was boring. I waited for something to happen but nothing happened. I called out in my mind and no one answered. It went on. It seemed like it went on for days. And then weeks or months. I was not in my physical body or anywhere anymore. I called out. I begged to be brought back. I worried I had died. I had horrific ideas that my family would find me dead of a "drug overdose," when my intention was not to get high or to punish myself, but to have a spiritual, comforting experience. I had the deepest sorrow I've ever felt. I begged for my life back. I begged and begged. And then I got angry and demanded it. I was "screaming" in this place in such a rage. This could not be it.

cleanse*

Everything I had experienced with ayahuasca up to this point felt alive, intelligent, loving. This place was without any of that. It felt cold and digital somehow. Electronic. And yet it made me realize that this life and this world feel like hazy dreams by comparison. So I knew that that place is more of a reality than this one is and that terrified me because I love my family and my life so much more than I had ever realized and I wanted nothing more than to be here and to finish out my life story. I demanded the right to finish my life. "The voice" told me that everything is OK, that life ends on its own terms at the right time for it to end, and that I had no fault in it being over. I cried so hard and I demanded so adamantly that I have a chance to complete the story I signed up for.

And then at some point I felt something. I felt the presence of something and it was terrifying. It had a heavy magnetism that felt utterly destructive. And then in a flash, this tiny object in the distance was zooming at me, again at a speed that is too hard to comprehend. I was an orb and it buzzed and zapped and had whipping tendrils all around it and it felt like it had all the power in the world. I wondered if it was the Sun or God or what it might be. It scared the fuck out of me.

Then I was falling. It was as if I were falling through space with sheets of glass slamming into me, and me falling through them, and the sheets of all all were moments of my life. I have written about this here before. The moments were from my past and they were moments that had not yet occurred. It happened so fast that I couldn't make any sense of whether it was real or not. As I "saw" them, what happened was that I actually re-experienced them. Moments from childhood, recent ones, all just chaotically flying around.

I saw myself from above sitting in a chair looking old and weathered and I couldn't decide it if was my father or me, but it didn't look enough like my father to be him. But I had died, so how could it be me? And I registered, again, that this all felt more real than our reality does and I knew it was real.

"On the way down," I saw two things that confused me and annoyed me and terrified me. This was April of 2015. I saw Donald Trump. He was president of the United States. And I thought, why the fuck am I seeing Donald Trump? And I thought, well, if he wins the election, then I'll know that I was seeing the future. And I knew that it was more real than reality. I have discussed this here and at the time I discussed it, I refused to describe the second vision because it was too horrifying for me to even describe for fear that somehow saying it out loud might make it manifest. But Trump is gone now and so I will say it. I saw a concentration camp, with people up against a wire fence looking starved and suffering. It scared the shit out of me so much that from April of 2015, I was absolutely raving about the reality that Trump could become president and the capacity of his willingness to do evil things. I wrote about the dangers of him in 2015. I told everyone I absolutely knew he would win and everyone told me I was crazy.

Anyway, I crashed through all those visions, past and future, and then my eyes opened and I was in my bedroom. I BAWLED. I could not believe I had the chance to be alive again. I literally jumped up and down for the next two days to experience gravity. Yes, that's crazy, but that's the effect it had.

After all the sensational sensory overstimulation and the hyper-felt emotions, I realized when I "came back" here that I am here to live out a story and I am determined to do it. I also realized that no matter how complicated things seem in this world, things in this world are sooooooooooooooo simple. We have so many limitations on us, and I am telling you, that is a blessing compared with chaos. I remember as if it happened last night that this place feels like a paradise, this place being our live in this world. I don't think it's the ultimate reality anymore.

R96 Post away, my love. It’s good for you and informative to us.

R68, I would say that adults are exactly who ayahuasca is for/who can handle it. It's too complex an experience to be wasted on a youth (blank slate) who can't process/appreciate the experience, and it's not exactly a party drug like molly.

Not exactly? It's not a party drug or "a good time." It can be a terrifying, traumatic experience, and it can be a blissful experience, but it demands intention and attention. Ayahuasca isn't something you pop in your mouth that shows you rainbow colors. I really cannot imagine anyone taking it as a party drug.

R103, there are a lot of college-age kids going for ayahuasca tourism trips, and I'm like, why? The experience will almost certainly be lost on them. I think they think it'll be like some jungle acid trip.

R104 Have you taken ayahuasca?

I really can't imagine the experience being lost on almost anyone. It can be transcendent. It's insightful and profound and usually makes people feel tremendous empathy and a feeling of interconnectedness. I can't imagine how that would be lost on someone because they're in college. It might be a good foundational view with which to start out a life.

After I took ayahuasca and felt that plants and all beings are conscious and interconnected, I actually walked around and thought, "wow, no wonder indigenous people send young people on vision quests. I would have lived so differently if I had seen the world the way I see it now when I was young and ambitious."

R105, yes, when I was younger. And you're right, while I wouldn't say it was lost on me, I would say that I wasn't mature enough/had enough meaningful life experience to process what the experience was trying to teach me. I think I needed more wisdom, maturity, and introspection to fully process it.

R106 That's fair. I could have lost my mind from it had I not been in such a desperate life situation when I took it and if I had not known what to expect. But people of many ages take it and get a lot out of it.

Great posts,R94.

Is it something that you want to do with a friend/partner?

R109 If you go to a retreat in South America, Costa Rica, etc., then you need to research the safety, and especially if you're a woman, you should go with someone else. Some bad things have happened at some retreats--generally, sexual assaults of women by people who work at the places. They're rare, but they have happened.

One other little caveat: some South American shamans use admixtures--other plants in their recipes--and for some, that includes "toé," which can be datura or brugmansia (aka angel's trumpet), and it is very potent and potentially lethal. It's unlikely anyone would add it without really knowing what they are doing, but I've read that people should make sure to request no toé. So just take proper precautions and do your research. Ayahuasca itself shouldn't be dangerous to almost anyone, but admixtures can be, and there have been some safety problems at some retreat centers.

Also, if you decide to do one of those 'ayahuasca tourism' things, you should still read about the process of how it is made and why people take it traditionally, read about people's experiences and/or watch YouTube videos of people describing their experiences so that you'll know what you are in for. You also need to be certain you don't have any contraindicated medical conditions such as cardiovascular problems, and that your system is well cleared (at least six weeks) of any antidepressants or antianxiolytics, *and* you should follow an ayahuasca diet beginning several days before the experiences. They're important from a traditional perspective, but the diet turns out also to be important or at least useful from a physiological standpoint because some types of foods don't mix well with ayahuasca. Not observing the diet won't kill you, but it could adversely affect your experience in some ways--anxiety, for example--and if you're going to take such a huge leap of faith as to take ayahuasca, why not take the step of observing the diet, too?

Please watch this documentary, and especially the very last part where the host discusses how Ayahuasca can permanently change one's brain chemistry for the better. Several men portrayed in the video relay how the experience changed their lives 2 years later. All were dealing with deep depression and/or very traumatic childhood experiences.

R110 and R111 Thank you!

Psilocybin, iboga, ayahuasca and I believe also LSD are well documented at this point as effective treatments for anxiety, depression and addiction cessation.

When the founder of Alcoholics Anonymos formulated his 12 steps, one of the original steps was the use of LSD. It was eliminated because eventually people decided LSD is a "bad drug" and that it's crazy to use a drug to break an addiction. But it works.

Psilocybin has the greatest efficacy of any known substance at breaking tobacco smoking addiction. Ibogaine is an extract used clinically for severe physical addiction.

Psychedelics can cause neurons that normally are not connected to attach, and that is what creates temporary extraordinary sensory perception. It likely repairs some damaged neurons in the process, sort of a "tune up" that makes the brain function more as it was designed to do.

I described how the ayahuasca gave me a "physical exam" every time I took it but I neglected to mention that that included a "scrubbing bubbles" sensation inside my head. It felt like something fizzy was happening in my brain, or that's how I interpret the sensation, anyway.

My short-term memory improved after those experiences, but I also took lion's mane mushroom (non-psychotropic) supplements for several years. Lion's mane has been clinically proven to improve mild cognitive impairment and show strong promise for potentially regenerating damaged nerve cells, which to date has not been possible. You can find abstracts from studies relating to this via PubMed, NIH's online medical research library.

Dude, just buy some 'shrooms.

Machine elves are typically attributed to smoked DMT and not usually to ayahuasca.

DMT is the "light show" component and generally speaking the more superficial aspect of the experience.

The ayahuasca vine is the soul experience.

The order of events is: 1) the physical purge; 2) the DMT visuals (if they happen); and 3) the visionary vine. The third part has been likened to "10 years of therapy in six hours," and you really should think about it that way if your inclination is to take ayahuaca for giggles. If you just want to get high, choose something else. If you want to heal your soul or confront your questions about mortality, then take ayahuasca (or iboga).

I love you, R113. You’re so thought provoking!

Thanks, R116. Love you back.

thank you all so much for so many great posts!

Is it very different from shrooms?

R119 Shrooms, while psycho active, and are light, buoyant, spiritual, sensually enhancing... you are never completely "out" of your regular self and understanding.

For most people Ayahuasca is much heavier, and you are definitely not in control. Following someone else's directions of what to see, think and understand. Being out, away, different from your regular self is what the experience is. Not for the faint of heart.

Also, as someone upthread said - one, almost universal outcome of the Ayahuasca experience is the lasting awareness that plants are sentient.

Robin Quivers from Howard Stern tried it but I don't remember what she said about it.

If this trip is like Tori’s “Datura,” I wanna go!

Great thread!

R122 It's like Tori's "Sister Janet." That song is an account of an ayahuasca experience.

And I believe the song "Beauty of Speed" is an account of DMT.

We climbed through the canopy only to find a crack our cage.

The last thing, a look you gave, and then we tumbled out of control.

I tried to strike a deal with the universe. Me and my deals with the universe!

Smacked upside of the head with the harsh of daylight.

So simple last evening: the beauty of speed.

Afraid we've been changing. In a way I wasn't loving. FEEL those colors changing. The beauty of speed...

I'm coming back for more out of a black and white world. Past a shooting star: the beauty of speed! See the colors changing! See the colors changing...

Even still, I was built to tolerate your temper-ature. It fluctuates, so I must break through the bleak of winter, through your latest barrier. Your latest barrier.

Smacked upside of the head...

I'm coming back for more out of my black and white world, past a shooting star, the beauty of speeeeed! See the colors changing, see the colors changing, see the colors changing, Baby, changing, Baby, changing, I see, see the colors changing!

Afraid I've been changing.

In a way, I wasn't loving.

Feel those colors changing.

The beauty of speed.

[quote]the lasting awareness that plants are sentient

In what sense or senses? That they 'feel' or react to physical stimulus? That they are somehow conscious or have emotions?

I'm curious because I have had similar thoughts w/o ever taking ayahuasca.

R126 I didn't write the comment that you quoted, but I wrote the long descriptions of my ayahuasca experiences above. "The voice" I discuss that talked to me telepathically, that felt maternal or grandmotherly and seemed to "hold my hand" and support me through the re-living of rough experiences and made me feel safe felt to me like the plant. I can explain the voice etc. better than I can explain why it felt like that spirit was the spirit of the vine, but it did feel that way to me unambigously. In my mind, I think of her as "mama ayahuasca." I even always had the sense that as my body was being "inspected," it was the spirit of the plant moving through a human/animal body and "playing" with the ability to move in a different way.

After my second ayahuasca experience, which was deeply moving, I came out of it and had great difficulty rationalizing that I felt like I had been "possessed" by a plant intelligence. That just seemed thoroughly schizophrenic. Yet it was the only way I could interpret what happened, and all subsequent experiences were the same. Even the last one that was a "breakthrough psychedelic experience" that detached me from my body, as soon as I opened my eyes and was back in this reality, I was simultaneously comforted by "mama ayahuasca" and told it's OK, it's OK, you're OK.

After every experience, for weeks and months afterward, I used to gently touch plants as I walked down the street and mentally acknowledge them. Now my house is full of plants and I honestly have great respect for them as conscious, intelligent beings.

I now believe that plants access information in a different way than we do. Our brains calculate and they filter stimuli out so that what we experience is limited and we can move through life as we need to do without distractions. I'm sure all plants have different life experiences, but I believe that many hold great wisdom and have superior intelligences to ours. We just normally are not able to communicate, and ingesting ayahusca, iboga, mushrooms, cactus et al. allows us to experience one another.

Also, R126, in the Amazon, ayahuasca is regarded as a "teacher plant." People who use it respect ayahuasca as an intelligent, kind entity who shares her knowledge with people when they approach her respectfully. (My experiences confirmed this for me.) I believe ayahuasca was the clear inspiration for the intelligent, nurturing tree in the movie Avatar.

In parts of Africa, people likewise view iboga as a teacher plant--but less kind, with a masculine quality that beats the hell out of you psychically but which nevertheless imparts profound information, including connections with deceased ancestors. This plant and tradition were represented in the movie Black Panther, but as a comic book-y flower that was ingested to take people to the realm of ancestors.

I recommend the book "The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge" by Jeremy Narby. It's "speculative science" but Narby's experiences in the Amazon are really fascinating.

Narby is an anthropologist and he went to the Amazon to study plant medicine.

Ayahuasca is made of two plants: banisteriopsis caapi, an enormous vine, and (most often) psychotria viridis, a leafy shrub that contains DMT. There are billions of species of plants in the Amazon. The vine and the leaf have to be combined to produce the psychoactive effects of ayahuasca.

Narby was confounded and frustrated by the answers he got when he asked the people how they ever figured out how to combine those two plants out of all the plants in the area. He asked them, and their answer was "We ask the plants."

He asked what that means and they were as confused as he was. They just kept insistently saying that they ask the plants and the plants tell them. Eventually, when he couldn't understand, they talked him into trying ayahuasca and then he understood that plants can communicate telepathically, and they tell people things. Just like the local people said. He had been racking his brain trying to interpret their answer as a metaphor but it was just a plain answer.

[quote]Maybe I can lick a toad.

Oh not again honey!

I've had some great times on hallucinogens. I've also had some not so great times on them.

When people get all spiritualistic about it, I instantly lose interest.

R124 How did I miss this?! Source, please.

R127 I swear, I want you to make love to me.

R132 Source of what?

R133 LOL thanks...I think I'm better at analyses and interpretations than at sex, though.

Do I gotta go all the way to damn Peru to try this?

R135 Costa Rica has ayahuasca retreats and it's more convenient to get there and the people are more Americanized.

There are tradeoffs: In Peru, you are more likely to get an authentic experience. Many of the shamans are real, tradtionally trained through apprenticeships, the environment is the natural home to ayahuasca, and you can always book an adjoining trip to see Machu Picchu!

In Costa Rica, you'd get an experience made for tourists, an imitation of an Amazon-region experience. The shamans there are more likely to be attuned to satisfying customers than to doing "soul work," and she they most likely would have studied the ritual as a means to an end of making money rather than as a spiritual commitment.

Some people are describing bad trips earlier in the thread. Never tried ayahuasca, but as a teen (and depressed at times), took morning Glory seeds and tripped alone and it was horrible. I had some visuals and then threw up off and on and at one point felt very peaceful/connected and listened to Enya, but at some point started to panic and feel like I’d never come back and I was also upset that I had no control over the visuals. I remember holding my breath and not feeling any burning and then I panicked more thinking of how to end the trip and how stupid I was for doing this and considered jumping out of my window upstairs. I prayed out of fear and panic and then managed to call a friend to come over and help calm me down.

Setting and mindset are everything with hallucinogens and I would caution anyone against tripping alone. I never took a hallucinogen again after that horrible trip—that was a few decades ago.

I have read that sole indigenous people or at least shamans consider ayahuasca a teacher also in the sense that you learn lessons class by class, just like in a school or through tutoring, apprenticeship, etc.

There's a saying that "ayahuasca never gives you more than you are prepared to handle," even though it can be overwhelming at the time you do it.

So, typically, it's meant to be taken more than one time. Like learning numbers before counting, before arithmetic, before algebra, each incremental installment builds on prior lessons. So don't expect to drink it and experience a big-bang revelation and then be done with it.

