Let’s Talk About AYNI

Let’s Talk About AYNI
Reciprocity as a Principle of Life
Talk with Ximena Xaguar

What can ancestral traditions teach us about the relationships and responsibilities surrounding altered states of consciousness?

In Andean traditions, Ayni — reciprocity — expresses a way of understanding life through the relationships between people, community and the natural world. Beyond material exchange, it invites us to recognise what we receive, what we take and what we give back.

Drawing on teachings received in Andean and Amazonian contexts, this talk explores how ritual and sacred plant practices are embedded in cultural, spiritual and communal relationships. Within these perspectives, ritual can be understood as a way of reordering the cosmos: renewing balance and our relationship with the elements and the wider living world.

As interest in psychedelics grows, how can we approach ancestral knowledge with respect for the Indigenous communities that sustain it? And how can insights gained through expanded states of consciousness become part of a more conscious and reciprocal way of living?

An invitation to consider integration as an ongoing practice of attention, responsibility and care — towards ourselves, others and the world we share.

XHIVA is the founder of Re Evolution Art, a cultural association in Switzerland and an intercultural platform that brings together contemporary art, cultural exchange, and traditional knowledge under the guiding principle “Bridging Cultures Through Art.”

Thursday, 19 November 2026, 17:00
Photobastei, 2. Stock, Sihlquai 125, 8005 Zürich