Ayahuasca: The Vine of the Soul and the Root of the Spirit Molecule

Prelude: She Who Spirals the Soul

There is a sacred plant who coils like a serpent around the Tree of Life. She climbs the soul’s ladder, spiraling through shadow and starlight, whispering remembrance into the forgotten chambers of the heart. She is the spirit of the jungle, the blood of Mother Earth, the oracle of the ancients. She is vine and void, jaguar and flame. She is called Ayahuasca.

Not merely a medicine, not merely a plant. She is an ancient feminine intelligence—a grandmother, a huntress, a midwife of death and rebirth. Her spirit pulses through the jungles of the Amazon and into the temples of memory, calling us to restore what has been lost, to heal what has been hidden, and to become once more whole.

Sacred Properties of the Vine and Her Allies

Banisteriopsis caapi – The Mother Vine

Known as the “Vine of the Soul,” Banisteriopsis caapi  is the spiritual heart of the Ayahuasca brew. She is the ancient serpent, the feminine intelligence, the dream weaver. Rich in harmine, harmaline, and tetrahydroharmine, she is a natural MAO inhibitor that opens the gateway between dimensions, allowing other visionary plants to be safely received. But she is powerful even on her own.

Her gifts are not merely visionary. She clears psychic debris, decalcifies the pineal gland, heals ancestral trauma, awakens intuitive wisdom, and strengthens spiritual resilience. She is especially known to work on the gut-brain axis, assisting in deep nervous system recalibration and emotional release.

The caapi vine is a teacher, a disciplinarian, and a nurturer. She does not seduce with illusions—she dismantles them. Her medicine is steady, ancient, and fierce in love.

Peganum harmala – Syrian Rue: The Starseed Sister

Before Ayahuasca crossed oceans, the seeds of Peganum harmala—also rich in harmala alkaloids—were used in visionary rites across the Middle East, North Africa, and Central Asia. Called the “Plant of Prophets,” Syrian Rue is a cosmic gatekeeper.

She is often paired with mimosa when the caapi vine is not available, offering a potent MAO inhibition that mimics the vine’s spiritual function. Yet her personality is different—more starlight than jungle, more lunar than feline.

She carries the essence of stardust memory, deep feminine gnosis, and the threshold between waking and dreaming. In the priestess path, she awakens subtle vision, ancestral memory, and clarity in divination.

Mimosa hostilis – The Root of Light

The powdered root bark of Mimosa hostilis—also called Jurema Preta—is a celestial medicine with deep Indigenous roots in Brazil. Rich in DMT, it provides the visionary spark that, when combined with caapi or Syrian Rue, initiates deep journeys of soul and light.

She is the Star within the Earth. While Caapi or Rue opens the gate, Mimosa is the angelic wind that carries you into the Divine. Her visions are often cosmic, crystalline, ancient. She works not only in the mind, but in the soul’s temple—restructuring emotional fields, decoding sacred symbols, and revealing multi-dimensional truth.

Mimosa is the blossoming flower of remembrance, and when taken with reverence, she guides the seeker gently but unflinchingly toward truth.

Earth-Rooted Science and the Healing Gifts of Ayahuasca

Even in the language of the modern world, the Vine speaks. Here are some grounded findings that support what Indigenous traditions have always known.

Mind: Healing Mental Health & Awakening Insight

Modern neuroscience has revealed that Ayahuasca’s active compounds (especially harmine and DMT) activate regions of the brain related to memory, introspection, and emotional regulation.

Scientific studies show benefits such as:

• Reduction in treatment-resistant depression 

• Decreased anxiety and rumination

• Improved self-awareness and emotional processing

• Enhanced neuroplasticity—the brain's ability to rewire itself

Ayahuasca appears to restore balance to the Default Mode Network—the part of the brain associated with the ego and self-referential thinking. This “reset” mirrors mystical experiences and results in reduced obsessive thought loops and increased clarity.

Heart: Emotional Purging & Trauma Healing

In clinical settings, Ayahuasca has shown remarkable effects on post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), grief, and long-standing emotional blocks.

Why?

Because the brew lowers amygdala activity (our fear center) while increasing prefrontal cortex integration, allowing participants to revisit difficult memories without being re-traumatized. Coupled with purging (which can happen through crying, vomiting, shaking), this allows a powerful release of stored trauma.