And it is quite unlike addictive drugs: You typically do not want to do it again soon after you do it because it is very challenging. Shamans consider the ayahuasca experience to be less important than the time between experiences during which you integrate/make sense of/discover meaning from those limited experiences. Then you are ready for the next one.

R121, she went to Etnikas, mentioned above. She had a great experience. That's why I chose Etnikas. It was great.

Here's a clip of Robin talking about it. There's much more to the segment, but they only posted part of it.

The footage isn't of Etnikas though, and I don't recognize the shaman (I met two): perhaps she had two different experiences and two different places.

Different part of the clip.

R135 There are ayahuasca shamans (shamen?) all over the country. Every county in the Bay Area has a "center"....

As was said above (and documented by the solo morning glory trip) never, ever do ayahuasca alone. Best situation is where you have total confidence in the experience and good intent of those who are guiding you.

^^ I remember seeing some reality TV show about a couple in rural Kentucky who were running an Ayahuasca center. They both seemed a little like people of WalMart MAGA folk.... not my choice, but hey, if that makes you feel safe...

R134 That T based that song on a trip. It’s one of my favorite b-sides. I mean, I suppose the lyrics give that impression...

[quote] Master shaman, I have come / With my dolly from the shadow side

R144 I don't have a source. It's my interpretation, but it's crystal clear to me.

Sister Janet has been a favorite of mine since the 90s, but I always thought the lyrics were stream of consciousness like "Here. In My Head" and "Thoughts." Then I took ayahuasca, and the next time I played the song I realized that it's a totally straightforward account of an ayahuasca experience.

I'll break it down. You can choose whether or not to hear it as I do.

[quote] Master shaman, I have come

Straightforward account to making a pilgrimage to a shaman.

[quote] with my dolly from the shadow side / with a demon and an Englishman

A dolly has long been used in magical rituals. The shadow side refers to another, hidden dimension. She has made the pilgrimage with a demon—this may be metaphorical, or it may be a "term of endearment" for someone she knew—and an Englishman. That may be her husband, who is from Cornwall, or it may be another English person. She was living in England at the time the song was written.

So far, all of this adds up to her making a pilgrimage to a medicine person. She has prepared, bringing her dolly and her demon (many possible meanings), and she has gone with a companion.

[quote] I'm a mother / I'm my son

This is VERY typical of ayahuasca, and with breakthrough experiences with different psychedelics: interconnectedness, realizing that not only in a metaphorical way, but in the ultimate version of reality, we are all one. So here, the process is beginning, and she is realizing that she is the same person as the people she is close to, and we could extend this to say with all people.

[quote] Nobody else / is slipping the blade in easy / nobody else / is slipping the blade in the marmalade

I interpret this as a moment of realizing that the people who she has blamed for causing harm, for hiding blades in sweet things that she then ingests, are no different than she is. She has been blaming others, those closest to her, for surreptitiously harming her. She's now realizing that she is those people. "I'm them" could mean that she harms them back in the same ways, or it could be a realization that she's been harming herself--nobody else is doing it. Either way, she identifies with those people now.

[quote] but all the angels / and all the wizards / black and white / are lighting candles in our hands

Above, I described the phased processes I've always experienced with ayahuasca. Here, she is giving us phases of experience: First, she meets the shaman, prepared to do the work. Then, she is introspective and has an epiphany about her relationships and her accountability. Now, she is seeing apparitions: angels and wizards have materialized in front of her. I find it interesting that she says "black and white" here and also in "Beauty of Speed," which I believe to be about DMT, she sings she's coming out "of our black and white world."

Tori has talked quite a lot about her ayahuasca experiences with a shaman, and she often has discussed light and dark, black and white, the shadow side as compared with this world. She regards her ayahuasca "tea with the devil" trips as visiting her shadow, going into the dark, black world, and finding that it lends context to the light we all seek. She talks about balancing the two.

More in the next one...

R145 Love your interpretation. Also, “Here. In My Head” and “Thoughts” are two of my favorite songs ever. So brooding and exquisitely uplifting all at once, and those piano lines... ::chef’s kiss::

More on "Sister Janet" as an ayahuasca narrative...

[quote] Can you feel them / touching hands before our eyes?

This is a straightforward depiction of the synesthesia people commonly report during these experiences. You shouldn't be able to feel wizards and angels touching one another's hands in front of you, right? Well, on ayahuasca, everything is felt. (This is, again, referenced in "Beauty of Speed" when she sings "See those colors changing / FEEL those colors changing / The beauty of speed.")

[quote] And I can even see sweet Marianne.

You have to know something personal about Tori to know what this means, but Marianne was a childhood friend of hers who died. So Tori is now under the influence of ayahuasca, and she's having visions (and feelings) of wizards and angels, and she sees her friend. So she is in fact "on the other side."

To me, it's important to note that this song sounds mysterious and haunting even without knowing what it means, but nearly everything she sings about is inspiring awe in her. She's astounded, but she sings it almost as if she is in a trance.

[quote] Sister Janet, you have come / from the woman clothed with the Sun

The Woman Clothed with the Sun is from the Book of Revelation. That is how the apparition is named in the Bible. She's also known as the Woman of the Apocalypse.

Sister Janet's identity could be anyone, but Sister Janet was an Australian Catholic nun who recorded a rock version of the Lord's Prayer in 1973. Tori was young at this time, she has always been attuned to music, and her father, a Methodist minister, forbade Tori from listening to rock music, and so this nun was probably a role model for Tori as a child.

[quote] Your veil is quietly becoming none.

"Nun" may be a pun, just for kicks. "Apocalypse" literally means "the lifting of the veil." So we have the woman of the veil, or the apocalypse. Tori is astonished here, because she is seeing "beyond the veil" that (in New Age speak, most commonly) divides this material world from the spiritual world. Sister Janet comes into her mind, Tori realizes she was birthed by something divine, and she realizes she is seeing/feeling that aspect of being.

R147 Okay, now you’re preaching to the choir.

Still love you and your divergent thinking!

More Tori...

[quote] Call the Wanderer / He has gone

The Wanderer is a pseudonym for Odin, the ultimate Norse god.

This is a rare mention of a pagan god from so early in her music, but as time has gone on, Tori has made a lot more mentions of European pre-Judeo-Christian gods, and her album Night of Hunters takes her back to ancient Ireland, when the Romans came in and committed genocide against the Celtic gods. This is a really big part of her beliefs system, and she now refers frequently to the disappearance of the "old gods," and she resents it. Her friend Neil Gaiman's "American Gods" deals with this, as well.

[quote] And all those up there / are making it look so easy / with your perfect wing / A wing can cover all sorts of things

This rings of sarcasm to me, which is kind of a funny thing to be put into such a reverent song, but it's common to her worldview. She is having this divine vision--all those angels she sees are presumably beautiful, hovering, and she reveals a little jealousy that they're making being look so easy...but then she cuts them with an accusation of sorts, observing that they have perfect wings, but under them they are concealing something. So she sees these angelic creatures, but she suspects that they are not showing their true selves. (Biblical angels are freaky and often violent creatures, and they can look really terrifying under their wings, which they use to cover themselves, depending on the order of angel.)

[Chorus]

[quote] Hey! Yeah! Yes, this again! Well, I—I think I could try this once again.

This is the first time in the song when she has a pretty excited tone. Her journey seems to be coming to an end, and it has been tumultuous and bizarre and revelatory...and she decides that, yes, she could do it again.

If you take ayahuasca, you'll definitely be left questioning whether you would ever want to put yourself through that again. And you'll probably decide yes.

R148 It wasn't meant to be preaching.

People in this thread have asked for people to share experiences, and I just wanted to walk through the song lyrics because I interpret them to be a really reliable representation of a typical ayahuasca experience.

She went through the phases of visions, self-discovery, personal accountability, encountering the divine, coming down, and questioning whether she could ever put herself through that again.

So I thought it would be worthwhile. :)

R150 You are too adorable :*

What is the body high like? We used to call tripping on acid "frying" and that's kind of what my body felt like. A little more mellow on shrooms. I loved Molly and K back in the day. What's the closest body sensation you can compare it to or is it all just in the mind with the exception of the purging?

R152 I had a distinct buzzing feeling. Just a latent energetic kind of buzzing, and it seemed to be about the same frequency as the buzzing sound I heard in my last super-trip.

This woman does a good job of describing it.

Some of these visuals look just like what I saw/was enmeshed in during the highly visual part, but many parts don't look familiar at all.

The sounds here, though, are very reminiscent of the "out of body" part of the experience. It's unpleasant and it's so tied to my memory that these sounds actually still make me feel physically nauseated.

The vibrating/buzzing feeling feels very tied to the sound.

And by the way, in traditional shamanic approaches to architecture, sound is of the utmost important. During all ayahuasca rituals, shamans sing songs called icaros that they use to accompany the person on ayahuasca, to direct their trip and to keep them safe. It's really interesting because the shifting geometric compositions, the sounds, the vibrating and song are all tied together.

This movie is EXCELLENT. It seems to be inspired by the sort of philosophic worldview that ayahuasca imparts, but it avoids directly mentioning ayahuasca and instead substitutes a fictitious replacement plant.

The movie has an 82 ("universal acclaim") on Metacritic and 96% on Rotten Tomatoes.

It's worth your time whether or not you ever drink ayahuasca.

R155 I’ve listed after that man’s body a few times. Damn.

r95 Uh, with the "explosive diarrhea" - was there a toilet nearby or ... ?

You were able to clean yourself up for the rest of the trip, right?

*lusted

This thread is absolutely fascinating! Thank you to everyone who posted their experiences, especially r113.

Many of the things described ( the sounds, the geometry, the movement and sensations) sound like accounts from ancient sources I have read in the past although these sources did not directly reference ayahuasca.

Also, I can't remember which poster posted the link with the "machine elves" digital art but that fucking blew me away! I can only describe it as "falling into" that picture. The artist doesn't seem to offer prints which is a shame. I can't stop thinking about it.

Please continue posting your experiences as they fascinate me. While I'd be interested in exploring this avenue, as a female, I don't think it would be too safe, sadly.

R159, there are female shamans/ayahuasca healers, if that's of any interest.

Yes, r160, I've had a session with one minus the ayahuasca, so I know they are out there.

It's not the shamans that concern me. It's the other people who would be attending. It's mostly white males and I would not feel completely comfortable around them in that sort of situation.

But thank you.

Hi, all.

I'm the person who shared those long posts above about my experiences with ayahuasca and the Embrace of the Serpent movie.

This is the type of conversation I appreciate about this website, along with interesting obscure stuff, old-timey gay stuff (Bette and Joan, etc.).

I'm a sincere and earnest person, probably to a fault, and I am sad to say that after more than a decade of some illuminating discussions here, I feel like I need to leave this site and find something else to do with my time, or at least a more civil online forum.

Someone started a thread here a few days ago that has stunned me. The topic is a news story about a 24-year-old woman who was gang raped and murdered by two men. 85 percent of the comments in that thread mock the woman, say she got what she wanted and worse, or else they say that she got what she deserved for hanging out with black men, along with astonishing lies about black men being savage killers and rapists. These are the kinds of lies Donald Trump and his followers tell that almost destoyed the United States.

The past four years was traumatic and I do not wish to expose myself to that kind of sick rhetoric any longer.

I started a thread imploring the site owners to moderate content to prohibit extreme hatred, such as claiming a rape and murder victim deserved what she got and claiming that black men are violent and subhuman. My thread got a lot of support. And then it got deleted by the site owners. The hateful thread is still here, and so I can't be part of this community any longer.

Sincere thanks for engaging in my last meaningful conversation on this website. I wish all of you well and I hope you find peace in your explorations.

[quote] I'm a sincere and earnest person, probably to a fault, and I am sad to say that after more than a decade of some illuminating discussions here, I feel like I need to leave this site and find something else to do with my time, or at least a more civil online forum.

I can sense your sincerity and earnestness, R162, quite intensely, actually. I completely relate to where you’re coming from because I have often felt the same, taken extended breaks from the site, and no longer engage on it as often and intensely as I used to. That being said, there is light to be found here amidst the darkness, but I understand and respect your decision.

In fact, the last couple of weeks I have been mulling over doing the same as you. My subscription ends in December and I have already decided not to renew it. I can’t say I won’t be back but a part of my relationship with DL has certainly ended. Most of it has to do with me. On the cusp of middle-age, I find that I want to tend to and explore so much.

I wish I knew you outside of here, love. You’re a true gem.

Is it something that can help you get out of a rut, or stop you from feeling sad (about a loss, for example)..

R162 I had you blocked, which is very curious because this last post is reasonable, and in part, something I could write myself. But you must have posted something at sometime that offended me, so I blocked you. My point is that in this sloppy, blind, binary, two dimensional environment of digital communications - silly, offensive, corrosive things are said... and misperceived.

I do think that the anonymous nature of the internet not only exposed an endemic racism/hate, but actually fostered it, grew it. It's a huge problem. I think the only thing that can save civilization (the root of the word being "civil") is a kind of spiritual renewal engendered by things like ritual and awakening - ayahuasca an example of that.

I can understand your reason for stepping away. I think a "goodbye cruel world" message in social media is actually asking for discussion of why you want that . (Snitty trolling would respond like, "it's not an airport, you don't need to announce your departure").

But this thread, your contributions to it, your understanding of its value, suggest how much you can contribute to DL. Ignore the mess all around, stay to build the beauty. I have no clue why I ever blocked you... but there you go.

R164 Did you read the posts on this thread? Yes, absolutely the point is, in part, to awaken the mind/being to something otherwise ignored, missed, unknown. But folks need to know it's not just for momentary pleasure - there is a "risk" involved. You can press restart, but the price is you can never be that previous self.

At least in my thinking.

I have a chronic gastrointestinal disorder.

I'm asymptomatic, but anything that involves potential pants-shitting immediately makes me not want to partake.

A few years ago, podcasters Ross and Carrie ("Oh No, Ross and Carrie") went down to Costa Rica to do ayahuasca and detailed their experiences.

It's pretty funny and eye-opening.

Part 1 linked below.

Plant Medicine. Off topic, but this is probably a good thread to ask: CBD vs THC. Can anyone speak to the question whether CBD actually does anything?

R169 CBD does work and helps with pain, anxiety, and some forms of depression.

R169 I have started using cbd for cramps and for a migraine I had recently, and partner took some for anxiety. We take relatively low doses as needed but it helps take the edge off pain and anxiety, but it does need to be combined with a bit of THC to work (but can be a microdose to avoid a high). There are products out there with an 18:1 ratio, etc. When I’ve taken it for pain, etc. it has improved my mood slightly, I’ve found. But for severe pain, you’ll have to up the dose quite a bit, which I worry will create tolerance over time if used too often.

For severe pain, I would suggest regular/moderate ratios of CBD:THC. Weed, when I still used it, could take my pain away almost as effectively as an opiate, but I would definitely get high.

Thank you, r162, I am very sorry to see you leave as your posts have fascinated me but I completely understand your disgust.

TBH, I had been avoiding this place for several months because of all the hate. It never used to be this bad. It seems like it's been overrun with MAGAts and other scumbags.

But I logged back in after reading all of the posts in this thread to let ALL of you know I appreciate the openness shared here. So thank you to everyone who shared.

R163 and R175 please do not leave and leave us with trolls and hateful people in here! Although I understand if you need to. I avoid most threads in here because of the horrible things people say, but stick to my special niche threads that I like, including spiritual threads and some celebrity gossip. It is disheartening to see so much snark and bitterness in many threads but we need more people to call it out and provide more balance to the nastiness. Otherwise it’s just a bunch of angry trolls. But I think your frustration is valid so do what you need to do! I just wish we had a place to interact that wasn’t so toxic.

R174 DL has always been full of snark and bitterness. That is fine. It's tolerable and at times relatable.

That is not what I am talking about.

I am talking about a thread about a young woman who was raped by two men and murdered by them. In that thread, with over 100 responses, the majority of responses either said that the woman deserved it/wanted it/asked for it because she hung out with black men, or else they said that all black men are violent/rapists/murderers while dehumanizing them as oversexed animals.

That is not snark or bitterness. It's the worst kind of hatred. It is truly Nazi-level hatred, dehumanizing an entire race and mocking a woman who was killed after being serial raped.

