Ayahuasca- Vine of the Soul

Richard Evan Schultes is largely considered the father of modern ethnobotany. Ethnobotanists aim to document, explain, and describe the complex relationships between cultures and how they use plants. This includes food, dyes, construction, cosmetics, and of course spiritual use. Schultes plant studies largely took him to the Amazon rain forest, initially in search of a blight resistant rubber tree plant, but his field-work with the native Americans tuned him into much more. While he eventually abandoned his search for the rubber tree due to political reasons, what he did find were over 300 new plant species never discovered and practical traditional use for over 30,000 more. His book The Plants of the Gods: Their Sacred, Healing, and Hallucinogenic Powers, co-authored by Albert Hofmann in 1979 is considered his greatest popular work.

One of the curious uses for plants he discovered was with the indigenous tribes of Peru. He was the first westerner to academically document the brew Ayahuasca. The brew had been used by the tribes there since pre-colonization, and when the Spanish and Portuguese discovered its use they wrote it off as the work of the devil.


Traditional Ayahuasca is a foul bitter brew composed of two plants that work in a sort of harmony to open the entheogenic properties of one another.

One of the two plants is a sturdy jungle vine, Banisteriopsis Caapi. This vine contains an MAOI, or monoamine oxidase inhibitor. That is it inhibits enzymes in the body that break down a number of chemicals, and can be prescribed to combat depression (though often as a last resource due to its often lethal reaction with other drugs.) One of the chemicals this enzyme breaks down is DMT (dimethyl-tryptamine). DMT is one of those chemical compounds that was banned in the 1971 Convention on Psychotropic Substances and is a Schedule I drug in many countries. It is also found in nearly every living organism on the planet, including people. Typically DMT is broken down orally and the only way to ingest the chemical is to vaporize and inhale it, or inject it.

The tribes of Peru through either pure luck or decades of trial and error discovered the MAOI quality of the B. Caapi vine when mixed with leaves from the tropical shrub P. Viridis, the other component of the traditional ayahuasca brew. When the two plants are combined in a pot, and boiled in the semi acidic waters of the Amazon river it produces a powerful, orally active DMT "potion."







This traditional Ayahuasca brew has a number of effects on those who choose to participate in the ceremony. Upon ingestion the thick, phlegm like concoction works its way into the guts of the person. After roughly 30 minutes the potion starts to have an effect. The stomach cramps and ties itself in knots. Nausea slowly creeps up on the person. Reality starts to not seem quite as real as walls melt away or everything gets long tracers. Strong geometric patterns overcome the vision of the person, and then comes "the purge." Due to the emetic properties of the component plants, most users of ayahuasca should expect to have violent bouts of vomiting or even diarrhea.

Believe it or not, many of the people who have used this powerful spiritual product describe the purge portion as quite pleasant, and an important part of the process. From the book Aya Awakenings, by Rak Razam:

"As the minutes go by we collapse into our mattresses, and the sound of vomiting fills the air. La Purga the natives call it -- the purge. Wracking heaves of spew usher forth from gringos all around me, as the ayahuasca reads their energetic bodies, finds the sickness within and brings it up and out, sometimes from both ends.
I'm actually feeling okay, slightly spacey, but the steady warmth of the ayahuasca in my stomach is nothing compared to the gag reflex from all the vomiting gringos. I'm at the bottom right hand corner of the maloca (large jungle hut), so close to the edge I should be able to lean over and vomit when it comes time to purge myself, and part of me wishes it would happen sooner rather than later just to get it over with...
The ayahuasca starts to come on slow, snaking in and out like a lover, tantalizing me. The spirit in the plant is playing hard to get -- or, more than likely, she's finding me hard to get. She's interfacing, overlapping energy fields as her jungle medicine comes on strong. There's a flash of vibrant green as something starts to happen, as I fall into this target window of curious circuit-like patterns, lines of energy that are called "ayahuasca rivers." Locks deep inside of me that I never knew were there are tumbling open and i am spilling into the spaces they reveal...
The circuitry patterns come and go as I struggle with the vine in me now, still holding on and breathing through the cramps in my stomach and the pressure building up in my bowels. I feel like the ayahuasca's getting to know me from the inside out, but I'm trying to control her; I'm static and blocking her ability to come through. It's only when all others seem to have fallen asleep in the wee hours of the night that I bring myself to get up and creep down into the jungle to purge." (Aya Awakenings: p.55-57)

After purging usually complete detatchment from reality happens, as you are transported mentally to a different sense of reality. Pure hallucinogenic, no connection to the outside world. When in this state almost unanimously drinkers claim to have seen spirit beings and deep detatchment from the reality they came from. This state usually lasts for 4-6 hours. From the erowid experience vault:

