Send us Fan Mail What happens when a lifelong search to understand the mind, body, spirit, and human experience eventually leads you somewhere you never expected? In this episode, Jason sits down with Elizabeth Dalton, a San Diego–based practitioner whose path has taken her through massage therapy, nutrition, Ayurveda, yoga, Kambo, Bufo, somatic work, and now into a new chapter as a Tribal Detox Kambo instructor. Elizabeth’s journey began long before medicine work. Growing up in a large, deeply religious LDS family, she struggled from a young age with depression and a persistent desire to understand why being human could feel so difficult. Her original interest was psychology, but life took her in another direction—first into massage therapy, then bodywork, nutrition, holistic health, Ayurveda, and eventually the deeper connection between the physical, emotional, and spiritual aspects of healing. Her introduction to psychedelic and indigenous medicines was anything but gentle. Elizabeth shares openly about her first Bufo experience, complete ego dissolution, difficult integration afterward, and how the experience fundamentally challenged what she had been taught about God, death, and the afterlife. She also recounts an intense weekend involving Kambo and ayahuasca that ultimately helped shape the way she believes medicine should—and should not—be facilitated. Those experiences became an important lesson: a powerful experience isn't automatically a therapeutic one. The conversation dives deeply into the old-school approach to Kambo—the large amounts of water, high numbers of points, and the belief that a successful session required a purge. Elizabeth explains how watching clients endure unnecessarily intense sessions caused her to begin questioning what she had been taught. Rather than asking, “How intense can we make this?” she began asking a different question: How can we work with Kambo while listening to the individual person and their nervous system? That question eventually led Elizabeth toward what she describes as somatic Kambo—using the medicine alongside body awareness, emotional processing, and a much more individualized approach. Jason and Elizabeth also get into the serious responsibility that comes with facilitating medicine: water consumption, electrolyte balance and hyponatremia, preparation, informed consent, practitioner boundaries, integration, and why facilitators have to resist the temptation to believe that more suffering equals more healing. The conversation also gets deeply personal as Elizabeth discusses leaving the religion she grew up in, redefining her relationship with God and spirituality, navigating a difficult marriage, and learning to trust what actually resonated with her rather than forcing herself into a belief system because it was familiar. Eventually, all of the seemingly unrelated pieces of her life began coming back together. The young woman who once wanted to study psychology found herself working with the mind through somatics, the body through Ayurveda and bodywork, and the spiritual dimension through Kambo and Bufo. After years of searching, questioning, learning, and changing direction, Elizabeth describes her next step into teaching as strangely full circle. In This Episode Elizabeth's early fascination with psychology and the human experienceGrowing up in a strict LDS/Mormon householdMassage therapy, bodywork, nutrition, and AyurvedaHer first experience with Bufo and complete ego dissolutionHow medicine changed her understanding of God and the afterlifeReligious deconstruction and finding spirituality outside organized religionHer first Kambo experience during the 2020 lockdownA difficult ayahuasca ceremony and the importance of preparation and responsible facilitationThe dangers of assuming a more intense ceremony is a better ceremonyMoving away from purge-chasing and excessive water protocols in KamboHyponatremia, electrolytes, and practitioner responsibilityWhy suffering isn't something we need to “earn” healing throughElizabeth's development of a more somatic, individualized approach to KamboThe vulnerability involved in medicine work and the privilege of being trusted as someone's facilitatorWhy boundaries and vetting matter in Bufo facilitation and trainingFinding Tribal Detox and returning to Kambo training as an already experienced practitionerIntegration, surrender, and learning to move with the ebbs and flows of lifeElizabeth's path toward becoming a Tribal Detox Kambo instructorThe ceremony that became one of the most significant turning points of her lifeThis is a conversation about medicine, but even more than that, it's about curiosity, questioning what you've been taught, learning through experience, and allowing your path to evolve as you do. Connect with Elizabeth Dalton Elizabeth Dalton — Surya Wellness 📍 San Diego, California Instagram: @_suryawellness Website: www.suryawellnesssd.com Subscribe so you don't miss future conversations as we explore plant medicines, integration, spirituality, science, psychology, and everything that happens beyond the ceremony.
