In this episode of Ayahuasca Podcast, host Sam Believ (founder of http://www.lawayra.com) has a conversation with Brigitte Kolibab.

Brigitte is a yoga teacher, ceremony facilitator, and long-time student of both Eastern spiritual practices and Amazonian plant medicine. Her work focuses on bridging the gap between the yogic path and the Ayahuasca experience, offering integration tools through body-based practices. She co-leads the Yoga & Integration retreats at LaWayra.

We touch upon topics of:

  • The impact of psychedelics on someone with an existing spiritual practice (00:03:40)
  • How Ayahuasca can enhance your yoga and meditation, and vice versa (00:06:10)
  • Using yoga as a tool for integration (00:10:45)
  • The Yoga & Integration retreats at LaWayra (00:13:25)
  • Psychedelic states that can be achieved through yoga alone (00:17:00)
  • The role of synchronicity and how Ayahuasca amplifies it (00:20:30)
  • How Ayahuasca influences manifestation (00:23:40)
  • Reflections on our first and most recent yoga retreats (00:28:15)
  • Why we’re planning more Yoga & Integration retreats (00:31:00)
  • How LaWayra has changed in the last two years (00:35:20)
  • Her favorite moments from the retreats (00:39:00)
  • Parallels between the yogic system and the Ayahuasca path (00:42:10)
  • Crossovers between Ayahuasca and other modalities like breathwork and meditation (00:47:30)

If you would like to attend one of our Ayahuasca retreats go to http://www.lawayra.com

Find more about Brigitte Kolibab on Instagram at @b.khonest

Transcript

Sam Believ: You’re listening to ayahuasca podcast.com.

Brigitte Kolibab: I think what you can learn from your ayahuasca experience is something you can learn maybe in 10 years of deep meditation. After so much meditation, you might finally learn to forgive someone that hurt you to be present in your life. You might experience these deep feelings of.

When you drink ayahuasca without meditating ever, you can experience these things. Then when you meditate after this experience, I believe you can reconnect with those feelings much more easily. You can reconnect with the feeling of love. You can reconnect with forgiveness. You can reconnect with whatever you experience.

You can even continue what you are working on. Often. In the integration retreat in meditation, people were revisiting their experience and receiving new insights. They were. Continuing the message of Ayahuasca and they were giving themselves a clear place to connect with it, which I think was really important.

I feel like as someone who’s meditated a lot before ever trying Ayahuasca and ever before, ever trying psychedelics in general, I was. Experiencing what I experienced in meditation, but in a much, much deeper way. So I was able to understand a little more. I think sometimes when we like engage with these medicines, we learn things that we might not be quite ready for.

Sam Believ: Hi guys, and welcome to ayahuasca podcast.com. As always with you, the whole assembly. Today I have an interview in a conversation with Bridget kba. Is that how you say it? Yeah. Kba. Bridget is a Brooklyn based yoga instructor, artist, and a retreat leader known for her transformative and immersive experiences.

She began practicing yoga in the age of 15. Great. He’s surprised ’cause they failed website. Yeah. Yeah. For formal training includes a 200 hour certification from Raja Yoga in Philadelphia and a 500 hour certification from Ish Ash Yo Yoku. Okay. She’s also an artist and I was enthusiast. Starting from recently.

In this episode, we talk about what happens when someone with existing spiritual practice try psychedelics. How Ayahuasca can improve your yoga and meditation experience, and how your yoga and meditation can improve your ayahuasca experience. Yoga is a form of integration. We talk about our yoga integration retreats here at Laira.

Psychedelic experiences that can be achieved by simply doing yoga. Talk about synchronicities and how ayahuasca enhances them. Manifestation, and so much more. Enjoyed this episode. This episode is sponsored by Laira Ayahuasca Retreat. At Laira, we combine affordability, accessibility, and authenticity.

Laira, connect, heal, grow. Guys, I’m looking forward to hosting you, Bridgette, welcome to the show. Thank you so much. Bridgette tell us about your history what brought you to yoga and then eventually what brought you to Ayahuasca?

Brigitte Kolibab: Okay. I think I was always very. Naturally inclined to the yoga meditation.

I remember one of my earliest memories was trying to explain to my mom that I felt like I had a front of a mind and a back of a mind, and the back of my mind could watch the front of my mind, and she was not understanding at all. I felt so frustrated, but I feel as a very young person, I was understanding this idea of observing my own thoughts, and then I had a pretty.

Loving family. But it was I would say a troublesome in my home. And when I was a teenager, I found a yoga studio that, because I didn’t have a lot of money, they had this offer. If you bring someone, you get to go for free. And I went to so many classes and I started feeling wow, yoga makes me love my boyfriend more.

But I think in reality I was just. Learning how to love myself more, connecting with myself. So then when I was 18, I started teaching. I had a lot of experiences early on. Then with meditation, I remember going to a music festival and. I was pushed into this tent and they put these headphones on me and this guy’s voice was saying, I am not the body.

