How the Plants Teach: The Medicine of Secrets
Chapter 14: There’s a way the plants speak that doesn’t come through books or teachers. It comes through silence, through listening, through visions. What unfolded in the days that followed helped...
There’s a way the plants speak that doesn’t come through books or teachers. It comes through silence, through listening, through visions. Luis had told us that one of us would be shown something in a dream—a medicine, a teaching—and that it would come in its own time. I didn’t know how to take his words until it happened. What unfolded in the days that followed helped me understand how these tribes have learned what they know. This is not a story I could have imagined. It had to come from the plants themselves.
Sometimes when I lay in my hammock in the temple, Luis would come and sit beside me on the only chair in the village. The chair would go with him wherever he went. There, he would tell me a story or teach me something about plants, animals, or other tribes. Many times I was deep on the force of the medicine and in an altered state of consciousness. His stories were just amazing, and even when I would not fully understand everything in Portuguese as of yet, I loved listening to them. Sometimes I would lose my sense of reality listening to those stories, and the veil between the dream world and 3-D reality would fade. Together, Muka and Ayahuasca were singing their songs to me. It was so special to see how the dieta was unfolding, and how spending time in the jungle, and being completely out of communication, was calming my mind. In those deeper states of silence, new insights continued to come in.
On the sixth day, while I was lying in my hammock, deep on the force of the medicine, I felt a huge energy enter me. My body was moving and trembling; I had to get up. I almost jumped out of my hammock after not moving for days. I walked with big steps, stomping on the ground, roaring like a panther. My fingers were rigid, and my hands were spread wide open. My arms were at my sides, shaking. I must have looked rather frightening to the others.
The black panther is one of my spirit animals, and in those moments I could feel the spirit of the black panther. I have connected with him before in other ceremonies. I see him as a beautiful, shining, strong animal, lying in silence on the branch of a tree, almost invisible, in stealth, radiating his wisdom. Or he is roaring, running through the jungle. He is a magnificent animal who has taught me many things over the years.
Edi looked at me and asked me if I was alright. I said I was okay and that I felt the black panther—but that there was nothing to worry about. I asked for another glass of medicine. He looked at me, saw that I was serious, and poured me another serving. It must have been around two hundred milliliters, which is a very large dose compared with a regular dose of around thirty. I drank it all at once and kept pacing through the temple, roaring. Eventually, I returned to my hammock. My body relaxed, and all at once I fell into a deep journey. It was as though I had been knocked out, and in my vision I travelled to a completely new space.
I was immersed in silence. My body was almost non-existent; it had relaxed so deeply, I could hardly feel it anymore. Lying there, my thoughts went in a strange direction. It was as if I couldn’t remember anything anymore. I consciously tried to remember important details of my life, but I just couldn’t. I panicked for a moment: was I losing my mind? I reminded myself that I was on a deep journey, and that the journey would end at one point. I took a deep breath and relaxed back into the moment. When I tried to remember anything, I could not. I couldn’t remember my name, or the name of my parents. I couldn’t recall anybody or anything in my life in that moment. Sometimes a very vague glimpse of my life would come in, but if I tried to focus on it, it would disappear immediately. As I relaxed into the experience, my mind went completely blank. I went into complete nothingness, and I just let it happen. From that place of nothingness, I travelled further and further to places that I had never visited.
I was sitting on a log in the middle of the rainforest. A beautiful woman came to sit beside me on my right, a woman I had seen before in my visions. “I am Madre Ayahuasca,” she said. “I am your mother.” I nodded. The black panther, in the body of a man, came to sit next to me on my left and said, “I am the black panther. I am your father.” And like that, a circle started to form, a circle of elders. Slowly, everybody took their place. It was really special to see so many elders in a circle. Some of them were wearing beautiful headdresses made from feathers. Their bodies were painted. Some had beautiful long robes in many colors. There were just a few words spoken; mostly, there was silence.
When the circle was completely formed in the vision, Luis stepped into the circle. I was surprised to see him there. He looked exactly as he looked in real life, without any ceremonial clothes or ornaments. Walking straight toward me, he had a small glass in his hands. “This,” he told me, “is Huni Shiwa, the medicine of secrets.” I looked at him to question whether I should drink it. He nodded, and I took the glass.
