My first experience on any type of psychedelic was bout two years ago when I was given 1g of golden teacher mushrooms and this was the first time I cried in years. But after that experience it was like the floodgates had opened. I would cry easily and about almost everything. For someone who was not used to showing emotion this was new, scary and embarrassing for me to deal with. My emotions then became so overpowering over the next year that I would get angry so easily, defensive and depressed much worse than before and the smallest things seems to trigger this. I didn’t want to go through life not feeling but at the same time being unmedicated was scary as the emotions I finally allowed myself to feel after 20-something years of repression were overwhelming and unmanageable.
I decided to attend my first ayahuasca ceremony as my last resort as I was not prepared to go on antidepressants again to blunt my emotions.
I remember driving to my first ayahuasca ceremony in the worst storm I have every experienced on the road in my life. I was alone, scared and wondering why on earth I am still alive only to be put through such experiences. The truth was I didn’t want to go do ayahuasca, I didn’t want to go do anything. I was just going because I had no other options. I was hoping that ayahuasca would be able to rid me of all that was weighing me down in life. I had heard the horror stories about the bad trips people had had on ayahuasca but I knew nothing was as bad as the darkness I faced everyday in my waking life. I knew there was no more pain I could be put through than what I had already survived throughout my childhood. I wasn’t scared of what might happen in the trip. I was scared of going to do ayahuasca and feeling the same after and then coming to the realisation that I now had really run out of any further options. Well, any other options that involved me being alive.
My first ceremony was a two-day journey with a group guided by shamans and started with me drinking a cup of ayahuasca followed by the singing of the shamans throughout the ceremony. After a short while I felt my whole body get hot which started in my pelvic area and moved up my meridian to my head. And the biggest smile formed on my lips which I had no control over at all. I immediately felt like this was going to be a good experience. I was so euphoric, happier than I can ever remember being in my life. My body was so hot, it felt like my stomach was boiling and bubbling up, and my skin was tingling in some places and felt like it was melting off in other places. The experience did not start slowly and build up – it hit me like a bus! I knew at once that this trip had started and was here to stay with all intensity.
For about half an hour I had the most insane visuals. It was the brightest colours, mirrors, the most intricate patterns and fractals swirling all around me at dizzying speeds. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I was watching the most spectacular show with the biggest smile on my face. The full body experience was continuing though, and I could feel my body at different parts heating up and almost “swelling” like a balloon that was about to pop. I remember touching my hand and wondering what is wrong with it as it felt all rubbery and being slightly bothered about it, asking myself “what’s wrong with my hand?”.
And then I heard a woman’s voice reply “nothing is wrong”
I responded “something is wrong with my hand, it feels funny”
Then she repeats firmly “nothing is wrong”
Then I said “ok, sceptically I guess nothing is wrong?”
Then she replies again firmly “nothing is wrong, don’t you understand, all the concerns you have with your health etc, nothing is wrong”
So then I though to myself “ok that’s fine maybe I will entertain this thought that nothing is wrong and its fine”
I then saw what would look like the inside of the most sophisticated clocks, tiny gears all working together and I just knew this was “the mind” and I would be zooming into this and zooming out almost like a rollercoaster. I then saw hot pink “gears” very intricately and there was black ink covering it and then from one side to the other the black ink slowly lifted up almost levitating and then dissolved. And I don’t know how, but I just knew that this was the depression that had been “lifted from my mind”. And I was surprised that that was my depression, just an ink blot on my brain that could be lifted up so easily and effortlessly. And then I thought that’s strange. Because I don’t actually feel like anything is different. I still felt like my brain feels the same, it was still not stopping.
And then I spoke to the voice and I said “maybe the depression is gone but I still cant be happy because there’s no peace. My mind doesn’t stop. And I wont be happy until you take it from me. I don’t want it anymore, it is causing me so much pain.” And I said this because it wouldn’t even let me believe that the depression is really gone after I saw that the black ink had lifted! And this shows how bad the situation was because I really value my mind and what it can achieve but it was causing me such suffering I didn’t want it anymore.
And then she said “no you need your mind I cant take it”
But she showed it to me with the most intricate clockwork and told me here “I have cleaned it for you” and I saw how it changed from orange to white and I could feel the difference. Like calm and peace. And then I saw how the anxiety had been causing depression and I could feel that now the depression had gone. And I almost laughed about it because these sicknesses that had held me down were not in me or part of me – they were just like a layer of dirt or ink on me which could be removed so easily. And I was so happy like “yeah, my anxiety and depression is gone” and I could now believe it.
