Ayahuasca ceremony - unconscious mind and being reborn

[Batman]

Hello,

This is a trip report of my Ayahuasca ceremony. I won't dive into the setting details, other than stating that it was in nature with a group and a shaman.

After drinking the first cup, it was obvious that the medicine works by releasing the initial layers of unconscious mind into Consciousness. This is observed by sensing that the flow of energy in the body (whether physical, emotional or energy sense of the body) is more balanced. This observation is especially noticeable in the "Chakras", like between the eyebrows, in the center of the chest, solar plexus and more. This sense of energy flow was accompanied by complex Psychedelic visuals, that cannot be described by me other than the sense of purifying thoughts and beliefs form the unconscious mind. If I push the envelope on my creativity, I would describe the visuals as emotionally geometric shapes the resembles the visual representation of suppressing thoughts, feelings and emotions. As more and more suppressed thought is brought to surface, nauseous and nasty feelings in the body are felt, which is reasonable if the medicine oblige you to face your shadow and feel it.

All and all, the first cup is quite manageable, even though it requires coping with some truth regarding the hidden aspects of our adopted identity. However, the second cup is where the real work knocked on my door and asked for answers. Ready?

So after 'excavating' the initial layers of the shadow, it is time to face our most hidden and obnoxious thoughts and beliefs regarding our self and others. This is where I was forced to meet with the deep traumatic events of my life, and the conceptual architecture that erected as a result of this traumas. The deep layers of our subconscious is where fear, guilt, shame, hurt, dishonesty, illusion and attachment lurks. Encountering those aspect of my shadow was extremely painful to swallow, almost unbearable. It wouldn't surprise you that this is the part where most people are crying from the depth of the pain the reside in their emotional heart, and emit unreasonable voices of disgust and terror having to face shame and guilt, and of course, vomit their intestines out. This is purification of both body and mind, which are ultimately two sides to the same coin. During purification and afterwards deep insight regarding thoughts and beliefs can be gleaned, and it becomes obvious that every thought we hold affects the body, that in some way the thought form wishes to materialize in the body. For me, it was no different. Childhood trauma made me cry and emit voices of sheer helplessness due to feelings of rejection, shame and guilt. This was accompanied for me by extremely complex visuals both in shape and color, which I lack the ability to describe with words. 

Finally, I had to face the belief that I am this specific body-mind. I was "shown" that this is an illusion, that who I really am isn't some specific self, but both this self and every other self. In some weird way I cannot explain, I had visuals that showed me how self and other complete each other and cannot exist one without the other. Every experience of my self was possible only due to the experience of others, and vice versa. Even thought the distinction between self and other seem solid and separated, it is an illusion. The distinction between experiencing only one mind and experiencing another's mind is what enables the Self to experience different minds. This was extremely daunting for the attachment to the mind, which I sensed as some deep pain for being deluded so long. I cried. I realized that I could never hide aspects of my self from others, because I am others so the only one I am hiding from is me, which is a paradox. It is impossible to hide from You, because You is all there is, and You know when the self is hiding. Whenever we manipulate an other, whether it is by lying, misrepresenting, affectations, etc., we are only manipulating our self. The same goes, of course, for hurting or judging the 'other'. Thinking of our Being as some specific self is an illusion, a trick of mind, an attachment that distort the Truth. After realizing that the body-mind is not even a blip in existence, that who I am isn't this body-mind, I experienced a sensation of being reborn. I was relieved completely of my shadow and attachment to thought. I could not care less what others think of me, I only wanted to hug them and tell them that I love them. The perceptions of the body sensations and the sky in night was of pure bliss, joy and love, as in being grateful for just existing. I could not fathom that such sensations of freedom can be felt. Breathing was deep and profound, penetrating every particle of my being and the nervous system felt rejoiced, renewed and "electrical". I could sense profound sense of divine energy between my eyebrows for I finally saw reality for what is is. The magnitude of my enthusiasm and astonishment was out of this world, and I could not hold my self from saying repeatedly: Wow, wow, wow.

To wrap things up, I would say that Ayahuasca differs from the classic Psychedelics not only because it is DMT which enables to dive deep into our shadow or unconscious mind, but allow us to flood the unconscious to the conscious long enough so we can see all of our hidden delusions and emotions. Mix this with the shamans music and way of touching our hidden and sensitive aspects of our self, and you get a profound experience. Don't get me wrong, Psilocybin and LSD can and probably will expose your subconscious, but usually not to depths of Ayahuasca. As for DMT in it's freebase form, the trip is usually too fast and too complex to glean serious insight regarding self and mind. But it is nice to make you curious. I would also say that if you "cleaned" your subconscious, than your trips will probably be lucid and without all this repressed emotions and horrific visuals. This is probably rare amongst human beings because we tend to be selfish and dishonest, so only mature and extremely honest individuals will have "lite" subconscious. Regarding practices such as meditation and contemplation, I cannot deny their ability to penetrate our hidden aspects, but if you want to reach the bottom of the subconscious, the root of the false self, they require intense focus and commitment. 

I really hope this post helped you in some way. Ayahuasca can be extremely complex and emotionally disturbing experience. But it can also mature you a lot, bring modesty to the self, and motivate transformation. It is also a heart opening trip because you can learn the deep truth regarding the illusion of being a specific self, which in turn weakens the attachment to mind and body.

Much love