What I Unlearned from Ayahuasca Ceremonies About Speaking with Plants
Finishing Dr. Gagliano's book, Thus Spoke the Plant, and reflecting on my own plant medicine ceremonies to weave together a space of appreciation, reflection, and non-human conversation
I know I often write about nature messages, which I fondly call noticements- those moments that ask us to pause, slow down, and notice what is happening around us. I muse on what the crested saguaro might mean, or why the curved bill thrashers sing, or how to maneuver rattlesnakes and toddlers in desert gardens. And yet, I will admit that many of my musings are my interpretations of what the plants have to share with me, rather than direct, quoted dialogue. Could such a message be received directly from the plant?
I’ve just finished reading Monica Gagliano’s book, “Thus Spoke the Plant,” which had been languishing on my giant bookshelf for far too long. Feeling drawn to the title again, I found myself staying up at night looking at diagrams of PVC pipe coaxing pea plants to grow towards light in mazes. And, surprisingly even to myself, I was fascinated! Dr. Gagliano’s entire premise is that scientists don’t really see, don’t truly believe that plants are their own autonomous creatures. As prioritizing rational thought and classification through Linneaus’ systems became dominant in Western European practice, plants were subjected to their own inferior realm. Why it was acknowledged that plants could grow, adapt, and even communicate when they need to (more recently studied), scientific skepticism loomed large about the plants’ intelligence and self-autonomy.
In response to this, Dr. Gagliano focuses her book on sharing different moments she’s had in-depth, 1-1 communication with plants, and how they’ve taught her to design experiments (like the PVC mazes) to let plants teach humans just how brilliant they are. In reading her reflections, it was amazing how she hollows herself out, both as a researcher and scientist, to become a student of the plants. She is constantly challenging her own lenses and belief systems. This looks like aforementioned pea plant experiments to show that peas can train themselves to grow differently than what biologically serves them, or mimosa plant studies that demonstrate how the “scaredy-cat” leaves can ascertain true danger from perceived danger, and begin to respond accordingly.
Doing the reverse of what Dr. Gagliano does, I often place human amid the plant in order to create deeper connection- like this painting I made while in Brazil
Many, though not all, of her communes with plants are assisted by different plant medicines, like osha root (often called bear root), or through vision quests. As someone who is not indigenous, she approaches these callings towards plant medicine with a reverence, slowness, and humility that I have rarely seen amongst non-native folks. There’s been such a frenzy in the last decade, though well before that, for non-indigenous people to seek answers to their own questions through plant medicine. The capitalism of medicine consumption has exploded, leading to important conversations in those spaces about who should be the shaman, or teacher, or guide, and what training is needed, what is fair compensation, and who should or shouldn’t participate. A big theme I’ve noticed is the intention– when Dr. Gagliano spoke to teachers, she told them she was being led to the particular medicine because the plants called to her, and because she needed to speak for them. It wasn’t about her own answers; it was how she could best be of service.
Twice in my life, I’ve been invited to join ayahuasca ceremonies and I’ve participated in ceremonies. First was in Ecuador with a community I gathered with every month to celebrate the full moon, and then, a year or so later, in upstate New York, in a ceremony facilitated by a Brazilian maestra I had met when working in Brazil a few months prior. In both of my acceptances to these experiences, I was centered on the self- what I wanted to learn, what I hoped to be revealed. I had elements of consumption woven into my curiosity, and while this is very “human,” after reading Dr. Gagliano’s book I’m reminded of how plant ceremonies have always served a greater, communal purpose- how one can contribute to the whole.
A younger me, with the mother of the Brazilian maestra, celebrating Queen of the Night blooming in Brazil
I’ll never forget one of the Colombian shamans, who was visiting Ecuador, sitting with me on that first night of my first ayahuasca ceremony. I went up to him a few hours into the evening, after consuming the tea and waiting, waiting, waiting. Stubbornly, I told him that I wasn’t experiencing anything. Some body aches, some warmth, but that was it. In Spanish, we conversed back and forth about what I thought was going to happen- visions, hallucinations, plants speaking, anything!
He laughed, gently, at my frustration and told me kindly, “My dear, you have way too many expectations in life. Go and sit down, what’s happening is already unfolding.”
This message has stayed with me for years, and is one I still grapple with to this day- how do my own expectations cloud what I’m being called to do, or how I’m being called to show up? My second plant medicine ceremony, on the ancestral Mohawk lands of upstate New York, was quite different. A small group of us were tucked in an old, creaking wooden manor that belonged to rock stars of the 1970s (you can’t make this stuff up- as my mom would say). In this season of life, I was much more in a place of receiving. With that curiosity, humbly setting aside expectations, I, similar to Dr. Gagliano, found ways to commune directly with plants, animals, and spirit guides who have all remained with me for years since.
At one point in that ceremony, I remember telling myself that I was never going to speak again. I had come to the conclusion that words, at least, in English, were too crass, too clunky, too incapable of capturing the vastness of living. Words felt like cages, rather than wings. I was convinced I’d never utter another word. Not too long afterwards, the maestra came and found me sitting silently by the fire. She asked me to come back and join the group. I remember struggling internally- do I speak with her, thereby breaking the absolute power of the loud silence I was living in? The silence felt like the ultimate teacher. Or, do I refuse and stay there, not talking? I did eventually decide to speak, and when I did, I looked at her in awe, and marveled how beautiful she was, and how beautiful I was, and how beautiful we all were.
An old, blurry photo celebrating with the maestra after the ceremony in New York
Somedays, I miss the deep ritual of ceremonies that I’ve been invited to participate in. And yet, it’s more complicated back in my home state of Arizona, on the indigenous lands of the Tohono O’odham and Yoeme. Ceremony with plants shouldn’t be purchased; it comes when one is open, available, and in right alignment with people and land. These days, I create different types of ritual with friends and family- new moon or full moon circles, blood honoring during my period, intentionality in birth, gatherings for the solstice and equinox. In these moments of communion, I find myself back in the solitude and silence of connection- able to listen, and to hear, better. In stillness, I begin to believe I can, in fact, be in conversation with the plants around me.
I consider what the desert willow tree in my front yard might tell me about its ongoing battle with the leaf-cutter ants. Or I ponder what the dying saguaro might say, the wounded one, who is rotting from the inside. I hug the eucalyptus tree– beautiful, invasive, water-vampire species- and imagine its journey from Australia to North America. I wonder- how might I be of service? How might I be a voice? How might I continue the impossible act of shedding my human lens in an attempt to see anew?
How might you create small ritual, or ceremony, with the plants around you these days? As we move into the darkest week of the year, I hope that we are all able to find delight in the silence, acceptance in the stillness, and beauty in the darkness of this time.