Ceremony 4

Love & Trust


September 6, 2009



This was the first ceremony I attended at the Jenaro Herrera ceremony house in Peru. The ayahuasca that we would drink this night was the remaining ‘tea’ from the previous group, tomorrow night we will drink our own brewed yage-tea, made up of the traditional ingredients for ayahuasca, plus Sanango and 10-12 barks of tree spirit-teachers; we‘ll also gather these with the help of the shaman from the jungle and misc. river banks.

Most of these notes are ’sketches’ for this ceremony: It seems that on this first time here in Peru that I’d receive a sort of itinerary or ’Table of Contents.’

That night, prior to the ceremony, the group was watching a comedian-show on a laptop computer, I had reservations about certain parts, though felt that the comradeship was far more important than the context: Later my results of this ’intake’ would show up in my ayahuasca vision realm, me…

A vision opened up where I witnessed a small audience (like a group sitting in a small theatre) of demons, portly, shirtless, somewhat drunk and rowdy watching the very same comedian on a screen… The screen was being perceived as either ‘being’ on my actual stomach lining/inner-torso or projected outside onto a wall; the theatre was portrayed as them seated inside me, within the ’digestion chamber’ of my body. During this vision, certain feeling-lessons were being subtly sent to my conscience about the visual-heart ‘food’ I had let in… Not to be done again for sure.

There was a point in the ceremony where I had a correspondence with an anonymous being (yage?) I began with a series of questions that seemed to stem from the premise that ‘We make our life,’ out of beliefs, actions, etc… I asked ’What if…’ (I do not recall the specific questions) and the answer was “Shall it be.” This went on for about four or five questions till I felt that the intellectual projections/thought-realities were not ’safe’, that I ought to stop wondering about how the mind makes the world outside myself come true and dropped this line of questions. The answer “Shall it be.” was most profound, a little ominous like a wise old grandmother warning me that I was looking for trouble and would find it, though it was also soft and reassuring that Cause & Effect was part of the veil, and nothing to stress over…

The Gnome Doctor: There occurred a visit by a little gnome. He stopped by the side of my head and was tightening a wire or cord; he was partially shaded, dressed like a professor/technician, I could not make him out very well and he seemed ‘On Schedule‘ and softly indifferent, like a line of music in an orchestra‘s opening…

A news article/TV show appeared in my consciousness about a MFA Professor shooting himself in prison. It gave no details how he got there, simply the ’News Flash.’

The many ‘me’s’ as a baby ~
An incredible image appeared, a composite picture of me when I was a child, different ’portraits’ of me while angry, sad, irritable, neutral, etc. I do not believe that all of the pictures were in the negative, simply that it showed a mandala of mood or set expressions, a sort of incarnation wreath of the wearing soul.

There were several ‘ceremony phobias’ that I seemed to have inherited from the third ceremony in Holland; one of being in ‘a mess’ and another of barking dogs. I recall in this ceremony four that I reconciled the ‘barking dog’ and ‘being in a mess’. This reconciliation was triggered by actual barking dogs in the village and by a single ‘dropping’ that fell in the dark upon my sleeping mat from one of the ceremony house’s roof beams. Being in the jungle has its surprises… This overcoming was subtle and led to deepening my journey inwards.

The Little Closed Cinder Block House: I happened upon a little gray cinder block house sitting out in a meadow, possible a dry, sandy area… I approached it, redecorating with flowers and color.

Zinny: My father’s father, Zinny, showed up as a voice/presence in my vision, expressing his dislike/irritableness concerning a poem I wrote about him, i.e., dedicated to him and asked me to “…remove it.” (from the Internet). I logged on the next morning and did so. (I initially agreed to remove the poem while in the yage dimension.)

Depth Forgiveness: There was another ’news article’ that showed up; one describing the angry and accidental death-blow that a father expressed upon his son in a moment of rage… It was this night that I visited him and forgave him for this event. There’s a small chance that this was the father of another ’little boy’ and so, in my journal I put ’my?’ in brackets next to this note: recording this today (September 22) I feel that it was me…

There were bouts with Cynical Spirits who were commenting about the positive possibilities in my life. I traveled through these ’mem-brains’…

At some point in the early morning (3-4 AM) I rose my head and saw a passing shadow (about 5-6 feet tall), moving right to left outside the ceremony windows. It appeared and disappeared within a ten foot span.

