What I learned from taking psychedelics in Costa Rica
I was hanging out with a friend recently and she started talking about how important it is to take other peoples medicine.
Here's what she said:
Sometimes I'm shocked when I hear how well my medicine works on other people, it just doesn't feel that strong to me. It feels like I'm creating it from my own little eco-system and I really need someone else's medicine to feel a big impact.
At first I was like, "nahhh, my tools work for me and I don't have that problem in my field."
Though, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that the really big changes have pretty much always been prompted by some external force.
As we talked about it more, I remembered some of my first experiences working with other teachers...
Some of you know my story better than others...
Essentially, I was in it deep with Ayahuasca, drinking it as often as I could, which was a lot.
I was also super stuck.
I'd stopped getting shit from these experiences and actually started to deteriorate physically, emotionally, psychologically... and of course financially. 😩
I was in Costa Rica with an awesome group of people and a few of them mentioned other teachers they'd worked with.
While I was intruiged, part of me was like "wait, I thought Ayahuasca had all the answers?" 🤦♀️
Well, at the end of this particular retreat, I tried Huachuma for the first time.
Now, drinking Ayahuasca has been a true labor of love for me... as in, it was a gloriously righteous form of masochism that I deeply enjoyed engaging in... to relentlessly punish myself for my very existense. 😲
So, here I was in Costa Rica, almost haphazardly consuming my first cup of Huachuma, with very low expectations, (due to my dogmatic belief in the superiority of Ayahuasca.)
and incredibly, I felt the experience of a new medicine that didn't cause me pain, angst, or straight up suffering.
It was actually fun!
I was struck by the heart opening beauty of everything... and it agreed with my physically!
Huachuma was incredible. It showed me that there were other medicines and other ways of receiving the transformation that I sought.
Within a week, I discovered a teacher who I ultimately studied with for years.
This was the pivotal experience that got me where I am today.
Huachuma gave me a willingness to receive someone elses medicine. Fuck, what a gift.
It seemed like such a small thing at the time. In reality, it was the beginning of something long and winding, but it felt GOOD right from the beginning and that was a relief!
The ‘I can do this myself’ attitude is very common in our culture. Honestly, I love the movement of being one's own 'Guru' because, at the end of the day, that is true.
And, it's also true that along the way, receiving other peoples medicine can be invaluable to show us the things that we inevitably have a hard time seeing ourselves.
For some of us, it just takes a little direction and we can find our own way,
and some of us find that we really thrive under the longer term personal attention and guidance of a professional.
Either way is truly perfect and I've leaned into both over the years.
Shadow integration is something that can be digested in bits and pieces. You can consume my free content and really make a lot of headway, it's true.
Yet, the pointed attention and insight from a seer-of-patterns (ie. ME) can save you a LOT of time.
As I frequently point out… shadow work is hard by the very nature of the fact that it’s what we actively hide from ourselves!
I love creating little practices and exercises to coax those things out…
and here’s the thing… leaps and bounds come when you can cut alllll the way down to the source of a pattern..
and that can take a little help...
and perhaps someone elses medicine 💡
I can sense that there are those of you who are feeling the potential of this work, and ready to test the waters of receiving more direct medicine. I encourage to visit my “GET WITH ME” page to fill out a one-on-one coaching inquiry.
I look forward to meeting you on Zoom,
Lucy B.