Sleep Before Your Ceremony: It’s essential to enter the ceremony feeling refreshed to stay awake. Many of us arrive at the retreat after long journeys, already exhausted from travel and perhaps from the stress of the unknown. If this is true for you, use your free time during the retreat to get as much rest as possible. Being well-rested helps you maintain focus during ceremony nights and better regulate your energy and reactions, enhancing your overall experience.

Stay Seated: Remain seated for the entire ceremony if your health and physical condition allow. Lying down may signal your body that it’s time to sleep, and you wouldn’t want to miss the experience.

Focus on Breathing: Breathing will help you to stay calm and collected, and even with eventual discomfort you can manage your energies with taking slow deep breathes. As you wait for the brew to take effect, breathe deeply and consciously (try: inhale for 4 counts, hold for 4, exhale for 4, hold for 4, repeat). Return to your breath whenever your mind wanders.

Reminding Yourself of the Duration: If the ceremony feels overwhelming, remember that it will soon pass. Keep in mind that the effects usually last a few hours but are not permanent, even if they feel prolonged. Below are some tips to help you through intense moments.

Adjusting Intensity: If your physical sensations, visions, or emotions become too intense, ask Mama Ayahuasca (also known as AyaMama, the spirit of the Ayahuasca plant) to decrease the intensity. Conversely, if you don’t feel much, ask AyaMama to enhance the experience.

Grounding Techniques: Place your palms downward on your knees/thighs, combined with deep and slow breathing and open eyes. This can help ground you and reduce intensity. You can also look around and observe your surroundings, helping your conscious mind recognize that you are in a safe environment.

Receiving More: To prepare for experiencing more, place your palms upward on your knees or thighs, with deep and slow breathing and closed eyes. Repeat your intention and refine it if needed. This helps you open up to more insights and enhances your sensory experience during the journey. Be prepared for the option of taking a second cup if offered when the time comes.

Energy Balance: Interlacing your fingers and practicing deep breathing can help balance your energies and calm you.

If You Are There with a Loved One: You are solely responsible for yourself during a ceremony. Even if a loved one struggles, refrain from intervening with the intention of calming or rescuing them. Your only role is to focus on your own process and allow the professional team and shaman to take care of the rest.

Respectfully Stay Until the End: The ceremony concludes when the shaman declares it finished. A sense of completion arises as the candles are relit, and quiet whispers aim to maintain the serenity. Sometimes, participants might feel bored or frustrated during the ceremony if they haven’t received much insight and may wish to leave. If you find yourself in this situation, it’s advised to patiently wait until the ceremony is over, avoiding unnecessary noises or actions that might disturb others. Instead of leaving, a more respectful choice toward the shaman and your fellow participants is to stay until the end. Use this time to relax, meditate, or practice conscious breathing.

Post-Ceremony Rest: Sleep it out afterward, and practice conscious yawning if sleep doesn’t come easily, ensuring the brew wears off completely.

Seek Assistance: Don’t hesitate to ask for help from the shaman, facilitators, or AyaMama if needed.

Be Present with the Right Mindset: Approach this journey with respect and intention, while allowing yourself to be playful and curious. Be open to change and the possibility of healing and transformation. There may be times when you feel like crying or laughing; every emotion is welcome here. Embrace them, live them, and enjoy the ride!

Setting intentions for your ceremonies may be on your mind. Consider establishing a main purpose for the entire retreat, along with individual intentions for each ceremony, adjusting them as needed.

Before my very first Ayahuasca ceremony, a close friend shared the basic version of the insight below with me. Since then, I’ve refined it through my own retreats and with others who have tried it.

Speak to Mama Ayahuasca (also known as AyaMama, the spirit of the Ayahuasca plant) as if she were the most loving grandmother you can envision. She listens, knows you, feels you, loves you, and understands how you learn and heal best, always with the best intentions for you. Address her respectfully, with humility and kindness, and ask for her assistance in any matter. Her answers will come in the form you’re most receptive to—whether through visions, thoughts, sounds, smells, or body sensations. Speak to her in your mind or whisper as if she’s right beside you.

The format below for creating intentional requests has been effective for many willing to try it:

If you’re unsure where to begin, try something like: “AyaMama, show me how I can heal through positive experiences”, or “AyaMama, show me how I can live a happy life”, and also “AyaMama, show me what my life looks like when I am happy”.

