For many first-time visitors, ayahuasca arrives surrounded by uncertainty. People hear dramatic stories, see intense reactions, and wonder whether the medicine is truly healing or simply overwhelming. According to Sam Believ, founder of LaWayra Ayahuasca Retreat in Colombia, the answer depends entirely on how the medicine is approached. In the right setting, with the right preparation and guidance, ayahuasca can become one of the most powerful tools for emotional healing available today.

What Ayahuasca Actually Is

Sam explains ayahuasca in very practical terms: it is a traditional brew made by cooking two plants together over several days until they form a thick medicinal liquid.

One ingredient is the ayahuasca vine, while the second is a plant containing DMT, the psychoactive compound that creates the visionary aspect of the experience.

The vine itself plays a crucial role because it allows DMT to become active when taken orally. Without that interaction, the experience would not unfold in the same way.

For indigenous communities, however, the chemistry is only one part of the story. For thousands of years, the brew has been treated not as a drug, but as medicine — something used intentionally for healing, guidance, and understanding.

Why Every Experience Is Different

One of the most important lessons Sam shares is that ayahuasca rarely matches expectations.

Some people expect strong visuals and receive emotional clarity instead. Others expect insight and find themselves confronting physical discomfort, old memories, or powerful body sensations.

He often explains that the medicine seems to respond less to what a person wants and more to what they currently need.

That is why two people sitting side by side in the same ceremony can have completely different experiences.

One may feel deep peace while another moves through fear, grief, or intense internal questioning.

Why Purging Is Often Part of the Healing

For newcomers, vomiting is usually one of the biggest fears.

Yet once people experience it, many describe purging as one of the most meaningful moments of release during ceremony.

Sam explains that physical purging often arrives together with emotional release.

A difficult memory may surface, followed by vomiting, and afterward the emotional charge surrounding that memory often changes.

What felt heavy becomes lighter.

What felt trapped becomes mobile again.

This is why traditional ceremony does not treat purging as a problem, but often as a sign that something important is moving.

Why Safety Depends on Preparation

Although ayahuasca can be deeply healing, Sam emphasizes that it is not for everyone without exceptions.

People with schizophrenia in the family, serious heart conditions, or those taking certain medications — especially antidepressants — need special caution.

The medicine itself is not inherently dangerous for most healthy people, but interactions with medication can be serious.

That is why retreat preparation includes dietary guidance, medication restrictions, and clear screening before arrival.

For an average healthy person, however, he considers ayahuasca extremely safe when served correctly.

Why the Shaman Matters So Much

A major part of that safety comes from the ceremonial leadership.

Sam strongly warns against drinking ayahuasca casually, alone, or with inexperienced facilitators.

In his view, the presence of a real indigenous shaman is not simply cultural decoration — it is central to physical and emotional safety.

A trained shaman understands dosage, pacing, energetic shifts, and how to guide difficult moments during ceremony.

At LaWayra, cups are spaced carefully across the night to prevent people from going too deep too quickly.

That pacing is deliberate: too much medicine too early can make the journey overwhelming rather than productive.

Why Experience Matters More Than Labels

One of Sam’s strongest concerns is the growing number of people who begin serving medicine after very little training.

He believes the global popularity of ayahuasca has created situations where people present themselves as guides without having the depth required to hold ceremonies responsibly.

For him, true ceremonial authority takes years — often decades — of training inside indigenous lineages.

Someone may look spiritual, speak confidently, and still lack the knowledge needed when a ceremony becomes difficult.

That is why he advises people to choose retreats based on lineage, experience, and long-term reputation rather than appearance alone.

Why Depression Often Changes After Ceremony

Sam’s own relationship with ayahuasca began during a period he now recognizes as depression.

He had not been formally diagnosed, but emotionally he knew something was wrong.

His first deeper experiences with medicine did not instantly solve life, but they did something equally important: they removed enough pain for him to see clearly.

That clarity then made change possible.

He often explains that depression is not always random chemistry.

For many people, it is connected to suppressed emotion, dissatisfaction, fear, or unresolved life patterns.

