AYAHUASCA - MY FIRST CEREMONY - THE DEATH OF THE EGO

I sat in the darkness of the maloca waiting, massaging my stomach. I could feel things moving inside me, but other than that, my perception seemed normal. The acid taste of Ayahuasca lingered on my tongue like thick, rancid Vegemite.

“Expectations are limitations” Mateo, a facilitator at the temple, had told me in preparation for my first ceremony, “There are no rules.”

Mattresses had been laid out in a circle around the maloca – one for each ceremony participant. Along with each mattress came a blanket, a pillow, a bucket to purge in, a mapacho (natural tobacco cigarette), matches and an ash tray.

My sense of time had dissolved along with the light of the last lantern and I was left waiting in the darkness, confronted with the endless chatter of my restless mind. It was a curious thing, being in a room full of people and yet remain silent and surrounded by darkness. Outside the Amazon jungle was alive with the sounds of the creatures of the night.

I had fasted since breakfast – eager to show my dedication to the plant teachers and prepare my body for the ceremony. We were all waiting obediently for the Masteros and Masteras to start singing the legendary icaros, signifying that the medicine had begun to take effect, but my patience was wearing thin rather quickly - uncomfortable with the uncertainty of what was to come. Still yet to master the art of meditation, I wrestled with my mind, silently begging the shamen to open the ceremony.

As a little more time passed I began to feel very tired and uncomfortable sitting cross-legged on my mattress. My knees ached, begging to be released from their discomfort, tempting me to lie down comfortably. We had been advised to stay upright at least until the icaros began in order to allow the medicine to be digested properly.

I waited. And I waited. And my mind chattered, and my knees continued to complain. I tried waiting some more, but eventually, between my restless mind and my aching knees, I felt it fairly urgent and not unreasonable to make myself comfortable on my mattress.

Lying down, I was much more aware of the Ayahuasca inside me, scanning my body, crawling under my skin. Reality started to sway around me and I felt myself being rocked gently, as though I were lying in a hammock strung between the arms of a large, ancient tree.

A voice began to sing a low and eerie note, leading the even more unfamiliar sounds that proceeded to rise up throughout the maloca. I’d read descriptions of the legendary icaros in books before, but nothing could have prepared me for the sounds that surrounded me as the shamen invited the plant teachers to join us. Their songs were beautiful and soulful; as if they were indeed singing the universe into existence. And, though I had never heard such music in my life, their songs were familiar; as if welcoming me back into the womb I was born from.

Strange creatures appeared over me, looking down at me with intense curiosity. They were colourful and bug-eyed, and though I sensed they were harmless, I felt afraid and uncertain as my ego was silently slaughtered.

& With the death of my ego, I didn’t feel so brave and adventurous any more.

Instead I felt alone and afraid, realizing how my ego had led me here in an attempt to demonstrate and impress others with my "fearlessness" in facing Ayahuasca’s challenging reputation. So there I found myself, afraid and paralyzed with indecision as I struggled understand what I'd gotten myself into. "This was a bad idea," I thought to myself. "I don’t ever want to do this again". I desperately wanted someone by my side to reassure me that everything would be okay, but, there was no one, and so I lay dumbly in the darkness; lost without a point of reference.

The creatures continued to watch over me. I sensed they knew what I was going through. They could smell my fear like any beast, and yet they remained harmless; staring back at me, observing my discomfort. They were the faces of the icaros being sung - the alien plant spirits of another dimension. Strange and florescent; alive.

I felt their love surrounding me, welcoming me home, but even so, I continued to feel anxious and uncertain; uncomfortable having lost the ego’s ability to rationalize things as I was used to. I imagined this must be what it is like to be a new-born; the sensory overload that comes with leaving the womb; overwhelmed with the vastness of the world upon first contact.

Rest now. The creatures cooed. One day you will grow strong and understand.

I yawned, over and over and curled up into a fetal position on my side in an effort to ground myself. The yawning continued throughout the night; just another form of purging I was told. The creatures breathed me in and for a moment I understood, but my fear got the best of me and so I was exhaled back into discomfort.

Colours and images formed above me and I began to see snippets of the vivid dreams I’d been having in the weeks leading up to this moment. Images pulled together to form a mural. I tried to make some sense of the "message" but found myself bewildered. Perhaps that was the first lesson that Ayahuasca taught me: that you don’t have to justify or interpret everything - sometime's there's no need to understand.

While these visuals were all very interesting, a part of me grew frustrated with what I was getting – since I was here, I wanted to have a grand adventure; a vivid, healing, hallucination, like those I had read of in books on Ayahuasca. I wanted to walk into the jungle, meet with snake teachers and face my demons, but all I was doing was laying on this mattress like a frightened little child; confused. I was so eager to jump into the deep end with Ayahuasca fearlessly; but why? ‘…not what you want, but what you need…’ a voice taunted me.

My anxiety stayed with me and I continued to feel overwhelmingly confused and afraid. Without a reference point I just wanted someone to help me; to tell me what to do; to tell me that I was okay, yet that’s life isn’t it? There is never really anyone around to tell you what to do; that you are good, bad or okay. One has to learn to discern that for themselves; to believe wholeheartedly in their choices.

I sat up, no longer feeling sick in the stomach. A Mastera was sitting in front of me, singing an icaro in her ancient tongue. I held her hand, needing the physical contact, still wanting to be reassured that I was alright. I was thirsty. We’d been instructed not drink anything until after the ceremony. But I drank anyway, wanting to break a rule; hoping that something would happen that I could make sense of - perhaps that I would be punished for my disobedience?
Nothing happened. I lay back down and closed my eyes.

When the Mastera finished her song, she took my head in her hands and began to suck from the crown of my head. Next she blew Agua de Florida (cleansing flower water) over me, and rubbed some more on my hands and over my face before shuffling over to the next mattress.

