Ayahuasca Journey 4: Past Life Flashback and Samadhi

🕒 9 MINUTE READ

Friday August 25th, 2017 8PM
As usual, I got to the ceremony at around 8 and proceeded with my first dose. There were four key experiences to highlight this journey, all very unique in its own way.

Participants: Jarvis (the shaman), May (the assistant), Adelita (older Hispanic lady), and Adelita's Father

1st Dose
I got into half lotus seated position and began meditating. I noticed that by meditating into the initial wave, I had more control of my mind and the inner world visuals would be less chaotic. It helped with the initial nausea as well. As the first dose kicked in, the usual onset of colors, lines, and fractals commenced. The "cool dudes" in my previous trip came to visit me again. They don't stop appearing until I had an incident with one of them with my fifth journey, the next trip. There were two new characters that showed up in my closed eye visuals this time. The first one was the silhouette and outline of an old shamanistic native looking grandma. She was calm and peaceful. The second one by far more interesting, was a little girl with a monster head. She had the body of a little girl in a cute pink dress but had the face of a demon. Her demeanor was bratty, aggressive, and wanted attention. I have encountered this entity in my lucid dreams before but I'm not sure what's her purpose. Go ahead and google images of "little girl with demon face" or use your imagination. But I'll tell you, she definitely is not pleasant to look at. Regardless, she's been rather harmless despite her appearance. She would be a reoccurring character in my sixth and eight journey. As usual, I abide as the witness and observe them without judgement.

I had a strange interaction with the "cool dudes" this time. In my closed eye visuals, they encouraged me to die. They would tell me to die, and I would go through the process and come back alive. Then I would see them giggling, laughing, hands over their mouths, and mocking my death. Almost implying to me "See, we told you so, you die and you'll come back." That death is not final, but almost some sort of cosmic joke. My death experiences during this trip were far more gentler and serene than what I felt during my first trip where it was more violent and fear based. I guess I'm learning how to let go and die more peacefully.

Given that I was more in control this trip and was not delirious or confused, when it was time to take the 2nd dose, I went ahead without hesitation.

2nd Dose
After taking my 2nd dose, I decided to go meditate in the center of the room in front of the burning candles and fake plant centerpiece. There I sat in full lotus and as mentioned above, I went through another gentle death process that the "cool dudes" guided me through. As I sat there after reestablishing myself from the simulated death process, I felt a sudden surge of energy building up in my core, my solar plexus. It was building and building and my breath automatically got deeper and deeper. Very meditative. I started breathing heavily, as if my breath was a taking on a life of its own. It was very autonomous. Then at some point, Mother Aya completely took control almost as if she possessed my body. I got up with my hands spread and feeling super expansive. The energy that I felt earlier in my core began to rise from my gut and out of my mouth. All of a sudden, a huge "OM" burst forth out of my mouth with my head tilted back and my arms raised high in the air. I felt like a huge expansive tree with my branches extending and reaching out into the cosmos while vibrations were emanating from the core of my being and out of my mouth. At the pinnacle of my roar, my consciousness was gone for that split second and then I was back. As I exhaled the last remnants of the vibrations, I felt negative energy leaving my breath. After that, the first thing I said was "What the fuck was that?!" and started laughing my ass off. May, who happened to be lying on the side with her head towards the center, heard me and also began laughing with me. Both of us knew, something crazy just happened. It was such an unbelievable feeling of release and was such a remarkable event.

I was in my spirit mode, my cosmic state, the feeling of Ayahuasca power. It was a tad disorienting, as if the immensity of that consciousness couldn't be contained in my body. Anyway, both of us were feeling quite awesome now. We both decided to go outside to sit in the parking lot to hang out and chat. While sitting there next to each other on the floor, I had another vision flash before me. It was May and I, both monkeys on a savanna under a tree fending off hyenas. Instinctively, I suppose to scare off the hyenas, I just started bellowing out in the parking lot and she started making monkey noises too. It was hilarious and we were having the time of our lives. Perhaps we knew each other once as monkeys in our past lives, maybe some sort of soul mate? This would be my first past life flash back I've ever experienced.

As we chatted outside, I would get random surges of Ayahuasca energy overtaking me. I'd drop in silence midway during conversations and feeling such life force flowing through my body. It was a very intense cosmic expansive feeling that made my whole being flex with power and energy. A feeling that you and the universe are one, cosmic consciousness. A heightened level of awareness. As we were coming down, we got on top of the roof of her jeep, laid there and chatted. May was kind enough to give me a massage while I was still feeling the effects of Ayahuasca. During the massage, I saw a closed eye vision of a huge pristine white ivory divine palace. Not sure where it was from, but it sure was beautiful and majestic.

