Thursday, July 15, 2010

Ayahuasca Initiation

I have been making some changes to the Foundation this year, improving the website as well as the retreats and courses that we offer.  A new era is quickly approaching and I would like the Ayahuasca Foundation to be ready for the changes that are coming.  One of the most important improvements we've made to our organization is the new Initiation Course with don Enrique Lopez.

This course is intended for people who want to take their study of the Amazon healing more seriously.  Students will spend 40 days straight with the shipibo curandero don Enrique at a remote jungle camp, drinking up to 18 times.  We will be following true plant diets with two sacred and powerful plants in solitude.
Students will be following a traditional, authentic shipibo initiation, except that the accommodations in the jungle have modern amenities like running water and a gas stove.  The food will be prepared by the curandero don Enrique’s wife, Wilma, who is also a healer and has studied the science of curanderismo for many years.  Students will receive initiate’s clothing made by Wilma, according to the shipibo tradition.  The curandero don Enrique leads this course with total attention to the students and to the teachings of the science of healing so that everyone sees, hears, experiences, and understands plant spirit medicine to the most profound level possible in their 40 days in the Amazon Rainforest.

The course consists of doing plant diets, vapor baths, and taking plant remedies, learning icaros, remedy preparation and administration, massage therapy, soplaying, chupando, prayer, and ceremony procedure.  Students take part in making the ayahuasca used during the course, as well as other plant remedies.  In just six weeks students learn enough to begin treating patients and holding ceremonies.  When I lead my first course with don Enrique, I honestly learned more in those six weeks than I had learned in the previous two years of study.  It is an incredible opportunity to truly study with an authentic shaman in the Amazon Rainforest.  If you are serious about learning ayahuasca healing, then you should take a look at this course.