I am not even the mind. And that was the first experience I had with deep meditation where I felt like I was floating above my own body. Oh, body. Oh yeah. It was incredible. And that’s also the place that I first started experimenting a little bit with psychedelics and learned some really powerful.

Messages there. But then I got my certifications in yoga. I was working other jobs and during the pandemic I had a huge online community, maybe 50 people across 50 or five or six different time zones. And it was that point where I realized, okay, I can build something from this and I don’t have to go back to working for other people.

So I started, running retreats. And then I found my way, my first international street here in Fredonia, Columbia. And it

Sam Believ: was your first one?

Brigitte Kolibab: My first international one, yeah.

Sam Believ: Okay. I didn’t know that. I thought you were doing that for a while.

Brigitte Kolibab: No, I had done maybe 10 retreats in New York and Pennsylvania, but I decided to do the retreat here and I found an Airbnb.

I looked at maybe 30 Airbnbs all over South America, and I had no real reason to choose this one other than a friend said, that one looks good. And I felt okay, that’s the universe speaking through that person. I’ll just choose that house. And then after I decided to rent it, but actually before I even got there, you reached out to me on Facebook.

And then it turned out we were here in the same. Tiny place in Columbia.

Sam Believ: Yeah, it’s very interesting because let me gonna switch the video to a wide lens. For those of you who are watching, who are listening, I recommend you find this video on YouTube and just see the background. So this is Fredonia behind us.

You can see the mountain, that’s called Sara Bravo, angry Mountain. And then behind you can see our maloca. But Fredonia is basically a really random place. So when I saw on Facebook that somebody was organizing a retreat them for, I was like, oh my God, I’m not alone. So I reached out.

Then you ended up coming to the Ayahuasca retreat. Yeah. And then I came to your retreat and some people from your retreat came to mine. And actually, when was it? Two years ago?

Brigitte Kolibab: This was a year and a half ago. But I had been thinking about Ayahuasca before you reached out. And like everyone says, I felt like I was waiting for the call.

I was waiting for it to find me, which has been how all of my psychedelic experiences throughout my life has have been actually. But, that day that you reached out, I. I had really bad menstrual cramps is, which is more relevant for later, and I was thinking so much about my heritage, my family, where I came from, in this deep process of pain and thinking about my lineage and.

I was thinking so much about my Lithuanian grandfather. So then when you told me that you were from Latvia, I felt like it was a big coincidence. And I also have a German grandmother that died from a brain tumor. So that same day I met a German man in the grocery store who told me. That his grandmother died from a brain tumor.

So I felt like the world was just like hearing these things about Germany. And then I also have some Native American roots that I actually learned more about in the ayahuasca ceremony recently. So all of these things came together and then I got your call. And something that I have never told you actually was about a week before I came here, I had a dream that you were in.

And your face was combined with the tus face. And when I saw you for the first time here, I was really surprised and taken aback. ’cause I had realized that you had been in a dream of mine a week before.

Sam Believ: Yeah. That’s pretty freaky. Who was it that Drew Titus face together with a Tiger’s face, one of the patients?

Oh, I don’t know. It’s like there’s something about ayahuasca, like faces burned together, but yeah, it’s definitely very synchronistic. Like the fact that you found from all the places, all the Airbnbs with the pool and stuff like that, you ed on you and how random it is and how unexplored it is. Like honestly, this area has no tourism.

Like right now we probably, the wire probably brings. All of the international tourists here are like 95%. Yeah. To the town,

Brigitte Kolibab: which makes it amazing to come here because there aren’t tourist prices. There isn’t that like distance between people and visitors. That’s crazy. People still,

Sam Believ: people here still like Ringo.

Yeah. They haven’t been worn out. There’s definitely some suspicion. The jelly, when we’ve been here for about four years now. We have a lot of guests staying, like a lot of times like blonde. Women like yourself, and I was always worried like, oh, something’s gonna happen. But they always catch rides and people are friendly.

Yeah. And nothing ever happens except for good things. But yeah. Let’s talk about synchronicities. Like obviously the way I found you was pretty random. Then you came and you found out was through us. Now we did another retreat and one really great. There’s a chance that we might be doing a lot of them, and that’s what we’re gonna talk about later as well.

For those of you who might be interested in integration retreat with Bridget. But let’s talk about synchronicities. Ha have you talk about synchronism in your life, in your journey. Like the one that you obviously pay attention to those little cues.

Brigitte Kolibab: Definitely. I feel like my life is one synchronicity after another.

I’ve had experiences where I’m in a tiny airport in some country in Europe, and then I hear someone say Bridget, and I turn, and it’s someone I went to university with or something like that. Even here in my break in Meine, I was at an Airbnb where. The other guest had stayed with a really good friend of mine in Italy.

But when I find synchronicities like this where I meet someone who knows someone I know or, I maybe see or find an object that just showed up in a dream, which is something that happens to me often. I always follow that. I feel like, okay, I’m on my path, or the universe is speaking to me through symbols, and I’m being guided to wherever I need to go, even if I don’t know exactly what I’m wanting.

I just have full faith that when these experiences happen, it means I’m on my path.

