PART 2: Planning & Preparing Mind and Body for Ayahuasca
By: Josh Mcnamara
Tags: Health, Mental Health, Psychedelics, Breathwork, Spirituality

PART 2: Planning & Preparing Mind and Body for Ayahuasca

There are many places around the world that people go to to experience an Ayahuasca ceremony these days.

The quality and experience of the shamans or guides you choose and the environment you are in will have a big impact on your overall experience.

If you have shamans, guides or retreat centres that provide a safe, relaxed and protected space you will be able to fully relax into the experience and let go.

Unfortunately there are pretenders out there that have learned how to sing and put on a good show but have no real understanding of how to hold space and mix the brew properly.

So, doing your research, reading reviews, creating a shortlist and then actually looking into the person or centre is a vital part of the journey.

There are many paths that lead someone to an Ayahuasca ceremony and as I mentioned earlier there are many places around the world to experience one.

In this piece I’ll just be talking about my experience in Peru and the experiences of others I met along the way.

The three most common paths I’ve seen people take on their way to a Peruvian Ayahuasca jungle experience are;

Those that are travelling around South America or Peru and they hear from a fellow traveller about this ancient plant medicine being taken by people in the jungle. They think fuck yeah ill try that and get on a plane, head to Iquitos or the Sacred valley with little to no planning or preparation. Other people have landed in Iquitos ready to experience the Amazon in all its wonders and then get offered countless Ayahuasca experiences by locals on their arrival. They decide to go and do a 1 or 2 night experience again with little or no preparation. The last group of people are those that have already heard about these experiences, they do their research, they plan out where to go, when to go, what retreat is within their budget and fly to Peru with the specific intention of going through a 7–15 day retreat.

Now, I don’t like to be prescriptive about other people’s journeys or decisions they make on their path but I’ll offer my experiences and let people make their own judgements.

In 2011 I was cruising around South America when I first heard about Ayahuasca from a mate who had had a few experiences with it.

It seemed like a potentially life changing thing to do, so when the opportunity arose a few weeks later to jump onto a bus and head into the amazon from Lima I jumped at it.

I had no plan, no specific centre or shaman I was looking for, I just landed at a town deep in the mountains, asked around and eventually found a ‘so called’ shaman to take me through a ceremony.

I had also been partying my way around South America for the prior 4 months so not exactly the ideal preparation.

I’m not gonna go into detail about this particular experience but lets just say it was a bit of a let down, it tasted horrible, I purged a bunch of times but didnt feel like I got any insights or any visions to write home about.

Somehow I sensed that because I hadn’t respected the process and the medicine it hadn’t helped me satisfy my expectations.

But the seed had been planted and for the next 8 years I would always wonder when the time might be right to head back into the jungle and do it properly.

At the start of 2019 I moved back to Melbourne after being in the US for a number of years. I was preparing to start and embark on a new chapter of my life.

The last chapter had been extremely satisfying but at the same time extremely challenging. I could feel that a change of direction was in order. My old identity no longer fit and I knew I had to enter the path of uncertainty to figure out what kind of person I wanted to become.

In order to grow in every sense of the word I knew there was a need for a bit of internal re-engineering.

I was in the process of planning out my 2 month trip to Italy and Japan in early 2019 when I went on a trip down to see some mates in Apollo Bay. One of them being the mate I spoke with before going on the first Ayahuasca trip 8 years earlier.

After a crazy weekend and some deep convos, I decided to do a 5 day water fast and cruise down the great ocean road with my swag in toe.

Obviously with a lot of time to think I suddenly started thinking about the trip I was about to embark on and started to entertain the idea of fitting Peru into the equation and do a proper Ayahuasca mission.

All of a sudden something in my body lit up and I knew deep within that now was the time.

Luckily I hadn’t booked my flights to Japan as yet so I decided to go to Chile first on the way to the jungle and then onto Italy after.

My mate had some recommendations on people and places to talk to in Iquitos about the experience. I kept them in mind but had a strong feeling that I needed to embark on my own journey and do my own research just so I could feel into what places felt right for me.

What I noticed after weeks of researching different retreat centres and other peoples reviews and experiences was that choosing the right people to go on this journey with was going to be super important.

There seemed to be about three different costing options. There were some centres and people offering week experiences for around the $700-$1000AUD price point but the facilities and reviews were extremely mixed.

Then there were a bunch of options in the middle range for around $1500-$2000 price range and these centres had proper websites, reviews that were a little varied but on the most part they seemed quite legit.

Finally, there were some options up the high range up towards 3k for a week or 9 days at retreat centres who had amazing reviews, beautiful facilities, lots of support staff and the highest levels of safety.

I weighed up the different options and went with a retreat centre in the mid range.

I resonated with the written content on their website

They had a heap of positive reviews

Their facilities while not over the top looked great

There were 2 shamans father and son who looked super experienced, haha I know how do you ‘look’ experienced but I dunno they just did.

There was a Western facilitator and retreat manager, which I liked because it meant that there’d be no language barriers

The dates worked well for me

I felt comfortable with the price

Last but not least I liked the way they communicated with me while I was making the decision. They sent me very specific guidelines and steps to take in the lead up to the retreat, they were very clear about diet and any medications that might react with the Ayahuasca and they seemed professional and most importantly I felt a sense of safety with them.

Ayahuasca is not a journey, adventure or a medicine that you should take lightly without consideration. There are many other plant medicines, drugs and experiences that can be done on a whim, but Ayahuasca in my opinion is not one of them.

It’s a journey into ones self, its a journey into your inner world that can be scary, uncomfortable and traumatic for a lot of people.

But at the same time it can be life changing, beautiful, joyous, healing and the connection you have to yourself and the environment will likely never be the same.

Landing in Iquitos, seeking out a random experience with a random so called shaman without doing your homework, preparing your mind and body in the lead up and having respect for this profound medicine is not the path I would recommend taking.

There are stories far and wide about people having experiences that are physically and emotionally dangerous so don’t do what I did first time around and do it properly if this is something you feel called to do.

So what does preparation look like? I feel I’ll lose 90% of you after reading reading this haha. But here goes.

2 weeks prior

No sexual activity including masturbation

No alcohol

No drugs of any kind including weed

No pork

No hot or spicy foods

No cold ice drinks

And as you get closer like within a week add these items to the list

Refined sugars

Red meat

Dairy products

Fermented foods

Caffeine and other stimulants.

By eliminating these items you are preparing your body physically, mentally and spiritually for the Ayahuasca journey ahead.

These are guidelines, you will not die if you don’t follow them 100% but they are super important for many reasons but these two resonated the most for me.

By preparing your body physically by eating clean foods and eliminating as many toxins prior as possible you are potentially limiting the amount of internal housekeeping and purging the body will have to do during the experience. By showing your commitment and respect for the Ayahuasca plant and the traditions that go along with it you are building an energetic connection with them which is essential in having the best experience.

Other activities and things I did in preparation were

yoga and meditation

Breathing exercises (most important)

Get into nature as much as possible, helping the body to relax

Set your intentions.

You could go into the experience doing none of these things mentioned above.

But, if you’re not open to some basic preparations then you really gotta ask yourself why you’re actually doing this?

If you have the right intention and the right attitude towards your experience and you want to get the most out of it then you wont think twice about committing to these foundational steps.

If you’re in it to have fun and trip out a bit then this isn’t the plant medicine for you.

After getting clear why I was going, what my intentions were and what retreat centre I was going to it was almost time to kick off.