Ayahuasca does not simply numb those feelings — it often reveals them directly.

Why People Call It Years of Therapy

At retreats, many participants describe one week of ceremony as feeling like years of therapy compressed into a short time.

Sam understands why.

In ordinary life, people often avoid uncomfortable thoughts for years.

Inside ceremony, those same thoughts can become impossible to ignore.

But unlike ordinary rumination, the medicine often adds perspective.

Pain appears together with meaning.

Patterns become visible.

What felt chaotic starts to make sense.

Why Integration Is the Real Work

Despite all the intensity of ceremony, Sam repeatedly says the most important part happens afterward.

A powerful experience alone does not change a life unless the person begins applying what they saw.

That is why journaling, walking in nature, meditation, silence, and reflection are all encouraged after retreat.

Sometimes integration means making large changes.

Sometimes it means doing nothing dramatic at all — simply allowing new understanding to settle.

But what matters most is not losing the insight immediately under everyday noise.

Why Modern Life Makes This So Necessary

One reason Sam believes ayahuasca resonates so strongly today is because many people rarely stop long enough to listen to themselves.

Modern life encourages productivity, distraction, and constant stimulation.

Very little space remains for internal reflection.

Even taking one week entirely for healing feels unusual to many people.

Yet he believes that lack of pause is one reason so many people struggle emotionally.

The retreat environment itself becomes healing because for many participants it is the first time in years they have truly stepped away.

A Tool, Not a Miracle

Sam is careful not to present ayahuasca as magic.

It does not automatically create happiness or permanently remove pain.

What it often does is interrupt automatic suffering long enough for new choices to become visible.

For some, that means healing depression.

For others, addiction weakens, anxiety softens, or emotional direction becomes clearer.

But the medicine still expects something afterward: honesty, patience, and willingness to continue the work once ceremony ends.

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Listen to the whole podcast episode here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCjXIHLqh0c

As interest in psychedelic healing continues to grow worldwide, ayahuasca retreats are becoming increasingly visible — but not all retreats are built the same way. For Sam Believ, founder of LaWayra Ayahuasca Retreat in Colombia, the goal has never been simply to create another retreat center. His larger vision is to make deep healing more accessible while preserving traditional indigenous medicine in a way that remains practical for modern people.

That philosophy explains why LaWayra has expanded quickly while also becoming one of the most reviewed ayahuasca retreats in South America.

Why Accessibility Became a Core Principle

One of the strongest beliefs behind Sam’s work is that ayahuasca should not become something available only to wealthy spiritual travelers.

Many retreats in South America charge prices that place the experience beyond reach for many people, especially those already struggling with depression, anxiety, burnout, or emotional crisis.

Sam chose a different route: lower the entry barrier.

For him, accessibility means more than price.

It also means simplifying preparation, reducing unnecessary complexity, and creating an environment where first-timers do not feel intimidated by spiritual formalities.

The retreat is designed so that someone completely new to plant medicine can arrive without already belonging to a spiritual subculture.

Why Traditional Quality Still Matters

Although accessibility is important, Sam insists that lower cost should never mean lower quality in the medicine itself.

One of the strongest elements of LaWayra’s model is that the ayahuasca comes from a traditional indigenous source.

The shaman works within a family lineage where ceremonial knowledge has been passed down through generations.

He grows the vines in the Amazon, harvests them himself, and prepares the medicine through traditional cooking methods.

For Sam, this is one of the biggest differences between authentic retreat work and more superficial operations where medicine may be bought without knowing its full origin.

Why Integration Is Just as Important as Ceremony

Sam repeatedly emphasizes that the ceremony itself is only part of the process.

A powerful ayahuasca experience can open deep emotional insight, but if a person returns home without understanding how to integrate it, much of the long-term benefit may fade.

That is why integration has become a central part of the retreat structure.

Guests are encouraged to reflect, journal, share, and begin translating insights into daily habits.

Without integration, ayahuasca risks becoming a dramatic experience rather than a lasting transformation.

Why the Healing Does Not End After the Retreat

One of Sam’s most practical observations is that true growth begins after people leave Colombia.