It is not tolerable.

I complained about it.

My complaint was deleted and that thread was not, and not were the sick responses.

If I joined any kind of club or community in real life where people spoke this way, much less thought this way, I would speak out against it. If the proprietor of that place told me to shut up and told the others to keep talking, I would leave it because that is not a place I would have any interest in being.

I have not read worse anywhere on the Internet than what is being said now on DataLounge, and it pains me because I have come here for so long and now I regret having engaged with people who think these things. I feel guilty about it.

R140 Thanks for the clip. I remember Robin trying to talk seriously about it, but in typical Howard fashion, he just made fun of her for it. Gonna watch it again.

Are the ayahuasca and san pedro cactus experiences similar?

3,200-year-old mural of spider god found in Peru. I'm thinking some of these ancient people were partaking...

"Embrace the Serpent" (free for Amazon Prime members) clearly states that knowledge of Ayahuasca and other beneficial plants came from the "Sky gods" who came to Earth as teachers. This is in direct contrast to the many videos where hosts claim that the plants themselves imparted the knowledge.

Wondering if the colonizing priests savagely beat the natives for discussing native traditions and beliefs and therefore their origin stories changed.

Either way Ayahuasca is an antidote to the many intestinal parasites and tropical diseases. Perhaps it helped hunters focus for long periods of time, stave off hunger until the actual kill, and made extremely long, treacherous hikes and voyages tolerable.

Strongly recommend you watch this very short video explaining the effects and demonstrated medical and psychological benefits of Ayahuasca. Those with delicate stomachs should be forewarned that Ayahuasca is very acidic

R180 The machine elves ate the video.

r40 Is Ecuador dangerous?

R180, Here's the link.

It's possible to have the experiences relayed above through intentional meditation and especially shamanic journeying without ingesting any substance.

R184 With all due respect, that's like a "breatharian" proposing that if one meditates enough or properly one can get all the sustenance needed from the air and one can stop eating.

Meditative states can produce great insights, open doors - enlightenment transforming how one experiences being itself. But its is different from the ayahuasca-metabolizing experience. Not even saying which is more authentic or more transformative, just that there is a difference.

Hiking to the top of Mt Whitney and walking through the Louvre are both wonderful experiences. There is no need to say they are the same.

R185 I appreciate what you say that your experiences with ayahuasca were distinct from meditation or guided journey without ayahuasca. However, believe it or not, I have experienced the reset/healing from helpers, electrical energy zapping areas of my body, color healing, intelligent two-way conversations, downloads and life changing understanding, among many other experiences described thread, without ayahuasca. Just presenting another perspective. I do have a funny story about when I did imbibe which I will write below.

When I took took ayahuasca, I was the same as the poster above that had explosive diarrhea, which started 12 hrs after I ingested and went for 6 hrs after that. Also threw up 6 hrs after ingestion and broke a blood vessel in my eye from all the harsh yakking. So yes there was a purge! Lol! Anyhoodle, I was due to get on a plane 3 days later and was concerned about the eye and pressure so went to ER. Now...if you were me, do you tell the story of how this demon red eye came to be, or do you say you threw up from bad food?? People in scrubs took lots of notes....

R182, I never had any problems there. I would avoid Guayaquil though -- which is easy enough.

Of all the videos I've watched I strongly recommend this one particularly if you are right brained. Towards the end the host explains how you can get the same effect for free if that's what is right for you.

I am guessing this isn't something that can be done in the US?

Ayahuasca is federally illegal in the U.S., and it's a schedule 1 drug, which is preposterous. Schedule 1 drugs are supposed to carry a high risk of death by overdose, high risk of physical addiction, and have no medicinal value. None of this applies.

There are a couple of exceptions to the legal status, though.

Two Brazilian churches, União do Vegetal (UDV) and Santo Daime, won a US Supreme Court case that allows them both to administer ayahuasca as a religious sacrament. This is the only explicitly legal way to use ayahuasca in the U.S., and both churches are Christian.

(Notably, a study of UDV members by psychiatrist Charles Grob of the UCLA School of Medicine found them to be psychologically and physically healthier than average, and he has recommended ayahuasca as a treatment for depression.)

The other "legal" use in the U.S. is not legal, per se. A few states and Washington, D.C. have decriminalized the use of plant medicines including cannabis, psilocybin and ayahuasca for personal use by individuals. That means that using it is still federally illegal and therefore risks imprisonment or high fines, but it's the lowest-level priority for police, and so you are unlikely to be arrested for using or possessing it unless you are doing something else to attract the cops--being violent, scaring people, making noise, etc. Theoretically, jaywalking is a higher-priority arrest, but if you happen to jaywalk with ayahuasca in your system, then you could go to prison (theoretically!) for ayahuasca use.

Possessing the plant material that makes ayahuasca is *not* illegal anywhere in the U.S. You may own the leaves and the vine that contain DMT and harmaline. Once you cook them, you've extracted the psychoactive substances and at that point you possess an illegal substance.

One other thing about the risk of using ayahuasca in the U.S.

My therapist is a psychiatrist who works in a hospital and she told me that a patient came in who "almost died" from using ayahuasca. I was curious to know how that happened. The patient was seen or heard by someone behaving erratically and making noises, and they called the police.

The police and EMS came and saw the patient what they believed to be a psychotic state, and the EMS brought the patient to the hospital.

The hospital immediately gave the patient an antipsychotic medication and an antidepressant/antianxilytic.

Combining ayahuasca with psychoactive pharmaceuticals can cause serotonin syndrome, which can be fatal. The hospital almost killed the patient by giving him medications for mental illness, unaware that he had ayahuasca in his system. So it was really the hospital staff that risked his life unwittingly, but because ayahuasca is illegal, they blamed the patient and the drug for the harm.

[quote] Schedule 1 drugs are supposed to carry a high risk of death by overdose, high risk of physical addiction, and have no medicinal value. None of this applies.

I consider the fact that marijuana is still classified as a Schedule 1 drug even more preposterous.

In other news, the New York senate passed a bill yesterday to legalize marijuana.

R192 An important bit of advice. When you take Ayahuasca make sure mom pins a not on your shirt: "High, not psychotic."

No one should do A without a guide and a context that supports and protects you. Anyone taking it alone, just for the high, is pushing off into the ocean in a kayak with no paddle. Respect the plants or there will be tears before bedtime.

After reading these stories I went into a trance like state and saw lights. Amazing the power of belief.

No way this is real right?

Ahem.

www. Soul - (hyphen) Herbs. Com

It's better to fly to the country where it's legal, with a Canadian tourism company to make sure it's legit, right? There's no telling what you're ordering and no way to have accountability for it because it's currently illegal!

R195, Remember that the drug was originally used to counteract internal parasites common in the rain forest. Forced vomiting and other forms of elimination was a magic cleanse as well as a psychological boost for those suffering helplessly.

R196 Well, a few counter-arguments to be the devil's advocate:

1. You can travel to Peru or Brazil or Costa Rica where it's legal and presumably safe, but you're drinking the brew on faith that it has been prepared with the ingredients you hope it to be prepared with. In reality, you're taking a cup of liquid from someone you don't know and trusting that it will be safe. As mentioned above, there have been some violent incidents with some retreat staff (uncommon) and there have been issues with some shamans mixing in toé (also uncommon), which can be deadly and also can be terrifying and traumatic.

2. The plant materials are not illegal in the U.S. Making a brew of them, and thus extracting the DMT and harmaline and combining them so that they are orally active, is illegal in the U.S., however.

3. If you were to order the plant material, it's true that you don't know for sure that you'll get what you ordered. But once you receive the material, you can easily compare it with images online and verify that you've gotten what you paid for.

The bottom line is that you're taking a risk either way. And while you can try to hold a retreat center in a foreign country legally liable for harm caused to you there, what do you really think the chances are that that would work out in your favor? A tourist visiting a country for what is regarded as trendy drug tourism suing a medicine man who runs a shack? In what court? Are you going to fly back to Peru for legal proceedings? And will they take your claim seriously and award you for damages? Probably not.

Beautifully filmed travelogue of No Peru combined with spiritual philosophy re Mother Ayahuasca. Relaxing native music for the soundtrack. Strongly recommend this immersive experience.

What is the plant ayahuasca comes from? Are there different types of plants?

This is my problem. When people start talking about extraction, harmaline maoi, receptor, activator. I just don't get it and since it's shaky and underground it's hard to know the safest route of preparation. It's only self appointed gurus with teks.

R98--- Thank you for sharing this with us. I do have a question, if you don't mind? The place you were at, where you begged to be returned to this life, do you fear death? Is that what you think you were shown, where we go when this life is over? Thank you again. I have been low dosing mushrooms to treat life long depression and self destructive behavior. It has been one week and I feel nothing except nauseous. Maybe I am being impatient because I am a very impatient person. Any input would very much appreciated. I have doubled my caps for two days now. Nothing.

Thanks for all the vid links! I will definitely be checking them out when my schedule clears up.

R202...are you a poster on the long-running mushroom thread? Lots of company there for novices (like us) and lots of experienced people too.

Also R202...I am a first time user of psilocybin based on the other thread. The full effect of the capsules kicked in after about a month, I would say. It’s not so much a “high on life” feeling as it is just not spending so much time dwelling on depressing things, and being able to shake them off if they enter my mind. I also find that the advice given to set an intention each time you dose is helpful.

Thank you, R205. As I said, I am so very impatient and it hasn't served me well, to say the least. I just want out of this darkness so very badly. Sigh.

It takes time. Also, you might eventually want to up the dosage but it’s said to be best to do it slowly. Definitely check out both threads if you haven’t...so much good advice and support to be found over there, along with several success stories. I’m holding you in the light, as we Quakers say. Life is definitely not easy. 🕯

I ordered some shrooms capsules. I'm waiting for them to arrive. I hope they are potent enough to work. I wonder when the effects will begin. I wonder if I can swallow like 10 to see what a mushroom experience is actually like.

[quote]I’m holding you in the light, as we Quakers say. Life is definitely not easy.

Sorry for interjecting, R207, but your post made me smile and go “awww!” 🙏🏼

According to R8's website, it's not safe to take in combo with almost any other drug, including Benadryl.

[quote] This is my problem. When people start talking about extraction, harmaline maoi, receptor, activator. I just don't get it and since it's shaky and underground it's hard to know the safest route of preparation. It's only self appointed gurus with teks.

I'm certainly not saying this to encourage you to brew ayahuasca on your own, but it really is not that complicated. It sounds like you're comparing it to growing mushrooms with "tek," and nothing like that is involved. Ayahuasca is basically made like a sauce, but a whole lot of sauce.

There are three ingredients: the ayahuasca vine, the DMT-containing additive plant (more on that below) and water. That's it.

The brew is made by putting the plant materials in a big pot, simmering it for hours until it reduces to very little, straining the fluid from the plant material. You set aside the "juice" and fill up the pot full of vine and leaves and simmer it down again. You strain it again, fill the pot, simmer and strain again. Then you discard the plant material and simmer down all the ayahuasca brew you have into a cup or two. And that's it. It's not complicated. This is a technique that has been practiced for hundreds and possibly thousands of years in the rainforest.

The active chemicals in the plants is not relevant to the preparation--it's just information that explains what is having a physiological effect on your body. But it isn't complicated, either. It's just interesting to note. The ayahuasca vine contains one psychoactive (you might call it trance-inducing) substance and the DMT-containing plant that is combined with it contains a psychedelic substance (DMT). DMT is not orally active. That means that if you drink DMT, it won't have any effect ok their own. However, combining it with ayahuasca makes it orally active, and the DMT and the trance qualities work together to create a powerfully transformative experience. But you don't need to know the "how" for it to work. All you need to know is what to expect so that you can be prepared for it.

[quote] What is the plant ayahuasca comes from? Are there different types of plants?

Ayahuasca comes from a plant called Banisteriopsis caapi. It is a HUGE, twisting vine that grows in the tropics. Ayahuasca is translated as "vine of the dead" or "vine of souls" because of its profound qualities. If you ever experience it, you will understand the name.

The vine is gigantic, and so it is shredded to pulpy bits to prepare as a brew. (Tori Amos's song "Strong Black Vine" refers to it this way: Blow to bits/Every drip serpents bless/You rape Earth knowledge/Still, she will save you/From your evil faith.")

The vine is the "soul" of ayahuasca and only Banisteriopsis caapi is used.

The DMT-containing plant that is combined with it vary.

--Most commonly, Psychotria viridis, also known as chacruna, is combined with it. Chacruna is regarded as a relatively gentle form of DMT. Chacruna is a woody shrub and only its leaves are used in the brew.

--The alternative sometimes used in the Amazon is Diplopterys cabrerana, aka chaliponga. Chaliponga is regarded as a more aggressive form of DMT than chacruna.

--Not traditionally used but sometimes used by westerners in place of chacruna or chaliponga are syrian rue or acacia bark. Both of these are very potent.

R211 Thanks!!

So ayahuasca activated DMT orally? What's the difference between 5-meo?

There's something about smoking DMT, taking 3 hits and breaking through. Is there similar with ayahuasca oral DMT?

R203, Each video I post is of high quality but very different in style.

This one is quite long but extremely thorough. It combines a travelogue of the rain forest of Brazil and the descendants of the Mayan people with a lot of the philosophy re how Ayahuasca works as explained by an American ex-pat.

Visitors who have a variety of serious psychological and/or physical ailments are portrayed in depth going thru the process. If the purging and repetitive music start to get to you, skip to the end with the surprising follow-up of how all were cured by the immersive process.

R212 DMT and 5-MeO-DMT are not the same. I have never smoked DMT or experienced 5-MeO-DMT, and so I can't really comment personally. I've listened to a lot of stories from people and it sounds to me as if smoked DMT sends people immediately into another, colorful, geometric dimension for 10-15 minutes, and 5-MeO obliterates your sense of self for a time and it's less visual and more of a mind fuck, so to speak. One is wondrous and one is transcendent and stupefying, if I interpret accounts correctly.

Yes, ayahuasca makes DMT orally active. Some people have breakthrough DMT experiences with ayahuasca and some do not. I keep saying it but it can't be overstated: while smoked DMT seems to be something people do for "fun," drinking ayahuasca is not fun. It's not a 10-15 minute psychedelic trip. It's a 5-6 hour-long introspective journey. Most people who do it do see and feel spectacular visions, but what makes more of an impact in most cases is the effect of the vine as an inner personal journey. I sort of think of the combination as DMT luring unsuspecting people in with the promise of spectacle and then the vine wrapping herself around them and holding them through traumas so that they come out healed when they would not have taken the journey otherwise.

But yes, you certainly can have spectacular visions, a psychedelic breakthrough complete with ego dissolution and a knowingness of oneness on ayahuasca. It may or may not come the first time, though, because with ayahuasca, you get what you need when you need it. It's not a toy.

I realize this sounds woo-woo to people who just want to have fun with a drug but I think you'd do well to keep it in mind because you will find it to be true.

Here's a ayahuasca trip report.

So do we go to heaven when we do these drugs? Does it disconnect us from the body and let our souls come out?

In the video still above, you can see the vine (brown) and the chacruna (green leaves) in the pot. That's what is combined to make ayahuasca brew.

The buzzing in his video is what it sounds like when you're about to be "ejected" from yourself.

As he reports, I've also experienced times when the effects come on strong and then quickly wane. It's surprising and disappointing and leaves you anxious. That happened to me when I had my total breakthrough with open-eyed visuals: it began to come on and then everything was normal for 20 or so minutes and then BAM! it was an open-eyed arcade game and then it went back to normal and then I was just yanked out of my body and sent off into a void. I have found that the experiences tend to come in waves.

Radically different video offering. Trippy visually, combined with intellectual discussion by several noted psychiatrists and university researchers.

R216 There's a reason it's called vine of the soul.

Also iboga, which is more aggressive than ayahuasca.

Could you just, drink it and then go to sleep?

Btw, I'm hearing a buzzing in my ears. I'm so highly suggestable to this stuff. I swear the last time I spent a few hours reading testimonials I started seeing random orbs.

I don't want to work corporate America anymore. I just want to do these drugs. 😊

How are you going to pay for the drugs?

