The Vine of the Soul

By Lorraine Bassett

The Vine of the Soul contains an important message to us all from the shamans of one of the last indigenous tribes on the planet. Lorraine Bassett is a PhD student, spiritual healer, and teacher who has traveled the world in pursuit of her own spiritual development. Follow her journey into the heart of the Amazon to work with the Shipibo Shamans through ritual use of the ayahuasca vine to form deep connections with the spirit world. Emerge from this riveting story with a deeper view into your own spiritual journey and the importance of connection to the natural and spirit worlds.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Balboa Press
• Release date: Nov 15, 2013
• ISBN: 9781452582870

Lorraine Bassett

Lorraine Bassett’s boundless energy, passion for life, spirituality, and determination to survive has driven her to succeed in both the spirit and business worlds. Lorraine has been CEO of a leadership consulting company and head of sales in a high-tech startup. She holds an MBA in business strategy and is completing two PhDs in Metaphysics and Divinity. Her passion is Taekwondo, in which she is a third Dan black belt and two-time US National Olympic Style Ultra Sparring Bronze Medalist. Lorraine, her husband, and their six-year-old daughter divide their time between homes in eastern Massachusetts and in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. To learn more about Lorraine please visit… thevineofthesoul.com and lorrainebassett.com

Book preview

THE VINE OF

THE SOUL

Lorraine Bassett

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Copyright © 2013 Lorraine Bassett.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

For Author photo: I am releasing a non-exclusive usage of that photo provided that credit be given when it is used as ©Kristen Leigh Conklin Photography

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

The author of this book does not dispense medical advice or prescribe the use of any technique as a form of treatment for physical, emotional, or medical problems without the advice of a physician, either directly or indirectly. The intent of the author is only to offer information of a general nature to help you in your quest for emotional and spiritual well-being. In the event you use any of the information in this book for yourself, which is your constitutional right, the author and the publisher assume no responsibility for your actions.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

ISBN: 978-1-4525-8286-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4525-8288-7 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4525-8287-0 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2013917397

Balboa Press rev. date: 11/05/2013

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1 Vision

Chapter 2 Journey to Amazon

Chapter 3 Shipibo Arrival

Chapter 4 Ceremony One—The Girl in the Cupboard

Chapter 5 Waking in the Shipibo Retreat

Chapter 6 Ceremony 2—The Warrior

Chapter 7 Ceremony Three

Chapter 8 Iquitos

Chapter 9 The Final Ceremony

Chapter 10 The Message

Dedicated to Herbert and the people at the Shipibo retreat.

Deepest thanks to my spiritual partner Kevin with whom I share my life journey. To Sean and Kelley, thanks for your editing and ideas. Krissie, thank you for the way you see and capture the world.

Humanity participates by nature in all cosmic events, and is inwardly as well as outwardly interwoven with them.

Richard Wilhelm on the Chinese concept of Tao

Prologue

The coffin circled the barely functioning baggage carousel in long, pathetic loops. Whomever it contained had been the only other passenger on the flight that had brought me here. I was thousands of miles from home, deep in the middle of a rainforest fed by the largest, most powerful, and perhaps most mysterious river on the planet—the Amazon.

The name brings up vivid images that most of us have gotten from movies, some of us from books, and a relative few from experience. The images are vivid. They are green, and they are at once inviting and foreboding. I felt both excited and anxious. I was about to venture into a world responsible for sustaining much of life on the earth. I was about to step into the spirit world of the Amazon shamans.

I had found my luggage easily—it had come out first—and I had been ready to walk away when the coffin had emerged onto the conveyor belt like some bad omen, an unexpected reminder of just exactly what I had been traveling with and why I had traveled.

The simple, wooden box rode the carousel around and around. I wondered if its occupant had ever ridden a real one, ever sat on a painted wooden horse and reached for the gold ring, and if so, had they ever managed to catch it? I wondered what that person had believed about the afterlife. There were no clues. The box was rough-hewn and anonymous. It could be that the man or woman inside that box had awaited nothing but dirt and worms and peace after death. Or it could be that he had awaited heaven, as I have seen it in the vision that brought me here.

As I stood and watched the wooden box and wondered about its contents, my thoughts were drawn back to the last time I had been this close to a coffin. It was at my mother’s funeral. That sad day and the events around it would forever be imprinted in my heart and mind. I had buried both parents eight weeks apart, and though it had been nearly two years since the funerals, the physical pain in my heart was a constant reminder of the grief that I felt.

I was brought back to the present by someone tapping me on the shoulder to ask if I needed a taxi. I declined politely.

I had come here to the Peruvian Amazon, hoping to understand a vision I had been shown of heaven. The vision had perplexed me for years. I had never been religious, and it had awakened a deeply spiritual part of me that far surpassed anything I had previously experienced in my work as a healer. When I had I learned about the ayahuasca experience with the shamans and its life-changing spiritual revelations, I knew just where I was headed. I just had no idea how pivotal my relationships with my parents were and how much I still needed to heal from their loss in order to move forward with my own spiritual growth and understanding of that vision.

The day of my spiritual awakening was the day I saw and knew I saw – all things in God and God in all things.

Methtild of Madgeburg

Chapter 1

Vision

My vision first came to me on a quiet evening in my apartment in Munich. It was not brought on by a near-death experience, like the visions of so many others, but rather by a deep meditation. Normally I experienced a deep peace after my meditations. This evening, however, I felt a sense of urgency as if something was trying to reach me from the deepest part of myself. This feeling was so unsettling that I lay on the bed and closed my eyes in an attempt to settle my thoughts.

I breathed deeply, trying to regain the peace I had felt before. My body began to feel very heavy. Soon I was no longer aware of any physical body, only of my conscious thought. Though I could hear myself breathing, each breath seemed to take me further from my physical body. As I separated from myself, I could feel myself becoming part of everything, being drawn into something I had not experienced in my most profound meditations.

As my consciousness expanded, I began to be aware of many sounds surrounding me. I could hear other people breathing as though I was somehow breathing for them. The expansion continued, and soon I felt as though I was