we got ready to go to sleep and that was it so that that night that first night so this you know we're we're still talking about my kind of like first day there and we'll start in a moment um or continue in a moment but that first the night that i went to sleep i had a very clear dream and i wasn't quite asleep just yet but as soon as i closed my eyes i was saying my prayers and going over my intention for the next day just doing some breathing because i mean it's loud it could be people who've never slept in a jungle or in a forest it's really more a jungle the forest isn't that loud jungle's loud there is you know thousands of bugs all around you and they wake up at night you know so it's very loud like you're not you know you're not just falling asleep like oh like sounds of like maybe 10 crickets a little stream no it's whatever you know frogs you know it's like it's a lot they're dude they're awake man you know um so it took me a little bit to go to sleep but as soon as i close my eyes it's like their daytime right that's their time to get that's party time man yeah the jungle you know um so i kind of closed my eyes and as soon as i did and i kind of started to drift to sleep but i was still awake because i could still hear the outside i saw eyes open in my eyes another set of eyes and as i sort of looked looked at it i looked up and it was a huge green snake okay and in spanish um there was a feminine voice and it said you know abierto which means you know it translates open open yeah mm-hmm and so this you know tripped me out because i'm not even i didn't take it you know wait i just got there nothing even you know i haven't taken anything yet so it was kind of a deep you know kind of a deep thing and then i was able to kind of go to sleep after that and um and then you in your first day now you're kind of starting in your little boot camp you know or your little retreat if you want to call it that and you start by drinking um at least at this center and i don't want i don't want to give it all away but you know i'll give as much as i can so folks know what it is uh you drink this um i don't know what i think it's a mixture of a couple different kind of plants but um it causes you to vomit right so they start you out by cleaning your stomach and that's the real reason why they do that because you're supposed to be dieting before you go there you're supposed to not be having sex and not be eating meat and alcohol and everything else but because the food's different down there they really kind of want to reset that gut flora gut fauna and so you drink this stuff and you you puke for sure so that's your technical side is that an absorption issue too for the ayahuasca yes a lot of the ways of those okay yeah and and the the dieting is important you know the dieting is very important actually it's like if you're going on retreat or somebody is dieting for um you know if you're going on a diet because you want to lose weight or you want to get you know whatever get buffer whatever the case is it's very what you take in is extremely important and so if you're going to be taking in something that you want to absorb well you have to make sure the stomach is clean and i think it's also a way of getting rid of whatever else literally whatever else you're carrying with you from the outside world so you have yourself and you have what's in your stomach i can't empty your mind but i can empty the next thing closest to your mind which is your stomach and for those who study chinese medicine know the very close relationship of the you know the stomach and the brain and even even in western medicine the gut brain is got brain stuff it's getting really popular now yeah it's a thing so they start you off by doing that and so that's how you get up in the morning you get up and get up and puke how bad does i mean for people going into it how bad does it feel do you get super nauseous do you feel good no you just you you this was the most mild purging i i've ever had in my life okay so it's not like you hit a bad hangover or something you don't feel bad you just drink something you're like oh yep pretty much that's right you start coughing a little bit then all of a sudden there it comes you know and it's usually just once and then you're like oh okay that wasn't too bad okay good and then you drink water and you wait a little bit and then you go eat breakfast because there's things that people get concerned about too and going into these things like you know am i going to have to feel like all queasy and bad or whatever and it's so it really wasn't that wasn't your experience this point no yeah no this part was not was not bad uh and then we waited about 40. there's a phrase there this part okay so we'll get to that so this part wasn't too bad so then we went and had breakfast and um after i had breakfast then then it then it then i started to feel real bad and then i went in the bathroom and then i threw up for real like projectile like it was you know whole body heaving it was really aggressive so what was the source of that you think was that still from the plant that you ingested or is that just the thing so everybody else ate at the same time nobody else threw up my guess is that what they give you that drink is not just stuff to make you vomit there's probably other things in there that are doing that are starting to work already oh gotcha gotcha gotcha you know and so the process has started the process has started now what's in there i don't know i think there's some tobacco in there but and there's some a lot of other things i'm not sure