Ayahuasca: Amazon's potent healing brew

(Metta Beshay) The Ayahuasca we've been told about is a lie

Tribal ayahuasca medicine work

Indigenous Shipibo ladies, Amazon, 2011

The Shipibo-Conibo are an indigenous (Native American) people along the Ucayali River in the Amazon rainforest of Peru.

Formerly two groups, they eventually became one tribe through intermarriage and communal rituals and are currently known as the Shipibo-Conibo people [2, 3].

Lifestyle, tradition, and diet

Kené pattern on Shipibo-Conibo textile

The Shipibo-Conibo have lived in the Amazonian rainforest for millennia. Many of their traditions are still practiced, such as ayahuasca medicine work.

Medicine songs have inspired artistic tradition and decorative designs found in their clothing, pottery, tools, and textiles. Some of the urbanized people live around Pucallpa in the Ucayali region, an extensive indigenous zone. Most others live in scattered villages over a large area of jungle forest extending from Brazil to Ecuador. More

Ayahuasca (Yage, Capi) Brew:

• Chakruna leaves (Psychotria viridis) = DMT
• Banisteriopsis caapi (Vine of the Dead)
• Harmala alkaloid = Harmaline (MAOIs)