Savings. Then I will meditate and ask the plant about money and what I should do with my life.

R214 Keep it up, toots! You’re doing all the filtering and hard work for us and we love you for it!

Meant for R213!

R216 It certainly gives us a peak into the metaphysical world, both the light and dark sides.

I will remember to reach out to Jesus if it starts going bad.

Forgive me, R218, but there are a couple of hot men in this vid. Thanks!

That's the spirit, R227, you big old MARY! Yeah, I know it wasn't my show but still…

R227 I'd be cautious, depending on how you envision Him

I thought [italic]Amen[/italic] was more His style. And it showed Sherman Hemsley didn't need Norman Lear to star in a hit TV show and that Clifton Davis was not to blame for the failure of [italic]That's My Mama[/italic].

R230 Ok, I will..

Did ayahuasca give you answers you were seeking for years, after meditating beforehand? Or did it just kind of make you feel groovy and not worry about your problems anymore.

I honestly thought Ayahuasca was the name of Joanna Kerns' maid when my show was on the air and she could afford hired help.

R232 It showed me things I wanted to see and also things I had never fathomed and would prefer not to know. Overall, the gifts were beyond my hopes. I understand I am worthy of the same respect I give to every other person, and now I am much kinder to myself and therefore more content. I feel less connected from some social conventions and therefore alienated. I honestly carry a childlike sense of wonder about so many everyday things now that makes me feel a kind of joy that I thought was lost after childhood and it's so thrilling that thinking about it brings me to tears. It ended a lifelong compulsion of contemplating suicide and made me afraid of an early death. It convinced me death is the end of this present experience but only a transformation that may be traumatic in a moment, but no more than birth was. It made losing my mother--which terrorized me--a lot easier to accept because I now truly believe that we'll never be disconnected, just separated. It's been a godsend for me. But that's just me.

R233 Chiiile...

R234 You cutie, you.

[quote][R233] Chiiile...

No, I was from Venezuela. Mr. Kirk helped me get saved from the Devil and communism when I work for the white lady on TV with him.

R231 Issued a citation for typing while on hallucinogens.

R232 Hmmm. I think acid, psilocybin/shrooms, mescaline/peyote, high THC stuff... do affect a person per his/her experience, or intention. A long time meditator would have an awareness of what to see and experience - even unspoken or unrecognized, would go into the experience expecting certain things.

Ayahuasca seems not to care about any of that. Previous experience gets checked at the Door.

Related, but different. I think that these tools are important, and they open up the heart, soul and mind to new understanding, bigger understanding. I think these tools, used correctly, generate the Sacred.

But, once taken a few times, do they need to be taken again. I do know folk who taken strong hallucinogens for entertainment, indicated by the frequency and geography of their use.

Ram Dass (rest his soul), one of the original LSD pioneers, stopping taking LSD. He said he did it every couple years "just to check in."

The problem is a question of regular access in non-shitty neighborhoods.

R234 That's like this conversation I heard where these drug experiences said they thought kids were high all the time.

R239 Which plant if I ask it will best tell me how to do life? Because I am almost done. I've had enough. I keep praying to God that if my doesn't change could I just not be here anymore? I'm just done with it all.

R242 Don’t give up, love. Dark nights of the soul are never easy but always fruitful.

R239 In my experience, no, they don't necessarily need to be continued. As I said earlier, the United States schedule 1 status of psychedelics is especially egregious and preposterous because schedule 1 drugs are supposed to fulfill three primary criteria:

1. Schedule 1 drugs must be highly addictive. Psychedelics are not physically addictive and in fact they tend to be the opposite: typically, people do not use them regularly.

2. Schedule 1 drugs must pose a high risk of death by overdose. No one has ever died from an overdose of a psychedelic. Risks are associated with them for some people--for example, some people with latent psychotic illness present with psychosis after using a psychedelic, and some people who have known or unknown cardiovascular problems can be harmed by ayahuasca and iboga because they cause vasoconstriction (narrowing of blood vessels) during use. Also, because of the MAOI content in ayahuasca, combining with SSRI antidepressant medications can cause serotonin syndrome. However, all these risks very rarely cause problems and no one has ever died from overdosing on any psychedelic--unlike alcohol, narcotics, aspirin, Tylenol...

3. Schedule 1 drugs must have zero known medicinal use. This makes classifying all psychedelics, including cannabis (considered by the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies to be a mild psychedelic), preposterous. MDMA was originally developed and used until 1985 by psychotherapists in clinics as a therapeutic to great effect. Then the US government banned researching it for medical purposes and said it has no medicinal use. We now know cannabis has a great number of medicinal properties, from anti-seizure effects to improving glaucoma symptoms, pain relief and appetite stimulation. Psilocybin is now known to be the most effective smoking cessation aid--to far better effect than prescription pharmaceuticals used for this purpose--and it is now used effectively for end-of-life mortality panic. Ibogaine has been extracted from iboga as a pharmaceutical drug used to break narcotic addiction. Ketamine is now used legally in clinics (in pharmaceutical form) to treat mental illnesses as MDMA used to be used. Ayahuasca is not administered clinically in the west and is regarded as hard to study because its preparation is more recipe-art than science, with inexact quantities in different plants, and so it has been pushed to the sidelines--which is good because it is regarded as a plant teacher and a soulful entity by those who have experienced it, and once Purdue Pharma, Pfizer or AstraZeneca commodifies it and the FDA approved their ayahuasca pills, they'll destroy the natural plants and their purposes.

Traditionally, I believe most people use iboga one time as a spiritual rite of passage. It holds people for three full days and most people would not want to do that more than once.

My experience with ayahuasca matches those of others I have heard: I used it several times at first, with each session being a kind of elementary class that built on lessons from the one before it. After three times, I was stunned and bewildered by what I saw and felt and I needed a lot of time to make sense of it and to settle back into reality. After a couple years, I took it again and it was more comfortable and familiar, and I saw and felt much more. Then I waited a couple of years and did it again. That time involved extraordinary revelations and a feeling that I went to "the other side" and so much more, and when I came back I was grateful to be alive again, this world felt like a wonderful, wondrous place that I wanted to be, and I have only had fleeting thoughts about doing it again. When I think about it, my inclination is always that I was so grateful to come back to this life that I don't know why I am thinking about leaving it, even briefly, until it's my natural time to move on from it.

So to answer your question, R239, I think that ayahuasca is self-limiting for most people. You get life-changing lessons from it, those lessons reset and rebalance your sense of who you are in day to day life, and eventually you end up extraordinarily grateful for the life-changing lessons but the recollections of those experiences never leave you or dull at all as some memories do, and you just don't feel any call to keep drinking it. I can understand the concept of 'checking in,' though, if only because I felt so strongly that ayahuasca was a real, sentient entity, and the interaction was so intimate--a kind of mind-body meld--that I feel like taking it again would feel again like going on a vacation to visit an old friend in a way.

Is it ok to do microdose shrooms a few days before aya?

R245 Thanks, that all makes sense. I have a good friend who has taken ayahuasca several times a year for years. I am not one to judge any one else's journey... but I observe that he has slipped down to some shadowy places, and is rambling around a unique and distancing reality. Just kind of toss notes to him over the wall and hope for his best

R242 I don't know how genuine that post is, but may I share that there is a connection in all of us, a door to unitary Presence that is pure and limitless and unconditional love. You are not only loved by the Universe, you are that love itself. On this Good Friday, I access my own traditions to share with you that the Christ was given by the Creator to all of us to know our experience, not to die for our sins, but to conduct a healing light into our darkness. Know that out here in stupid, trivial digitalia, on an obnoxious board like this, there is an old man who prays for your happiness and well being. And that energy is all around you, holding you close. You are the eyes of the world, and it's a beautiful place to see.

R247 that sounds like my ex ,your 1st paragraph, although not necessarily from ayahuasca

Thanks Acid Grandfather. It's pretty genuine. My life's not great and I'm really hoping whatever happens when you ingest these psychedelics will help me make my life better.

I think my way of thinking had led to it being like this. So maybe it will help even if it's just a reset and not explicitly explaining exactly what I need to be doing.

I am planning an ayahuasca retreat for my 40th.

So, when we die, we go back to the one and we don't have an identity anymore? Are their other Gods? Or just the One?

Sometimes I understand why atheists really want to call it all hogwash and balderdash. The thought of having to do life for eternity seems unbearable. Much better to enjoy a finite existence.

[quote] So, when we die, we go back to the one and we don't have an identity anymore? Are their other Gods? Or just the One?

We return to the One if and when we have rid ourselves of karma. If not, we return to hell: here.

R251 False dichotomy, it's not either/or, Pookie.

For me the eternity/identity questions are not in some chronological prison of our current incomplete understanding. The Kingdom of Heaven is inside you, right now.

Not a lot of opportunity to discuss in a social media snack - but I sense you'd be happy with the Stoics' school of thought. Revival of it in the 21st century.

R228, I tried to post videos DL would enjoy watching.

There’s a quickly growing body of research in psychology about the beneficial effects of awe (feeling small in the vastness of the world but while feeling safe) on the body and mind. Hallucinogens do this synthetically by temporarily activating certain parts of the brain. That said, by listening to a beautiful music piece, seeing vistas yourself or even in a video, seeing something inspiring in nature, seeing a beautiful or powerful work of art, etc. can create beneficial effects that are lasting if you create enough awe experiences for yourself. Someone I know experienced awe simply by watching the series Planet Earth. Whether or not we use hallucinogens, creating opportunities for awe would be beneficial for everyone reading this thread in terms of mental and physical health.

[quote] The Kingdom of Heaven is inside you, right now.

Very true, R253.

Ok. I am ordering it. $300 because I can't make it myself. I shall get it in two weeks and join you fine people in knowing the secret of life and not being depressed anymore.

Acid Grandfather, is this true?

Ok got the stuff. BCappi and MHBark. I'm just boiling it together in a pot on med for 3 hours. That's it.

R259 Psychotria viridis is gentler than mimosa is. You're planning to jump straight into something very potent and aggressive--so just brace yourself. You may give yourself quite a fright.

It sounds like you are very eager to make things happen, but patience would serve you well. You might be smart to take the caapi brew by itself the first time, without any additive at all. You will have a chance to understand the feeling of the vine first. By itself, it will still cause you to purge, and you'll still feel anxious and quite possibly will go into a deep, emptional trance state. You could possibly have dreamlike visions, as well. But no phantasmagorical light show. After taking just the caapi, you may be less likely to panic as the effects of the caapi and the mimosa both kick in. You need to prepare yourself so that you don't go into a panic as the effects settle in because if you panic, you will guarantee a very difficult journey. (It would still be worthwhile in the end, most likely, but a lot of time would need to pass before you felt it was worthwhile, and a 'bad trip' could be self-defeating. When people say you have to be in the right mindset and the right setting, it's true. So prepare yourself. Listen to other people's journey stories and realize that any and all of those things could happen to you. If you see an electrical grid blipping in and out before your eyes, or a giant snake, or geometric shapes that think out loud and speak by creating shapes, all of that is 'normal' and you will come back. But the greater challenge than a reality reset in the long run will be confronting your most personal traumas and insecurities, and you will have no choice but to honestly confront them. That will be liberating but the process of it will take a lot of emotional energy and you won't be able to opt out. So make a real, definite determination to yourself that you want and need to do it and you will not try to bail out. Trying to bail out = bad trip. Trying to go into denial = bad trip. It's like a drug addict signing up for a 28-day rehab center and then trying to run away as they are walking through the door. Had they not tried to run away, they'd go through a challenging process but it wouldn't be a horrible experience. If they try to run away, though, the guards will grab them and drag them into their room and everything that follows will feel like an assault. That is exactly how the spirit of ayahuasca works. Shortcuts are not ideal.

R260 Speaks with a lot of wisdom here, pay attention (except for the analogy about signing up for rehab... huh?)

R258 Lots of different sources of a variety of chemicals which alter consciousness, lead to visions and insights, and change the channel for a short time or forever. I think if you're not familiar with how to prepare them, how to use them, what to expect and how to complete the journey, you really should stay away from them.

Intention (which has details like context, trust, internal readiness, experience - in addition to motivation) is important to determine what the experience will be. If you do work "before" the trip - meditation, yoga to center in the body, purging with teas or fasting, and critically - breathing, following the breath, trusting the breath etc. - doing this work may help make the experience deeper, more therapeutic, more likely to deliver insights.

Part of the context is having the plants (or chemicals, if you're going synthetic) prepared correctly, and if you're doing this the first time having somebody be a guide. Guide means someone who knows what they are doing and also, someone who is not high. Again, doing DMT for the first time really should be done under guidance.

If you are doing it just to get high, you'll get high. But what a waste of precious living, what a waste of sacrament. (And what an invitation of a bad experience.).

This may be too woo woo for some - but the Sacred Plants deliver best when respected. Doing Aya (or, in my old view, other high powered entheogens) simply to get high, to roll the dice for bliss... is like having a bottle of Domaine de la Romanee-Conti Romanee-Conti Grand Cru, Cote de Nuits, opening it and using it to cook chicken.

R261 The point of the rehab analogy is to emphasize that working with ayahuasca can be likened to therapeutic self-improvement. It's not easy work. It's entirely rewarding work that is worth the effort. And you can choose how you participate: You can walk in willingly and cooperate with the system, which will give you a very challenging experience but one which will pay off for you in the end. Or you can go into the system, freak out and decide it's too hard for you, and end up being restrained and forced to do the work you sign up for. In a rehab facility, you'd be restrained by security and forced by counselors to do what you signed up for. In the context of ayahuasca, you'd be restrained and forced by ayahuasca to do what you signed up for if you enter into it and then freak out. So you have to go in with an understanding of both what you want to get out of it and that once you sign up for it, you're going to either participate willingly or be made to participate unwillingly. In the end, you'll benefit either way, but wouldn't you rather not make it harder than it has to be?

R259 Bitch, you did not!

Home girl is about to have a South American jungle trip in her living room. 😂

R261 I've only taken ayahuasca, but having done so, the idea of anyone taking it to get high for fun is alarming to me. That's why I keep emphasizing that it's not fun.

Even if a person can't make any sense of the notion and thinks it's ridiculously New Age, it would still be wise to *pretend* that ayahuasca is a teacher who commands respect or else will beat you up until you do. Because that is how it works. Even if a person doesn't attribute the effect to a living spirit, the reality is the same: using it to get high will not work. I think the most likely scenario would be that you'd be caught off guard when you find yourself emotionally on your knees and in an absolute state of awe and then you'd respect it or, less likely, you'd totally resist that what you're feeling and seeing is actually happening and you'll try to claw your way out of it...in which case, you'd get beat up the entire time it's happening and come out of it in a total state of alarm.

As I said, I've never taken any other psychedelic of any sort, but the latter point above is proved by Maureen Dowd's experience with edible marijuana. She had never taken marijuana in any form and decided it would be a good idea to write a column about her first experience in the New York Times after it was decriminalized in Colorado. So she few to Colorado, bought an edible brownie (or something) and took it back to her hotel room. The person who sold it to her told her to follow the instructions on the label and not to take more than one serving. She ate it, waited a short while, decided it didn't work, and so she ate the entire thing, which was 10 or 12 servings or so. She then felt the effects, freaked out, and it turned into a nightmarish trip because she was so unprepared, disrespectful and resistant to the experience after it started. She then decided as a result of her personal experience, which rejected everything she was told not to do, that marijuana is a dangerous drug and that it should be prohibited everywhere.

I imagine that she might have had a positive experience if she had been less cavalier, more respectful of the plant medicine, and if she had not been so eager to have a phenomenal fireworks show that she could brag about to everyone she knew. She fucked it up for herself by being arrogant.

Ayahuasca does NOT tolerate arrogance. Whether you see it as a divine entity or just a potent set of chemical compounds to be careful with, it pays off to humbly ask for insights from it. If you start a wrestling match, you'll look.

Take a look at pictures of the ayahuasca vine. This is what you'll end up psychically wrestling with if you don't approach it with humility and respect. It's a gracious being and it will not leave you hurt, but it will beat the shit out of you until you submit to it.

