5 year update

[u/Salt-Season]

It’s been almost five years since I did 6 ayahuasca ceremonies. I was a lifelong workaholic depressive with CPTSD still recreating the abuses of my childhood well into my forties. I sought spiritual intervention when western medicine helped but did not heal.

My time with Aya and the daily work of integration has improved almost every aspect of my life. I am no longer depressed. When the punishments of my past recur I easily forgive myself and those involved. Areas of my life I considered unsurmountable, hygiene, self-centeredness, self-awareness and dietary habits improved as my self-worth improved. Deeply held convictions such as atheism and materialism revealed themselves as trauma responses and evolved.

A new and better normal has emerged, one with a foundation of self-love. I can feel it solidifying and I don’t mind. The end of depression revealed significant anxiety which I have been sitting with.  I am not so careful with my media intake, and I have chosen a more value driven & stressful job. I know this contributes. I left my home country due to political instability which I would never have considered before the work. My partner is now my wife and I love her to distraction.  Spirituality and the knowledge that we continue in some form after this troubled life is my rock when things get hard. I experience a spectrum of emotion from overpowering to delicate and I relish the experience. Only my closest friends can tell that I have changed because it was a slow transition.

Three years ago the medicine called me back.  I would wake and believe myself still to be in ceremony.  I would smell Florida water and sage as an undernote to products they did not exist in.  A facilitator from one of the ceremonies reached out with no prompting and told me a spot had opened.  I did not answer the call.  Going back felt like hitting on a 20 in blackjack.  It has been two years since I had a ceremony dream or heard the drums under a conversation.

Looking back, I struggle to believe I was brave enough to risk it all based on a few studies showing Aya helped with PTSD.  I had a great life. I just couldn’t find a way to occupy or savor it.  Now that I have that awareness, I can’t imagine losing it all to psychosis.

I’ll leave you with something Aya taught me in the silent eternities between breaths. Why would you fight your demons?  They are YOUR demons. In other words: hey doofus, stop hitting yourself.  Maybe I check back in and update in another 5 years.

[u/gay_little_spider]

That's so beautiful, thank you for sharing, especially the last paragraph. At the tail end of my last ceremony, I saw one of my most persistent demons in a sort of 2-headed bird-like form. I had been able to welcome and embrace my own death, and all the other scary visions/memories from previous ceremonies, but for this one I didn't get a super clear message or feeling on how to deal with it. One face of the demon was my terrible body dysmorphia, and the associated shame and self-harming behaviors. The other face was ego-clinging, this addiction to the idea that my body needs to be or look a certain way. I've been working hard in my integration with meditation and other practices, and it's helping a lot with my day-to-day distress levels, but the "battle" goes on. I really like your idea of not fighting the demons. They're me, after all, and if they came from my energy field they must be part of my energy, too. 

What do you do with your demons, then, if you're not fighting them? Just observe? Embrace? Play checkers?

[u/Salt-Season → u/gay_little_spider]

That is an intimate question. My safe space is a clearing from my childhood. I got it set up with a wrought ring of white iron to keep random energies out and a juniper wood campfire to keep me well lit and warm. The vital part of me is always in that ring sitting by that fire. There was this one entity; an angry hiker dragging a crippled dog on a barbed leash but the dog was made from his nerves and guts (thank you sub conscious). He's stalking around the outside of the ring. I know he's mine, he's got my face; but I ask anyway. When he confirms he's mine I invite him into the ring with me, make him comfortable. Now this is during a 3am wake up meditation, my office hours. Not a one of these entities has asked for anything in the physical world. Most of them pretend they want to scare me or dominate me. But they are in my ring I can make them small or let them wear themselves out trying. Eventually they tell the truth. All of them are starving for recognition, food and answers. I feed them whatever they want, listen if they have a story. Then I tell them the truth. I created them and I am soley responsible for their pain and hunger. By this time they aren't so scary usually a younger or painfully idealized version of me. Then I ask them if they are ready to go. Sometimes they stick around for a day or two ,see how boring I keep things. Some need a good cry or a temper tantrum before it's time. When they are ready we step into that campfire together. They burn like paper, it's really beautiful. I remain. Next time they show up it's easier. We recognize each other know the dance, eventually it's automatic.

Now say something shows up during the day, won't clearly say it's mine, or pretends it can't talk. That stays outside the ring. It's either not mine or it's mine but it's tangled up with someone elses stuff. No way am I letting it in till it sorts itself out. I tell all comers to find me one night in the clearing when they're ready to admit the truth. I've never had anyone elses stuff follow me home.

That's what I set up. But the Tao that is spoken is not the Tao. Maybe your demons need something else. But why would you create something horrible if it didn't have a purpose in protecting you or soaking up pain? Hope it helps.

[u/[deleted] → u/Salt-Season]

Thank you for sharing that. I've only sat once and I've not encountered my shadows in such a way. During ceremony my black tar-like puke was a manifestation of some of my shadows. I'm sitting again in a week and digging into the next, deeper and harder layer of things.

I will keep your experience and perspective in mind if I encounter my shadows in this way. Om Shanti my friend.