I lay alone, trying to deal with my confusion. ‘Perhaps I am not in my body anymore; I just think I am.’ I thought to myself. ‘Maybe if I stand, my body will remain on the floor, and I can walk into a vision and deal with what I need to deal with.’ I slowly began to rise, though I was so unstable. My legs had turned to jelly and I was defiantly mareado (drunk) and still in my body. I lay back down. Again I yearned for someone to tell me how this works; to tell me that I was okay.

I shone my torch against the back wall, and waited for Becca to come over to me. I liked her. She was also Australian, and had flowing red hair and crystal blue eyes. We went outside together and though I had initially wanted to talk to her, to have a human interaction – so desperate to communicate in English – when we were together I found it difficult to express myself.

‘How are you doing?’ she asked me once we were seated on the bench outside. I clutched her hands tightly unable to speak, unsure how I could communicate the strangeness of this experience, and without warning I began to cry softly into her hands.

She comforted me, distracting me by pointing out the fireflies and various constellations in the vast sky above. To me, in that state, she was the mother of the universe, open and nurturing, sharing her wisdom of the world with me with such patience and love. I felt safe again and soothed by her presence.

‘Everything is going to be fine’ she said. I nodded. ‘Just breathe, if anything gets too hard just focus on your breath and observe what is happening’. Her voice sounded different than from speaking with her before the ceremony. She spoke much more simply with an almost mystical, aboriginal accent. ‘Now do you want to go back inside? I believe there are some messages waiting for you.’ I nodded, reluctantly and followed her back to my bed. And, of course, she was right, the big messages were yet to come.

Lying back down I tried to meditate, confronting the usual frustration that comes with attempting to clear the human mind. I tried to be present but my thoughts continued to tease me, distract me, overwhelm me. I wanted to leave my body, to experience something else, but with the birth of that desire I began to see how much I tended to play it safe in life. I was too comfortable in my human body, on the mattress, listening to the strange icaros emanating around the room and I was afraid of the unknown that would come with leaving this familiar form.

The Masteras continued to visit me, singing their songs and I felt confronted to hear somewhat sexual moans as they shifted key. Moment to moment, I would hear the pattering of tiny footsteps around me. At some level I knew they were playful spirits, like older siblings, wanting to play with me – the new-born – yet restraining themselves in respect of my fragile state. They seemed to say: we’re waiting for you to grow up and play and we’re excited to get to know you.

Another Mastera came to my bedside to work with me. I felt weak and tired and lay on my side letting the experiences take over. Her song was solemn and lonely. Gradually, my paradigm shifted into an omnipresent awareness and I was no longer an individual, but the creator of the all, stepping back for a moment to consider my creation.

I remember experiencing profound déjà vu, where I was disappointed with the realization that I was all there is and I felt overwhelmingly alone, despite all the parts of me that I had created on this earth in an attempt to address this sadness. My loneliness echoed around me, bouncing off the harsh truth of what it means to be absolutely everything; the reality that illusions are, at the end of the day, just illusions. This was the big bang – the birth of the purest desire to create separation, others, playmates, and ultimately distraction from this lonely hell. I saw the beauty in human life, and wanted it back so desperately. I ached to know another.

Looking back now it is very difficult to communicate the extent of the intensity of this feeling. It was uncomfortable and confusing, but having had time now to process these experiences I have pieced together a deeper understanding of what this experience had to share with me; how we, God, are an island, surrounded by no-thing-ness, a blank canvas for creation; an orphan.

And as an orphan, alone, we play all the parts, creating the illusions of others, orchestrating the story of humanity like a child that creates their own world while playing with dolls. The characters, the drama, it all comes from the same source; creative and delightful. It is the reason why we have good and bad and a god that loves all of us. And we (God) are addicted to this game of life, the amusement it provides and the satisfaction we get from experiencing the spectrum of all life has to offer.

At this I laughed at myself for wanting or expecting to ‘get somewhere’ or to attain enlightenment through rigorous spiritual practice, because in this omnipresent state it was clear to me that living as a human with all it’s uncertainty and getting ‘no-where’ was much more exciting. I yearned desperately for a playmate, visualizing my loving parents. They stood before me smiling, but I found it painful to realize that they too were illusions; characters, I, the author, had created and fallen in love with, but would never truly get to meet.

Experiencing God’s pure nature, I was also confronted with the (sometimes, frightening) fact that God doesn’t know everything. That God doesn’t know what is beyond itself - particularly if there is more or other ‘Gods’ or why God even exists. In fact God doesn’t know anything. Rather, God creates by choosing to define what ‘the truth is’ and what ‘knowing’ is. We’re really making this all up.

As the night progressed my initial anxieties and fears began to subside. I felt that I was being wound up, with each turn leading me to become more evolved, deepening my understanding of the situation. I began to feel more sure of myself, realizing that there is no ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ and that really I just have to choose whole heartedly what I wanted to believe in, in order to have an authentic experience.

Eventually I became sleepy. The ceremony had progressed into the early hours of the morning, and while I was tired, I couldn’t decide if I had had enough or still wanted more.

I realized how funny I was, having brought protection amulets into the ceremony with me to help me feel safe and grounded when the universal amulet lies in one’s ability to tune into their breath. As I clutched my moonstone crystal a voice seemed to remind me that in order to be able to let go of my body and experience alternative states of being I would have to let go and leave such objects behind. ‘Next time’ I promised myself, hoping that I would follow through and wasn’t just procrastinating out of fear. I spent the remainder of the ceremony in comfort, at peace, drifting in and out of consciousness. I was present to hear the last icaro, powerfully thanking the spirits for their time. Too lazy to rise, I slept in the maloca that night, rising the following morning at six before retreating back to my tambo (hut).