Ayahuasca is a Quechua word that attracts and frightens many people from the beginning of its history.

It is the name of a psychedelic or entheogenic beverage typical of the Amazon basin, used for shamanic and religious rituals, which Christian missionaries already identified in the 1500s as a diabolic substance.

Even today this double approach remains of the divided psyche of modern society .

If on the one hand the moralistic and justicialist side of our modern societies has inscribed ayahuasca in the group of narcotics (in Italy it is illegal) by attaching to it the terrible "drug" label, as is done with heroin and cocaine, on the other, many people, young and old, face a path of knowledge and study: they learn about the chemical composition of the plant, evaluate interactions with the organism and the human psyche, and share numerous personal experiences made by other pioneers, often went directly to the place to see first-hand and understand how deep the white rabbit hole is .

Chemistry and composition of Ayahuasca

Let us first analyze the ayahuasca from the botanical and chemical point of view . By the name ayahuasca (literally " liana of the spirits ") is meant a drink obtained by mixing and boiling more plant species in a variable composition according to the Amazon area and the shaman.

Generally we find the chacruna ( Psychotria virdis ), or the plant that contains the molecule with entheogenic power, together with Banisteriopsis caapi, which has the function of MAOI, which prevents the body from digesting the enetogeous alkaloids and thus canceling its effectiveness.

The enthalogenic alkaloid in question is dimethyltryptamine or DMT, a tryptamine that human beings, like almost all living things, produce and which has been called a molecule of the spirit .

It is an analogue of serotonin and melatonin, capable of inducing what we commonly call "hallucinations" but which in reality are much more: experiences that not only have a visual character, even not limited to include all the senses, but to to interpenetrate them in a synergistic way, to open new ones, and to give the whole revelatory character thanks to a characteristic part of the experience called "ego death", or death of the ego .

Traveling to learn about Ayahuasca

However, reliable studies show that the discovery and use of ayahuasca are not as ancient as those of other entoegens, such as psilocybinic fungi or mescaline cacti.

So why do many people undertake long and demanding journeys, especially in the Peruvian part of the Amazon forest to experience the ayahuasca?

After all, it is also known to scientific research the power that substances such as psilocybin of fungi, mescaline of cacti and ibogaine of iboga, have to counteract two evils very common in our society and in our age: depression and addictions .

Post-traumatic or congenital depression, drug addictions, compulsive shopping, sex addiction, drugs or social networks, we are undoubtedly overflowing with sickness due to a life that is often senseless and unbalanced.

Our society presents us with unbelievable models of perfection, hides the dead, the sick, the old, so that our unprepared psyche is not able to manage the natural awareness, thus rendered unconscious, that death, illness and old age will touch also to us, transient and imperfect beings.

The power of entheogens

The experience of entheogens is different from that of the other drug categories .

The other drugs lie, they make you feel a strength that does not correspond to the real one, infuse unbelievable security and make you feel loved when in reality you are simply isolated and disconnected from the world or relaxed but actually under pressure and full of pain.

Entheogens hit a hard truth in the face that we love to keep hidden: we will die, we are already doing it, little by little, getting older.

And this is good because it is a condition of continuous rebirth, of sharing and reflux of a universal and unlimited energy that has given us a temporary form, like a wave in the ocean.

Our evil comes from not following this flow, from not perceiving ourselves in all beings, embodied and disembodied, past, present and future.

Once this state is reached, no death or degradation can really affect our spirit and we will stop provoking the diseases we flee from.

The importance of the shaman

But why the Ayahuasca and not other substances at the bottom similar? Probably due to the traditional ritual and the presence of the shaman .

Not all shamans are reliable, but the presence of a true shaman is a source of guidance and protection during these experiences, both healing and terrible to deal with.

The shaman, for those who believe in the principle of reincarnation, has already died many volts and knows how to "return".

In fact, one of the risks is this : although the real purpose is to return different and mature from such an experience, sometimes sinking into the abyss can open the door to latent psychoses that can exacerbate the symptoms of discomfort.

These psychoses however, it must be said, could potentially become effective with any other trauma: the death of a close relative or an accident, for example. After all this risk is also part of the transience of our condition and should be accepted.

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