The Ayahuasca Ego Death Experience – Can She Teach Us to Die Before We Die?

Art by Rafal Oblinski

Our global culture is deep into the Coronavirus pandemic, and as a result, many of us are facing the reality of death on a much more tangible level than ever before.

First, there’s the fear of contracting the Coronavirus, and thanks to our mainstream media’s fear-based coverage of the illness, it’s kicked millions of people into the fear of dying from it.

Additionally, each day that passes strengthens the odds that we know someone who is near death, or who has already passed from the virus, or be any other means. In most cases, we don’t even have the opportunity to support our loved ones through transitioning, as the level of contagion and the current lockdown prevent us from the luxury of being by their bedsides.

This pressure cooker creates intense feelings of fear, loss, confusion, disconnection, and frustration. Our freedom of movement has been stripped away, we are locked indoors contemplating this new grave reality, and many of us are jobless and have the anxiety of basic needs like food and shelter to contend with as well.

It’s the perfect storm, and it’s divinely orchestrated. It’s time to get real about death.

Any of us that have had the blessing of working with Ayahuasca, however, are likely no strangers to this experiential contemplation of what dying is really all about. One of her most powerful, sacred teachings centers around understanding what death is, and isn’t. Being in her altered embrace is the perfect training ground for facing a pandemic, and the inevitable transition that awaits us all.

Ayahuasca’s Death Wisdom – Nothing Ever Dies

Death is the big ole cosmic joke. In our Western world, we rail against the inevitable transition, by vilifying it (Grim Reaper, anyone?) and doing all we can to resist it. Growing old isn’t celebrated, it’s feared and fought against—because it represents the journey back into the abyss.

We don’t trust the unknown, so death is the enemy. Allopathic medicine takes this to a horrifying extreme. They would rather keep someone alive artificially, indefinitely, than accept the fate that death offers.

And the irony is…death is safe, and beautiful—it’s a homecoming. Once we transition, we are back into a superconscious space; sans ego, or resistance. In fact, that’s the only thing that does die-we no longer resist the truth of who we are.

Drinking Ayahuasca helps to fast track that remembrance. Her name is often translated to mean, “vine of the dead.” She is by far the most potent medicine for anyone wanting to the know the truth about what les beyond the physical.

Ask Ayahuasca nicely for a near death experience, and she just might deliver.

What It Means to Die Before We Die, and How Ayahuasca Assists

Ah, the elusive, mythical, impossible-to-describe experience of ego death--that golden goal of “dying before we die.”

Ego death is the highest experience possible while inhabiting a body, but one that we must go into with extreme caution.

If we are soulfully called to work with something like Ayahuasca to increase our odds of having a legitimate ego death, and it’s not something forced in any way, the ego death can be the moment where everything in the multiverse suddenly embodies the experience of perfection that most of us intellectually understand is always the case.

If we force it in any way, however, it can be a trip to hell that we may never fully recover from.

Even those of us who are “ready” in a spiritual sense often need years and years to integrate a psychotropic-plant induced universal aha.

This is the experience that can cause your entire worldview to pivot. And depending how closed-minded and narrowly-focused we were before The Big Event, that is one of many factors that determines how easy–or devastatingly difficult–it is to integrate.

How do you know you’re ready for an ego death?

You don’t. Even those of us who are gung-ho get wildly humbled. It’s astonishing how strong the body-mind is; the part of us that has been programmed for a gazillion years to simply survive. No amount of spiritual wisdom can bypass our survival consciousness if it becomes triggered into a fight for life.

That said, every time we mediate, and every time we work with entheogens, or just experience a deep connection of being-ness, we are flexing the muscle that knows and trusts that death is safe.

For some, that means when the invitation of ego death arrives, we are able to just. Let. Go. To melt into the cosmos and to re-experience our unity, in a conscious way.

For others, that muscle may have been flexed to the hilt, but an epic battle is still going down. Our beautiful bodies are evolutionary machines that have profoundly deep programming around survival, and there are times that no amount of spiritual wisdom is going to bypass that potent punch of desire that screams I WILL NOT DIE.

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Art by Gus Quintana

We simply never know how we will react when the universe gives us the invitation of death. The thing is, no matter how much of a smarty-pants we’ve become about this death thing, when it comes knocking in a way that feels real, all bets are off.

I’ve taken the road into ego death both ways. There was the time my body shutdown due to a combination asthma attack/panic episode, and I lost consciousness before I reached the hospital. Once I was there, I completely shut off. Heart stopped. Breath ceased. And yet, I was conscious and still felt ALIVE.

I had the obligatory out of body experience, only it felt like the most magical thing that has ever happened. I saw my body and the crowd of people around her. I knew I had died. I was BLISSED OUT at this reality.

I also knew almost immediately that I had to go back. My consciousness was deeply drawn to the light at the ceiling; the more I felt into that fluorescent halo, the more I felt the love that was calling me home.

And in tandem, the more I experienced the reality of death, the more I realized it was just not time yet. I did not want to go back to that prison of a body. But I knew how blessed I was to know the reality of how safe death is, and that was my gift. It was time to face my soul’s mission.

I was only gone a minute or two, but that changed my life.

Some 14 years later, I had my first ego death, facilitated by an Ayahuasca ceremony. That didn’t transpire with the same level of grace and happiness. I fought like a rabid beast, cornered by the devil himself. I resisted on every level I could find. But Aya, she wore me down. I kept running and running and fighting and pushing, as I had done on previous occasions; it was like a drowning woman finally realizing the ocean was going to win.

I surrendered. I fully expected to watch my body shut down.

While my heart rate did seem to slow to a crawl, and my breath was barely there, what happened was that “I” ceased to be. My body….was fine. Resting more deeply than she had in ages. My identity, however, was obliterated.

It only lasted an instant. The ego death, that is. The effects….are endless.

There have been others. Some even lasted for days. Always, always, the ego finds a hold again, but never with the same convincing tenacity or “realness”.

Use This Time of Uncertainty and Helpless as a Path to Awakening

We are isolated, we are fed fear in bucket loads, we are cooking in a sea of intensity. Just like a plant medicine ceremony. Which means if we lean in, if we listen and feel and let the energies undo and unravel us, the truth of who we are can surface.

This is a time of extraordinary awakening.

Every experience we have of ego death in any form prepares us for the Big One. If we can die with grace and surrender, we get to take that vibration with us to the next chapter. I’d say that’s worth fighting--or rather surrendering–for.

What is this global pandemic teaching you about the reality of death?

Next Post: What Does Ayahuasca Say about the Coronavirus Pandemic?

About the Author

Tina “Kat” Courtney, The Afterlife Coach, has worked as an Ayahuasca shaman for almost 15 years. Kat is always a vocal advocate for all plant medicines and sacred spaces, and for the proper integration of peak experiences. Additionally, Kat works with people confronting issues around death, fear, trauma, and shadow as an Ayahuasca Coach and Shamanic Therapist. She’s a transformational junkie with a major love of polarities, and she adores helping others love their darkness too.