Tonight is ceremony night. It has been just over two years since I did my last Ayahuasca ceremony. They have always been impactful and part of me wanted to not touch the brew ever again, but my strongest part is prepared to do anything to lead an amazing life.

Everybody has gathered to get their intentions. Mikis, the founder of TierraMitica and my teacher, is looking at me, pondering about what intention to give me. I break eye contact for a second and he laughs. ‘Do I already know my future, Grandmother?’ he says. What an interesting intention.

Since I knew yesterday afternoon that we would have ceremony tonight, I have not been wanting to go into fear and anxiousness. Every time before my previous ceremonies, I would go into a scary world. Now, I just want to have fun until it happens, and I seem to be able to do this pretty well.

The ceremony approaches. All of the TierraMiticans, except Mikis and Lis, are participating, each with his or her own impactful intention. It is so great to do this ceremony with this family. I know all of them so well and they know me so well. Together we will each battle our demons tonight, even though we will focus on ourselves. I am feeling a bit nervous and a tiny bit scared, but I choose to feel powerful and in control. It is actually working this time and only a very slight tremble is present in the background. Secretly, I hope it will be a fun and cool ceremony and not just one where only a big demon pops up. Do I already know a little of the future of my ceremony?

Sara opened the four directions and made our connection to the earth and the sky. I can barely see the wooden ceremony ground. The moon and stars are hiding behind thick clouds, while I am standing on my appointed mattress, waiting for my name.

‘Tom,’ I hear. I walk up, kneel and get cleansed with thick smoke by the first Shipibo woman, Teolinda, who is beside the male shaman Ruben. The third shaman, Teresa, is sitting in front of the cups with Ayahuasca. I go to her and see three cups with Ayahuasca. I hesitate for half a second. This stuff is very distasteful, disgusting even, and I wonder if I should pinch my nose to not smell it like Damien said. I take the fullest cup, filled to the rim, as a way to show my intention that I really want to find my answer, even though it might be a horrible experience. I quickly gorge it down, without pinching my nose. It is not as bad as I remember it. This is a tastier brew.

I sit down on my mattress, in a position as powerful as possible: straight back and neck with my hands directly on my legs. The fear I have is that I am going to throw up before the ceremony starts again and that I will have to drink again. This happened in a spectacular way in my last ceremony. However, I feel I am in control and I start saying my intention in my head over and over again, like a mantra, with my eyes closed.

The shamans start singing and I lie down under the open jungle sky with two blankets over me, my eyes closing again. The ceremony has fully begun.

Wow. It is so good to be back. I was so afraid of potentially doing this again, but I have been doing the work for the last two years. I did pretty well. I am a powerhouse. Full gratitude is flowing through my body and I thank the Ayahuasca for being back with me, for all the gifts she gave me previously and kept giving me, for the beautiful life I am living and for the fact that I am not in hell and not vomiting like a crazy, scared person. It is also gratitude for myself, for part of me cannot believe I am actually doing this again. After my little prayer, nothing happens. Wow, that is unexpected. Nothing big is happening. I really do not want to not find my answer, so I keep repeating my intention. ‘Do I already know my future, Grandmother Ayahuasca?’ I feel and trust the answer is going to be there, so all I have to do is keep insisting. My subconscious will submit. After some time, the first realization comes that I will die. Not a very pleasant feeling accompanies the thought, but it is fine. Everybody dies, I will die. It is fact.

More time passes. A white tent with a candle shining through, appears in the grassy plains of perhaps, Canada. I see the face of a cute freckled woman with two blonde ponytails over her shoulders. I am in there with her, she is my girlfriend. Confused, I tell the Grandmother that Sim is my girlfriend. The face of the blonde woman starts to swap with Sim’s on and off. I also see the blonde woman having a really angry face for just some moments. The message I feel is that I want Sim to be my woman and I am 100% committed, but if she does not want to go the extra mile with me, I will find and be with someone else who will, and live a happy life.

It is a struggle to feel all this. Why is it so hard for me to feel my future fully? A first answer comes that I am thinking too much of what Mikis will think. What will he think about any idea? What would the best plan be in his mind? If I keep doing this, I will never be able to fully dream and live the free, amazing life that I want. Of course, I want him as my teacher and learn from him and ask him for guidance, but I should be able to make plans myself.