Inside the retreat environment, everything supports emotional openness: nature, quiet, ceremony, group connection, and distance from normal pressures.

The real challenge begins when someone returns home.

Traffic, work stress, conflict, family tension, and ordinary life quickly test whether the inner shift is real.

This is why he often says that the real work starts after the retreat, not during it.

Why Ayahuasca Rarely Becomes Addictive

A common concern for people unfamiliar with ayahuasca is whether repeated use creates dependency.

Sam’s answer is simple: ayahuasca is too demanding to become casually addictive.

The process often involves emotional confrontation, physical purging, difficult realizations, and long internal work.

People do not usually crave that for pleasure.

In fact, even experienced drinkers often hesitate before ceremony because they know the medicine demands honesty.

What sometimes happens instead is that people return because they have unfinished work — not because they seek entertainment.

Why Preparation Should Be Serious but Realistic

Sam also rejects extreme preparation requirements that may discourage people unnecessarily.

He believes certain things matter greatly, especially stopping antidepressants and other psychoactive medications well in advance, because some combinations can be dangerous.

But he does not believe someone needs months of extreme discipline before arriving.

In his view, asking deeply anxious or depressed people to become perfectly disciplined before healing often creates another barrier.

A realistic preparation process works better than an idealized one few people can maintain.

Why Colombia Became the Right Place

Although Sam originally came to Colombia long before ayahuasca became central in his life, the country eventually became the natural home for the retreat.

He describes Colombia as a place with unusual balance: strong natural beauty, relatively low cost of living, warm climate, and living indigenous traditions still connected to ayahuasca.

For years Colombia remained overshadowed by Peru in psychedelic tourism, largely because international tourism developed later.

That delay, however, also preserved certain traditions from becoming overly commercialized too early.

Why the Retreat Keeps Expanding

LaWayra began very small.

At first, ceremonies were occasional and informal.

Over time, retreat frequency increased as demand grew.

Today multiple retreat periods run each month, and expansion continues.

New cabins, more infrastructure, and long-term planning are gradually turning the retreat into something larger than short ceremonial visits.

The Vision Beyond Retreats

What Sam ultimately wants is not only a retreat center but a healing community.

The long-term idea includes spaces where people stay longer, work remotely, integrate deeply, exercise, meditate, and remain connected to healthier habits rather than immediately returning to old patterns.

In this vision, ayahuasca becomes an entry point rather than the entire experience.

People come for medicine, but remain for the environment that helps sustain change.

Why Demand Will Likely Keep Growing

Sam believes global demand for plant medicine will continue rising because the scale of emotional suffering is simply too large to ignore.

Depression, anxiety, trauma, and burnout are no longer fringe issues.

At the same time, many people feel conventional approaches have not fully addressed root causes.

As scientific interest in psychedelics grows, he expects more people to explore ayahuasca not out of curiosity alone, but because they are actively searching for a different kind of relief.

For many, that search begins only after everything else has already failed.

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Listen to the whole podcast episode here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1JOmSVheiBw

Ayahuasca and DMT are often mentioned in the same conversation, but according to Sam Believ, founder of LaWayra Ayahuasca Retreat in Colombia, they should not be treated as interchangeable experiences. Although DMT is one of the active compounds found in ayahuasca, he argues that reducing ayahuasca to DMT alone misses almost everything that makes the traditional medicine powerful.

For many newcomers, the comparison begins with convenience. DMT appears fast, intense, and brief. Ayahuasca requires preparation, ceremony, time, and often physical discomfort. Yet Sam believes that this difference is precisely why the two lead to very different outcomes.

Why Ayahuasca Is More Than One Molecule

One of Sam’s simplest comparisons is that isolated DMT is like eating one ingredient from a full meal and assuming you understand the whole dish.

Ayahuasca contains far more than a single psychoactive effect.

The brew combines multiple plants, traditional preparation methods, ceremonial structure, and indigenous knowledge developed over generations.

Even before the medicine is consumed, the setting already shapes the experience: the presence of a shaman, music, intention, ritual order, and emotional containment all influence what happens.