As we sobered up, Jarvis came outside and we discussed my feeling of cosmic consciousness. Then the idea was thrown out to take a third dose. This would be May and my first time taking three doses.

3rd Dose
Both of us took a smaller dose for our third. The dose was small enough where it did not overwhelm us like it did the first two. While on Ayahuasca, May went to the center of the studio to perform yoga asanas. She mentioned Ayahuasca made her more flexible and she felt more grounded performing yoga with Ayahuasca in her system. As I laid there in the center watching her, here and there I'd have peak minor braingasms. These are tiny surges of energy I feel on the forehead of my brain where I'd see white light and the chakra colors. Each time, this happened, I'd exhale some sort of energy (prana) that felt negative leaving my being.

Now to my next experience, a very peculiar one. As I laid there flat on my stomach still watching her perform yoga postures, I went ahead and grabbed a bottle of water in my hands. Looking at this bottle of water in my hands, I began to feel immense gratitude and thankfulness that the universe has combined various elements to put this object together. This little plastic container holding a small amount of water to quench my thirst. And then it happened. While staring at the bottle of water, suddenly everything went pitch black. I was gone, I disappeared as in deep sleep. The bottle, my surroundings, sound, all my senses, gone. Vanished. I don't know how many seconds passed by but then I reappeared with everything still there with my eyes open as I were before it went black. Then I immediately realized, it was a certain state of samadhi, a state of non-being. Perhaps the 7th jhana or 8th jhana. Very very cool experience. A glimpse of non-duality.

samadhi: 7th through 9th jhana

However, despite having these experiences on Ayahuasca, I'm learning that these states do not last. Ayahuasca is like meditation on steroids. It gives you a glimpse of what meditative masters have achieved without the hours of practice they've gone through. Although, it is easier for the masters to achieve such states as a result of their practice without relying on anything but their own being. So traditionally, they don't recommend anything external on the path.

At the very end of this journey, I sat in pure bliss, no thoughts for almost three hours. I just sat there until the sun came up. During this time, a block away from our lot, I saw a flash of sparkles glittering across the top of a tree. It was magical.

Thank you Divine Mother Ayahuasca.

https://www.meetup.com/AyahuascaDTLA/events/242701370/

Ayahuasca Journey 3: The Observer and Observed are One

🕒 7 MINUTE READ 

Friday August 18th, 2017
Having just died on journey one and getting a glimpse of the divine light. Then came journey two, where I experienced a flash of GOD. I had to come back for this third journey to validate what I went through was legit. I wanted to confirm that my experience was not a mistake and that I could consistently reproduce it with Ayahuasca. So that I could be certain of what I had felt. This would be the journey where I'd discover, becoming one with the cosmos. The Shiva Being.

Participants: Jarvis (the shaman), John (the assistant), May, Shiv (Indian in his early 30s), Carlos (Hispanic in his late 30s), and Flor (Hispanic woman in her late 30s).

First Dose
I don't really recollect the initial onset of this first dose. I do recall that this was the first time I got into half lotus meditative posture while waiting for Ayahuasca to kick in. At some point, it kicked in, I went ahead and laid down on my stomach. From what I vaguely recall, the initial visuals were similar to journey one and two. One very interesting feeling I recall in this trip was the experience of what I call mini "time-gaps". These time-gaps were a very a strange feeling and phenomenon. Each time one of these gaps occurred, I would feel life and time would pause for two to three seconds. I'd hear a strange squiggly noise in the center of my brain and feel a strange sensation at the bottom of my spine. Every time I heard the squiggly noise, time would stop, then resume. It was weird as fuck, and it happened a couple of times. Forgetting how long I was in this state, at some point I got up to purge in the restroom.

Being in the restroom, it felt very strange, very fake. Like some strange gimmick out of place in the middle of the universe. Anyway, I puked my guts out into to the toilet and remembered looking into the bowl, feeling a strange presence of GOD. But this was not it. This was more subtle and not as pronounced as my flash in journey two. I then proceeded with purging out the other end. Sitting there on the toilet with the lights on seeing sparkles in space and the floor moving, I started to notice the light got brighter and brighter. As I sat there taking a shit, dumping my innards out, suddenly that bright light started swelling up within me and began to expand. It was the divine light again, and this time it was expanding alongside with my awareness. I was completely dumbfounded and awestruck as this light energy surged and exploded in my mind completely overtaking my ego and becoming pure awareness. I had found GOD again with my pants down taking a shit! Confident that this was indeed the experience of the divine again, I was in sheer bliss and awe. Sitting there, suddenly I recalled to be mindful of others who need to use the restroom. I had lost track of how long I was in there.