At this point the music changed and there was some gong that went off and I was almost immediately in another dimension which didn’t have the bright colours and patterns anymore and I saw a lady standing by a tree which I felt was in the amazon and I knew it was Mother Ayahuasca and she told me its time to get rid of everything that is weighing me down which I agreed to. And then again almost immediately we were in another dimension with nothing around me it was just myself and she told me that she had to remove my boyfriend’s heart from within me as it was weighing me down. At this point she reached into my stomach and up my ribcage and started pulling out his heart. She said “he is inside of you and making you sick, I must take it out”
The physical pain was so strong, it hurt so bad I thought I was dying. And she held his heart out in front of me and showed me that his heart was black and gooey and attached to my heart which was still red and healthy looking except for this black that was making me “sick”.
(the strange thing here is that I wasn’t even concerned that she had removed my heart too, I was just so upset that she had removed his heart from within me, I didn’t even know she was removing my heart too because I was only concerned with his).
“Don’t you see he is making you sick – you need to let go of him”
“cant you see what he is doing to your heart, he is making you sick”
I said “do not ask that of me why does that have to be the way.”
And she said “the only way you can be happy is if you let go of him”
I started crying and I said “no, take anything but this why must you take him from me” and she said you said you came here to get rid of what is weighing you down and now the time has come and youre not prepared to do it”. So I thought to myself an said “if this is it then it must be done. If this is the only way for me to heal and be happy then I guess I have to do this. I cant back out now. If he is making me sick then I must let it go. Then I asked “so I must break up with him then in life to be happy?” there was no answer but I knew that once I removed his heart from mine I would have to break up with him and carry this out in real life. I wasn’t prepared to do this so I started crying even more and said no I cant I will literally die from this pain, its not possible. Then she asked firmly “then why did you come here” so I said “ok do it” and before I could properly finish the words she ripped his heart off mine and I knew we were over. I felt overcome with such sadness I had never felt this in my life because for the first time I was just sad. Not sad and angry. Or sad and disappointed. Just sad. And it was so pure to have this sadness wash over me and I mourned the loss of my love. The tears rolled down my face so gently and I came to terms with what I had just done. I accepted it fully. I was so surprised that this had caused me so much pain as I saw my heart after the black goo had been removed and I could see it was still whole so I couldn’t believe the intense pain I felt having to let go as though a physical part of me had been removed.
When I had gotten over my mourning and come to terms with having let him go I saw her with that the black part which was my boyfriend’s heart was wheeled out by her on a medical trolley.
I then saw my heart again which was floating up higher and higher onto a white pedestal and there were flower wreaths around it and angel wings around it and I was showed my heart which is now healed and told it is safe and protected forever. Which made me happy but I was still concerned because I had seen my boyfriends heart which was so black and was still sad for him and that I would have to break up with him now. So I asked again “does this mean I have to break up with him when I go back” and I was still in so much shock about this and kept repeating “I have to do this because his heart was black and making me sick, he was the reason for all my sickness” and I was going on about it. And then finally replied sternly and said “no Tesha, that wasn’t his heart. That was a sickness. And I asked – his sickness? Because you said he is making me sick” and she said “no, that black thing that was removed wasn’t him, that was your attachment to him that was making you sick. You can still go back and have him and be happy with him but you had to let go of your attachment to him, that was making you sick, and it wasn’t him it was you who created that. And then I accepted it, didn’t resist that thought, but at the same time was confused because she had shown me his heart and told me it was his that was making mine sick. But then some part of me understood that she had to tell me that and had to show me that so that I could believe that I was really giving up his heart and our love in order to give up the attachment. I had to believe that I was giving up his heart for a greater purpose like to heal etc. in order to truly give up the attachment.
But I was still insisting what she had showed me was his heart. And she said no that wasn’t his heart (which I could also now believe because it didn’t look like a heart it just looked like black goo over my heart). And she showed me his heart and it was just like an anatomical heart but unlike mine being red, his whole heart was black. And I remember seeing it and being so horrified because it was oozing tar and pouring out black oil and thinking this is so terrible and bad. And then I questioned her that she is showing me this heart what does it mean because mine was red and only had a small part of black on it and yet his whole heart is black and scary what are you trying to tell me…that he is a bad person? Surely this means that he really is bad for me. And I convinced myself that yes he is a bad person, that’s what it means. Then after being quiet for some time she said no. he is not a bad person, don’t you see, he is sick, his heart is sick. And then I came to the realisation that everything he does that is bad is not because he is a bad person, it is because he is so so sick. And I used to always wonder why he couldn’t control his anger and why he had to say the most hurtful things when I could control myself in the same argument and why he would push me away and it all became clear that his heart was so much sicker than mine. Then she said “don’t you see his is sick, he needs healing, he needs the medicine, he needs to come and get his heart cleaned too.” And I just thought “wow people always say people only hurt others when they are hurting themselves and it never sunk in, but here I came and saw it for myself and I realised that I don’t hurt others that way, not because I am some superior person, but rather because I am not as sick as them.
