Caya Shobo

Caya Shobo is a special place with a unique vision for healing and learning in accordance with the renowned Shipibo plant medicine tradition. We are not a profit-oriented business but rather a beautiful home and sanctuary for those desiring real healing and shamanic learning through the Shipibo healing practice of master plant Dieta with highly skilled teacher and practitioners. 

In our 2 week Dieta healing retreats (run throughout the year) we offer 8 Ayahuasca ceremonies and personalized Shipibo master plant Dieta treatment from some of the most skilled practitioners in Peru. 

It is our honour to work with Ayahuasca, a powerful master teacher plant from the Amazon which has an incredible ability to reawaken deeply buried memories, remind you of your spiritual nature and you humanity, and show the traumas, sickness and confusions buried within that you are ready to begin healing. We regard Ayahuasca as a noble medicine that commands a great deal of respect, humility and care in how it is administered and taught.

At Caya Shobo, we also know through our many decades of experience working with Amazonian plant medicines that Ayahuasca treatment alone is not enough to sustainably resolve one’s deeply held traumas and problematic patterns of perceiving and being. While Ayahuasca allows one to see the healing needed, it is through expertly guided and properly administered Shipibo plant Dieta that a deep and lasting restoration of wellness may be achieved. 

Little by little, in a slow and steady and strictly disciplined process, Shipibo plant Dieta has the power to purify and strengthen the body, clarify the psyche, and restore the soul to wellness. Dieta weaves the healing power and wisdom of nature’s most powerful teacher plants into the very fiber of one’s being, and when done well, Dieta can bring about a truly embodied health and sense of reconciliation, understanding and love back to our hearts. 

Dieta is a complex and time-honored practice of the Shipibo people, used by their most highly skilled medicine practitioners (the Onanya or Onaya) to address the roots of disease, pain and suffering. For the Shipibo people who grow immersed in the embrace of the rich living balance of the jungle, wellness is related to harmony. Disharmony and imbalance lead to sickness, stress, sadness, confusion and even poor luck. Restoration of harmony in all aspects of life, at both the personal and the collective level, is the way the Shipibo tradition brings about health and wellbeing. And the carefully prescribed, administered, and disciplined practice of plant Dieta is the Shipibo way to achieve and sustain this healing.

As the master Onanya shamans sing their healing songs to grow and align the plant Dieta energies within a patient’s system, and reawaken the consciousness of the body, mind and spirit to life’s essential wisdoms, the energies of sickness are gradually uprooted, unfurled and cleared away. These songs, called ‘icaros’ in the Shipibo tradition, miraculously carry the energy, wisdom and the power of the plants that the maestro himself has dieted and developed over years and decades of disciplined practice and personal sacrifice. 

The specific master teacher Dieta plants have been carefully identified by the Shipibo, over thousands of years of shamanic practice, for their unique healing and learning properties. There are dozens if not hundreds of master healing and teaching plants in the Amazon, but it is important to adhere to strict dietary and other restrictions in order to ensure the safety and efficacy of each plant treatment. Some restrictions are common amongst the master plants (such as avoiding salt and sugar), but some requirements are unique to specific plants. These details are discovered by each Onanya from both his/her own ancestral lineage and also directly from the plants themselves, through the strict practice of Dieta.

Through many long, learning Dietas the Onanya healer develops an overall ‘Knowledge Dieta’ and personal way of working with the medicine of Ayahuasca and the master plants. Depending on the degree of devotion and quality of the shaman, it is possible for this Knowledge body to encompass incredibly complex and specific visions and learnings about doctoring of the body, mind and spirit that are gifted to the worthy Dieter by the teacher plants themselves. Needless to say, not all shamanic healers in the Amazon carry the same level of expertise, knowledge or integrity for working with this powerful healing tradition.

At Caya Shobo our entire leadership team is dedicated to the traditional practice of Dieta and we believe our extensive experience with Dieta has afforded us a special vision and ability to assess and determine the level of accomplishment of our shamanic Onanya practitioners. We choose to work only with the most senior of Shipibo Onanyas, all who come from renowned healing families and have a minimum of 15 years experience working with the true way of Shipibo master plant dieta. Typically our maestros have more than 25 years of experience with holding Ayahuasca ceremonies and healing patients with plant Dieta.

Integrity in the medicine is of paramount importance to us at Caya Shobo and we believe this is what gives us the distinction of genuine healing results and assuredness of safety for all our guests.

During a 2 week retreat at Caya Shobo, guests have the opportunity to gain a first-hand experience of the transformative healing power of both Ayahuasca and the Amazonian master Dieta plants when administered by true master Shipibo shamanic healers. And with the skilled knowledge and care of our experienced facilitators, guests may come to safely know some of the sacred wisdoms of this remarkable Shipibo healing tradition, and the spiritual mysteries residing in the natural world. You will be able to bring these understandings home with you, seeded in your heart, mind and body to deliver lasting betterment to your life and all your relationships.