I realize the Tori Amos stuff might be annoying to people, but since this thread is about people's experiences and insights about ayahuasca, I'm going to post a few quotes from her because they're accurate in my experience:

[quote] "The drug which had a big effect on me was ayahuasca. It comes from a vine in the Amazon and you ingest it. You know that stuff they take in The Emerald Forest? It's like that. I was hanging around with some medicine women and they suggested I try it. I was very lucid, but felt like I was walking around Fantasia, having a conversation with myself. It isn't like acid. It's more emotional, more mental. But it can grab you by the balls and just shove you up against the wall. I've been in a room with a woman who was literally trying to bite her own arm off. And this lasted for 15 hours. I wasn't scared - just scared that I'd make a fool of myself. The funny thing was, I kept laughing and laughing, rather than sitting in the corner being intense. Then every so often, I'd say, I'm in a really rough patch. And one of the medicine women would come over and reassure me that everything was going to be alright. But it would keep on getting deeper. In the end, though, it was an educational experience. I learned a lot about myself. I haven't taken it in a couple of years now. You can only really do it once in a blue moon. But the wild thing is that sometimes I only have to smell something and I'm right back there again, high as a kite. It just happens."

[quote] "I find it [the truth] especially when I'm in an altered state. Music can put me in an altered state. So can hallucinogens. I have used hallucinogens and I do sometimes still use them to journey to another space. I don't use them to escape, but as a tool. And they have been helpful, but only because I have been working with people who have been in the Amazon and learned how to have visionquest. It's the idea of going into your psyche and knowing it more deeply. It's a complete wealth of information in there."

[quote] "I find it [the truth] especially when I'm in an altered state. Music can put me in an altered state. So can hallucinogens. I have used hallucinogens and I do sometimes still use them to journey to another space. I don't use them to escape, but as a tool. And they have been helpful, but only because I have been working with people who have been in the Amazon and learned how to have visionquest. It's the idea of going into your psyche and knowing it more deeply. It's a complete wealth of information in there."

[quote] "Um... the most influential journeys I have had have been with ayahuasca, the vine from the Amazon, the combination of that and mushrooms. It's very much a medicine woman, medicine man's journey drug, where you go inside. It's not a social thing. It's an internal experience. I experiment with things that are usually an internal experience, because that's just what excites me. And yes, it does sometimes give me visions. But my intention when I am doing it is very different than recreational. I don't do it recreationally. I do it to go do inner work, and I'm very clear before I do it what I'm searching for. That way, there's no abuse suffered and I don't rely on it. It's just one more tool that I use sometimes."

[quote] "Ayahuasca is a vine in Brazil in the Amazon - I've had it freeze-dried a few times - but the point is that it gives the medicine men vision down there, and I'd like to think that my concerts are like a journey you get from ayahuasca; that you go through an emotional journey."

[quote] "Ayahuasca...yes, definitely changed my perspective. And I would say to you that the work I did with it at the time, in the late 80s, early 90s, it affects me to this day insomuch as that it has opened up my perspective to realize I needed to listen. I needed to not speak all the time. I needed to listen, and see, and hear what people are saying to me or showing me, what the universe was trying to show me in the moment. It taught me how to do that."

R265 Love it!

R177, San Pedro is from the Andes (mountain region). Ayahuasca is from the Amazon rainforest. Where ayahuasca is feminine sacred plant, San Pedro is masculine. San Pedro was a very gentle and benevolent experience, filling you with love and positivity.

LOL R263

Is R259 still alive?

Some of you should get a lot out of Alan Watts. I’ve started a thread on him (linked below).

Yes, I'm alive, thanks. It takes about a week for delivery. The B caapi will be here soon so I'll start that by itself.

Then the mimosa h will arrive and I will microsip it until I feel ready for trying the big breakthrough. Honestly guys a 6 hour journey doesn't seem like fun. If it's anything like the thinking and analytics I get into my head when I smoke weed 🙄.

R271 Hopefully you won’t try to chew your own arm off!

Nope. I will sip it. I will meditate before.

R273 Mimosa won't be active on its own, only with the caapi. But you could drink caapi first and wait 20 minutes or so before the mimosa.

For whatever it's worth, my first ayahuasca experience was terrifying--just a feeling of panic and doom, no visions. The ones that followed were not. And my body does NOT like cannabis at all. I have smoked it once and took a medical tincture twice and it caused me to panic. It doesn't seem compatible with my psyche.

Why is this thread grayed out?

It’s not for me. Are you on “delicate flower” or “asbestos eyeballs”? 😂😂😂

R274 Thanks. I ordered like 250g each and will ratio it out in equal parts. I will try boiling it separate and together. Just micro sips to start.

I wish I could use a pressure cooker or crock pot.

R275 Big pharma doesn't want you to know there are other mental health alternatives to their endless cycle of meds

This preparation made me laugh.

The caapi is about to arrive. I'm so happy!

Oh hell no, R280. Are you ready?

Yes. The caapi simmering. It smells bad. I see why people throw up.

I guess I'll french press it in 2 hours. I don't have a cheese cloth.

Honestly not even sure it's going to work. Just looks like some shredded tree.

R283 It is shredded bark. It's also a teacher. Remember that.

You will most likely have very mild psychotropic effects from taking Banisteriopsis caapi alone, so you may drink it and feel nauseated and then decide it didn't work. Don't be foolish. It is very mild on its own and the effects are not visual, but visionary--deep meditation in a trancelike effect. You may feel a heavy buzzing sensation and it's possible you'll feel panicked. It does smell bad and it tastes worse. But whether you get a potent reaction or a very mild one or feel nothing, it is working in your interest.

Do you know what kind of caapi vine you're working with? Black, yellow, cielo, red? They vary in intensity.

It's yellow. I didn't know it varied by intensity.

I really want to drink it now but I guess it had to be 3 hours. It's just the caapi. The mimosa is coming from Netherlands in another week or so.

I also got my microdose mushroom capsules and took one today.

R285 It does, although it also varies from individual plant to plant.

There's a reason the Tori Amos song above is called "strong black vine." Black caapi is usually the most potent. Yellow is the most traditional one and it should be easy on you.

Thanks.

I wish I could have a meetup party or something and do this. In a real pot ceremony outside.

Do people see snakes because they're in the jungle? I'm going to lay in my hammock.

I think it boiled out because I got about a coffee cup total. I drank it. I feel nice I guess. Lightheaded.

I'm listening to Grandma Willow from Pocahontas.

Put the phone away and close your eyes and listen.

Ok. I will.

R282 Share every detail of your experience here. In fact, commune with us whilst ascended.

R286 Isn’t Strong Black Vine underrated? I think AAtS is in general.

R286 I appreciate the song more than I enjoy listening to it. I realized why it's so discordant when I figured out what it's about.

Isn’t that song “Two Vines” by Empire of the Sun supposed to be about ayahuasca?

I don't think I drank enough. I kinda rushed the boiling by an hour. It was 3/4ths of a coffee cup.

Everything was just peaceful. It looked like there were diamonds in the trees. It was the sun behind the tree.

That's about it! Strange to think you can order some tree and boil it. I'll do it again but be more methodical about it. I spilled a pickle jar and was too distracted to see or hear anything.

No major insights or anything.

R293 Yes, I understand 😂 I love Ophelia, though.

R295 Chiiile. Has it even been an hour?

R295 Are you being serious with us?

I don't know why you would have rushed it, but ayahuasca preparation typically involves simmering down three washes of water and then further concentrating the three concentrates into a thick, almost tarry viscous liquid. That can take eight to 12 hours.

It usually takes ~45 to 60 minutes or so before the effects begin, and then they last for five to six hours in most cases.

You didn't mention the taste, which is unforgettable, or purging...

Yes, it has. I'm pretty big, 6 ft and hefty so I'll need more.

R298 Oh! I didn't know that. I just simmered it for about two hours, drained it and drank what I drained.

You're supposed to make a tar?

R296 I think the album is good and certainly underappreciated, but it's also very heavy and the only Tori album that actually makes me sad. I love Flavor, Fire to Your Plain, Give and Starling. I like Curtain Call a lot as a song but it's really depressing.

Yeah it was nasty. I chugged it but it was less than a coffee cup. I'm trying to forget about it and hoping I won't be having accidents tomorrow.

R300 Not tar, really. It should look like this. It gets thick, even a slight bit syrupy if you really concentrate it. It always will have particles that will settle and separate out a clearer liquid from a dark particulate one.

The point of doing multiple washes is to extract as much from the leaves as possible. Then you concentrate all the reduced liquid into about a cup or so. It should be a rich, dark brown, not a brownish or yellowish clear water.

This is it. This is what I boiled. A few handfuls of this.

Another view.

If it isn't this dark and opaque then you made a weak tea.

Patience is a virtue.

Ok. I guess I need to read more about how to make it thicker.

R306 Watch this. He shows how to do it. It seems like you're intent on taking a shortcut, but you really should do multiple washes.

He says to use vinegar in the water. The reason for that is because the acid helps to extract the essence from the bark. You could use lemon juice in place of vinegar (which will make it taste more putrid), but you could also not use anything and get a less potent brew.

I did,but his caapi is a resin, no?

R301 It was a necessary evil after the disasters that were TBK and ADP. Although I don’t really listen to them anymore, AAtS and MwG were when I realized she had hit her nadir and was on her way back. For that reason alone, I will always look on them bittersweetly. NoH and UG were breaths of fresh air and NI was a true return to form. Those last three contain some of her finest work, even when compared to her first 5 masterpieces.

Did you puke? If you didn't, it wasn't quite done right.

Ok. I see. It's a process.

Well, I had a nice little intro anyway.

R308 Here's a better video showing how the caaapi is simmered down. The process is exactly the same, but I didn't realize he was using mimosa and adding a caapi resin until the end of that video.

The caapi resin he shows in the video above looks like what is left when you properly reduce the vine, except that it would be liquid. If you froze it, it would look like the resin he showed.

Ok I see, so they boil out the water. So it's supposed to boil out. I kept adding water, but that should be pulled.

I'm going to try the crockpot and coffee filter method to cook this.

R309 I don't think either the Beekeeper or American Doll Posse is a disaster at all. I think the Beekeeper is a very good album, just a mature familial one, and American Doll Posse is all over the place but I love many if its songs. But that era wasn't her best albumwise. I didn't love Night of Hunters at first but it grew to be one of my favorites once I realized how brilliant it is. And I totally agree about Native Invader, although I believe Native Invader in great part to be a pop retelling of Night of Hunters. Battle of Trees = Wildwood, for example, and Fearlessness = Cloud Riders, Bang = Star Whisperer, etc. I think Native Invader was Tori's ultimate coming out as a shaman, and I think Midwinter Graces was her first foot coming out of the closet about that.

Concentrate it by simmering.

My stomach hurts but I didn't throw up.

My brew did not come through...

R313 I'm tellin' ya, this song is a key to understanding ayahuasca.

"Submission is my mission for a strong black vine. Your mission: concentrate! Yoo might just see that sweet Jesus."

Tori's big on double entendres. You have to submit your spirit to ayahuasca and let it have its way with you.

You also have to concentrate in two ways:

1. Concentrate the tea. Simmer it down slowly and concentrate it. Concentrating it means letting it evaporate so that it gets thicker and thicker. You seem not to have realized that, so you should realize that before next time.

2. Concentrate on your intention before drinking it and then set aside distractions and focus. If you're distracted, you might not get into the right state of mind to observe what you're hoping to understand.

R314 I absolutely love NOH - it’s in my top 5 - and did from day one. I felt like she was back in her element and doing what she does best. I also love the instrumental version of the album she released, which underscores her craftsmanship as a musician.

I like bits of TBk - Marys of the Sea, Martha’s Foolish Ginger, General Joy, Toast, Original Sinsuality, Barons of Suburbia, the bridge in Witness (“Is there anyone, is there anyone around...”) - but it doesn’t work for me as a whole. I really don’t like ADP and I forced myself to love it when it first dropped. I think I associate it too much with a very dark, drug fueled time in my life when I was bouncing all over the country like a cold, numb pinball. Still, it too has songs I like. That’s the thing with Tori: she’s never released an album I didn’t love at least some of the songs in.

It's going to take my weekend. I'll report back on Monday!

Thanks for your help. I seriously thought it was a TEA like a watery tea. I didn't realize they concentrated it down into a goo.

My ear rang for like 3 secs.

R317 See, you just reminded me that I secretly do love AAtS. As she said herself upon its release, it was her first personal album in a while - no concept except those harmless visualettes - and the darkness and pain she communicates in it is authentic, even if bleak.

R318 I love Father's Son, Code Red, Beauty of Speed, Almost Rosey, Dark Side of the Sun, Smokey Joe, Dragon and Miracle.

I also love the bridge ("we could make it easy/easy, Love/easy...wrapped in metal/wrapped in ivy/painted in mint ice cream") of Bouncing Off Clouds. But the rest of the song doesn't really do much for me.

I find her concepts intriguing as the genesis or part of her creative processes, but I really just pay attention to the music. I never cared to learn her ADP characters and what songs go with which, and I never really paid attention to what gardens her Beekeeper songs belong to.

Scarlet's Walk was also a concept album and it is brilliant. It weaves together narratives about her life, about Native American people, about a character named Scarlet, about US history and about the geography as a sentient being and somehow it all works brilliantly. She also created an online "Scarlet's Web" component that I did click through to read the stories, but it's the songs that really matter.

The thing that put me off to Night of Hunters at first was the concept. When I read that her daughter plays a shapeshifting fox-goose spirit guide and her niece plays "the fire muse," I thought, Oh, Jesus, give me patience. But as ALWAYS with her music, I learned bit by bit what she was referring to and that her references were not just pulled from her ass and the album just revealed a whole world to me.

Wow. I'm shitting water. Thanks!

Are there any other plants, trees etc that you recommend boiling? I'm guessing it's better to do this Saturday because of the side effects.

[quote] Are there any other plants, trees etc that you recommend boiling?

Potatoes, carrots, etc., but I prefer them roasted, personally.

I see this definitely isn't a light hearted little excursion. This is a full on journey. You really should be outside somewhere wearing depends and drinking until you puke and drinking some more until you surrender to Gaia or whatever you believe in. Into the fire you go.

Thanks, r322, for letting us know how your first attempt at making the brew went and to the poster showing how to make it.

Very informative.

R321 I love all of what you’ve mentioned from ADP, especially the BoC bridge, which I wish was longer and maybe even the whole.

Apropos enough, the concept to NoH - which, thankfully, she was subtle about - involves the main character (Tori) being guided into/through a peyote ritual!

*the whole song

You bitches have me contemplating undergoing a self-administered ayahuasca ritual in my living room now!

What are some reliable online shops I can purchase the fixings from?

R326 Yes, the drink of the cactus practice. When she travels back to Ireland, there are also references to entheogens there:

[quote] At ten comes the vine/That generates bramble wine/The constant change of the night sun/A song in the blood of the white bull

[quote] From Ivy leaves is an ale that can unveil/The hidden meanings and serpents/Only revealed through visions

So Tori in the present and in her past life had relationships with these visionary plants, and a big part of the mythology of Night of Hunters and the spirituality of Native Invader relates to them. It's through the plants that she gains the vision and meets the entities that teach her how to shapeshift. And of course, American Doll Posse was all about exploring those different shapes. This has been a lifelong journey for her.

R328 Maybe the others will know that. They can recommend the right two plant combos. It's basically a plant with DMT and another plant that opens that DMT up (by maoi).

Just set aside at least two days. One for prep, that's a lot of simmering down now, and the other in case it's like alcohol for you and you shit like mad the next day.

R329 Yup. It’s obvious we’re both big fans, lol.

And the hidden meanings and serpents she envisions in Battle of Trees, thanks to the vine, are retrieved from a lost past life.

And in "Virginia" in 2002:

So hundreds of years go by

(The red road carved up by Sharp Knife)

She's a girl out working her trade

And she loses a little each day

To ghetto pimps and presidents

Who try and arouse her turquoise serpents

She can't recall what they represent

And when you ask she won't know

I was wondering if I could add a bit of cinnamon or honey to the brew to make it taste better?

Ok, I tried it again. Again, just B Caapi by itself ( and I've been taking 1 microdose of shrooms in the morning for the past few days).

