Stepping Into The Fire

Stepping Into the Fire is the cinematic release that reaches into the ash of the bare bones of existence and asks the question "is humanity born to die, or is humanity born to live?" The film follows the true story of three successful individuals brought together by an ancestral medicine from South America that has become legendary for its miraculous and profound effects. Ayahuasca -- as the Amazonian brew is known -- is well known for its mental, physical and energetic healing properties. Stepping Into the Fire closely examines the life-changing effects Ayahuasca can have and illustrates why environment and health are so crucial to human success on a global scale.
Stepping Into the Fire features Roberto Velez, Donna Walsh, Bo and José Pineda Varges (a.k.a Maestro Mancoluto). The story begins with Roberto Velez -- a high-level New York Stock Exchange trader -- raised since adolescence in America, but ultimately of Peruvian descent. In the peak of his career, Velez finds himself seeking; unable to reconcile his material gains with the lack of direction and depth in his life. With nowhere else to turn, Velez scours Peru -- the land of his ancestors -- only to find Mancoluto, a first-level master shaman descended from one of the earliest civilizations in Amerindian history, Chavin. Mancoluto's expertise in natural health, particularly in the case of two ancestral medicines known as Ayahuasca and Huachuma, provides him a unique lens when treating Velez's predicament. Once this connection was made, countless other pieces start falling into place and a center for ancient Peruvian healing arts is quickly born.

Stepping Into the Fire is the beautifully woven tapestry of recent events that will leave you ignited and inspired to discover what it is in your life that keeps the fire alive

Ethnobotanist Mark Plotkin's quest to preserve the ancient wisdom of Amazonian shamans.
For more than twenty years Dr. Mark Plotkin has searched the Amazon for plants that heal. He is an ethnobotanist, a scientist who studies the relationship between indigenous people and plants. He set out on a mission to find a cure for diabetes, a disease that killed both of his grandmothers. The Shaman's Apprentice charts the story of Mark's discoveries, and looks at the astonishing ability of native people to manage their environment.

People of the forest have become sophisticated chemists by necessity, utilizing plants for every aspect of their lives. Often, the entire knowledge of a tribe resides in the mind of the shaman - the tribe's doctor and spiritual leader. But the shamans are also the most endangered species in the Amazon. Marooned in time by the loss of traditional ways, many of the native healers have no apprentices. Most are old, and each shaman's death is a kind of extinction. It is these shamans that Mark seeks out, hoping to save their precious knowledge, for it may be vital to the world's future.

The Shaman's Apprentice is a story of survival against the odds. It interweaves the luminous rainforest world of phenomena and legends with western science and the grim realities of extinction. In the story of one man's quest to preserve the ancient wisdom of our species, we find intelligence, cooperation and hope that could save one of the most glorious places on Earth.