Abigail Dixon

Eye adventure. Eye walk, eye see, eye think, eye write.

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Healed by nature: Ayahuasca and the moon

When I was fourteen a doctor on London’s Harley Street put me under general anaesthetic and inserted a hormone pumping coil into my womb. I was a virgin.

At the time it was a last resort, a so-called durable solution to my diagnosed hormone imbalance, which had caused six months of continuous heavy bleeding. What an amazing thing, I thought, that a little piece of metal sitting inside my womb could control my menstrual cycle so well that I didn’t need to have a period at all.

My recent encounter with Ayahuasca has changed everything. It made me wake up and realise that this temporary solution was doing nothing more than disguise and slowly accentuate the problem.

Ayahuasca is a Native American plant medicine, perhaps the world’s best-known enthoegen. It is commonly recognised for its mind-altering and visionary effects that bring about spiritual growth and deep personal healing.

Ayahuasca, which literally translates as “Vine of the soul/spirits,” has been used in sacred ceremony for thousands of years across parts of Peru, Ecuador, Colombia and Brazil. The medicine consists of two main ingredients, the Ayahuasca vine and Chacruna, a shrub native to the Amazon basin that contains the psychoactive Dimethyltryptamine (DMT). In combination these plants induce a solitary journey into ones deepest self. Everyone’s experience is different but many describe it to be ‘life-changing.’

My intentions for retreating at the Temple of the Way of Light (a shamanic healing centre deep in the Peruvian Amazon) had nothing to do with my hormones on the surface, but I quickly came to realise that this jungle vine was to address things from right down at the roots.

To get to the ‘Temple’ one must first get to Iquitos, the world’s largest city to be only accessible by plane or boat. From there you journey onwards along the river before docking on its banks and trekking for an hour into the jungle. This physical journey in itself allows you to leave behind your everyday life, the off-grid lifestyle brings no opportunity for distraction, and daily yoga and meditation classes compliment the sacred ceremonial space that the medicine requires. You really are able to immerse yourself fully during this month long retreat.

In hindsight, I see that I had been misled by the Western medical system into believing that I was a malfunctioning woman. That there was no resolve to my hormone imbalance, apart from contraceptive devices that were causing me to suffer from migraines, acne, mood-swings and depression. It had been a fourteen-year-long battle with my femininity that lead me to have a fear of menstrual blood and a deep insecurity in womanhood.

I was nervous, but had faith when the Shipibo shaman asked me to stop taking the contraceptive pill immediately.

“Don’t you see, it is that pill which is causing your migraines. Many woman have this problem, it’s common, but very easy to resolve,” he told me casually as he looked at his wife for reassurance.

I was prescribed two local plant medicines, Uvus and Tamomari, which I was to take every morning before breakfast. These plants are known to help with reproductive health and hormone balancing; just two of thousands of natural remedies used in situ to successfully heal illnesses.

It is said that by residing in solitude and dieting on a plant for an expended period of time, that shamans are able to connect with the plant spirit world in order to gain knowledge and understand each plants’ healing qualities.

It didn’t take me long to appreciate the power of shamanism. The shamans’ ability to intuitively guide each one of us on the retreat, through our visionary insights, was astonishing. Their gentle approach and serenity a gift, and their healing powers, particularly when singing an Icaro, awe-inspiring.

An Icaro is the name for songs sung during Ayahuasca ceremonies in Shipibo culture. In their belief, Icaros are used to call in their spirit world, to induce ones mareacion (visionary experience), to draw out bad omens and trapped energies in the body, and if required, to bring an end to ones mareada state. The sounds can be piercing and it gets straight under your skin, into your veins and more often than not makes you feel very sick.

Among Ayahuasca’s recognised healing qualities is its ability to purify and cleanse the body. It is nicknamed ‘la purga’ and it is no fallacy that this medicine makes you purge from many parts of the body.

Yes, often the Ayahuasca experience is not easy and definitely not pleasant. The word ‘purge’ becomes frequently used on retreat. Purging is just one of the many elements of the healing journey induced by this mystical plant concoction, and although tough to face at times, the sense of release one is left with afterwards is simply amazing.

In my experience, the power of nature did not end with the plant’s healing abilities. I came to realise that mother Ayahuasca was calling me to sit under the moon, to resolve a deep-rooted puzzle within me. One that had caused me much anguish, depression and anxiety since puberty – my manic hormones.

As I stepped outside at the end of a ceremony the glow of the full moon called me. I found myself lying alone on a bench in the middle of the jungle under a bright, brilliant sky. I recognised that my menstrual cycle was in tune with the moon as I gazed up and spoke to the full moon.

