This is the chapter I almost didn’t include.
By this point in my journey, I’d seen what plant medicine could do. Not in a “I read about it on Instagram” way — I’d lived it, felt it, cried through it. And I wanted more. Not more ceremonies, but more understanding. I wanted to go deeper.
That’s when I heard about Kambo.
If you’re not familiar, Kambo comes from the secretion of the Amazonian Giant Leaf Frog. Indigenous tribes, including the Matsés, Katukina, and Yawanawá peoples, have used it for centuries in their healing traditions. It’s not just a substance — it’s considered a powerful spirit helper that works on physical, emotional, and spiritual levels. When practiced with proper respect for its origins, the frogs are carefully handled and released back to their habitat unharmed. These traditions carry a deep sense of reciprocity and gratitude for the frogs as sentient beings who offer healing.
I was curious enough to do something impulsive. I looked up Peter Gorman — the man known as the father of Kambo in the United States — and sent him an email. On a whim. No plan, no expectation.
To my surprise, he wrote back. He was leading a training of five students at his home in Texas. Five. Not a retreat center with fifty people and a juice bar. Five students in his backyard, his inner circle assisting, learning from the man who brought this tradition to the West.
I could’ve found a local practitioner. Someone with a nice website and a cancellation policy. But something in me said *go to the source*. So I did.
I’m not here to convince you to try Kambo. But as someone who has studied this practice and experienced its benefits firsthand, I can say it has been deeply impactful for many people. From a scientific perspective, Kambo introduces bio-active peptides into the body and has been associated with benefits like reduced inflammation, pain relief, and support for certain conditions. But what stands out to me most is what it teaches us about release and purification.
Kambo makes something very clear: we all accumulate stress, trauma, and emotional baggage over time. If we never release that buildup, it can overwhelm us. You’ve heard the phrase “the straw that broke the camel’s back.” We’ve all seen someone who seems fine — until suddenly they’re not. They reach their breaking point and explode. We’re like pressure cookers; without a valve, the pressure eventually has to go somewhere.
Traditional purification practices, including Kambo, can provide that valve. But you don’t need to work with frog medicine to understand the lesson. The deeper message is that we need regular, healthy ways to release what we carry — physically, emotionally, and spiritually.
If traditional medicines aren’t your thing, that’s completely okay. There are countless other ways to let go. Crying in the shower. Screaming into a pillow. Doing a high-intensity workout. Shaking your body out to loud music. Practicing breathwork for ten minutes. Journaling your anger onto paper and then ripping it up. Meditating and letting your feelings move through you instead of bottling them up.
Even something as simple as dancing around the living room, jumping on a trampoline with your kids, or taking a long solo walk can offer that needed release. You might sing at the top of your lungs in the car before school pickup. The point is not how you do it — but that you do it. We all need to “purge” in our own way when our emotional tanks get too full.
What I’ve learned from indigenous healing practices is the importance of regular emotional release — you don’t need a ceremonial context to feel a sense of catharsis. Whether it’s through movement, sound, or breath, finding your own mini-release each day will leave you feeling lighter, more spiritually connected, and ready to face whatever comes next.