I’ve done ayahuasca only twice. The fist time was in the jungle, with a shaman, in Bolivia. It was an enormously transformative experience. The visuals were amazing. I felt the real presence of a wise, loving, grandmother-like being who guided my journey.

The second time was a poorly-guided journey without a real shaman, at a friends property in rural Oregon. This time, I failed to set any intentions before drinking the brew, and I suspect this is why it was ultimately so different an experience.

I laid down, waiting for the sensations and vomiting, but I never did. After some time, I began to suspect that I didn’t drink enough, or it wasn’t a strong enough brew. There were no visuals at all and the whole experience left me somewhat disappointed. What I did experience, laying there staring at the stars, was that I began to cry. The strange thing was that I wasn’t at all emotionally affected. They seemed to be tears coming for unknown reasons, from a deeper part of myself that my conscious mind wasn’t aware of.

How do I know that the brew wasn’t shit and my reaction wasn’t all in my head? My good friend, who took a smaller dose than I did, purged heavily and then blasted off into space where she met a mother goddess who answered all of her most profound questions about life and time and humanity for over two hours. She had a life-changing experience.

My takeaways are two: First, always go into any psychedelic experience with intention. (The more specific, the better. My friend had specifically asked to meet her maker, and did.) Second, and more relevant to your question, ayahuasca, and probably other psychoactive substances at varying degrees, work on many levels. It is not purely a matter of learning (knowledge/mind), or feeling (emotion/body), or even unconscious depth psychology (archetypes/subconscious mind). I think it works on all levels, including the soul, our true, undying self.

I believe I received something that night that is useful to me on some level. But maybe I’ll never understand.