Feeling the Silence

I drank ayahuasca again last Sunday in a very beautiful ceremony. I was much more prepared mentally for the experience, although I was still scared before the ceremony began. Alonso, the ayahuascero, said he is always scared before every ceremony, which makes sense, and which makes me respect him even more. At this point I can say which makes me love him even more. He is such a beautiful being who lives from his heart, who sees from the eyes of his heart and from what I have experienced, acts from his heart.

A friend of mine from Block Island came to the ceremony with me, as well as two other people I have met here. It was small this time, only the four of us, three apprentices of Alonso´s, a man from Taray, Alonso and his wife, and their one year old son. Before I went I wrote down the things I wanted ayahuasca to help me with, although I was prepared to experience whatever I needed to experience, since one of my intentions was to surrender to the divine I AM presence inside me, which sees beyond the needs of my ego to what my soul wants for me to grow into a deeper being.

One by one we knelt before Alonso and drank, then walked back to our seats on the ground in the same round room as the last time. Alonso began to play his music, which is so sublime. I settled into the ground and breathed and let my mind relax as the music washed over and through me. I could sense the medicine moving through my body, and then after about an hour it started to affect my consciousness. It is hard to describe what I saw, or at least what the ayahuasca dimension looked like, but if you have ever seen ayahuasca art with its geometric patterns and swirls and colors, then you can get a good idea of what I was seeing. However, the feeling of being in contact with beings from another dimension, very powerful, benevolent beings, divine entities, was more powerful to me than the way things looked, up until a certain point when I felt one of these beings "operating" on my third eye, one of the things I requested. This was not painful or scary, I just felt pressure in my forehead and knew that this being was helping me and I thanked it. From that point on I remembered that my friend Aymar told me that once you become experienced with the medicine it is possible to direct the journey, so I continued to ask the entities to assist me. All of the things I asked for were addressed as best as the plant could do at that point for me. One of the particularly painful things I asked to be released from was not resolved as fully as I wanted it to be, but the message I got from the ayahuasca was that the result I wanted was what my ego wanted, not what my heart wanted, or what my soul knew was the truth, so that I was going to have to continue to accept this condition and learn to open my heart despite the pain that it causes, and it is true, I know, that pain is one of the most powerful ways to learn about love, that I was being given an opportunity to fully accept all the ways that love can live within us without the attachments we so often insist on as conditions or definitions of what love is. All these messages came through me in images and feelings, very beautiful feelings of love. I was crying silently almost the whole ceremony at the beauty of what I was experiencing and at the love radiating from Alonso´s music, and from the others in the room. I had a powerful vision of Jesus Christ, and then a vision of myself with him in a past life. I also had a vision of a North American Indian man dancing who I knew was my husband in a past life. I asked to see myself with him, but looking back, I think I didn´t because I was looking for myself how I look now, not how I did when I was with him. I had many visions of animals, and also an incredible energetic transference from the earth in which I received energy streaming up into my first chakra.

The medicine also worked on us as a group as a whole, bringing up a social issue that is difficult for me. I was feeling uncomfortable and responsible for the people who I brought with me, which was also the case the first ceremony. Both times I actually only asked one person to accompany me, and the others just sort of came along, although I told them to call Alonso to make sure it was ok they came. Anyway, one of the conditions of participating in the ceremony is that you cannot leave until it is officially over. While we were still in the dark, someone came in with a flashlight and went up to Alonso, who stopped playing his music and came over to me and said that one of the people who came with me not exactly invited was leaving because their was something wrong. Alonso´s son had discovered him and came into tell his father. Alonso asked me to accompany him outside to talk to him. Needless to say, this was very disrupting to the energy of the group, both because the circle was broken, and also because the lights were lit at this point. I walked over to the house with Alonso, amazed I could and asked this person what was wrong, if he was ok. His answers were terse and fairly rude. Out of respect for his experience I do not want to reveal them here. Alonso asked him to come in for just an hour more. We told him we were worried about him and I asked him to come sit next to me and try to sleep, suggestions that were not met well. Finally Alonso told him that he had made a commitment and needed to come back in, which he did. I was able to walk back in and recenter myself as Alonso continued to play, and to my surprise, I realized that no one in the room was holding me responsible for this person´s behaviour. Alonso asked me to go because I spoke English and because he thought I would want to help my friend, which I did, even though he rejected my help. So he came back, although he left after about 20 minutes, before the ceremony was over. The rest of us continued on listening to the beautiful music by candle and firelight now, meeting each others´eyes and hugging each other until Alonso closed the circle and people drifted home to sleep, although I slept there on the ground again. I think what happened to this person was that the ayahuasca, which he had drank many times before, worked on his dark side and brought it out into the light, maybe in a way that he didn´t expect, because it sounds like his medicine ceremonies in the past were more hallucinatory in nature. I think this is a testament to the power and purity of Alonso´s use of the medicine, however. The disruptor was angry because he wasn´t tripping hard enough, which I think might have actually been the medicine he needed to bring him into a state where his dark side came out and he had an opportunity to integrate it within the ceremony in a way that he might not have expected.

In the end, it is surrender that is required, and surrendering to the heart, as I¨m sure many of you know, can be very painful, because our wounds must be faced, and felt again sometimes. I feel so grateful and blessed by the beings that helped me in the ceremony and for all the humans in the room with me, and grateful for having the strength to go back for another ceremony.

Many of you who read this appeared to me in the ceremony, everyone shining and in a state of love and grace, and I prayed for all of you and for the earth who allows us to walk on her belly, and for my Uncle, who has crossed over into the stars, too. I saw his face so clearly as he was in life and felt his peace and contentment with wherever he is. I thank all of you for journeying with me and look forward to deepening our connections as we all grow into what we need to be.