“Thank you. Thank you so much for this healing. Please help me produce oestrogen. Please.” I whispered.

You might laugh and think I’m crazy but since that night I am almost lost for words by the physical and mental changes within me.

It began was pains inside my ovaries and my womb and continued through each Ayahuasca ceremony during my month in the jungle. This acute pain and a surreal inner contact with my womb put me in touch with the healing my body was undertaking. I purged what felt like poison; residue from years of artificial hormones being pumped into my body. It was painful, it was traumatic, but it was unspeakably cleansing.

With all its mystery, my Ayahuasca journey put me back in touch with nature. The plant awakened my mind, my body, my nervous system, in order to help me understand and heal the root cause of these physical and mental glitches within me.

Two months later, to the day, my moon cycle began on cue with the luminous fullness of the moon. I had, for the first time in my life a natural and normal menstrual flow. My body feels different now – it feels balanced and stable. It feels fertile and I feel like a woman.

Why, I keep asking myself, are these medicines, the Uvus and the Tamomari in particular, that have no vision inducing effects, not used more widely around the world? Why are we girls and woman masking nature with science and living so out of contact with our bodies? What happened to the celebration and unison of our menstrual moon cycle? What happened to the red tent?

The answers I keep finding bring a constant: We’re disconnected from nature. Disconnected from our planet, our bodies and our health.

Our planet has been looking after us since the beginning of time, yet we’re so lost in science that we have begun to forget about these natural healing remedies. We jump too quickly, in haste for a speedy antidote. What Ayahuasca has taught me is that with some patience and some faith we can restore our bodies and rejuvenate our health naturally.

How thankful I am to Ayahuasca and the masters of plant medicine, the shamans of the Amazon rainforest, for opening my eyes and for giving me this courage to trust the medicinal resources offered to us by Mother Nature.

Then there was the moon’s role in my healing, for which I cannot find words, only gratitude.

By Abigail Dixon

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Drum rhythm

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I live here, I live now.

A year ago I found the courage to leap. I quit my job, packed up my belongings, stacking my books into cardboard boxes to me stored in my grandmother’s attic. Waiting, waiting to be boated away one day. I swore to myself I’d never move back to London.

I booked a flight to India but for lack of forward planning my visa application bounced, so I ended up connecting onwards through the sky to Nepal. I remember looking out of the window, seeing the foothills of the Himalayas through birds-eye; knowing nothing about Nepal, not even that it is the birth place of Buddha.

I trogged through the city, dodged collisions by split seconds on the pavements and roads - merged in madness - of Kathmandu city. I was given a copy of the karma sutra by a man in a corner camera shop. I expect my cheeks blushed as I peaked through the pages.

Within days I was on a yoga mat. My abs aching, the core of my body shaking. Two weeks of ashtanga, until I felt call to begin trekking.

I had the shits, obviously. So by day three my body felt weak. I found a village to rest, read, honour my feet, and squat over a long drop toilet; until I reached recovery. I was eager to tie up my laces again.

A week later, inside clouds, sub zero temperature, I summited at five thousand, four hundred and sixteen metres above sea level. I became ever so aware of my breath; in the difficulty of obtaining enough oxygen from each inhale of air.

I walked day by day, from village to village, passing holy temples, pray wheels and ruined castles once inhabited by kings. I turned twenty-six, somewhere between Muktinah and Kagbeni, and as I counted by blessings I saw in the mirror of my mind a beautiful being, being I. And so began this journey. With each step I took I retracted myself from conversation, from too much company. I was liking spending time with I. Giving myself space to think, to walk in nature. With no distraction or desire or need, apart from putting one foot in front of the others. Breathing. Observing.

In the Himalayas I looked at myself for the first time. And through the murky patches of uncertainty, and the dark circles of fear or denial, or something similar, I saw a light that was I. Stripped back from cultural conditioning, full of insight, my inner light offered me a tongue taste of what was to come. As I walked the lessons begun.

I got home in time for summer, to be earthy and British. To work and play in the garden. I signed papers in the village church to stitch my sister to a man. Gaining a brother-in-law, I drank alcohol galore. Which, after the funfair of indulging, dancing, swinging and gulping back more - mindlessly - brought to the surface, fear, pain and aggression. In the early hours of the morning my eyes rolled, my tongue told, too out of control, too in need of a reaction to find myself a comfy spot on the drawing room floor to shut down my over active vocal cords, and sleep. That inner flame was out, drowned out. I didn’t like hearing me shout, under the influence of the worlds most dangerous and destructive drug, alcohol.

