Off to the Jungle

Well, I've been here settling and preparing to move to the jungle. Nerves strike and I wonder what in the world am I doing? Why am I giving up everything to push this project forward? Why am I doing this? Then my heart speaks and says, "because it's where I need to be". I've listened to my heart on and off in this life and for about 6 months of 2016 my heart ached as I was trying to force my music instead of following all of my loves in life which include nature, indigenous medicine and philosophy, gardening, outdoor exploration and international travel, music, and the idea of moving our world towards sustainability.

It turns out is a lot more difficult to actually follow your heart than just to say "follow your heart". It takes guts to follow your heart. I'm learning that I have those guts. I'm coming down here with relatively no money and no idea if these projects will coalesce in to the dreams I have for them. But I do believe in them because it is the right thing to do. I also know that if I don't try, then they definitely won't be created with me being a major role. So I'm giving it a shot.

The first two weeks here have been relatively smooth. I was invited to a medicine retreat in Minca at a beautiful retreat center called Aloha Ke Akua. For the first four days we ate minimally, without many spices, and connected deeply with a few others going into deep questions about our lives and ourselves. This part of the retreat is called Purpose Spark. Led by a friend and musician Gregory Bogard. It's an idea to connect deeply with people quickly. Sharing things that aren't normally shared. For example, after our first day we had soul work to do listing out our challenges and victories in this life. Then the next day we shared our biggest challenge in this life that we have faced for ten minutes. Now you may think that is long but trust me, if you go deep, you could talk for much longer. In fact my biggest challenge I shared was to follow my spirit path which has been a strong pull since I was about 20 years old, initially breaking me, but rebuilding me. So I could have shared just under 8 years of challenges. If you think about it we are all walking novels, in fact, you might say each year is a new novel and each day another page.

I won't go to much further in to Purpose Spark but if you ever hear of one happening near you, I would recommend you checking it out.

Picture of our busy schedule:

On day 3 of the retreat we worked with this frog medicine called Kambo. The origin story behind Kambo is very interesting so I will share that with you.

A great medicine man in the region of the Amazon we now call Brazil was unable to heal a sickness that had befallen his tribe. He tried all of his medicines and none of them were working, so he prayed to the great spirit and asked for guidance. A few days later the medicine man had a vision of a frog, how to call this frog in, how to extract the poison, and how to apply it to his people. The medicine man listened to the vision and went to the exact location where his vision was. He called to the frogs and extracted a poison from them to apply to his people. With this medicine he was able to heal the sickness that had fallen upon his people. From that day forward Kambo has become a well known medicine to work with many different ailments both physical and psychological.

Kambo is one of the more powerful medicine's I have ever worked with and have much respect for this medicine. I won't be working with this medicine very much in the near future. Both Kambo and Yage guided me to focus on only Yage (also well known as Ayahuasca). So in the jungle I will only work with this medicine until I can expand beyond it.

During the two ceremonies with Ayahuasca I was learning who I am and what I am here to do, which I am doing exactly that. Taking a leap of faith to follow a dream to protect the Amazon, learn the ways of the elders, build my music, and be an example to the world. If we all try to do something for the world and by following our hearts, we would transform this world. In fact I believe we are transforming this world. Many more people are awakening and much of the darkness that surrounds us seems more like a push to keep the darkness. But you can't stop the sun from rising. I believe we are transforming. I am transforming.

During the second ceremony I gave my heart to the world. The world is my guide and I believe in a better way. I love you all.

Here are some more pictures from Aloha Ke Akua:

Update for The Peoples' Forest Project:

With the project and the money we raised we are able to employ to people to begin restoration projects on their land for three months. This will be the pilot project and we are working with them to develop their own organization and retreat center in the jungle for the medicine. We are also using $400 dollars to have the young man we got sponsored to build guitars build us two guitars to begin our music school. We are also almost ready for the workshop to be built. Hopefully by mid year we will be able to build the workshop which will host a wood working company and a seamstress.

One Love

Bryan Jay

P.S- I leave to the jungle on Thursday or Friday it seems so I will be updating this blog and the project for everyone on March 10th. After that it will be monthly where I will write about the project and my own experiences. Much love.