Sam Believ: Yeah. And then the way you described Ayahuasca calling you, that’s also a very interesting and very common one. Like I remember when I was going to drink Ayahuasca for the first time, for a period of time, I just started hearing about it from every direction or podcast.

And it’s just kinda almost like these days if you talk about something on, on social media, they like algorithms start feeding you, but it’s like in, in the offline world. Which is really interesting. And funny enough, I went from being cold to I asking now from through this podcast and through retreat and social media, now I become a messenger.

And a lot of times people say yeah, I don’t know if I’m cold to, I ask, I say if you’re hearing my voice, then basically you’re being called. I’m an unofficial messenger. You’re the ayahuasca angel, one of, one of the very many.

Brigitte Kolibab: And now I feel like by through you, I’m also now becoming that for some people in my life who were afraid to try ayahuasca, thinking about it.

Heard I was doing the integration retreat and felt like. They should come here and try it for the first time.

Sam Believ: So you first tried Ayahuasca here a year and a half ago? I

Brigitte Kolibab: did.

Sam Believ: And then obviously we just finished the retreat a few days ago and you did it again. So ta talk to us about your ayahuasca experiences and how does it tie into your spiritual practice and your healing journey.

Brigitte Kolibab: My first ayahuasca experience here, the reason that I mentioned that I was having menstrual cramps is because. A really big message that I got is that period of time is incredibly powerful and intuitive for me, and I’ve always had, feelings like maybe because I have a lot of pain during that time, that there’s something wrong with me that needs to be fixed.

But I got this big message that it’s actually a connection to source energy. It’s a time where I can receive a lot of messages. So it’s no surprise that you reached out to me during that time when I was in this big period of intuition. And then I also. I feel like what had been getting in the way between me and growing my business, me and reaching more people was a little bit of a feeling of imposter syndrome.

Like I knew I had so much confidence in what I was doing and what I was teaching. And then sometimes right before retreat I would start to feel like, who am I to deliver this information? And. During my Ayahuasca experience the first time here, my very first ceremony, I was lucky to have a really deep connection with the medicine.

I completely connected with the feeling of. My own power, which seems to be a common experience for people where they become more confident. And I feel like that reassurance from what felt like an outside source, that I’m doing exactly what I need to be doing, that I’m on my path, that I am a powerful person with a strong message, really changed over the past year and a half how I’ve been thinking about my work and.

I’ve always been incredibly impulsive with my choices. Like the synchronicities, when I experience one, I follow them. But after the ayahuasca, I think that was even stronger and it led to a lot of really great situations in my life. One of them being going to India and having many also magical experiences there.

That I don’t know if I would’ve necessarily followed, if I hadn’t gotten that confidence and that push from the medicine. And then since I’ve been here recently I feel like. I’ve been doing a lot of asking the medicine how I can help people integrate, and I’ve been seeing a lot of my own ego, a lot about other people’s ego, a lot about how to help people from where they are, and then experiencing very deep sensations from my childhood that I’m not really sure yet how they’re informing me, but I’m sure I’ll learn soon.

Sam Believ: Yeah, I think I saw a moment where something came up for you and you just had to go have a little cry.

Yeah. I’m not gonna ask what happened, but it’s interesting, like what you’re describing that. You had your first ask experience a year and a half ago, and then slowly kinda started doing something through you.

That’s something that I was trying to describe to people because I had my first OW ASK experience, and although I was, I connected and it was profound, but it wasn’t really, it wasn’t like an immediate answer. It’s oh, here you go, and here’s, not like a soda machine where you like put in a coin and the soda comes out and the transaction is over.

Yeah. It’s more of a, like a drip. Where you get a little bit of information, as I like to say, ayahuasca is not gonna change your life, but it will redirect you by one degree and you end up in a totally different place. It’s like a slow simmering process of realizations and just you change so slowly and so gradually you almost not notice it, but you end up being a totally different person always for the better.

So I don’t know if you can attest to that or how it felt for you.

Brigitte Kolibab: Yeah, I think that. I’ve had a really deep spiritual practice from an early age, and then in a more formal way when I was a teenager and over the past 10 years or so, even deeper. So I feel like I had this. The foundation already of connection to things that are greater to myself than myself, connection to moving into a trance-like state.

So I feel like when the Ayahuasca joined me, I was really able to hold the medicine and understand in a really deep way, like feeling like I was. Connecting to the universe through this medicine. And then the synchronicities were stronger, the manifestations were more powerful. It was like a way to deepen my connection that I had already started forming a pathway, but then the ayahuasca just came through and you feel so much more connected to the universe, connected to your path, and I feel like it’s easier to find.

Where you are meant to go. So maybe it’s not that the direction changed for me because I was already moving towards it. It just made the pathway more smooth, it increased it, if that makes sense. I don’t know if I’m speaking too.

Sam Believ: Yeah. Metaphorically or so. What I like to say is plant medicines and all the plants and the ayahuasca, but also tobacco they’re somewhat of an antenna that increases your signal.

