Ayahuasca Healing Guide: What its Really Like To Work With Ayahuasca

Ayahuasca use has grown rapidly over the past few decades. There are now countless personal accounts online, but it can be very hard to extract a clear, coherent picture of what it is actually like to go through a healing process with ayahuasca—both for people in general and for those seeking help specifically with depression.

Common questions include:

• Where should I go?
• How do I know the people there know what they’re doing?
• Will I be safe? What if it doesn’t help?
• I feel different from other people—will it still work for me?
• I really don’t want to vomit in front of strangers. Do I have to?
• What if I “do it wrong” and miss out on the healing?
• How will they support me if I get frightened or confused?
• I don’t believe in the spirit world—can it still help me?

…and many more.

The purpose of this article is to offer a trustworthy source of information about what a healing journey with ayahuasca can be like for the person going through it. It is written for people considering ayahuasca as a path for healing, personal growth, or to enrich their spiritual lives.

A little bit of fear or anxiety is normal when considering working with ayahuasca. This is easily managed when you arrive at your retreat center and is all about you building faith and trust in the medicine, and in your own ability to manage what arises during ceremony.

• Know everything is optional. You do not have to do anything you don’t want to.
• Consider sitting in on the first ceremony but not drinking. There is always the opportunity to drink more later in the ceremony.
• Begin with very small doses.
• Gradually increase your dose as you build confidence.
• Move at your own pace. You get to make that choice.
• Do not allow yourself to feel pressured to move faster than you are comfortable. That pressure may be within yourself, or come from an unskilled facilitator.
• Trust yourself to know what is best for you in this introductory period.

This is a common when people arrive and very easily managed. Every good ayahuasca center will provide a thorough introductory talk, and that is usually enough to ease people's anxieties. If not, the above approach seldom falls short.

Many people consider ayahuasca because they’re seeking relief from long-standing emotional pain, depression, anxiety, or trauma. Here I’ll share what I’ve seen most often—when it tends to help, what can limit its effectiveness, and why readiness and “surrender” matter so much.

Based on my experience, the answer to that question is, “Yes, it probably can”—but with important caveats. There are many factors that can limit the effectiveness of ayahuasca. Those factors are within the person seeking healing.

Factors That Can Limit Ayahuasca’s Effectiveness

The most common is a lack of genuine readiness for change. Consciously, people often feel completely committed to their healing, growth, and transformation. However, at deeper subconscious levels, there can be powerful ambivalence and resistance. When there is a conflict between conscious intention and subconscious patterns, the subconscious usually wins.

Another common factor is being strongly identified with a victim stance. In these cases, people tend to use a lot of “buts” when they talk about their process and their ceremonies: “Yes, but that won’t work for me…”, “Yes, but you don’t understand my situation…” They may focus almost exclusively on the ways life has gone wrong, why things don’t work out for them, or why change isn’t possible. This is not a moral failing; it is often a deeply entrenched survival strategy. But it can make it very difficult for ayahuasca work to translate into lasting change.

A third factor is resisting the “work” of the medicine during ceremony. Trusting ayahuasca and letting it do what it needs to do is at the heart of this process. People often hear that they need to surrender, but what does that mean?

These examples may help you understand what “surrender” means in practice:

Specific Examples

The Importance of Surrender

Surrender is not a factor when the journey is beautiful, loving, joyful, or full of interesting visions and insights. We do not resist what we enjoy. Surrender comes into play when the experience turns difficult or frightening, when your body feels tense or uncomfortable, or when strong emotions and memories start to surface. That’s when your mind may start saying, “This is wrong. Make it stop. I can’t do this.” Surrender is about letting go of all of that kind of resistance to ayahuasca's work.

If your mind starts telling you "this is wrong", that is the moment where surrender really matters. It does not mean you like what is happening, or that you stop caring about your safety. It means you keep breathing, stay with the experience as best you can, and allow the medicine to keep working instead of fighting it, suppressing it, or trying to escape at all costs.

This is a big ask for most people. Our natural reaction to pain or fear is to pull away. Very few people are able to fully surrender the first time they face a hard ceremony. For many, it takes several journeys before they can genuinely let go. A phrase I hear repeatedly is: “I finally surrendered, and as soon as I did, everything changed. It got so much easier.”

