Тема «Я на пути»
Я на пути. Нужна помощь,сказано было обратится к хакерам.
дом учителей
Тому кто помогает друзьям будет послана помощь,а тот кто помешает им, встретит препятствие на своем пути,но как это
случится и когда людям неведомо .
В русских переводах Кастанеды нам называют "врагов человека знания" таким образом:
Страх, Знание, Сила, Старость.
Но в оригинале они перечислены так:
Fear, Indulgence, Complacency, Old Age.
На мой взгляд, индульгирование или потакание себе это не знание.
А удовлетворенность или самодовольство это не сила.
И возникает вопрос: того ли Кастанеду мы читаем?
Страх, Знание, Сила, Старость.
Но в оригинале они перечислены так:
Fear, Indulgence, Complacency, Old Age.
На мой взгляд, индульгирование или потакание себе это не знание.
А удовлетворенность или самодовольство это не сила.
И возникает вопрос: того ли Кастанеду мы читаем?
Пока искал в сети кое-какую инфу, нашел три забавных файла. Два на английском, один на русском.
Вот что было на русском:
Бросивший вызов смерти
Как часть знания дон Хуана, «бросивший вызов смерти» был и является существом, который появился в 1725 году, который пришел повидать нагваля Себастьяна, который был сторожем церкви в Туле. Нагваль работал в церкви и был безопасным там. Он заботился о колоколах и другом имуществе церкви. Однажды старый индеец пришел к нему и сказал: «Мне нужна твоя энергия, или иначе я объявлю тебя практиком черных искусств...» Естественно, Себастьяну пришлось выслушать его.
Индейцу требовалась энергия только от нагваля. Мы все имеем пупок («брешь»). Мы все умрем оттуда, это смертельное место, дыра в энергетическом теле, из которой жизненная сила убегает при смерти. Нагваль имеет вдвое больше энергии, чем нормальный человек, поэтому индеец сказал, что не будет никакого вреда, если ему дадут минимальное количество.
Этот индеец был волшебником из эпохи, существовавшей 7000 лет назад. Он дожил до сегодняшних дней, помещая точку сборки в другие позиции и получая «займы» для жизни. Он перемещал свою точку сборку в ключевую позицию, которая давала ему насекомоподобное качество. Затем он вытягивал энергию из пупка нагваля и закачивал ей свой «мешочек». После этого его точка сборки возвращалась в привычную позицию, и он снова выглядел человеком.
До 1725 года он не нуждался в энергии. Так он стал связан с линией новых видящих. В обмен на энергию нагвалей он давал дары – различные позиции точки сборки. Знание о том, как достигать этих новых позиций и что ожидать от них. Себастьян был экстраординарным. Он получил восемь новых позиций от этого «бросившего вызов смерти». Лухан получил 52 позиции. Но это было не для дон Хуана, он не интересовался в дарах арендатора, как и Кастанеда. Но он поимел Кастанеду. Пожевал до смерти, как сказал дон Хуан.
Кастанеда лишь наполовину верил тому, что дон Хуан рассказал об Арендаторе. В Мексике были найдены зерна кукурузы, которые датировались 34000 лет назад. Первые миграции в Мексику предположительно произошли 10000 лет назад. Это были охотники и собиратели. Но дон Хуан сказал, что это не верно.
Однажды дон Хуан сказал, что он отведет КК к «бросившему вызов смерти». Тот подумал, что все это чушь и подколка. НО ДХ отвел его. КК перепугался до смерти. Его встретил индеец с каким-то диким акцентом – на всех слогах. Если слово имело ударение на первом слоге, он ставил его на втором. Но он делал это постоянно, поэтому КК поверил, что он делал это искренне.
Мужчина был худым и жилистым. От его голоса у КК сжимался Живот. Он сказал: «Мои глаза любовались шлемами испанских завоевателей. Я видел, как они двигались. Я чувствовал их дискомфорт, как они спали в своих шлемах и броне. Я чувствовал их боль. Я видел невероятные вещи. Что ты хочешь?»
-- Ничего, ответил КК.
-- Но у нас есть соглашение. С тобой это будет трудно, потому что ты последний...»
Конечно, он как-то знал, что КК был последним нагвалем в этой линии, но сам КК тогда этого еще не знал. Они встретились в Мехико, в субботу. КК ел сыр вместе с ним, все казалось обычным и нормальным. Они вышли на прогулку. А затем КК вдруг понял, что ждет дон Хуана и понятия не имеет, что случилось. Он чувствовал ощущение чего-то ужасно старого, пыльного, чужого, но не угрожающего. И была жуткая ностальгия. КК казалось, словно он совершил полет, которому не было конца. Он впервые реально понял, что такое бесконечность...
Он проснулся в странном городе. Там была мощенная дорога, которая круто поднималась в середине, дорога «1-ой зубчатой передачи». Первое, что было видно, поднимаясь на холм, это шляпы мексиканцев на другой стороне. Это было особое ощущение, «кинематографичное». И вот КК смотрел на это... (Позже ДХ назвал этот город эпицентром энергетических извилин.) КК ждал дон Хуана с этим ощущением ностальгии, бесконечного полета, без возможности найти затишье. Дон Хуан сказал, что это был яд, который оставил ему «бросивший вызов смерти». Это как быть распростертым, готовым, словно что-то надвигается. Чужеродное чувство.
В следующий раз, когда КК встретился с Арендатором, это был почти конец жизни дон Хуана.. В небольшой церкви в Туле его встретила великолепная женщина. КК так сильно боялся перспективы, что ДХ буквально затащил его в церковь. Рядом были две женщины с тремя мужчинами, выходившими из церкви. Трое мужчин спустились по ступеням, а две женщины вошли внутрь.
-- Где же он?-- спросил КК.—Тут нет ни одного мужчины.
-- А кто тебе сказал, что Арендатор мужчина?—ответил ДХ.
Он указал на женщину на последней скамье. ДХ заставил меня перекреститься для соблюдения обычаев. Женщина повернулась и улыбнулась им. В тот момент КК выбежал из церкви, прихваченный приступом астмы. Он болел астмой в детстве.
-- Откуда такой страх?—спросил его ДХ.
Семейным именем КК было Карлос Арана (произносится «Аранья»), и на португальском это означает «паук». ДХ спросил? «Что не так, мистер Паук?» Чем дальше уходил КК, тем сильнее становилась тахикардия (нерегулярное сердцебиение). Тогда КК успокоился и сказал ДХ: «Ладно, пошли.» ни вернулись в церковь и сели рядом с женщиной.
Он поприветствовала КК хрипловатым голосом и взяла за руку.
-- Мне понравилась твоя энергия, muy bien.
И затем она брала его из сна в сон. Он потерял девять дней, хотя думал, что прошла одна ночь. ДХ сказал ему, что он заключил соглашение, которое не осознает, пока «полностью не созреет». Бросивший вызов смерти был таким же реальным, как ДХ. Другой, но причудливой возможностью, которая доступна для всех нас. Человеческое неизвестное простирается очень далеко, но оно все равно остается в сфере наших возможностей.
Кто же мы? Путешественники, попавшие в какую-то отвратительную западню? Возможно. КК воспринимал Арендатора и ДХ, как штурманов. Почему принимая то, что передается – ворчливость, дряхлость, недовольство, повторения с бесконечными сожалениями – не решают что-либо.
«Я пойду на этот семинар, и если он дерьмище, пусть так оно и будет.» Вот путь волшебника. «Ах, я не получил персонального обхождения...» Люди приходят, в первом подходе, он говорят нам «сдуйте наши лачуги». Я говорю им, вам нужно избавиться от эго, а в ответ «Иди на хрен». Мы стали острыми как бритвы, идем сначала медленно, потому вы можете прыгнуть. Не говорите мне этого: «Я ваш доброволец, возьмите меня, возьмите! Я сделаю все, что вы скажете.» Перестань быть эгоистом, говорю я. «О, я так разочарован, Карлос... Никаких пейотов в пустыне.»
А вот есть победивший смерть. Выдающийся человек своего времени. Неорганики тоже отягощены летунами. Нет ничего более приятного для них, чем объединиться с нами. Но единственные, кто отваживаются на это, волшебники. Они существа, которые хотят обогатить свое осознание. Вы открыто признаете, что вы в их сфере, и они хватают вас. Как им еще вести себя, когда у них нет способа стать известными вам. Летуны нас систематически разделяли (от неоргаников).
ДХ говорил, что нео опасны. Арендатор был схвачен неорганиками, но он принял их предложение. Он провел тысячи лет в их мире. Однажды этот борец за окончательную свободу обнаружил способ бегства. Он превратился женщину. Это просто для волшебника. Женщина имеет свою точку сборки с ее «сияющей стороной» повернутой внутрь, а точка сборки мужчины повернута сияющей стороной наружу. Все, что вам нужно сделать, повернуть ТС вокруг, и ваше тело превратится во что-то другое. Это не иллюзия.
Став женщиной, он отвлек внимание нео и ускользнул от них без труда. Прежде он был связан с нео, и вдруг потерял свои возможности. И теперь ему капут. КК был последним в линии, что же делать Арендатору. Он пошел с ним. КК стал его последним шансом. А у КК бегали по коже мурашки. Какие возможности...
Короче, Арендатор убежал дважды. Сначала от смерти, затем из мира неоргаников. Как красота и элегантность. Он не выбрал быть человеком, но все еще существо, которое собирается умереть. Он знал только сражения, это величайшая история. Он как мы, но обогащен своей жаждой свободы. Вряд ли ему известно, что такое свобода, ну и что. Он движется к тому, что нельзя отрицать.
Вот что было на русском:
Бросивший вызов смерти
Как часть знания дон Хуана, «бросивший вызов смерти» был и является существом, который появился в 1725 году, который пришел повидать нагваля Себастьяна, который был сторожем церкви в Туле. Нагваль работал в церкви и был безопасным там. Он заботился о колоколах и другом имуществе церкви. Однажды старый индеец пришел к нему и сказал: «Мне нужна твоя энергия, или иначе я объявлю тебя практиком черных искусств...» Естественно, Себастьяну пришлось выслушать его.
Индейцу требовалась энергия только от нагваля. Мы все имеем пупок («брешь»). Мы все умрем оттуда, это смертельное место, дыра в энергетическом теле, из которой жизненная сила убегает при смерти. Нагваль имеет вдвое больше энергии, чем нормальный человек, поэтому индеец сказал, что не будет никакого вреда, если ему дадут минимальное количество.
Этот индеец был волшебником из эпохи, существовавшей 7000 лет назад. Он дожил до сегодняшних дней, помещая точку сборки в другие позиции и получая «займы» для жизни. Он перемещал свою точку сборку в ключевую позицию, которая давала ему насекомоподобное качество. Затем он вытягивал энергию из пупка нагваля и закачивал ей свой «мешочек». После этого его точка сборки возвращалась в привычную позицию, и он снова выглядел человеком.
До 1725 года он не нуждался в энергии. Так он стал связан с линией новых видящих. В обмен на энергию нагвалей он давал дары – различные позиции точки сборки. Знание о том, как достигать этих новых позиций и что ожидать от них. Себастьян был экстраординарным. Он получил восемь новых позиций от этого «бросившего вызов смерти». Лухан получил 52 позиции. Но это было не для дон Хуана, он не интересовался в дарах арендатора, как и Кастанеда. Но он поимел Кастанеду. Пожевал до смерти, как сказал дон Хуан.
Кастанеда лишь наполовину верил тому, что дон Хуан рассказал об Арендаторе. В Мексике были найдены зерна кукурузы, которые датировались 34000 лет назад. Первые миграции в Мексику предположительно произошли 10000 лет назад. Это были охотники и собиратели. Но дон Хуан сказал, что это не верно.
Однажды дон Хуан сказал, что он отведет КК к «бросившему вызов смерти». Тот подумал, что все это чушь и подколка. НО ДХ отвел его. КК перепугался до смерти. Его встретил индеец с каким-то диким акцентом – на всех слогах. Если слово имело ударение на первом слоге, он ставил его на втором. Но он делал это постоянно, поэтому КК поверил, что он делал это искренне.
Мужчина был худым и жилистым. От его голоса у КК сжимался Живот. Он сказал: «Мои глаза любовались шлемами испанских завоевателей. Я видел, как они двигались. Я чувствовал их дискомфорт, как они спали в своих шлемах и броне. Я чувствовал их боль. Я видел невероятные вещи. Что ты хочешь?»
-- Ничего, ответил КК.
-- Но у нас есть соглашение. С тобой это будет трудно, потому что ты последний...»
Конечно, он как-то знал, что КК был последним нагвалем в этой линии, но сам КК тогда этого еще не знал. Они встретились в Мехико, в субботу. КК ел сыр вместе с ним, все казалось обычным и нормальным. Они вышли на прогулку. А затем КК вдруг понял, что ждет дон Хуана и понятия не имеет, что случилось. Он чувствовал ощущение чего-то ужасно старого, пыльного, чужого, но не угрожающего. И была жуткая ностальгия. КК казалось, словно он совершил полет, которому не было конца. Он впервые реально понял, что такое бесконечность...
Он проснулся в странном городе. Там была мощенная дорога, которая круто поднималась в середине, дорога «1-ой зубчатой передачи». Первое, что было видно, поднимаясь на холм, это шляпы мексиканцев на другой стороне. Это было особое ощущение, «кинематографичное». И вот КК смотрел на это... (Позже ДХ назвал этот город эпицентром энергетических извилин.) КК ждал дон Хуана с этим ощущением ностальгии, бесконечного полета, без возможности найти затишье. Дон Хуан сказал, что это был яд, который оставил ему «бросивший вызов смерти». Это как быть распростертым, готовым, словно что-то надвигается. Чужеродное чувство.
В следующий раз, когда КК встретился с Арендатором, это был почти конец жизни дон Хуана.. В небольшой церкви в Туле его встретила великолепная женщина. КК так сильно боялся перспективы, что ДХ буквально затащил его в церковь. Рядом были две женщины с тремя мужчинами, выходившими из церкви. Трое мужчин спустились по ступеням, а две женщины вошли внутрь.
-- Где же он?-- спросил КК.—Тут нет ни одного мужчины.
-- А кто тебе сказал, что Арендатор мужчина?—ответил ДХ.
Он указал на женщину на последней скамье. ДХ заставил меня перекреститься для соблюдения обычаев. Женщина повернулась и улыбнулась им. В тот момент КК выбежал из церкви, прихваченный приступом астмы. Он болел астмой в детстве.
-- Откуда такой страх?—спросил его ДХ.
Семейным именем КК было Карлос Арана (произносится «Аранья»), и на португальском это означает «паук». ДХ спросил? «Что не так, мистер Паук?» Чем дальше уходил КК, тем сильнее становилась тахикардия (нерегулярное сердцебиение). Тогда КК успокоился и сказал ДХ: «Ладно, пошли.» ни вернулись в церковь и сели рядом с женщиной.
Он поприветствовала КК хрипловатым голосом и взяла за руку.
-- Мне понравилась твоя энергия, muy bien.
И затем она брала его из сна в сон. Он потерял девять дней, хотя думал, что прошла одна ночь. ДХ сказал ему, что он заключил соглашение, которое не осознает, пока «полностью не созреет». Бросивший вызов смерти был таким же реальным, как ДХ. Другой, но причудливой возможностью, которая доступна для всех нас. Человеческое неизвестное простирается очень далеко, но оно все равно остается в сфере наших возможностей.
Кто же мы? Путешественники, попавшие в какую-то отвратительную западню? Возможно. КК воспринимал Арендатора и ДХ, как штурманов. Почему принимая то, что передается – ворчливость, дряхлость, недовольство, повторения с бесконечными сожалениями – не решают что-либо.
«Я пойду на этот семинар, и если он дерьмище, пусть так оно и будет.» Вот путь волшебника. «Ах, я не получил персонального обхождения...» Люди приходят, в первом подходе, он говорят нам «сдуйте наши лачуги». Я говорю им, вам нужно избавиться от эго, а в ответ «Иди на хрен». Мы стали острыми как бритвы, идем сначала медленно, потому вы можете прыгнуть. Не говорите мне этого: «Я ваш доброволец, возьмите меня, возьмите! Я сделаю все, что вы скажете.» Перестань быть эгоистом, говорю я. «О, я так разочарован, Карлос... Никаких пейотов в пустыне.»
А вот есть победивший смерть. Выдающийся человек своего времени. Неорганики тоже отягощены летунами. Нет ничего более приятного для них, чем объединиться с нами. Но единственные, кто отваживаются на это, волшебники. Они существа, которые хотят обогатить свое осознание. Вы открыто признаете, что вы в их сфере, и они хватают вас. Как им еще вести себя, когда у них нет способа стать известными вам. Летуны нас систематически разделяли (от неоргаников).
ДХ говорил, что нео опасны. Арендатор был схвачен неорганиками, но он принял их предложение. Он провел тысячи лет в их мире. Однажды этот борец за окончательную свободу обнаружил способ бегства. Он превратился женщину. Это просто для волшебника. Женщина имеет свою точку сборки с ее «сияющей стороной» повернутой внутрь, а точка сборки мужчины повернута сияющей стороной наружу. Все, что вам нужно сделать, повернуть ТС вокруг, и ваше тело превратится во что-то другое. Это не иллюзия.
Став женщиной, он отвлек внимание нео и ускользнул от них без труда. Прежде он был связан с нео, и вдруг потерял свои возможности. И теперь ему капут. КК был последним в линии, что же делать Арендатору. Он пошел с ним. КК стал его последним шансом. А у КК бегали по коже мурашки. Какие возможности...
Короче, Арендатор убежал дважды. Сначала от смерти, затем из мира неоргаников. Как красота и элегантность. Он не выбрал быть человеком, но все еще существо, которое собирается умереть. Он знал только сражения, это величайшая история. Он как мы, но обогащен своей жаждой свободы. Вряд ли ему известно, что такое свобода, ну и что. Он движется к тому, что нельзя отрицать.
первый файлик на английском:
Evasive Mysteries
By Graciela Corvalan, translated by Larry Towler
Magical Blend Magazine (Issues 14 and 15)
Carlos Castaneda is world reknowned as an author of seven best selling books
on the Toltec system of sorcery. Some give him credit as being the crucial
catalyst of mainstream awareness of metaphysics that has grown so in recent
decades. Graciela Corvalan Ph.D. is a professor of Spanish at Webster
College, in St Louis, Missouri. Graciela is currently working on a book
consisting of a series of interviews with mystical thinkers in the Americas.
A while back she wrote a letter to Carlos Castaneda asking for an interview.
One night she received a phone call from Carlos accepting her request and
explaining that he had a friend who collected his mail for him while he was
away traveling. Upon his return he always reached into the mail sacks and
pulled out two letters which he then acted upon. Hers had been one of the
most recent two. He explained he was excited to be interviewed by her for she
was not a member of the established press. He arranged to meet Graciela in
California on the UCLA campus. He asked that the interview first be published
in Spanish which Graciela has done, in the Argentinian magazine, "Mutantian."
Now we are honored to release an English translation. Graciela has obviously
succeeded in capturing a flash of lightning over a desert night and showing
us amazing insights into Carlos Castanada the Toltec Seer!
[beginning of interview]
At around 1:00 pm, my friend and I set course for the campus of UCLA. We had
somewhat more than two hours of travel.
Following Castaneda's directions, we arrived without difficulty at the guard
shack at the entrance to the parking lot of UCLA. It was about quarter to
four. We stationed ourselves in a more or less shady place.
At exactly four o'clock, I looked up and saw him coming toward the car:
Castaneda was wearing blue jeans and a pale cream colored open-collared
jacket without pockets. I got out of the car and hastened to meet him. After
the greetings and conventional courtesies, I asked him if he would permit me
to use a tape recorder. We had one in the car in case he permitted us. "No,
it's better not to," he answered with a shrug of his shoulders. We showed him
the way to the car to get the notes, notebooks and books.
Loaded with books and papers, we let Castaneda drive. He knew the route well.
"Over there," he said, pointing with his hand, "there are some beautiful
river banks."
From the beginning, Castaneda established the tone of the conversation and
the themes which we were to deal with. I also realized that it wasn't
necessary to have all those questions that I had so laboriously worked out.
As I had anticipated from his telephone call, he wanted to speak to us about
the project he was involved in, and the importance and seriousness of his
investigations.
The conversation was conducted in Spanish, a language that he manages with
fluidity and a great sense of humor. Castaneda is a master in the art of
conversation. We spoke for seven hours. The time passed without his
enthusiasm or our attention weakening. As he gradually became more
comfortable, he made more use of typically Argentinian expressions so as to
make use of his coastal ways such as a friendly gesture to us that we are all
Argentinian.
It must be mentioned that although his Spanish is correct, it's evident that
his language is English. He made abundant use of expressions and words in
English for those which we give the equivalent of in Spanish. That his prime
language would be English is manifested also in the syntactic structure of
his phrases and sentences.
All that afternoon Castaneda strove to maintain the conversation on a level
that wasn't intellectual. Even though he has obviously read a lot and knows
the different currents of thought, at no time did he establish comparisons
with other traditions of the past or the present. He transmitted to us the
"Toltec teachings" by means of material images that, precisely for that
reason, hindered their being interpreted speculatively. In this way Castaneda
wasn't only obedient to his teachers but totally faithful in the route he has
chosen-he didn't want to contaminate his teaching with anything extraneous to
it.
Shortly after meeting us, he wanted to know the reasons for our interest in
knowing him. He already knew about my possible outline and the projected book
of interviews I was planning. Beyond all professionalism, we insisted on the
importance of his books that had influenced us and many others so much. We
had a profound interest in knowing the font of his teaching.
Meanwhile, we arrived at the banks and, in the shade of the trees, sat down.
"Don Juan gave me everything," he began to say, "when I met him I had no
other interest than anthropology, but upon encountering him I changed. And
what has happened to me I wouldn't change for anything!"
Don Juan was present with us. Every time Castaneda mentioned or remembered
him we felt his emotion. He told us that, from Don Juan, he had learned that
there was one totality of exquisite intensity capable of giving himself
everything in every present moment. "Give your all in each moment is his
principal, his rule," he said. That which Don Juan is like can't be explained
and is rarely comprehended, "it simply is."
In The Second Ring of Power Castaneda records one special characteristic of
Don Juan and Don Genaro, that which all others lack. There he writes:
"None of us is disposed to lend to another undivided attention in the way
that Don Juan and Don Genaro did."
The Second Ring of Power had left me full of questions; the book interested
me a lot, especially after the second reading, but I had heard unfavorable
commentaries. I had certain doubts myself. I told him that I believed that I
had enjoyed Journey to Ixtlan best without really knowing why. Castaneda
listened to me and answered my words with a gesture which seemed to say, "And
me, what do I have to do with the taste of all?" I continued speaking,
looking for reasons and explanations.
"Maybe my preference for Journey to Ixtlan is because of the love I
perceived," I asserted. Castaneda made a face. He didn't like the word love.
It's possible that the term might have connotations of romantic love,
sentimentality, or weakness for him. Trying to explain myself, I insisted
that the final scene of Journey to Ixtlan is bulging with intensity. "There,"
said Castaneda. Yes, he would agree with that last statement. "Intensity,
yes," he said, "that's the word."
Emphasizing the same book, I demonstrated to him that some scenes seemed to
me definitely grotesque. I couldn't find justification for them. Castaneda
was in agreement with me. "Yes, the behavior of those women is monstrous and
grotesque, but that vision was necessary to be able to enter into action," he
said. Castaneda needed that shock.
"Without an adversary we are nothing," he continued. "The adversary belongs
to human form. Life is war, is struggle. Peace is an anomaly." Referring to
pacifism he qualified it as "monstrosity" because, according to him, men,
"are beings of success and struggles."
Without being able to restrain myself I told him that I couldn't accept
pacifism as a monstrosity. "What about Ghandi?" I asked. "How do you see
Ghandi, for example?"
''Ghandi?" he responded to me, "Ghandi is not a pacifist. Ghandi is one of
the most tremendous fighters that have existed. And what a fighter!"
It was then that I understood the very special value that Castaneda gives to
words. The "pacifism" that he had made reference to couldn't have been a
pacifism of weakness; that of those who don't have enough guts to be, and
consequently do something else, that of those who do nothing because they
don't have objectives or energy in life; that pacifism reflects a completely
self-indulgent and hedonistic attitude.
With a grand gesture which would include all of society without values, will,
or energy, he replied, "All drugged out...yes, hedonists!"
Castaneda didn't clarify those concepts, and we didn't ask him to. I had
understood that part of the aesthetic of the warrior was to free himself from
the human nature, but the unusual comments of Castaneda had filled me with
confusion. Little by little, however, I was getting to know that being,
"beings of success and struggles" is the first level of the relationship.
That is the raw material where they part. Don Juan, in the books, always
referred to the good "tone" of a person. There begins the learning and one
passes to another level. "You can't pass to the other side without losing the
human form,'' said Castaneda.
Insisting about other aspects of his book that hadn't made themselves clear
to me, I asked him about the hollows that had remained with people by the
simple act of having reproduced.
"Yes," said Castaneda, there are differences between people who have had
children and those who haven't. To pass on tiptoes in front of the eagle, you
need to be whole. A person with 'hollows' can't pass."
He will explain to us the metaphor of the eagle a little later. For the
moment I will pass by this almost without mentioning it because the focus of
our attention was on another theme.
"How do you explain the attitude of Dona Soledad with Pablito and that of la
Gorda with her daughters?" I wanted to know insistently. Taking from the
children that edge which at birth they take from us was, in large measure,
something inconceivable for me.
Castaneda agreed that he still doesn't have it all systematized. He insisted,
still in the differences that exist between people who have reproduced and
those who haven't.
"Don Genero is crazy! Crazy! Don Juan, in a different way, is a serious crazy
man. Don Juan goes slowly but arrives far away. In the end, the two of them
arrive...
"I, like Don Juan," he continued, have hollows; that is to say, I have to
follow the route. The Genaros, on the other hand, have another model.
"The Genaros, for example, have a special edge that we don't have. They are
more nervous and of rapid motion...they are very fickle, nothing detains
them.
"Those who like la Gorda and I have had children have other characteristics
that compensate for that loss. One is more settled and, although the road
might be long and arduous, one arrives also. In general those who have had
children know how to take care of others. It doesn't mean that people without
children don't know how, but it's different...
"In general one doesn't know what one is doing; one is unconscious of actions
and later pays for it. I didn't know what I was doing," he exclaimed,
referring, without a doubt, to his own personal life.
"At birth, I took everything from my father and mother," he said. "They were
all bruised! To them I had to return that edge that I had taken from them.