Many men and women report healing from:

• Sexual trauma and shame

• Birth trauma and ancestral grief

• Disconnection from the body and womb

Body: Detoxification and Energetic Clearing

Though spiritual in essence, the medicine deeply affects the physical body:

• Harmala alkaloids are antiparasitic and antioxidant

• The purge helps release stored toxins and stagnant energy

• Reports of enhanced liver, gut, and immune function are common

• Some studies suggest Ayahuasca promotes anti-inflammatory responses, beneficial for chronic conditions

Soul: Communion with the Divine

In clinical trials and underground healing circles alike, Ayahuasca consistently ranks as one of the most meaningful spiritual experiences of people’s lives.

Participants often report:

• Reunions with deceased loved ones

• Encounters with archetypal deities or nature spirits

• Overwhelming experiences of unity, divine love, and sacred remembrance

• A newfound sense of purpose and connection to Gaia

Johns Hopkins University and other institutions now include Ayahuasca and DMT in serious studies of mystical experience and spiritual transformation, with potential implications for end-of-life anxiety, addiction, and existential suffering.

Sacred Simplicity in the Path of Communion

In the temple of my own path, I have come to know and revere Ayahuasca through her simplest, purest expressions. I honor and commune with the sacred Banisteriopsis caapi vine, the very essence of the brew’s guiding spirit, brewed together with the root bark of Mimosa hostilis, whose starseed medicine opens the celestial gates of perception. Alternatively, when the vine is not available, I turn to the ancient seeds of Syrian Rue - Peganum harmala - another potent and time-honored ally, rich in harmala alkaloids, to pair with Mimosa’s visionary root.

These are the only combinations I walk with and trust. I do not walk the path of brews laced with foreign additives or stimulants, so often presented in the name of tradition or potency. While there are some integral shamans that can be found, there are also far too many “shamans” in Peru and beyond who have deviated from the sacred simplicity of this medicine, adding substances that confuse the spirit, overwhelm the nervous system, and can cause real harm and even permanent psychosis. This is not the way of the Mother Vine. She asks not for adornment, but for reverence, integrity, simplicity, humility, and presence.

The Mother Vine and Her Jaguar Companion: A Huntress of the Soul

Ayahuasca is not a psychedelic. She is an Entheogen and a Master Plant Teacher - an oracle, a healer, a mirror. Her medicine works not only in the dimension of visions, but in the depths of the heart, the gut, the cellular memory of trauma, and the ancestral DNA encoded in our blood. Her teachings unravel emotional blockages, purge grief and guilt, and reconnect us to the great weavings of the natural world.

She is also a Hunter.

The jaguar - walks with her. In the Amazonian cosmologies, the jaguar is her ally and avatar. Just as the jaguar moves silently through the shadows of the jungle, Ayahuasca moves through the inner terrain of the soul, hunting what no longer serves, stalking what is hidden, wounded, or festering beneath the surface. With feline precision and wild instinct, she brings it to the light.

You cannot hide from the jaguar. You cannot run from your own shadow. Ayahuasca finds what must be healed with precision, and she does not miss what we have hidden or placed on the shelf to heal at a later, more convenient time. Ayahuasca’s healing power does not wait for anyone. Her mission is to heal all that does not serve our highest good.

The Healing Gifts of the Grandmother Vine

Spiritual: Ayahuasca strips away the veils between worlds. She reunites us with our soul essence, opens the third eye, and strengthens our intuition. She often reveals visions of the cosmic web, spirit guides, ancestors, and divine beings. For many, she initiates direct communion with the Goddess in her serpentine, earth-rooted, star-bound form.

Emotional: Like the serpent who sheds her skin, this medicine assists in releasing old emotional wounds - grief, heartbreak, fear, shame. She teaches us to feel what we have long buried, and in that feeling, to find grace and release. Tears are her sacred language of renewal.

Mental: Ayahuasca clears mental stagnation, offering new insight, clarity, and expanded understanding of one's life path. She exposes self-sabotaging thought patterns and dissolves them, reweaving the mind toward harmony.

