The Hummingbird Ayahuasca Healing Centre, Peru
The Hummingbird ayahuasca healing Centre is a rainforest retreat and shamanic healing
Centre specialising in plant spirit medicines and traditional cures.
It provides a safe haven for contemporary seekers to find the healing and vision they need through the effective use of proven shamanic techniques and jungle medicines, leading to resolution, well-being, positive transformation and happiness.
The Centre takes its name from the hummingbird (el colibri) which in Peru is the guardian of healers and those who seek healing or wish to learn the shamanic arts and wisdom of the plants.
Located 14 kilometres from the jungle town of Iquitos within the Amazon rainforest, it offers healing retreats with some of the most respected and powerful ayahuasceros (ayahuasca shamans).
ABOUT THE CENTRE
The Hummingbird is a private retreat Centre owned and run by Tracie Thornberry and Ross Heaven.
Tracie is a counsellor specialising in drug and addictions release therapy who previously ran the Tranquilo Healing Centre in Iquitos. Professionally trained and qualified she integrates shamanism, plant spirit medicine and work with ayahuasca and San Pedro into her therapeutic programmes to provide a most effective way of leading people to wellness. She is very experienced with jungle medicine and has attended hundreds of ayahuasca ceremonies with many shamans, assisting in their work.
Ross is a psychologist, healer and the author of more than 10 books on shamanism, spirituality and healing, including the well-known works on ayahuasca and San Pedro, Plant Spirit Shamanism and The Hummingbirds Journey to God. He first visited Peru to drink these medicines in 1998 and has worked with many of the countrys best-known and respected shamans both in the Amazon and co-facilitating workshops in Europe and the UK. He has drunk ayahuasca well over 200 times and led plant medicine workshops and ceremonies throughout Europe for several years. Since 2007 he has also brought groups to the Amazon and Andes to work with ayahuasca and San Pedro on his Magical Earth and Cactus of Vision journeys.
THE ETHOS OF THE CENTRE
The focus of The Hummingbirds work is on vision and healing, a term which, in the Amazon, has a wider meaning than its Western usage and refers to an ultimately beneficial outcome brought about by the restoration of balance and positivity to the mind, emotions and spirit as well as the physical self.
It offers a pioneering yet ancient path towards these outcomes by blending its knowledge of shamanism, medicine ceremonies and the therapeutic arts with the expertise of indigenous healers who embody a compassionate, sincere and heartfelt desire to assist in healing and personal transformation.
Its aim is to make the profound benefits of ayahuasca accessible to all while at the same time preserving the wisdom of tribal people, their culture, medicines and methods of healing.
LOCATION AND ACCOMMODATION
The Hummingbird is set in 11 acres of beautiful rainforest well away from the noise and rush of city living. Some of its land is virgin forest which has remained pure for generations; some is open garden planted with trees and flowers where you can also see the blue of the sky (something of a rarity in the rainforest!) There are some lovely walks at the Centre, a lagoon and trees and flowers with brilliant blossoms.
Accommodation is in traditional palm leaf thatched huts called tambos or in the casa grande the big house a wooden longhouse which has been reformed to make individual rooms so that guests have the privacy and space they need for personal work and reconnection to nature but never feel isolated or alone; for some the best of both worlds.
All rooms are clean and comfortable and have a bed with a mosquito net (although mosquitoes are rarely a problem here), a lamp, a table and chair and nothing else. This is authentic rainforest accommodation, used for centuries by indigenous people, and there are no gadgets, TVs, internet or other mod cons to get in the way of your experience so you can let go of the outside world and focus on your healing work with ayahuasca, the vine of souls
AYAHUASCA
The brew is made from ayahuasca vine (Banisteriopsis caapi) and the leaves of the chacruna plant (Psychotria viridis). It is said that a shaman can find many sources of both by listening for the heartbeat that emanates from them.
The mixture is prepared by cleaning specially-chosen vines and adding them and the leaves to water. This is then boiled and reduced for several hours, attended by shamans who blow their intentions and good wishes (soplada) into it, make prayers to their spirits for good healings and singing icaros (sacred healing songs) into the brew during its preparation and in ceremony.
When ayahuasca is drunk it can open up a new world that is extraordinary, amazing and healing and yet it is the same world we are part of every day; ayahuasca simply opens our eyes to what is really before us.
The experience normally begins soon after drinking with a feeling of warm presence in the stomach which spreads throughout the body. Most people describe this as very pleasant, like being in a warm, body-temperature bath.
Approximately 40 minutes later visions begin, which may be of other worlds or new perspectives on this world and/or recollections in words, sights, sounds or feelings of episodes and events from your life which need to be healed and which you can now approach from a position of knowledge and strength, aided by the spirit of ayahuasca.
Healing comes through a subtle shift in awareness, a deepened understanding of your place in the world or an increase in personal power.
SACRED SONGS
Icaros, the healing songs of the shaman, are integral to the ayahuasca experience and direct the ceremony and the visions which may arise. The shaman has songs for each person's needs, the vibrations of which summon healing energies with words that tell of Natures ability to heal.
As the shaman sings people might even see these things in their own visions (ayahuasca was once known by the scientific name telepathine because of its ability to work in this way). Another common experience is to see rainbows streaming from the shamans mouth as he sings to you, becoming white light or healing colours as they enter your energy field.
Healing takes place as the vibrations of these songs rearrange the patterns, waveforms and frequency of your energy system, also empowering and directing the ayahuasca you have drunk so it can act with greater intensity and focus on your behalf.
As a result of this shift in energy you become, in a sense, a new person who can see and understand life from a new perspective and sadness, illness, anger or other unhelpful energies can be transmuted into ecstasy, well-being and love.
For more information on The Hummingbird Healing Centre visit www.ayahuascaretreats.org or email ross@thefourgates.com for a copy of its brochure.
by: ross heaven
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