Now I have to recoup the edge that I lost."
It would seem that these "hollows" that have to be closed, have to do with
biological adornment. We wanted to know if to have "hollows" is something
irreparable. "No," he responded, "one can be cured. Nothing is irrevocable in
life. It's always possible to return what doesn't belong to us and recoup
what is ours."
This idea of recovery is coherent with a "path of learning" walk in which it
doesn't suffice to know or practice one or more techniques but that requires
an individual and profound transformation of being. It relates to
everything-a coherent system of life with concrete and precise objectives.
After a short silence I asked him if The Second Ring of Power had been
translated in Spanish. According to Castaneda, a Spanish publishing house had
the right, but he wasn't sure if the book had come out or not.
"The translation into Spanish was done by Juan Tovar, who is a good friend of
mine." Juan Tovar used the notes in Spanish that Castaneda himself had
furnished him, notes that some critics have put in doubt.
The translation into Portuguese seems to be very beautiful "Yes," said
Castaneda. "This translation is based on the translation into French. Really,
it's very well done."
In Argentina, his first two books have been banned. It seems that the reason
given was the drug affair. Castaneda didn't know. "Why he asked us without
waiting for our answer. "I imagine it's the work of the 'Mother Church' ".
At the beginning of our conversation, Castaneda mentioned something about the
"Toltec teaching." Also in "The Second Ring of Power" it insists in "the
Toltecs" and in "being a Toltec". "What does it mean to be a Toltec" I asked
him.
According to Castaneda, the word "Toltec" constitutes a wide meaning. It is
said that someone is a Toltec in the same way that it can be said that one is
a Democrat or a philosopher. In the way he uses it, this word doesn't have
anything to do with its anthropological meaning. From the anthropological
point of view the word makes reference to an Indian culture of the center and
south of Mexico that was already extinct at the time of the conquest and
colonization of America by Spain.
"Toltec is one who knows the mysteries of watching and dreaming. All of them
are Toltecs. It deals with a small group that has known how to maintain alive
a tradition from more than 3,000 years B.C."
As I was working on mystic thought and had particular interest in
establishing the fountain and the place of origin of the distinct traditions,
I insisted, "Do you believe that the Toltec tradition offers teaching that
would be peculiar to America?"
The 'Toltec nation" maintains alive a tradition, that is, without a doubt,
peculiar to America. Castaneda asserted that it is possible that the early
Americans could have brought something upon crossing the Bering Straits, but
all this was so many thousands of years ago that for the moment there are
nothing more than theories.
In Stories of Power, Don Juan talks to Castaneda about the "wizards" about
"those men of knowledge" that the conquest and colonization of the white man
couldn't destroy because they didn't know about their existence nor notice
all the incomprehensible ideas of their world.
"Who forms the Toltec nation? Do they work together? Where do they do it?" I
asked.
Castaneda answered all of my questions. He is now in charge of a group of
young people that lives in the area of Chaiapas, in the south of Mexico. They
all moved to that area due to the fact that the woman who now teaches them
was located there.
"Then...you returned?" I felt impelled to ask him to remember the last
conversation between Castaneda and the little sisters at the end of The
Second Ring of Power. "Did you return right away like the Gorda asked you to?
"No, I didn't return right away, but I did return," he answered me laughing.
"I returned to continue a task which I can't renounce."
The group consists of about 14 members. Even though the basic nucleus is 8 or
9 people, all are indispensable in the task that each does. If each one is
sufficiently impeccable, a large number of people can be helped.
"Eight is a magical number," he said at one moment. Also he insisted that the
Toltec isn't saved alone but that he goes with the basic nucleus. Those who
remain are indispensable in continuing and maintaining alive the tradition.
It is not necessary that the group be big, but each one of those who are
involved in the task is definitely necessary for the total.
"La Gorda and I are responsible for the arrivals. Well...really I am the
responsible one but she helps me intimately in this task," explained
Castaneda.
He spoke to us later about the members of the group that we knew from his
books. He told us that Don Juan was a Yaqui Indian, from the state of Sonora.
Pablito, on the other hand, was a Mixteco Indian, Nestor was Mazatecan (from
Mazatlan, in the province of Sinalea), and Benigno was Tzotzil. He stressed
several times that Josefina was not Indian but was Mexican and that one of
her grandparents was of French origin. La Gorda, as were Nestor and Don
Genaro, was Maytec. "When I met La Gorda she was an immense heavy woman
brutalized by life," he said. "None of those who knew her can today imagine
that she now is the same person as before."
We wanted to know in what language he communicated with all the people of the
group, and what was the language that they generally used among themselves. I
reminded him that in his books there are references to some Indian languages.
"We communicate in Spanish because it's the language we all speak," he
responded. Besides, neither Josefina nor the Toltec woman are Indians. I only
speak a little in the Indian language. Single phrases like greetings and some
other expressions. I don't know enough to maintain a conversation."
Taking advantage of his pause I asked him if the task which they are doing is
accessible to all men or if it deals with something for only a few.
As our questions began to point at discovering the relevancy of the Toltec
teaching and the value of the experience of the group for the rest of
humanity, Castaneda explained to us that each one of the members of the group
has specific tasks to perform whether in the Yucatan zone, in other areas of
Mexico, or in other places.
"Performing tasks one discovers a large number of things that are directly
applicable to concrete situations of daily life. doing tasks one learns a lot.
"The Genaros, for example, have a musical band with which they go through all
the places of the frontier. You will imagine that they see and are in contact
with many people. You a}ways have the possibility to transmit knowledge. It
always helps. It helps with one word, with one little insinuation... each
one, faithfully performing his task, does it. All humans can learn. All have
the possibility to live as warriors.
"Any person can undertake the task of warrior. The only requirement is to
want to do it with an unshakeable desire; that is to say, one has to be
unshakeable in the desire to be free. The way isn't easy. We constantly seek
excuses and try to escape. It's possible that the mind obtains it but the
body feels everything...the body learns rapidly and easily."
'The Toltec can't waste energy in foolishness," he continued. "I was one of
those persons who can't be without friends...I can't even go to the movies
alone." Don Juan in a resolute moment told him that he had to abandon all
and, particularly, separate himself from all those friends with whom he had
nothing in common. For a long time he resisted the idea until finally he got
involved.
"One time, returning to Los Angeles, I got out of the car a block before
arriving home and telephoned. Naturally on that day, as always, my house was
full of people. I asked one of my friends to prepare a satchel with some
things and bring it to where I was. Also I told her that the rest of the
things- books, records, etc.-could be distributed among them. It's clear that
my friends didn't believe me and took everything as borrowed," clarified
Castaneda.
The act of getting rid of the library and records is like cutting off
everything in the past, a whole world of ideas and emotions.
"My friends believed that I was crazy and kept hoping that I would return
from my craziness. I didn't see them in about twelve years," he concluded.
After twelve years passed, Castaneda would meet again with them. He first
looked for one of his friends who put him in contact with the rest of them.
They then planned to meet, and get together to eat dinner. That day they had
a good time; they ate a lot and their friends got drunk.
"To find myself with them after all those years was my way of showing my
gratitude for the friendship that they had offered me before," said Castaneda
"Now all are grown. They all have their families, spouses, children...It was
necessary, nevertheless, that I thank them. Only in that way could I
definitely terminate with them and end a stage of my life."
It is possible that Castaneda's friends don't understand anything he is
doing, but the fact that he wanted to thank them was something very
beautiful. Castaneda didn't pretend anything with them. He sincerely thanked
them for their friendship, and in doing so, freed himself internally from all
that past.
We then spoke of love, "of that often mentioned love." He related to us
several anecdotes about his Italian grandfather, "always so lovesick," and
about his father, "so Bohemian, he." "Oh, love! Love!" he repeated several
times. All his commentaries tended to destroy the ideas that one commonly has
about love.
"It cost me a lot to learn," he continued. "I was also very lovesick. Don
Juan had to work hard to make me understand that I had to cut off certain
relationships. The way in which I finally cut off with one was the following.
I invited her to dinner and we met in a restaurant. During the dinner the
same thing happened as always. There was a big fight and she yelled at me and
insulted me. At last I asked her if she had any money. She answered that she
had. I took advantage of that to tell her that I had to go to the car to look
for my wallet or something like that. I got up and didn't go back. Before
leaving her, I wanted to be sure that she had enough money to take a taxi
home. Since then I haven't seen her.
"You aren't going to believe me, but the Toltecs are very ascetic," he
insisted. Without doubting his word I commented that that idea couldn't be
deduced from The Second Ring of Power. "On the contrary," I stressed. "I
believe that in your book many scenes and attitudes present confusion."
"How do you think I was going to say that clearly?" he answered me. "I
couldn't say that the relations between them were pure because not only would
nobody have believed me but nobody would have understood me."
For Castaneda, we live in a very "bustful" society. Of all that we had been
speaking that afternoon, the majority hadn't been understood. It's that the
same Castaneda is seen obligated to adapt to certain exigencies of the
publishers who, at the time, would strive to satisfy the tastes of the
reading public.
'The people are into another thing," continued Castaneda. "The other day, for
example, I entered a bookstore here in Los Angeles and I began to leaf
through the magazines on the counter. I found that there was a large amount
of publications with photos of nude women...many also with men. I don't know
what to tell you. In one of the photos there was a man fixing an electric
cable while high on a ladder. He had on his protective helmet and a large
belt full of tools. That was all. The rest was naked. Ridiculous! Something
like that can't be possible! A woman is graceful...but, a man!" As means of
explanation he added that women have a lot of experience due to their long
history in that type of thing. "A role like that has no room for
improvisation."
"This is the first time I have heard of the idea that the behavior of women
isn't improvised; it is something totally new for me," I responded.
After listening to Castaneda, we were convinced that, for the Toltec, sex
represents an immense draining away of energies that is needed for other
tasks. His insistence is therefore understood about the totally ascetic
relations that members of the group maintain."
"In the point of view of the world, the life that the group carries and the
relationships they maintain are something totally unacceptable and unheard
of. That which I tell them isn't believable. It took me a long time to
comprehend it, but I have finally been able to verify it."
Castaneda had told us earlier that when a person reproduces he loses a
special edge. It appears that that "edge" is a force that children take from
their parents by the mere act of birth. This "hollow" that remains with a
person is that which must be filled or recovered. You have to recover the
force which you have lost. He also made us understand that a prolonged sexual
relationship of a couple ends with a decline. In a relationship differences
surge up which make certain characteristics of one or the other progressively
rejected. In consequence, for reproduction, it is selected from the other
part that which one likes, but there is no guarantee that that which is
chosen is necessarily the best. " In the point of view of reproduction," he
commented, 'the best is at random." Castaneda strove to explain to us these
concepts better, but had to confess again that they are themes which he
himself doesn't have clear yet.
be continued
Evasive Mysteries
By Graciela Corvalan, translated by Larry Towler
Magical Blend Magazine (Issues 14 and 15)
Carlos Castaneda is world reknowned as an author of seven best selling books
on the Toltec system of sorcery. Some give him credit as being the crucial
catalyst of mainstream awareness of metaphysics that has grown so in recent
decades. Graciela Corvalan Ph.D. is a professor of Spanish at Webster
College, in St Louis, Missouri. Graciela is currently working on a book
consisting of a series of interviews with mystical thinkers in the Americas.
A while back she wrote a letter to Carlos Castaneda asking for an interview.
One night she received a phone call from Carlos accepting her request and
explaining that he had a friend who collected his mail for him while he was
away traveling. Upon his return he always reached into the mail sacks and
pulled out two letters which he then acted upon. Hers had been one of the
most recent two. He explained he was excited to be interviewed by her for she
was not a member of the established press. He arranged to meet Graciela in
California on the UCLA campus. He asked that the interview first be published
in Spanish which Graciela has done, in the Argentinian magazine, "Mutantian."
Now we are honored to release an English translation. Graciela has obviously
succeeded in capturing a flash of lightning over a desert night and showing
us amazing insights into Carlos Castanada the Toltec Seer!
[beginning of interview]
At around 1:00 pm, my friend and I set course for the campus of UCLA. We had
somewhat more than two hours of travel.
Following Castaneda's directions, we arrived without difficulty at the guard
shack at the entrance to the parking lot of UCLA. It was about quarter to
four. We stationed ourselves in a more or less shady place.
At exactly four o'clock, I looked up and saw him coming toward the car:
Castaneda was wearing blue jeans and a pale cream colored open-collared
jacket without pockets. I got out of the car and hastened to meet him. After
the greetings and conventional courtesies, I asked him if he would permit me
to use a tape recorder. We had one in the car in case he permitted us. "No,
it's better not to," he answered with a shrug of his shoulders. We showed him
the way to the car to get the notes, notebooks and books.
Loaded with books and papers, we let Castaneda drive. He knew the route well.
"Over there," he said, pointing with his hand, "there are some beautiful
river banks."
From the beginning, Castaneda established the tone of the conversation and
the themes which we were to deal with. I also realized that it wasn't
necessary to have all those questions that I had so laboriously worked out.
As I had anticipated from his telephone call, he wanted to speak to us about
the project he was involved in, and the importance and seriousness of his
investigations.
The conversation was conducted in Spanish, a language that he manages with
fluidity and a great sense of humor. Castaneda is a master in the art of
conversation. We spoke for seven hours. The time passed without his
enthusiasm or our attention weakening. As he gradually became more
comfortable, he made more use of typically Argentinian expressions so as to
make use of his coastal ways such as a friendly gesture to us that we are all
Argentinian.
It must be mentioned that although his Spanish is correct, it's evident that
his language is English. He made abundant use of expressions and words in
English for those which we give the equivalent of in Spanish. That his prime
language would be English is manifested also in the syntactic structure of
his phrases and sentences.
All that afternoon Castaneda strove to maintain the conversation on a level
that wasn't intellectual. Even though he has obviously read a lot and knows
the different currents of thought, at no time did he establish comparisons
with other traditions of the past or the present. He transmitted to us the
"Toltec teachings" by means of material images that, precisely for that
reason, hindered their being interpreted speculatively. In this way Castaneda
wasn't only obedient to his teachers but totally faithful in the route he has
chosen-he didn't want to contaminate his teaching with anything extraneous to
it.
Shortly after meeting us, he wanted to know the reasons for our interest in
knowing him. He already knew about my possible outline and the projected book
of interviews I was planning. Beyond all professionalism, we insisted on the
importance of his books that had influenced us and many others so much. We
had a profound interest in knowing the font of his teaching.
Meanwhile, we arrived at the banks and, in the shade of the trees, sat down.
"Don Juan gave me everything," he began to say, "when I met him I had no
other interest than anthropology, but upon encountering him I changed. And
what has happened to me I wouldn't change for anything!"
Don Juan was present with us. Every time Castaneda mentioned or remembered
him we felt his emotion. He told us that, from Don Juan, he had learned that
there was one totality of exquisite intensity capable of giving himself
everything in every present moment. "Give your all in each moment is his
principal, his rule," he said. That which Don Juan is like can't be explained
and is rarely comprehended, "it simply is."
In The Second Ring of Power Castaneda records one special characteristic of
Don Juan and Don Genaro, that which all others lack. There he writes:
"None of us is disposed to lend to another undivided attention in the way
that Don Juan and Don Genaro did."
The Second Ring of Power had left me full of questions; the book interested
me a lot, especially after the second reading, but I had heard unfavorable
commentaries. I had certain doubts myself. I told him that I believed that I
had enjoyed Journey to Ixtlan best without really knowing why. Castaneda
listened to me and answered my words with a gesture which seemed to say, "And
me, what do I have to do with the taste of all?" I continued speaking,
looking for reasons and explanations.
"Maybe my preference for Journey to Ixtlan is because of the love I
perceived," I asserted. Castaneda made a face. He didn't like the word love.
It's possible that the term might have connotations of romantic love,
sentimentality, or weakness for him. Trying to explain myself, I insisted
that the final scene of Journey to Ixtlan is bulging with intensity. "There,"
said Castaneda. Yes, he would agree with that last statement. "Intensity,
yes," he said, "that's the word."
Emphasizing the same book, I demonstrated to him that some scenes seemed to
me definitely grotesque. I couldn't find justification for them. Castaneda
was in agreement with me. "Yes, the behavior of those women is monstrous and
grotesque, but that vision was necessary to be able to enter into action," he
said. Castaneda needed that shock.
"Without an adversary we are nothing," he continued. "The adversary belongs
to human form. Life is war, is struggle. Peace is an anomaly." Referring to
pacifism he qualified it as "monstrosity" because, according to him, men,
"are beings of success and struggles."
Without being able to restrain myself I told him that I couldn't accept
pacifism as a monstrosity. "What about Ghandi?" I asked. "How do you see
Ghandi, for example?"
''Ghandi?" he responded to me, "Ghandi is not a pacifist. Ghandi is one of
the most tremendous fighters that have existed. And what a fighter!"
It was then that I understood the very special value that Castaneda gives to
words. The "pacifism" that he had made reference to couldn't have been a
pacifism of weakness; that of those who don't have enough guts to be, and
consequently do something else, that of those who do nothing because they
don't have objectives or energy in life; that pacifism reflects a completely
self-indulgent and hedonistic attitude.
With a grand gesture which would include all of society without values, will,
or energy, he replied, "All drugged out...yes, hedonists!"
Castaneda didn't clarify those concepts, and we didn't ask him to. I had
understood that part of the aesthetic of the warrior was to free himself from
the human nature, but the unusual comments of Castaneda had filled me with
confusion. Little by little, however, I was getting to know that being,
"beings of success and struggles" is the first level of the relationship.
That is the raw material where they part. Don Juan, in the books, always
referred to the good "tone" of a person. There begins the learning and one
passes to another level. "You can't pass to the other side without losing the
human form,'' said Castaneda.
Insisting about other aspects of his book that hadn't made themselves clear
to me, I asked him about the hollows that had remained with people by the
simple act of having reproduced.
"Yes," said Castaneda, there are differences between people who have had
children and those who haven't. To pass on tiptoes in front of the eagle, you
need to be whole. A person with 'hollows' can't pass."
He will explain to us the metaphor of the eagle a little later. For the
moment I will pass by this almost without mentioning it because the focus of
our attention was on another theme.
"How do you explain the attitude of Dona Soledad with Pablito and that of la
Gorda with her daughters?" I wanted to know insistently. Taking from the
children that edge which at birth they take from us was, in large measure,
something inconceivable for me.
Castaneda agreed that he still doesn't have it all systematized. He insisted,
still in the differences that exist between people who have reproduced and
those who haven't.
"Don Genero is crazy! Crazy! Don Juan, in a different way, is a serious crazy
man. Don Juan goes slowly but arrives far away. In the end, the two of them
arrive...
"I, like Don Juan," he continued, have hollows; that is to say, I have to
follow the route. The Genaros, on the other hand, have another model.
"The Genaros, for example, have a special edge that we don't have. They are
more nervous and of rapid motion...they are very fickle, nothing detains
them.
"Those who like la Gorda and I have had children have other characteristics
that compensate for that loss. One is more settled and, although the road
might be long and arduous, one arrives also. In general those who have had
children know how to take care of others. It doesn't mean that people without
children don't know how, but it's different...
"In general one doesn't know what one is doing; one is unconscious of actions
and later pays for it. I didn't know what I was doing," he exclaimed,
referring, without a doubt, to his own personal life.
"At birth, I took everything from my father and mother," he said. "They were
all bruised! To them I had to return that edge that I had taken from them.
Now I have to recoup the edge that I lost."
It would seem that these "hollows" that have to be closed, have to do with
biological adornment. We wanted to know if to have "hollows" is something
irreparable. "No," he responded, "one can be cured. Nothing is irrevocable in
life. It's always possible to return what doesn't belong to us and recoup
what is ours."
This idea of recovery is coherent with a "path of learning" walk in which it
doesn't suffice to know or practice one or more techniques but that requires
an individual and profound transformation of being. It relates to
everything-a coherent system of life with concrete and precise objectives.
After a short silence I asked him if The Second Ring of Power had been
translated in Spanish. According to Castaneda, a Spanish publishing house had
the right, but he wasn't sure if the book had come out or not.
"The translation into Spanish was done by Juan Tovar, who is a good friend of
mine." Juan Tovar used the notes in Spanish that Castaneda himself had
furnished him, notes that some critics have put in doubt.
The translation into Portuguese seems to be very beautiful "Yes," said
Castaneda. "This translation is based on the translation into French. Really,
it's very well done."
In Argentina, his first two books have been banned. It seems that the reason
given was the drug affair. Castaneda didn't know. "Why he asked us without
waiting for our answer. "I imagine it's the work of the 'Mother Church' ".
At the beginning of our conversation, Castaneda mentioned something about the
"Toltec teaching." Also in "The Second Ring of Power" it insists in "the
Toltecs" and in "being a Toltec". "What does it mean to be a Toltec" I asked
him.
According to Castaneda, the word "Toltec" constitutes a wide meaning. It is
said that someone is a Toltec in the same way that it can be said that one is
a Democrat or a philosopher. In the way he uses it, this word doesn't have
anything to do with its anthropological meaning. From the anthropological
point of view the word makes reference to an Indian culture of the center and
south of Mexico that was already extinct at the time of the conquest and
colonization of America by Spain.
"Toltec is one who knows the mysteries of watching and dreaming. All of them
are Toltecs. It deals with a small group that has known how to maintain alive
a tradition from more than 3,000 years B.C."
As I was working on mystic thought and had particular interest in
establishing the fountain and the place of origin of the distinct traditions,
I insisted, "Do you believe that the Toltec tradition offers teaching that
would be peculiar to America?"
The 'Toltec nation" maintains alive a tradition, that is, without a doubt,
peculiar to America. Castaneda asserted that it is possible that the early
Americans could have brought something upon crossing the Bering Straits, but
all this was so many thousands of years ago that for the moment there are
nothing more than theories.
In Stories of Power, Don Juan talks to Castaneda about the "wizards" about
"those men of knowledge" that the conquest and colonization of the white man
couldn't destroy because they didn't know about their existence nor notice
all the incomprehensible ideas of their world.
"Who forms the Toltec nation? Do they work together? Where do they do it?" I
asked.
Castaneda answered all of my questions. He is now in charge of a group of
young people that lives in the area of Chaiapas, in the south of Mexico. They
all moved to that area due to the fact that the woman who now teaches them
was located there.
"Then...you returned?" I felt impelled to ask him to remember the last
conversation between Castaneda and the little sisters at the end of The
Second Ring of Power. "Did you return right away like the Gorda asked you to?
"No, I didn't return right away, but I did return," he answered me laughing.
"I returned to continue a task which I can't renounce."
The group consists of about 14 members. Even though the basic nucleus is 8 or
9 people, all are indispensable in the task that each does. If each one is
sufficiently impeccable, a large number of people can be helped.
"Eight is a magical number," he said at one moment. Also he insisted that the
Toltec isn't saved alone but that he goes with the basic nucleus. Those who
remain are indispensable in continuing and maintaining alive the tradition.
It is not necessary that the group be big, but each one of those who are
involved in the task is definitely necessary for the total.
"La Gorda and I are responsible for the arrivals. Well...really I am the
responsible one but she helps me intimately in this task," explained
Castaneda.
He spoke to us later about the members of the group that we knew from his
books. He told us that Don Juan was a Yaqui Indian, from the state of Sonora.
Pablito, on the other hand, was a Mixteco Indian, Nestor was Mazatecan (from
Mazatlan, in the province of Sinalea), and Benigno was Tzotzil. He stressed
several times that Josefina was not Indian but was Mexican and that one of
her grandparents was of French origin. La Gorda, as were Nestor and Don
Genaro, was Maytec. "When I met La Gorda she was an immense heavy woman
brutalized by life," he said. "None of those who knew her can today imagine
that she now is the same person as before."
We wanted to know in what language he communicated with all the people of the
group, and what was the language that they generally used among themselves. I
reminded him that in his books there are references to some Indian languages.
"We communicate in Spanish because it's the language we all speak," he
responded. Besides, neither Josefina nor the Toltec woman are Indians. I only
speak a little in the Indian language. Single phrases like greetings and some
other expressions. I don't know enough to maintain a conversation."
Taking advantage of his pause I asked him if the task which they are doing is
accessible to all men or if it deals with something for only a few.
As our questions began to point at discovering the relevancy of the Toltec
teaching and the value of the experience of the group for the rest of
humanity, Castaneda explained to us that each one of the members of the group
has specific tasks to perform whether in the Yucatan zone, in other areas of
Mexico, or in other places.
"Performing tasks one discovers a large number of things that are directly
applicable to concrete situations of daily life. doing tasks one learns a lot.
"The Genaros, for example, have a musical band with which they go through all
the places of the frontier. You will imagine that they see and are in contact
with many people. You a}ways have the possibility to transmit knowledge. It
always helps. It helps with one word, with one little insinuation... each
one, faithfully performing his task, does it. All humans can learn. All have
the possibility to live as warriors.
"Any person can undertake the task of warrior. The only requirement is to
want to do it with an unshakeable desire; that is to say, one has to be
unshakeable in the desire to be free. The way isn't easy. We constantly seek
excuses and try to escape. It's possible that the mind obtains it but the
body feels everything...the body learns rapidly and easily."
'The Toltec can't waste energy in foolishness," he continued. "I was one of
those persons who can't be without friends...I can't even go to the movies
alone." Don Juan in a resolute moment told him that he had to abandon all
and, particularly, separate himself from all those friends with whom he had
nothing in common. For a long time he resisted the idea until finally he got
involved.
"One time, returning to Los Angeles, I got out of the car a block before
arriving home and telephoned. Naturally on that day, as always, my house was
full of people. I asked one of my friends to prepare a satchel with some
things and bring it to where I was. Also I told her that the rest of the
things- books, records, etc.-could be distributed among them. It's clear that
my friends didn't believe me and took everything as borrowed," clarified
Castaneda.
The act of getting rid of the library and records is like cutting off
everything in the past, a whole world of ideas and emotions.
"My friends believed that I was crazy and kept hoping that I would return
from my craziness. I didn't see them in about twelve years," he concluded.
After twelve years passed, Castaneda would meet again with them. He first
looked for one of his friends who put him in contact with the rest of them.
They then planned to meet, and get together to eat dinner. That day they had
a good time; they ate a lot and their friends got drunk.
"To find myself with them after all those years was my way of showing my
gratitude for the friendship that they had offered me before," said Castaneda
"Now all are grown. They all have their families, spouses, children...It was
necessary, nevertheless, that I thank them. Only in that way could I
definitely terminate with them and end a stage of my life."