Yeah. So if you’re like, manifesting, ’cause that, obviously I haven’t manifested all of this here pretty consciously. And if you’re manifesting something but then you drink the medicine. Your signal is stronger. And it brings me this thought that I had a long time ago. I don’t know if I ever shared it, but people think oh, ayahuasca is this religion, and if you drink ayahuasca, you believe in ayahuasca and Mother Ayahuasca is your God.

I don’t agree with it because what it seems to me, and we had people from different religions that they all connect to their old version of God. So like I think what I ask if if God is internet. Like something you’re connecting to Ayahuasca is a computer or a smartphone. It’s like an interface. Yeah. Or like that’s what comes through me because it’s just this thing that like, whatever you want, it just guides you to it to just so malleable and so varied. But it

Brigitte Kolibab: makes a lot of sense to me, and I feel like I’ve seen here it’s like some people are going online for the very first time and they have this big whoa, what is the internet experience? And then other people that have had moments of going online where then they can like, I don’t know, look up things for longer or watch videos or have a deeper experience.

Sam Believ: Just like you were going online from like a. 2000 smart, like not smartphone, but just a flip phone.

And all of a sudden you get like a nice sort of fancy tablet experience. Yeah. And then it’s so much clearer and you have the HD video and stuff like that. Yeah. It’s very interesting because some people also believe Ayahuasca is a technology like the. Somebody figured it out how to mix those two plants and then left it for us.

And maybe we lost something, but that, that remained. One thing I wanna talk about is something is that we don’t talk about a lot, if ever. I don’t think I ever mentioned the topic, and it’s something that is not comfortable for me to talk about, especially in the ceremony, which is you mentioned menstrual cramps and all of that energetic aspect of menstruation and stuff like that.

In the ceremony shamans they take this very seriously. So I call, if a woman is on her period, she has to be like, on the other side of the room and don’t come close to them because there’s like a conflict in masculine versus feminine energy, whatever. And then there can be like a rupture and but.

It’s not me, it’s not me asking you, but it’s just an opportunity for me to mention the topic. Yeah. Because we’re actually gonna do a workshop about it Yeah. This week. And so my understanding is that you describe yourself when you were in that state. Yeah. You were more connected and something is happening because honestly, o obviously the energy that happens there in your womb.

Around that time. It’s basically, it’s the energy that is strong enough to create a new life. Yeah. So it’s like really powerful thing. Yeah. So that’s why I guess the shamans are treating it so seriously because it can be so strong and overwhelming for them that it can hurt them. Yeah. I don’t know.

What are your thoughts about that? If you have any knowledge? Ha Have you had experience that you had to drink the medicine while you were on your Luna, as they call it here, moon?

Brigitte Kolibab: I haven’t yet, but on my moon, I keep getting, every time I’m away, I am on my moon so far. But I do feel like the more we connect to our bodies as women, the more we also understand our own cycles.

And actually, when I am. On my, like, when I’m really focused in meditation and yoga and practicing every day and really in tune with myself, almost always I sink to the full moon. So there’s something greater than myself with my menstrual cycle that’s moving through the world, through the universe a little more deeply.

Sam Believ: Or maybe you’re just a werewolf.

Brigitte Kolibab: Maybe I’m a werewolf. We could put both to the test for sure, but I think that time. Is incredibly powerful. And because it’s uncomfortable to talk about or because it’s something like not as societally accepted it’s something that women will hide. We don’t talk about, we don’t respect necessarily it’s not respected even by other women sometimes when you want rest on this tire or whatever.

But I think that it’s a time where we’re. Having a really powerful release that deserves respect, that actually increases intuition and allows us to connect with ourselves on the earth a lot more.

Sam Believ: Yeah, it’s like a renewal and very powerful stuff. But yeah. So let’s talk about the integration retreat we just did.

Why did we do it? How did it go? Were you happy with the result?

Brigitte Kolibab: Definitely, I think it was,

Sam Believ: first of all, tell people what is the retreat, what happens there and why should they come?

Brigitte Kolibab: What happens during the integration retreat, it’s five days after your Ayahuasca experience. And it’s a really powerful and important time because this is when your neuroplasticity is the greatest.

So a lot of times people. They think you might spend time integrating, but in reality you might actually go back to the city and have a party go back to work go into old habits. So the retreat gives people an opportunity to be here, where they took the medicine to be in nature. And then every morning.

On this past retreat, we did the morning pages, which is a brain dump in your journal. Every morning was silent so people could have their own time to process. I served tea and then we did yoga practices, breath work, meditation every single morning, and then other activities like. A manifestation workshop.

There was a workshop where we broke down dreams and symbols so you could understand your subconscious mind a little more, and maybe what happened in the ceremony, having time to understand the symbols that came up for you. And then we also. The cacao ceremony, which was a really fun time for people to dance and enjoy together because during the Ayahuasca ceremonies, even though we’re all together, we’re very much in our individual process.