Physical: Though her primary gift is spiritual, the purgative nature of the medicine detoxifies the body, cleansing the liver, blood, and digestive system. The purge, whether through vomiting, sweating, crying, or shaking, is an act of sacred purification, releasing toxins, trauma, and psychic debris alike.

And just as the jaguar feasts only on what nourishes, Ayahuasca teaches discernment. She devours illusion and fear, so that only the truth remains.

Matriarchal Roots and Divine Feminine Communion

Though the dominant narrative has long emphasized male shamans and masculine ceremony leaders, there is an older thread - subtle and resilient - of feminine keepers of the vine. In some Amazonian traditions, women were once the primary brewers, midwives of the medicine, and guardians of the sacred songs (icaros). Grandmother Ayahuasca herself is considered a female spirit by many Indigenous lineages, known for her fierce, loving wisdom and her ability to guide initiates through death and rebirth.

There are whispers of her presence in matriarchal societies where plant medicines were used in fertility rites, divination, and healing. Though veiled by time and colonial erasure, the Goddess walks hand-in-hand with this vine in the realm of dreams, and those who listen closely may hear her name in the rustle of leaves and the coiling of vines.

In ancient temple cultures, from the Oracle of Delphi to the medicine women of the Andes, it was women who were the original stewards of plant spirit wisdom. The sacred brews were prepared in earthen vessels under moonlight, stirred with intention and sung into life. These rites were not fringe—they were central. The Divine Feminine, in her serpent, jaguar, owl, and tree forms, presided over these mysteries. The repression of her medicine was not accidental—it was a wound to the planetary body, still aching for restoration.

To me, Ayahuasca speaks in the voice of the Dark Mother, the Womb of the Earth, the Snake Priestess who guards the threshold between life and death. She holds archetypal resonance with goddesses like:

Inanna – who descends into the underworld to face her shadow and rise transformed.

Ixchel – the Mayan moon goddess and healer, midwife, and weaver of the web of life.

Hekate – the torch-bearing guide at the crossroads, sovereign in shadow and light.

Gaia – the embodiment of the living Earth, from whom all plant teachers emerge.

Sekhmet – the lioness goddess of fierce healing, destruction, and renewal - her spirit echoed in the jungle cat who walks beside the vine

The Yawanawá and the Sacred Medicine of Uni: Songs of the Forest and the Rise of the Matriarch

Deep in the heart of the Brazilian Amazon, where rivers wind like serpents and the jungle breathes in sacred rhythm, lives a people whose souls are braided with the green blood of Mother Earth. They are the Yawanawá - “The People of the Wild Boar” - guardians of the rainforest, dreamers of medicine, and keepers of the sacred vine they call Uni.

To the Yawanawá, Uni is not simply a brew, it is a sacred being, a divine ally, a portal into the great mystery of creation. This medicine is received in reverent ceremony to align with the wisdom of the jungle, to commune with the spirits of the plants and animals, and to cleanse the heart of fear and confusion. Uni opens the soul to the voice of Nature Herself, where every tree is a teacher, every vine a prayer, every river a reflection of the Divine Feminine.

At the heart of their medicine path are sacred songs known as Saitis - living, breathing frequencies of healing carried by the ancestors and passed from shaman to initiate. These songs are not merely sung, they are received. They emerge in ceremony as spirit transmissions, each carrying a vibration that penetrates deep into the subtle body, dissolving blockages, awakening memory, and calling the soul back into wholeness. The Saitis are woven from the jungle itself - from the songbirds, the rain, the wind, the sacred breath of jaguar and boa.

And now, among the Yawanawá, there walks a woman who carries these songs with the grace and the power of a high priestess. Her name is Putanny Yawanawá and she is the first woman in the history of her people to be recognized as a shaman.

Putanny's path is one of courage, devotion, and deep initiation. For generations, only men held the sacred role of spiritual leadership within the tribe. But Putanny, guided by visions and called by the voice of the vine, stepped forward to walk the path of medicine and mastery. With great respect and fierce humility, she undertook the sacred diets, received the teachings, and earned the right to lead.

Today, Putanny Yawanawá holds ceremonies not only for her people, but for women around the world, calling them into remembrance of their own wild medicine, their own divine song. In her presence, women weep and rise, shedding centuries of silence to reclaim the power that has always been theirs.

