Post-Ceremony Process (6) – Talking to Her

One thing that became a regular part of my routine life, after ingesting Ayahuasca, is The Conversation with Her.

Yes, I frequently speak with Her, to Her, at Her. And after this many years (FOUR!), I do believe and understand it in my bones – SHE IS LISTENING and RESPONDING. All the time.

In the weeks after my first 3 ceremonies in March 2020, I noticed something eerie happening in my body, which took some time for me to understand and wrap my head around. I still have no ‘rational’ way of knowing if my estimation is correct, but to hell with rationality eh? Especially for those of us who become a part of this world of plant medicine.

I was merely standing in my kitchen one afternoon (April 2020, during the first nationwide lockdown), cooking myself up a meal, when I noticed a buzzing or tingling sensation in my lower back. I reflexively checked for an insect or something on my back, checked in the mirror facing the kitchen to see what it was that was causing that physical sensation. Nothing, there was nothing that I could see moving on my clothes on my back.

I went back to shuffling around the kitchen, when I felt the sensation again. Like a buzzing – very gentle.

A few moments of feeling it again made me realise that its not stemming from any insect or object physically interacting with my body, it was in fact coming from within my body.

At that point in time I had a very half-baked theoretical knowledge of Kundalini energy. I still know jackshit about it really, except a few keywords, the serpent up the spine, rising up, enlightenment etc. Really, nothing of note or substance.

I kept feeling this buzzing in my spine, without understanding what it was – in the coming few days. Since my mother and most of her paternal ancestors have suffered from age-related spinal degeneration and discs collapsing over time, I had this terrible thought – is it happening to me too? At the tender age of 36-37!? Shit!

But there was no pain accompanied with this tingling sensation, it was just a gentle vibration in one spot on my spine/ back – and sometimes the spot shifted a bit up or down. This carried on for months on end with no discomfort for me physically (re: spinal degeneration fears).

One fine day, I started talking to IT – to the sensation – as if it was HER. I noticed that when I would be thinking about ayahuasca, or the ceremonies, or would be in a good head space, the sensation would return/ appear. It became so comforting to me somehow, little old me isolated, quarantined from the world all by myself for 3 months – to have HER in my house, in MY BODY, with me, always.

I don’t know how else to explain it.

I DO NOT FEEL CRAZY STATING THIS HERE – NOT AT ALL.

I do not doubt my estimation. It WAS HER, talking to me, through my body. It was so wonderful.

Alongside this, I have developed the habit/ reflex of TALKING TO AYAHUASCA, as if she is sitting right next to me. She is my GOD in a sense, she is a FRIEND, she is a confidante. I have been talking to her, venting to her, begging her, crying to her, crying for her since before I even sat in any ceremony. This started right after I signed up for the ceremony-retreat online. After I had had a few intensely vivid dreams in the run-up to the retreat, I had begun asking her questions, asking for signs, asking for solutions. And she would answer. She would communicate.

She has communicated with me through people, through “coincidences”, through dreams, through my emotions, through my body – for she is in my body, she is in my mind. She has talked to me through other plant medicines as well. When I ingested mushrooms for the first time, I actually saw her standing in my room, in a corner.

She speaks to me through random noises in my house which are not being caused by any physical disturbance. She wakes me up at odd hours with a loud bang in the house, a wooden bang (which upon inspection hasn’t been ’caused’).

I talk to Her all the time – for SHE IS MY MOTHER. SHE IS MY GUARDIAN.

SHE TOLD ME SO, didn’t She?

Yup.

After initial skepticism and doubts about my ‘sanity’, I have continued to speak with Her. If and when I cry, I mentally or sometimes even loudly cry “mumma mumma mumma“. The comfort I look for is HER. She doesn’t always seem to ‘respond immediately’, but she eventually sends me kindness, symbols, people, events that make it known that its HER.

I tell her I am grateful, I tell her I am deeply lonely, I tell her I am angry, I tell her I am sad.

Once, in 2022, amidst a severe depressive and ‘hermit’ phase, when I was crying so much from loneliness and feeling ‘useless, lost’ that my nose bled. I asked HER for some mercy. I asked her for SOS help.

A second later an old friend texted me to check on me.

In the same phase, another day I was having the shittiest thoughts and crying like a baby who has been abandoned on the street. I begged her for some relief. A friend, a different one from before, decided to call me randomly after many years.

In talking to him, catching up, I forgot about what I had been feeling an hour ago.

I see Her trying to move me along, people say ‘directional’ things to me that sound like SHE is talking directly to me. Random people – not Aya people.

One tiny but consequential example is this:

My cousin sister suddenly said to me “why don’t you put together an art-catalogue to capture all the art you have created in the last 4 years?!”. I had come away from my second Aya retreat in 2023 (which was vastly different from my first retreat in 2020 – left me feeling very frustrated and lost, unclear on the insights and messages barring one particular area of my being – expression – a resounding message given to me – Anjuri, you must share, you MUST SHARE – almost as if IT IS MY EXISTENTIAL ROLE for which I am HERE) – I took what my cousin said as Aya talking at me, I heeded this instruction immediately. Within a few days I had an artfolio ready to be shared with the world.

I shared it with more and more people over the course of a week – starting only with loved ones, close friends, aya community, and then literally more and more layers of long-lost contacts, then finally almost everyone on my contacts list – and THE AMOUNT OF LOVE & VALIDATION I HAVE RECEIVED by all sorts of people has been DIVINE. It was so deeply inspiring, especially since we feel the fear of ‘spamming’ people, of being rejected or dismissed. People who I hadn’t spoken to in a decade, people from my ‘corporate job’ phase, friends who time & laziness had turned into acquaintances – everyone responded with their thoughts, surprise, love and sometimes deeply insightful perspectives on my art.

SHE TALKS, and most of the time I try to listen and take action.