So this was a time to bond together as a community, to dance, to play a little, to have fun, and then have our times of solitude where we look deeply in ourselves. The way I had it organized this time was each day was seemed with a certain energy center in the body. If you’re not familiar with the seven chakras, these are where they’re clusters of energy in the body that affect certain parts of ourselves or our life.

So I started with the root chakra, and that day it was very much about grounding safe. D rest. And then when we moved into the next day, we were in the sacral chakra. And this is about feminine energy, creativity. So we did an art activity. The yoga classes were themed that way. Solar plex of chakra is our power in the world manifesting masculine energy.

We. Fire that day. And then heart chakra, we were connecting with each other. We had the cacao, which really opens your heart. We did an eye gazing meditation, which is uncomfortable for some people at first, but ended up being really powerful in the end. And then through chakra, we practiced a big somatic release.

We made a lot of noise that day. I don’t know if you heard it. Yeah, we were shouting and really connecting with our voice in the world. So I think themed like this with the energy centers in the body, it allows us to connect and align with our own energy and then really gives us a time when we have the heightened neuroplasticity to be able to begin forming good habits and also find what connects us to our own flow state.

There was someone who actually told me that they had practiced yoga. Several times over the years, and they never really enjoyed it or got it. They just waited until it was over, moved through it. They knew it was good for themselves, so they did it. And then after their ayahuasca ceremonies doing yoga here, they were like, wow.

Now I understand yoga. I get this now for the first time after all these years. So I think opening yourself with the ayahuasca also allows you to invite in these practices that are self connection and healthy, good for your mind, your body and your spirit.

Sam Believ: Yeah, it’s it’s a question I also wanted to ask you because as you mentioned, somebody came here and it enhanced their yoga experience.

Yeah. So what do you think about. Ayahuasca. Enhancing your yoga and meditation and yoga and meditation, enhancing your ayahuasca experience.

Brigitte Kolibab: I think the connection is huge. I think what you can learn from your ayahuasca experience is something you can learn maybe in 10 years of deep meditation. After so much meditation, you might finally learn to forgive someone that hurt you to be present in your life.

You might experience these deep feelings of love when you drink ayahuasca without meditating ever, you can experience these things. Then when you meditate after this experience, I believe you can reconnect with those feelings much more easily. You can reconnect with the feeling of love. You can reconnect with forgiveness.

You can reconnect with whatever you experienced. You can even continue what you were working on. Often in the integration retreat in meditation, people were. Revisiting their experience and receiving new insights. They were continuing the message of Ayahuasca and they were giving themselves a clear place to connect with it, which I think was really important.

I feel like as someone who’s meditated a lot before ever trying Ayahuasca and ever before, ever trying psychedelics in general, I was. Experiencing what I experienced in meditation, but in a much, much deeper way. So I was able to understand a little more. I think sometimes when we. Engage with these medicines.

We learn things that we might not be quite ready for, and then the experience can be challenging, but I think meditation opens us up to be ready for those experiences. So meditating before your ayahuasca journey is, in my belief, the most helpful thing that you can do for yourself to prepare.

Sam Believ: Yeah.

With achieving the states, the similar states that you can achieve and all the parallels, I dunno. You’ve been to India, they say that in the past they also had some fancy psychedelic called and it’s kind sounds similar to Ayahuasca. Have you heard anything about that? I don’t

Brigitte Kolibab: know

Sam Believ: about it.

Nothing at all. Sorry. But yeah, so I’m just, I suspect that people who were developing yoga and meditation and other breath work and all of the spiritual stuff, I have a feeling that they were. Connected to you? Yeah. Through some medicines as well, because it’s kinda like hard to imagine somebody just comes and writes ves just by themselves.

But if you think that maybe they’re working with someone, ’cause psychedelics can also be a great tool for learning.

Brigitte Kolibab: Yeah. I think that in India, a lot of people that I met were very. Like anti doing or taking anything to en enhance their experience. So I started doing a lot of just little research on this, hearing what some of these people in India were saying about ayahuasca.

And I came across a really interesting story about oh. Not Alan Watts, Ramdas. Ramdas had a guru in India and he brought him LSD. And he kept taking the LSD and kept taking the LSD because his practice was so strong it didn’t affect him. But then he gave the message like, okay if you focus your mind on God and you do this in a cool place, you can take your yogi drugs.

And I really kept that with me. Okay, so long as you’re focused on the right message, you’re having a solitary experience and you’re not overheating like it’s supported.

Sam Believ: Yeah, from the story, somebody gave some sad psychedelic and they said after having the experience said, this is close as you can go before without going crazy.

Yeah. It’s as deep as you can go.

Brigitte Kolibab: Yeah.

Sam Believ: I somewhere believe that. Leave that. Let’s go back to the integration retreats. Okay. What what do people say?

Brigitte Kolibab: I think that, let’s see. There were some people that were incredibly happy to learn these yoga practices and meditation for the first time. There were other people that had tried Ayahuasca before but didn’t integrate after, and they felt a little lost about how to navigate their experience.