In this vision, Luis explained many things about the Huni Shiwa: what it was for, how to use it, the proper dosage. He showed me how to identify the plant, telling me exactly what to look for when searching for it. He showed me where it was growing, in a place next to the river. He showed me how to prepare the medicine, and we prepared it together. When he had told me everything he knew about the Huni Shiwa, he left the circle. I looked around one more time, honoring this protective circle of elders, the cup still in my hand. It was a deep and profound moment, and then I woke up.
I heard the music of the jungle again. I thought, “Where am I?” Slowly, I remembered where I was. I was lying in my hammock in the temple. It took me a while to realize what had happened, and I remembered the words Luis had spoken just a few days before: “One of you, only one, will have a dream. In that dream, someone will come to you—a man or a woman. That person will show you about the plants in your dreams and teach you many things. It will only happen to one of you.”
I closed my eyes, and tears started to roll down my cheeks. I called to Luis, who was lying in his hammock nearby. He came to sit next to me, and I told him everything that had happened in my vision. He nodded and said he had been there with me. This man had not drunk Ayahuasca for more than sixteen years, yet he was still able to travel to those places without any medicines. What an inspiration and example he was for me!
He asked if I remembered what he had showed me. I told him everything I could remember. He listened in silence, sometimes asking about a small detail. “What did the leaf look like?” Or: “How many of the leaves would you put in the pot to prepare it?” After telling him everything I remembered about Huni Shiwa, he told me he had heard about it before, but they had never found the plant: it was still one of the secrets of the jungle.
He asked me where the plant was that I had seen in my vision. I told him it was next to a river, in a very specific spot, at a place where there was a bend in the river.
He asked, “What river was it growing next to?”
I had no idea. It had just looked like one of those Amazon rivers. There were thousands of them. “I don’t know,” I said.
He remained silent for a bit. Then he started to laugh. “Next time,” he said, “ask for the name of the river, okay? Then we can go there and find the plant.” We locked eyes, and it took me a moment to understand what he was saying. When I understood that it would be very difficult to find that plant without knowing the exact location, I started to laugh. Luis joined in, and we laughed together for quite a while.
I gave him a big hug and thanked him. It was so special to remember the words of Luis of a few days ago, and to now be in a moment where they had come to pass. It had been a profound experience for me. That experience deepened my love and respect for Luis. My heart was beating with excitement.
That evening, sitting around the fire, he told me that I now had experienced how indigenous people learn from the plants. This was the way the plants came to them—in their dreams, in their visions. Every generation, a few new plants and medicines would come to them like this. There and then, I understood how the tribe had obtained such a deep knowledge of the plants, knowing cures for diseases they had never even seen, like cancer.
That night, Edi and Muca came back from a long day of hunting. The whole day I had been feeling them after my vision. I was not sure how they would react to this happening. We had talked in the days before about who was going to receive that vision that Luis had prophesized. Those conversations had become a little competitive, and that energy had taken me a little by surprise. It had created some distance between Edi, Muca, and myself.
When they arrived they sat down around the fire, and Luis told them what had happened. I listened to their conversation in silence and observed their reactions. Luckily there was not a single feeling of jealousy. They praised me and honored the vision, and we were all so happy. I felt so relieved to feel that. Louisa joined us and brought a plate of small, fried fish. We sat there in silence and ate them with our hands. When we finished our simple dinner at the fire, I gave them all a big hug and poured another cup of Ayahuasca. I had made a commitment of ten days and nights. The journey was not over, not quite yet. Day eight was coming to a close, two more to go.
“Strong warrior, strong warrior!” they told me, with their right fists in the sky. And there I was again, in my hammock, leaving the dream we call life, entering a world that was becoming more and more familiar to me. I went back into the reality that we call a dream.
As I went back into the dream, my body wrapped in the silence of the forest, the days of dieta passing one by one. I thought I had seen much already. I thought I had touched something true. But nothing could have prepared me for what came next.
There was still one more encounter waiting for me in that jungle. One that would stay with me long after I left.
You may remember, at the very start of this story, I mentioned that I wanted to tell you about a serpent I once met.
Her name is Nalini…