It is possible that Castaneda's friends don't understand anything he is
doing, but the fact that he wanted to thank them was something very
beautiful. Castaneda didn't pretend anything with them. He sincerely thanked
them for their friendship, and in doing so, freed himself internally from all
that past.
We then spoke of love, "of that often mentioned love." He related to us
several anecdotes about his Italian grandfather, "always so lovesick," and
about his father, "so Bohemian, he." "Oh, love! Love!" he repeated several
times. All his commentaries tended to destroy the ideas that one commonly has
about love.
"It cost me a lot to learn," he continued. "I was also very lovesick. Don
Juan had to work hard to make me understand that I had to cut off certain
relationships. The way in which I finally cut off with one was the following.
I invited her to dinner and we met in a restaurant. During the dinner the
same thing happened as always. There was a big fight and she yelled at me and
insulted me. At last I asked her if she had any money. She answered that she
had. I took advantage of that to tell her that I had to go to the car to look
for my wallet or something like that. I got up and didn't go back. Before
leaving her, I wanted to be sure that she had enough money to take a taxi
home. Since then I haven't seen her.
"You aren't going to believe me, but the Toltecs are very ascetic," he
insisted. Without doubting his word I commented that that idea couldn't be
deduced from The Second Ring of Power. "On the contrary," I stressed. "I
believe that in your book many scenes and attitudes present confusion."
"How do you think I was going to say that clearly?" he answered me. "I
couldn't say that the relations between them were pure because not only would
nobody have believed me but nobody would have understood me."
For Castaneda, we live in a very "bustful" society. Of all that we had been
speaking that afternoon, the majority hadn't been understood. It's that the
same Castaneda is seen obligated to adapt to certain exigencies of the
publishers who, at the time, would strive to satisfy the tastes of the
reading public.
'The people are into another thing," continued Castaneda. "The other day, for
example, I entered a bookstore here in Los Angeles and I began to leaf
through the magazines on the counter. I found that there was a large amount
of publications with photos of nude women...many also with men. I don't know
what to tell you. In one of the photos there was a man fixing an electric
cable while high on a ladder. He had on his protective helmet and a large
belt full of tools. That was all. The rest was naked. Ridiculous! Something
like that can't be possible! A woman is graceful...but, a man!" As means of
explanation he added that women have a lot of experience due to their long
history in that type of thing. "A role like that has no room for
improvisation."
"This is the first time I have heard of the idea that the behavior of women
isn't improvised; it is something totally new for me," I responded.
After listening to Castaneda, we were convinced that, for the Toltec, sex
represents an immense draining away of energies that is needed for other
tasks. His insistence is therefore understood about the totally ascetic
relations that members of the group maintain."
"In the point of view of the world, the life that the group carries and the
relationships they maintain are something totally unacceptable and unheard
of. That which I tell them isn't believable. It took me a long time to
comprehend it, but I have finally been able to verify it."
Castaneda had told us earlier that when a person reproduces he loses a
special edge. It appears that that "edge" is a force that children take from
their parents by the mere act of birth. This "hollow" that remains with a
person is that which must be filled or recovered. You have to recover the
force which you have lost. He also made us understand that a prolonged sexual
relationship of a couple ends with a decline. In a relationship differences
surge up which make certain characteristics of one or the other progressively
rejected. In consequence, for reproduction, it is selected from the other
part that which one likes, but there is no guarantee that that which is
chosen is necessarily the best. " In the point of view of reproduction," he
commented, 'the best is at random." Castaneda strove to explain to us these
concepts better, but had to confess again that they are themes which he
himself doesn't have clear yet.
be continued
продолжение:
Castaneda came to us describing a group whose requirements, for the average
person, were extreme. We were very interested in knowing where all that vigor
came from "What is the sole objective of the Toltec? We wanted to know the
sense of what Castaneda was telling us. "What is the objective that you
pursue?' We insisted on bringing the question to a personal level.
"The objective is to leave the living world; to leave with all that one is
but with nothing more than what one is. The question is not to take anything
nor leave anything. Don Juan left completely-from the world. Don Juan doesn't
die because the Toltecs don't die." In The Second Ring of Power, La Gorda
instructs Castaneda with respect to the dichotomy "wizard-tonal." The domain
of the second attention "is only achieved after the warriors sweep totally
the surface of the table...this second attention makes the two attentions
form a unity and this unity is the totality of oneself." In the same book, La
Gorda says to Castaneda, "when the wizards learn to 'dream,' they tie
together their two attentions and, therefore, there is no need for the center
to push out.. .sorcerers don't die. . . I don't want to say that we don't
die. We are nothing, we are nincompoops, stupid; we aren't either here nor
there. They, on the other hand, have their attentions so united that maybe
they never die."
According to Castaneda, the idea that we are free is an illusion and an
absurdity. He pushed to make us understand that common sense deceives us
because ordinary perception only tells us a part of the truth.
"Ordinary perception doesn't tell us all the truth. There has to be more than
a mere passing through the earth, of only eating and reproducing," he said
vehemently. With a gesture I interpreted as alluding to the unfeelingness of
all and the immense tediousness of life in its everyday boredom, he asked us,
"What is all this that surrounds us?' Common sense would be that accord to
which we have arrived behind a long educative process that imposes on us
ordinary perception as the only truth. "Precisely. The art of the wizard," he
said, "consists of bringing learning to discover and destroy that perceptive
prejudice."
According to Castaneda, Edmundo Husserl is the first one from the West who
conceives of the possibility of "suspending judgement." In "Ideas for a pure
phenomenology and a phenomenological philosophy" (1913) Husserl dealt
thoroughly with the "era" or "phenomenological reduction." The
phenomenological method doesn't deny but simply "puts into parentheses" those
elements that sustain our ordinary perception.
Castaneda considers that phenomenology offers him the theoretical
methodological framework to comprehend the teaching of Don Juan. For
phenomenology, the act of knowing depends on intention and not on perception.
Perception always varies according to history, that is to say, according to
the subject with knowledge acquired and immersed in a determined tradition.
The most important rule of the phenomenological method is that of "toward the
same things."
'"The task with which Don Juan fulfilled me," he insisted, "was that of
breaking, little by little, the perceptive prejudices until arriving at a
total rupture." Phenomenology "suspends" judgement and is limited to the
description of pure intentional acts. "So, for example, I construct the
object 'house.' The phenomenological reference is minimal. The 'intention' is
what transforms reference into something concrete and singular."
Phenomenology, without a doubt, has, for Castaneda, a simple methodological
value. Husserl never transcended the theoretical and, as a consequence, he
didn't touch the human being in his life in all his days.
For Castaneda, the most the western man-the European man-has arrived to is
the political man. This political man would be the epitome of our
civilization. "Don Juan," he said, "with his teaching is opening the door for
another much more interesting man: a man who still lives in a magical world
or universe."
Meditating about this idea of the "political man" a book by Eduardo Spranger
named "Forms of Life" came to my memory, in which it says that the life of
the political man "is interwoven of relationships of power and rivalry." The
political man is the man of dominion whose power controls as much of the
concrete reality of the world as the beings that inhabit it.
The world of Don Juan, on the other hand, is a magical world populated with
entities and forces.
"The admirability of Don Juan," said Castaneda, "is that even though in the
world of days he appears to be crazy, nobody is capable of perceiving him. To
the world, Don Juan offers a face that is necessarily temporal...one hour,
one month, sixty years. Nobody would be able to catch him off guard! In this
world Don Juan is impeccable because he always knew that what is here is only
momentary and that which comes after...well...a beauty! Don Juan and Don
Genaro intensely loved beauty."
The perception and conception which Don Juan has of reality and time are
undoubtably very distinct from ours. If on the level of daily life Don Juan
is always impeccable, this doesn't prevent you from knowing that "from this
side" all is definitely fleeting.
Castaneda continued describing a universe polarized between two extremes: the
right side and the left side. The right side would correspond to the tonal
and the left side to the wizard.
In Stories of Power, Don Juan explains extensively to Castaneda about those
two halves of the "bubble of perception." He says that the last duty of the
teacher consists of tediously cleaning a part of the "bubble," and then
reorganizing "all that there is" on the other side. 'The teacher is occupied
in this hammering away at learning without pity until all his vision of the
world stays in one half of the bubble. The other half, that which has
remained clean, can therefore be reclaimed by something which the wizards
call will.
To explain all this is very difficult because at this level words are totally
inadequate. Precisely, the left part of the universe "implies the absence of
words," and without words we cannot think. There are only actions. "In that
other world," said Castaneda, "the body acts. The body doesn't need words to
understand."
In the magical universe-as it's called-of Don Juan, certain entities exist
that are called "allies" or "fleeting shadows." These can be captured a
number of times. For this kind of capture a large number of explanations have
been sought, but, according to Castaneda, there is no doubt that these
phenomena depend principally on the human anatomy. The important thing is to
arrive at an understanding that there is a whole gamut of explanations that
can give reasons for these "fleeting shadows."
I asked him, then, about that knowing with the body that he speaks of in his
books. "Is it that, for you, the whole body is an organ of knowledge? I
inquired.
"Sure! The body knows," he responded to me. As an example, Castaneda told us
of the many possibilities of that part of the leg that goes from the knee to
the ankle where a memory center could be seated. It would appear that you can
learn to use the body to capture those "fleeting shadows." The teaching of
Don Juan transforms the body into an electronic scanner," he said, looking
for an adequate word in Spanish to compare the body to an electronic
telescope. The body would have the possibility to perceive reality at
distinct levels which, in their time, would reveal configurations of material
also distinct. It was evident that for Castaneda the body had possibilities
of movement and perception to which the majority of us are not accustomed.
Standing up and pointing to the foot and the ankle, he spoke to us of the
possibilities of that part of the body and of the little that we know about
all of this. "In the Toltec tradition," he affirmed, "the apprentice is
trained in the development of those possibilities." At this level Don Juan
begins to construct."
Meditating on these words of Castaneda, I thought about the parallel with
Tantric Yoga and the distinct centers or "chakras" through which the
ritualist comes to awakening by means of certain ritual practices. In the
book The Hermetic (impenetrable) Circle by Miguel Serrano one reads that the
"chakras" are "centers of conscience." In the same book, Karl Jung refers to
a conversation that Serrano had with a Pueblo Indian chief named Ochwian
Biano or "Lake of the Mountain." "He explained to me his impression of the
whites-always so agitated, always looking for something, aspiring to
something... According to Ochwian Biano, the whites were crazy; only crazy
people affirm thinking with the head. This affirmation of the Indian chief
produced great surprise in me and I asked him what he thought with. He
answered me that he thought with the heart." (Miguel Serrano, The
Impenetrable Circle, Buenos Aires: Ed. Kier, 1978)
The path of knowledge of the warrior is long, and requires total dedication.
The warrior has a concrete objective and a very pure incentive.
'What is the objective ?' I insist.
It seems that the objective consists in passing consciously to the other side
through the left flank of the universe. "You have to try to come as near as
possible to the eagle and strive to escape it without it devouring us. "the
objective," he said, "is to leave on tiptoe by the left hand side of the
eagle.
"I don't know if you know," he continued, seeking the way to clarify for us
the image, "that there is an entity that the Toltecs call the eagle. The
visionary sees it as an immense blackness that extends to infinity; it is an
immense blackness that ligthning crossed. For that reason it is called the
eagle: it has black wings and back, and its chest is luminous.
"The eye of the entity isn't a human eye. The eagle doesn't have pity.
Everything that is alive is represented in the eagle. That entity encloses
all-the beauty that man is capable of creating as well as all the bestiality
that isn't the human being properly said. That which is appropriately human
in the eagle is immensely small in comparison with all the rest. The eagle is
excessively mass, bulk, blackness...in front of that little which is proper
in a human being.
"The eagle attracts all life force that is ready to disappear because it is
nourished from that energy. The eagle is like an immense magnet that picks up
all those beams of light that are the vital energy of that which is dying."
While Castaneda told us all this, his hand and fingers imitated, like
hammers, the head of an eagle pecking space with an insatiable appetite.
"I only tell you that which Don Juan and the others say. They are all wizards
and witches!" he exclaimed. "They are all involved in a metaphor that is
incomprehensible for me."
"What is 'the master' of man? What is it that claims us?" he asked. I
listened attentively and stopped talking because he had entered a terrain in
which questions were possible.
'The master of us can't be a man," he said. It seems that the Toltecs call
"master" the "mold of a man." Everything-- plants, animals and human beings
--have a "mold." The "mold of man" is the same for all human beings. "My mold
and yours," he continued explaining, "is the same, but in each one it is
manifested and acted on in a distinct form according to the development of
the person."
Dividing the words of Castaneda, we interpreted that the "human mold" is that
which doesn't reunite, that which unifies the force of life. The "human
form," on the other hand, could be that which impedes us from seeing the
mold. It seems that while the "human form" isn't lost, we are, and this
impedes us from changing.
In The Second Ring of Power, La Gorda instructs Castaneda about the "human
mold" and the "human form." In that book, the "form" is described as a
luminous entity and Castaneda remembers that Don Juan described it as, "the
fount and origin of man." La Gorda, thinking about Don Juan, remembers that
he told her that, "if we arrive at having sufficient personal power we will
be able to glimpse the pattern although we are not wizards; and that when
this occurs we will say that we have seen God. She told me that if we call it
God, it would be fit because *the mold is God.*" (The translation and the
italicization are ours.)
Many times that afternoon we returned to the theme of the "human form" and
the "mold" of man. Surrounding the theme from distinct angles, each time it
was becoming more evident that the "human form" is that hard shell of the
person. 'that human form," he said, "is like a towel that covers one from the
armpits to the feet. Behind that towel there is a bright candle that is being
consumed until it goes out. When the candle goes out, it is because one has
died. Then, the eagle comes and devours it.
"Seers," continued Castaneda "are those beings capable of seeing the human
being as a luminous egg. Inside of that sphere of light is a lit candle. If
the seer sees that the candle is small even though the person appears strong,
it means that it is already ended."
Castaneda had told us before that the Toltecs never die because to be Toltec
implies having lost the human form. Only at that moment we comprehended: if
the Toltec has lost the human form, there is nothing that the eagle could
devour. He hadn't kept us in doubt either that the concepts "master" of man
and "mold" of man as well as the image of the eagle referred to the same
entity or were intimately related.
Several hours later, seated before hamburgers in a cafeteria on the corner of
Westwood Boulevard and another street whose name I don" remember, Castaneda
reported to us his experience of losing the human "form." According to what
he said, his experience wasn't as strong as that of La Gorda (in The Second
Ring of Power, La Gorda relates to Castaneda that when she lost "the human
form" she began to see an eye always in front of her. That eye accompanied
her all the time and almost ended in driving her crazy. Little by little she
got used to it until, one day, the eye happened to form a part of her. "Some
day,...when I arrive at being a real being without form, I won't see that eye
any more; the eye will be one with me...) who had symptoms similar to those
of a heart attack "In my case," said Castaneda, "a simple phenomen of
hyperventilation was produced. In that precise moment I felt a big pressure:
a current energy entered through my head, passed through my chest and stomach
and followed through my legs until it disappeared through my left leg. That
was all."
"To assure myself," he continued, "I went to a doctor, but he didn't find
anything. He only suggested that I breathe in a paper bag to diminish the
amount of oxygen and to resist the phenomenon of hyperventilation."
According to the Toltecs, in some way you have to return or pay the eagle
what belongs to it. Castaneda had already told us that the master of a man is
the eagle, and that the eagle is all the nobility and beauty as well all the
horror and ferocity which is found in all that is. Why is the eagle the
master of man? 'the eagle is the master of man because it feeds from the call
of life, of the vital energy that is loosened from all that is." And, making
once more the gesture with his hands resembling the pecking head of the
eagle, cleared the space of pecks with his arm, which he said, "Like that!
Like that! It devours everything!"
"The only way to escape the voracity of death is irrefutable and inescapable,
the action begins."
"What does it consist of, how do you do this personal recapitulation?" I
wanted to know.
"In the first place a list has to be made of all the people you have known in
the length of your life," he responded, "a list of all those who in one way
or another have forced us to put the ego (that center of personal growth that
later would be shown as a monster of 3,000 heads) on the table. We have to
bring back all those who have collaborated so that we might enter into that
game of 'they like me or they don't like me.' A game that isn't anything else
than upset living about we ourselves...Licking our own wounds!"
"The 'recapitulation' has to be total," he continued; "it goes from Z to A,
going backwards. It begins in the present moment and goes toward early
infancy, until two or three years of age and even earlier if it were
possible."
Since we were born, everything is being engraved on our bodies. The
'recapitulation' requires a great training of the mind.
How do you do this 'recapitulation'?
"One goes carefully bringing up images and fixing them in front of yourself,
then, with a movement of the head from right to left, every one of the images
is blown out as if we were sweeping them from our vision... The breath is
magic," he added.
With the end of the 'recapitulation,' ended also are all the tricks, games
and the self feeling. It seems that in the end we know all our tricks and
there isn't any way to put the ego on the table without our realizing
immediately what we are pretending with it. With "personal recapitulation"
you can divest yourself of everything. Then, only the task remains; the task
in all its simplicity, purity and rawness.
"The 'recapitulation' is possible for everyone, but requires an inflexible
will. If you fluctuate or hesitate; you are lost because the eagle will eat
you. In that terrain there's no room for doubt. In the first The Teachings of
Don Juan, it says this: The thing that you have to learn is how to arrive at
the crack between the worlds and how to enter into the other world. . . there
is a place where the two worlds come together one over the other. The crack
is there. It opens and closes like a door with the wind. To arrive there, a
man must exert his will, must, I would say, develop an indomitable desire, a
total dedication. But he must do it without the help of any power and of any
man...
"I don't know how to explain all of this well, but in the fulfillment and
dedication to the task, you have to be compulsive without truly being so
because the Toltec is a free being. The task asks all of one; however, it is
freeing. Do you comprehend? If this is difficult to understand it is because,
at its base, it deals with a paradox.
"But to this recapitulation," added Castaneda, changing tone and posture,
"you have to put 'spice' on it. The characteristic of Don Juan and his 'pals'
is that they are fickle. Don Juan cured me of being tiresome. He is not
solemn, nothing formal." Within the seriousness of the task that they all
perform there is always room for humor.
To illustrate in a concrete way the way that Don Juan taught him, Castaneda
related to us a very interesting episode. It seems that he smoked a lot and
that Don Juan resolved to cure him.
"I smoked three packs a day. One after the other! I didn't let them go out.
You see that now I don't have pockets," he said, showing his jacket that,
lacked them. "I eliminated pockets in them so as to remove from my body the
possibility of feeling something on my left side, something that might remind
me of the habit. In eliminating the pocket, I eliminated also the physical
habit of carrying my hand in my pockets."
"One time Don Juan told me that we were going to spend several days in the
Chihuahua hills. I remember that he expressly told me not to forget to bring
my cigarettes. He recommended to me, also, to bring provisions for two packs
a day and no more. So I bought the packs of cigarettes, but instead of 20 I
packed 40. I made up some divine packs that I covered with aluminum foil to
protect my cargo from animals and the rain."
'Well equipped and burdened with a knapsack, I followed Don Juan through the
hills. There I walked, lighting cigarette after cigarette, and trying to
catch my breath. Don Juan had tremendous vigor. With great patience he waited
for me while observing me smoke and try to keep up with him through the
hills. I wouldn't have had the patience that he had with me!" he exclaimed.
"We arrived, at last, at a pretty high plateau, surrounded by cliffs and
steep hillsides. There Don Juan invited me to try to descend. For a long time
I probed from one side to the other until finally I had to desist from the
purpose. I wasn't going to be able to do it.
"We continued like that, for several days, until one morning I woke up, and
the first thing I did was to look for my cigarettes. Where were my divine
packages? I looked and looked, and I didn't find them. When Don Juan woke up,
I wanted to know what was happening to me. He explained what was going on and
told me, 'Don't worry Surely a coyote came and carried them away, but they
can't be very far. Here! Look! There are the tracks of the coyote!'
"We spent all that day trailing the tracks of the coyote in search of the
packs. There we were, when Don Juan sat on the ground and, pretending to be a
little old man, very old, began to complain, 'This time I'm sure lost. . .
I'm old. . .I can't any more. . . ' While he was saying this, he grabbed his
head in his hands and made a great fuss."
Castaneda told us this whole story imitating Don Juan in his gestures and
tone of voice. It was a spectacle seeing him. A little later, the same
Castaneda would tell us that Don Juan used to make reference to his
histrionic abilities.
'With all that walking around," continued Castaneda, "I believe that 10 or 12
days had passed. I already didn't care about smoking! That is how I lost the
desire to smoke. We had gone along like demons running through the hills!
"When the time came to return, you can imagine that Don Juan knew the way
perfectly. We went down directly to the town. The difference was that, then,
I already didn't have a need to buy cigarettes. From that episode," he said
nostalgically, "fifteen years have passed."
"The line of not-doing," he commented, "is precisely the opposite of the
routine or the routines to which we are accustomed. Habits, like smoking for
example, are those which have us tied up, in chains...in the sense of
not-doing, on the other hand, all avenues are possible."
We were silent for a while. I finally broke it to ask about Dona Soledad. I
said that she had impressed me as a grotesque figure; really, like a witch.
"Dona Soledad is Indian," he answered me. "The history of her transformation
is something incredible. She put such willpower into her transformation that
in the end she achieved it. In that force her will developed to such an
extreme that as a consequence she also developed too much personal pride.
Precisely for this reason I don't believe that she can pass on tiptoes by the
left side of the eagle. In whatever way, it's fantastic what she was capable
of doing by herself! I don't know if you remember who she was...she was
Pablito's 'mamacita.' She was always washing clothes, ironing, washing
dishes... offering little meals to someone or another."
In relating this to us, Castaneda imitated in gestures and movements a little
old lady. "You have to see her now," he continued. "Dona Soledad is a young
strong woman. Now she is to be feared!"
"The 'recapitulation' took Dona Soledad seven years of her life. She hid
herself in a cave and didn't leave there. She stayed there until she finished
with everything. In seven years that's all she did. Even though she can't
pass together with the eagle," Castaneda said, full of admiration, "she'll
never go back to being the poor old thing she was before."
After a pause, Castaneda reminded us that Don Juan and Don Genaro still
weren't with them.
"Now already everything is different," expressed Castaneda nostalgically.
"Don Juan and Don Genaro aren't there. The Toltec woman is with us. She asks
tasks of us. La Gorda and I do tasks together. The others also have tasks to
perform; distinct tasks, also in different places.
"According to Don Juan, women have more talent than men. Women are more
susceptible. In life, moreover, they wear out less and tire less than men.
"For this reason Don Juan has left me now in the hands of a woman. He has
left me in the hands of the other side of the man woman unit. Furthermore, he
has left me in the hands of women; of the little sisters and La Gorda"
"The woman who is teaching us now has no name. (Several months later La Gorda
(Maria Tena) called me to send a message from Castaneda. In that
conversation, she told me that Mrs. Toltec is named Dona Florinda, and that
she is a very elegant, vivacious and anxious woman. Mrs. Toltec must be 50
years old.) She is simply the Toltec woman.
"Mrs. Toltec is the one who teaches me now. She is responsible for
everything. All the others, La Gorda and I, are nothing."
We wanted to know if she knew that he was going to meet with us as well as
his other plans.
"Mrs. Toltec knows everything. She sent me to Los Angeles to converse with
you," he responded, turning his attention to me. "She knows about my projects
and that I'm going to New York".
We also wanted to know what she was like. "Is she young? Is she old?" we
asked him.
"Mrs. Toltec is a very strong woman. Her muscles move in a very peculiar way.
She is old, but one of those who shines with the strength of her makeup."
It was difficult to explain how she was. In his trying, Castaneda sought for
a point of reference and reminded us of the movie Giant.
"Do you remember," he asked us, "that movie that James Dean and Elizabeth
Taylor appeared in? There Taylor plays a mature woman although in reality she
was very young. The Toltec woman causes the same impression in me: a face
with the makeup of an old woman with a body still young. Also I could say
that she acts old.
"Do you know about the National Enquirer' he casually continued, "A friend of
mine is in charge of saving them for me here in Los Angeles, and every time I
come I read them. It's the only thing that I read here... Precisely in that
newspaper recently I saw some photos of Elizabeth Taylor. Now she surely is
large!"
What did Castaneda want to transmit to us in making the comment about the
National Enquirer is the only thing he reads? It's difficult to imagine that
a sensationalist newspaper would be his fount of information.
That comment in some way synthesized his judgement with respect to the
immense production of news that characterizes our era. That comment also
encloses a judgement in respect to the values of the whole Western culture.
Everything is on the level of the National Enquirer.
Nothing Castaneda said that afternoon was casual. The different fragments
which he provided pointed at creating a determined impression on us. In this
intention wasn't in any way wrong; on the contrary, his interest was to
transmit the essential truth of the teaching they are involved in.
--
The second half of this interview will be printed in issue #15 of Magical
Blend. Another partial translation has previously been printed in Seeds of
Unfolding.
A CONVERSATION WITH CARLOS CASTANEDA
Published in Magical Blend Magazine Issue #15
[This is part 2 of the interview]
**********************
[Introduction to interview by Magical Blend Magazine]
During the planning stages for a book she is writing on mystical thinkers,
Graciela Corvalan wrote a letter to Carlos Castaneda requesting an interview.
She later received a phone call from Castaneda in which he accepted her
request, explaining that he was excited to be interviewed by her since she
was not a member of the established press. Castaneda asked her to meet him at
a specified time and date on the UCLA campus. When Graciela and a few
colleagues arrived for the interview, she was asked not to use the tape
recorder she had brought along. So, for seven hours, loaded with books and
papers, Graciela kept notes as the man, who some have credited as being the
crucial catalyst of mainstream awareness of metaphysics, explained his
tutelage under the Yaqui Sorcerer, Don Juan, his present "tasks" assigned to
him by the "fierce" Toltec Woman, and the nature of the "Toltec teachings."
In the first part of this interview, published in Magical Blend issue #14,
Graciela explained that the interview was conducted in Spanish, noting that
although Castaneda is fluent in Spanish, his native language is obviously
English. Graciela found that Castaneda, though well read, was not intellectual
in a bookish sense. At no time, says Graciela, did he establish comparisons
with other traditions of the past or present. "It was obvious that he did
not wish to contaminate his teaching with anything extraneous to it."
Graciela found Castaneda "a master in the art of conversation" as he talked
at length about his past and present.
At the time he met Don Juan, Castaneda's primary interest was anthropology,
but, "upon encountering him I changed."