Surrendering to the medicine when every logical part of you is screaming, “There is no way this could be good for me,” is an act of enormous courage. It really is. And without at least some willingness to take that step, not much is likely to change.

Ayahuasca and the doctor spirits will only heal what we give them permission to. They are integrous beings. They will never act against our will. Even if that will is expressed subconsciously.

And that brings us to commitment. How commited are you? What are you willing to do to receive what you came for? How much do you really want what you say you want?

The greater the commitment, the more effective the healing, because a strong commitment will override any subconscious negations of your conscious desires. A strong commitment removes all resistance. It is that simple. It really is. I have spent 14 years observing this in action.

To answer the question can ayahuasca help with emotional struggles? It is possible, if:

• You go to a well-run retreat
• The retreat has highly experienced and skilled healers
• You are committed to your healing.
• You can surrender to the process during ceremony
• You follow the guidance given at the retreat.

The honest answer is that no one can predict what a given ceremony will bring. The effect of ayahuasca is unpredictable, with each ceremony usually being unlike the prior one. The difference can be so extreme you might think you took another substance. Ayahuasca is variable not only in the nature of the visionary aspect, but also in how your body will feel. No other substance I know of shares this inconsistency.

Still, common patterns do exist across the time period of a 7-12 day retreat. This section offers a clear, reassuring map of possibilities—so you can recognize what’s happening without assuming you’ve done something wrong, or the healing process has gotten of track somehow.

Below are patterns I’ve seen repeatedly. If you’re feeling nervous, you can skim the headings first and expand only what feels helpful.

Choosing the right retreat is one of the most important decisions you’ll make in this process. Here are practical criteria to help you evaluate centers with clarity—especially if you’re seeking deep healing rather than a general ‘experience.’

The choice of retreat center is the most critical part of deciding to work with ayahuasca. Retreat Guru now lists almost 1400 ayahuasca retreats, and trying to pick one can feel overwhelming.

The quality of these retreats varies enormously. Facilities and “extras” (yoga, massages, nature walks, etc.) add real value to the process, and people go to retreats for a wide variety of reasons.

If you are looking for deep healing, true transformation, the critical factor is the skill and experience of the person leading the ceremonies.

The skill and experience of the facilitators helping you outside of ceremony is the second most important factor. Strong facilitation can dramatically shorten the time it takes for insights from ceremony to “click”—turning days of confusion into clarity and forward movement, sometimes within 30–60 minutes.

Make Safety a Priority

Physical Safety

The above list and more is important to have in place in case they are needed, but that need rarely arises from drinking ayahuasca. In 14 years the Hummingbird has had several medical situations that required prompt action, and one true emergency: acute appendicitis. None of them have been related to consuming ayahuasca. All were pre-existing conditions the client was unaware of. Any travel agency knows that given enough time working with the public, somebody will need prompt medical attention.

The medical and psychological screening is the most important part of the intake process. There are conditions and medications with which it is dangerous to drink ayahuasca, physically and psychologically. Be honest. Reveal every significant medical or psychological condition transpired the past two years at a minimum.

Some people die drinking ayahuasca when they should not.

Some people end up in psychiatric clinics after drinking ayahuasca when they should not.

We have had three people go psychotic while at the center. Two had an undisclosed history of psychotic episodes, the other took an anti-psychotic at 2 pm before ceremony. They had not disclosed their medication on our intake form. Two of these people were still psychotic two months later. They would not have been accepted to the retreat if they had disclosed their conditions. It is possible they knew that and decided to take a risk anyway out of desperation for relief from their suffering. I do understand that. I lived with depression for 30 years, so yes, I understand why someone might do that.

The decision to work with ayahuasca is deeply personal. My aim has been to provide grounded information so you can make that decision with more confidence, realism, and self-trust.

I hope you have found this information helpful. Ayahuasca and huachuma are remarkable healers and teachers. There is enormous in mystery in how they work. They clearly want to help people. They clearly can. If we allow them to.

As with so many of you reading this, my teens and 20's were a very dark place. Here is what I have learned. There was never anything wrong with us, other than our beliefs that there was something wrong with us. And those beliefs can be changed. Ayahuasca accelerates that process. We have Choice.

If you experience emotional distress or have medical questions, please seek advice from a qualified health professional.