As I walked out, I noticed something was very different about my being. Something I've never felt before. My body felt extremely light and also quite big. I was a larger expansive version of my self, with the dead weight of my body completely being lifted. I looked at my hands, they were like massive holographic hands, way longer than usual. The very perception of my being has been scaled up.

Everything felt like an illusion. So this is what the Buddhist call Samsara, or the Hindus call Maya. That our reality is in fact an illusion. As I walked, I felt like an immense being, some sort of walking spirit. I wasn't quite sure what to make of it, but it felt good and confident, as if this was the real me, standing tall and proud. Our true nature, to abide as the essence of spirit.

In this state I decided to sit down in front of the centerpiece of the studio to meditate. I sat in full lotus with relative ease, there was no pain or discomfort as there normally is when sober. As I sat there and meditated, I started to achieve single pointed concentration. At the peak of my meditation, there was perfect stillness and I became "the witness". I was the witness, watching my body and all happenings occur within me. It was like I was frozen time, yet I could still see people walking around my body. I had become the observer, watching myself in 3rd person. This was definitely some state of Samadhi. As I shifted my attention back to that which was being observed, at that moment, the observer and observed became one. Oneness, the non-dual state. There were no thoughts or feelings, just pure perception and pure awareness. Everything was complete.

As I sat there, another interesting phenomenon began to occur. Since I was abiding as the observer, I watched my body get up, grab my keys, go to my car, get a jacket, put it on, and stand outside the parking lot. I realized, what I had just perceived was that fact that I am no longer the actor. That free will is really an illusion. When you are in the state of the observer, all happenings and phenomenon continue to occur without your conscious initiative to take action. This was truly a profound realization. After this understanding, I slowly began to regain conscious control of my body. However, reflecting back on this, it almost seemed as if Ayahuasca took control of my body and that it was moving on its own. However, that was not the case. Ayahuasca simply allowed me to identify as the observer and it showed me, that a higher power continues to animate our very beings. This is true surrender. This is the natural unfolding of cause and effect, our karmas. If we are not who we take our selves to be as a body, then abiding as the observer, there lies the imperishable timeless being, that which is never born and can never die. This is where true peace lies, in the eye of the storm.

From my various Ayahuasca trips, there seems to be various stages of consciousness that can be described. From lowest to highest:

1. Unconsciousness, deep or dreamless sleep
2. Unawareness, not self aware, like some lower animal forms
3. Self aware, but in the deluded state, mistaken to be the ego, thoughts, feelings, and the body
4. Awake or aware, deep understanding that you are not the ego nor the body, but instead always mindful and abiding in the present, the current moment
5. Observer or the witness, identification with pure awareness, that which perceives the body, thought, and all waking phenomenon. A clear demarcation from all happenings. That you, abiding as the witness is not affected, cannot be touched
6. Being state, oneness with the universe, to become the totality, the observed and observer become one, there's no longer a separation of the observer (the subject) and the observed (the object). Non duality. That demarcation is merged. Yoga, union with the divine
7. And finally the non being state, emptiness, unmanifest, turiya, nirvana, pure consciousness, the source

This was a deep and profound trip. More of my third journey experience could also be found in Journey 9. There were a lot of similarities between the two.

https://www.meetup.com/AyahuascaDTLA/events/242525631/

Ayahuasca Journey 2: Synchronicity with Ganesh

🕒 7 MINUTE READ

Sunday July 9th, 2017 8PM

Four weeks prior to my 2nd Ayahuasca trip, I had a lucid dream where I entered a strange dream realm. In this mystical dream realm, I walked into a sauna full of steam and moisture. The room had an orange/pinkish hue. As I entered the room and looked to my left, I saw a giant pinkish/peachy entity with massive elephant head. He was sitting in a giant hot tub full of steam looking at me with serene eyes and acknowledging my presence. It was the Hindu deity, Lord Ganesh, the remover of obstacles. Please note, I am not Hindu and at the time, I did not know too much about Hindu deities. In fact, three years ago I was debating with my Hindu friend on why he even believes in these fairy tale religions with three faces, six arms, and elephant heads. Anyway, after Ganesh acknowledged me, I proceeded with my lucid dream, which I will not get into here.

