The New Integrated Medicine and Self-healing

For the past week I have dived into a snow-balling movement that is going on right now, which for me means a revolution in medicine. Reading wonderful authors like Debra Greene, listening to amazing enlighteners both back home in Estonia through radio and also the inspirational figures Bruce Lipton, the cell-biologist who is now an educator in the new development in genetics called epi-genetics or (beyond) genetics, and Lissa Rankin who is also an educator as to the role of stress, our belief about stress and the role of doctors in healing.

It has been an astounding journey where most of my biological base knowledge taught in schools has been over-thrown. Genes don't control us, its the signals and the quality of intent from the environment which through the membrane of the cell can either trigger genes or leave them silent, but genes can do nothing on their own and after removing genes from the cells, the cells still function in a normal way. The placebo effect is perhaps the main reason why people heal in conventional medicine. We are self-healing mechanisms. The last part was not new to me at all, but it was the mechanism and the reasons behind that was left somehow unclear.

Biology and medicine are finally tuning into the recognition that consciousness is the most important part of an organism. I find myself doing my happy dance on the inside! 
Religion on its own failed because people needed proof. We experience the world through our senses and these receptors to the outside can see, taste, touch, smell, hear- of course we couldn't be satisfied when that part of experience of life was left out of the equation. And yet science ie looking for proof is not complete on its own because there are phenomena that it just cannot explain with looking at the physical aspect only, many things just don't make sense. 
Evolutional psychologists know the importance of a faith system for human beings, without something to believe in, to trust in, and to have hope in we are living in fear. We simply do not do well with the proposition and thought-system that it is an alien, hostile universe out there that acts without cause or reason in a random way and can threaten us at any time. Perhaps this view-point is also important at certain periods of life, it can propel us through existentialism towards many dissolutions of things we do not need, but in the long run it is a non-sustaining world-view.
When we banned religion and turned solely towards science then at first that worked quite well, there seemed to be definite laws and reasons about the outside that we could figure out and then control and we had a heightened faith in ourselves. 
Of course it turned out that nature still acts unpredictably and besides that there were a lot of cold mechanical philosophical implications coming out of science like Darwinism and random competitive evolution, or the Newtonian clockwork model of the world that alienated us to a feeling of a lonely isolated machine. Still in the mercy of the unknown. 
Even in modern science the more we know about the proven facts the more crazy the universe seems, especially with the rise of the modern sciences like quantum physics etc. 
In my opinion, though people do protest this of course- science in fact IS the new religion or has turned into one. There are many things coming out from research now that show that many of the accepted "facts" of science are based on nothing but an agreement of the majority of the scientists in the past who presented it to the public as facts, and it caught up in the whole collective consciousness perhaps in the old model of faith, which ironically it was rebelling against in the beginning- perhaps a habitual track for us too strong to fight against, the path of least resistance. Really these "facts" were either partial findings to begin with or almost not researched at all, for example vaccines, aids, blood transfusions to name some. 
If you listen to the most passionate advocates of science, you will often find people who refuse to even question many dogmas of science, who ridicule people who want to seemingly put the whole thing to question which we already take solace and comfort in, by simply doing additional new research or to look into alternatives to these, as would be scientific-minded really. The only conclusion is that science simply took the place of religion in a way. 
But times are changing now, as soon as scientists started tackling the role of the mind and consciousness, in the after-advent of the discovery of the quantum world, and in the advent of a cyber-connected world of the modern era also.. there is a union happening among the open-minded and progressive scientists. Different fields of science are in fact coming to the same conclusions, conclusions that perfectly match old spiritual wisdom that the highest achieving researchers into the predecessor system for looking for answers found. 
Spirituality and science together make a perfect marriage, something that I have been hoping for for a long time. By spirituality of course I do not mean organized religion, following dogma, blind faith. I mean the lessons that ancient cultures gave us, which we simply wanted to throw away like throwing the baby out with the bath water- those of feeling like an integrated part in our own deeply respected world- like shamans did. Those of coming to contact with the higher intelligence, knowledge about the life-energy that makes our hearts beat and lungs breathe, knowledge about the essence of life, the spark that is sacred, knowledge that because everything is connected we are all tiny parts of the process but we form a whole and there is love, there is meaning- like the the core of all religions did. With remembering these discoveries of the spiritual paradigm we can establish materialism also as the yang to the yin, with creating the perfect balance.

The new research into the placebo effect and stress has developed these understandings in short about what disease is and how we heal.. 