"When she left me for the night, the visions came in floods, as if they had been waiting to prey on me on my lonesome.... and OH MY... were they fucking relentless. Taunting, grotesque and graphic. Genuinely frightening in a nightmarish sense; except I was very aware that this was no dream. I was visited by countless dragons, in various forms and guises. Some were menacing… disgusting and sometimes they were comical caricatures of distorted, twisted creatures. They let out high pitched screeches whilst abruptly twisting and disfiguring into more revolting, more distorted figurations. They were attempting to purposefully scare me. I knew that was their intent, and I tried my hardest to not give into the fear. All the while clutching onto the bed. Sometimes the air was filled with prehistoric reptilian birds soaring and threatening. 

Sometimes birds were mechanical. Sometimes beautiful. At one point they were picking at and devouring me. Some sort of punishment, perhaps....? I could see myself; my back, up from above. Sparrows and birds of prey were feasting on me, shredding my tendons, and I remember thinking at the time what a wondrous piece of art this image could make. 

At one point there were colossal apocalyptic horses, with heads exploding into bloodied bits around the room. The fan above me in the room appeared alive and maleficent. The walls breathing. The little green night light to the left of my bed was some slithering, hissing serpent, constantly letting me know of its presence. 

The visions grew slightly kinder at one point when I was brought to some ancient landscape of mountains and dreamy colours. White, silky dragons glided through the lands and protected the creatures within. They showed me their home, and told me I'd be welcomed again after death one day. They said this was one option of the afterlife. 

And thence the sinister scaly caricatures returned, snapping their jaws, flaunting their deformities, and screeching in what seemed a world devoid of meaning. They came, and they came back again until it became some sort of comical spectacle and I could see they were more or less harmless. 

Still, the ghastly imagery stayed with me till I fell asleep. At first I was terrified, then I supposed I became accustomed to them. But it was never at any point near pleasant, as it had been the previous night. The spirits were there with the clear purpose to torment me, and were not interested in any sort of communication or reason. "

The healing properties of this concoction are what brings many people to the vine.  While non-native users know of the spiritual applications of ayahuasca, a less well-known traditional usage focuses on the medicinal properties of ayahuasca. When used for its medicinal purposes ayahuasca affects the human consciousness for less than six hours, beginning half an hour after consumption, and peaking after two hours. Ayahuasca also has cardiovascular effects, moderately increasing both heart rate and diastolic blood pressure. In some cases, individuals experience significant psychological stress during the experience. It is for this reason that extreme caution should be taken with those who may be at risk of heart disease.

Ayahuasca is also surprising easy to make at home, although I've found you may have to substitute some of the traditional ingredients out for ease. This is my personal favorite recipe as far as ease of access to materials, cost, and ease.

• 5-10 grams of Mimosa Hostilis root bark 
• 2 grams of Syrian Rue seed matter 
• 1 Large coffee filter
• 1 stainless steel or ceramic pots, no aluminum.
• Vinegar 

So I personally love Syrian Rue, its my own personal little favorite plant. The seeds contain an MAOI just like our friend B. Caapi used in traditional brews, but it also contains seperate properties in the alkaloid Harmaline that are slightly hallucinogenic in their own right.

Instead of the lengthy proccess of extracting the MAOI from B. Caapi you can simply swallow the seeds like a pill, 2-5 grams will provide sufficient MAOI enyme inhibiting properties for the DMT to not be metabolized.

1. The stainless steel pot is filled with roughly about 400ml of water and 4 tablespoons of vinegar. The root bark should be submerged into the water and brought to a slow simmer, not boiled, (the lowest setting on the cooker should be used for this) excessive heat will destroy alkaloids.

Once most of the water in the pot has evaporated, more water can be added 2 or 3 or more times to continue the brewing process as the longer it brews the more potent the ayahuasca will be This is optional but recommended, If there is no time to do this at least twice the amount of root bark will need to be added to achieve a similar dosage. 

2. Before the water has simmered down to about ¾ of the way down, the root bark should be taken out of the water and left to cool. Once the root bark has cooled down enough, the liquid should be squeezed out of the root bark back in to the pot and the root bark should be discarded of. The water is then further evaporated and what should be left is a small amount of a purple/brown coloured liquid enough to fill a shot glass.

3. The Syrian rue, needs to be taken 30 minutes before the root bark.

Thats it! your milage may vary though.

Be sure to research heavily the health risks of taking Ayahuasca and precautions if you ever decide to try it. It could have potentially deadly side effects if mixed with the wrong medication or recreational drugs.