exactly i don't really want to know you know although i kind of do but anyway yeah you want to know actually but um people are going to have their trade secrets not everybody's going to go that's right this is a proprietary black blend so um you know so then then i went in the bathroom and then i really i there was a lot like it was very aggressive like my ribs were squeezing like out my abs were sore when i was done and i came back to the to the little that didn't happen that didn't happen to everybody right no only only me i'm special apparently yeah yeah um and i came back and i just felt terrible terrible and i very interesting i i won't forget it man i sat down and a woman who was sitting at the table near us now the the bathrooms that were maybe about 100 yards or so away from or 75 yards away from the eating area so close enough that if someone screamed you could hear them yell but like you're not going to hear over there and but they heard me and when i sat down the woman said are you okay i said yeah why she goes we heard you in the bathroom suffering okay and and just that statement let me know that i was in a little bit of a different place with people already you know i'm saying like they're aware that like oh they didn't someone didn't say oh dude i heard you in the bathroom throwing up bro yeah like it wasn't like that like they're they're aware that like that was some you know cleansing you know what i'm saying and yeah i think that's maybe something worthwhile sharing with people because if you haven't done any of these retreat things it's not like every single person is going to be your pal or something like that and people have their issues but you can meet some really nice people who will support the hell out of you in doing that because they kind of have this recognition like i'm going on the thing you're going on the thing we're going on the thing together let's like let's hold each other up while we're doing this i mean you can have those experiences and they're pretty nice that's sangha too yeah no that definitely is that definitely the community that's a huge part of it for sure because that's how it is that's it they're very it's it's so part of the experience it's so part of you yeah anyone's i've ever done like this and i'm making analogies between this and doing retreats and stuff that seems like the analogy for me yeah yeah but um yeah i've like i've had support from people times when you need people they'll step in and you know because these are hard these are experiences that are adventures you know they have roller coasters to them right and you know sometimes you need uh a little bit of tlc or a helping hand from someone and people will do it so if you know it's one of the things to think about before you go into these things just know that um there are people who could be who will be good people there who will yeah that will help yeah you'll get help from strangers yeah which is you guys won't be strangers after that correct and you'll do the same for other people yeah you know it's just part of that being in that space so after i did that i was sick all day long and so most people here probably don't practice chinese medicine but i was in xiao yang all day and for those who don't know xiaoyong meaning alternating chills and fever and my i was so it's i'm in the jungle it's you know the beginning of may it's hot very hot i am freezing freezing they couldn't give me enough blankets i had all of my clothes on and i'm sitting there freezing and sweating and moaning groaning just uh all day for hours that was sounds a little like for our tcm folks listening that almost sounds a little shao yin or something too because you could be really cold and like yeah i wonder about that connection this is like tcm stuff between those things you know um yeah okay cool so it's not cool but you know awesome [Laughter] but you know like you can understand what it is right sometimes that helps a little bit right yeah okay maybe xiao again your mind can say that to yourself but you're like yeah so this was uh but i you know for those who don't know that i was just i was sick all day long i had a very high fever um which is concerning because you know you just you come to a place you don't know you drink some stuff that makes you puke and now you're really ill and you were fine you know the morning before so obviously something's going on yeah so i stayed in my room all day sweating and groaning um and then the there was a doctor there who taught at pacific college where eric teaches now and where i graduated from um and he comes in about maybe about an hour half hour before the ceremony is supposed to start and he said how are you feeling i said okay you know he's like you don't look so great and i was like yeah i feel terrible and uh he's like well what do you need and i was like i don't know man he's like do you want to go see a physician or something like that i was like i don't know maybe he's like oh it's about four hours away you want to go i was like no i don't want to go because i know what it took to get here yeah yeah and um so he's like well are you gonna drink the medicine and i was like i don't know man he's like that's awful long way huh and i was like oh man all right i'll see you in there you know because like he just you know he was he tried to be encouraging or was he trying to do he was trying to he was trying to be encouraging in a way that he knows that a guy would probably be encouraged by you know a little a little teasing are you really you're gonna quit okay no problem you lay here and be sick