Graciela remembers that, "Don Juan was present with us. Every time Castaneda
mentioned or remembered him, we felt his emotion."
From Don Juan, Castaneda learned the sorcerer's principle rule: "Give your
all in each moment." And through Don Juan, Castaneda became involved in the
long process of freeing himself from his past, a process which included
divesting himself of both possessions and friends. According to Castaneda,
the life of the Toltec warrior requires "an unshakeable desire to be free."
In the course of the interview, Castaneda revealed himself to be every bit
the "warrior" showing a distaste for pacifism and cheap sentiment. "Without
an adversary," he maintains, "we are nothing."
In questioning Castaneda about the Toltec tradition, Graciela found that,
from an anthropological perspective, the word Toltec makes reference to an
Indian culture of the center and south of Mexico that was already "extinct"
at the time of the conquest and colonization of America by Spain. But,
according to Castaneda, Toltec is descriptive not so much of hereditary
characteristics but rather of a way of life and a way of looking at life.
"Toltec," says Castaneda "is one who knows the mysteries of watching and
dreaming." It is a tradition that has been maintained for more than 3,000
years. Though Toltec colonies or civilizations may have been destroyed by the
white man, the Toltec "nation" could not be destroyed, for it represented
something incomprehensible to the white man to whom the dream world remained
cut off, mysterious and unapproachable.
According to Castaneda, the objective of the Toltec "is to leave the living
world; to leave with all that one is, but with nothing more than what one
is." Don Juan succeeded in this activity, but it was not, emphasizes
Castaneda, death, because "Toltecs don't die." In The Second Ring of Power,
la Gorda says, "when the wizards learn to 'dream' they tie together their two
attentions and, therefore, there is no need for the center to push
out...sorcerers...don't die."
Freedom, says Castaneda, is an illusion perpetrated by the snare of the
senses. "The art of the wizard consists of bringing learning to discover and
destroy that perceptive prejudice." In transcending, or breaking, the tyranny
of the senses, a door to a magical universe is opened. Castaneda describes the
universe as being polarized between two extremes: the right side and the left
side-The two halves of the "bubble of perception." On the left side is action.
Here there are no words. Here the mind does not conceptualize but rather the
entire body realizes, without thoughts and without words. The duty of a
teacher such as Don Juan is to move all vision of the world into the right
side, so that the left side can remain clear for the magical practice of will.
Presiding over the universe is the Eagle, an immense blackness representative
of all the beauty and all the bestiality in everything that's alive.
According to Castaneda, that which can be called "human" is very small in
comparison to the rest. As excessive mass, bulk, and blackness, the Eagle
attracts and feeds on all life force that is ready to disappear. It is, he
says, "like an immense magnet that picks up all those beams of light that are
the vital energy of that which is dying."
The key to escaping the Eagle is "recapitulation" which involves going
backward from adult to infancy, clearing out the images of a lifetime,
divesting oneself of everything until only the "task" remains and one arrives
at the "crack between the worlds." "To arrive there," says Castaneda
"requires an indomitable desire, a total dedication." But one must do it
without the help of any power and of any man.
According to Toltec tradition, all living things have a "mold." The mold of
man is the same for all human beings. In each individual it is developed and
manifested according to the development of the person. The "human form", on
the other hand, impedes us from seeing the mold. In The Second Ring of Power,
the "form" is described as a luminous entity. According to Don Juan, it is
the "fount and origin of man." The reason that Toltecs do not die is because,
having lost the human form, they have nothing that the Eagle can devour.
In The Second Ring of Power, la Gorda relates that when she succeeded in
losing the "human form," she began to see an eye always in front of her which
almost ended up driving her crazy. But "someday" she says, "when I arrive at
being a real being without form, I won't see that eye anymore; the eye will
be one with me."
So, without further digression, we proudly present the second part of
Graciela Corvalan's interview with Carlos Castaneda.
Castaneda came to us describing a group whose requirements, for the average
person, were extreme. We were very interested in knowing where all that vigor
came from "What is the sole objective of the Toltec? We wanted to know the
sense of what Castaneda was telling us. "What is the objective that you
pursue?' We insisted on bringing the question to a personal level.
"The objective is to leave the living world; to leave with all that one is
but with nothing more than what one is. The question is not to take anything
nor leave anything. Don Juan left completely-from the world. Don Juan doesn't
die because the Toltecs don't die." In The Second Ring of Power, La Gorda
instructs Castaneda with respect to the dichotomy "wizard-tonal." The domain
of the second attention "is only achieved after the warriors sweep totally
the surface of the table...this second attention makes the two attentions
form a unity and this unity is the totality of oneself." In the same book, La
Gorda says to Castaneda, "when the wizards learn to 'dream,' they tie
together their two attentions and, therefore, there is no need for the center
to push out.. .sorcerers don't die. . . I don't want to say that we don't
die. We are nothing, we are nincompoops, stupid; we aren't either here nor
there. They, on the other hand, have their attentions so united that maybe
they never die."
According to Castaneda, the idea that we are free is an illusion and an
absurdity. He pushed to make us understand that common sense deceives us
because ordinary perception only tells us a part of the truth.
"Ordinary perception doesn't tell us all the truth. There has to be more than
a mere passing through the earth, of only eating and reproducing," he said
vehemently. With a gesture I interpreted as alluding to the unfeelingness of
all and the immense tediousness of life in its everyday boredom, he asked us,
"What is all this that surrounds us?' Common sense would be that accord to
which we have arrived behind a long educative process that imposes on us
ordinary perception as the only truth. "Precisely. The art of the wizard," he
said, "consists of bringing learning to discover and destroy that perceptive
prejudice."
According to Castaneda, Edmundo Husserl is the first one from the West who
conceives of the possibility of "suspending judgement." In "Ideas for a pure
phenomenology and a phenomenological philosophy" (1913) Husserl dealt
thoroughly with the "era" or "phenomenological reduction." The
phenomenological method doesn't deny but simply "puts into parentheses" those
elements that sustain our ordinary perception.
Castaneda considers that phenomenology offers him the theoretical
methodological framework to comprehend the teaching of Don Juan. For
phenomenology, the act of knowing depends on intention and not on perception.
Perception always varies according to history, that is to say, according to
the subject with knowledge acquired and immersed in a determined tradition.
The most important rule of the phenomenological method is that of "toward the
same things."
'"The task with which Don Juan fulfilled me," he insisted, "was that of
breaking, little by little, the perceptive prejudices until arriving at a
total rupture." Phenomenology "suspends" judgement and is limited to the
description of pure intentional acts. "So, for example, I construct the
object 'house.' The phenomenological reference is minimal. The 'intention' is
what transforms reference into something concrete and singular."
Phenomenology, without a doubt, has, for Castaneda, a simple methodological
value. Husserl never transcended the theoretical and, as a consequence, he
didn't touch the human being in his life in all his days.
For Castaneda, the most the western man-the European man-has arrived to is
the political man. This political man would be the epitome of our
civilization. "Don Juan," he said, "with his teaching is opening the door for
another much more interesting man: a man who still lives in a magical world
or universe."
Meditating about this idea of the "political man" a book by Eduardo Spranger
named "Forms of Life" came to my memory, in which it says that the life of
the political man "is interwoven of relationships of power and rivalry." The
political man is the man of dominion whose power controls as much of the
concrete reality of the world as the beings that inhabit it.
The world of Don Juan, on the other hand, is a magical world populated with
entities and forces.
"The admirability of Don Juan," said Castaneda, "is that even though in the
world of days he appears to be crazy, nobody is capable of perceiving him. To
the world, Don Juan offers a face that is necessarily temporal...one hour,
one month, sixty years. Nobody would be able to catch him off guard! In this
world Don Juan is impeccable because he always knew that what is here is only
momentary and that which comes after...well...a beauty! Don Juan and Don
Genaro intensely loved beauty."
The perception and conception which Don Juan has of reality and time are
undoubtably very distinct from ours. If on the level of daily life Don Juan
is always impeccable, this doesn't prevent you from knowing that "from this
side" all is definitely fleeting.
Castaneda continued describing a universe polarized between two extremes: the
right side and the left side. The right side would correspond to the tonal
and the left side to the wizard.
In Stories of Power, Don Juan explains extensively to Castaneda about those
two halves of the "bubble of perception." He says that the last duty of the
teacher consists of tediously cleaning a part of the "bubble," and then
reorganizing "all that there is" on the other side. 'The teacher is occupied
in this hammering away at learning without pity until all his vision of the
world stays in one half of the bubble. The other half, that which has
remained clean, can therefore be reclaimed by something which the wizards
call will.
To explain all this is very difficult because at this level words are totally
inadequate. Precisely, the left part of the universe "implies the absence of
words," and without words we cannot think. There are only actions. "In that
other world," said Castaneda, "the body acts. The body doesn't need words to
understand."
In the magical universe-as it's called-of Don Juan, certain entities exist
that are called "allies" or "fleeting shadows." These can be captured a
number of times. For this kind of capture a large number of explanations have
been sought, but, according to Castaneda, there is no doubt that these
phenomena depend principally on the human anatomy. The important thing is to
arrive at an understanding that there is a whole gamut of explanations that
can give reasons for these "fleeting shadows."
I asked him, then, about that knowing with the body that he speaks of in his
books. "Is it that, for you, the whole body is an organ of knowledge? I
inquired.
"Sure! The body knows," he responded to me. As an example, Castaneda told us
of the many possibilities of that part of the leg that goes from the knee to
the ankle where a memory center could be seated. It would appear that you can
learn to use the body to capture those "fleeting shadows." The teaching of
Don Juan transforms the body into an electronic scanner," he said, looking
for an adequate word in Spanish to compare the body to an electronic
telescope. The body would have the possibility to perceive reality at
distinct levels which, in their time, would reveal configurations of material
also distinct. It was evident that for Castaneda the body had possibilities
of movement and perception to which the majority of us are not accustomed.
Standing up and pointing to the foot and the ankle, he spoke to us of the
possibilities of that part of the body and of the little that we know about
all of this. "In the Toltec tradition," he affirmed, "the apprentice is
trained in the development of those possibilities." At this level Don Juan
begins to construct."
Meditating on these words of Castaneda, I thought about the parallel with
Tantric Yoga and the distinct centers or "chakras" through which the
ritualist comes to awakening by means of certain ritual practices. In the
book The Hermetic (impenetrable) Circle by Miguel Serrano one reads that the
"chakras" are "centers of conscience." In the same book, Karl Jung refers to
a conversation that Serrano had with a Pueblo Indian chief named Ochwian
Biano or "Lake of the Mountain." "He explained to me his impression of the
whites-always so agitated, always looking for something, aspiring to
something... According to Ochwian Biano, the whites were crazy; only crazy
people affirm thinking with the head. This affirmation of the Indian chief
produced great surprise in me and I asked him what he thought with. He
answered me that he thought with the heart." (Miguel Serrano, The
Impenetrable Circle, Buenos Aires: Ed. Kier, 1978)
The path of knowledge of the warrior is long, and requires total dedication.
The warrior has a concrete objective and a very pure incentive.
'What is the objective ?' I insist.
It seems that the objective consists in passing consciously to the other side
through the left flank of the universe. "You have to try to come as near as
possible to the eagle and strive to escape it without it devouring us. "the
objective," he said, "is to leave on tiptoe by the left hand side of the
eagle.
"I don't know if you know," he continued, seeking the way to clarify for us
the image, "that there is an entity that the Toltecs call the eagle. The
visionary sees it as an immense blackness that extends to infinity; it is an
immense blackness that ligthning crossed. For that reason it is called the
eagle: it has black wings and back, and its chest is luminous.
"The eye of the entity isn't a human eye. The eagle doesn't have pity.
Everything that is alive is represented in the eagle. That entity encloses
all-the beauty that man is capable of creating as well as all the bestiality
that isn't the human being properly said. That which is appropriately human
in the eagle is immensely small in comparison with all the rest. The eagle is
excessively mass, bulk, blackness...in front of that little which is proper
in a human being.
"The eagle attracts all life force that is ready to disappear because it is
nourished from that energy. The eagle is like an immense magnet that picks up
all those beams of light that are the vital energy of that which is dying."
While Castaneda told us all this, his hand and fingers imitated, like
hammers, the head of an eagle pecking space with an insatiable appetite.
"I only tell you that which Don Juan and the others say. They are all wizards
and witches!" he exclaimed. "They are all involved in a metaphor that is
incomprehensible for me."
"What is 'the master' of man? What is it that claims us?" he asked. I
listened attentively and stopped talking because he had entered a terrain in
which questions were possible.
'The master of us can't be a man," he said. It seems that the Toltecs call
"master" the "mold of a man." Everything-- plants, animals and human beings
--have a "mold." The "mold of man" is the same for all human beings. "My mold
and yours," he continued explaining, "is the same, but in each one it is
manifested and acted on in a distinct form according to the development of
the person."
Dividing the words of Castaneda, we interpreted that the "human mold" is that
which doesn't reunite, that which unifies the force of life. The "human
form," on the other hand, could be that which impedes us from seeing the
mold. It seems that while the "human form" isn't lost, we are, and this
impedes us from changing.
In The Second Ring of Power, La Gorda instructs Castaneda about the "human
mold" and the "human form." In that book, the "form" is described as a
luminous entity and Castaneda remembers that Don Juan described it as, "the
fount and origin of man." La Gorda, thinking about Don Juan, remembers that
he told her that, "if we arrive at having sufficient personal power we will
be able to glimpse the pattern although we are not wizards; and that when
this occurs we will say that we have seen God. She told me that if we call it
God, it would be fit because *the mold is God.*" (The translation and the
italicization are ours.)
Many times that afternoon we returned to the theme of the "human form" and
the "mold" of man. Surrounding the theme from distinct angles, each time it
was becoming more evident that the "human form" is that hard shell of the
person. 'that human form," he said, "is like a towel that covers one from the
armpits to the feet. Behind that towel there is a bright candle that is being
consumed until it goes out. When the candle goes out, it is because one has
died. Then, the eagle comes and devours it.
"Seers," continued Castaneda "are those beings capable of seeing the human
being as a luminous egg. Inside of that sphere of light is a lit candle. If
the seer sees that the candle is small even though the person appears strong,
it means that it is already ended."
Castaneda had told us before that the Toltecs never die because to be Toltec
implies having lost the human form. Only at that moment we comprehended: if
the Toltec has lost the human form, there is nothing that the eagle could
devour. He hadn't kept us in doubt either that the concepts "master" of man
and "mold" of man as well as the image of the eagle referred to the same
entity or were intimately related.
Several hours later, seated before hamburgers in a cafeteria on the corner of
Westwood Boulevard and another street whose name I don" remember, Castaneda
reported to us his experience of losing the human "form." According to what
he said, his experience wasn't as strong as that of La Gorda (in The Second
Ring of Power, La Gorda relates to Castaneda that when she lost "the human
form" she began to see an eye always in front of her. That eye accompanied
her all the time and almost ended in driving her crazy. Little by little she
got used to it until, one day, the eye happened to form a part of her. "Some
day,...when I arrive at being a real being without form, I won't see that eye
any more; the eye will be one with me...) who had symptoms similar to those
of a heart attack "In my case," said Castaneda, "a simple phenomen of
hyperventilation was produced. In that precise moment I felt a big pressure:
a current energy entered through my head, passed through my chest and stomach
and followed through my legs until it disappeared through my left leg. That
was all."
"To assure myself," he continued, "I went to a doctor, but he didn't find
anything. He only suggested that I breathe in a paper bag to diminish the
amount of oxygen and to resist the phenomenon of hyperventilation."
According to the Toltecs, in some way you have to return or pay the eagle
what belongs to it. Castaneda had already told us that the master of a man is
the eagle, and that the eagle is all the nobility and beauty as well all the
horror and ferocity which is found in all that is. Why is the eagle the
master of man? 'the eagle is the master of man because it feeds from the call
of life, of the vital energy that is loosened from all that is." And, making
once more the gesture with his hands resembling the pecking head of the
eagle, cleared the space of pecks with his arm, which he said, "Like that!
Like that! It devours everything!"
"The only way to escape the voracity of death is irrefutable and inescapable,
the action begins."
"What does it consist of, how do you do this personal recapitulation?" I
wanted to know.
"In the first place a list has to be made of all the people you have known in
the length of your life," he responded, "a list of all those who in one way
or another have forced us to put the ego (that center of personal growth that
later would be shown as a monster of 3,000 heads) on the table. We have to
bring back all those who have collaborated so that we might enter into that
game of 'they like me or they don't like me.' A game that isn't anything else
than upset living about we ourselves...Licking our own wounds!"
"The 'recapitulation' has to be total," he continued; "it goes from Z to A,
going backwards. It begins in the present moment and goes toward early
infancy, until two or three years of age and even earlier if it were
possible."
Since we were born, everything is being engraved on our bodies. The
'recapitulation' requires a great training of the mind.
How do you do this 'recapitulation'?
"One goes carefully bringing up images and fixing them in front of yourself,
then, with a movement of the head from right to left, every one of the images
is blown out as if we were sweeping them from our vision... The breath is
magic," he added.
With the end of the 'recapitulation,' ended also are all the tricks, games
and the self feeling. It seems that in the end we know all our tricks and
there isn't any way to put the ego on the table without our realizing
immediately what we are pretending with it. With "personal recapitulation"
you can divest yourself of everything. Then, only the task remains; the task
in all its simplicity, purity and rawness.
"The 'recapitulation' is possible for everyone, but requires an inflexible
will. If you fluctuate or hesitate; you are lost because the eagle will eat
you. In that terrain there's no room for doubt. In the first The Teachings of
Don Juan, it says this: The thing that you have to learn is how to arrive at
the crack between the worlds and how to enter into the other world. . . there
is a place where the two worlds come together one over the other. The crack
is there. It opens and closes like a door with the wind. To arrive there, a
man must exert his will, must, I would say, develop an indomitable desire, a
total dedication. But he must do it without the help of any power and of any
man...
"I don't know how to explain all of this well, but in the fulfillment and
dedication to the task, you have to be compulsive without truly being so
because the Toltec is a free being. The task asks all of one; however, it is
freeing. Do you comprehend? If this is difficult to understand it is because,
at its base, it deals with a paradox.
"But to this recapitulation," added Castaneda, changing tone and posture,
"you have to put 'spice' on it. The characteristic of Don Juan and his 'pals'
is that they are fickle. Don Juan cured me of being tiresome. He is not
solemn, nothing formal." Within the seriousness of the task that they all
perform there is always room for humor.
To illustrate in a concrete way the way that Don Juan taught him, Castaneda
related to us a very interesting episode. It seems that he smoked a lot and
that Don Juan resolved to cure him.
"I smoked three packs a day. One after the other! I didn't let them go out.
You see that now I don't have pockets," he said, showing his jacket that,
lacked them. "I eliminated pockets in them so as to remove from my body the
possibility of feeling something on my left side, something that might remind
me of the habit. In eliminating the pocket, I eliminated also the physical
habit of carrying my hand in my pockets."
"One time Don Juan told me that we were going to spend several days in the
Chihuahua hills. I remember that he expressly told me not to forget to bring
my cigarettes. He recommended to me, also, to bring provisions for two packs
a day and no more. So I bought the packs of cigarettes, but instead of 20 I
packed 40. I made up some divine packs that I covered with aluminum foil to
protect my cargo from animals and the rain."
'Well equipped and burdened with a knapsack, I followed Don Juan through the
hills. There I walked, lighting cigarette after cigarette, and trying to
catch my breath. Don Juan had tremendous vigor. With great patience he waited
for me while observing me smoke and try to keep up with him through the
hills. I wouldn't have had the patience that he had with me!" he exclaimed.
"We arrived, at last, at a pretty high plateau, surrounded by cliffs and
steep hillsides. There Don Juan invited me to try to descend. For a long time
I probed from one side to the other until finally I had to desist from the
purpose. I wasn't going to be able to do it.
"We continued like that, for several days, until one morning I woke up, and
the first thing I did was to look for my cigarettes. Where were my divine
packages? I looked and looked, and I didn't find them. When Don Juan woke up,
I wanted to know what was happening to me. He explained what was going on and
told me, 'Don't worry Surely a coyote came and carried them away, but they
can't be very far. Here! Look! There are the tracks of the coyote!'
"We spent all that day trailing the tracks of the coyote in search of the
packs. There we were, when Don Juan sat on the ground and, pretending to be a
little old man, very old, began to complain, 'This time I'm sure lost. . .
I'm old. . .I can't any more. . . ' While he was saying this, he grabbed his
head in his hands and made a great fuss."
Castaneda told us this whole story imitating Don Juan in his gestures and
tone of voice. It was a spectacle seeing him. A little later, the same
Castaneda would tell us that Don Juan used to make reference to his
histrionic abilities.
'With all that walking around," continued Castaneda, "I believe that 10 or 12
days had passed. I already didn't care about smoking! That is how I lost the
desire to smoke. We had gone along like demons running through the hills!
"When the time came to return, you can imagine that Don Juan knew the way
perfectly. We went down directly to the town. The difference was that, then,
I already didn't have a need to buy cigarettes. From that episode," he said
nostalgically, "fifteen years have passed."
"The line of not-doing," he commented, "is precisely the opposite of the
routine or the routines to which we are accustomed. Habits, like smoking for
example, are those which have us tied up, in chains...in the sense of
not-doing, on the other hand, all avenues are possible."
We were silent for a while. I finally broke it to ask about Dona Soledad. I
said that she had impressed me as a grotesque figure; really, like a witch.
"Dona Soledad is Indian," he answered me. "The history of her transformation
is something incredible. She put such willpower into her transformation that
in the end she achieved it. In that force her will developed to such an
extreme that as a consequence she also developed too much personal pride.
Precisely for this reason I don't believe that she can pass on tiptoes by the
left side of the eagle. In whatever way, it's fantastic what she was capable
of doing by herself! I don't know if you remember who she was...she was
Pablito's 'mamacita.' She was always washing clothes, ironing, washing
dishes... offering little meals to someone or another."
In relating this to us, Castaneda imitated in gestures and movements a little
old lady. "You have to see her now," he continued. "Dona Soledad is a young
strong woman. Now she is to be feared!"
"The 'recapitulation' took Dona Soledad seven years of her life. She hid
herself in a cave and didn't leave there. She stayed there until she finished
with everything. In seven years that's all she did. Even though she can't
pass together with the eagle," Castaneda said, full of admiration, "she'll
never go back to being the poor old thing she was before."
After a pause, Castaneda reminded us that Don Juan and Don Genaro still
weren't with them.
"Now already everything is different," expressed Castaneda nostalgically.
"Don Juan and Don Genaro aren't there. The Toltec woman is with us. She asks
tasks of us. La Gorda and I do tasks together. The others also have tasks to
perform; distinct tasks, also in different places.
"According to Don Juan, women have more talent than men. Women are more
susceptible. In life, moreover, they wear out less and tire less than men.
"For this reason Don Juan has left me now in the hands of a woman. He has
left me in the hands of the other side of the man woman unit. Furthermore, he
has left me in the hands of women; of the little sisters and La Gorda"
"The woman who is teaching us now has no name. (Several months later La Gorda
(Maria Tena) called me to send a message from Castaneda. In that
conversation, she told me that Mrs. Toltec is named Dona Florinda, and that
she is a very elegant, vivacious and anxious woman. Mrs. Toltec must be 50
years old.) She is simply the Toltec woman.
"Mrs. Toltec is the one who teaches me now. She is responsible for
everything. All the others, La Gorda and I, are nothing."
We wanted to know if she knew that he was going to meet with us as well as
his other plans.
"Mrs. Toltec knows everything. She sent me to Los Angeles to converse with
you," he responded, turning his attention to me. "She knows about my projects
and that I'm going to New York".
We also wanted to know what she was like. "Is she young? Is she old?" we
asked him.
"Mrs. Toltec is a very strong woman. Her muscles move in a very peculiar way.
She is old, but one of those who shines with the strength of her makeup."
It was difficult to explain how she was. In his trying, Castaneda sought for
a point of reference and reminded us of the movie Giant.
"Do you remember," he asked us, "that movie that James Dean and Elizabeth
Taylor appeared in? There Taylor plays a mature woman although in reality she
was very young. The Toltec woman causes the same impression in me: a face
with the makeup of an old woman with a body still young. Also I could say
that she acts old.
"Do you know about the National Enquirer' he casually continued, "A friend of
mine is in charge of saving them for me here in Los Angeles, and every time I
come I read them. It's the only thing that I read here... Precisely in that
newspaper recently I saw some photos of Elizabeth Taylor. Now she surely is
large!"
What did Castaneda want to transmit to us in making the comment about the
National Enquirer is the only thing he reads? It's difficult to imagine that
a sensationalist newspaper would be his fount of information.
That comment in some way synthesized his judgement with respect to the
immense production of news that characterizes our era. That comment also
encloses a judgement in respect to the values of the whole Western culture.
Everything is on the level of the National Enquirer.
Nothing Castaneda said that afternoon was casual. The different fragments
which he provided pointed at creating a determined impression on us. In this
intention wasn't in any way wrong; on the contrary, his interest was to
transmit the essential truth of the teaching they are involved in.
--
The second half of this interview will be printed in issue #15 of Magical
Blend. Another partial translation has previously been printed in Seeds of
Unfolding.
A CONVERSATION WITH CARLOS CASTANEDA
Published in Magical Blend Magazine Issue #15
[This is part 2 of the interview]
**********************
[Introduction to interview by Magical Blend Magazine]
During the planning stages for a book she is writing on mystical thinkers,
Graciela Corvalan wrote a letter to Carlos Castaneda requesting an interview.
She later received a phone call from Castaneda in which he accepted her
request, explaining that he was excited to be interviewed by her since she
was not a member of the established press. Castaneda asked her to meet him at
a specified time and date on the UCLA campus. When Graciela and a few
colleagues arrived for the interview, she was asked not to use the tape
recorder she had brought along. So, for seven hours, loaded with books and
papers, Graciela kept notes as the man, who some have credited as being the
crucial catalyst of mainstream awareness of metaphysics, explained his
tutelage under the Yaqui Sorcerer, Don Juan, his present "tasks" assigned to
him by the "fierce" Toltec Woman, and the nature of the "Toltec teachings."
In the first part of this interview, published in Magical Blend issue #14,
Graciela explained that the interview was conducted in Spanish, noting that
although Castaneda is fluent in Spanish, his native language is obviously
English. Graciela found that Castaneda, though well read, was not intellectual
in a bookish sense. At no time, says Graciela, did he establish comparisons
with other traditions of the past or present. "It was obvious that he did
not wish to contaminate his teaching with anything extraneous to it."