This is why he rejects the idea that ayahuasca can be understood simply as “DMT in liquid form.”

Why Duration Changes Everything

A major difference is time.

DMT often produces a very intense experience lasting only minutes.

Ayahuasca unfolds over several hours.

That longer duration creates space for emotional processes that go beyond visual phenomena.

Instead of being pushed rapidly through extraordinary imagery, participants often move through memories, emotions, realizations, physical release, and internal dialogue in a slower and more structured way.

For Sam, healing often depends on this slower unfolding.

The Role of Purging

One of the most misunderstood parts of ayahuasca is purging.

Many first-timers fear vomiting and see it only as an unpleasant side effect.

Sam describes it very differently.

In his experience, purging is often one of the core mechanisms of release.

People frequently report that after vomiting they feel physically lighter, emotionally calmer, or mentally clearer.

The process is often described not as illness, but as expulsion of something stored deeply inside.

This is one reason he believes isolated psychedelics cannot fully replicate the same healing dynamic.

Why DMT and Ayahuasca Lead to Different Outcomes

Sam does not deny that DMT can produce extraordinary experiences.

People often report contact with entities, geometric realms, or overwhelming visions.

But he emphasizes that powerful imagery does not automatically equal lasting change.

In his observation, many people return from ayahuasca with measurable changes in daily life: reduced depression, less anxiety, less alcohol use, greater emotional clarity, and sometimes complete shifts in long-standing habits.

That type of lasting change appears far less consistently in isolated DMT use.

The Problem of Removing Tradition

A central concern for Sam is what happens when ancient medicines are separated from the traditions that protected them.

He gives several examples of plants that originally had sacred or balanced uses before modern culture transformed them into something very different.

Cacao became sugar-heavy chocolate.

Coca became cocaine.

Tobacco became industrial cigarettes.

In each case, a traditional plant was stripped from its context and altered for convenience or stimulation.

He worries that something similar happens when ayahuasca is reduced to extracted compounds without respect for its ceremonial framework.

Why Ceremony Matters

For Sam, ceremony is not decorative.

It is part of safety.

The shaman is not simply present to create atmosphere but to guide, regulate, and protect the experience.

Traditional music, smoke cleansing, and ritual sequencing all serve specific functions developed over generations.

Without that structure, difficult experiences may become confusing or destabilizing.

This is why he strongly advises against treating powerful psychedelics casually, even when they appear easy to access.

Can DMT Still Have Value?

Although critical of simplification, Sam is not entirely dismissive of DMT.

He accepts that some people may find value in it, especially if approached intentionally.

But he argues that intention matters enormously.

A casual use during a work break or for entertainment misses the seriousness these substances require.

If someone chooses to work with DMT, he believes it should still be done with respect, preparation, and a clear internal reason.

Why Ayahuasca Often Feels Self-Regulating

One of the most striking aspects he describes is that ayahuasca often appears to regulate the relationship itself.

Some people who return too quickly without integrating previous lessons report difficult ceremonies.

In Sam’s own experience, coming back too soon led to a harsh session that seemed to reflect unfinished inner work.

This has led many experienced drinkers to describe ayahuasca almost as a teacher that responds differently depending on how a person approaches it.

Why Western Thinking Often Seeks Shortcuts

A recurring theme in Sam’s perspective is that modern culture constantly searches for faster versions of everything.

Shorter methods.

Simpler formulas.

More immediate results.

But he believes some things lose their essence when stripped down too aggressively.

Healing, especially deep emotional healing, often requires time, discomfort, and patience.

Ayahuasca does not fit neatly into the modern desire for speed.

Ancient Knowledge in a Modern World

For Sam, the real lesson is not that tradition must remain frozen, but that modern systems should approach older knowledge with humility.

It is possible to combine modern retreat organization, medical screening, and psychological integration with indigenous ceremonial wisdom.

But removing tradition entirely often creates confusion rather than progress.

The medicine may still work, but something essential becomes weaker.

In that sense, ayahuasca remains not just a substance, but a relationship between plant, ritual, guide, and human intention.

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Listen to the whole podcast episode here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIhKaWBbuBs