There was a pronounced uneasiness in the group as we neared the moment of commitment required to consume the shaman's hallucinatory potion of choice. We had been sufficiently warned of the perils of this course of action, since we would be ingesting what was said to be a poison.
By way of explanation, John Perkins told us, "The Shuar consider ayahuasca sacred. Its name literally means 'vine of death.' You are under no obligation to try it. In fact, if you ask my advice, I will discourage you. If you do decide to accept the shaman's invitation, you must understand the risks.''
"Risks?" I muttered, pretending to clear my throat as eyes turned my way. Even learning to program my VCR was more appealing than what I was being asked to consider.
"The Shuar say it is their most powerful teacher,' he went on. "It is dangerous, but according to them, all true learning involves taking risks." He paused, then reiterated, "This is your decision. Please remember that ayahuasca should only be consumed with the purest of intentions and an understanding of all that its name implies."
Then—as if we needed to hear more—he told us that it would cause us to become violently ill. This while we were sitting in darkness deep in the undergrowth of the third world, knowing full well that we were considered to be a meal by a large contingent of the regional reptilian species. Not exactly on my list of top ten things to do in this lifetime!
Following an animated group discussion and serious individual consideration, seven of our group of sixteen decided to take part in the ceremony. Now you have to understand, I'd never used hard or recreational drugs of any sort. My experience was limited to alcohol and an experimental puff of the funny stuff that Clinton never inhaled. I graduated from college in the very early sixties and had bypassed the loose-living hippie lifestyle—having a phony ID as a youth to buy beer for college fraternity parties was the extent of my prior lawlessness (a truth I am just now divulging to my mom).
Much to my surprise, I decided to join the minority who planned to participate.
[Note: I strongly advise readers to abstain from any form of drug use. I participated in this ceremony as a person of broad experience, far along on my spiritual journey. It was presented in a healing ceremony, and administered by an authentic shaman whose culture believes in the spiritual healing qualities of ayahuasca. It was prepared by the shaman, who then accompanied the participants on their journeys and provided guidance.]
Shirl had (of course) volunteered, along with five others—one of whom had a previous negative experience with ayahuasca but wished to try it again. Interestingly, many of those who were willing to risk the unknown peril of an arduous eight-hour trek into the rain forest earlier that day were unwilling to take this journey into the depths of the spiritual world.
We were advised to team up with a buddy who was to remain reality-grounded and was willing to experience the journey vicariously through our actions, words, and anticipated bodily purging. My partner turned out to be Lynne, a soft-spoken woman to whom I had given a psychic reading earlier in the trip and to whose conservative life philosophy I could relate. Lynne expressed a true willingness to stand by me regardless of what happened—a reassuring promise if you are depending on someone to watch over your life while you step out-of-body for awhile.
Three of the eight had committed to an additional specific healing. For some reason I still don't understand, this necessitated the shaman to spit into our individual mixtures in order that he might connect with our consciousness during the healing.
Spitting seemed to play a significant role in this culture. When one is invited into an indigenous native's home, it is customary to consume the aforementioned chincha. The drink is made the day before an expected visit by the women of the village, who chew and then spit jungle-grown manioc root into an unappetizing mixture.
Most Ecuadorian shamans also spray-spit or camay a powerful corn liquor called trago on most everything from their huacas (healing stones) to the bodies of those who come to them for healing. Camaying is a process used by healers to connect or bring unity to someone or something. It is used by Native American shamans for soul retrieval: a method used to retrieve a wandering spirit or power animal and convey the spirit back to the one being healed by blowing into the top of their head. In the case of the Ecuadorian shamans, it is done with a mouthful of liquor, but an Otavalo medicine man whom we later met in the Andes camayed fire during his ceremony.
So there we were, being informed that the unseen high priest who was lurking behind a single lit candle in the jungle darkness was busily spitting in our drinks.
This healing thing sometimes requires a real stretch of belief.
The Unbelievable Power of Belief
Having seen and experienced a number of unexplainable events during my twenty-year metaphysical search, however, this precept was not outside the realm of believability—at least not for me. Miraculous healings were something with which I had some experience.
During a trip to Brazil, I was honored with an invitation to assist Antonio De Padua, a well-known shaman, with performing some healings. Antonio asked me to help diagnose and later cleanse the energy from several of the large number of faithful who lined up daily outside his church. On the same trip, I was selected by another healer to remove a pair of ten-inch-long forceps from the back of his patient during psychic surgery in San Paulo. They had been inserted by the ghost energy of one Dr. Fritz, a surgeon who died over 100 years ago but whose spirit and knowledge many medically untrained Brazilian healers claim to channel.
I was also on the healing end of a bizarre ceremony wherein a Brazilian shaman wielded a scalpel inches from my abdomen, cut ting into my spiritual essence—my aura. I had requested a personal healing, and the shaman both accurately diagnosed and cured my bodily disorder. The same shaman healed a bruised disk in Shirl's neck. And that's not all . . .
We once witnessed a healer emanating visible light from five of his seven chakras. Truth be told, we've even spent considerable time with healers who claim to receive their enlightenment from timedimension travelers, or aliens from another universe.
[Note: Chakra is a yoga term for wheel-shaped energy centers in the body, most often thought to be seven in number. Each chakra is believed to possess distinctive properties relating to particular body organs and deities. The lowest three (at the base of the spine, navel, and solar plexus) are said to be male, or yang, and relate to the emotions of survival, control, and power. The highest three (at the the throat, between the eyes, and at the crown of the head) are female, or yin, and relate to communication and the psychic or spiritual aspects of our nature. The heart chakra, in the center of the body, represents love—the strongest emotion in the universe. It is considered by many to be both male and female.
The mere fact that someone I had never seen, miles from modern medical assistance, in the dead of night, was spitting into the poison I was soon to ingest did not seem to be a significant enough factor for me to reject the ceremony outright.
A Proverbial Flying Leap
The shaman began with the five who wished only to experience the mind-altering ceremony and not the healing. Each was presented to the shaman, who administered the sacred potion from a small bowl. This was immediately followed by a trago chaser to clear the palate. Then they were told to wait.
Before I was summoned by the shaman, my wife (who had been the first of our group to consume the ayahuasca) suddenly groaned, grabbed her tummy, and quickly exited the enclosure. It was clear where she was headed and what she was going to do. I knew she must really be sick because she'll do almost anything to avoid throwing up. When a second member of our group got violently ill, I began to reevaluate my decision.
Suddenly I heard my name being called. As I approached the shaman, I could feel his powerful presence in the darkness. He gave me the bowl and I quickly gulped the bitter drink before I could change my mind. The highly potent trago tasted sweet by comparison and I think I took several large gulps to wash the bitterness from my mouth.
By the