Monday July 10th, 2017

The next day I was ranting and raving about my dream experience to one of my friend/coworker Edric at work over chat. That day, my gym partner Matteus had gone regularly to this yoga class and wanted to introduce Edric and I for first time. When I got there, guess what was the first thing I encountered in the room, a medium sized statue of Ganesh. I totally tripped out on the synchronicity and mentioned to Edric and Matteus about it.

snapchat from the yoga studio

Two weeks later, on Sunday July 23rd I encountered the opportunity to take Ayahuasca and signed up for my first session on Friday July 28th, which I will not discuss here but have gone into detail in another post. I will mention though, the day after my first trip, an image of Ganesh popped up while scrolling through random Instagram images. So I looked him up on DMT-Nexus forum and apparently, many others have encountered him. On the site, I read the following... "Ganesha is known as the Lord of New Beginnings, as the Initiator, Guardian of Gateways etc...and so it is appropriate that so many of the Ganesha experiences posted here are initial experiences." It may just be coincidental, but my first Ayahuasca trip came shortly after my vision of him in the dream I mentioned above.

Friday August 11th 2017
Fast forward two weeks later to my 2nd Ayahuasca journey, I got to the ceremony and greeted the the shaman and the other patrons and proceeded with my first dose.

Participants that night: Jarvis (the shaman in his late 30s), John (his assistant, ex-marine in his late 30s), May (she left), Paulo (from Colombia also left), and Rauchet (black male in 20s).

I laid down and as the dose kicked in 30 minutes to an hour, I started getting close eyed visuals very similar to my first trip. They were these characters in human form of various colors interacting with me through non-verbal communication, "the cool dudes". It was relatively chaotic and all over the place. Again, with the men with hats, beards, shades and pretty girls all offering me drinks and trying to interact with me by showing me things. So after staying in this inner world journey for a bit, I sat up and started to get my open eye visuals.

A rainbow colored hue, purple and pink haze began to fill the studio and the room became looking very cosmic. As if the studio was in some space like ethereal dimension, the heavens. I looked down at my feet (which seemed very child like) and sleeping bag (which felt like I was floating on some cloud being cradled in this dreamy space). As I sat there, looking up at the rainbow colored auras in the room, there appeared out of thin air on my left side this 3D virtual like being, Lord Ganesh! And the first thing I said to him was,  "Holy fuck you're real?!" Lord Ganesh looked at me and proceeded to laugh with deep bellied hearty laugh and replied "Yes, I'm real". And the second thing that came to mind was that I felt that I should ask him a question. Although not verbatim, I asked him, "What about the prophets, Jesus, the Buddha?" Not sure where I was going with my question but out of nowhere, appeared another figure in front of me next to Ganesh, a blue skinned deity no other than Lord Vishnu. He too started laughing and said... "They are all incarnations of me". I was elated and in awe of their presence.

Suddenly, to my right, burst forth this bright light and halo, quite in contrast to the purple and pink haze in the room. In that halo was a cartoonish/artsy (contrary to 3D/Virtual) white-haired old man, sitting on the grass in meditative posture, under an apple tree. He looked upon me with grace, intent, and a gentle smile. And he said to me "You found me!" Then he burst out into haughty laughter and joy. As he laughed, so did Ganesh and Vishnu. I too then started to laugh out loud with glee and joy. It was pure bliss and ecstasy, all four of us laughing and chuckling together. Then they vanished and I laid down with such a huge ecstatic smile on my face. I think that old man may have been some guide or guardian, or may be even an old guru of mine, perhaps in a past life. He looked a lot like Lahiri Mahasaya from "Autobiography of a Yogi".

Lahiri Mahasaya in full lotus

Not too long after, I began to sober up and went outside to tell one of the assistants regarding my vision. After some discussions, it was time for my 2nd dose, round two. When it started to kick in, I went back to my spot/sleeping bag and once again, after some inner world close eyed visuals, the Ayahuasca realm started to overlay the room again. I was pretty disoriented, confused, and was floored this time around. As a laid there staring out one of the windows something profound started to happen. A quick flash, where my peripheral vision and awareness began to expand and the feeling got wider and wider. As it expanded, I, the ego, my personality, my individuality disappeared. Suddenly, I became, and was the universe itself, pure consciousness/awareness. Union with divinity. The all seeing eye. Shortly after it subsided, I came to realize I had just experienced my first encounter with the Godhead, what the Hindus call Brahman. I did not encounter this on my first journey, but have experienced this in my subsequent trips and would stay in this state for much longer periods.

Of all my trips to this day, the visions that occurred on this day were the most mind blowing and will forever leave a lasting impression.

https://www.meetup.com/AyahuascaDTLA/events/242341518/