I went to spend time in the hills of Ibiza, where I was effortlessly drawn to a man, succumbed by that feeling ‘it’s meant to be’. Around the same time she began to summon me. Madre ayahuasca. Madre ayahuasca. Madre ayahuasca. So I hit London to earn enough money to get me to the Peruvian Amazon.

I’d been making love with this man, who the day before I flew packed his bags too, and jumped on a plane to meet me. At sunset, as the wheels of the plane dropped down the palms of my up hands were sweating, my pulse slightly fretting. He was standing there in the airport of La Paz, holding up my name, smiling.

In the High Andes we lived with a local family, wrapped up in blankets made from the wool of their alpacas. They are farmers, and so for that week so were we. Ploughing terraces; living Quechuan reality.

We parted, I again alone to discover myself through a prism of subtlety. At four o’clock one morning I hiked up to Machu Picchu. I found a spot, quite for up, away from the clucking cameras of tourists, who I, in those moments of hypocrisy; hated. But I shifted these feelings aside, took off my boots, crossed my legs, shut my eyes. I meditated, sitting silently.

I met ayahuasca for the first time in early September, and continued to drink her every three nights for a month. What happened to me? Well, I was shown gratitude, the most intricate patterns of love that flickered through space, in race. Metric patterns that seemed so innate. Beauty, I was shown beauty, before I was taken to this really dark place.

I’ve never felt so sad, never felt so vulnerable. I’ve never felt so alone. In deep darkness I wretched my way through ceremonial nights, questioning everything. It’s frightening to meet yourself, but the fear it’s soon replaced. After purging, intricate levels of understanding took place. Sparks of detail making space for me to map out in the visions before my hallucinating face, how things really are.

In darkness, I saw light. The light of thunder, the light of the moon. The light of a glow bug sitting quietly with nothing pressing to do. Yes in darkness, there is always light. To see it, I just had to visualise and allow my kundalini to rise. And as the divine female rose, I heard a voice within me speak in prose. It was conversing with a tree. Discovering my femininity, my fertility.

This energy snaked through each chakra of my body. And as it did I began to feel in my hands the shapes of you insides. It seemed that I was touching my womb. So began a spiritual awakening and a love affair with the moon.

There remained one leap.

I could feel you, I could smell you, I could hear your breath as I was pulled away, taken once again from within mother’s womb. As I snaked my way through space, panting, twisting, groaning aloud, I was in pain. Each muscle, they ached as I restrained. Desperate to stay attached to you, mummy.

But I wasn’t aloud, the medicine stood her space, whispering, “it’s time to grow, to stand alone.” And so I found the courage to cut the umbilical cord and let go. Within seconds this wounded child began to heal. It seemed a pretty big ordeal to have a rebirth lying face down deep in the Amazon rainforest.

As the bruises of childhood sunk away, the brevity of womanhood filled space. The wild in me flew, as I grew, from baby to beautiful woman. Standing stark naked, my hands raised, bare feet flat on the ground, jungle all around, and rain hitting me from all angles. Wild, yes it felt so good to be wild.

We’d be here all day, if I didn’t pull the reins on this part of the story. (One day you can read my book). But I tell you now, this drug, it’s medicine and I have been healed.

Still, we all continue to make mistakes, for lessons’ sake. Out of the jungle I came wanting more. More. On the plane to Ibiza I admitted to myself I was acting slightly insane, but the invitation was arousing and I had to see him. I was to play the fool, in this game. As I glided across the world, my trust was given in a whole slice to the madness of metal and jets, to keep me high in the sky. Meanwhile he was on the beach, with another girl. Yes, I was to play the fool in love, this time.

Thirty-five hours later I find myself in this really diverse ceremonial space, drinking more ayahuasca. And my body, it flipped out. I was shaking, no control over me. And he, well he judged me. So a month later, I was at home curled up on an armchair in the breakfast room, pained. My heart was broken as you brought me a streaming cup of lemon, ginger tea.

I could see that you, and most of our family through I’d gone mad on this jungle vine. I put my hands up, still now, it was a challenge to reintegrate. I couldn’t stand it; every time I flushed to loo I felt bad. Ayahuasca had put me so in touch with Pacha Mama that the environmental activist in me was now a lit flame. I refused to eat birds on Christmas Day. I judged, as you all munched around dead bones, me sticking to parsnips and carrots grown just down the road.

During this awakening on New Years Eve, while sipping magic mushroom tea, I saw the planet crumble at our feet. How can we stop all this waste?

Permaculture.

Five days later I was on a plane. I needed jungle, community living. I was desperate to be back in a spiritual space. And it was at this time in the now of being I, that I arrived between two volcanoes. I felt my feet dig firmly into the earth, my hands claw forward in mud. The texture of the soil sink into the grains of my skin, reading by palms, recognising everything. I was planting myself. Not without complications, of course. My life is never free from these, is yours?

