The hours and days after a deeply transformative Ayahuasca ceremony can be expansive, sensitive, and magical, and a well-curated playlist can be the musical medicine to sweeten your landing. From profound lyrics with acoustic backing to subtle symphonic waves, these songs will keep you good company as you integrate.
Sparse and delicate, the guitar opening this piece makes me immediately close my eyes and give space to whatever reflections may come. Perfect company for a moment of bathing in the beauty of transformation, expansion, and all of the raw spaciousness that comes along with it.
Justin Vernon’s vocals are soft, the harmonies divine, and the opening piano lines ethereal. This song brings me immediately into the sweet ceremonial morning moments as the sun rises, a new day has arrived, and that expansive state settles into my heart.
It’s the lyrics of this song that melt my heart. “You can’t rush your healing / Darkness has its teaching.” In the profound space after a ceremony of realizing oneness, patience, and deep personal forgiveness, I’m not sure there is a song that more accurately communicates that easeful space.
The first time I heard this song was in ceremony, as the sun was rising, and that sensation has stayed with me ever since. This song crescendos to a soaring expansion, a collective call to stand up for our ancestors. Goosebumps guaranteed.
Simply: don’t forget to breathe. Murdoch’s deep, breathy voice gives permission to rest in a casual, strolling melody. This song is an amazing soundtrack for a walk in the forest.
The second song for your woodsy stroll, Alexander brings a little funk with deeply profound lyrics: “Truth is that I never shook my shadow / Every day it’s trying to trick me into doing battle…” Mesmerizing and affirming after such a journey.
For me, one of the most consistent and deeply resonant realizations with each journey is that everything is already perfect. In the hours and days after a ceremony, sometimes I need a little reminder. So Fink reminds me, with this lyric: Perfect darkness is all I can see.
If you speak Spanish, the lyrical story will melt your heart. If not, just enjoy the feel of earthy bass, vocals reminiscent of a jungle breeze, and let yourself be transported to the mountains from whence our beloved Madre Aya came.
I met Nessi’s music in the jungle of Costa Rica. A true medicine woman in her own right who has been in many ceremonies herself (“Na-na-nah Yahe…”), this song is a prayer and gratitude to the medicine. Reconnect to the power and depth of your experience through her heartful voice.
This amazing Brit came singing into my life by the riverside, and he too is steeped in the traditions of the jungle. This song is mystically transporting, and brings me back to moments with the fire, beneath the stars, in the heart of letting go of thought, mind, worry, fear.