Then, after these messages, I feel disgust coming up. I see myself working in a volunteering camp for sick people in Africa. Really ill and malformed people are here. I am helping them, but I do not really want to feel this nastiness. Strong as I am, I still try to explore it as fully as I possibly can. It is a game of feeling things that I do not want to feel. Somehow, I really do not want to be near this black woman with a baby inside her, potentially sick. It is interesting by the way, that all my Ayahuasca ceremonies have been very visual. Visual messages work very well for me. A very dark part of my subconscious pops up. I see little needles poke a baby to have it in pain. A tiny part of me likes this and pure disgust is in me now. I consciously choose that even though I and all people have weird, hurtful things stashed away in us, I do not choose to enhance it and just like that, it loses its value. Now, danger pops up. Armed black men are nearby and might want to take my things and rape my woman. I have to think of the rape scene of the movie Clockwork Orange for the second time in the ceremony now. It is a scene that impressed me very much when I saw it many years ago. The powerlessness when someone rapes your woman and mistreats her and you is something that I am very afraid of, while interestingly enough, part of me cannot stop thinking about it. I do not want this to happen, so I decide in the Ayahuasca that it is a good idea to start picking up Krav Maga, or any effective fighting sport, while I am in Holland, so I am able to protect myself and my woman in case anything might happen while I travel across the depths of this world.

My time in the volunteering camp is over and I see all the black people there raising their arms together with me in the middle. I brought them together and they are yelling my name in gratitude and inspiration. Instead of being alone, now they are a people of one fist, their hearts open to each other and me. This is so beautiful. I see that I could potentially go to the mountains in that same country to enjoy the beauty, while I bring people together at the same time. This is much more what I want.

The visions continue. I am at a beautiful, grand palace in India. Bengal tigers are majestically crawling around and beautiful plants surround the bridges and handmade streams of water. It is me and Sim in paradise. We are fucking each other’s brains out on a big, heavenly bed inside the palace. Sim is my Bengal Tigress. We are living paradise without the paradox. No shame, no guilt, no misery, no bullshit. Without all the misery that tends to come in for me and most people when they are in paradise. The paradoxical thought that “it is too good to be true” leads them to constantly find reasons to be unhappy, even while in paradise. I realize more and more that this life, is NOT too good to be true. There is no single reason to make yourself in misery when you are in paradise. Wow. Do I already know my future, Grandmother?

So, I do partially see my future, but why is it so hard? Why do I not see everything clearly, Grandmother? I see all kinds of weird things from my subconscious that do not really make sense. Waves and arches of tiny clocklike things are moving slowly past. I beg the Grandmother to show me more and more, to go deeper, to find my answer. I can feel I am the strong space into which any feeling can appear and I will stand my ground. I have to have the willingness to feel everything. This sounds scary, but is not any feeling examined and felt fully, totally manageable and not scary at all? This is my hypothesis, but I am not sure yet. Step by step, I keep going deeper.

The globe is appearing in my vision. Planes are flying from all kind of cool hotspots to everywhere. I am travelling the world with my woman on and on with the purpose of connecting people. I want to make people feel. I want to open people’s hearts and connect them, have Indian, black, red, white, yellow people connect and feel that everybody feels the same deep down. I am convinced everybody feels the same kind of things deep inside of them. All the things people are afraid of to feel, feeling that they themselves are not good enough, that mom or dad told us that what we are feeling is a very bad thing, all of this is the same in everybody. In the deep, hidden, forbidden corners of our mind, everybody is that same happy boy or girl. I am flying all over the world to connect people’s hearts to each other and I am feeling fantastic. I also see that Andy, another man who lives here at Tierramitica, I looked up to while not wanting to, is also just human and he is just the same as anybody else. I do not need to feel jealous or worth less than him.

Then, the Grandmother Ayahuasca appears to me herself. She is a treelike old, wise grandmother. She tells me: ‘Feeling other people is your gift.’ I am not completely feeling it myself, for it is a little bit of an abstract message. She asks me to use this gift and the gifts of feeling she has given me and help other people to feel themselves deeper and deeper. This is my future, but I realize that I have to go for it and fight for it. It will not happen just by itself.