Um, this was a lot more intense. I froze the brew a couple of times because I read that helps break it down. I cut several lemons and squeezed them in. I boiled it down and french pressed it into a cup.

I did throw up, but strangely no no. 2 side effects like last time.

I'm a little disappointed because I feel like this was all projections of my own mind. I noticed whatever was in the environment, if it was two dots or something, my mind would attempt to make a person out if it. Sometimes they looked normal, sometimes quite frightening. Started worrying about dying from a bad reaction.

Honestly thought there was no way I could actually add DMT to this and make it even more intense. I didn't close my eyes and got some nice visuals If elderly people, living their lives. I saw a fast motion interaction of this family at a window, maybe a nursing home. I flew through the sky like a bird and dived down over water below and thought of "oh, I've missed this." I remember thinking something like, silly humans they think they're the only ones with feelings.

I had another weird thought. The plants produce this as a way to manipulate humans into caring for the environment so the trees survive. Not that that's a bad thing but it was a little sad. Like the bacteria that hijacks an ant's brain and makes it hang on a leaf so it can infect whatever insect eats it and spread.

^^^ Anyway, maybe the worst part was the feeling that I am alone and it's just my brain on chemicals.

Not a trip to meet God or someone exciting. If that makes sense.

It is good to help you get to the truth if who you are at stop bullshitting yourself. Can see why it's not addictive because bad trips aren't fun.

R257, I believe you may benefit from San Pedro Cactus in a controlled environment.

R334 All the thoughts you had are common: the realization that human beings artificially separate ourselves from the rest of creation, the realization that the plants are communicating this way with people to get us to realize what we are doing to the planet. I hate to refer to it again, but read the lyrics to "Strong Black Vine":

[quote] Shut your mouth I'm spinning it tight down south I'm on a raid, tie you down 'Cause, boy, I can save you from that evil fate Eagles serve Yeah, uh huh, Mother first They turn you predator But, boy, I can save you from that evil fate

This is the vine ("spinning tight" refers to growth habit) telling human beings that Mother (Gaia/Earth) should be put first but we have become her predator. This relates to the thought you had, which you can interpret as your own or you can consider whether the vine actually can communicate telepathically.

[quote] Bodies bathe in black gold your pleasure Arms sold in balmy cities that may not be with us for long Save you from that evil faith, lay back

Balmy cities won't be with us for long because of climate change. The vine is trying to save us from our fate and the evil faith that is driving us to cause so much harm. Ayahuasca is a messenger from the planet to give up the false faiths and love mother Earth again.

[quote] Blown to bits Her innocent flesh to dust All for a dark God All for the love of some evil faith Swollen stream Every drip serpents bless You rape Earth knowledge Still she would save you from your evil faith

The vine has been "blown to bits" by being shredded to make your brew. Her innocent flesh has been pulverized for your purposes. You drink her and you forcibly imbibe knowledge of and from the planet--and still, she would save you from your evil faith if you listen.

Anyway. That's a song and you may or may not agree with the perspective, but I would encourage you to keep thinking about what you thought and experienced. You experienced banisteriopsis caapi.

People try to prepare for it but they focus on the DMT light show. I wrote extensively above that ayahuasca is not what people expect and it isn't fun and it isn't a hallucination: it's a telepathic communication. You go deeply into your own psyche and you are accompanied there by a guide who forces you to confront realities you've denied or ignored and supports you as you do so.

It feels a little like your thought except that it also feels a little like it's new information being imparted by someone else.

It feels a little like dreaming except that it's too vivid and clear and it has too much of a clear message to be a dream.

This would sound crazy to anyone who has not experienced it or who comes from a culture in which its use is not sacred, but when you take ayahuasca, you enter into a relationship with it. You will be tested. The panic you feel at first is akin to disorientation of going to a foreign country and trying to make sense of all the difficult to understand stimulus. When you use it serially, you mellow out as you understand what to expect--not just what happens, but how it feels, and how to communicate with it--and you learn more each time. More about yourself but also more about your place in this reality. Yes, the vine wants to convey an important message, but that doesn't make it a manipulation. It makes it an extraordinary, revolutionary breakthrough in communication between a human being and a species human beings thought were unintelligent because they don't speak languages with mouths. They can "mind meld" with you, and you just experienced that. The DMT is a gateway to other places but the vine is the communication of an intelligent, compassionate soul. There is nothing sad about it asking people to wake up and realize the harm we are causing to ourselves and everyone else.

This will sound nuts to most people, but with successive ayahuasca experiences, I came to think of them as willingly lending myself over to being possessed, body and mind, by the spirit of the plant--a literal spiritial communion.

If you're Christian, that might seem blasphemous or something, but I'm not and it really is the best way to characterize how I felt it. I think if you think of it that way, then you'll go in with more appropriate expectations than if you expect to have an acid trip or something.

You have deeply significant epiphanies and you may also have significant (possibly worldview-changing) visions. Would it help to call it communion with God to make it more palatable and less confusing?

R337 Interesting. When I was spinning, I felt like I was jumping up and down. This is going to sound stupid but I asked the plant in my stomach that if it was still alive and not dead, to please not kill me. I was afraid I was going to have a bad maoi side effect like serotonin syndrome or something.

They say there are energies with it like male, female, grandmother, grandfather. I didn't really feel that. I didn't see snakes. I did see my childhood fear of aliens which was disturbing. That's when I thought, oh this is in my head. It's just me. This my fear, not a plant trying to show me something. I could have gotten the same reaction with an artificial chemical compound. It's like it frees up the most disturbing recesses of your mind you have buried. That's the part I found sad, because it felt like this is your brain on drugs, a spectacle of up and down, zany emotions, not here is the great Mother Earth spirit. Maybe doing it alone had something to do with that.

Another * insight * knowing everything is really boring and lonely. That's why God broke apart and we don't remember everything. That way we won't be lonely or bored.

I used to get so mad a God for not figuring out how to enjoy life with out the suffering part. I think they think it's inconsequential but it doesn't feel like it when you're here. They need to fix that.

Also the Price is Right came on and felt like Bob Barker was a smooth black man in a past life. How much of this is just my fucking imagination and the tree life whispering secrets. Idk, it's conflated. I come away from this feeling like science is very important. Delusions are delusions.

[quote] I come away from this feeling like science is very important. Delusions are delusions.

The science of ayahuasca use:

[quote] In the first assessment, nearly half (45%) of the naïve users were found to meet the diagnostic criteria for a psychiatric disorder. After the ayahuasca use, more than 80% of those subjects showed clinical improvements that persisted at 6 months. The questionnaires showed significant reductions in depression and psychopathology. Regarding sub-study 2, long-term users showed lower depression scores, and higher scores for self-transcendence and quality of life, as compared to their peers in sub-study 1. Further controlled and observational naturalistic studies assessing the eventual risks and potential benefits of ayahuasca are warranted.

Using it provokes curiosity and re-engages people with life that had become mundane, and so an interest in scientific knowledge-seeking is a natural outgrowth.

Another study's conclusion:

[quote] This article has two important take-home messages: (1) the therapeutic effects of ayahuasca are best understood from a bio-psycho-socio-spiritual model, and (2) on the biological level ayahuasca may act against chronic low grade inflammation and oxidative stress via the Sig-1R which can explain its widespread therapeutic indications.

[quote] Not a trip to meet God or someone exciting. If that makes sense.

God isn’t that easy, toots!

R337 I’ve told you so before in this very thread, but I want to meld with and have my own little “cactus practice” with you, you adorably enlightened being, you.

Do you have to love Tori Amos to get Ayahuasca?

R346 lol. No.

R346 lol no...Sorry, I know it must be annoying that I've quoted her and her lyrics here. I didn't do it to convert anyone to her fandom, but just because the thread OP asked for insights about ayahuasca and she is full of them. She's the first source of info about it I ever had, and her music helped me to integrate my experiences after they left me dumbfounded. So I was just sharing what helped me.

R348 The op is also a BIG Tori fan, so...

I want to add MDMA/ecstasy to it so I love everything. So when I see aliens I don't freak out.

Is that ok?

R350, ayahuasca, in and of itself, is enough of an experience that it really should be done on its own. I can't imagine anything more piled on top of it.

R351 I think R350 is pretty obviously mocking everyone here.

R352 um, excuse me k, no.

Yes, I have an intense fear of aliens. I used to be terrified of them. I saw Fire in the Sky as a kid and felt they were real and at any second they could grab me and destroy me. I really feel like they are real.

Anyway, when I did the stronger b caapi it was at night and a shadow on my wall looked like an alien and I ran out of the room. Now, I'm never doing this at night again. I can get scared at night just in general. I looked at my ceiling fan and saw three grey aliens and that's when I was like aw, fuck. It's like my worst fear.

Anyway, my mimosa came. I'm boiling it tomorrow and it's currently freezing. I guess I will just take some sips of it because I don't want a bad trip. Someone said it would be gentle because it was yellow. Nope! Nope.

Now I did look up a breakthrough video and this made me happy. This gave me hope. Also heard another story about a guy who healed his friend in the bar.

Anyway I just want an experience like this. I just don't know how I'm going to do it if it starts turning bad. I swear to God I used to have such an intense fear if aliens. It's basically a clinical phobia. I cannot stress enough how it's basically my biggest fear especially at night.

The day is fine. I'll be fine in the day. No night. Mistake.

Btw just like really? Really? It's that implausible to actually see aliens? Are you serious? When the pentagon has confirmed the ufo footage is real and people are flying out of their body into different realms.

Oh sure, I'm the weirdo. We're crossing over into different realms but there's no chance of seeing some unknown hostiles. Right.

“There are more things in heaven and earth [...] than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”

R353 You should have a sitter with you in case you freak out. Combining substances is reckless both for psychological and potentially for physiological reasons. What compels you to feel like amping up one of the most potent psychotropic medications in the world to improve it beyond how it has been perfected over centuries?

You may not be in the right mindset. You need to trust it and not try to make it better by controlling it.

Also, running out of the room in panic from the brew without DMT concerns me that you're going to totally panic and no one will be there to ground you. If you ended up in an ER talking about being attacked by aliens, they'd most likely load you up with psych medications that could be dangerous in combination with ayahuasca. At the very least, write down what you are taking and have that with you throughout just in case.

Finally, mimosa is very potent. It's a lot more potent than the traditional chacruna or chaliponga. If you're going to see aliens, mimosa is probably most likely of all of them to be your gateway. If you take a little and feel like too much time has passed and feel inclined to take a lot more, you'd be well advised to think twice.

I can't blame you for being eager for a potentially thrilling new experience, but between your inclination to take psilocybin, cannabis and MDMA with ayahuasca (why??), it really seems to me like you are going for a bazooka-blast dazzling drug high and possibly not for the spiritual experience that ayahuasca usually is. It's not crack or meth or heroin and it shouldn't be approached like it is.

Just my $0.02.

I'm just really excited to meet God and get answers. I've waited my whole life for this. Last night I sipped a tea spoon full of it and had nice dreams. It will be day and I never freak out during the day. I'll just sip a little to see.

I just freak out at night in general. I'm a spaz.

Btw the conquistadors thought it was a devil brew.

Set and setting are always, always said by experienced people including clinicians who administer psychedelics to be the most important part of any psychedelic experience.

Set is mindset. If you're calm, open, relaxed and optimistic, then you're far more likely to have an awe-inspiring but not traumatic experience. If your mindset is fearful, anxious, paranoid or if you go in feeling like you're endangering yourself and regret it after you take the substance, then you are very likely to have a very bad trip. Most people still say that their bad trips were good for them in the long run, but in the short term (and rarely in the long term, as well), a very bad trip can be traumatic and can even cause PTSD. Advice to OP: If you're planning to load up your ayahuasca with other drugs and you go in fearing aliens are going to abduct you and do terrible things to you, then *YOU* are setting yourself up for a very bad experience. And you inevitably would blame the medicine. Please take seriously what you're doing and why. Adding MDMA, psilocybin or other medicines is not the way to go. South American shamans say "Ayahuasca is not a drug. It's a medicine." The shamans who administer it are called cuanderos--those who cure, healers.

Setting is where you take it. Most people take it in a version of a traditional setting--if not in the Amazon or the Andes, then at least in a group setting with a trained professional medicine person there to guide you, able to calm you down if necessary, and able to take medical action in the rare case it could become necessary. Given your inexperience, your setting (being alone) may not be the best for you, particularly because you're afraid you're going to be possessed by alien demons.

If you can learn to let go, to take your time, to accept what is given rather than greedily expecting full-on enlightenment by combining a bunch of drugs, and so thinking of it as a threat to you, then you'll be fine. But you do have some factors working against you.

Expect nothing. Hope for the best. Trust that it knows what it is doing and it will give you what you need--nothing more than you can handle--and you will be absolutely fine. But if you demand more than it can give, you're likely going to bring yourself disappointment either by lackluster experience or else by a totally overwhelming one that terrifies you.

I believe part of the reason it inspires such deep panic at first is to test people, to find out if they are really committed and willing to go with what is given, or else freak them out so as not to give them more than they can bear. It's a screening process.

You must think of it as a teacher. It knows what it is doing. When you walk into a classroom expecting your teacher to download the content and capacity of Einstein's mind to you on day one, you're going to have a terrible attitude toward your teacher, and your teacher is going to kick you out and not give you the lessons you need to know if you want to see what Einstein saw one day. Does that make sense?

R359 If you're a judgmental, fearful crusader for Christianity who kills everyone who thinks anything different than what your Bible teaches, and you end up in a mind meld with a wise plant spirit, then you're going to believe it's a seductive brew of the devil because it's going to show you realities that you've been trained all your life to reject as false and dangerous.

You can't always get what you want.

You can't always get what you want.

But if you try sometimes, you just might find, you get what you NEED.

Ugh this stuff is awful. I only had two sips and threw up. How do people even get it down? I don't know how I'll ever be able to ingest it. It's disgusting.

Fuck this shit!

R363, it's not called The Purge without reason.

Look at her heartily drinking this like it's delicious. Lies!

You suck up your courage, you drink it, you purge, you move on.

Countless people have done it. It's not that big a deal.

It made a centimeter thick paste at the bottom. Do I eat that?

YES I do! Thanks 😊

R367 😂 Your whole trajectory on this thread is both hilarious and endearing.

Thanks 😊 I'm really sad I threw out the other paste. It's a learning experience.

And thanks Tori Amos

Btw, it's amazing! Simply amazing.

Ayahuasca Trip Report.

So I ate the paste and I felt euphoria. I went outside and the trees looked so nice, almost formidable. They felt very alive and just as important as humans. I came inside and stared at a colorful piece of artwork. It started looking like those holographic images you see. At one point it almost seemed like some figures were coming out of it. I saw some interesting shapes and triangles.

Then I felt more euphoria. It was almost too much. Like smiling really big when you may not want to smile.

I don't think about, ruminate or analyze anything. I was focusing on the physical feelings because this was my first experience. I got a pop-up thought of my sister and just thought, no I'm good. I don't need to relive all the psychological trauma and guilt right now.

When I laid down to go to sleep, well, I could not. I got all the fun house clown, 60s checkerboard patterns. I was just like...ok. A little annoying when you want to go to sleep. Then I saw all these ancient people and vines everywhere, all kinds of stuff. At this point it had been several hours. I tried to get mad at it but I just gave up.

Then something weird happened. I had to get up and go to bathroom or throw up, water something. When I got up I was effortless light. I could not feel my body. I was really puzzled, like normally there is a heaviness, when picking something up. I didn't feel it all. When I moved, it felt like I was thinking it and making it happen but not feeling it. That set me into debating if it had numbed my pain receptors so I could not feel or if something else was going on. I looked back in my bed to make sure it wasn't an out of body experience, but my body wasn't there.

I want to say it almost felt like a big secret. Like I'm wearing a suit body and agreeing to pretend to feel this body and go through certain limitations here. I started wondering if life was all a delusion and if we're really here . The feeling of my body came back in a few minutes. I was glad because I did not want to stop this life. Almost a feeling of like being strapped back in a racecar to finish the race.

I'm not sure how deep I went. Next time, maybe in a month I will do this in nature, in the early morning, before prayers. It's took long of an experience.

