How Did I First Discover Ayahuasca?

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In this episode, I answer a listener question from Ben, @geekytechgeeks on Instagram.

That's still probably my favourite Instagram name.It doesn't get geekier than that. So Ben is over in Surrey, just outside of London in the UK.

And his question is, how did you first discover ayahuasca?

So the first thing is, if you want to read about my ayahuasca experience, go to freethewageslave.com/ayahuasca-experience or just Google "free the wage slave ayahuasca" and you'll find it.

Well, how I discovered it is a bit of a long story. My dad is what you could call a psychonaut somebody that explores the other world through psychedelics. So he, you know, grew up in the 70s and was part of that festival culture.

So he was trying mushrooms and you know, various things like that. So anyway Remember him talking about that stuff when I was a kid, it was always, you know, quite an open household. But it never really appealed to me I like to stay in control.

So, you know, I asked it was something I'd kind of heard about on the fringes of the culture maybe I'd seen a video on vice or something, you know, on YouTube, but it wasn't really anything on my radar.

And I think I didn't find ayahuasca but ayahuasca found me and I do think that it does that it comes into the person's life when they're ready.

So for me in 2017 life got bad and if you want the details there's a blog post freethewageslave.com/quitting-my-9-to-5 - that's a lot hyphens, just Google "free the wage slave and then quitting my nine to five and you're going to find it.

So life got bad, there was a breakdown. And I then went to Dubai, so I kind of ran away from that life. And I went to Dubai, to work for 15 months and what thought was my Savior. It was actually a hard time I really struggled.

I was working 80+ hours a week, six days a week, I was alone on Christmas Day and my birthday in the desert didn't really make many friends because I was just working so much. And I left by in May 2018. And I decided I'm going to South America.

And I had a cruise booked with a friend of mine Ann-Sofie. Shout out Ann-Sofie, we're going on a cruise through Panama, Colombia, Aruba, Bonaire, Curacao. And at the end of that cruise, I knew I was going to be in South America, and I was probably going to Peru.

Now I actually never made it to Peru, but just the fact that I was going to Peru somewhere in my mind connected to ayahuasca. And I remember Tim Ferriss, he interviewed Dr. Gabor Mate about ayahuasca.

And just before I left for that South America trip, my good friend Stephanie at Project glow on Instagram. She told me Look, if you're going to do it, that's okay. But make sure you're informed. Watch this interview with Tim Ferriss and Dr Gabor Mate and it was just wonderful.

I've watched it, and I kind of put it to the back of my mind off that I wasn't sure I was going to do it. Fast forward a couple of months and I was with my girlfriend, Miriam in Cancun. And she out of the blue in the kitchen one day tells me Hey, you know, there's an ayahuasca ceremony, do you know anything about it? And that was really where it became real.

Before I knew it. I'd agreed to go to ayahuasca. And it was just a totally life changing experience. For me. It completely transformed everything, my relationship with myself with my parents, with my friends, my purpose in life. It didn't really change me.

But what it did was it allowed me to understand other people's perspectives, I could feel their emotions and that feeling gave me empathy for them, and forgiveness and the anger dissipated, the judgement dissipated. And I think I just became a more well rounded human being as a result of that experience. So that's how I discovered ayahuasca.