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Preparation

Preparatory Diet

The preparation diet helps prepare your body for the medicine by keeping your body clear of many kinds of foods and substances. Because cleansing is such a central part of how Ayahuasca works, this pre-cleanse allows the medicine to go deeper. Additionally, Ayahuasca does not agree with certain foods, and having these in your system close to ceremony can cause a lot of physical discomfort and other negative side effects.

We recommend starting the diet 5- 7 days prior to the first ceremony so that your body is prepared for the medicine and so that you have the best experience possible. However, it becomes a mandatory restriction starting 24 hours prior to the retreat and for the duration of the weekend.

As part of this diet, please refrain from the following:

  • pork

  • red meat

  • aged, fermented, or pickled foods and drinks of any kind. This includes fermented cheeses, soy sauce, tempeh, tofu, aged or cured meats, jerky, kimchee, sauerkraut, kombucha, nutritional yeast, etc.

  • spicy food,

  • highly salted or oily foods

  • highly sweetened foods (fruit is fine)

  • Coffee and tea is OK and will be served during the weekend.

Mandatory Restrictions

Ayahuasca is a complex medicine with many different bioactive and psychoactive ingredients. Interactions with certain prescription medications, over-the-counter medications, herbal supplements, and recreational drugs can be dangerous, cause unpleasant side effects, or reduce the effectiveness of Ayahuasca.

The following restrictions are necessary for you to safely and positively experience the benefits of this medicine and are based on both traditional Ayahuasca practices and modern medical understanding. Ignoring these restrictions can be dangerous.

Total abstinence from all alcohol, recreational drugs (including cannabis), and all prescription and over the-counter medications for a period of 7 days prior to the retreat. This also includes herbal supplements, protein powders, and any amino acid supplements (e.g. L-Glutamate, L-Tryptophan, etc.)

Additionally you must be completely off all selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors (SSRI) and related medications such as SNRIs, which includes many anti-depressants, for at least 30 days prior to the retreat. This is critically important for your safety.

If you have questions about specific supplements, medications or substances please email us to discuss. After we review your participation questionnaire we will inform you of any additional restrictions related to medications/supplements you are taking.

Media Cleanse

We recommend cutting out all social media, news, and all highly charged content for 7 days prior to the retreat. This includes graphic, violent, or highly sexualized books, websites, movies, and TV. The idea is to reduce the influence of any external content that is emotionally or mentally agitating or compulsive in nature. Many people have compulsive/ addictive relationships with social media apps like Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and TikTok. Cutting out these apps will help you to be in the right frame of mind for the retreat and also free up your mental space to focus on yourself and what you have come to work on.

Ayahuasca is a very deep healing and transformational medicine, and the work starts way before you sit with it in ceremony. The media cleanse well help you to be mentally prepared for the experience. Instead of using social media, read books on healing, spirituality and personal development themes. We offer some recommendations in the next section.

Setting Intentions

We recommend that participants have an intention for participating in this retreat. Intentions are helpful in framing what you want to get out of the experience and will help in guiding your experience over the course of the weekend.

An intention can be as general such as “heal” “learn” “connect with spirit” or can be specific to particular work you would like to do or a specific area in your life you would like help with.

We strongly recommend spending some time the week beforehand reflecting on why you are choosing to go on this journey at this time in your life. Keep a journal and write down the intentions that you have for this experience. You can write down as few or as many intentions as you like. After our evening meditations it is helpful to take a few minutes and reflect on what you learned and experienced and write it down in the same journal. This helps to illuminate how the meditation experiences relate to your intentions.

We also recommend reflecting on how you can put the lessons into practice in your day to day life. There is tremendous transformational power in bringing your intention to spirit, receiving guidance and wisdom and translating that into practical changes in your life.