She tells me that later in life, maybe in like 5 years or later when I feel it is time, I should come back to her and drink Ayahuasca again to find an answer that will want to reveal itself to me then, to go even deeper.

A big organization is rising. I am one of the most important people in it. It is about connecting everybody’s hearts all over the world. We are one. The people in the organization are feeling one with each other. It is like the UN or something. I am incredibly respected, adored and admired, revered even. I am afraid for lingering too long in this feeling, for I am afraid of deserving this. I have to overcome the notion that I should not feel this good. I am together with my woman Sim. I know that if she does not want to go the extra mile with me, there will be someone else who wants to live this incredible life with me. The organization is rising and it has some kind of democratic system. People are one and stop fighting and because of this, time and resources are being spent on beautiful big projects, like a next big space mission and all kinds of other cool events.

The general energy on the floor during our ceremony is super high. Big waves of energy try to drag me away and blow me over. People are vomiting around me, someone is gorging out his liver, people are crying, asking for help to the assistants and the shamans keep singing their powerful Icarus, their songs. The shamans stop singing every so often and then start again. Whenever they start again, I can physically feel my ceremony intensify instantly, the energy and the feelings blowing me deeper. It is real.

A question pops up in my head. Why am I doing all this connecting people from all over the world? I am doing it for me, is the immediate answer and - fuck duty and obligation. The realization comes that I do not feel I deserve feeling the beauty of life. I consciously choose that I deserve all this, for of fucking course I deserve this, but some kind of barrier is inhibiting me to fully enjoy the beauty of life. This all should not be about duty or about sacrifice or about doing anything for other people, but about doing it for me. And opening hearts and connecting people is for me. It is the most beautiful thing. It is of vital importance that I myself live life to the fullest to show others the way too.

‘How can I open people’s hearts and connect them?’ I ask the Grandmother. I have to insist, for I do not get an immediate answer. Then, the answer is obvious. I start to feel things move inside me, things I do not want to feel, things hidden, yet beautiful. The answer is that I need to feel the depths of myself and every feeling I pushed away to the fullest. This way I can show others. This way I can dance with life! Dancing more and more with life is the most beautiful thing and this is my future. Daring to feel more, daring in life, is my way.

I keep exploring my future, keep going at my intention. I am going to be a writer and talk about feeling and life and show people in this way. This is something I already know during the whole ceremony. I keep insisting, asking the Grandmother how I can open people’s hearts. An idea pops up to create my own YouTube channel with the potential name: Being one in a practical way. The fear of shooting and posting a video pops up. It does not have to be good. Actually, it might be better to play a weak boy, for everybody feels and understands the same things. Everybody knows what it was like to feel weak and afraid. It does not matter what it is, as long as it is true and real and opening my own heart, people will recognize themselves. I know there will be huge resistance inside me to actually create this channel, even though I am doing it for me. But I know to create and have this future, work needs to be done. I need to fight for it.

I see that I can also organize huge cool parties under a huge fancy tent and have events to invite people from all over the world and have them connect, starting from the moment the big organization comes into sight. Parties are fun. I continue in my vision of being so important and influential in my big organization to change people’s lives and open their hearts. Also meaning, I will have haters and opposition. I will need to deal with it and brush it off and more importantly, be mindful of my own safety. People that are hurt and afraid can do hurtful things. It is only natural that this might happen, and it is a choice.

The Grandmother continues to show me that in order to be this amazing leader in an organization that opens and connects hearts, I need to be able to play certain roles. I will need to learn to play along with people in the highest of functions in suits and also with the common man. It is important to be able to switch energies and choose exactly how I behave in the moment. This will be very much fun to learn. I can ask Mikis. This is what he is working on. I will need to step up and I will build myself a beautiful, strong body that can defend itself. I will learn Spanish and the way of the world. I will have dance lessons and dance my ass off. I will learn so many, cool things. I also see that I cannot fuck up. For example, I will not hook up and have an affair with the sexy woman in the desert trek. All of this is for me, everything in my life, my choice. Many women will want me deeply, but I will have to be adamant. I do not want to cheat; I want to dive as deeply as heavenly possible with my chosen one. My woman is by my side all the time and we have amazing amounts of sex through our whole journey together all the time. This is very important to me and crucial for everything. I want to dive deeper and deeper with her, reach God, or however anyone wishes to call it. Because this is what I want and what she wants. I see myself as a king on my amazing throne, dancing with life, while the spectacle of life happens around me. Beautiful wasps, insects, plants, environments, feelings, experiences and people are flying around me.

