Ayahuasca – A discussion

[YinYang]

To get back to whether the curandero is a necessary component or not, this is from Ayahuasca in My Blood: 25 Years of Medicine Dreaming:

Another point I think needs making - as it frequently comes up in conversations related to the use of ayahuasca, San Pedro, peyote, and probably with all of the master plant teachers - is the question of the value of a curandero. The question that arises is whether or not a curandero (in the case of auahuasca and San Pedro) or a "Roadman" (in the case of peyote) is necessary. The answer, I think, is that they're not necessary - the plants will teach you something whether there is a curandero or not. But I think that the work of a good curandero can add whole dimensions to the experience.

On a physical level, the curandero is the master preparer of the auhuasca. He must be compared to a chef, rather than a cook. More than that, his interactions with the spirits of the plants he's working with are what's of great value. The plants must give up their chemicals to whomever puts them in a pot and boils them.

But the curandero, through his relationship with the sentient side of the plant, can encourage those plants to give up more than their chemical components, to give up their spirit. This is not to be dismissed.

Curanderos have generally spent years becoming intimate with the spirits of the plants. Moreover, the curandero might have several plant allies, and depending on the needs of those drinking on a given day might have a variety of admixture plants he can add to the basic recipe. And each of those plants bring their individual spirits and personalities to the ceremony the curandero is running.

And running the ceremony is really what the curandero does. It might look to an outsider as if he or she is just sitting on a stool, chanting and shaking a leaf-rattle, but he is doing much more than that. He is seeing what each person is dreaming, his icaros, songs, sending some further out into their dreams and pulling others back down to earth at the same time. The curandero is healing everyone simultaneously as well, even those who don't know they need it. He is asking his plant spirit allies to work with everyone, and his allies respond.

Until you've experienced it, that is a difficult thing to believe. One former guest explained it this way, just hours after his first ayahuasca experience. The guest was named Lynn, and he was one of two males among my six guests. He said he was sitting on the hut floor and not having much of a reaction to the medicine. "And at one point in the ceremony, I mentally called out to Julio to show me something," he said. "Anything that would indicate that I hadn't taken a very expensive trip for nothing."

"I had my eyes open while I was thinking that." he said. "And as soon as I did, Julio suddenly stood and grew about 14 feet tall and his chakras began spinning with the most fantastic lights, shooting colours all over the space and me. And then he very clearly said "Now can I get back to the work I was doing on the women?"

"In that moment," Lynn said, "I understood something fantastic happens out in that realm - a realm that I wasn't certain existed until that point in time."