Stress turns on the fight-or-flight program in our body, the sympathetic system. Our brains, through the secretion of stress hormones trigger the following actions in our bodies- the blood flows into our limbs, involved in self-protection, away from our brain and torso, leaving less oxygen and energy there, lessening our immune system. In a longer period of stress of course the bodies respond with disease. It seems that disease is the body's crying out to us- no! We are starved and need attention. Often it happens that people over-work and over-stress and its only when they get sick then they allow themselves to take the time out and heal themselves so in other words the body's response with disease is the only intelligent decision it can make. 

Our cells renew constantly, every few years our whole cellular body is completely new. So it is not a problem for the body to heal at all, it doesn't seem to need anything from the outside for that. Yet we have more and more prolongued and debilitating and chronic disease. This can be firstly because the stress factor remains and the body remains in the sympathetic system instead of going into the parasympathetic relaxed healing system. These signals are coming also from our emotional and mental bodies. If our cells get the signal from our thoughts- I cannot get better, there is something wrong, or our emotions- I am afraid, then the cell responds in the same way, it doesn't distinguish between perceived threats or actual threats, there have been many experiments proving this. 
Or the second signal, that dr. Lipton has talked about as well, is the unconscious programming we have been receiving from the people around us since we are very little- you have to go to the doctor, he will make you better. You may be an open-minded person with awareness of the bodys self-healing powers at times, but without the full realization on the experiential level perhaps also- the deep-rooted programming will take charge and the long-established conviction- only a doctor can make me better, I have no knowledge or power really to do that- will block the body to actually go to the self-healing stage, the signals for relaxation are not there! It is the same with people who go on a self-developing road through meditation for example. It takes a very long time for the set habits to allow our minds and bodies to fully and deeply go into the practice, even though we understand and know that it works and is good for us.
Once we go to the doctor the obstacle for healing is dissolved, belief activates the relaxation which in turn will allow us utilize our own innate healing mechanism. 

It is a question for me- whether it has any effect at all what the doctor does to you, whether he gives you a pill, gives you a placebo, or does nothing. As long as he does not upset the release of the healing program, (which unfortunately of course happens all the time and doctors even do harm constantly by causing diagnosis shocks in a patient), but performs his function of providing allowance for you to do your thing, supporting you and making you feel protected, then there is nothing wrong with going to the doctor of course. This is until we reprogram ourselves to truly believe in our own bodies, then going to the doctor, unless it is an accident and our bones need to be set, or any other assistance like for giving birth- becomes obsolete. 

So I have been thinking for some time- are doctors necessary. For those with the belief in their own innate ability to heal- they are not. But now I realise that for those still with the belief that it is the doctor who heals them- they are important. And for those who believe that alternative doctors do the best healing- these doctors are the best ones. It really boils down to our own belief-system and who do we trust, who can get us to the state of parasympathetic response. Is it you? It can be you! But many will perhaps always feel more comfortable with a support system outside them who they can rely on and who comforts them. Whatever works! Create the positive atmosphere however you like, but its that state of trust and well-being, relaxation, which is the real doctor for all of us, and there are many things we can do to increase that, including thought exercises, emotional healing from the past, meditation, yoga, healthy nutrition, exercise, falling in love with someone or better yet- being in love with life, universe and everything, including our own tiny expressions of that beautiful energy that are our bodies. Possibilities are endless! :)


 

Energy Medicine and the Multidimensional Model by Debra Greene

"According to Einstein’s famous formula, E=MC2, energy and matter are interchangeable. Matter can be converted into energy, and energy into matter. Indeed, when physicists looked deeply into matter to find what we are made of, they discovered that matter is not solid but consists of subatomic particles comprised of mostly empty space. In turn, when they looked into the “empty space,” physicists determined that it was not so empty after all, that it is teaming with energy, effervescing, a quantum froth. This energy is at the core of everything in existence.

One does not have to stretch far to see the parallels between this underlying energy-essence that connects everything and the notion of unifying oneness that weaves its way through many spiritual traditions. One of the places where science and spirituality intersect comfortably is in the emerging field of energy medicine. Here ancient methods find their home in modern practitioners’ offices and in research laboratories.

The question then arises: If everything is energy, what constitutes the legitimate domain of energy medicine? In attempting to answer this question, I found a useful model that is shared by modern scienceand many ancient traditions. It accounts for the diversity in the field of energy medicine and helps to explain a vast array of energy-based phenomena. This theoretical model holds that a human being consists of multiple layers, or dimensions, that coexist simultaneously. Although individual models based on this principle differ slightly in terms of the number of layers and their labels, there is general agreement about four main dimensions: the physical-etheric, the emotional, the mental, and the spiritual. According to the ancients, the soul is encased in these successive layers.