Graciela found Castaneda "a master in the art of conversation" as he talked
at length about his past and present.
At the time he met Don Juan, Castaneda's primary interest was anthropology,
but, "upon encountering him I changed."
Graciela remembers that, "Don Juan was present with us. Every time Castaneda
mentioned or remembered him, we felt his emotion."
From Don Juan, Castaneda learned the sorcerer's principle rule: "Give your
all in each moment." And through Don Juan, Castaneda became involved in the
long process of freeing himself from his past, a process which included
divesting himself of both possessions and friends. According to Castaneda,
the life of the Toltec warrior requires "an unshakeable desire to be free."
In the course of the interview, Castaneda revealed himself to be every bit
the "warrior" showing a distaste for pacifism and cheap sentiment. "Without
an adversary," he maintains, "we are nothing."
In questioning Castaneda about the Toltec tradition, Graciela found that,
from an anthropological perspective, the word Toltec makes reference to an
Indian culture of the center and south of Mexico that was already "extinct"
at the time of the conquest and colonization of America by Spain. But,
according to Castaneda, Toltec is descriptive not so much of hereditary
characteristics but rather of a way of life and a way of looking at life.
"Toltec," says Castaneda "is one who knows the mysteries of watching and
dreaming." It is a tradition that has been maintained for more than 3,000
years. Though Toltec colonies or civilizations may have been destroyed by the
white man, the Toltec "nation" could not be destroyed, for it represented
something incomprehensible to the white man to whom the dream world remained
cut off, mysterious and unapproachable.
According to Castaneda, the objective of the Toltec "is to leave the living
world; to leave with all that one is, but with nothing more than what one
is." Don Juan succeeded in this activity, but it was not, emphasizes
Castaneda, death, because "Toltecs don't die." In The Second Ring of Power,
la Gorda says, "when the wizards learn to 'dream' they tie together their two
attentions and, therefore, there is no need for the center to push
out...sorcerers...don't die."
Freedom, says Castaneda, is an illusion perpetrated by the snare of the
senses. "The art of the wizard consists of bringing learning to discover and
destroy that perceptive prejudice." In transcending, or breaking, the tyranny
of the senses, a door to a magical universe is opened. Castaneda describes the
universe as being polarized between two extremes: the right side and the left
side-The two halves of the "bubble of perception." On the left side is action.
Here there are no words. Here the mind does not conceptualize but rather the
entire body realizes, without thoughts and without words. The duty of a
teacher such as Don Juan is to move all vision of the world into the right
side, so that the left side can remain clear for the magical practice of will.
Presiding over the universe is the Eagle, an immense blackness representative
of all the beauty and all the bestiality in everything that's alive.
According to Castaneda, that which can be called "human" is very small in
comparison to the rest. As excessive mass, bulk, and blackness, the Eagle
attracts and feeds on all life force that is ready to disappear. It is, he
says, "like an immense magnet that picks up all those beams of light that are
the vital energy of that which is dying."
The key to escaping the Eagle is "recapitulation" which involves going
backward from adult to infancy, clearing out the images of a lifetime,
divesting oneself of everything until only the "task" remains and one arrives
at the "crack between the worlds." "To arrive there," says Castaneda
"requires an indomitable desire, a total dedication." But one must do it
without the help of any power and of any man.
According to Toltec tradition, all living things have a "mold." The mold of
man is the same for all human beings. In each individual it is developed and
manifested according to the development of the person. The "human form", on
the other hand, impedes us from seeing the mold. In The Second Ring of Power,
the "form" is described as a luminous entity. According to Don Juan, it is
the "fount and origin of man." The reason that Toltecs do not die is because,
having lost the human form, they have nothing that the Eagle can devour.
In The Second Ring of Power, la Gorda relates that when she succeeded in
losing the "human form," she began to see an eye always in front of her which
almost ended up driving her crazy. But "someday" she says, "when I arrive at
being a real being without form, I won't see that eye anymore; the eye will
be one with me."
So, without further digression, we proudly present the second part of
Graciela Corvalan's interview with Carlos Castaneda.
[Beginning of Corvalan Interview - Part 2]
EVASIVE MYSTERIES
By Graciela Corvalan, Ph.D.
We continued talking about the Toltec Woman and Castaneda told us that she's
leaving soon. "She's told us that in her place are going to come two women.
The Toltec Woman is very strict, her demands are terrible!" Now, if the
Toltec Woman is fierce, it appears that the two who are coming are much worse.
Let's hope that she's not leaving yet! One can't stop wanting nor can prevent
the body from complaining and fearing the severity of the undertaking...
Nevertheless, there's no way of altering destiny. So, there it grabbed me!
"I don't have more liberty," he continued, "than the impeccable one because
only if I'm impeccable, I change my destiny; that is to say, I go on tiptoes
by the left side of the eagle. If I'm not impeccable, I don't change my
destiny and the eagle devours me.
"The Nagual Juan Matos is a free man. He is free in fulfilling his destiny.
Do you understand me? I don't know if you understand what I want to say," he
asked worriedly.
"Sure we understand!" we retorted vehemently. "We find a great similarity
with what we feel and live daily in so much in this last section as in many
other things that you have referred to us up to now."
"Don Juan is a free man," he continued. "He looks for liberty. His spirit
looks for it.. Don Juan is free from that basic prejudice; the perceptive
prejudice that prevent us from seeing reality.'
The importance of all that which we came speaking about resides in the
possibility of destroying the circle of routines: Don Juan made him practice
numerous exercises so he would become conscious of his routines: exercises
such as 'walking in the darkness' and the 'power walk.'
How to break that circle of routines ? How to break that perceptive arc that
ties us to that ordinary vision of reality? That ordinary vision that our
routines contribute to establishing is, precisely, that which Castaneda
denominates 'the attention of the tonal or 'the first ring of attention.'
"To break that perceptive arc isn't an easy task; it could take years. The
difficulty with me," he affirmed laughing, "is that I am very pigheaded.
Quite unwillingly I went on learning: For this reason, in my case, Don Juan
had to use drugs...and so I ended up...with my liver in the stream!
"In the line of not-doing is achieved the destroying of routines and becoming
conscious," explained Castaneda. While saying this he stood up and started to
walk backwards while he remembered a technique that Don Juan had taught him:
Walking backwards with the help of a mirror. Castaneda continued reporting to
us that to facilitate the task he devised an artifact of metal (like a ring
that in the style of a crown he bore on his head) in which the mirror was
fastened. In that way, he could practice the exercise and have his hands
free. Other examples of techniques of not-doing would be to put on your belt
backwards and to wear your shoes on the opposite feet. All these techniques
have as an objective to make one conscious of what one is doing at each
moment. "Destroying routines," he said, "is the way we have of giving the
body new sensations. The body knows..."
Immediately Castaneda related to us some of the games that the Toltec youth
practice for hours. "They are games of not-doing," he explained. "Games in
which there are no fixed rules but rather they are generated as they play."
It seems that by not having fixed rules, the behavior of the players isn't
foreseen and, consequently, everyone must be very attentive. "One-of these
games," he continued, "consists in giving the adversary false signs. It's a
game of pulling."
As he said, in that game of pulling, three persons participate and two posts
and a rope are needed. With the rope you tie up one of the players and hang
him from the posts. The other two players must pull on the ends of the rope
and try to fool him giving him false signs. All have to be very attentive so
that when one pulls, the other also does it and the person who is tied
doesn't get twisted.
The techniques and games of not-doing develop attention: You can say that
they are concentration exercises since they obligate those who practice them
to be fully conscious of what they are doing. Castaneda commented that old
age would consist in having remained shut in the perfect circle of routines.
"The way of teaching of the Toltec Woman is to put us into situations. I
believe that it's the best way because in putting us in situations we
discover that we are nothing: The other way is that of self love, that of
personal pride. The former way transforms us into detectives, always
attentive to all that could happen or offend us. Detectives? Yes ! We spent
time seeking evidence of love: if they love me or they love me not. Thus,
centered in our ego we don't do anything but strengthen it. According to the
Toltec Woman, the best is to begin considering that nobody loves us."
Castaneda told us that for Don Juan, personal pride resembles a monster of
3,000 heads. "One destroys and knocks down heads but others always rise up...
It's that one possesses all the tricks!" he exclaimed. With the tricks it
appears that we fool ourselves believing we are somebody.
I then reminded him of the image of catching weaknesses, "as rabbits are
caught in a trap," that appears in one of his books. "Yes," he answered me,
"you constantly have to be on the lookout."
Changing position, Castaneda began to give us the history of the past three
years. "One of the many tasks was that of cook in those roadside cafes.
La Gorda accompanied me that year as a waitress. For more than a year we
lived there as Jose Cordoba and his wife! "My complete name was Jose Luis
Cordoba, at your service," he, said with a profound reverence. "Without a
doubt, everyone knew me as Joe Cordoba."
Castaneda didn't tell us the name or the location of the city in which they
lived. It's possible that they had been in different places. It appears that
at the beginning, he arrived with la Gorda and the Toltec Woman, who
accompanied them for a while. The first thing was to find housing and work
for Joe Cordoba, his wife, and his mother-in-law. "That was how we presented
ourselves," commented Castaneda, "otherwise, the people wouldn't have
understood."
For a long time they looked for work, until finally they found it in a
roadside cafe. "In that type of establishment you begin very early in the
morning. At five a.m. you have to be already working."
Castaneda told us, laughing, that in those places the first thing they ask
you is: "Do you know how to make eggs?" What could there be to making eggs?
It appears that he delayed enough time in figuring out what they were trying
to say until he finally discovered that they were talking about the diverse
ways of preparing eggs for breakfast. In restaurants or cafes for truck
drivers. 'Egg making' is very important.
They spent one year working there. "Now I know how to 'make eggs'," he
affirmed laughing. "All that you would want!" La Gorda also worked a lot. She
was such a good waitress that she ended up by taking care of all the girls
there. At the end of a year, when the Toltec Woman told them, "That's enough,
you're finished with this task," the owner of the cafe didn't want us to leave.
"The truth is that we worked very hard there. A lot! From morning till night."
During that year, they had a significant encounter. It relates to the story
of a girl named Terry who arrived at the cafe where they were asking for work
waitressing. By then, Joe Cordoba had gained the confidence of the owner of
the establishment and was the one in charge of contracting and watching over
all the staff. As Terry told them, she was looking for Carlos Castaneda. How
could she know that they were there? Castaneda didn't know.
'This girl Terry," continued Castaneda with sadness and giving us to
understand that she looked dirty and messy, "is one of those 'hippies' who
take drugs...a terrifying life. Poor thing!" Later, Castaneda would tell us,
that, even though he could never tell Terry who he was, Joe Cordoba and his
wife helped her a lot during the months she spent with them. He told us that
one day she came in very excited from the street saying that she had just
seen Castaneda in a Cadillac parked in front of the cafe. "He's there," she
screamed to us; "he's in the car, writing." "Are you sure it's Castaneda? How
can you be so convinced?" I told her. But she continued, "Yes, it's him, I'm
sure.. ." I then suggested to her that she go out to the car and ask him. She
needed to get rid of that immense doubt. "Hurry! Hurry!" I insisted. She was
afraid to speak to him because she said that she was very fat and very ugly.
I encouraged her. "But you look divine, hurry!" Finally, she went, but came
right back crying a river of tears. It seems that the man in the Cadillac
hadn't looked at her, and had thrown her out telling her not to bother him.
"You can imagine that I tried to console her," said Castaneda "It gave me so
much pain that I almost told her who I was. La Gorda didn't let me; she
protected me." Really, he couldn't tell her anything because he was
performing a task in which he was Joe Cordoba and not Carlos Castaneda. He
couldn't disobey.
As Castaneda told it, when Terry arrived she wasn't a good waitress. With
passing months, without a doubt, they brought her to be good, clean and
careful. "La Gorda gave much advice to Terry. We cared for her a lot. She
never imagined who she was with all that time."
In these last years they had passed moments of tremendous deprivation during
which people maltreated and offended them. More than once he was at the point
of revealing who he was, but... "Who would have believed me!" he said.
Besides, the Toltec Woman is the one who decides.
"That year," he continued, "there were moments in which we were reduced to
the minimum: we slept on the ground and we ate only one thing."
Hearing this, we wanted him to explain to us the ways of eating they had.
Castaneda told us that Toltecs only eat one type of food at a time, but that
they do it continually. "Toltecs eat all day," he commented in a casual tone.
(In this affirmation of Castaneda one can see his desire to break the image
that people have of the sorcerer or wizard - beings with special powers who
don't have the same needs as the rest of mortals. In saying that 'they eat
all day," Castaneda united them with the rest of mankind.)
According to Castaneda, the mixing of foods, for example, eating meat with
potatoes and vegetables, is very bad for your health. "This mixture is very
recent in the life of humanity," he affirmed. "To eat one kind of food helps
digestion and is better for the organism.
"One time Don Juan accused me of always feeling sick. You can imagine that I
defended myself! However, later I realized that he was right and I learned.
Now I feel well, strong and healthy."
Also the way of sleeping that they have is different from that of the
majority of us. The important thing is to realize that you can sleep in many
ways. According to Castaneda, we have learned to go to sleep and to get up at
a determined hour because that is what society wants from us. "So, for
example," said Castaneda, "parents put the children to bed to get rid of
them." We all laughed because there was some truth in his statement.
"I sleep all day and all night," he continued, "but if I add up the hours and
minutes I sleep, I don't believe they come to more than five hours a day."
To sleep in that way requires on the part of the person the ability to go
directly into deep sleep.
Returning to Joe Cordoba and his wife, Castaneda told us that one day the
Toltec Woman came and told them that they were not working enough. "She
ordered us," he said, "to organize a pretty big business in landscaping,
something like designing and arranging gardens. "This new task of the Toltec
Woman wasn't anything small. We had to contract a group of people to help us
to do the work during the week while we were in the cafe. During the weekends
we dedicated ourselves exclusively to the gardens. We had a lot of success.
"La Gorda is a very enterprising person. That year we worked really hard.
During the week we were in the Cafe and on the weekends always driving the
truck and pruning trees. The demands of the Toltec Woman are very large.
"I remember," continued Castaneda, "that at a certain opportunity we were in
the house of a friend when reporters arrived looking for Carlos Castaneda.
They were reporters from The New York Times. So as to pass unnoticed, la
Gorda and I put ourselves to planting trees in my friend's garden. In the
distance we saw them enter and leave the house. That was when my friend
yelled at us and mistreated us a lot in front of the reporters. It seemed
that Joe Cordoba and his woman could be yelled at without consequence. None
of those who were present there came to our defense. Who were we? There, only
the poor people and dogs work in the sun!
"So that was how between my friend and us we fooled the reporters. My body,
however, I couldn't fool it. For three years we were involved in the task of
giving experiences to the body to make it realize that, in truth, we are
nothing. The truth is that the body isn't the only thing that suffers. The
mind also is accustomed to constant stimuli. The warrior, however, doesn't
have stimuli from the media; he doesn't need them. The best place, therefore,
is that where we were! There nobody thinks!"
Continuing with the story of his adventures, Castaneda commented that more
than once he and la Gorda were kicked out in the street. "Other times, going
by truck down the highway, we were pushed to the edge of the road. What
alternative did we have? It's best to let them pass!"
Through all that Castaneda came telling us, it appears that the task of those
years had to do with, "learning to survive in adverse circumstances," and
with "surviving the experience of discrimination." This last, "something very
difficult to endure but very informative," he concluded with great calm.
The objective of the task consists in learning to remove oneself from the
emotional impact which discrimination provokes. The important thing is not to
react, not to get angry. If one reacts, he/she is lost "One doesn't get
offended by a tiger when it attacks," he explained, "you move to the side and
let it pass."
"In another opportunity, la Gorda and I found work in a house, she as a maid
and I as butler. You can't imagine how that ended! They kicked us out into
the street without pay. Even more! To protect themselves from us in case we
were to protest, they had called the local police. Can you imagine? We were
jailed for nothing.
"That year, la Gorda and I spent working very hard and suffering great
privations. Many times we didn't have anything to eat. The worst thing was
that we couldn't complain nor did we have the support of the group. In that
task we were alone and we couldn't escape. In whatever way, even though we
might have been able to say who we were, nobody would have believed us. The
task is always total.
"Truthfully, I am Joe Cordoba," continued Castaneda accompanying his words
with his whole body; "and this is very beautiful because you can't fall
lower. I have already arrived at the bottom you can be. That is all that I
am." And with these last words he touched the ground with his hands.
"As I told you before, every one of us has different tasks to perform. The
Genaros are quite bright; Benigno is now in Chiapas and he's doing very well.
He has a musical group. Benigno possesses a marvelous gift of imitation; he
imitates Tom Jones and many more. Pablito is the same as always; he's very
lazy. Benigno is he who makes the noise and Pablito celebrates it. Benigno is
the one who works and Pablito gathers the applause.
"Now," he said in way of conclusion, "we have all finished the tasks which we
have been doing and we are preparing ourselves for new tasks. The Toltec
Woman is the one who sends us."
The story of Joe Cordoba and his woman had impressed us a lot. It dealt with
an experience very different from those of his books. We were interested in
knowing whether he had written or was writing anything about Joe Cordoba.
"I know that Joe Cordoba existed," said one of us; "he had to exist. Why
don't you write about him? From all that you have come telling us, Joe
Cordoba and his woman is what has impacted me most."
"I just brought a new manuscript to my agent," Castaneda answered us. "In
that manuscript, the Toltec Woman is she who teaches. It couldn't be any
other way...The title might possibly be, "The Stalking and the Art of Being
in The World." [This book was published in 1981 as The Eagle's Gift.] There
is all her teaching. She is the one responsible for that manuscript. A woman
had to be the one who taught about the art of stalking. Women know it well
because they have always lived with the enemy; that is to say, they have
always walked 'on tiptoe' in the masculine world. Precisely for that reason,
because women have long experience in that art, the Toltec Woman is she who
has to give the principles of stalking.
"In that last manuscript, however, there is nothing concrete about the life
of Joe Cordoba and his woman. I can't write in detail about that experience
because nobody would understand nor believe it. I can speak of these things
with very few...Yes, the essence of the experience of the last three years is
in the book."
Returning to the Toltec Woman and her nature, Castaneda told us that she was
very different from Don Juan. "She doesn't love me," he insisted, "la Gorda,
on the other hand, yes, she loves her! You can't ask the Toltec Woman
anything. Before you speak to her she already knows what she has to say.
Besides, you have to fear her; when she gets angry, she hits," he concluded
making many gestures which indicated his fear.
We stayed in silence for a while. The sun had gone down and its rays reached
us through the branches of the trees. I felt a little cold. It seemed to me
that it was around 7 p.m.
Castaneda appeared also to become aware of the time. "It's already late," he
told us. "What do you think about getting something to eat? I invite you."
We got up and began to walk. As one of those ironies, Castaneda took charge
of my notes and books for part of the way. The best thing was to leave
everything in the car. That's what we did. Free of our bundles, we walked for
some blocks in animated conversation.
All that they had achieved requires years of preparation and practice. One
example is the exercise of "dreaming." "That which seems so foolish,"
affirmed Castaneda emphatically, "is very difficult to achieve."
The exercise consists in learning to dream at will and in a systematic way.
You begin by dreaming about a hand that enters the visual field of the
dreamer. Then, you see the whole arm. You continue in a progressive way until
you can see yourself in the dream. The other step consists in learning to use
dreams. That is to say, once you have achieved control over them, you have to
learn to act on them. "So, for example," Castaneda said, "you dream about
yourself that you leave the body and that you open the door and go out into
the street. The street is something outrageous! Something in you leaves you;
something that you achieve at will."
According to Castaneda, dreaming doesn't take much time. That is to say,
dreams don't occur in the time of our watches. The time of the dream is
something very compact.
Castaneda gave us to understand that in dreams an immense physical draining
is produced. "In dreams, you can live a lot," he said, "but the body resents
it. My body really feels it... Afterwards you feel like a truck has run over
you."
Several times, touching upon that theme of dreaming, Castaneda would say that
that which they do in dreams has a pragmatic value. In Tales of Power, you
read that the experiences of dreams and "those lived in one's waking hours
acquire the same pragmatic valence," and that for sorcerers "the criteria to
differentiate a dream from reality becomes inoperative." (p. 18).
That of leaving or traveling outside of the physical body keenly caught our
interest, and we wanted to know more about those experiences.
He answered us explaining that every one of them had achieved different
experiences. "La Gorda and I, for example, go together. She takes me by the
forearm and. . .we go."
He explained to us also that the group has common journeys. They are all in
constant training whose objective would be 'to become witnesses.' "To arrive
at being witnesses means," affirmed Castaneda, "that you can't judge any
more. That is to say, it relates to an *internal sight* which equals not
having prejudices any more."
Josefina seems to have great abilities to journey in the body of dreaming.
She wants to take you there and probes recounting marvels. La Gorda is the
one who always rescues her."
"Josefina has a great facility to break that arch of being able to reflect
upon things. She's crazy, crazy!" he exclaimed. "Josefina flies very far, but
she doesn't want to go alone and always returns. She returns and looks for
me... She gives me reports that are marvelous."
According to Castaneda, Josefina is a being who cannot function in this
world. "Here," he said, "she would have ended up in some institution."
Josefina is a being "who cannot be held to the concrete;" she is ethereal.
"In whatever moment she can definitively leave." La Gorda and he are, on the
other hand, much more cautious in their flights. La Gorda, particularly,
represents the stability and equilibrium that in some measure he lacks.
After a pause, I reminded him of that vision of an immense dome which in The
Second Ring of Power is presented as the place of meeting and where Don Juan
and Don Genaro would be waiting for them.
"La Gorda also has that vision," he commented pensively. "That which we see
isn't an earthly horizon. It's something very smooth and arid in whose
horizon we see rising an immense arch which covers all and which extends
until it arrives at the zenith. In that point in the zenith, you can see a
large brightness. You could say that it is something like a dome that emits
an amber light."
We strove to press upon him questions so that he would give us more
information about that dome. "What is it? Where is it?" we inquired.
Castaneda answered that by the size of what they see, it could be a planet.
"In the zenith," he added, "there is like a great wind."
By the brevity of his answer, we realized that Castaneda didn't want to talk
much about that topic. It is possible, also, that he couldn't find adequate
words to express what they saw. No matter what, it is evident that those
visions, those flights in the body dreaming, are a constant training for the
definitive journey-that leaving through the left side of the eagle, that
final leap which is called death, that giving an end to the recapitulation;
that being able to say "we are ready," in which we carry all that we are but
nothing more than that what we are.
"According to the Toltec Woman," Castaneda conferred to us, "those visions
are my aberrations: She thinks that that is my unconscious way of paralyzing
my actions; that is to say, the way I have of saying that I don't want to
leave the world. The Toltec Woman also says that with my attitude, I am
detaining la Gorda from the possibilities of a more fertile or more
productive flight."
Don Juan and Don Genaro were great dreamers. They had an absolute control of
the art. "I am surprised," immediately exclaimed Castaneda, raising his hand
to his forehead, "at the fact that nobody notices that don Juan is an
outrageous dreamer. The same can be said of Don Genaro. Don Genaro, for
example, is capable of bringing his body of dream to the every day life."
The great control of Don Juan and Don Genaro is evidenced in that of not
being noted or passing by unnoticed. (In all his books, Castaneda has
referred to that of "not being noted" and "to go by unnoticed." In The Second
Ring of Power, Castaneda records the times that Don Juan had ordered him to
concentrate on not being obvious." Nestor, also, says "that Don Juan and Don
Genaro learned to not be noticed in the midst of all this." The two are
masters of the art of "stalking." Of Don Genaro, la Gorda says that "he was
in the body of dreaming most of the time," (p. 270). "All that they do," he
continued with enthusiasm, "is worthy of praise. Of Don Juan, I admire
immensely his great control, composure and serenity.
"Of Don Juan, it can never be said that he is a senile old man. He isn't like
other people. There is here on campus, for example, an old professor who when
I was a young man was already famous. At that time, he was at the peak of his
physical strength and intellectual creativity. Now, he's chewing his tongue
of cork! Now I can see him as he is, as a senile old man. Of Don Juan, on the
other hand, you will never be able to say something like that. His advantage
in respect to me is always abysmal."
In the interview with Sam Keen, Castaneda says that one time Don Juan asked
him if he thought the two were equals. Even though he really didn't think
that they were, in a condescending tone he said yes. Don Juan listened to
him, but he didn't accept his verdict. "I don't think that we are," he said,
"because I am a hunter and a warrior and you are more like a pimp. I am ready
at any moment to offer the recapitulation of my life. Your small world full
of sadness and indecision can never be equal to mine." (Sam Keen, Voices and
Visions (New York: Harper and Row, 1976), p. 122.)
In all that Castaneda had told us can be found parallels with other currents
and traditions of mystical thinking. In his own books are cited authors and
works of antiquity and of the present. I reminded him that, among others,
there are references to *The Egyptian Book of the Dead*, to *Tractatus* by
Wittgenstein, to Spanish poets like San Juan de la Cruz and Juan Ramon
Jimenez, and to Latin American writers like the Peruvian Cesar Vallejo.
"Yes," he responded, "in my car there are always books, many books. Things
that someone or another send me. He was accustomed to read sections of those
books to Don Juan. He likes poetry. It's clear that he only likes the four
first lines! According to him, that which follows is idiocy. He says that
after the first verse it loses force, that it's pure repetition."
One of us asked him if he had read of or if he knew the yoga techniques and
the descriptions of the different planes of reality which the sacred books of
India offer. "All that is marvelous," he said. "I have had, moreover, pretty
intimate relationships with people who work in Hatha Yoga.
"In 1976, a doctor friend named Claudio Naranjo (Do you know him? he asked
us.) connected me with a yoga teacher. That's how we went to visit him in his
'ashram' here in California. We communicated by means of a professor who
acted as interpreter. I was trying to discover in that interview parallels
with my own experiences of traveling outside of the body. There, however, he
didn't speak of anything important. There was, yes, much show and ceremony,
but he didn't say anything. Towards the end of the interview, this character
took in his hands a metal watering can and began to wet me with a liquid
whose color I didn't like at all. No sooner had he withdrawn, when I asked
him what he had just thrown at me. Someone came near and explained to me that
I should be very happy because he had given me his blessing. I insisted on
knowing the contents of the container. Finally I was told that all the
secretions of the teacher are saved: 'Everything that comes from him is
sacred.' You can imagine," he concluded in a tone between jocular and joking,
"that here concluded the conversation with the yoga master."
EVASIVE MYSTERIES
By Graciela Corvalan, Ph.D.
