The Myth of the Goddess Ayahuasca as told around fires in the jungle of the Ucayali*

Grandmother painting by Luis Tamani

There was once a village, deep within the lush jungle, where people struggled to survive, cultivating the earth during the dry season, fishing when the waters rose and scavenging the tropical forest. In the middle of the village, there was a huge and ancient tree, and since times immemorial there was a taboo attached to this old grandfather tree. It was strictly forbidden to either climb or even just dare to touch its majestic branches. It was an unimaginable, unfathomable sin to even think of tasting its mysterious fruits, and all the area under the tree was undisturbed and untrodden, full of never tasted fallen fruit. Even the birds refused to scavenge them, maybe genetically afraid through generations of ancestors stoned for their impudence.

It just so happened that an inquisitive rebellious and restless boy was growing ever bolder, and kept asking everybody why the prohibition existed, but never got any answer other than whispers of admonitions to cease asking such preposterous and blasphemous questions. Maybe everybody was too afraid to speak or maybe the taboo was so old that nobody remembered its origin, having been taught to respect it, no explanation ever offered.

The boy, itching with curiosity, could not accept this mystery and one day when nobody was watching, secretly entered the forbidden circle, climbed to the top of the enormous tree, hiding among its ample foliage. He stayed hidden for hours, enjoying the spectacular aerial view all around him. He observed entranced the life of the village and saw many things and behaviors hidden until he grew hungry and thirsty. Hesitantly he reached out, picked, smelled and sampled the old Grandfather tree’s soft purplish brown fruit. Soon after, abruptly, his heart opened wide, he felt a flow of pure love for the tree, the jungle with all the creatures in it and his fellow villagers. He was in instant ecstasy and drowning soporifically in overwhelming feelings, rivers and oceans of feelings. He looked down and saw everybody with a new eye, seeing, feeling for the first time their fears and anxieties as if they were his own and saw them as himself, understood their behavior and a spontaneous laughter bubbled up his spine filling him with joy, just as streams of tears were flowing from his deepest insides. He started singing and shouting, inviting everybody to climb the tree, assuring them there was no danger, wanting all his new loved ones to experience and share his ecstasy.

The villagers were reluctant at first, but soon enough the children, being less inhibited, started to climb and eat the fruit, soon finding themselves joined in a feeling of goodwill, unity, brotherhood and love, experiencing the exquisite sensation of happiness and oneness. The adults, initially frozen, seeing the elation in the faces above and hearing the playful songs of the children, soon overcame their terrified reluctance and climbed up as well, joining the hugging, singing and the celebrations for the discovery of this amazing state of ecstatic adoration for all; they became children, pure and free to express their essence finding love and openness in every face.

Little time was lost before the ancient tree was full of joyous people, when with creaking sounds the proud, living relic started rising to the heavens, its millennial withered roots violently unearthed and dangling; shedding clouds of worms, soil and dust. A brilliant warm light encompassed its foliage drawing it to the sky as the last roots wriggled out of the earth, slowly liberating it from its bonds, allowing it to soar, when suddenly!!!

A heart breaking mother’s scream shattered the moment; a little girl had been forgotten behind and was now crying, looking wide eyed and powerless at her mother and everybody else leaving her behind, jumping in vain trying to reach the roots that were already a few meters over the ground, vibrating and raring to go..

The desperate scream of the mother seeing her toddler’s pained and frightened eyes pierced the heart of the Goddess Ayahuasca and awoke her from her serenity. She was resting beyond time on a fluffy, thick, brilliant white cloud. Her full consciousness rocket like descended from the heavens where she dwelt; her grandmother soul took in the scene of the drama below, and without hesitation, dropped down instantly transforming herself into a thick rope like braided vine. She let herself fall like a plant comet to the earth, one end finally grabbing a branch, wrapping itself around it like a monkey’s tail, the other dropping coiled around the desolate child. 

The villagers all shouted to the child to grab the vine and soon she was taken aloft, just as the living spaceship catapulted itself upwards with a tremendous roar of joy; accelerating insanely to the skies. The little girl was soon lovingly ensconced in her mother’s arms, the magical fruit easily restoring joy and laughter to her face.

With all willing souls aboard, the spaceship continued its voyage to the home where beings of love and light reside when their souls mature. It soon reached its destination, the place of Light.

The Goddess Ayahuasca, her purpose fulfilled, chose to remain  on earth as a sacred vine, to serve as ladder and pathway to the heavens for all laggardly beings left behind, making it her role, her happiness, her life purpose to sacrifice her celestial position for the good of every pure child’s soul needing a helping hand to fly beyond its tethers. A ladder to climb and join the brilliant beings of love in the kingdom of Light…a kingdom full of inviting thrones, one for any being that wishes to be king or queen, and infinite ones waiting to be claimed. 

*Excerpt from the upcoming book by Mikis :A Mythic VoyageTo be published and available on Amazon and other sites early 2015

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