My Story

My journey with plants began in 1998 following a near-fatal accident in the Peruvian Andes. While running alone on a mountain near Machu Picchu, I lost the main path, followed an animal track, and fell a significant distance down the mountain. I survived against the odds, stopped by a tree that quite literally saved my life.

At the time, I was working as General Manager of a large hotel in Aguas Calientes. I was professionally successful, but personally uncertain, I felt increasingly disconnected from my work, my purpose, and my reason for being in Peru. That accident was a turning point. I asked a simple but urgent question: Why am I here?

That night, I experienced a vivid vision of a shaman who told me he had been waiting for me and that I would need to find him, to find my answers.

Shortly afterwards, I left my position at the hotel and travelled to Iquitos in the Peruvian Amazon to look for the Shaman. I found Don Juanito, the very shaman I had seen in the vision, in a little village called El Chino, at the very end of the Tuayhu River, fourteen hours away from Iquitos. He was a traditional Amazonian plant medicine curandero who served his community, as the local doctor. Under his guidance I entered a deep apprenticeship, and committed fully to the plant medicine path.

On returning to the UK, I chose to remain loyal to Don Juanito and the plants I had been taught to work with. I did not study under other teachers or combine this work with additional modalities. This continuity and depth of lineage have shaped the grounded, disciplined way I work today.

Over decades of practice, my relationship with plants has taught me that humans are not separate from nature but fundamentally interdependent with it. My work centres on restoring this relationship, both personally and collectively, through focused training and study with a small number of Master Plants.

My Education and Expertise

I combine hands-on experience with formal academic training:

• BA (Hons) in Study of Religions, SOAS University of London

• MSc in Development Studies, SOAS University of London

• MSc in Global Environmental Politics and Policy, Birkbeck University of London

• Postgraduate Diploma in Psychology, Human Givens Approach

I have also practiced Vipassana Meditation for over thirty years, and regularly attend 10 day silent retreats and sit in meditation daily. The two wings of my bird are Plant Medicines and Meditation.

I am also the author of The Shaman’s Last Apprentice and Beyond Illusion, memoirs documenting my apprenticeship and how I integrated the teachings of Don Juanito and the plant medicines into everyday life, in London.

Working with Master Plants

I have spent decades studying and working with three feminine Master Plants:

• Ayahuasca (the Grandmother): For 14 years, I facilitated journeys to the Peruvian Amazon for those seeking a serious and respectful engagement with Ayahuasca. I am a guardian of land in the Amazon where I grow my own Ayahuasca and Chacruna, ensuring that participants develop a conscious, ethical relationship with the plants from source to ceremony. I work closely with female Shipibo shamans to honour and uphold the feminine lineage of this medicine. I am currently on sabbatical from Ayahuasca work.

• Cacao (the Maiden): On 20 December 2012, in Palenque, Mexico, I drank Ayahuasca outside Peru for the first time since completing my Amazonian apprenticeship. During that ceremony, I received clear guidance to bring cacao to the West, and serve it in the same grounded and respectful way I had worked with Ayahuasca. I returned to London with 21 pounds of Guatemalan cacao and began offering plant medicine ceremonies, at a time when no such work was being done in the city, drawing directly from my apprenticeship training. Today, I work directly with Indigenous communities in the Chocó Andino region of the Ecuadorian Highlands. We pay fair prices and use only non-GMO, single-origin, ancient cacao varieties grown without pesticides or herbicides. Our soils are tested for heavy metals, and the cacao we offer meets the highest standards of quality and integrity.

• Cannabis (the Mother): In 2006, I founded Global Hemp Solutions, producing hemp foods including hemp seed, protein, and porridge. Due to supply chain challenges, the company closed in 2010, but my commitment to hemp did not. Since 2015, I have been actively involved in revitalising the UK hemp industry. I am Managing Director of the British Hemp Alliance, a not-for-profit organisation composed of environmental professionals with expertise across the full hemp value chain—from cultivation and processing to scientific research and land restoration. The BHA specialises in hemp phytoremediation and is the UK’s leading organisation advocating for industrial hemp as a regenerative environmental crop. Our work supports decarbonisation, land restoration, and sustainable industrial development.

My Mission to Inspire Conscious Change

I educate people on the importance of living in harmony with nature.

Through ceremonies, retreats, mentoring, and training, both online and in person, I guide others to reconnect with the natural cycles of Nature, develop conscious relationships with Nature, and bring balance to their lives.

Ritual Cacao - my ceremonial cacao company is ethical, fair-trade and ensures that all stakeholders are flourishing, from the Cacao Trees, the soils, the farmers, to the people who work at Ritual Cacao.

British Hemp Alliance - my hemp company cleans toxic soils to ensure we have clean and vibrant soils to grow food for the future generations.

I am always learning and growing. Between 2015 and 2018, I undertook a Chiric Sanango dieta, a demanding and deeply orienting plant discipline traditionally used to bring clarity, emotional alignment, and strength of heart. In 2022 and again in 2024, I dieted Ayahuma, a forty-metre Amazonian tree known for its grounding qualities and its capacity to cultivate stillness, resilience, and calm.

What I have learnt over the years, is that this work is slow, disciplined, and relational.

It is not about peak experiences, but about long-term integration and responsibility.

My approach is deeply ethical, evidence-informed, and grounded in long-term experience. I prioritize participant safety, environmental responsibility, and cultural respect in all my work.