We continued talking about the Toltec Woman and Castaneda told us that she's
leaving soon. "She's told us that in her place are going to come two women.
The Toltec Woman is very strict, her demands are terrible!" Now, if the
Toltec Woman is fierce, it appears that the two who are coming are much worse.
Let's hope that she's not leaving yet! One can't stop wanting nor can prevent
the body from complaining and fearing the severity of the undertaking...
Nevertheless, there's no way of altering destiny. So, there it grabbed me!
"I don't have more liberty," he continued, "than the impeccable one because
only if I'm impeccable, I change my destiny; that is to say, I go on tiptoes
by the left side of the eagle. If I'm not impeccable, I don't change my
destiny and the eagle devours me.
"The Nagual Juan Matos is a free man. He is free in fulfilling his destiny.
Do you understand me? I don't know if you understand what I want to say," he
asked worriedly.
"Sure we understand!" we retorted vehemently. "We find a great similarity
with what we feel and live daily in so much in this last section as in many
other things that you have referred to us up to now."
"Don Juan is a free man," he continued. "He looks for liberty. His spirit
looks for it.. Don Juan is free from that basic prejudice; the perceptive
prejudice that prevent us from seeing reality.'
The importance of all that which we came speaking about resides in the
possibility of destroying the circle of routines: Don Juan made him practice
numerous exercises so he would become conscious of his routines: exercises
such as 'walking in the darkness' and the 'power walk.'
How to break that circle of routines ? How to break that perceptive arc that
ties us to that ordinary vision of reality? That ordinary vision that our
routines contribute to establishing is, precisely, that which Castaneda
denominates 'the attention of the tonal or 'the first ring of attention.'
"To break that perceptive arc isn't an easy task; it could take years. The
difficulty with me," he affirmed laughing, "is that I am very pigheaded.
Quite unwillingly I went on learning: For this reason, in my case, Don Juan
had to use drugs...and so I ended up...with my liver in the stream!
"In the line of not-doing is achieved the destroying of routines and becoming
conscious," explained Castaneda. While saying this he stood up and started to
walk backwards while he remembered a technique that Don Juan had taught him:
Walking backwards with the help of a mirror. Castaneda continued reporting to
us that to facilitate the task he devised an artifact of metal (like a ring
that in the style of a crown he bore on his head) in which the mirror was
fastened. In that way, he could practice the exercise and have his hands
free. Other examples of techniques of not-doing would be to put on your belt
backwards and to wear your shoes on the opposite feet. All these techniques
have as an objective to make one conscious of what one is doing at each
moment. "Destroying routines," he said, "is the way we have of giving the
body new sensations. The body knows..."
Immediately Castaneda related to us some of the games that the Toltec youth
practice for hours. "They are games of not-doing," he explained. "Games in
which there are no fixed rules but rather they are generated as they play."
It seems that by not having fixed rules, the behavior of the players isn't
foreseen and, consequently, everyone must be very attentive. "One-of these
games," he continued, "consists in giving the adversary false signs. It's a
game of pulling."
As he said, in that game of pulling, three persons participate and two posts
and a rope are needed. With the rope you tie up one of the players and hang
him from the posts. The other two players must pull on the ends of the rope
and try to fool him giving him false signs. All have to be very attentive so
that when one pulls, the other also does it and the person who is tied
doesn't get twisted.
The techniques and games of not-doing develop attention: You can say that
they are concentration exercises since they obligate those who practice them
to be fully conscious of what they are doing. Castaneda commented that old
age would consist in having remained shut in the perfect circle of routines.
"The way of teaching of the Toltec Woman is to put us into situations. I
believe that it's the best way because in putting us in situations we
discover that we are nothing: The other way is that of self love, that of
personal pride. The former way transforms us into detectives, always
attentive to all that could happen or offend us. Detectives? Yes ! We spent
time seeking evidence of love: if they love me or they love me not. Thus,
centered in our ego we don't do anything but strengthen it. According to the
Toltec Woman, the best is to begin considering that nobody loves us."
Castaneda told us that for Don Juan, personal pride resembles a monster of
3,000 heads. "One destroys and knocks down heads but others always rise up...
It's that one possesses all the tricks!" he exclaimed. With the tricks it
appears that we fool ourselves believing we are somebody.
I then reminded him of the image of catching weaknesses, "as rabbits are
caught in a trap," that appears in one of his books. "Yes," he answered me,
"you constantly have to be on the lookout."
Changing position, Castaneda began to give us the history of the past three
years. "One of the many tasks was that of cook in those roadside cafes.
La Gorda accompanied me that year as a waitress. For more than a year we
lived there as Jose Cordoba and his wife! "My complete name was Jose Luis
Cordoba, at your service," he, said with a profound reverence. "Without a
doubt, everyone knew me as Joe Cordoba."
Castaneda didn't tell us the name or the location of the city in which they
lived. It's possible that they had been in different places. It appears that
at the beginning, he arrived with la Gorda and the Toltec Woman, who
accompanied them for a while. The first thing was to find housing and work
for Joe Cordoba, his wife, and his mother-in-law. "That was how we presented
ourselves," commented Castaneda, "otherwise, the people wouldn't have
understood."
For a long time they looked for work, until finally they found it in a
roadside cafe. "In that type of establishment you begin very early in the
morning. At five a.m. you have to be already working."
Castaneda told us, laughing, that in those places the first thing they ask
you is: "Do you know how to make eggs?" What could there be to making eggs?
It appears that he delayed enough time in figuring out what they were trying
to say until he finally discovered that they were talking about the diverse
ways of preparing eggs for breakfast. In restaurants or cafes for truck
drivers. 'Egg making' is very important.
They spent one year working there. "Now I know how to 'make eggs'," he
affirmed laughing. "All that you would want!" La Gorda also worked a lot. She
was such a good waitress that she ended up by taking care of all the girls
there. At the end of a year, when the Toltec Woman told them, "That's enough,
you're finished with this task," the owner of the cafe didn't want us to leave.
"The truth is that we worked very hard there. A lot! From morning till night."
During that year, they had a significant encounter. It relates to the story
of a girl named Terry who arrived at the cafe where they were asking for work
waitressing. By then, Joe Cordoba had gained the confidence of the owner of
the establishment and was the one in charge of contracting and watching over
all the staff. As Terry told them, she was looking for Carlos Castaneda. How
could she know that they were there? Castaneda didn't know.
'This girl Terry," continued Castaneda with sadness and giving us to
understand that she looked dirty and messy, "is one of those 'hippies' who
take drugs...a terrifying life. Poor thing!" Later, Castaneda would tell us,
that, even though he could never tell Terry who he was, Joe Cordoba and his
wife helped her a lot during the months she spent with them. He told us that
one day she came in very excited from the street saying that she had just
seen Castaneda in a Cadillac parked in front of the cafe. "He's there," she
screamed to us; "he's in the car, writing." "Are you sure it's Castaneda? How
can you be so convinced?" I told her. But she continued, "Yes, it's him, I'm
sure.. ." I then suggested to her that she go out to the car and ask him. She
needed to get rid of that immense doubt. "Hurry! Hurry!" I insisted. She was
afraid to speak to him because she said that she was very fat and very ugly.
I encouraged her. "But you look divine, hurry!" Finally, she went, but came
right back crying a river of tears. It seems that the man in the Cadillac
hadn't looked at her, and had thrown her out telling her not to bother him.
"You can imagine that I tried to console her," said Castaneda "It gave me so
much pain that I almost told her who I was. La Gorda didn't let me; she
protected me." Really, he couldn't tell her anything because he was
performing a task in which he was Joe Cordoba and not Carlos Castaneda. He
couldn't disobey.
As Castaneda told it, when Terry arrived she wasn't a good waitress. With
passing months, without a doubt, they brought her to be good, clean and
careful. "La Gorda gave much advice to Terry. We cared for her a lot. She
never imagined who she was with all that time."
In these last years they had passed moments of tremendous deprivation during
which people maltreated and offended them. More than once he was at the point
of revealing who he was, but... "Who would have believed me!" he said.
Besides, the Toltec Woman is the one who decides.
"That year," he continued, "there were moments in which we were reduced to
the minimum: we slept on the ground and we ate only one thing."
Hearing this, we wanted him to explain to us the ways of eating they had.
Castaneda told us that Toltecs only eat one type of food at a time, but that
they do it continually. "Toltecs eat all day," he commented in a casual tone.
(In this affirmation of Castaneda one can see his desire to break the image
that people have of the sorcerer or wizard - beings with special powers who
don't have the same needs as the rest of mortals. In saying that 'they eat
all day," Castaneda united them with the rest of mankind.)
According to Castaneda, the mixing of foods, for example, eating meat with
potatoes and vegetables, is very bad for your health. "This mixture is very
recent in the life of humanity," he affirmed. "To eat one kind of food helps
digestion and is better for the organism.
"One time Don Juan accused me of always feeling sick. You can imagine that I
defended myself! However, later I realized that he was right and I learned.
Now I feel well, strong and healthy."
Also the way of sleeping that they have is different from that of the
majority of us. The important thing is to realize that you can sleep in many
ways. According to Castaneda, we have learned to go to sleep and to get up at
a determined hour because that is what society wants from us. "So, for
example," said Castaneda, "parents put the children to bed to get rid of
them." We all laughed because there was some truth in his statement.
"I sleep all day and all night," he continued, "but if I add up the hours and
minutes I sleep, I don't believe they come to more than five hours a day."
To sleep in that way requires on the part of the person the ability to go
directly into deep sleep.
Returning to Joe Cordoba and his wife, Castaneda told us that one day the
Toltec Woman came and told them that they were not working enough. "She
ordered us," he said, "to organize a pretty big business in landscaping,
something like designing and arranging gardens. "This new task of the Toltec
Woman wasn't anything small. We had to contract a group of people to help us
to do the work during the week while we were in the cafe. During the weekends
we dedicated ourselves exclusively to the gardens. We had a lot of success.
"La Gorda is a very enterprising person. That year we worked really hard.
During the week we were in the Cafe and on the weekends always driving the
truck and pruning trees. The demands of the Toltec Woman are very large.
"I remember," continued Castaneda, "that at a certain opportunity we were in
the house of a friend when reporters arrived looking for Carlos Castaneda.
They were reporters from The New York Times. So as to pass unnoticed, la
Gorda and I put ourselves to planting trees in my friend's garden. In the
distance we saw them enter and leave the house. That was when my friend
yelled at us and mistreated us a lot in front of the reporters. It seemed
that Joe Cordoba and his woman could be yelled at without consequence. None
of those who were present there came to our defense. Who were we? There, only
the poor people and dogs work in the sun!
"So that was how between my friend and us we fooled the reporters. My body,
however, I couldn't fool it. For three years we were involved in the task of
giving experiences to the body to make it realize that, in truth, we are
nothing. The truth is that the body isn't the only thing that suffers. The
mind also is accustomed to constant stimuli. The warrior, however, doesn't
have stimuli from the media; he doesn't need them. The best place, therefore,
is that where we were! There nobody thinks!"
Continuing with the story of his adventures, Castaneda commented that more
than once he and la Gorda were kicked out in the street. "Other times, going
by truck down the highway, we were pushed to the edge of the road. What
alternative did we have? It's best to let them pass!"
Through all that Castaneda came telling us, it appears that the task of those
years had to do with, "learning to survive in adverse circumstances," and
with "surviving the experience of discrimination." This last, "something very
difficult to endure but very informative," he concluded with great calm.
The objective of the task consists in learning to remove oneself from the
emotional impact which discrimination provokes. The important thing is not to
react, not to get angry. If one reacts, he/she is lost "One doesn't get
offended by a tiger when it attacks," he explained, "you move to the side and
let it pass."
"In another opportunity, la Gorda and I found work in a house, she as a maid
and I as butler. You can't imagine how that ended! They kicked us out into
the street without pay. Even more! To protect themselves from us in case we
were to protest, they had called the local police. Can you imagine? We were
jailed for nothing.
"That year, la Gorda and I spent working very hard and suffering great
privations. Many times we didn't have anything to eat. The worst thing was
that we couldn't complain nor did we have the support of the group. In that
task we were alone and we couldn't escape. In whatever way, even though we
might have been able to say who we were, nobody would have believed us. The
task is always total.
"Truthfully, I am Joe Cordoba," continued Castaneda accompanying his words
with his whole body; "and this is very beautiful because you can't fall
lower. I have already arrived at the bottom you can be. That is all that I
am." And with these last words he touched the ground with his hands.
"As I told you before, every one of us has different tasks to perform. The
Genaros are quite bright; Benigno is now in Chiapas and he's doing very well.
He has a musical group. Benigno possesses a marvelous gift of imitation; he
imitates Tom Jones and many more. Pablito is the same as always; he's very
lazy. Benigno is he who makes the noise and Pablito celebrates it. Benigno is
the one who works and Pablito gathers the applause.
"Now," he said in way of conclusion, "we have all finished the tasks which we
have been doing and we are preparing ourselves for new tasks. The Toltec
Woman is the one who sends us."
The story of Joe Cordoba and his woman had impressed us a lot. It dealt with
an experience very different from those of his books. We were interested in
knowing whether he had written or was writing anything about Joe Cordoba.
"I know that Joe Cordoba existed," said one of us; "he had to exist. Why
don't you write about him? From all that you have come telling us, Joe
Cordoba and his woman is what has impacted me most."
"I just brought a new manuscript to my agent," Castaneda answered us. "In
that manuscript, the Toltec Woman is she who teaches. It couldn't be any
other way...The title might possibly be, "The Stalking and the Art of Being
in The World." [This book was published in 1981 as The Eagle's Gift.] There
is all her teaching. She is the one responsible for that manuscript. A woman
had to be the one who taught about the art of stalking. Women know it well
because they have always lived with the enemy; that is to say, they have
always walked 'on tiptoe' in the masculine world. Precisely for that reason,
because women have long experience in that art, the Toltec Woman is she who
has to give the principles of stalking.
"In that last manuscript, however, there is nothing concrete about the life
of Joe Cordoba and his woman. I can't write in detail about that experience
because nobody would understand nor believe it. I can speak of these things
with very few...Yes, the essence of the experience of the last three years is
in the book."
Returning to the Toltec Woman and her nature, Castaneda told us that she was
very different from Don Juan. "She doesn't love me," he insisted, "la Gorda,
on the other hand, yes, she loves her! You can't ask the Toltec Woman
anything. Before you speak to her she already knows what she has to say.
Besides, you have to fear her; when she gets angry, she hits," he concluded
making many gestures which indicated his fear.
We stayed in silence for a while. The sun had gone down and its rays reached
us through the branches of the trees. I felt a little cold. It seemed to me
that it was around 7 p.m.
Castaneda appeared also to become aware of the time. "It's already late," he
told us. "What do you think about getting something to eat? I invite you."
We got up and began to walk. As one of those ironies, Castaneda took charge
of my notes and books for part of the way. The best thing was to leave
everything in the car. That's what we did. Free of our bundles, we walked for
some blocks in animated conversation.
All that they had achieved requires years of preparation and practice. One
example is the exercise of "dreaming." "That which seems so foolish,"
affirmed Castaneda emphatically, "is very difficult to achieve."
The exercise consists in learning to dream at will and in a systematic way.
You begin by dreaming about a hand that enters the visual field of the
dreamer. Then, you see the whole arm. You continue in a progressive way until
you can see yourself in the dream. The other step consists in learning to use
dreams. That is to say, once you have achieved control over them, you have to
learn to act on them. "So, for example," Castaneda said, "you dream about
yourself that you leave the body and that you open the door and go out into
the street. The street is something outrageous! Something in you leaves you;
something that you achieve at will."
According to Castaneda, dreaming doesn't take much time. That is to say,
dreams don't occur in the time of our watches. The time of the dream is
something very compact.
Castaneda gave us to understand that in dreams an immense physical draining
is produced. "In dreams, you can live a lot," he said, "but the body resents
it. My body really feels it... Afterwards you feel like a truck has run over
you."
Several times, touching upon that theme of dreaming, Castaneda would say that
that which they do in dreams has a pragmatic value. In Tales of Power, you
read that the experiences of dreams and "those lived in one's waking hours
acquire the same pragmatic valence," and that for sorcerers "the criteria to
differentiate a dream from reality becomes inoperative." (p. 18).
That of leaving or traveling outside of the physical body keenly caught our
interest, and we wanted to know more about those experiences.
He answered us explaining that every one of them had achieved different
experiences. "La Gorda and I, for example, go together. She takes me by the
forearm and. . .we go."
He explained to us also that the group has common journeys. They are all in
constant training whose objective would be 'to become witnesses.' "To arrive
at being witnesses means," affirmed Castaneda, "that you can't judge any
more. That is to say, it relates to an *internal sight* which equals not
having prejudices any more."
Josefina seems to have great abilities to journey in the body of dreaming.
She wants to take you there and probes recounting marvels. La Gorda is the
one who always rescues her."
"Josefina has a great facility to break that arch of being able to reflect
upon things. She's crazy, crazy!" he exclaimed. "Josefina flies very far, but
she doesn't want to go alone and always returns. She returns and looks for
me... She gives me reports that are marvelous."
According to Castaneda, Josefina is a being who cannot function in this
world. "Here," he said, "she would have ended up in some institution."
Josefina is a being "who cannot be held to the concrete;" she is ethereal.
"In whatever moment she can definitively leave." La Gorda and he are, on the
other hand, much more cautious in their flights. La Gorda, particularly,
represents the stability and equilibrium that in some measure he lacks.
After a pause, I reminded him of that vision of an immense dome which in The
Second Ring of Power is presented as the place of meeting and where Don Juan
and Don Genaro would be waiting for them.
"La Gorda also has that vision," he commented pensively. "That which we see
isn't an earthly horizon. It's something very smooth and arid in whose
horizon we see rising an immense arch which covers all and which extends
until it arrives at the zenith. In that point in the zenith, you can see a
large brightness. You could say that it is something like a dome that emits
an amber light."
We strove to press upon him questions so that he would give us more
information about that dome. "What is it? Where is it?" we inquired.
Castaneda answered that by the size of what they see, it could be a planet.
"In the zenith," he added, "there is like a great wind."
By the brevity of his answer, we realized that Castaneda didn't want to talk
much about that topic. It is possible, also, that he couldn't find adequate
words to express what they saw. No matter what, it is evident that those
visions, those flights in the body dreaming, are a constant training for the
definitive journey-that leaving through the left side of the eagle, that
final leap which is called death, that giving an end to the recapitulation;
that being able to say "we are ready," in which we carry all that we are but
nothing more than that what we are.
"According to the Toltec Woman," Castaneda conferred to us, "those visions
are my aberrations: She thinks that that is my unconscious way of paralyzing
my actions; that is to say, the way I have of saying that I don't want to
leave the world. The Toltec Woman also says that with my attitude, I am
detaining la Gorda from the possibilities of a more fertile or more
productive flight."
Don Juan and Don Genaro were great dreamers. They had an absolute control of
the art. "I am surprised," immediately exclaimed Castaneda, raising his hand
to his forehead, "at the fact that nobody notices that don Juan is an
outrageous dreamer. The same can be said of Don Genaro. Don Genaro, for
example, is capable of bringing his body of dream to the every day life."
The great control of Don Juan and Don Genaro is evidenced in that of not
being noted or passing by unnoticed. (In all his books, Castaneda has
referred to that of "not being noted" and "to go by unnoticed." In The Second
Ring of Power, Castaneda records the times that Don Juan had ordered him to
concentrate on not being obvious." Nestor, also, says "that Don Juan and Don
Genaro learned to not be noticed in the midst of all this." The two are
masters of the art of "stalking." Of Don Genaro, la Gorda says that "he was
in the body of dreaming most of the time," (p. 270). "All that they do," he
continued with enthusiasm, "is worthy of praise. Of Don Juan, I admire
immensely his great control, composure and serenity.
"Of Don Juan, it can never be said that he is a senile old man. He isn't like
other people. There is here on campus, for example, an old professor who when
I was a young man was already famous. At that time, he was at the peak of his
physical strength and intellectual creativity. Now, he's chewing his tongue
of cork! Now I can see him as he is, as a senile old man. Of Don Juan, on the
other hand, you will never be able to say something like that. His advantage
in respect to me is always abysmal."
In the interview with Sam Keen, Castaneda says that one time Don Juan asked
him if he thought the two were equals. Even though he really didn't think
that they were, in a condescending tone he said yes. Don Juan listened to
him, but he didn't accept his verdict. "I don't think that we are," he said,
"because I am a hunter and a warrior and you are more like a pimp. I am ready
at any moment to offer the recapitulation of my life. Your small world full
of sadness and indecision can never be equal to mine." (Sam Keen, Voices and
Visions (New York: Harper and Row, 1976), p. 122.)
In all that Castaneda had told us can be found parallels with other currents
and traditions of mystical thinking. In his own books are cited authors and
works of antiquity and of the present. I reminded him that, among others,
there are references to *The Egyptian Book of the Dead*, to *Tractatus* by
Wittgenstein, to Spanish poets like San Juan de la Cruz and Juan Ramon
Jimenez, and to Latin American writers like the Peruvian Cesar Vallejo.
"Yes," he responded, "in my car there are always books, many books. Things
that someone or another send me. He was accustomed to read sections of those
books to Don Juan. He likes poetry. It's clear that he only likes the four
first lines! According to him, that which follows is idiocy. He says that
after the first verse it loses force, that it's pure repetition."
One of us asked him if he had read of or if he knew the yoga techniques and
the descriptions of the different planes of reality which the sacred books of
India offer. "All that is marvelous," he said. "I have had, moreover, pretty
intimate relationships with people who work in Hatha Yoga.
"In 1976, a doctor friend named Claudio Naranjo (Do you know him? he asked
us.) connected me with a yoga teacher. That's how we went to visit him in his
'ashram' here in California. We communicated by means of a professor who
acted as interpreter. I was trying to discover in that interview parallels
with my own experiences of traveling outside of the body. There, however, he
didn't speak of anything important. There was, yes, much show and ceremony,
but he didn't say anything. Towards the end of the interview, this character
took in his hands a metal watering can and began to wet me with a liquid
whose color I didn't like at all. No sooner had he withdrawn, when I asked
him what he had just thrown at me. Someone came near and explained to me that
I should be very happy because he had given me his blessing. I insisted on
knowing the contents of the container. Finally I was told that all the
secretions of the teacher are saved: 'Everything that comes from him is
sacred.' You can imagine," he concluded in a tone between jocular and joking,
"that here concluded the conversation with the yoga master."
окончание:
A year later, Castaneda had a similar experience with one of the disciples of
Gurdjieff. He met with him in Los Angeles upon the insistence of one of his
friends. It seems that the gentleman had imitated Gurdjieff in everything.
"He had shaven his head and had a huge mustache," he commented, indicating
with his hands their size. "We had just entered, when he energetically
grabbed me by the throat and gave me some tremendous blows. Immediately after
he told me to leave my master because I was wasting my time: According to
him, in eight or nine classes, he was going to teach me everything I needed
to know. Can you imagine? In a few classes he can teach someone everything."
Castaneda also told us that the disciple of Gurdjieff had mentioned the use
of drugs to accelerate the learning process.
The interview didn't last long. It seems that Castaneda's friend realized
right away the ridiculousness of the situation and the magnitude of his
error. That friend had insisted that he see the disciple of Gurdjieff because
he was convinced that Castaneda needed a teacher more serious than Don Juan.
When the interview ended, Castaneda told us that his friend felt full of shame.
We continued walking some six or seven blocks. For a while we talked about
circumstantial things. I remember that I commented to him that I had read in
La Gaceta an article by Juan Tovar in which he mentions the possibility of
filming the books. (See Juan Tovar. "Encounter of Power," La Gaceta, F.C.E.
(Mexico, December 1974).
"Yes," he said. "At one time that possibility was spoken of." He later told
us the story of his encounter with the producer Joseph Levine, who would have
intimidated him from behind an immense desk. The size of the desk and the
producer's words hardly comprehensible because of the huge cigar he kept
between his lips, were the things that had made the biggest impression on
Castaneda. "He was behind a desk like it was a dais," he explained, "and I,
there below, very small. Powerful! With his hands full of rings with very
large stones."
Castaneda had already said to Juan Tovar that the last thing he wanted to see
was an Anthony Quinn in the role of Don Juan. It seems that someone had
proposed Mia Farrow for one of the roles... "To conceive of such a movie was
very difficult," he commented. "It's neither ethnography nor fiction. The
project in the end fell apart. The sorcerer Juan Matos told me that it
wouldn't be possible to do it."
During that same time he was invited to participate in shows like Johnny
Carson and Dick Cavett. "In the end I couldn't accept things like that. What
would I say to Johnny Carson, for example, if he asked me if I spoke to the
coyote or not? What would I say? I'd say, yes... and then?" Indubitably, the
situation could have become very ridiculous.
"Don Juan was the one who put me in charge of giving testimony of a
tradition," said Castaneda. "He himself insisted that I accept interviews and
give conference to promote the books. Later he made me cut everything because
that type of task burns a lot of energy. If you're into those things you have
to give them force."
Castaneda explained clearly that with the production of his books, he is in
charge of taking care of the expenses of the whole group. Castaneda allows
everyone to eat.
"Don Juan," he insisted, "gave me the task of putting in writing all that the
wizards and sorcerers said. My task doesn't consist in anything but in
writing until one day they tell me, "Enough, here you stop." The impact or
not of my books, really is unknown to me because I'm not dealing with what's
happening here. To Don Juan before and to the Toltec Woman now belong all the
material in the books. They are responsible for all that is said there."
The tone of his voice and his gestures impressed us in a lively way. It was
evident that in that terrain the task of Castaneda consists of obeying. His
objective isn't anything but to be impeccable as receptor and transmitter of
a tradition and of a teaching.
"Personally," he continued after a pause, "I am working on a kind of journal;
it's something like a manual. For this work, yes, I am responsible. I would
like a serious publisher to publish it and to be in charge of distributing it
to interested persons and to centers of study."
He told us that he had worked out some 18 units in which he believes he has
summarized all the teaching of the Toltec nation. To organize the work, he
has made use of the phenomenology of E. Husserl as a theoretical framework to
make comprehensible what they taught him.
"Last week," he said, "I was in New York. I brought the project to the
editors of Simon and Schuster but I failed. It seems they got scared. It's
that something like that can't have success."
"Of those 18 units I am the only one responsible," he continued in a
meditative tone, "and, as you can see, I wasn't successful. Those 18 units
are something like the 18 falls in which I was bumped hard on the head. I
agree with the editors that it's a work of heavy reading, but there I am...