[quote] I started wondering if life was all a delusion and if we're really here...The feeling of my body came back in a few minutes. I was glad because I did not want to stop this life.

I shared both of these perceptions. It has changed my whole worldview and my life experience to understand that life is an illusion while also feeling that I want to be taking this ride. As someone who had been depressed most of my life, this lowered the stakes and makes me feel less often like events are crises, and at the same time gives me a little propulsive anxiety when I remember that yes, I want to be here. I chose to be here. And it's all an illusion, and so it's not that big a deal! Enjoy it all you can. The ride will be over too soon.

Take a break now and let your mind ruminate on all the perceptions you described. It's a treasure trove of wonder. It's like being a kid again.

This interests me. The "feeling like every event was a crisis". I do NOT feel that way. OTHER people feel that way then push their hysteria on me.

Can we maybe slip some of this stuff in the municipal water supply? Because that would make MY life so much easier.

R375 You cute little minx, you.

A very informative thread!

Btw, life is really awesome after the ayahuasca. I feel the antidepressant like residual effects. Like a safety net. Like, ah who cares if I fuck up a little.

Today I went to what I thought was my car and accidentally opened the car door with a passenger inside. I was like oops and went to my car which was the same color right beside it. I think before the Aya experience I would have been more anxious about it but I was just laughing at how silly I am. Felt bad for the passenger who must have had a little shock.

Everything is going to be ok and you can laugh at life's weirdness.

I'm not sure if life can possess.

Ok fine it can't. Yeah, yeah you went to a better school than me and are richer. Congrats for you.

R379 Why did you sign with an apostrophe? 😂

Because I cute.

R381 Yes, you is!

Why thank you!

Btw, that 1st trip was from only one wash. But it lasted 9 long hours.

I'm scared to wash it again 2 more times. I have another wash in the fridge, a 1 wash brew. If I do it 2 more times maybe I will get the introspection journey? Or hyperspace, whatever that is, where you float to other worlds.

It's so weird all those "machine elves" because in the drawings I saw they looked like ancient Mayans or tribes people in all their colorful finery. I did see similarities in the art and the experience.

R383 Islamic mosaics, European Christian stained glass windows, Celtic knots and trees of life, Indian mandalas and Tibetian Buddhist mandalas and other sacred art throughout the world features different icons but very similar geometric, concentric forms and colors that are all essentially psychedelic in nature.

Mayan and Aztec and Egyptian, ancient Greek, Roman, Assyrian and Sumerian reliefs that depict deities--compare these to 'machine elves.' Not just the notion of gods, but look at the actual depictions including the colors in cases where paint survived (ancient Roman art was painted in gaudy colors similar to Egyptian colors, but time has worn off the paint) and compare with depictions of 'alien' or other-dimensional descriptions of intelligent beings people describe contacting through psychedelic use.

Also compare with contemporary Hindu deities. Hindi people believe that these entities are real and that they coexist with us, and the depictions of them are a bridge between ancient depictions of gods and demigods, and colorful secular depictions of DMT-induced dimensions today.

Throughout history, people have had mystical visionary experiences in a few specific ways: through prayer/meditation, through ingesting substances, through starvation, through dancing and rhythmic music, through claiming to have died and then returned to their bodies, and at times spontaneously.

DMT is made by the human brain in tiny trace amounts, and there's no consensus about why it is made; however, it has been conclusively determined that DMT is released during the process of dying, and in some people the brain may spontaneously release it. People theorize that spontaneous release of DMT or accessing it through meditation, dance, or other practices may lead to spontaneous religious visions in some people--for example, a burning bush that might relay meaningful messages. Since the experience of DMT almost always results in a person feeling certain that "that reality is more real than this reality," throughout history, these experiences would have been documented visually and in writing (see the book of revelation, the book of Enoch and various religious texts), relayed to others in a community and regarded as an ultimate truth to which others would become obsessively determined to experience for themselves.

Below is a depiction of Hindu deities. Under that, I'll post a couple of secular psychedelic, DMT-inspired depictions for comparison.

This is a DMT-inspired painting by artist Alex Grey.

This is a painting that depicts an ayahuasca experience by Peruvian artist Pablo Amaringo. Compare with Hindu depictions of their gods and goddesses.

Another Pablo Amaringo ayahuasca painting. Note all the twisted, entwined geometric forms in this one.

Compare the organic twisted, knotted depictions in Amaringo's paintings with Celtic knots.

The Celtic knots are more graphic, less organic, but they are regarded as sacred symbols in their culture. Why would shapes like this become sacred to a culture? They're the sorts of geometries seen during psychedelic visions.

Besides the geometric forms, also look at the compositions of depictions of DMT-related visions: they are always visually overwhelming, with the whole field of vision packed with colorful shapes, symbols and in some cases human, animal, plant and hybrid or entirely other types of entities.

Compare that with Ancient Egyptian writing. Not only is the writing unusual to us, but it has a lot of characteristics of psychedelic visions, from the characters arranged all over the entire field of vision with some figures more prominent than other background figures, but the colors are bold and from afar, the colors and shapes look a lot like Amazonian textile patterns and Mesoamerican glyphs that depict divine scenes.

Compare the general visual impression of these Shipibo (indigenous Amazonian culture) textile designs with the "background" text in the Egyptian hieroglyph above. They give similar general impressions.

The Shipibo designs are made specifically to represent geometric visions seen with ayahuasca.

Similar patterns can be found on pottery from China to the Netherlands.

I thought the plants were only in the Americas. How did the celts do ayahuasca? And the rest of the world?

R391 Ayahuasca contains DMT. So does the human brain. It's released during the dying process and theoretically may also be released during other activities that have become religious practices, including meditation, fasting, dancing and rhythmic drumming that induce trance states.

Way above, someone mentioned that it's possible to attain similar visions through meditation as through psychedelics and others rejected the assertion, but it is probably true.

We know that ancient people practiced all of these techniques, from prayer (meditation) and tribal dancing and drumming to fasts at holy times and ingesting visionary substances including and other than ayahuasca.

I went to New Grange in Ireland a few years ago--it's older than the Great Pyramid at Giza--and the tour guide said no one knows the exact significance of the triskele (three spirals arranged into a triangle) motif carved on the stone at the entrance, other than that it was of significance to the pre-Celtic people and that some speculate it was a depiction of a shared psychedelic vision. (Another theory is that it's an aerial map of the river valley, but that seems to make less sense.) Anyway, the three spirals design is now the national symbol of Ireland, tracing back to this pre-Celtic tradition.

R350, if MDMA is the feeling you're wanting, San Pedro Cactus is more your roll rather than ayahuasca.

Legal in Orlando.

This is from their FAQ:

[quote] Ayahuasca is legal in the US it won a supreme court ruling in 2006 for religious use. both plants are legal it’s the DMT that is not legal. As you can see we are a church and we use ayahuasca as our sacrament We also have filled an Exemption letter with the DEA for religious use.

I think their claim to legal use of ayahuasca is dubious. The FAQ states that they have "filled [sic] an exemption letter with the DEA," not that they have been approcved for religious use.

The US Supreme Court has ruled specifically that the União do Vegetal (UDV), Santo Daime/Church of the Holy Light of the Queen may use ayahuasca legally as part of their [Christian] religious services, but these are the only entities legally exempt from schedule 1 enforcement to my knowledge. If you're looking for a place closer to home than the Amazon, I think Costa Rica is probably a safer bet than a dubious retreat center in Florida.

^^^ I have been to said dubious 'retreat center' several times. It is not cheap! It is legal, well-staffed with medical personnel. Don't trash something you haven't researched.

R384 The Book of Enoch is a fascinating read.

R397 Look at this recreation of the angel Ezekiel said he saw. It's bizarre and psychedelic. The animated recreation of his description begins around 3:00. He was definitely on a psychedelic or had a spontaneous DMT vision.

Thank you, r390 and others who have posted pictures or artist rendering of these experiences. They fascinate and intrigue me on numerous levels.

If I may put forth a theory on the thee Celtic spirals? I would suggest these three spirals represent the "three worlds". One is this world we inhabit. The second is the sky. The third is the underworld. I believe the spiral may represent the endless turning of all three worlds, bound together and yet sperate.

As a strange aside, I would say (based on a prior conversation) that these three worlds are "united" in the mighty oak.

Also, to get back on track, doesn't mistletoe contain hallucinogenic properties when used correctly?

God, I hate shitty interactions and shitty shit treatment. I had to deal with that today. I just want to jump in a pot of ayahuasca.

Sipping it now you bitches. Really want to spike their drinks with it so maybe they will be nice people.

^ actually don't want to because it's mine. Haha motherfuckers. It's all mine. I just need some time to do it. A day to do it and a day to recover.

This thread has convinced me to visit Peru again later this year, and do a San Pedro and Ayahuasca retreat. I was going to wait for my 40th, but eh, this year of covid has really taken its toll. I'm looking forward to pressing that re-set button.

I'm about to do some again. 😐

I just don't want to drink it and vomit it and have a fun house in my head until midnight.... Oh well. Yolo

Good luck, R402!

It's like the nastiest shit you could ever consume.

R403 You are too fucking cute 😂

R405, thanks! I did huachuma (San Pedro) with two close friends some years back. Two friends are a couple, and it saved their very strained, argumentative relationship. Like night and day ever since.

Does it make you trip like acid?

R409 It makes you trip.

It's not like acid.

R46

Well I did it! 😊

Did more caapi this time and much much less resin DMT mim bark. That was ok. Still saw some wiggles but no crazy town hijinx.

What I love about this stuff is the instant answers and lessons. I almost forgot what they were. Time can seem to take forever. It's like doing things all over from scratch. I remember something. I noticed there are a lot of trees in the background of my photos. We don't really pay much attention but they're there and they're alive.

Addictions can be comforting, familiar patterns, but it's ok to branch out and try something new. There's nothing to be scared of. We never really 'die.'

We are sort of our experiences. What we do matters. Each moment is a moment to shine.

Sometimes the group goals we have are so silly and laughable. Like why are we focusing on this weird objective instead of loving and befriending one another?

The intention and asking the question is everything for this to take effect.

I'm glad to not have to go full throttle. It's almost unbearable. I can't wait to do it next weekend but God the taste is horrible. It's almost like, is it really worth it? In many cases it's not.

I didn't throw up but I did gag and nearly vomited choking it down.

Yeah, one more thing. I understood why nothing is good enough forever. Because nothing is powerful enough to be good enough for all time. That's why things change.

No one really wants things to be static for eternity anyway. That's a prison.

Any more wisdom? I’m liking these nuggets.

What causes the continuous movement of atomic nuclei? What causes the spins and shifts of the cosmos?

What is the origin of light?

What…?

Ahem, yeah. I think I'll need one of those hyperspace brews for those.

Honestly, I think it's alive. A living being connected by all consciousness.

Not sure about space stuff but the light, the electric energy. I think that's a form of consciousness, if not God.

R415 You don’t need any brews for that. You just need to breathe, still your mind, and open your heart…

True. You can get there that way too. That way is more powerful.

R417 Very true.

R411 / R412 You've convinced me that you met Mama Ayahuasca with those epiphanies.

I do believe it's 'alive,' or else conscious, anyway, and I have been fascinated since I first drank it to contemplate how a living vine could be chopped down, pulverized, boiled, cooled and then still communicate by being ingested. This has profoundly altered my notions of what is conscious as well as made me consider deeply the notion of 'You are what you eat.'

Beyond this, everything that you wrote, every message you received, is familiar. All of them are among the messages I have received when I took ayahuasca. This is common.

And so for skeptics who don't buy the idea that ayahuasca carries its own consciousness and communicates (which is fine; it's a hard thing to believe given our scientific pradigms), it still poses really interesting questions worth ruminating: Why do most or many people who take ayahuasca come away with the same thoughts, which are experienced more as profound truths than as vague ideas? Is the plant conveying these/teaching the human user who imbibes its remains as they often feel they are? Is the medicine breaking down walls and opening human minds to a collective source of knowledge that typically is not accessible? Is the medicine simply activating certain neurons or having another physiological effect that then reliably causes ayahuasca users to have similar thoughts and experience those thoughts as being imparted by a separate consciousness? What is behind the effect of feeling as if the thoughts are being delivered by an external force/entity/energy rather than being endemic thoughts?

Re R416 Ayahuasca had an effect on my ability to do this.

I'm the person who has posted throughout the thread about my 4-5 ayahuasca experiences (and about Tori Amos's music—sorry!).

Before I took ayahuasca, I had become very ill from an unknown cause (I later found out I had had Lyme disease for years that became a neurological infection because it went untreated for so long.) and part of my symptoms were neurological and cognitive issues. I was a nervous wreck, anxious, panicked, and I could not focus.

I did try meditating to calm down but I couldn't do it. I was too distracted and unfocused.

After I took ayahuasca a couple of times, that changed. Consciously, it seems like it changed because I had already accessed such a deep well inside my psyche that I could return to a certain depth on my own. However, scientific research has shown that psychedelics can make new neuronal connections and may be able to repair damaged neurons, and so I think it is possible that the ayahuasca had a physical medicinal effect on my ability to focus, as well. (I will never forget the sensations of my brain being 'scrubbed' at the beginning of each experience.)

Anyway, after ayahuasca, I found meditation easy. I can close my eyes, breathe and focus. After a short while, a white or colored light appears and begins to grow and dart around in amorphous shapes. I modulate my breathing and eventually it and the light sync up and oftentimes the light turns a neon green color and expands to take up my entire visual field (with eyes closed) and will "wash over me." Every time this happens, I feel energized and cleansed. I've been able to do this on demand many times. Once I had an MRI and felt a little anxious in the tube, and so I did this meditative practice and it seemed like the MRI was over within a couple of minutes instead of 20. I also do it during dental work and it calms me and makes time pass quickly.

The only issue I have with it is that I have seen strange visions a few times while meditating and although they aren't scary visually, they totally alarm me and always jolt me out of the meditation because they feel to me like they are conscious. That would be one thing while taking ayahuasca, but for it to happen spontaneously just from breathing and focuing on inner vision for some reason freaks me out.

Appropriate that you're post 420, yeah?

It is my understanding that many people meditate to reach that state, r420.

I can see why it would be a bit unnerving. Why don't you trust yourself to open to this experience in the same way you trusted Momma Ayahuasca?

R421 I concur.

R420 How do you meditate but feel safe?

It's hard to describe but when I get into that spiritual state, other things in my life start appearing. It's a bit disturbing so I stopped. How do you make peace with what you see? Outside of meditation time?

R420 what are those visions that jolt you?

🥺

R423 Maybe those are things you are being called to confront and work through.

How to do it with out feeling weird and different for seeing things like Whoopi in Ghost 👻

I just can't.

R424 The visions that freaked me out were not scary looking at all. They freaked me out because of the feeling they gave me.

Twice while meditating, I got the familiar white light that changed to blue and green and different colors, darted around and then grew and expanded to the full field of vision, which always gives me a great feeling of peace and energy. But then in those instances, the center of the field of vision became grayish and grainy, almost pixelated, and then an oval shape formed and opened up to reveal it was an eye. It looked *exactly* like the eye on the dollar bill and it just hovered and drifted around a little bit, blinking its eyelids just like an eye. And I felt like someone was looking at me, a sentient presence. The first time it alarmed me immediately when it blinked and I opened my eyes immediately and laughed to myself and probably said "what the fuck?" (i think I could handle a non-blinking version of the same eye.) The second time it happened, I thought, 'OK, fine, let's have a staring contest' and the longer it looked at me, the more conscious it felt to me and I got freaked out again and came out of it.

The other two times were a similar perception but a different vision. I went through all the same processes and felt like I was being watched or wasn't alone and I waited for the eyeball to emerge but it didn't. I felt like I was being watched 'from above' and so (internally, and I can't explain how this visual perspective works since it's mental) I looked 'up' and felt like I was looking up through a deep hole or column, and slowly these three oval shapes became clearer in my field of vision. I didn't know what they were other than dots but they felt somehow alive, and then the longer I looked, I saw that each one had two large dark spots placed where eyes would be. They were also fuzzy/pixelated looking and not entirely in focus. I felt suddenly like they were aware I noticed them and I opened my eyes immediately and was really freaked out. Then it happened again, and as it began to happen I told myself just to keep focusing. It didn't last very long. I had a feeling of panic about being caught noticing that they were there and it made me feel very threatened for some reason. I opened my eyes and all I could think about was being in a petri dish or a well or some kind of enclosure and being studied without my knowledge. It was a disturbing feeling. It left me anxious about meditating too deeply.