So this really helped them navigate. And there were other people that really felt like it was incredibly important to be actually where they had their ceremony and remember everything for several days to think about it to be here. And then with the help of yoga and meditation, all the different practices begin to dissect and understand what to do next a little better, I think to have this incredibly deep experience and then to.

Go off into the world, it can be really jarring for some people without a little bit extra help.

Sam Believ: Yeah, definitely. I would, I took part myself in some of the events and it was pretty cool. Your yoga is very good for somebody. Thanks. None, not yogic as I am. Very not flexible. It was good. My hips are much more open now.

So I think it’s, yeah, I’ve observed people as well, ’cause obviously. We’ve done the re we’ve done one retreat before, but we did ayahuasca here and then we did the yoga a few days later at the other place. And I already gathered some information, but this this was all here and it was all very smooth and very well organized.

And people were definitely very happy. And I think that in a perfect world, we would do that after every retreat and everyone would stay and gladly commit. But the reality is. Yeah. Integration is one of those things that people really need, but they don’t really want. Yeah. It is kinda, it might seem like this extra work and it’s like stretching after the exercise.

Everyone wants to lift heavy, but nobody wants to stretch. I, myself, guilty, never stretch. This is why my yoga is not going that great. But, it’s necessary, but it’s whatever. You always think it’s like this secondary thing till you like get a lesion or something and then all of a sudden you start warming up before and you start stretching after.

So I definitely, because we do so much work with integration, like we have this course now and we have an integration coach and knowing how little percentage of the people actually does it. Yeah. Like actively engages with it. And then after. While they regret it, and then maybe in the future they finally learn it.

So I don’t know do you have any words for people to motivate them to actually integrate, whether by staying at one of your retreats or by just doing it by themselves?

Brigitte Kolibab: If you’re already making the commitment to do one of the most powerful psychedelics on earth and you’re opening your mind, you’re coming to Columbia to have this experience.

Then if you’re already making that commitment, you might as well also make the commitment to yourself to make sure that you go back to your life a better, healthier person with understanding of the messaging, not just have this huge experience and then go off into the world and try to figure it out on your own.

I think the support is incredibly helpful and just integrating in general for me personally. I feel like it’s taken weeks, months to understand. And if I didn’t have a yoga practice already, if I didn’t have a meditation practice already, I don’t know how I would’ve fully understood it.

Sam Believ: Keep

Brigitte Kolibab: talking.

Okay. I also think it’s really important to understand that yoga isn’t, it’s not just like stretching and breathing. It’s wonderful that your hips are more open after the yoga practice. The physical benefits are absolutely huge, and the health of the spine, the overall health of the body, longevity of the body is incredibly important.

But yoga itself is the philosophy that the goal or the, not necessarily the goal. ’cause you don’t have goals in yoga, but the final step is samati enlightenment, absorption, and. Your Ayahuasca experience gets you a little bit closer to that, but without having a practice to hold what you learned, to remember, what you learned, to reconnect with that feeling, you might just lose it and go back to who you were before or.

You might feel inclined to change and then you don’t know how, and you might go back to the job that you’re not liking, knowing that you like it less or go back to the relationship that you’re not liking or forget. And I think if we want to make the world a better place, we have to hold the messaging that we’re learning here and share it with other people and have practices that make us healthier.

Sam Believ: Yeah. The challenge with, would I ask the analogy that I’ve heard somewhere and I wish somebody tells me who authored it, but if you see the mountain behind me and you imagine that the top of the mountain is the Samati and the Enlightenment and nirvana and whatever you want to call it, then there’s many different paths you can climb up the mountain.

Like hundreds of them, like very different paths. And I ask is like a helicopter that takes you straight to the top. And but then with the sort of clause in the contract that after a very short time, it takes you back down. So in a way, I think it’s very helpful because you can know what you’re striving to.

Yeah. In your in your spiritual practice, what you’re, what’s the state you’re trying to achieve. So you know where you’re going, kinda have a map, but at the same time, also it can be, a little overwhelming because you don’t know. How to deal with that state while you’re shortly in it.

So that’s what I was composed glow. So this is why integration is very important,

Brigitte Kolibab: especially in that afterglow time because not only are you your, is your brain. Ready to rewire and learn new pathways, but also your central nervous system can learn new habits. So if you go right to stress where you’re in a nervous state and you’re not breathing correctly, your central nervous system will respond and go back to that state.

But if you. Learn in the afterglow, how to relax the body, how to slow down the central nervous system, and you’ll be able to build this habit of being more relaxed. And for me personally, the ayahuasca and integration practices have really increased my intuition, where even when I’m helping with ceremony now I’m.

I’m having little psychic experiences. I am getting inner dialogue from other people. I am seeing images that people tell me later they were thinking about when I’m not even connected to the medicine. So I feel like it can also open us up to some pretty magical experiences too. And I’m hoping that this really deep intuition will increase the more I do the medicine and the more I meditate.

Yeah,

Sam Believ: you’ll come to the point where you’ll be tripping just by entering into Maloca.

Brigitte Kolibab: Yeah. That’s how I felt the first time. Like when I came back here, I felt really tired and I sat down to meditate and I felt like when I opened my eyes, the grass on the hill was breathing. And I’m like, am I tripping?