Don Juan, Don Genaro, all the others are different. They are fickle!"
(According to what Castaneda communicated to us by telephone, Simon and
Schuster finally decided to accept the project of the journal that had seemed
to worry him so much.)
"Why do I call them units?" he asked, moving ahead of us. "I call them that
because each one of them claims to show one of the ways to break the unit of
the familiar. That unique perceptive vision can be broken in different ways."
Castaneda, trying once again to clarify this, gave us the example of the map.
Each time we want to arrive at some place we need a map with clear points of
reference to not get lost. "We can't find anything without a map," exclaimed
Castaneda. "What later occurs is that the only thing we see is the map.
Instead of seeing what there is to see, we finish seeing the map we carry
inside. Therefore, to break that arc of reflexibility, to constantly cut
the bonds that lead us to the known points of reference, is the ultimate
teaching of Don Juan."
Many times during that afternoon, Castaneda had to insist that he was "just a
contact to the world." All the knowledge of the books belongs to the Toltec
nation. In the presence of his insistence, I couldn't but react and tell him
that the labor of arranging the material from notes into coherent and well
organized book must have been immense and difficult.
"No," responded Castaneda. "I don't have any work. My task consists, simply,
in copying the page which is given me in dreams."
According to Castaneda, you can't create something from nothing. To pretend
to create like that is an absurdity. To explain this to us, he brought up an
episode in the life of his father. "My father," he said, "decided that he was
going to be a great writer. With that idea, he resolved to fix his office. He
needed to have an office that was perfect. He had to keep in mind the
smallest detail, from the decorations of the wall to the type of light on his
work table. Once the room was ready, he spent much time looking for a
suitable desk for his task. The desk had to be of a determined measurement,
wood, color, etc. Another such incident occurred with the selection of the
chair on which he would sit. Later he had to select the suitable cover so as
to not ruin the desk's wood. The cover could be plastic, glass, leather,
cardboard. On this cover my father was going to rest the paper on which he
would write his masterpiece. Then, seated at his chair, in front of the blank
paper he didn't know what to write. That is my dad. He wants to begin writing
the perfect phrase. Surely you can't write that way! One is always an
instrument, an intermediary. I see each page in dreams, and the success of
each one of those pages depends on the degree of fidelity with which I am
capable of copying that model from the dream. Precisely, the page which
impresses or impacts most is that in which I have achieved reproducing the
original with most exactitude."
These commentaries of Castaneda reveal a particular theory of knowledge and
of intellectual and artistic creation. (I thought immediately of Plato and of
St. Augustine with his image of "inner teacher." To know is to discover and
to create is to copy. Neither knowledge or creation can ever be an
undertaking of a *personal nature*.
While we ate dinner I mentioned to him some of the interviews which I had
read. I told him that I had enjoyed greatly that which Sam Keen had done and
which had been published first in Psychology Today. Castaneda was also
satisfied with that interview. He has much appreciation for Sam Keen. "During
those years," he said, "I knew many people with whom I would have liked to
have continued being friends...one example is the theologian Sam Keen. Don
Juan, however, said, 'Enough."'
With respect to the interview in Time, Castaneda related to us that first a
male reporter came to meet with him in Los Angeles. It seems it didn't go
well, (he used some Argentine slang) and so he left. They then sent "one of
those girls that you can't turn down," he said making us all smile. It all
came out well, and they understood each other "magnificently." Castaneda had
the impression that she understood what he had told her. In the end, however,
she didn't do the article. The notes which she had taken were given to a
reporter that "I think is now in Australia," he added. It seems that this
reporter did what he wanted with the notes they gave him.
Every time that for one reason or another, the Time interview was mentioned,
his annoyance was evident. He had observed to Don Juan that Time was too
powerful and important a magazine. Don Juan, on the other hand, had insisted
that the interview be done. "the interview was done, 'just in case"'
concluded Castaneda informally using once again a typically port area
(Argentinian) expression.
We also spoke of the critics and of that which had been written about him and
his books. I mentioned to him Richard deMille and others who had put in doubt
the veracity of his works and the anthropological value of them.
"The work that I have to do," affirmed Castaneda "is free from all that the
critics can say. My task consists of presenting that knowledge in the best
way possible. Nothing they can say matters to me because I no longer am
Carlos Castaneda, the writer. I am neither a writer, nor a thinker, nor a
philosopher...in consequence, their attacks don't reach me. Now, I know that
I am nothing; nobody can take anything from me because Joe Cordoba is
nothing. There isn't in all this, any personal pride.
"We live," he continued, "on a level lower than the Mexican peasants, which
is already saying a lot. We have touched ground and we can't fall lower. The
difference between us and the peasant is that he has hopes, wants things, and
works to one day have more than he has today. We, on the other hand, don't
have anything and each time we will have less. Can you imagine this?
Criticisms can't hit the target.
"Never am I more full than when I am Joe Cordoba," he exclaimed vehemently
standing up and opening his arms in a gesture of plentitude. "Joe Cordoba,
frying hamburgers all day with my eyes full of smoke...Do you understand me?"
Not all the critics have been negative. Octavio Paz, for example, wrote a
very good preface for the Spanish edition of The Teachings of Don Juan. To me
his preface was most beautiful. "Yes," Castaneda said feelingly, "That
preface is excellent. Octavio Paz is a complete gentleman. Maybe he is one of
the last who remain."
The phrase, "a complete gentleman" doesn't refer to the undeniable qualities
of Octavio Paz as thinker and writer. No! The phrase points to the intrinsic
qualities of being, the value of a person as a human being. That Castaneda
might point out that he is "one of the last ones who remain" accented the
fact that he is relating to a species in danger of extinction.
"Well," continued Castaneda trying to soften the impact, "maybe there remain
two gentlemen." The other is an old Mexican historian friend of his whose
name wasn't familiar to us. He told us some anecdotes about him that
reflected his physical vitality and intellectual vivacity.
At this juncture in the conversation Castaneda explained to us how he selects
the letters that arrive to him. "Do you want me to explain how I did it with
yours?" he asked directing himself to me.
He told us that a young friend receives them, puts them in a bag and keeps
them until he arrives in Los Angeles. Once in Los Angeles, Castaneda always
follows the same routine: First he dumps all the correspondence into a large
box, "like a toy box," and then he only takes out one letter. The letter he
takes out is that which he reads and answers. Clearly nothing is done in
writing. Castaneda doesn't leave tracks.
"The letter I took out," he explained, "was the first one that you wrote.
Later I looked for the other one. You can't imagine how many problems I had
to get your phone number! When I already believed that I wasn't going to have
any luck, I obtained it by the intervention of the university. I had really
already thought that I wasn't going to be able to speak with you."
I was very surprised to know all the inconveniences that he had had to get
to me. It appears that once he had my letter m his hands, he had to try to
exhaust all means. In the magical universe much importance is given to 'signs.'
"Here in Los Angeles," continued Castaneda casually, "I have a friend who
writes me a lot. Each time I come I read all his letters, one after the other
as if it were a diary. One certain time, between the letters I bumped into
another one that without realizing I had opened. Even though I immediately
realized that it wasn't from my friend, I read it. The fact that it was in
the pile was for me a 'sign."'
That letter put him in contact with two people who reported a very
interesting experience to him. It was night and they had to enter the San
Bernardino Freeway. They knew that to meet it they had to continue ahead
until the end of the street. Then they had to take a left and continue until
they reached the freeway. So they did it, but after some 20 minutes they
realized that they were in a strange place. It wasn't the San Bernardino
Freeway. They resolved to get off and ask, but nobody helped them. At one of
the houses where they knocked they were met with screaming.
Castaneda continued telling us that the two friends went back down the road
until they reached a service station where they asked for directions. There
they were told what they already knew. So they again repeated the same steps,
and without any inconveniences arrived at the highway.
Castaneda met with them. Of the two of them, it seems that only one is truly
interested in understanding the mystery.
"On the earth," he said as means of explanation, "there are sites, special
places or openings, through which you can enter and pass through to something
else." Here he stopped and offered to bring us. "It's near here... in Los
Angeles... If you want, I can take you," he said.
"The earth is something alive. Those places are the entrances from where the
earth periodically receives force or energy from the cosmos. That energy is
that which the warrior must store up. Maybe, if I am rigorously impeccable, I
might get close to the eagle. May it be so!
"Every 18 days a wave of energy falls upon the earth. Count," he suggested to
us, "starting on the third of next August. You will be able to perceive it.
This wave of energy could be strong or not; it depends. When the earth
receives very large waves of energy, it doesn't matter where you might be, it
always reaches us. Before the magnitude of that force, the earth is small and
the energy reaches all parts."
We were still animatedly conversing when the waitress approached and in a
cutting tone asked if we were going to order anything else. As nobody wanted
dessert or coffee, we had no other remedy than to get up. No sooner had the
waitress moved away when Castaneda commented, "It seems we are being thrown
out. . ."
Yes, we were being thrown out and, maybe, with reason. It was late. In
surprise we checked the passing of time. We got up and left for the avenue.
It was night, the street and the people had the appearance of a fair. A mime
dressed in tails and top hat was clowning around behind our backs. Everything
we saw made us smile while our eyes searched for the plate that is always
passed during those representations. To our right, under the eaves of an old
theater, someone was trying another representation on a miniature stage. I
believe I saw a cat ready for its function. Really there you could see
everything. In other times; a man disguised as a bear tried to compete with a
human orchestra. "The question is to look for alternatives each time more
extravagant," someone commented. While we walked, returning to the campus,
Castaneda spoke about a prospective trip to Argentina.
"There a cycle is closed," he told us. "To return to Argentina is very
important for me. I'm still not sure when I can do it, but I will go. For now
I have things to do here. Just in August three years of tasks will be
accomplished, and it's possible that then I might go."
That afternoon, Castaneda spoke to us a lot about Buenos Aires, about its
streets, neighborhoods and sports clubs. He remembered nostalgically Florida
Street with its elegant stores and the itinerant multitude. He was even
reminded with precision of the famous street of cinemas. "Lavalle Street," he
said making memory.
Castaneda lived in Buenos Aires during his childhood. It seems he was
enrolled in a downtown school. Of that era he remembers with sadness that it
had been said that he was "wider than he was tall" words that when one is a
child hurt a lot. "I always looked with envy," he commented, "on those
Argentinians so tall and handsome.
"You know that in Buenos Aires you always have to belong to some club,"
continued Castaneda. "I was from Chacarita. To be from River Plate isn't
surprising, right? Chacarita, on the other hand, is always one of the last."
In those times, Chacarita always came out last. It was touching to see him
identified with those who lose, with the 'underdog.'
"Surely La Gorda will come with me. She wants to travel. Clearly she wants to
go to 'Parice', he declared. "La Gorda buys now in Gucci, is elegant and
wants to go to Paris. I always say to her, Gorda, why do you want to go to
Paris? There there is nothing. She has a certain idea about Paris, 'the city
of light' you know.
Many times that afternoon, La Gorda was named. With her, Castaneda brought us
to an extraordinary person due to the fact that he, without a doubt, feels
great respect and admiration for her. What would be the sense then, of all
that circumstantial information that he gave us about her? I believe that
with those commentaries, as well as those in which he referred to the way of
eating and sleeping of the Toltecs, Castaneda tried to prevent us from
forming a rigid image of what they are. The work that they are doing is very
serious and their lives are austere, but they aren't rigid nor can they be
squeezed into the traditional norms of society. The important thing is to
liberate oneself from schemes, not to replace them with others.
Castaneda gave us to understand that he hasn't traveled much in Latin
America, if you exclude Mexico. "Lately I've only been in Venezuela," he
said. "As I've already told you, I have to go to Argentina soon. There a
cycle is closed. After that I will be able to leave. Well. . . the truth is
that I don't know if I want to leave yet." His last words were said
smilingly, '"Who doesn't have things that hold him down."
He has traveled through Europe several times for business related to his
books. "In 1973, however, Don Juan sent me to Italy," he affirmed. "My task
consisted of going to Rome to obtain an audience with the Pope. I didn't
claim to obtain a private audience but one of those audiences which are
conferred on groups of persons. All I had to do in the interview was to kiss
the hand of the Supreme Pontiff."
Castaneda did everything that Don Juan had asked him. He went to Italy,
arrived in Rome and asked for the audience. It was one of those Wednesday
audiences, after which the Pope officiates at a public mass in the plaza of
San Pedro. They did confer on me an audience but.. . I couldn't go," he said.
"I didn't even arrive at the door."
That afternoon, Castaneda referred several times to his family and to his
typically liberal and frankly anticlerical background education. In The
Second Ring of Power, Castaneda also makes reference to the anticlerical
heritage that he received. Don Juan, who doesn't seem to justify all his
prejudices and battles against the Catholic Church, says: "To conquer our own
foolishness requires all our time and energy. This is the only thing that
matters. The others lack consistency. Nothing that your grandfather and your
father have said about the Church has made them happy. To be an impeccable
warrior, on the other hand, will give you force, youth and power. Thus, the
appropriate thing for you is to know how to choose." (p. 236) Castaneda
didn't theorize about these themes. With respect to the disjunctive
'clericalism-anticlericalism' he only wanted us to receive a teaching with
the example of his experience. That is to say, he makes us understand that
it is very difficult to break the schemes which have been formed in youth.
END
A year later, Castaneda had a similar experience with one of the disciples of
Gurdjieff. He met with him in Los Angeles upon the insistence of one of his
friends. It seems that the gentleman had imitated Gurdjieff in everything.
"He had shaven his head and had a huge mustache," he commented, indicating
with his hands their size. "We had just entered, when he energetically
grabbed me by the throat and gave me some tremendous blows. Immediately after
he told me to leave my master because I was wasting my time: According to
him, in eight or nine classes, he was going to teach me everything I needed
to know. Can you imagine? In a few classes he can teach someone everything."
Castaneda also told us that the disciple of Gurdjieff had mentioned the use
of drugs to accelerate the learning process.
The interview didn't last long. It seems that Castaneda's friend realized
right away the ridiculousness of the situation and the magnitude of his
error. That friend had insisted that he see the disciple of Gurdjieff because
he was convinced that Castaneda needed a teacher more serious than Don Juan.
When the interview ended, Castaneda told us that his friend felt full of shame.
We continued walking some six or seven blocks. For a while we talked about
circumstantial things. I remember that I commented to him that I had read in
La Gaceta an article by Juan Tovar in which he mentions the possibility of
filming the books. (See Juan Tovar. "Encounter of Power," La Gaceta, F.C.E.
(Mexico, December 1974).
"Yes," he said. "At one time that possibility was spoken of." He later told
us the story of his encounter with the producer Joseph Levine, who would have
intimidated him from behind an immense desk. The size of the desk and the
producer's words hardly comprehensible because of the huge cigar he kept
between his lips, were the things that had made the biggest impression on
Castaneda. "He was behind a desk like it was a dais," he explained, "and I,
there below, very small. Powerful! With his hands full of rings with very
large stones."
Castaneda had already said to Juan Tovar that the last thing he wanted to see
was an Anthony Quinn in the role of Don Juan. It seems that someone had
proposed Mia Farrow for one of the roles... "To conceive of such a movie was
very difficult," he commented. "It's neither ethnography nor fiction. The
project in the end fell apart. The sorcerer Juan Matos told me that it
wouldn't be possible to do it."
During that same time he was invited to participate in shows like Johnny
Carson and Dick Cavett. "In the end I couldn't accept things like that. What
would I say to Johnny Carson, for example, if he asked me if I spoke to the
coyote or not? What would I say? I'd say, yes... and then?" Indubitably, the
situation could have become very ridiculous.
"Don Juan was the one who put me in charge of giving testimony of a
tradition," said Castaneda. "He himself insisted that I accept interviews and
give conference to promote the books. Later he made me cut everything because
that type of task burns a lot of energy. If you're into those things you have
to give them force."
Castaneda explained clearly that with the production of his books, he is in
charge of taking care of the expenses of the whole group. Castaneda allows
everyone to eat.
"Don Juan," he insisted, "gave me the task of putting in writing all that the
wizards and sorcerers said. My task doesn't consist in anything but in
writing until one day they tell me, "Enough, here you stop." The impact or
not of my books, really is unknown to me because I'm not dealing with what's
happening here. To Don Juan before and to the Toltec Woman now belong all the
material in the books. They are responsible for all that is said there."
The tone of his voice and his gestures impressed us in a lively way. It was
evident that in that terrain the task of Castaneda consists of obeying. His
objective isn't anything but to be impeccable as receptor and transmitter of
a tradition and of a teaching.
"Personally," he continued after a pause, "I am working on a kind of journal;
it's something like a manual. For this work, yes, I am responsible. I would
like a serious publisher to publish it and to be in charge of distributing it
to interested persons and to centers of study."
He told us that he had worked out some 18 units in which he believes he has
summarized all the teaching of the Toltec nation. To organize the work, he
has made use of the phenomenology of E. Husserl as a theoretical framework to
make comprehensible what they taught him.
"Last week," he said, "I was in New York. I brought the project to the
editors of Simon and Schuster but I failed. It seems they got scared. It's
that something like that can't have success."
"Of those 18 units I am the only one responsible," he continued in a
meditative tone, "and, as you can see, I wasn't successful. Those 18 units
are something like the 18 falls in which I was bumped hard on the head. I
agree with the editors that it's a work of heavy reading, but there I am...
Don Juan, Don Genaro, all the others are different. They are fickle!"
(According to what Castaneda communicated to us by telephone, Simon and
Schuster finally decided to accept the project of the journal that had seemed
to worry him so much.)
"Why do I call them units?" he asked, moving ahead of us. "I call them that
because each one of them claims to show one of the ways to break the unit of
the familiar. That unique perceptive vision can be broken in different ways."
Castaneda, trying once again to clarify this, gave us the example of the map.
Each time we want to arrive at some place we need a map with clear points of
reference to not get lost. "We can't find anything without a map," exclaimed
Castaneda. "What later occurs is that the only thing we see is the map.
Instead of seeing what there is to see, we finish seeing the map we carry
inside. Therefore, to break that arc of reflexibility, to constantly cut
the bonds that lead us to the known points of reference, is the ultimate
teaching of Don Juan."
Many times during that afternoon, Castaneda had to insist that he was "just a
contact to the world." All the knowledge of the books belongs to the Toltec
nation. In the presence of his insistence, I couldn't but react and tell him
that the labor of arranging the material from notes into coherent and well
organized book must have been immense and difficult.
"No," responded Castaneda. "I don't have any work. My task consists, simply,
in copying the page which is given me in dreams."
According to Castaneda, you can't create something from nothing. To pretend
to create like that is an absurdity. To explain this to us, he brought up an
episode in the life of his father. "My father," he said, "decided that he was
going to be a great writer. With that idea, he resolved to fix his office. He
needed to have an office that was perfect. He had to keep in mind the
smallest detail, from the decorations of the wall to the type of light on his
work table. Once the room was ready, he spent much time looking for a
suitable desk for his task. The desk had to be of a determined measurement,
wood, color, etc. Another such incident occurred with the selection of the
chair on which he would sit. Later he had to select the suitable cover so as
to not ruin the desk's wood. The cover could be plastic, glass, leather,
cardboard. On this cover my father was going to rest the paper on which he
would write his masterpiece. Then, seated at his chair, in front of the blank
paper he didn't know what to write. That is my dad. He wants to begin writing
the perfect phrase. Surely you can't write that way! One is always an
instrument, an intermediary. I see each page in dreams, and the success of
each one of those pages depends on the degree of fidelity with which I am
capable of copying that model from the dream. Precisely, the page which
impresses or impacts most is that in which I have achieved reproducing the
original with most exactitude."
These commentaries of Castaneda reveal a particular theory of knowledge and
of intellectual and artistic creation. (I thought immediately of Plato and of
St. Augustine with his image of "inner teacher." To know is to discover and
to create is to copy. Neither knowledge or creation can ever be an
undertaking of a *personal nature*.
While we ate dinner I mentioned to him some of the interviews which I had
read. I told him that I had enjoyed greatly that which Sam Keen had done and
which had been published first in Psychology Today. Castaneda was also
satisfied with that interview. He has much appreciation for Sam Keen. "During
those years," he said, "I knew many people with whom I would have liked to
have continued being friends...one example is the theologian Sam Keen. Don
Juan, however, said, 'Enough."'
With respect to the interview in Time, Castaneda related to us that first a
male reporter came to meet with him in Los Angeles. It seems it didn't go
well, (he used some Argentine slang) and so he left. They then sent "one of
those girls that you can't turn down," he said making us all smile. It all
came out well, and they understood each other "magnificently." Castaneda had
the impression that she understood what he had told her. In the end, however,
she didn't do the article. The notes which she had taken were given to a
reporter that "I think is now in Australia," he added. It seems that this
reporter did what he wanted with the notes they gave him.
Every time that for one reason or another, the Time interview was mentioned,
his annoyance was evident. He had observed to Don Juan that Time was too
powerful and important a magazine. Don Juan, on the other hand, had insisted
that the interview be done. "the interview was done, 'just in case"'
concluded Castaneda informally using once again a typically port area
(Argentinian) expression.
We also spoke of the critics and of that which had been written about him and
his books. I mentioned to him Richard deMille and others who had put in doubt
the veracity of his works and the anthropological value of them.
"The work that I have to do," affirmed Castaneda "is free from all that the
critics can say. My task consists of presenting that knowledge in the best
way possible. Nothing they can say matters to me because I no longer am
Carlos Castaneda, the writer. I am neither a writer, nor a thinker, nor a
philosopher...in consequence, their attacks don't reach me. Now, I know that
I am nothing; nobody can take anything from me because Joe Cordoba is
nothing. There isn't in all this, any personal pride.
"We live," he continued, "on a level lower than the Mexican peasants, which
is already saying a lot. We have touched ground and we can't fall lower. The
difference between us and the peasant is that he has hopes, wants things, and
works to one day have more than he has today. We, on the other hand, don't
have anything and each time we will have less. Can you imagine this?
Criticisms can't hit the target.
"Never am I more full than when I am Joe Cordoba," he exclaimed vehemently
standing up and opening his arms in a gesture of plentitude. "Joe Cordoba,
frying hamburgers all day with my eyes full of smoke...Do you understand me?"
Not all the critics have been negative. Octavio Paz, for example, wrote a
very good preface for the Spanish edition of The Teachings of Don Juan. To me
his preface was most beautiful. "Yes," Castaneda said feelingly, "That
preface is excellent. Octavio Paz is a complete gentleman. Maybe he is one of
the last who remain."
The phrase, "a complete gentleman" doesn't refer to the undeniable qualities
of Octavio Paz as thinker and writer. No! The phrase points to the intrinsic
qualities of being, the value of a person as a human being. That Castaneda
might point out that he is "one of the last ones who remain" accented the
fact that he is relating to a species in danger of extinction.
"Well," continued Castaneda trying to soften the impact, "maybe there remain
two gentlemen." The other is an old Mexican historian friend of his whose
name wasn't familiar to us. He told us some anecdotes about him that
reflected his physical vitality and intellectual vivacity.
At this juncture in the conversation Castaneda explained to us how he selects
the letters that arrive to him. "Do you want me to explain how I did it with
yours?" he asked directing himself to me.
He told us that a young friend receives them, puts them in a bag and keeps
them until he arrives in Los Angeles. Once in Los Angeles, Castaneda always
follows the same routine: First he dumps all the correspondence into a large
box, "like a toy box," and then he only takes out one letter. The letter he
takes out is that which he reads and answers. Clearly nothing is done in
writing. Castaneda doesn't leave tracks.
"The letter I took out," he explained, "was the first one that you wrote.
Later I looked for the other one. You can't imagine how many problems I had
to get your phone number! When I already believed that I wasn't going to have
any luck, I obtained it by the intervention of the university. I had really
already thought that I wasn't going to be able to speak with you."
I was very surprised to know all the inconveniences that he had had to get
to me. It appears that once he had my letter m his hands, he had to try to
exhaust all means. In the magical universe much importance is given to 'signs.'
"Here in Los Angeles," continued Castaneda casually, "I have a friend who
writes me a lot. Each time I come I read all his letters, one after the other
as if it were a diary. One certain time, between the letters I bumped into
another one that without realizing I had opened. Even though I immediately
realized that it wasn't from my friend, I read it. The fact that it was in
the pile was for me a 'sign."'
That letter put him in contact with two people who reported a very
interesting experience to him. It was night and they had to enter the San
Bernardino Freeway. They knew that to meet it they had to continue ahead
until the end of the street. Then they had to take a left and continue until
they reached the freeway. So they did it, but after some 20 minutes they
realized that they were in a strange place. It wasn't the San Bernardino
Freeway. They resolved to get off and ask, but nobody helped them. At one of
the houses where they knocked they were met with screaming.
Castaneda continued telling us that the two friends went back down the road
until they reached a service station where they asked for directions. There
they were told what they already knew. So they again repeated the same steps,
and without any inconveniences arrived at the highway.
Castaneda met with them. Of the two of them, it seems that only one is truly
interested in understanding the mystery.
"On the earth," he said as means of explanation, "there are sites, special
places or openings, through which you can enter and pass through to something
else." Here he stopped and offered to bring us. "It's near here... in Los
Angeles... If you want, I can take you," he said.
"The earth is something alive. Those places are the entrances from where the
earth periodically receives force or energy from the cosmos. That energy is
that which the warrior must store up. Maybe, if I am rigorously impeccable, I
might get close to the eagle. May it be so!
"Every 18 days a wave of energy falls upon the earth. Count," he suggested to
us, "starting on the third of next August. You will be able to perceive it.
This wave of energy could be strong or not; it depends. When the earth
receives very large waves of energy, it doesn't matter where you might be, it
always reaches us. Before the magnitude of that force, the earth is small and
the energy reaches all parts."
We were still animatedly conversing when the waitress approached and in a
cutting tone asked if we were going to order anything else. As nobody wanted
dessert or coffee, we had no other remedy than to get up. No sooner had the
waitress moved away when Castaneda commented, "It seems we are being thrown
out. . ."
Yes, we were being thrown out and, maybe, with reason. It was late. In
surprise we checked the passing of time. We got up and left for the avenue.
It was night, the street and the people had the appearance of a fair. A mime
dressed in tails and top hat was clowning around behind our backs. Everything
we saw made us smile while our eyes searched for the plate that is always
passed during those representations. To our right, under the eaves of an old
theater, someone was trying another representation on a miniature stage. I
believe I saw a cat ready for its function. Really there you could see
everything. In other times; a man disguised as a bear tried to compete with a
human orchestra. "The question is to look for alternatives each time more
extravagant," someone commented. While we walked, returning to the campus,
Castaneda spoke about a prospective trip to Argentina.
