Ayahuasca, Fast Track to Enlightenment?

Up to the time of posting this article, I’ve learned more about myself and the nature of the human condition from my journeys with this magical plant brew than from the sum total of ALL my other life experiences!

So since I’ll be continuing to refer to Ayahuasca in many of my future posts, I thought it would be a good idea to lead with a basic informational article about this ancient mystical gift from the rainforest.

Rather than boring most of you with a bunch of dry text about chemistry, history, ceremonial process and metaphysical theory, I thought it would be more fun to watch a short video. (Well, due to the YouTube limit of 15 mins per single upload, it’s actually 2 short vids!)

So here is one of the most experienced and gracious ‘Shaman’ that I’ve had the pleasure to journey with (Darpan), in a short interview answering some basic and some very insightful questions. Enjoy ...

In summary, Ayahuasca is a healer and a teacher and provides us with a portal to a multi-dimensional experience of the Universe. All of this from the simple act of drinking 60ml of liquid, then sitting or lying down and surrendering to whatever happens next.

Yes, these things are available through other technologies, but what is unique about Aya is its immediate-ness. There’s really nolonger any need to spend 20 years meditating alone in the forest or kow-towing at the feet of some guru hoping that one day you’ll have served enough time to be tossed the odd scrap from the master’s overflowing plate of knowlege!

I’ve done quite a bit of all of the above, and I can honestly say I got more profound insight, awareness and life-changing experience in my first hour of my first cup of Ayahuasca, than in all the years of meditation and esoteric study that preceeded it.

I’d also argue that there just isn’t enough time left for the conventional techniques of raising consciousness. We’re on the hurry-up. Unless there’s a major shift in the way we treat each other and our planet very soon, the future looks more than a bit dire.

I’ll add one thing to Darpan’s eloquent and informed introduction to the plants...

Practice for Death!

Scientific research on Ayahuasca is very scant, mostly due to the Class A scheduling of the brew’s main psycho-active ingredient DMT (Di-Methyl-Triptamine). In other words, most researchers who want to investigate Aya can’t get a licence or funding to do so because: ‘This shit is a dangerous, addictive, illegal narcotic’ (only the illegal part is accurate!)

In fact, as Darpan reminds us, DMT is endogenous to the human body – it’s manufactured by the pineal gland.

Rick Strassman is one of the few ‘white coated’ researchers who’s managed to conduct officially recognised DMT experiments. In his subsequent book “DMT: The Spirit Molecule”, Strassman tells us that pineal DMT production goes into overdrive during two specific, universally experienced human events: Birth and Death!

In fact, for a full 2 minutes after the brain has STOPPED FUNCTIONING, i.e. the person is pronounced ‘Brain Dead’, the pineal keeps on pumping out this profoundly important molecule.

What does that tell you?

For me, it suggests that DMT is involved in the opening of a portal between this 3D experience we call ‘the real world’ and the dimension or dimensions our energetic essence calls home, i.e. where we come from and go back to!

I like this idea. It’s nicely aligned to the universally taught mystical concept of ‘life after death’, but, for me at least, requires less faith in an abstract concept. My mind finds it easier to believe in some mechanism or strategy that seems more plausible or even likely once a bit of science is thrown in.

So if you can accept the idea that a DMT overdose is at least chemically similar to the actual death experience, an Ayahuasca Journey can be seen on some level as ‘practice for death’

During an Aya journey there is still a fairly vivid and tangible link to 3D and the human mind and body, which I suspect will be different at the actual transitional moment of death when the human mind and body ‘dies’. However, my best guess is that the topography, or the direct awareness of the multi-dimensional worlds (which can be experienced without involving the mind), will be very similar.

Navigating these realms becomes a possibility once the individual has sufficient practice (took me 10 to 20 sessions to get to that point), and this is what I refer to as ‘death practice’.

Before one gains a modest ability to ‘surf the DMT wave’ one’s experience tends to be a bit like the awning of a shop front in a hurricane, flapping around aimlessly and helplessy in the wind!

Footnote: one thing Aya has taught me with brutal intensity, is that whenever I think I’ve got a handle on it, that’s just a mistaken belief of my fragile and rather arrogant egoic mind. In reality, I haven’t even scratched the surface!

So no matter how experienced or adept the individual, a DMT overdose can just as easily take you to the depths of terror as to the heights of ecstasy. Buyer beware!!

Edit to add: Since writing this article some time ago, I’ve since begun working in altered states without plant assistance, courtesy of Diana Roth’s outstanding help and support (BeyondVibration.org). I believe that Diana is correct in asserting that we must learn to get into these states and journey into other realms ‘solo’, primarily so we can go where our soul wants to go, rather than where the plant wants to take us!

Whilst I have no regret for my earlier experiences, and still intend to use the plants from time to time, I am now dedicated to journeying without plant assistance. The plants showed me what is possible and gave me a good feeling for how to get there, now I want to do it on my own