If you are scared, you can start with an honest confession and a request, such as: “AyaMama, I’m so scared, please be gentle with me.” Feel free to add your specific intention for the night.

As you become familiar with the practice of attending ceremonies throughout your retreat, you’ll gain the courage to craft your own sentences.

There are abundant resources online, but finding genuinely helpful ones requires effort. I regularly share new techniques and ideas on the Blog to support independent retreat preparation and integration HERE! >>

You might also want to check out the Resources page.

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A complimentary 60-minute session offers us the opportunity to discuss your journey and explore your support needs. This session is not an attempt to commit you to future sessions (unless you choose), but rather a way to provide personalized support. Once I understand your needs and goals, I can guide you in the right direction for your success. If I can assist further, I can develop a tailored collection of information or self-help practices based on your input and share it in a blog post for everyone’s benefit.

Mindful preparation involves understanding your automatic reactions to triggers and stress. It takes time to practice a healthier and calmer way to respond to the same stimuli.

Journaling can help address your weaknesses and triggers, enabling you to recognize a moment before slipping into autopilot, thus taking charge of your actions and words. Such awareness is like a superpower, keeping you present in the moment.

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When you focus on healing specific issues you discovered with journaling, and work on them before your retreat, you can transform on a much deeper level.

Absolutely. Allow yourself time to practice self-regulating techniques such as mindful breathing, EFT tapping, grounding, and energy-balancing exercises. This practice ensures your body remembers these techniques when you need to stay calm and relaxed. Stepping out of your comfort zone can be challenging, especially under Ayahuasca, when your logical mind functions differently. Being well-versed in using these tools is crucial.
I can also offer easy techniques that take only a few minutes to enhance your self-care toolbox. Feel free to reach out if you need additional support!

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Compile a list of techniques that have helped you in stressful situations and keep it accessible during your retreat, as you may need them multiple times. Focus on techniques that are short and simple enough to use even during ceremonies.

Experimenting with intentions is fine, but setting clear intentions before drinking the brew provides clarity and helps to make sense of the wisdom and insights received. A well-defined intention aids in navigating your journey and interpreting your experiences afterward, especially when receiving insights or wisdom. Sometimes these answers come long after your retreat, seemingly unrelated to the ceremonies. Writing down your specific intentions can help you connect them with subsequent aha moments.

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By slightly shifting your questions to Mama Ayahuasca, you can transform your entire ceremony experience. It’s tempting to ask questions tinged with hope that someone will soothe our pain, like “Why is my life so miserable?” However, I advise against asking such questions, as AyaMama might show you the events and traumas that cause your current feelings of misery, and you likely already know the answer to WHY.
Instead of asking why, frame your questions with a future focus, embracing the certainty and hope that change is possible, and you just haven’t figured out HOW yet. Your question could be: “How can I live a fulfilling life?” or “Show me the beauty of self-love.” This sets the stage for a positive healing session. Remember this approach and try to reframe your questions accordingly. If you need help, feel free to reach out to me at hello@readytogodeeper.com

It’s best to begin as soon as you’ve decided to join a retreat. Emotional and mental preparation takes longer than simply following essentials like journaling, meditation, yoga, and the recommended diet.

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Create a plan for your preparation process and self-care routine, ensuring you approach this journey with respect and intention. Start independently, holding yourself accountable for following through. Allow yourself enough time to adjust your life to your plan, recalibrate as needed, and measure your progress. If you’re open to guidance, consider working with a coach who specializes in Ayahuasca preparation and integration.

These practices are essential and effective for many. However, if you’re serious about transformation and have unresolved issues from the past, thorough emotional and mental preparation is also recommended. These issues may surface during ceremonies, so preparing in advance gives you a head start. By the time you drink the brew, you’ll be well-prepared to explore your past.

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Engaging in inner work requires time, effort, and persistence. While guidance from a coach is beneficial, individual practice at home is crucial for maintaining accountability in self-care and self-love. Don’t feel discouraged if you find that inner work mirrors meditation—it also follows its own rhythm, with focus and distraction occurring continuously. With consistent practice, you may find yourself experiencing longer periods of deep focus, which is the ultimate goal.