Just arriving at, yeah,

Sam Believ: there’s been so much. I was drank here and now, so it’s like in the air. It

Brigitte Kolibab: really is.

Sam Believ: Yeah, you just you come here and feel the energy. Yeah. It’s it’s very interesting the, this talk, talk to us about the ceremonies as well your psychedelic experiences and also your experience being in the service, in the ceremony, in

Brigitte Kolibab: service.

I, I feel really good in that role because I think it takes an incredible amount of intuition and. I feel like I’ve received messages from the medicine while helping with ceremony. So when we’re here volunteering typically we have a teeny tiny, a microdose of ayahuasca that we drink in order to protect us and also help connect us to the group.

And there’s commonly these little. Psychic bonding experiences with the group. Sometimes people are receiving messages about another person. One time after helping with a ceremony someone came up to me and said, mama Ayahuasca told me that you’re going to be very safe on your travels. So I wasn’t connected to the medicine, but he was, and then the medicine was talking to me or to me through him.

And I even had one experience where someone. I fell on one of the volunteers and they’re very deep in their process and she fell on the ground. But a second before it happened, I knew that I had to go over there. It was a really strong intuition of, go over there, something’s gonna happen, you need to help.

And then the moment it happened, I was right there to pull him off of her. I also saw at one point when I was helping during ceremony, someone very deep in her process, a purple orb coming out of her. I saw at one point dark shadows move across the room, and one time I heard a voice in my mind say, forget everything you’ve ever learned.

Stop thinking, just feel. And I took that as very strong personal advice. So when I’m helping with the ceremonies, I’ll have moments where I try to feel what’s going on. And 95% of the time it’s just people. Purging, they’re just puking in their buckets. They need a napkin or water. But if you, if I close my eyes and really feel what’s happening in the room, I’ll, I almost hear people as if they’re right next to my ear.

I think because hearing is increased on ayahuasca, so I feel incredibly connected with the group. And I’ve even had experiences where I feel as if I am. I going into other people’s bodies during ceremony and feeling where their tension is. So I felt like I went into someone’s body and they had a really big tension in their stomach and then they purged and I felt this great sense of relief.

So often when people are purging and I’m helping with the ceremonies, I feel so relieved with them. It’s like an. Over empathy experience,

Sam Believ: you can take it to the next level. And some people purge for other people.

Brigitte Kolibab: Wow.

Sam Believ: So you’ll be like, oh you’re going through a really rough time. Let me purge for you.

And then you purge and they get a relief.

Brigitte Kolibab: That feels the ultimate act of Yeah. Empathy.

Sam Believ: T has to be careful. It seems like you’re after his job.

Brigitte Kolibab: I actually, during ceremony, have had a really strong feeling to protect the title. So that’s, I think his job is protected. I’m just there for support.

Sam Believ: Yeah. Ts help. But yeah, it’s is definitely feel, it feels like you’re in that direction of like spiritual gifts, so you should definitely drink more and maybe someday you can. Become one as well. Not that it’s a necessity, but definitely some people are called. You mentioned like imposter syndrome when you were organizing your first retreats and you’re like, who am I to do it?

Yeah. How do you feel now about that and what have you learned and maybe words of encouragement for people listening that maybe wanna organize something?

Brigitte Kolibab: I think a lot of us feel this imposter syndrome and. Like, when I started doing this, I was a lot younger than most of my peers. So being a young woman I always feel like I maybe have to fight a little harder to prove that I am capable or intelligent or a leader in some ways.

But I think that. The more I follow my impulses, the more I do, the less I deal with imposter syndrome. And I think the moment that we feel it creeping in this, oh, I might not be good enough, or I might not, the other people might not like it, it’s important to honor those feelings and then totally ignore them.

I think they always come up for us. Have they come up for you at all? Any feelings?

Sam Believ: Absolutely. In the very beginning. It’s better now. Because we’re pretty well established. Yeah. But in the beginning I was like, what am I even doing here? We would be in the backyard of my home.

Somebody screaming and had a newborn at home was like, what the hell? Yeah. But what helped me personally work through that was the fact that I always had a Tita. Yeah. So I was never like, oh, here I am. I’m gonna give you Ayahuasca and that, that would be crazy. Never do this, please.

But because I had a Tita and I was like, plugging into an ancient tradition, it made me feel like, yeah I’m here. I’m just, I’m connecting people with the tradition. I’m just making a smooth transition. I’m a clutch. Yeah. I’m not wheels, I’m not a motor. I’m a clutch.

And that helped. But obviously now as we progressed, we ayahuasca is almost became smaller part of the experience because of how much more there is to it, and integration being one of the things we’re adding. So that. It definitely feels like we carry a bigger part of the responsibility now, but also I’m not by myself now.

Obviously I have a big team and if you are, if you’re planning to organize something and you are afraid that people will judge you or whatever, just know they will. Like I have people, I remember I was promoting on Facebook and this like you were just a drug dealer and this is. You’re blah, blah, you’re this terrible whatever.

