Ayahuasca Ritual and Spiritual Practices for Substance Abuse Rehabilitation: the Takiwasi Model and Experience

The Takiwasi therapeutic community in Peru integrates Amazonian Ayahuasca traditions into a treatment model for substance use disorders that combines plant intakes, rituals, spirituality, psychotherapeutic integration, and communal living. The chapter analyzes how traditional healers and Western psychologists are trained in Ayahuasca-assisted therapy, the ideology about illness and disease, and preparatory and post-session integration activities. Purification through purgative plants, dietary restrictions, and sexual abstinence precede treatment. Ritual and spirit relations are central, emphasizing a shamanic approach to developing new perspectives through group workshops, individual psychotherapy, and community life.

Study at a glance

Abstract

The psychoactive brew Ayahuasca has a central role in the traditional medicines of the indigenous people of the Amazon basin and in recent decades has generated significant research interest among the academic community along with the revival of psychedelic medicine. The therapeutic community Takiwasi, located in Peru, leads this movement in its dedication to treatment of substance use disorders with Ayahuasca and other traditional medicines, and its clinical experience is playing an important role in the evaluation of the therapeutic efficacy of such ancient medicines to treat modern diseases. This chapter analyzes how Amazonian Ayahuasca traditions are integrated into Takiwasi treatment model in a complex scheme of plant intakes, rituals, spirituality, psychotherapeutic integration, and coexistence. Focus is placed on the ritual practices for administering this entheogen to clients, the way both traditional healers and Western psychologists are trained in Ayahuasca-assisted therapy, Takiwasi’s ideology about illness and disease, and the preparatory and post-session integration activities performed that accompany treatment with this sacred brew. Traditions of Amazonian medicine incorporated as central elements of therapeutic practice begin with purification through purgative plants and other procedures, including dietary restrictions and sexual abstinence. Ritual and spirit relations are central to the Takiwasi therapy which emphasizes a shamanic approach to development of new perspectives integrated through group workshops, individual psychotherapy, and their concretization in community life.