The end to this summer of 2013 has proven to be one of revelation, integration and manifestation on so many levels. Starting out this year I'd never have guessed it, but as part of a longer journey into wholeness it's been pretty fabulous all in all. Actually let me re-phrase that for what I've learned is that we are already perfectly whole but it's more that we've simply forgotten that fact. RE-membering is the trick. Re-Calling in our divinity, but sometimes we need a hand with that remembering yes? And so, from a synchronistic moment at a summer festival, which led to a random and unexpected meeting with David Icke, which in turn led to a book landing in my lap, a book which left a profound imprint upon my soul, and through that story (The Shaman's Last Apprentice) I found myself gently led towards our plant teachers and the facing of many a fascination and a fear.
I've held a sense of distant reverence for the mother vine, more commonly known as Ayahuasca for some time now, however the key word here was 'distant'. I've given a cursory glance or two to many a website or article, thinking that really it was more for others this particular pilgrimage, than it was for me. Truth be told I was fearful of its potential potency fearing two things: first, that following a few bad acid trips that this too would be some hellish and inescapable journey resulting in my certain madness, and secondly that my personal 'demons' would engulf me, leaving me in tatters, a shell of the woman I once was, unable to put myself back together again. Now, having since followed the series of synchronistic events that led to my initiation, I can clearly see how unfounded these fears actually were, but I voice them on behalf of others who may feel the same, for I know we are many. In voicing these fears though, I found myself experiencing so many strange and timely meetings and people that I was left in no doubt that I was meant to be doing exactly what I was and just 'listening' to these messages.
Now, at this point my blog post could get very lengthy! I could give all the details of these random events and tell all about how they brought me to a place of communion, or I could just tell you that I got there, to that magical place where the soul is bared and the heart revealed, truly revealed, for us to bear witness to our tiny and somehow insignificant place in this amazing Universe, insignificant and yet holding so much capacity to choose to do either harm or good with the custodianship of our planet. What I learned about myself that was perhaps the single most liberating thing for me was that in letting go of fear, control and some false beliefs about my inner demons, that my 'freedom' lay on the other side of that fear. I learned that it is never possible that these fear based ego voices can be greater than us, for they are simply a part of us, one part of the whole, and that the whole is pretty wise and knows far more that the vessel we inhabit, this body, in this lifetime, insofar as knowing that we are absolutely meant to be here and have a unique role to fulfil whilst being so.
When you journey with the mother vine, you see beyond doubt how ultimately connected we all are, to each other and to the earth, to our history, our evolution and our future, and it is the most breathtaking realisation I've ever experienced. It is impossible to contemplate doing harm to it, or to consider a return to living in the same ignorant ways we may once have done, when we have seen and felt what magnificence truly lies beneath our feet, and the possibilities for what sustains our lives and the lives of generations yet to come. I envisage clean water for my children and my grandchildren, I envisage fresh air and good food, enough to share with all, and I know that this is infinitely possible if we can but release our fear riddled grip on our need to possess, and take endlessly without giving back.
So this summer, I've taken part in several plant medicine ceremonies; Ayahuasca, San Pedro and Komba (the venom of the tiny, somewhat cross looking, emerald green Amazonian tree frog). I've been blessed to spend time in the company of people truly awakening to other possibilities, people open to love, open to healing, and open to honouring not just the self but the planet. People committed to standing in integrity, committed to forging new pathways and changing what is for what can be and in that witnessing I am left humbled and deeply peaceful. I'm surprised by that sense of peace because for the first time in a long time, I feel that change is not only possible but is inevitable and it starts with our relationship to the self. Deep peace must be possible to conceive within before taking deep peace outside of ourselves, but more than that, it has to be a kind of selfless sense of peace if we are to truly create transformation and change in our world.
Honestly, I don't know where to begin in sharing the magnificence of these experiences but I am full of gratitude for the people who have been there with me, and to those I have yet to meet on this path. My teachers have been as much the wondrous souls holding the space as the other people courageous enough to show up and share. There are many pioneers and adventurers who have gone before me, Shamans and ordinary people, visionaries, healers, scientists, artists and psychonauts. People desperate to make changes in their tough lives, who seek to live anew, people who are just curious, people who are open mined, social engineers and lovers everywhere. All I can say is Health and Healing be ours Brothers and Sisters and AHO to that!
Alex Grey affirms that all we need to know is already inside us, and how ayahuasca takes us there.
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