- Chad Putman
- Sep 20
There is a part of me that already wants to release and let go of the experience. I was high for sure. It was very intense. I started with a 1/4 shot glass dose. I rested in the bed and under the blanket they provide. The feeling was almost like a roller coaster with visuals. Surrender was paramonte for me.
Before i took the shot i held it in my hand and reiterated my intention, my desire to know more and become a better healer. I also spoke in my mind my gratitude for grandmother Ayahuasca, pachamana, and for the Inca culture and the people for sharing their traditions and medication with me.
I also thought about all the people I didn't know and faces i didnt see that made my trip to Peru and this center possible.
Without a doubt i believe my humbleness, gratitude and respect for the people and the medicine throughout the night made my trip, journey and experience a very positive one.
The shortest way to explain the experience beside the warm body feeling, the visual of being part of a deep interwoven tapestry was the conversation with pachumama and responses. In her own quiet, soft and firm way she showed me what i came for. The answers to the questions about my early sexual experiences. The experience i had as a young boy that had been erased from my memory and only existed in my body. Specific names and people and places where re-experienced with intense light and preasure. And as each experience came i was able to hold the space and share with that memory and experience. I am hear to heal. I am hear to release this, to let go and forgive each and every name and face that came to me.
Grandmother was very kind to me in allowing me to explore and ask for forgieveness from others I had harmed through sex and actions as well. I was able to see my husband and the angel he has been in my life. I was not able to recieve a message to support my sister in her pain and suffering, because that is her work and her journey.
Grandmother also allowed me to hold onto her medicine throughout the night. I was told we would likely perge (vomit) within the first hour or struggle with diarrhea. But grandmother was so kind to me. I asked her to keep me solid so i could remain in the bed and not have to leave the sacred space to use the toilet. This was pretty amazing considering I had struggled with explosive number two, for some time now, even before the trip. She listened and granted me my wish so warmly and sincerely it wasn't until the following moring that i made it to the toilet and released a number 2 that was organized, soft and resembled a snake or dragan i released from my body.
There was no vomiting either. Perhaps remaining still and drinking very little water through the night was a wise move.
I also believe my communication with my body and grandmother Ayahuasca was benefitial. At times if i felt a pain or discomfort in my body i sent light and love there through breath and intention.
So much of the night was shifting from one scene, experience to another based on my ability and willingness to sit with it, experience it, receive the massage, engage with the work and release.
Breathwork and meditation proved to me a powerful tool.
There were certainly times after i took the 2nd dose (a 2nd quarter dose) that i became anxious and very concerned that i had done to much that i jumped on the adult ride without the seatbelt or the ability to navigate. But again this was where my breath, meditation and montras played a huge role to allow me to experience the intense sensations of the 2nd dose without loosing control and falling into fear, claiming a desire to escape and end it.
I truly never experienced anything like this in my life and as a person that has used drugs and struggles with addiction i believe its important for me to share that I was high. After the 2nd dose i keep saying to myself, before the journey and experience really kicked in that I didn't want this to be about getting high, i didnt want this to be about getting high. But i was, without a doubt. Grandmother was pretty clear that this journey was not going to cure my addiction, but rather take me to a place to show me the experiences that contributed to my drug use and desire to escape, at times in my life with drugs and sex.
I was able to see that once i started to take my power back in the earlier sexual experiences as a young boy and adolescent that i gained control and the others lost interest. I was able to see the sexual abuse as abuse of my gay spirit a knowing that i was gay before i was old enough to know what that was. I was able to see they hated that fem part of me and abused me in-part because of it. I was also able to see their tenderness and softness and warmth and touch and explosive organisms as human, as complicated and powerful for them as well. To be held and touched by them. To be a body for them to manipulate and penetrate and receive pleasure. I was there to recieve, release and forgive.
Mother Ayahuasca is a powerful tool and in my one experience with her in the sacred valley in Peru she showed me what i was not able to see. She blessed me with a safe, comfortable, warm and pleasant, intense experience. She guided me through the journey with love, compassion and understanding and in retruen i respected her gifts, her connection to my body and spirit. To the people, culture and customs that made this whole experience possibe including the center and the Ayahuasca healers and shaman that blessed me and clensed me before and during the ceremony with their kindness and songs and wisdom.
I didnt travel this path alone and my guides here at the center, during the ceremony carried me with their music, their words and their knowledge and intuition.
At times there would be silence or only the sounds of others perging or crying or snoring. The candle in the middle was the reminder of the center, of the sacred space in which we experienced Ayahuasca. But all of the magic happended behind my closed eyes. The work was internal and the experience was a gift to myself, a gift from another culture and people to me. In return i have the nessesary obligation and responsibility to engage in reciprocity. To freely give back what had been given to me. Not just to take but to give. Which in part is why i went on the field trip the following morning to volunteer at an orphanage in Cusco, to give thanks, to give back even in the small way that i did.
Which reminds me of the materials and jestures i offered with my hands and jewels i had with me during the ceremony. Before we started we were provided an hour long meditation with breathwork and prayer and yoga and stillness with a young Equadorian woman. She shared her guidace and message of love, oneness, forgiveness, gentleness and reciprocity. Not just as a jesture but as a fundimental part of the Peruvian culture. And in the meditation and during the ceremony, at times i held one hand palm up and the other down. Showing an openness to give and receive. I also had my father universe icon around my neck aquired from a Peruvian artist i met on the street in Pisac. He had woven the necklace holding the icon with shared care, love and intention. In a blue handkerchief i held my handcrafted mala necklace and grounding stone with striped elements and colors. In my pocket a moon stone reminding me of the future.
This medicine was offered to me a 2nd night, which is very common in most places. I'm told its an opportunity to go deeper and that no two ceremonies would be the same.
But as the morning passed and we traveled back from the orphanage i listened to my body and my feelings. I had received the medicine, the answers and was able to do the work of release and forgiveness during the first ceremony and as i thought about a second ceremony i felt sick and scared and low vibration. But then when i embraced No, i do not need a 2nd ceremony, not today not now, my vibration rose and my gratitude and mood improved. I had received and at this time i didnt not need anything further from this medicine and opportunity.
Rather i was able to spend the next 24 hrs resting and eating and connecting with others. I slept for 10 plus hours and grounded in my body in order to prepare for more travel in the days ahead and a San Pedro ceremony planned for two days after. I was also able to step back and recall the life and responsibilities i had to return home to the following week. That i wanted to be rested, connected and centered as i took the whole of this Peruvian experience in my heart back to my home, my work, my play and my contribution to others and community.
Don't do it if you are not ready, if it is not calling you. Ayahuasca is a sacred medicine, protected and offered by a people and a culture with deep ties to pachamama and spirit. It's not a toy, a drug or a trip to take lightly. That would only be disrespecting the people the cultue and the medicine.
Ayahuasca is a grandmother, a tool to heal, to relase to learn to love and to let go. Respect her and she will respect you in return.