Late into the morning I experienced an Italian woman entering the yage dimension (as a compartmentalized energy and story-voice) who began expressing extreme irritableness and anxiety about a sexual intrusion by her partner or acquaintance, from behind, (possibly something totally unwanted?) She quickly dissolved… I felt as though I had to delicately/quietly protect myself from her search to lay blame or act out revenge…

There was a session with Mother Ayahuasca where she distinctly ‘schooled’ me about “What Ought to Be.” It was a deep lesson and opening up of a part of my ego that feels that things ’Ought to be’ my way, to my standards, to my pre-liking, etc. Deeply humbling. She showed me how this ’Ought to be’ was a disease of the soul, a integral (though removable with time) part of what is stalling me… Acceptance and Creative Adaptation.

My Great Grandmother Eakin seemed to show up briefly and sit down inside me… (She lived to be 100 and was one of two grandmothers who raised me.)

A confrontation mounted: Where I approached a man who was holding a bright sphere and saying, “This is all I have.” In this instance it was implied that I had showed up to retrieve this sphere (possibly a soul-shard?). He was an older man (possibly my father’s father or his deceased brother), expressing himself in an adolescent way. In my journal I wrote ’woman or man’, though sense that it was a masculine force… I could feel the aura of preciousness that he’d invested into something desperately needed to be his though not.

My heart rate was fast at times. An instance where I tied something around a tree and then a sarcastic spirit-reply came (?) All throughout this journey there was allot of ’sending away of spirits.’ Experiences of hot & cold body temperatures.

There was a scene next to where I wrote the note ~ “Connected to father forgiveness.” I found myself in a sort of outside temple or sacred grove or trees; in front of me was a huge Book of David and behind it was a tree on fire…

Another instance where I devoted forgiveness to myself as a soul in a human incarnation.

A lesson concerning how I look at women: expectation, add-ons, desire, etc.
Ayahuasca seemed to be whispering an introduction to a new way of ’investing’ in appreciation and honoring an individual’s privacy, place in the creation sphere, rather than that of the usual projections…

A vision of a huge python or boa came to me; it slithered up behind a coiled and partly risen cobra and quickly swallowed it… From inside the much larger snake the cobra bit it, the snake collapsed and died, the cobra appeared out of its mouth and twisted away.

Towards the ending of the yage-dimension a question came to me that said,
‘How much Love have I given?’ And the name of my good friend ‘Rulik’ came into my consciousness as an example of a recent interaction/friendship,
that showed a portion of the answer...

During the ceremony I saw the traditional Shipibo patterns. I sand a little under my breath with the shaman. The rooster got on top of the ceremony roof and was crowing at near-dawn. I felt that I had traveled through or experienced multiple mornings.

Whispering/gliding Love and trust The sense (in the morning walking back from the river) of being a sort of spirit-toll-booth. During my walk to the river I saw what showed itself as a Spider-chapel: the design of its ’roof’ and information seeming to pulsate from it was telling/communicating to me that it was a kind of holy icon or affirmation/real structure of worship by/for the spider…

A happiness scene where I saw the rooster and made a sort of in the moment connection to its image, its majesty as a mysterious being of the Universe…
My happiness for being alive.

Luco sang many incredibly beautiful and profound Icaros and also put a line of perfume on each of our foreheads around 2 in the morning. Traditionally, here, the ceremony starts at 10 PM, lasting into the early morning hours of 6-7... Then we go to the river as a group and bathe…


September 22, 2009 ~ Observation from this ongoing 8 day period of Sanango dieta…

I have observed that in Western Society, the medicine there creates a situation where the soul is left looking at the body, puzzled, asking ‘why’, depressed, confused, lost, angst, a practical burden, etc. Additionally there are Western medicines that are prescribed for those ’patients’ of patients, family members who are suffering The Suffering.

My experience so far with the Amazonian medicinal approach has been one where the ’medicines’ allow The Body as a separate intelligence to look at the soul (a separate though integrated electronic entity); this can allow you to see your body very separate from normal every day integrated consciousness (body & soul blended together into a kind of spiritual dualism, looking at yourself, though a ’self’ that is distinctly layered, tightly meshed together and caught up in the daily habits of an often fear & desire orchestrated mechanism), to see as a present being, not confused or ’blended’ upon itself with the superstitions and beliefs of the dualistic mind or personality…

End of the Fourth Ceremony 9.6.2009: Typed 9.22.2009