Every morning just before sunrise he sounded the conch three times. Out of my tent I’d crawl to walk barefoot down the hill. I learnt to breath in meditation, to breath deep, fast, to fill my whole shell from my roots to crown. I learnt to control it, to let it go, to stumble when out of rhythm, making me gasp and grow. The teachings of Osho.

I learnt to shake, to shift through space in five rhythms of dance, beginning with flow. Then staccato, to chaos where I really let go, before slowing it down, sweat dripping, my eyes still closed as I swayed from lyrical rhythm to stillness; as if moving through honey. The voice of Gabriella Roth indulging me in the sacred space of me. “Left, right. Left right, yin, yang. Give a fuck, just let go.”

I learnt to concoct cacao, roast and grind and roll raw lux into flavoursome bucks. Then we’d dance high on life and spirituality. Beats from tribal to trance vibrating through me; as he looked at me.

A shaman, one who to me resembles a tree, reassured me: everything is alive. Everything is conscious. Everything is dynamic, connected and responsive.

"It’s the theatre of the bleeding obvious," he told me. The problem being too many of us deny our ability to see. Cultural conditioning has raised a board blocking the view of natures’ tools. It’s time to start honouring our originality and recognise our self-responsibility. Flip it, and you’ll see the ability to respond written before thee. This shaman, he printed out in plane spoken worlds the path of our responsibility. The recognition that we create our own reality. Everything that happens to you, to me, is chosen by self. A gift of opportunity to learn, to grow; to overcome what karma throws.

The game of eye candy ended. The lust of breath in tantras nest began with the touch of our heads. In, out, in, out, through my slightly parted lips; I became transfixed. The touch of loves’ magnificence, hiding beneath jungle trees. A lust so young, a yearned deep. Pure attraction, pleasure’s plead. We touched, we smiled, we shared, for weeks; until it was time for me to pack my bag, and leave.

To learn about permaculture, the illumination of indigenous tools. The synergy between life and land, in an effort to expand our perception of right and wrong, at the tipping point of this bond; with Mother Nature.

To expand some more, I saw, the desperate need for we, to step back with grounding. To dig for our roots, to learn sustainable techniques, to recognise our relative location. In a protest for our planet’s survival, when margins are slimming, the human race winning pseudo satisfaction out of multi-national ration. We need to live local, stop wanting, wasting and wishing for green grass in deserts. See, we’re all guilty. And now, concrete, it’s never looked so ugly. The cobbing technique, never seemed so neat.

By the next full moon, we were on the beach. Me, him, sand in the sheets. For a month of child-like bliss. Laughter and lessons packed in the desire of touch as we hid from the reality of such naked games with hearts. But recognising the beauty of healing, the purity of expression, the ease of company in our friendship and the luck of me walking up his driveway, panting, sweating.

Each morning we walked towards big waves. Giving the other valuable space in the wild water of pacific. My arms would be outstretched to the sides, hands skimming the water’s surface. Through slipping sand I stood my ground, finding a rise, a rush of power within me. I braced myself to be thrown in, knocked down, thrust around, but in the second before each wave hit I found the courage to submit. I dove in. Coming out the other side, brave. Smiling. Ready for the roll of the next.

And as with everything I seem to do, I dove in deep. The pitta dosha, my fire within; it’s my willpower and my sin. I feel the pulse, vibrating rhythms of inner coiling energy ‘isms’. I cried as he kissed me goodbye.

Reluctantly boarding a bus, from Nicaragua, North. I crossed four countries in a day, wishing I could stay. Guatemala greeted me, in darkness. Chilled air making my toes curl crudely, and yearn more-so for the tropics of that morning. I found a bed, to rest.

My yoga mat was calling. Stillness. It was time to surrender into stillness. To slow down the madness of me, in motion and stomp. To shut my mouth, and listen to the beat of held breaths in sun salutation. The duality of Hatha shining the power of sun and moon within me. The force of holding postures, trembling, eyes closed, mind shut to sounds outside of body. Coiling sways inside, lights flickering in my brow. Feelings of ignite, deep insight, pleasure of present sound in the 108th chant of Om.

One week on, today that is. My body is stiff. My mind at ease. Meditation’s showing me the way. The seat of each asana giving me strength. Another month of training ahead.

Air is life’s engine, breath the fuel. I Breath. I observe. Feeling the telluric pull of earths force, the cosmic shift of sacred myth. How happy I am. Surrounded by meditation, yoga, permaculture and love.

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Waves...

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Nestled

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