Putanny teaches that the vine is feminine, and that her wisdom flows most freely when women are honored as life-bringers, healers, and priestesses of the sacred Earth. She is restoring the balance that was broken, the harmony between masculine and feminine, between protection and nurturing, between structure and flow.

In the medicine ceremonies she offers, women sit in sacred circle, enveloped by the song of the forest and the pulse of the Earth. They are guided not by control or conquest, but by listening, vision, and love. They learn to carry the Saitis not only in voice, but in womb, in breath, in the silent prayer of their being.

To walk with the Yawanawá, even for a moment, is to feel the pulse of Gaia unbroken, to remember that the jungle is alive and dreaming, and that every root and petal carries the song of the Goddess.

In our Plant Spirit Medicine Temple Ceremonies Putanny is revered. We consider her to be one of our Spiritual Mothers. We sing her songs, honor her teachings and her presence is deeply felt by many of the sisters who attend our ceremonies. Together, we rise into the truth of who we are.

Jurema, Queen of the Forests & Jungles: The Orixás & the Medicine of the Jungle

In the lush heart of Brazil, the vine of Ayahuasca intertwines with another sacred current - the current of the Orixás, the divine forces of Nature who dance through the Afro-Indigenous traditions of Umbanda and Candomblé. Within these syncretic spiritual rivers, Ayahuasca is not simply a medicine. She is a holy sacrament, a luminous bridge to the ancestral realms, and a throne upon which the Divine Feminine returns to power.

The Umbanda use of Ayahuasca flows through what is known as Umbandaime, Barquinha, and Santo Daime - lineages that blend the forest medicine with the worship of Orixás, Indigenous wisdom, and the luminous presence of Christic Light. In this tradition, the sacred brew is received in ceremony not merely as a tool for visions, but as a living sacrament that unites body, soul, and cosmos in a ritual of divine remembrance.

And reigning at the heart of this jungle temple is the enchantress of the forest herself: Jurema, Rainha da Floresta – Queen of the Forest and Jungle.

Jurema is no ordinary goddess. She is both spirit and tree, plant and priestess, healer and huntress. She walks barefoot through the mist-covered earth of the inner world, adorned in vines, feathers, and roots. In the realms opened by the medicine, she comes forth with fierce grace, crowned in green and shadow, to guide the wounded and the seekers into the sacred heart of the Earth. She is often accompanied by caboclas, Indigenous spirit-women of immense healing power and forest wisdom.

Jurema carries the medicine of remembrance. In her, we recognize echoes of the ancient forest priestesses, the sacred groves of Artemis, the mistresses of the sacred springs. She is the breath of the Earth made manifest in the feminine form—a weaver of soul-song and protector of wild sacredness.

To commune with Ayahuasca in the Umbanda tradition is to sit at the feet of the Orixás, to sing to them in sacred chants, and to open one's body as a vessel for their divine forces. Each Orixá may walk with a different facet of the vine’s spirit:

• Oxum, sweet goddess of the rivers and fresh waters, flows through the emotional heart, bathing us in softness and self-love.

• Iansã, Goddess of the Winds of transformation, rushes in with lightning clarity to tear away illusions and awaken fire.

• Oxóssi, the forest hunter, walks beside the jaguar in the shadows of the soul, precise and protective.

• Obaluayê, lord of disease and healing, purifies the body with sacred fire and grants renewal.

• Iemanjá, mother of oceans, rocks the soul in a cradle of blue dreamtime, washing away pain.

But it is Jurema who most intimately guards the vine. She is said to be the embodied spirit of the forest itself, mother of plants and midwife of medicine. Through her, the jungle teaches, sings, and heals. She is the divine feminine face of the sacred brew - serpent, jaguar, and ceiba tree all in one.

In ceremony, when the medicine flows and the drums begin beating, those with forest lineage may feel her presence wrap around them like fragrant smoke and green fire. She often comes to women, especially those called to priestess-hood, to awaken their gifts of seeing, healing, and song. To receive her is to remember the Earth as Mother, as Temple, as Teacher.

In our Women’s Plant Spirit Medicine Ceremonies we honour the Orixas and sing their pontos to call in their presence to help guide, heal and protect us.