I do love this thread.... and I think a great thing for the human race, the planet, our celestial home in this universe, and all other universes... would be for humans to connect with this Universal sense of wisdom, peace, freedom, perspective, light, timelessness, and flow. We might stop trying to kill life for some mistaken notion of personal gain.

While chemically-instigated insights facilitate this awareness, and probably are the only way to open doors of perception for many, I think the "already there" practices, when done with intention, direction, open-heart and readiness... can also get to Unitary Consciousness in a way that lasts, informs, comforts....

Personally, after a life of seeking, I practice Dzoghen meditation.... which shows me my "identity" is really awareness, and all else is construct, ephemeral, attachment, mental events. My mind is the sky, and everything else (including Mama Ayahuasca) is just weather passing through.

In short... there's a lot to reach without taking anything else in the body. Remember Ram Dass stopped taking acid (he said why should you keep learning the same thing, other than he would partake every year or so to "check in").

[quote] In short... there's a lot to reach without taking anything else in the body.

We take foods and drinks into our bodies to sustain life and medicines to heal. Not incidentally, creating new life is also done by taking fluids into one's body.

What we take into our bodies affects us.

When I was in college, I knew someone who took drugs (I never did.) but he said he only took naturally occuring substances—never chemicals. I thought that was an excuse and an arbitrary line to draw. I have changed my mind.

I've taken ayahuasca and I found it both transformative and healing. Ayahuasca does contain potent chemical compounds that are known to be beneficial to the body. It also has a psychotropic effect that anecdotally for centuries and now through ongoing scientific studies is known to be psychologically beneficial.

All pharmaceutical medications are made from something, animal, vegetable and/or mineral. Most are made from plants. Most of the source plants have been used for eons as natural medicines; the difference in the pharmaceuticals is that they are typically super-concentrated extracts combined with other chemicals. They are not whipped up out of nothing.

We can't survive without taking foods into our bodies. We also live in a culture in which we constantly take poisonous foods and drinks into our bodies. We shouldn't, but we do. The advice about not taking things into our bodies applies as well to sodas, cakes, cookies, fried chicken, pizza, vodka and myriad other things that we do not need to take in to live but do it for the pleasure of the experience.

Ayahuasca, a psilocybin-containing mushrooms and other organic, living beings that are consumed with no chemical additives reward people with insights are far safer and ultimately better for people's bodies and minds than is Coca-Cola or Grey Goose, yet we refuse to see this plain reality as our reality. They have psychologically and physically healing properties and extremely slim risk of harm, even compared with the most common junk food whose only benefit is mometary stimulation of taste buds.

Don't throw stones about consuming natural plants for peace of mind and introspective insights if you drink to get drunk or eat Oreos and ice cream for the taste and sugar high.

Hon, no stones were thrown. Breathing is good, eh?

They mean to anyone reading this.

I remember back in college I was legit freaked out by a professor who said he was into this and absolutely would do acid again.

I had no idea that there was a difference between good drugs that aren't really addictive like ayahuasca, hallucinagen mushrooms etc. I thought acid was ACID like BATTERY ACID or sniffing glue and destroying your brain cells to get high.

Remember seeing an episode of Dragnet as a kid about some people who did acid and died and so always seemed like people who did it were insane.

But they're not. I know what they're on about now. Coke, heroin, all that shit is bad. At the clinics, they should swap

^ Actually, they could be even more insane if they were insane to start with.

It's not really like an envelope cure all where God lifts you up and shines love on you.

It is a nice brain hijack tool that allows you to think and accept some things.

Psychedelics do appear to have some potential to 'activate' psychosis in people who have a latent predisposition to it.

There's not a single case of death from overdose or misuse, though, and I physical harm is exceedingly rare. It's literally much safer than aspirin or Tylenol. However, people who have mental illness with psychotic features in their families or who have schizophrenia, bipolar or other disorders with psychotic potential are advised to avoid psychedelics.

Not sure if The ayahuasca gurus can answer, but when I meditate deeply I sometimes have mental images of places pop up in my head. Sometimes from memories, which are obvious, but others seem like places I’ve never been in European countries/cities somewhere. Any thoughts about what these are?

Scary indeed, R427. Next time, affirm the all encompassing nature of the Light until they disappear.

No guys I mean in my waking life. Kind of like the eye that was seen. Not during meditation.

Expound, R436.

Saw things that looked like Marfa lights.

R436, have you asked it what it wants? Ask the eye what it's looking at.

Do your best DeNiro impersonation. "You lookin at me? Are YOU lookin at ME?" If that gives you some confidence to find out what it wants.

You can tell it to be gone if it is not from the light. Tell it.

No, I am not afraid of it. I am just freaked out by the feeling of something/someone watching me silently. As anyone would be with any human or other animal staring at them! It's just a peculiar feeling. I am curious about it and I can imagine it as myself looking back at me but I don't really know if I want to investigate that deeply. I am both imaginative and rational and I like to keep one foot planted in imagination for fun and for interest in life and the other foot planted in material reason to maintain sanity.

Do people do this in the US?

Yes, in my living room.

MB came again but this time in a finely chopped powder.

I detest the thought of having to consume it. I wish I had a black caapi to open the doorway. It's kind of a drag taking hours. I know I say this and then do it and it's not so bad. I only wanted to meet who's in charge, the other side, that surreal lucid world.

Is it a scary trip?

R443 is Karen demanding to speak to the universal creator.

NOW, dammit!

R444, for me, I took ayahuasca when I was 20, and it was one of the few times where I can say that I was not ready for the sheer emotional allness of it, and so, it spooked me. I felt like I peered over the edge of a cliff at the end of the world and saw the world in its entirety -- its beauty, but also the abyss. There were moments of intense highs and lows. I am not at all a religious person, but there was a moment where I felt like I was staring directly towards the presence of some type of celestial god -- and while that may sound divine to some -- it scared the hell out of me. It was intense/too much at the time.

On the other hand, it did later help me repair my very at-the-time strained relationship with my dad. Thus, I wouldn't discourage using ayahuasca at all, as it has very powerful healing properties -- but it's something you need to go into prepared for what may come.

I didn't know it was legal R395.

R446 Is that what they call ego death?

R443 - if there is anything I have learned from my previous shroom days, meditations and endless reading of Carl Jung and various New Age authours is that there is no one universal creator in charge.

It's all you. The I AM. Universal consciousness just "is". It is not a separate entity. It divides into fractals like a prism can separate a rainbow but the singular consciousness is whole, complete, all encompassing. The "others" you meet in reality are fractals of that one prism, reflecting back to you the energy you hold within yourself. Jesus Christ in the bible was a metaphor for your human imagination. "Have faith the size of a mustard seed and ye can move mountains". Your faith is what moves the mountain, not God.

I particularly loved reading about people seeing sheets/panels with various realities, past, present, future on them. I have seen in my meditations a giant wheel, resembling a ferris wheel with multiple panels on it. Each one representing a different reality that we jump to as we move through this movie we call life. I love you guys.

R449 Completely agree, although I would state the conclusion in exactly the opposite way. The "I am" is the Creator, in that it is the expression of the Atman, the window into or individual expression of the Brahman. Individual consciousness is the wave and God is the ocean. And the universe, as we continue to know it, is also connected... all unitary expression of the Universal Creation.. the realms and levels of energy all map against the Great Chain of Being, Gudjieff's levels, and quantum mechanics. So I'd suggest the conclusion is not "it's all you", rather "you are all it"...

The single acid trip I remember most is sitting on a hillside in Echo Park in 1986, and feeling a force of white light traverse up through my spine into the infinite heavens and down through my spine into the earth and infinitely beyond... the white was Unconditional Love that was everything, the universe, me... all one thing, all energy and light, all love. The "abyss" is filled with this energy.

After reading the last few replies, I think I understand why the conscious "I" is mostly unaware of this connection. We simply wouldn't be able to cope with being the All but stuck in a puny physical form.

Not to diverge from the topic (I hope this isn't too much of a tangent) but maybe the ego/conscious is a product of the physical body while the subconscious/super conscious is what we really are? IDK if that makes sense.

The ayahuasca removes that barrier so we can see into ourselves (which is the All).

R428 - " So I'd suggest the conclusion is not "it's all you", rather "you are all it"..."

Yes! thank you... you said it better than I did.

R451 - I dont see it as us not being able to cope with the knowledge. Rather, we choose beforehand to come here and play the Earth game where we are unaware of our own power. Just my take on it. Yes I believe the subconscious is like a doorway to access All That Is and drugs like Ayahuasca can open that door and help reveal and integrate the shadow self.

My thoughts are in line with the several posts above, but I like to think about it just a little bit differently: we are all individually everything, and we are created that way out of a will to experience that. So it's not that we have forgotten the greater whole, and not that we can't conceive of it because we exist in these divided forms, but because this is the whole point, like carving facets into a jewel, the facets are there for a reason, to create their own colors and refractions, and each individual life and energetic experience is intended to be just that. It all comes together in the end.

I may have written the Rumi idea here before, I'm not sure, but I'll sum it up because it relates: He said that we are like cups of water dipped out of the ocean. The ocean is a whole entity that contains everything, of which everything is made, and to which everything will return. But while in the cup, the water there becomes its own temporary entity with its own temperatures and ecosystem, etc. It is the ocean, jt is made of the ocean, and it is simultaneously something other than the ocean. And when it evaporates or when it is poured back into the ocean, it is simply integrated into the ocean again, perhaps introducing some of its experiences as it does. There's no reason to fear the process, only to appreciate that it is possible to be part of everything while being something independent of it that ultimately will return to it.

R448, that terms sounds about right. I certainly felt very miniscule within the grand scheme of the universe and it was a very humbling experience. It took me months and even years later to realize that that was the experience I needed, as at that point I was at a sort of fork in the road where I could have gone down a risky, dangerous path. It helped tilt my head in the right direction.

Hi!

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I am looking into retreats in Colorado. There are a couple of two day retreats this summer. Oddly enough, I’m most afraid of not sleeping for two days. I just can’t imagine being that exhausted. They say that you can get some sleep during the day, but how well can you sleep on a mat with 30 other people in the room?

Recently saw a show about a group in Florida that is the only one that is able to bring Ayahuasca to the US legally by claiming to be a church. I’d I recall correctly, it’s near Miami and invites anyone to come and partake

^ it’s Orlando

Is ayahuasca really only for those who feel they have some to “fix” emotionally?

I’m not depressed, haven’t been abused, etc. Is it something that will still give benefits because it changes the way I’ll relate to the world?

Just saw that Michael Sam (ex-NFL player, came out as gay) took ayahuasca after a period of partying, drugs and depression. Apparently he had some awakenings. He apparently felt abandoned by the LGBT community after getting dropped from the NFL, hoping he could be a spokesperson or have some public role after his football career declined.

Yes, r460 from what I understand.

People in this thread are just discussing how the experience helped heal some issues. If you don't HAVE issues that need to be dealt with, you still take a fantastic journey into the unknown.

IOW, you don't have to be broken in order to benefit from the journey.

A person doesn't have to be terribly sick to benefit from good medicine. That's something western culture doesn't really have in our consciousness.

I want to try LSD before I die but where to get it ? college campuses?

the herb ashwagandha is supposed to help with anxiety as well among other benefits.

A lot of plants can be used medicinally.

It's crazy that we have this idea of plant medicines as 'alternative,' when the vast majority of medications use active ingredients derived from plants, and scientists scour the planet for plants that may be useful in curing currently incurable ailments.

It's also peculiar that in this place and time, we focus only on treating illness after we are ill, and we focus only on treating bodily illness and medicating mental illness with drugs to numb and cloud the mind. Entheogenic medicines operate on healing mind, body and spirit, not on numbing the way alcohol and narcotics do.

What does it taste like?

R467 Toad piss mixed with a little dead mammal flesh, in a earthy rooty way.

You think I'm kidding...

R467 Here's how I'd describe it: Imagine scooping a handful of soggy leaves off the floor of the woods in late winter, soaking them in vinegar, cigarette ashes, damp coffee grounds and Kaopectate and then drinking that.

The coffee grounds and Kaopectate references are for the texture, because it has this unusual ability to cling to the inside of your mouth and throat even after you swallow it, and this adds to the gagging and vomit-inducing sensation.

It is possible to avoid the taste, but I think that it is an important part of the experience. As unpleasant as it is, it doesn't compare meaningfully at all to the journey ayahuasca sends you on. The taste and the purging are the things that make a lot of people turn away, but the ayahuasca experience really shows you that material/physical things like that are entirely superficial, temporary and nothing to be afraid of.

Still, I've heard of people taking pill capsules filled with freeze dried ayahuasca for convenience and to avoid the taste. I guess that's the western world's first step in stripping all the meaning from it and making it a commercially available pharmaceutical that uses only a few of the known active ingredients and discards others that may be active and useful because they don't seem to be.

This video about ayahuasca is interesting.

There's a gateway in our mind that leads somewhere out there far beyond this plane Where reptile aliens made of light cut you open and pull out all your pain Tell me how you make illegal something that we all make in our brain Some say you might go crazy but then again it might make you go sane

Every time I take a look inside that old and fabled book I'm blinded and reminded of the pain caused by some old man in the sky Marijuana, LSD, psilocybin, and DMT they all changed the way I see But love's the only thing that ever saved my life

So don't waste your mind on nursery rhymes Or fairy tales of blood and wine It's turtles all the way down the line So to each their own til' we go home To other realms our souls must roam To and through the myth that we all call space and time

Annie Lederman has a great podcast episode about her experience.

I've learned a lot about life from my experience with A

I've learned a lot

What

What you call it memory maybe not so

What

Recommendations for poor depressed gays who live on the other side of the world to South America, but still need synapses reconnecting? AFAF.

I made some and have a cup in my fridge. Fuck no am I downing that shit. Yes, it is shit in too much of a dose.

I'll take about a teaspoon a day, thank you very much.

It made sediment at the bottom and water at the top. So half and half it and God is it disgusting. It helps me think and I don't get crazy fucking visuals.

Fuck being trapped in that shit for hours. Fuck you Ayahuasca!!!

R475 where the fuck do you live and work that you can just casually make it and keep it in your fridge at home?

Order ingredients online. It's not illegal.

Light boil in pot on stove. Rinse and drain x3. Boil it down. Filter it.

Put in cup, place in fridge.

Do not consume too much. Really, it's different for everyone and not a panacea. I'm still scared of it. That cup will remain in the fridge awhile.

You can really have a nightmarishly hellish trip on it so an experienced shaman is probably not bad idea if you're going for the full effect.

A very interesting interview with Dennis McKenna. He and his deceased brother Terrance have been studying psychedelics and ethnopharmacy for decades.

R477 DMT and any psychoactive substance or plant containing it is 100% illegal to buy, cultivate, transport, prepare or use in Australia, Canada, Norway, the U.K. and in several European countries such as Denmark, The Netherlands, France, Germany, Italy, Latvia, Romania and Sweden.

It was recently partially decriminalised in Spain and in Portugal. The sale, transport, and cultivation of the substance remain criminal offenses, however. Interestingly, in the U.S. DMT is a schedule 1 and technically illegal, but it seems there are significant legal loopholes around its use as an entheogen!c for strictly ‘religious reasons’.

R479 Terrence died pretty young for a modern man, he was only briefly into his 50s.

[quote] Rinse and drain x3

Around these parts we NEVER drain our pasta nor our yajé!

What are your insights?

It's a hallucinogen or are you tapping into some unconscious reality other dimension?

Or are you merely hallucinating it all?

Well you can order the shit online r477

It was then when I discovered my love of bareback orgies! 🍵

How did you even remember what sex was?

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^^the only places to do it in the U.K. seem really grimy and like a scam....

R485 a demisexual (if that's even a real thing) wouldn't be at any type of orgy except one between all close lifelong friends or exes. Which frankly sounds like a powder keg.