The Grandmother keeps telling me feeling deeper and more is the answer. Suddenly, my muscles want to tense up. Metal-like tubes are in my arms, legs, stomach and jaw, creating a weird shape. They want to make me move and tense up. They are a possession, fighting for control. I am feeling like a king and I keep relaxing my body, but the possession keeps fighting for control. I yawn and realize this is because of this. I have zoned out for a couple of seconds before, because of being tired, and forgot what I was working on for a second, because my body does not want me to really feel. I stay in control, but this possession that wants me to tense up does not go away. It is really annoying and I want it to fuck off. After some time, I pretend to get my big assault rifle from my back and shoot it to bits. ‘I am in control motherfucker!’

I realize that all it wants to do is prevent me to feel what is beneath it. It wants to protect me from me. I go past it and I get a glimpse of the fact that in my mother’s eyes, the feelings that I had as a baby, the being that I was in total, was something disgusting and not worthwhile. A very old memory pops up of me talking to one of my female friends when I was maybe four years old. I was feeling a lot of things going on inside me, but I was weirded out and remotely disgusted by it, so I decided to not feel it. My mom definitely gave me the message that what was going on inside me, was disgusting and despicable. Is this why I saw the volunteering camp with very sick people in Africa? To be able to feel disgusting things and feel that it is all okay? Perhaps to really feel, I need to feel the lowest thing in Africa or wherever and then the highest paradise in India. Go through the two extremes, so that nothing will ever scare me in life ever again.

Then, my choice to go to Amsterdam comes to mind. I had previously decided that after my time in TierraMitica, I would go to Amsterdam. I am doing this for me. I see me and Sim in a small room in Amsterdam and I feel small, crooked walls closing in on me. Still, I will be able to make a grand old time together with Sim. I will take some kind of job, it does not matter what exactly, as long as it is something. I now see Sim as a black widow spider, coming onto me in the bedroom. I like her in this mood. She is one of the only things in the world that still tickles my fear and that makes me use my power fully. When I look beyond this in her, I see a transformation of her into a beautiful Bengal tigress and we grow very close together.

The visions continue, after Amsterdam, I am going to Greece to attend Mikis’ workshop and I will ask him to teach me to feel deeper. He can help me for sure and with this commitment I will motivate myself to keep taking the next steps. He can help me make a beautiful and good plan for my Africa adventure. I need to go there to meet people from there and connect with them, but I am not sure yet of the specifics before I go to India. I ask the Grandmother if I can trust the Greek with the totality of my plan. Yes, I can trust him, but the question pops up: would you let him fuck your woman? Hell, no! The point of the question being: he is not in control of my life. So, I should not let him change the fundamentals of the things that I see here that are really important to me. This is my responsibility and I should not waver. I want to feel and connect deeper in Africa, that is what I know.

After all this happens in my life and I am getting old, I will be a teacher. I will teach young children about everything that I have learned and enjoyed. Maybe, this will happen on one of the Greek islands, in respect to my own teacher and because it might be awesome there. Even more reason to go to Mikis’ workshop on Lesbos.

Many times, I try to imprint my future plan into my mind, for it feels vague and I am afraid of forgetting my beautiful future. I just found one of my realest of fears: forgetting. This is a big one. Forgetting is also losing control.

So, fuck, I know the probabilities of my whole future and all that was and is standing in the way is my fear of or resistance to feeling. My career as a writer will be a great tool. I will travel to super-beautiful places in the world when I am in the organization and during my life. I am free! Dancing with life!

At the end of the ceremony, the possession of the inhibition that does not want me to feel more, does not want to give up still, and it is frustrating me. I know I need to go deeper, but I am only managing so much. I am basically already doing the work that is past my intention. I have succeeded! When Dorin calls the end of the ceremony, I am a little confused. I still have work to do! I try to switch as quickly as possible. Confused and wobbly – it is hard to walk for this was a very strong Ayahuasca brew - I get up, happy for everything that happened, to celebrate with and hug my family.

Written by Tom Suyker