Versions of the multidimensional model have been discussed over the years at annual conferences of the International Society for the Study of Subtle Energies and Energy Medicine (ISSSEEM), the leading organization for the scientific study of energy medicine. Elmer Green, the organization’s cofounder, a pioneer in biofeedback and psychophysiology research, used the model as a basis for his work (for more information on ISSSEEM and recordings from its conferences, go to www.issseem.org). The most substantiated version of the multidimensional model has been advanced by William Tiller, professor emeritus at Stanford University and former chair of the Materials Science department. Tiller’s contribution is significant because, after 34 years in academia, his feet are firmly planted in conventional science. His stated mission is to build a reliable bridge that seamlessly joins conventional science with the various subtle domains of inner reality and the domain of spirit. He calls his approach psychoenergetic science, and he has made important strides in revealing, in quantitative detail, how human consciousness interacts with physical reality.

Rich in heuristic value, Tiller’s multidimensional model was used by Richard Gerber, a practicing physician trained in internal medicine and devoted to researching vibrational healing. Gerber became a definitive authority on energy medicine with the publication of his seminal contribution Vibrational Medicine, which used the multidimensional model as its foundation. Meticulously researched and backed by the science of the day, the book was essentially the first energy medicine textbook of its kind. Former professor and analytical chemist Charles Krebs used the same model in his groundbreaking work on energy kinesiology (A Revolutionary Way of Thinking), and I also made use of the multidimensional model in my recent book on energy health (Endless Energy).

What Is the Multidimensional Model?

According to the multidimensional model, human beings consist of a spectrum of energy frequencies. These layers or “energy bodies” – the physical-etheric, emotional, mental, and spiritual – comprise distinct yet overlapping frequency domains. They represent the “equipment” through which we experience various dimensions of reality. Consciousness is the great mediator that connects the energy bodies and holds us together so that we function as a whole person (actions, feelings, thoughts, and volition) with continuity from day to day.

The slowest or lowest frequency domain is the physical plane, which we occupy by virtue of the fact that we have a physical body. Bones, organs, tissues, blood, glandular secretions, nervous system, and DNA all fall within the purview of the physical body. As well, the five senses of seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, and smelling belong to the physical body. But the gross physical body needs a power supply, a life force, in order to function. This life force is called the etheric body, and it is responsible for our vitality.

According to the model, the dense physical body and the etheric body must be understood as inseparably woven together, as two sides of the same coin. That’s why the physical-etheric is typically referred to as one body and not two. Without the etheric body to animate it, the physical body is a corpse. That Western medical science developed primarily through the study of cadavers helps explain how the etheric body was missed in conventional medicine.

The etheric body is the inner substantial form, the “internal scaffolding,” upon which the dense physical body is built. It consists of a vitality-rich energy that goes by several names: for example, chi in China, ki in Japan, prana in India, or mana in Hawaii. The martial arts from a variety of cultures are based on this energy, as are the healing systems of Traditional Chinese Medicine, acupuncture, Ayurveda, yoga, Tibetan Medicine, and kahuna healing, to name a few. The ancients knew this energy well and developed their healing practices accordingly.

Moving up the frequency spectrum, the remaining energy bodies that comprise our basic human constitution are the emotional, mental, and spiritual. The emotional body is responsible for our emotions and feelings, while the domain of the mental body is our thoughts and intellect. The spiritual body, which is the highest or fastest frequency domain, allows us to have spiritual experiences. We humans occupy these multiple levels of existence simultaneously. That’s what makes us so wonderfully complex. Most of us are familiar with the emotional, mental, and spiritual aspects of ourselves, but the etheric body, the foundational component of energy medicine, remains more of a mystery.

The Etheric Body

Although the U.S. medical world has been resistant to recognizing the etheric body, mainstream culture has embraced numerous practices based on its underlying principles. You don’t have to look far today to see the popularity of yoga, acupuncture, meditation, and the martial arts. These practices emerged from ancient cultures dedicated to the complex and systematic study of the etheric body, which led to a scientific understanding of human energy anatomy. Successful medical systems based on their findings followed. This knowledge and these practices are now being validated by Western scientific methods.

According to the ancients, the etheric body is a complex energy/information matrix that interpenetrates the dense physical body and extends beyond it for several inches. The etheric body powers the physical body through a sophisticated network of energy centers, distribution lines called meridians in Chinese medicine, and the branching of smaller and smaller energy capillaries called nadis, a Sanskrit term for “channels.” This network has been validated by a number of modern scientific methods, includingmagnetic resonance imaging(MRI). The energy centers are often referred to as chakras, a Sanskrit word that means round or wheel. These, too, have been experimentally verified with electrostatic measurements as well as electromyography (EMG). It’s likely that ancient scientists and practitioners had the capacity to see these wheel-like energy centers and named them accordingly. People today who claim to see these energies have described them as looking like spinning wheels or vortices that range in size from about two to several inches in diameter, depending on their stage of development.