The exploratory journey you started during your ceremonies doesn’t end there; it continues as you incorporate teachings and insights into your everyday life. Integration is an ongoing process that involves intentional actions after your retreat to transform your life. It includes finding meaning in the insights gained during ceremonies, re-evaluating relationships, and listening to your intuition about which habits to keep or release. It’s a step-by-step method, rich in ups and downs, so maintain focus on your goal, breathe, and continue forward.

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Preserving the heightened vibrancy gained from your jungle experience is an excellent integration goal, though challenging, as most of us return to an unchanged, bustling, noisy, and demanding world. This can create a push to revert to old habits, but with consistent daily routines and guided integration, you can remain aligned toward your best life at your own pace. Holding onto hard-earned inner peace, love, and clarity is rewarding amidst unchanged surroundings.

The duration of integration can vary significantly based on individual circumstances. Factors include the number of ceremonies you attended in your last retreat (and in total), the type of experiences you had, the supportiveness of your home environment, and your commitment to ongoing inner work.

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The primary responsibility lies with you, as you should develop an integration plan, just as you had for your preparation. Planning this while you are still close to your retreat experience (or perhaps still in the jungle) is ideal, as you likely feel different and changed on some levels. This can make it easier to decide on a daily routine of self-care practices and how to implement everything you’ve learned about yourself during your ceremonies. If there are lingering emotions, stories, or unresolved issues from your retreat, addressing these can help lighten your load. Consistent inner work is required, at least for a while, until you can release everything that no longer serves you.

Together, we can explore this question further. I offer a free 60-minute initial session where we can determine what works best for you and your optimal pace.

You’ll feel different than before. Frequent journaling allows you to review earlier entries, noticing changes. Ideally, you have detailed ceremony notes to revisit for the advice and wisdom received: are they active in your life and implemented in your relationships?

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Peace, completion, and readiness to live fully signifies total implementation. You might realize it’s time for another round or just enjoy the fruits of your efforts. Congrats! 🙂

Not entirely. Drinking Ayahuasca promotes healing by clearing energies that no longer serve you. However, while Ayahuasca is a powerful catalyst for transformation, true and lasting personal growth stems from continuous self-reflection, introspection, and the practical application of newfound insights in daily life. It is not a replacement for continuous inner work and integration.

Some people frequently repeat retreats without allowing adequate time for healing and thus avoid the challenges (and occasional boredom) of sustained internal work. This observation is drawn from my personal experience with the integration process, where I sometimes found myself rushing, only realizing the need for thorough integration nearly two years after my last retreat.

Please consider this as a sidenote; it’s mentioned because you have the choice to approach things differently. If you meet someone during your retreat or travels who proudly claims to have completed numerous ceremonies in a short period, such as close to or more than a hundred within 1-3 years (excluding shaman apprentices), it might indicate they are bypassing crucial integration.

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The next step is to listen to both your Soul and your body. Meditation can help distinguish between the ego’s fear of missing out and its tendency to rush, versus your Soul’s desire for deeper exploration and lasting change. This is especially difficult for those of us who tend to avoid persistence when facing challenges, opting instead for easier paths, which in this case may mean drinking more Ayahuasca.

Reflecting on how easily you implement new habits and projects, or follow through with important ideas may reveal a pattern of quitting when faced with difficulties. Instead of embracing challenges to grow stronger, we often choose to restart the process with a new idea, seeking the initial success we crave. If this sounds familiar (I’m certainly guilty of it), recognize this as a pattern you can now rewrite, perhaps through your integration process. This is a fresh experience post-retreat, so let’s commit to following through this time.

My primary methods include EFT Tapping, the Grief Recovery Method, and life coaching infused with mindfulness, relaxation practices, and guided meditation. Each session is intuitive, focusing on finding the best approach to support you. 

English and Hungarian.

Sessions are conducted online, with updates announced on the website.

The complimentary initial session is designed to help me understand where you are in your journey and what support you need. I’ve created an additional form for you to complete before this session to help you reflect on important questions about your path forward. This conversation is also a valuable opportunity to determine if we’re a good fit for your preparation and integration journey, ensuring that paid sessions are used effectively and efficiently.

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Complete the provided form beforehand to maximize our time together and plan effectively for future sessions.

If led by a certified therapist, integration can be considered therapy. I’m not a therapist; my methods are in the complementary field of energy healing.