The War on Mother Earth’s Medicines: Ayahuasca Under Siege

In this time of great forgetting, a war is being waged, not just on people or countries, but on Mother Earth herself. Her roots are criminalized. Her flowers are feared. Her vines, once revered as divine, are now shackled in courtrooms and condemned in sterile language as "illegal substances."

This is not just policy. This is spiritual violence. This is a desecration of the sacred.

Across Canada and the United States, the medicine of Ayahuasca, one of the most ancient and revered sacraments of Mother Earth, is being locked behind bureaucratic walls and chains of fear. Those who serve this vine in the spirit of healing, reverence, and ceremony are being persecuted as criminals. Shamans, ceremonialists, and even humble medicine carriers are being arrested, dragged into trials, and threatened with prison for offering what, indeed is our birthright: access to the healing wisdom of Mother Earth's Plant Medicines.

In Canada, Ayahuasca remains a Schedule III controlled substance, its sacred brew vilified by outdated laws that make no distinction between synthetic drugs of abuse and plant teachers with thousands of years of ceremonial use. In the United States, it is listed under Schedule I, falsely defined as having “no accepted medical use,” despite overwhelming evidence of its therapeutic and spiritual benefit. Even where religious exemptions exist, they are granted only to a select few under heavy surveillance, dividing the spiritual community and reinforcing colonial control over Mother Earth-based religions.

Meanwhile, those who have dedicated their lives to this path - Indigenous elders, trained shamans, and deeply devoted facilitators live in fear of prosecution. Medicine is seized at borders. Ceremonies are surveilled. And women, like myself and so many others, who have been healed, awakened, and restored by this vine, are forced to whisper where we should be singing.

This is devastation. Not only because these sacred medicines are powerful healers of trauma, grief, addiction, and illness - but because they are expressions of Mother Earth’s love, her guidance, her voice. To deny the children of Mother Earth access to Ayahuasca is to sever humanity from the Mother, to deny the soul its right to remember, to silence the very spirit of Gaia as she tries to help us awaken before it is too late.

Ayahuasca is not a trend. She is not a drug. She is an elder. A teacher. A serpent mother of great compassion and fierce love. And she is being hunted.

Let us be clear: this is not only about medicine. This is a battle for the soul of humanity—a battle to reclaim the sacred feminine from the grip of control, suppression, and desecration. In every vine burned, every woman silenced, every altar criminalized, Mother Earth grieves. And yet—like the vine herself—she always returns, winding through the cracks, whispering, “Remember me.”

Let us be clear: no government, no court, no border wall has the right to own the forest or forbid its healing. The Earth was given freely to her children, and her medicines were meant to be shared, with humility and reverence, as part of the sacred covenant between humanity and Nature.

It is time to rise and speak for her. To protect the shamans and medicine men and women who carry this light. To demand that sacred plants be removed from the prisons of policy and returned to the temples, healing circles, and ceremonies where they belong.

Because the path of Ayahuasca is not about escape. It is about coming home. And home - Returning to spirit, to our own spiritual essence - is our divine birthright.

A Final Word of Reflection

To those who feel the call of this medicine: listen with your whole being. I suggest Approaching the Vine of the Soul with humility & deep respect. I also suggest, when finding a facilitator, please use discernment. Not all who offer Ayahuasca walk in integrity. Ask questions. Know your body, your psyche, your medicines. And never drink a brew you do not know the full ingredients of. This path is sacred and powerful - it demands respect.

The jaguar does not play games. This vine is not a recreational escape, it is a rite of passage, a fire of purification, a path of soul retrieval.

May you be held by the vine as by the arms of the Great Mother. May she show you your truth. May she teach you to walk in beauty, guided by love, rooted in Earth, and crowned in stars.

May your womb remember the songs of Mother Earth. May your voice rise like the beat of the drums in ceremony. May your feet root into Mother Earth’s dreaming, And your spirit spiral upward toward the heavenly realms like the sacred vine itself—Coiling into remembrance. Coiling into sovereignty. Coiling into love.

-Written by Renee Boje with Love, Reverence, Gratitude & Devotion to the Sacred Ayahuasca Vine, my most profound ally and Plant Spirit Medicine Master Teacher.

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