She then put me in a typical fight with my boyfriend where he says I don’t really love him or what kind of horrible person I am or other false things about my character and I kept getting angry in the typical response I always had and I started burning up in anger. And then my response slowly changed because I remembered he only does this because he himself is unwell and my response changed to sadness that I must deal with his sickness, and I kept being put in the same fight and reliving it over and over until slowly that sadness changed too and I wasn’t sad for myself anymore, I was sad for him that he is so sick that he can’t believe that he has someone who truly loves him and is actually a good honest person. And I kept repeating “shame you are so sick” and I felt such genuine sadness for him that he is just sick, and not a bad person.
In the days before doing ayahuasca I was thinking a lot about childhood and was thinking that maybe the trip would help me come to terms with it and out it behind me. And in my trip I thought about this again and I saw a timeline/strip on a screen in front of me and on the left a small part of the strip was orange which was the past and on the extreme right was a strip with the future and the biggest part of the strip was the middle which was the present. And I asked Mother Ayahuasca “what about the past?” because I wanted some kind of explanation for it and he responded “what, about the past? What has it done to you? Is it still affecting you now” And I thought about it for a second and realised yes, truly nothing from the past is affecting me now, nothing from the past has been carried over into the future, maybe the emotions have carried over yes, but in that realm there was no emotions still attached to the past and I could think about it clearly but its almost as though, I didn’t lose a leg in the past and now I have to adjust to living without one. And I was forced to answer that actually no, nothing is still affecting me now. Then she said “so let it go stop thinking about it” then I said no, the past was big I can’t just let it go. Then she said sternly but its not affecting you now, so let it go, JUST. Let it go. And I said ok. And she moved her hand over that part of the time line and it changed from orange to white.
Then we moved over to the right into the present and I had to work in the present but she felt I couldn’t work there and she moved me over more to the right into the future and she showed me these visions of the future, of things I could possibly fantasise about or dream about in the future. She showed me this perfect life in the future and told me “you see all of this… you need to let it go” and I fought it. I was almost reaching out to it and touching it and saying this future is so beautiful I can’t let it go. Then I asked if I let this vision go does this mean I can’t have it? And she said “you asking these questions means you can’t let it go, you’re still trying to create the future” And after showing me the perfect future I wanted she showed me other versions which could be equally good and I had to entertain all these other options which weren’t my perfect fantasy but which I had to accept were possibilities that could make me equally happy. And eventually I let the dream of the future go even though it was so hard. And I was sad about it that I had to leave the dream. And she told me the fact that I’m sad that I had to let the dream go shows I still haven’t let it go because I am still attached to the outcome. She told me I had let go of that vision which was probably the hardest but I hadn’t let go of wanting to control the future. So, I asked “is that my ego that it wants control?” and she said “no its not that bad, you are just scared of the unknown. But you don’t need to fear the unknown or the future and you don’t need to create the future as you see it in your mind because your mind can not conceive what is possible at this moment in time because there are such amazing things ahead for you. You can everything you want in your life but stop trying to control it to the extent where you are actually limiting yourself because you can’t imagine how good it will be – the possibilities for you are endless and the universe has the most amazing gifts for you”. And she asked me what I wanted ten years ago and how I have much more now because I was given so many more opportunities that I didn’t even know existed ten years ago. And I was almost pushed into these better opportunities because everything I wanted wasn’t working out and at the time it felt like dissonance but only now I can see that the end result was way better than I could’ve ever planned because I didn’t know what was possible. And I was shown that I can’t actually plan my life, because my mind can’t comprehend what is possible for me or what the universe has for me. And I was told that I will end up having everything I wanted and so so much more.
She said “just because you’re giving up on your vision of the future doesn’t mean you can’t have it, you are giving up your attachment to the future, not the possibility of these things and much much more happening”.
To say this was a great experience would be an understatement. It was the best experience of my life. I came back to normal life with no anxiety and my depression cured to about 80% relief. I owe my life and everything to Mother Ayahuasca and for that reason I want everyone to know of her magnificence and how much in awe I am of this teacher plant. It truly was enlightenment. I have more to share and hope to do so in the near future. This was my medicine and I hope that one day I can contribute to it helping other people the way it helped me.