Yeah. And those are the people that need a ask the most. Yeah. Paradoxically. But, so there will be judgment and there will be people judging you and you will judge yourself, but somebody has, you have to start somewhere. I

Brigitte Kolibab: had a message in Spanish saying, don’t waste your money feeding this woman’s ego.

Sam Believ: Yeah. So you have to start somewhere. So if you wanna do something, just go for it, because nobody is a perfect from the beginning. You have to start somewhere and there will be mistakes made and there will be difficult moments. And, but if you don’t, like babies, when they learn walking, they’re gonna fall a couple times.

Yeah. It’s just otherwise what Never walk. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. And hater’s gonna hate.

Brigitte Kolibab: We also often. When you have a gift, when you have a call to do something, but we’re so much more afraid of our talents and our gifts and our success than we are failure. So often we won’t do the thing that we’re meant to do because.

We’re scared of what will happen or what could change or what it will become. And personally, I feel like getting over these fears has gotten to me a place or to a place where I’m living my dream life. I’m traveling and teaching yoga and making art, making some money, teaching yoga on my computer, going to amazing places like Lura, and it’s been incredible.

So whatever fears you have, whatever is on the other side. Is so much more gratifying and so much more valuable.

Sam Believ: And the last advice for those of you dealing with imposter syndrome takes some ayahuasca, preferably at low ira, preferably doing an integration retreat afterwards. Yeah, because for me personally I had my first Ayahuasca experience and it was beautiful and profound, but it didn’t really bring much meaning.

I was like this is great. Crossed off my list, I can move on with my life. And I thought it was just this thing that I did and it’s whatever. But what I realized later, a few years, like few months ago, maybe a year ago, I found the video that I made three months after my first Ayahuasca experience, or two months where I was like setting goals for my life.

And like all of them became reality. But something changed in me where I was setting goals and I was like recording them on video and I was just like, I always made me believe in myself. Yeah, just sadly. Yeah. And so that’s a very good tip. Bridget, when’s the next integration retreat and why should people that are listening, why should they come for the last re, for the Ayahuasca retreat and then the integration retreat?

So I’m gonna tell you the dates, if you don’t remember, do you? Okay.

Brigitte Kolibab: I know the Ayahuasca retreat starts May 12th.

Sam Believ: Yeah.

Brigitte Kolibab: And goes until

Sam Believ: 18th.

Brigitte Kolibab: The 18th. And then we have integration between the 18th and the 23rd.

Sam Believ: Exactly. Why should they come?

Brigitte Kolibab: One, it will absolutely change your life. Your experience with Ayahuasca will allow you to see so much about yourself.

If you’re already listening to this, you’re probably already sold on Ayahuasca, and you should stay for the integration because. It will help you really ground this, these messages, and also you’ll be able to hang out with the community. We’ll get to know each other. I’ll teach you yoga. I’ll teach you meditation.

It’ll be everything you need in your toolbox to move on with your life and be a better person.

Sam Believ: It’s also fun. It’s really fun. Yeah. The people were really enjoying themselves. Yeah. Like I was the retreat. We keep it fun and people, it’s but still it’s ayahuasca and you’re like, you working and there’s some seriousness to it.

But the integration retreat was more of a. Rest and break and fun.

Brigitte Kolibab: Yeah, we have to be respectful of other people’s processes. So there’s a lot of quiet time, there’s a lot of individual time during the ayahuasca ceremonies, but after there was really so much play.

Sam Believ: Okay, so I’ll see you in May, guys, May 12th.

You have to book both events separately and it’s already on our. On our page, which is la wire.com or ica in columbia.com. So you’re invited. I rarely actually talk about LA Wire at the podcast. Oh really? Yeah, but you’re invited. You should come. Yeah, please come. May. May is also. May nine 19th is my birthday as well.

Brigitte Kolibab: Oh really?

Sam Believ: Yeah.

Brigitte Kolibab: You’re a Gemini cusp

Sam Believ: Of Gemini. Taurus, yeah. So Taurus, Gemini

Brigitte Kolibab: Cusp.

Sam Believ: You guys also bring a gift

Brigitte Kolibab: and if it your get cigars birthday, then come celebrate as well.

Sam Believ: Yeah, we’ll give you a discount

Brigitte Kolibab: the why, a birthday party

Sam Believ: then. Then I’ll give you cigars. Okay. Thank you guys for listening. As always, we do the whole assembly of and I will see you in the next episode.

Thank you.

Brigitte Kolibab: I

Sam Believ: hope you enjoyed this episode. If you’d like to support us and psychedelic Renaissance at large, please follow us and leave us a like wherever it is you’re listening. Share this episode with someone who will benefit from this information. Nothing in this podcast is intended as medical advice, and it is for educational and entertainment purposes only.

This episode is sponsored by Lara Ayahuasca Retreat. At Lara, we combine affordability. Accessibility and authenticity. The Wira Connect, heal, grow. Guys, I’m looking forward to hosting you.