Chakras are like electrical power plants where high voltage energy is transformed and distributed through a convergence of power lines. The etheric body interfaces with the physical body through these power distribution lines, these meridians. This energy network corresponds to the physical nervous system. When several meridians intersect, which happens at the major nerve centers in the physical body, they become even more potent, teeming with life-force energy.

The Interface Effect

Chakras and meridians form the basis of a variety of established energy-based healing modalities and have been linked to physical, emotional, and mental health. One explanation for this is “the interface effect” of the etheric body. It is believed that the etheric body acts as an interface between the physical body and the other energy bodies (emotional, mental, and spiritual). In the clothing world, an interface performs important function –, for example, making the collar of a man’s dress shirt stiff so it can stand up. The purpose of an interface is to reinforce or add substance to whatever it is sewn into. It is usually stitched onto the inside of an outward-facing piece of fabric. This makes it invisible when the garment is completed because the interface is concealed between layers of fabric.

So it is with the etheric body. This energy body is woven onto the inside of the physical body and is “invisible” from the outside. As an interface, the etheric body reinforces the physical body, providing the energetic substance that holds the physical body together and helps it function as an integrated unit (for example, your liver stays in place and your heart beats without you having to think about it). Like a collar without an interface, if the physical body were without its etheric body “backing,” it would be limp and unsubstantiated, unable to stand up.

As an interface, the etheric body also acts as a gateway between the physical body and the three remaining bodies – the emotional, mental, and spiritual – creating reciprocity between them. Any of the bodies can be accessed through the etheric body. This is why healing modalities that specifically involve the etheric body (such as classical homeopathy, acupuncture, therapeutic touch, Reiki, Emotional Freedom Technique, Touch for Health, and other kinesiologies, to name a few) usually help with physical ailments as well as emotional and psychological issues.

The Blueprint Effect

In addition to being an interface, the etheric body serves another important function. The conventional wisdom is that genes provide the blueprint for the physical body. However, groundbreaking research in molecular biology over the last couple of decades suggests otherwise. Although genes play a fundamental role in determining our physicality, the new field of epigenetics (epigenetic means “above the gene”) has revealed another influence beyond the genes that determines whether or not a gene is used.

According to epigenetics, our genes are more like building materials than blueprints. They are the lumber, nails, Sheetrock, and fixture choices that may or may not end up being included in the physical structure. Something outside of the gene helps determine whether it becomes part of the building (or rebuilding) process. Mechanisms that potentially influence whether or not a gene gets “expressed” include such nonphysical factors as emotions, thoughts, and states of consciousness. In light of the interface effect, this is the domain of the etheric body as it provides a gateway to the physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual bodies.

It could be that the true blueprint for the physical body is the etheric body, which may contain the energy/information instructions that determine what goes into the physical body’s formation. It may also be that all aspects of the physical body, including illness and disease, preexist in the etheric body. The physical body is an exact replica of the etheric body; the etheric body is the “original.” This helps explain why energy-based healing modalities are able to produce physical effects simply by balancing the energies of the etheric body. It appears that they may be working at the level of the blueprint.

Implications

Taken together, the blueprint effect and the interface effect of the etheric body profoundly impact the physical body, from its shape and size to its ongoing health and vitality. The important energy activity happens behind the scenes, in the internal realms; the physical body displays the aftereffects. In essence, the physical body is the stage where emotions, thoughts, and spiritual energies play out their ultimate expression.

The multidimensional model, and the etheric body in particular, help explain why there’s such a high incidence of relapse with conventional medical approaches. One can fall sick with any number of illnesses, get treated, and then become sick again. The illness may not be truly healed because addressing only the physical aspect potentially leaves the “energetic signature” of the illness intact. Indeed, the energy bodies may hold the key to complete healing.

Recognizing and working with the energy bodies may also provide an accurate early detection system. Since, in this model, any physical ailment preexists in the etheric body before it manifests on the physical level, we don’t have to wait for an illness to show up in the physical body before correcting it. We can be pro-active by focusing on the energy bodies first, keeping them healthy and balanced. This is something that can largely be accomplished with education and self-care – a much more cost effective and much less invasive approach than medical interventions on the gross physical level.

Energy medicine is an idea whose time has come. Recognition of the energy bodies is what defines energy medicine and sets it apart from allopathic approaches. As far as we know, every healing system on the planet recognizes the existence of these types of energy except for one, conventional Western medicine. But as the therapeutic effects of energy-based healing methods continue to be substantiated, this is bound to change. It’s time to put the soul back into medicine."

Noetic Now Journal | Institute of Noetic Sciences

Ayahuasca, part 2- HEAVEN

Alex Grey - Theologue

Entering the second session with the master-plant took an immense effort, just the getting ready for it. Never in my life had I been so out of control, powerless and afraid. To choose to enter that world again was one of the hardest things I've had to do, my breath was unsteady and heart trembling. It didn't help that much that the shaman was saying not to enter with fear, that if I entered afraid, I would only have more of the same, more of fear. How easy it is to understand yet how do you force yourself not to be afraid if your only experience with the plant is that of utter hell. So instead of thinking- don't fear, I was saying to myself- remember to open your heart and love. Positives do work much better.

This time as I gulped down the brown liquid, a quarter of a dose of the night before, I wasn't asking for a lot other than- treat me kindly.. :)

Regardless of such a small dose, the effects were once again immediate. Straight away I was in the same place, the nasty place of vomiting and life-less soulless fear circus and playground. Ugly horrible noises- I thought- I cant believe this- I'm here again, I couldn't believe WHYEVER people do this thing, why was I doing this, AGAIN!!!

But soon I realised that it was different this time. I was able to stand back, probably because of the lower dose. I wasn't overwhelmed or drowned in the other reality, I could open my eyes and come back to my mattress. So I relaxed, got over the wish to just keep purging, focused, let the circus be, let the fear be. The shaman had told me that the shapes I had seen had all been doors and she was right, it turned out that the same hell was like a gate-way. The horrific clown-demons were gate-keepers with a simple test- can you overcome fear and turn it into love? Only with an open heart can you cross over to the magic side of Ayahuasca!

A different universe started to emerge. The crude shapes turned finer and finer. All corners smoothing out. Where only one or two colours had prevailed, now all the colours of all the chakras started to come through and build a cosmos like no other. Somehow my body was cleansed deeper than ever before, somehow for the first time in my life all my energy centers were open, all of them involved in co-creation.

From time to time I was still seeing a face of a demon-clown here and there, but now somehow I felt no judgement or fear for them. I was beginning to feel the unified and I had a clear knowledge that the demonic and the soulless also had a place in this whole.

How can I describe the next 3 hours other than that it was being in pure, unconditional love and bliss. The whole indescribable universe which opened up was like an organic interconnected 3D web, painted and shining with the light-beams of all the colours of the rainbow. I kept flying through this miraculous place, in which every millimeter was so full of detail, so intricate, so ornate. It was constantly being born, new vistas, new details, every intricate millimeter of its fabric turning ever more intricate and then molding into something different once again. Flying over stunning landscapes of green hills, oceans, rivers between canyons with round bridges over it, volcanoes. Meeting nature itself, I saw countless animals and birds and fish, mainly those of the Amazonian jungle but also for example koalas and platypuses and elephants, leaving me in a soul-quenching state of connectedness with Mother Earth in all its glory. I saw the images of Buddhas everywhere, especially during the first minutes, this in particular was giving me a feeling of security and support at that time. I also kept sighting an Eye on every corner of the highway of heaven. The eye always seeing, always open- sometimes the eye of a cat, sometimes that of a puma, sometimes human, sometimes also a face with three eyes. The meaning of this is self-evident as the shaman said- the third eye feeds off the heart, with an open heart the center of intuition cannot remain closed.

There were pyramids and pharaohs- in general so much detail it was impossible to remember even a fraction of all I saw.

It was a journey and it felt complete, which made me realise I was witnessing something like the blue-print of the evolution of consciousness and of the Earth. It was flowing and glowing with such gentle pure love and such overwhelming beauty that I couldn't stop crying while I had the biggest smile on my face.

I saw my friend, who was with me in this retreat, and had struggled a lot with the first night as myself, dancing under a Sun bathed in a golden light, free and wild and liberated. And in her own vision at that time she was actually dancing, free of fear, liberated! In fact somehow as a group I found us in a connected web of minds, and the link accessible through Ayahuasca, truly amazing to see intuition at work.

Love was everywhere. I saw the Man and the Woman standing hand in hand in front of a sunset, and the Man and the Woman again making love while suspended in the universe in front of a huge burning Sun.

There was one instant I wished to see a loved one in my vision and tried to mold the creation that was. Yet suddenly the flying avenue of light burst in a short-cut and there was a breaking black gap in the flow. I saw what happened and I laughed at myself for not being happy with the absolute perfection I was already witnessing. This was perhaps one of the most meaningful of all the lessons from this experience. Even while in sync with the source, and having entered this state because of one thing and one thing only- by being a witness and thus letting the natural power of love and life that each of us possesses, move us into a higher state, we as humans can get so confident that we forget to be witnesses and try once more to use a limited tool of the personal mind to "improve" that which is naturally, to fulfil our little wishes of the ego, thus losing that which took us there, the act of letting go, equanimous observation, thus losing the connection.

I kept traveling until the vision started to slow down and everything came back to its point of origin. Not surprisingly all the roads made of light went back to a huge pumping heart, now filling my vision, all the energy of the world started and ended there and I think that is what the Ayahuasca is mainly a teacher of. Its not the mind that is so important, the mind is the tool for seeing, but the heart is the core, the beginning, without the heart no higher goals are possible, love is the key.

I went to sleep slowly because the happiness was too deep and I felt full of energy. Everything was shining, even though it was a dark night. The sky was full to the brim with stars and my dreams were full of a flight of a bird.

How different was the next morning from the one before. At the breakfast table, instead of the previous shattered tired frightened faces, disorientated, lost; were shining creatures who looked each other in the eyes with love, gratitude for sharing the journey, open helpfulness.

Our last ceremony was the ceremony to the mother Earth or Pachamama. We held hands in a circle and sent back to eachother and to mother Nature all that we had gained. The feeling of unconditional love can only grow from giving back. The hands were pulsating with energy. We each made a pledge to commit to trying in whatever way to return the love and the shaman burned a bundle of symbolic presents to Pachamama, consisting of all manner of things like coca and tea-leaves, sugar, strings of gold, salt, even wine, in a small fire, the ashes remaining on the soil and the good intentions flying up with the smoke to the skies. Afterwards everybody hugged eachother, such a feeling of love and humanity! It was so beautiful to be able to speak freely with love and gratitude, to not be hindered by any of the communication patterns and games we usually are enslaved to.

I felt my heart was completely opened by this absolutely incredible plant mixture for that time. But I know that this was just a lesson of the path. Being a free and happy human being has nothing to do with one, two, or even twenty-times of experiencing the light. It is about working every single day to come to that place again, for our habitual tracks are strong indeed. It is not enough to rest after witnessing the beauty of human potential, and its dangerous to feel an achievement of overcoming ones blocks after going through such a hard time because that time is past now and life is in the present- the shamanic lesson from Ayahuasca is about working every day to keep the heart open. My heart in particular is a feeble, changeable creature. It opens to close to open again. It is a difficult path but I am in awe and full of deepest gratitude for the push from Pachamama to keep on that hard path. In total awe of the miraculous wisdom of the plants of Ayahuasca.

Thank you Etnika's Shamanic Retreat, Cuzco, Peru!

Ayahuasca, part 1- HELL

Dear ayahuasca,

I had no idea how much power could be in a plant.The wisdom of mother Earth itself. Thank you for helping me, for putting me face to face with your beautiful teaching about fear and love, about the raging hell and the soaring absolute heaven present in all life, this planet and my own little soul.

DAY 1
HELL

First, before attempting to describe one of the most powerful experiences of my life, I would like to clarify something about the profound shamanic healing therapy that the use of the master-plant ayahuasca is. It is not to be taken on lightly, in fact it is one of the most powerful (read-difficult) ways of healing. The practise has to be entered first with courage and second with faith. Even if we do not have a faith system of our own, we do have to have faith that the shamans and the people involved during this process, know what they are doing. Never under any circumstances is it for people who simply want to see visions and just to have some entertainment, diversion or an experience. It is a time-honoured pure and natural gift from the deep jungles of South America, it is an ancient wisdom of the shamans for the purpose of healing and nothing less, and it has to be felt, respected and honoured. Before the actual intake of Ayahuasca the shamans were doing for us a ceremony of coca-leaves, asking permission from the plant itself and from Pachamama (Mother Earth), asking whether we had enough courage, enough heart, enough faith. It took some time for the favourable answer to come, but the ceremony did force us to unite as a group and get into the right spirit. 
And even then- with respect and just barely enough courage to enter, one should be prepared to come face to face with the deepest darkness of oneself even though of course everyone hopes to see some light. It is in fact the darkness, that is intended to be released and that is the main purpose of this pracise for if we had no darkness we would not even be on this plane of earthly school of life. With this note I will try to share how truly astounding and helpful this therapy can be. 

Fear. 

After the first session of ayahuasca, I am truly shocked that I have survived and I am astounded that no matter how much I was convinced at that time that I was dying, I am still here. Fear is indeed a thought, just like the shaman said. But oh my god- did I have a lot of that.

It started with a little cubic swirling demon-clown peeking into my vision- peekaboo! There wasn't anything threatening about this figure, or from hindsight about any of the scenery and characters I encountered on my 3-4 hours long vision quest. Yet it's hard to describe how it makes one feel to suddenly be in an altogether different reality, to have everything one is accustomed to and depends on, taken away. So when all of a sudden I was in a universe I can best compare to surrealistic cubic art- with all kinds of shapes like triangles, squares, but more than that- grotesque, moving, living shapes- coming at me at full speed and frightening intimacy, I was not prepared. It was a full universe of not only picture but also sound, all the formations were making horrible loud clicking, grinding, ticking sounds (later the shaman explained that this is the way the ayahuasca plant wakes up in the nervous system, a sign that it has reacted with the brain). Also the sounds of people vomiting all around me did not help to ease me into it, rather made everything more hellish. The vision shapes were not just objects, yet they were not fully alive either, there was something cold about it all, empty of soul.. It was like a huge surreal circus, also akin to being inside a huge multi-coloured clock, every devilish cube and tube kept winding up and coming at me.

I tried to open my eyes but the vision was there even with open eyes. It was at this point when everything spiraled out of control for me. Suddenly I felt the nausea which is the main cleansing tool of the vine Ayahuasca. The mixture used actually consists of two plants. Ayahuasca, the vine, acts like a carrier for Chacruna, another plant, which is the component that carries the active ingredient of DMT- also known of late as the spirit molecule. The Ayahuasca helps the Chacruna carry the DMT to the brain, after which it exits the body via a purge. A stunningly beautiful and perfect process of nature. 

The mixture had been swirling around my circulation for some time now, it was so easy to feel it from the first few minutes- a bit like a surge of electricity, a hot stream, bubbling at times like a hot spring of Mother Nature. It started by descending to the stomach, down my arms and legs, making a circle and moving up through the spine to the brain which is when the peekabooing started. Almost everybody vomits it, the shamans hold the vomiting the most important of the whole process, as a tool to get rid of the bad energy accumulated through the years. The more you vomit the better and if some poor souls go through 5-7 sessions of only purging and no visions, tired and disappointed at the "only negative", the shaman will smile and be happy of their progress. Some people have difficulty keeping the bitter brown liquid down for more than 5-10 minutes, I managed until about 15. And then things got really ugly. 

The setting of the therapy looks a bit like an army hospital at night. Mattresses lined up against the wall of the "patients". Darkness because the eyes cannot handle light during this process. Next to each of the mattresses the essentials- a bucket for purging, tissues for cleaning up, a huge bottle of water. And of course the participants, all wrapped up in warm clothing and sleeping bags as one of the side-effects is also freezing. 

So after 15 minutes the nausea was incredible, never-before experienced in my life. And the visions were all-encompassing, devouring me, drowning me. The vomit was the plant mixture come to life, engorged into a huge black-green vine-serpent. The bucket was a huge long black tunnel, where I was falling down along with the serpent next to me, circling me, which was at times turning into a demonic face which was making purging sounds and telling me- purge! I felt it was the vine itself speaking to me. So I purged, it was impossible not to. It was impossible to stop, the nausea just kept growing. Suddenly I could not move my head and I had to gasp for air. The collar of my jumper felt like it was choking me, killing me. I kept wanting to hide under the blanket to get away from it all but there was no getting away. I was concentrating with all my might to breathe, relax, change the vision, but nothing helped. I needed tissue and water but whenever I tried to feel around me for these, firstly the movements made me too sick and secondly I had no idea where I was or of orientation. Everything I managed to touch was soft and fuzzy and the wrong shape and texture. I felt I was losing control over the whole of my body, paralysed in fear. I kept trying to breathe as I held my head.

At some point I realised that the shaman was singing and that the helpers were making a fuss around me. I had heard them talking around me for some time but I was convinced it had nothing to do with me, so removed was I from reality. I couldn't make out any words, they seemed coming from a million miles away, also it seemed I had forgotten all English, none of the words made any sense. The fuss they were making made me feel two-fold. First- it was giving me a tiny bit of hope, just to vaguely know that there was somebody out there, far far away from the circus of animated cubism where I was, but there. At the same time it made me feel more nervous about my current state, I knew I was bad, but until then I had no idea that I was the only one having problems at that time. Why was everyone so quiet, why weren't they gasping for their lives like I was?! 
I had forgotten that I am highly sensitive to stimulation such as this, over-sensitive compared to most people, had forgotten to tell the shamans to have a lesser dose. But it was too late of course. In hindsight I know that the dose was too much for me, but I also know that I was helped so much namely because of the extremity of the experience and that there is a deep wisdom in life which never gives us more than we can handle.

At this time, though I was far away from the voices next to me, I heard a clear and loud sentence from a young 15 year old shaman apprentice (a very talented girl, in real life seeming like an ordinary teenager, but during sessions proving herself highly powerful and intuitive)- OPEN YOUR HEART! I knew this was the truth and what I had to do. I felt my heart closed, over-powered with fear and blocks that had accumulated in me which I kept releasing but which kept growing back. 

Because all this time I had been gasping over a bucket, there was a time when one of the helpers had removed it to empty it. At one horrifying moment I had no bucket, I was feeling like another purge, yet I could not open my mouth to ask for it, I could not move my hands to locate it, I was powerless, helpless, sick in torments of hell. After the helpers finally returned me to my tunnel of flying serpents, the bucket became the most important thing in my life, all that mattered. I kept feeling it. It disappeared you see. While it was under my hands, the whole molecular nature of the world was twisting constantly and sometimes becoming absent altogether. The bucket swirled, disappeared, I could never be sure if it was there, if it wasn't, the space around me was empty and not empty at the same time. Had I entered some kind of quantum reality of uncertainty?- it certainly felt like that. 

The Universe gone cubist, soulless and clownish was still raving away at me. I was drowned in it, utterly lost, with no power at all. I honestly thought that there was no come-back from this reality for me, that I would stay lost in it forever, thus forgetting the exactly opposite point the shaman had made in the preparatory talk, where she asked us to remember, no matter how we felt, that nothing lasts forever, ayahuasca, like anything else has a life-span in our bodies, an energetic curve. In other words the teaching of anicca- things always rise to pass away. 

How long passed I have no idea, it was a timeless hell. But there came a point when I heard and finally understood what one of the helpers was saying to me- relax, just relax.

So I tried again. At first I couldn't understand where was my bed, I still couldn't sense this reality. The longer I kept my eyes open and concentrated, the more I started to see however. I was on my bed still- yey! Only sitting diagonally over the bucket, that's why I hadn't been able to find anything. Slowly I lay down and after many more bouts with nausea and sitting up again to dry-purge, I could at last, with one hand on my life-line the bucket, just to make sure it was still there, rest for a while. There were still the physical feelings, of freezing and being on fire at the same time, but I was alive and back.

Other than facing terror I managed on that first night to also open my heart. While the helper was leading me down the stairs later to go to the bathroom, I felt my heart burst open in the sweet pain of over-whelming love for her. She was leading me a small step at a time, I was completely blind and I felt so much humility and gratitude, for the helpers this whole scene must have been so hard, so difficult to witness, and to try to help- when the people are as lost as that, on the border of staying lost. I hadn't felt that moved for a long time. 

And coming back, resting and relaxed, still under the effects of Ayahuasca, I heard a thought- BEHOLD BIRTH. When I looked at my experience with this thought, I understood. I had asked from the plant to help remove the blocks for me in my path of self-realization. It's crystal clear to me now that the only obstacle I ever had was fear, from a young age. Fear of this insensitive world, fear of failing, fear of succeeding, fear of taking the first step, fear- first and foremost- of not being good enough. In order to remove that block- fear, there was nothing else to do other than to put me in the deepest fear possible. And what is the deepest fear? For some its death, I have met death and made peace with that. What is the next in line as to the fear-experiences though people tend not to remember this one? Birth. Looking at it, birth seemed exactly similar to my vision. A dark long tunnel and a completely alien world around me all of a sudden which makes no sense and because it is completely unknown and alien is utterly terrifying. Shapes we don't know coming at us, talking a language we do not understand, it's just sounds, shapes, colours. Us being completely helpless, we have no control over our bodily functions. We want to tuck away somewhere warm and dark, a comforting place that is our only experienced reality at that point. Oh the compassion I now feel for a baby being born! What a trauma!

The day after, like a new-born babe, I felt like crying all day. The whole day-time, spent alone and in noble silence, still mostly in fasting like in the day before, I was preparing myself with meditation on the heart. I knew the heart was the key, I knew that all that was necessary for this experience of rebirth was love. I was scared to death of the next session, but the shaman had promised me a small dose and I couldn't leave the process half-way, come what may.