"There a cycle is closed," he told us. "To return to Argentina is very
important for me. I'm still not sure when I can do it, but I will go. For now
I have things to do here. Just in August three years of tasks will be
accomplished, and it's possible that then I might go."
That afternoon, Castaneda spoke to us a lot about Buenos Aires, about its
streets, neighborhoods and sports clubs. He remembered nostalgically Florida
Street with its elegant stores and the itinerant multitude. He was even
reminded with precision of the famous street of cinemas. "Lavalle Street," he
said making memory.
Castaneda lived in Buenos Aires during his childhood. It seems he was
enrolled in a downtown school. Of that era he remembers with sadness that it
had been said that he was "wider than he was tall" words that when one is a
child hurt a lot. "I always looked with envy," he commented, "on those
Argentinians so tall and handsome.
"You know that in Buenos Aires you always have to belong to some club,"
continued Castaneda. "I was from Chacarita. To be from River Plate isn't
surprising, right? Chacarita, on the other hand, is always one of the last."
In those times, Chacarita always came out last. It was touching to see him
identified with those who lose, with the 'underdog.'
"Surely La Gorda will come with me. She wants to travel. Clearly she wants to
go to 'Parice', he declared. "La Gorda buys now in Gucci, is elegant and
wants to go to Paris. I always say to her, Gorda, why do you want to go to
Paris? There there is nothing. She has a certain idea about Paris, 'the city
of light' you know.
Many times that afternoon, La Gorda was named. With her, Castaneda brought us
to an extraordinary person due to the fact that he, without a doubt, feels
great respect and admiration for her. What would be the sense then, of all
that circumstantial information that he gave us about her? I believe that
with those commentaries, as well as those in which he referred to the way of
eating and sleeping of the Toltecs, Castaneda tried to prevent us from
forming a rigid image of what they are. The work that they are doing is very
serious and their lives are austere, but they aren't rigid nor can they be
squeezed into the traditional norms of society. The important thing is to
liberate oneself from schemes, not to replace them with others.
Castaneda gave us to understand that he hasn't traveled much in Latin
America, if you exclude Mexico. "Lately I've only been in Venezuela," he
said. "As I've already told you, I have to go to Argentina soon. There a
cycle is closed. After that I will be able to leave. Well. . . the truth is
that I don't know if I want to leave yet." His last words were said
smilingly, '"Who doesn't have things that hold him down."
He has traveled through Europe several times for business related to his
books. "In 1973, however, Don Juan sent me to Italy," he affirmed. "My task
consisted of going to Rome to obtain an audience with the Pope. I didn't
claim to obtain a private audience but one of those audiences which are
conferred on groups of persons. All I had to do in the interview was to kiss
the hand of the Supreme Pontiff."
Castaneda did everything that Don Juan had asked him. He went to Italy,
arrived in Rome and asked for the audience. It was one of those Wednesday
audiences, after which the Pope officiates at a public mass in the plaza of
San Pedro. They did confer on me an audience but.. . I couldn't go," he said.
"I didn't even arrive at the door."
That afternoon, Castaneda referred several times to his family and to his
typically liberal and frankly anticlerical background education. In The
Second Ring of Power, Castaneda also makes reference to the anticlerical
heritage that he received. Don Juan, who doesn't seem to justify all his
prejudices and battles against the Catholic Church, says: "To conquer our own
foolishness requires all our time and energy. This is the only thing that
matters. The others lack consistency. Nothing that your grandfather and your
father have said about the Church has made them happy. To be an impeccable
warrior, on the other hand, will give you force, youth and power. Thus, the
appropriate thing for you is to know how to choose." (p. 236) Castaneda
didn't theorize about these themes. With respect to the disjunctive
'clericalism-anticlericalism' he only wanted us to receive a teaching with
the example of his experience. That is to say, he makes us understand that
it is very difficult to break the schemes which have been formed in youth.
END
окончание:
A year later, Castaneda had a similar experience with one of the disciples of
Gurdjieff. He met with him in Los Angeles upon the insistence of one of his
friends. It seems that the gentleman had imitated Gurdjieff in everything.
"He had shaven his head and had a huge mustache," he commented, indicating
with his hands their size. "We had just entered, when he energetically
grabbed me by the throat and gave me some tremendous blows. Immediately after
he told me to leave my master because I was wasting my time: According to
him, in eight or nine classes, he was going to teach me everything I needed
to know. Can you imagine? In a few classes he can teach someone everything."
Castaneda also told us that the disciple of Gurdjieff had mentioned the use
of drugs to accelerate the learning process.
The interview didn't last long. It seems that Castaneda's friend realized
right away the ridiculousness of the situation and the magnitude of his
error. That friend had insisted that he see the disciple of Gurdjieff because
he was convinced that Castaneda needed a teacher more serious than Don Juan.
When the interview ended, Castaneda told us that his friend felt full of shame.
We continued walking some six or seven blocks. For a while we talked about
circumstantial things. I remember that I commented to him that I had read in
La Gaceta an article by Juan Tovar in which he mentions the possibility of
filming the books. (See Juan Tovar. "Encounter of Power," La Gaceta, F.C.E.
(Mexico, December 1974).
"Yes," he said. "At one time that possibility was spoken of." He later told
us the story of his encounter with the producer Joseph Levine, who would have
intimidated him from behind an immense desk. The size of the desk and the
producer's words hardly comprehensible because of the huge cigar he kept
between his lips, were the things that had made the biggest impression on
Castaneda. "He was behind a desk like it was a dais," he explained, "and I,
there below, very small. Powerful! With his hands full of rings with very
large stones."
Castaneda had already said to Juan Tovar that the last thing he wanted to see
was an Anthony Quinn in the role of Don Juan. It seems that someone had
proposed Mia Farrow for one of the roles... "To conceive of such a movie was
very difficult," he commented. "It's neither ethnography nor fiction. The
project in the end fell apart. The sorcerer Juan Matos told me that it
wouldn't be possible to do it."
During that same time he was invited to participate in shows like Johnny
Carson and Dick Cavett. "In the end I couldn't accept things like that. What
would I say to Johnny Carson, for example, if he asked me if I spoke to the
coyote or not? What would I say? I'd say, yes... and then?" Indubitably, the
situation could have become very ridiculous.
"Don Juan was the one who put me in charge of giving testimony of a
tradition," said Castaneda. "He himself insisted that I accept interviews and
give conference to promote the books. Later he made me cut everything because
that type of task burns a lot of energy. If you're into those things you have
to give them force."
Castaneda explained clearly that with the production of his books, he is in
charge of taking care of the expenses of the whole group. Castaneda allows
everyone to eat.
"Don Juan," he insisted, "gave me the task of putting in writing all that the
wizards and sorcerers said. My task doesn't consist in anything but in
writing until one day they tell me, "Enough, here you stop." The impact or
not of my books, really is unknown to me because I'm not dealing with what's
happening here. To Don Juan before and to the Toltec Woman now belong all the
material in the books. They are responsible for all that is said there."
The tone of his voice and his gestures impressed us in a lively way. It was
evident that in that terrain the task of Castaneda consists of obeying. His
objective isn't anything but to be impeccable as receptor and transmitter of
a tradition and of a teaching.
"Personally," he continued after a pause, "I am working on a kind of journal;
it's something like a manual. For this work, yes, I am responsible. I would
like a serious publisher to publish it and to be in charge of distributing it
to interested persons and to centers of study."
He told us that he had worked out some 18 units in which he believes he has
summarized all the teaching of the Toltec nation. To organize the work, he
has made use of the phenomenology of E. Husserl as a theoretical framework to
make comprehensible what they taught him.
"Last week," he said, "I was in New York. I brought the project to the
editors of Simon and Schuster but I failed. It seems they got scared. It's
that something like that can't have success."
"Of those 18 units I am the only one responsible," he continued in a
meditative tone, "and, as you can see, I wasn't successful. Those 18 units
are something like the 18 falls in which I was bumped hard on the head. I
agree with the editors that it's a work of heavy reading, but there I am...
Don Juan, Don Genaro, all the others are different. They are fickle!"
(According to what Castaneda communicated to us by telephone, Simon and
Schuster finally decided to accept the project of the journal that had seemed
to worry him so much.)
"Why do I call them units?" he asked, moving ahead of us. "I call them that
because each one of them claims to show one of the ways to break the unit of
the familiar. That unique perceptive vision can be broken in different ways."
Castaneda, trying once again to clarify this, gave us the example of the map.
Each time we want to arrive at some place we need a map with clear points of
reference to not get lost. "We can't find anything without a map," exclaimed
Castaneda. "What later occurs is that the only thing we see is the map.
Instead of seeing what there is to see, we finish seeing the map we carry
inside. Therefore, to break that arc of reflexibility, to constantly cut
the bonds that lead us to the known points of reference, is the ultimate
teaching of Don Juan."
Many times during that afternoon, Castaneda had to insist that he was "just a
contact to the world." All the knowledge of the books belongs to the Toltec
nation. In the presence of his insistence, I couldn't but react and tell him
that the labor of arranging the material from notes into coherent and well
organized book must have been immense and difficult.
"No," responded Castaneda. "I don't have any work. My task consists, simply,
in copying the page which is given me in dreams."
According to Castaneda, you can't create something from nothing. To pretend
to create like that is an absurdity. To explain this to us, he brought up an
episode in the life of his father. "My father," he said, "decided that he was
going to be a great writer. With that idea, he resolved to fix his office. He
needed to have an office that was perfect. He had to keep in mind the
smallest detail, from the decorations of the wall to the type of light on his
work table. Once the room was ready, he spent much time looking for a
suitable desk for his task. The desk had to be of a determined measurement,
wood, color, etc. Another such incident occurred with the selection of the
chair on which he would sit. Later he had to select the suitable cover so as
to not ruin the desk's wood. The cover could be plastic, glass, leather,
cardboard. On this cover my father was going to rest the paper on which he
would write his masterpiece. Then, seated at his chair, in front of the blank
paper he didn't know what to write. That is my dad. He wants to begin writing
the perfect phrase. Surely you can't write that way! One is always an
instrument, an intermediary. I see each page in dreams, and the success of
each one of those pages depends on the degree of fidelity with which I am
capable of copying that model from the dream. Precisely, the page which
impresses or impacts most is that in which I have achieved reproducing the
original with most exactitude."
These commentaries of Castaneda reveal a particular theory of knowledge and
of intellectual and artistic creation. (I thought immediately of Plato and of
St. Augustine with his image of "inner teacher." To know is to discover and
to create is to copy. Neither knowledge or creation can ever be an
undertaking of a *personal nature*.
While we ate dinner I mentioned to him some of the interviews which I had
read. I told him that I had enjoyed greatly that which Sam Keen had done and
which had been published first in Psychology Today. Castaneda was also
satisfied with that interview. He has much appreciation for Sam Keen. "During
those years," he said, "I knew many people with whom I would have liked to
have continued being friends...one example is the theologian Sam Keen. Don
Juan, however, said, 'Enough."'
With respect to the interview in Time, Castaneda related to us that first a
male reporter came to meet with him in Los Angeles. It seems it didn't go
well, (he used some Argentine slang) and so he left. They then sent "one of
those girls that you can't turn down," he said making us all smile. It all
came out well, and they understood each other "magnificently." Castaneda had
the impression that she understood what he had told her. In the end, however,
she didn't do the article. The notes which she had taken were given to a
reporter that "I think is now in Australia," he added. It seems that this
reporter did what he wanted with the notes they gave him.
Every time that for one reason or another, the Time interview was mentioned,
his annoyance was evident. He had observed to Don Juan that Time was too
powerful and important a magazine. Don Juan, on the other hand, had insisted
that the interview be done. "the interview was done, 'just in case"'
concluded Castaneda informally using once again a typically port area
(Argentinian) expression.
We also spoke of the critics and of that which had been written about him and
his books. I mentioned to him Richard deMille and others who had put in doubt
the veracity of his works and the anthropological value of them.
"The work that I have to do," affirmed Castaneda "is free from all that the
critics can say. My task consists of presenting that knowledge in the best
way possible. Nothing they can say matters to me because I no longer am
Carlos Castaneda, the writer. I am neither a writer, nor a thinker, nor a
philosopher...in consequence, their attacks don't reach me. Now, I know that
I am nothing; nobody can take anything from me because Joe Cordoba is
nothing. There isn't in all this, any personal pride.
"We live," he continued, "on a level lower than the Mexican peasants, which
is already saying a lot. We have touched ground and we can't fall lower. The
difference between us and the peasant is that he has hopes, wants things, and
works to one day have more than he has today. We, on the other hand, don't
have anything and each time we will have less. Can you imagine this?
Criticisms can't hit the target.
"Never am I more full than when I am Joe Cordoba," he exclaimed vehemently
standing up and opening his arms in a gesture of plentitude. "Joe Cordoba,
frying hamburgers all day with my eyes full of smoke...Do you understand me?"
Not all the critics have been negative. Octavio Paz, for example, wrote a
very good preface for the Spanish edition of The Teachings of Don Juan. To me
his preface was most beautiful. "Yes," Castaneda said feelingly, "That
preface is excellent. Octavio Paz is a complete gentleman. Maybe he is one of
the last who remain."
The phrase, "a complete gentleman" doesn't refer to the undeniable qualities
of Octavio Paz as thinker and writer. No! The phrase points to the intrinsic
qualities of being, the value of a person as a human being. That Castaneda
might point out that he is "one of the last ones who remain" accented the
fact that he is relating to a species in danger of extinction.
"Well," continued Castaneda trying to soften the impact, "maybe there remain
two gentlemen." The other is an old Mexican historian friend of his whose
name wasn't familiar to us. He told us some anecdotes about him that
reflected his physical vitality and intellectual vivacity.
At this juncture in the conversation Castaneda explained to us how he selects
the letters that arrive to him. "Do you want me to explain how I did it with
yours?" he asked directing himself to me.
He told us that a young friend receives them, puts them in a bag and keeps
them until he arrives in Los Angeles. Once in Los Angeles, Castaneda always
follows the same routine: First he dumps all the correspondence into a large
box, "like a toy box," and then he only takes out one letter. The letter he
takes out is that which he reads and answers. Clearly nothing is done in
writing. Castaneda doesn't leave tracks.
"The letter I took out," he explained, "was the first one that you wrote.
Later I looked for the other one. You can't imagine how many problems I had
to get your phone number! When I already believed that I wasn't going to have
any luck, I obtained it by the intervention of the university. I had really
already thought that I wasn't going to be able to speak with you."
I was very surprised to know all the inconveniences that he had had to get
to me. It appears that once he had my letter m his hands, he had to try to
exhaust all means. In the magical universe much importance is given to 'signs.'
"Here in Los Angeles," continued Castaneda casually, "I have a friend who
writes me a lot. Each time I come I read all his letters, one after the other
as if it were a diary. One certain time, between the letters I bumped into
another one that without realizing I had opened. Even though I immediately
realized that it wasn't from my friend, I read it. The fact that it was in
the pile was for me a 'sign."'
That letter put him in contact with two people who reported a very
interesting experience to him. It was night and they had to enter the San
Bernardino Freeway. They knew that to meet it they had to continue ahead
until the end of the street. Then they had to take a left and continue until
they reached the freeway. So they did it, but after some 20 minutes they
realized that they were in a strange place. It wasn't the San Bernardino
Freeway. They resolved to get off and ask, but nobody helped them. At one of
the houses where they knocked they were met with screaming.
Castaneda continued telling us that the two friends went back down the road
until they reached a service station where they asked for directions. There
they were told what they already knew. So they again repeated the same steps,
and without any inconveniences arrived at the highway.
Castaneda met with them. Of the two of them, it seems that only one is truly
interested in understanding the mystery.
"On the earth," he said as means of explanation, "there are sites, special
places or openings, through which you can enter and pass through to something
else." Here he stopped and offered to bring us. "It's near here... in Los
Angeles... If you want, I can take you," he said.
"The earth is something alive. Those places are the entrances from where the
earth periodically receives force or energy from the cosmos. That energy is
that which the warrior must store up. Maybe, if I am rigorously impeccable, I
might get close to the eagle. May it be so!
"Every 18 days a wave of energy falls upon the earth. Count," he suggested to
us, "starting on the third of next August. You will be able to perceive it.
This wave of energy could be strong or not; it depends. When the earth
receives very large waves of energy, it doesn't matter where you might be, it
always reaches us. Before the magnitude of that force, the earth is small and
the energy reaches all parts."
We were still animatedly conversing when the waitress approached and in a
cutting tone asked if we were going to order anything else. As nobody wanted
dessert or coffee, we had no other remedy than to get up. No sooner had the
waitress moved away when Castaneda commented, "It seems we are being thrown
out. . ."
Yes, we were being thrown out and, maybe, with reason. It was late. In
surprise we checked the passing of time. We got up and left for the avenue.
It was night, the street and the people had the appearance of a fair. A mime
dressed in tails and top hat was clowning around behind our backs. Everything
we saw made us smile while our eyes searched for the plate that is always
passed during those representations. To our right, under the eaves of an old
theater, someone was trying another representation on a miniature stage. I
believe I saw a cat ready for its function. Really there you could see
everything. In other times; a man disguised as a bear tried to compete with a
human orchestra. "The question is to look for alternatives each time more
extravagant," someone commented. While we walked, returning to the campus,
Castaneda spoke about a prospective trip to Argentina.
"There a cycle is closed," he told us. "To return to Argentina is very
important for me. I'm still not sure when I can do it, but I will go. For now
I have things to do here. Just in August three years of tasks will be
accomplished, and it's possible that then I might go."
That afternoon, Castaneda spoke to us a lot about Buenos Aires, about its
streets, neighborhoods and sports clubs. He remembered nostalgically Florida
Street with its elegant stores and the itinerant multitude. He was even
reminded with precision of the famous street of cinemas. "Lavalle Street," he
said making memory.
Castaneda lived in Buenos Aires during his childhood. It seems he was
enrolled in a downtown school. Of that era he remembers with sadness that it
had been said that he was "wider than he was tall" words that when one is a
child hurt a lot. "I always looked with envy," he commented, "on those
Argentinians so tall and handsome.
"You know that in Buenos Aires you always have to belong to some club,"
continued Castaneda. "I was from Chacarita. To be from River Plate isn't
surprising, right? Chacarita, on the other hand, is always one of the last."
In those times, Chacarita always came out last. It was touching to see him
identified with those who lose, with the 'underdog.'
"Surely La Gorda will come with me. She wants to travel. Clearly she wants to
go to 'Parice', he declared. "La Gorda buys now in Gucci, is elegant and
wants to go to Paris. I always say to her, Gorda, why do you want to go to
Paris? There there is nothing. She has a certain idea about Paris, 'the city
of light' you know.
Many times that afternoon, La Gorda was named. With her, Castaneda brought us
to an extraordinary person due to the fact that he, without a doubt, feels
great respect and admiration for her. What would be the sense then, of all
that circumstantial information that he gave us about her? I believe that
with those commentaries, as well as those in which he referred to the way of
eating and sleeping of the Toltecs, Castaneda tried to prevent us from
forming a rigid image of what they are. The work that they are doing is very
serious and their lives are austere, but they aren't rigid nor can they be
squeezed into the traditional norms of society. The important thing is to
liberate oneself from schemes, not to replace them with others.
Castaneda gave us to understand that he hasn't traveled much in Latin
America, if you exclude Mexico. "Lately I've only been in Venezuela," he
said. "As I've already told you, I have to go to Argentina soon. There a
cycle is closed. After that I will be able to leave. Well. . . the truth is
that I don't know if I want to leave yet." His last words were said
smilingly, '"Who doesn't have things that hold him down."
He has traveled through Europe several times for business related to his
books. "In 1973, however, Don Juan sent me to Italy," he affirmed. "My task
consisted of going to Rome to obtain an audience with the Pope. I didn't
claim to obtain a private audience but one of those audiences which are
conferred on groups of persons. All I had to do in the interview was to kiss
the hand of the Supreme Pontiff."
Castaneda did everything that Don Juan had asked him. He went to Italy,
arrived in Rome and asked for the audience. It was one of those Wednesday
audiences, after which the Pope officiates at a public mass in the plaza of
San Pedro. They did confer on me an audience but.. . I couldn't go," he said.
"I didn't even arrive at the door."
That afternoon, Castaneda referred several times to his family and to his
typically liberal and frankly anticlerical background education. In The
Second Ring of Power, Castaneda also makes reference to the anticlerical
heritage that he received. Don Juan, who doesn't seem to justify all his
prejudices and battles against the Catholic Church, says: "To conquer our own
foolishness requires all our time and energy. This is the only thing that
matters. The others lack consistency. Nothing that your grandfather and your
father have said about the Church has made them happy. To be an impeccable
warrior, on the other hand, will give you force, youth and power. Thus, the
appropriate thing for you is to know how to choose." (p. 236) Castaneda
didn't theorize about these themes. With respect to the disjunctive
'clericalism-anticlericalism' he only wanted us to receive a teaching with
the example of his experience. That is to say, he makes us understand that
it is very difficult to break the schemes which have been formed in youth.
END
A year later, Castaneda had a similar experience with one of the disciples of
Gurdjieff. He met with him in Los Angeles upon the insistence of one of his
friends. It seems that the gentleman had imitated Gurdjieff in everything.
"He had shaven his head and had a huge mustache," he commented, indicating
with his hands their size. "We had just entered, when he energetically
grabbed me by the throat and gave me some tremendous blows. Immediately after
he told me to leave my master because I was wasting my time: According to
him, in eight or nine classes, he was going to teach me everything I needed
to know. Can you imagine? In a few classes he can teach someone everything."
Castaneda also told us that the disciple of Gurdjieff had mentioned the use
of drugs to accelerate the learning process.
The interview didn't last long. It seems that Castaneda's friend realized
right away the ridiculousness of the situation and the magnitude of his
error. That friend had insisted that he see the disciple of Gurdjieff because
he was convinced that Castaneda needed a teacher more serious than Don Juan.
When the interview ended, Castaneda told us that his friend felt full of shame.
We continued walking some six or seven blocks. For a while we talked about
circumstantial things. I remember that I commented to him that I had read in
La Gaceta an article by Juan Tovar in which he mentions the possibility of
filming the books. (See Juan Tovar. "Encounter of Power," La Gaceta, F.C.E.
(Mexico, December 1974).
"Yes," he said. "At one time that possibility was spoken of." He later told
us the story of his encounter with the producer Joseph Levine, who would have
intimidated him from behind an immense desk. The size of the desk and the
producer's words hardly comprehensible because of the huge cigar he kept
between his lips, were the things that had made the biggest impression on
Castaneda. "He was behind a desk like it was a dais," he explained, "and I,
there below, very small. Powerful! With his hands full of rings with very
large stones."
Castaneda had already said to Juan Tovar that the last thing he wanted to see
was an Anthony Quinn in the role of Don Juan. It seems that someone had
proposed Mia Farrow for one of the roles... "To conceive of such a movie was
very difficult," he commented. "It's neither ethnography nor fiction. The
project in the end fell apart. The sorcerer Juan Matos told me that it
wouldn't be possible to do it."
During that same time he was invited to participate in shows like Johnny
Carson and Dick Cavett. "In the end I couldn't accept things like that. What
would I say to Johnny Carson, for example, if he asked me if I spoke to the
coyote or not? What would I say? I'd say, yes... and then?" Indubitably, the
situation could have become very ridiculous.
"Don Juan was the one who put me in charge of giving testimony of a
tradition," said Castaneda. "He himself insisted that I accept interviews and
give conference to promote the books. Later he made me cut everything because
that type of task burns a lot of energy. If you're into those things you have
to give them force."
Castaneda explained clearly that with the production of his books, he is in
charge of taking care of the expenses of the whole group. Castaneda allows
everyone to eat.
"Don Juan," he insisted, "gave me the task of putting in writing all that the
wizards and sorcerers said. My task doesn't consist in anything but in
writing until one day they tell me, "Enough, here you stop." The impact or
not of my books, really is unknown to me because I'm not dealing with what's
happening here. To Don Juan before and to the Toltec Woman now belong all the
material in the books. They are responsible for all that is said there."
The tone of his voice and his gestures impressed us in a lively way. It was
evident that in that terrain the task of Castaneda consists of obeying. His
objective isn't anything but to be impeccable as receptor and transmitter of
a tradition and of a teaching.
"Personally," he continued after a pause, "I am working on a kind of journal;
it's something like a manual. For this work, yes, I am responsible. I would
like a serious publisher to publish it and to be in charge of distributing it
to interested persons and to centers of study."
He told us that he had worked out some 18 units in which he believes he has
summarized all the teaching of the Toltec nation. To organize the work, he
has made use of the phenomenology of E. Husserl as a theoretical framework to
make comprehensible what they taught him.
"Last week," he said, "I was in New York. I brought the project to the
editors of Simon and Schuster but I failed. It seems they got scared. It's
that something like that can't have success."
"Of those 18 units I am the only one responsible," he continued in a
meditative tone, "and, as you can see, I wasn't successful. Those 18 units
are something like the 18 falls in which I was bumped hard on the head. I
agree with the editors that it's a work of heavy reading, but there I am...
Don Juan, Don Genaro, all the others are different. They are fickle!"
(According to what Castaneda communicated to us by telephone, Simon and
Schuster finally decided to accept the project of the journal that had seemed
to worry him so much.)
"Why do I call them units?" he asked, moving ahead of us. "I call them that
because each one of them claims to show one of the ways to break the unit of
the familiar. That unique perceptive vision can be broken in different ways."
Castaneda, trying once again to clarify this, gave us the example of the map.
Each time we want to arrive at some place we need a map with clear points of
reference to not get lost. "We can't find anything without a map," exclaimed
Castaneda. "What later occurs is that the only thing we see is the map.
Instead of seeing what there is to see, we finish seeing the map we carry
inside. Therefore, to break that arc of reflexibility, to constantly cut
the bonds that lead us to the known points of reference, is the ultimate
teaching of Don Juan."
Many times during that afternoon, Castaneda had to insist that he was "just a
contact to the world." All the knowledge of the books belongs to the Toltec
nation. In the presence of his insistence, I couldn't but react and tell him
that the labor of arranging the material from notes into coherent and well
organized book must have been immense and difficult.
"No," responded Castaneda. "I don't have any work. My task consists, simply,
in copying the page which is given me in dreams."
According to Castaneda, you can't create something from nothing. To pretend
to create like that is an absurdity. To explain this to us, he brought up an
episode in the life of his father. "My father," he said, "decided that he was
going to be a great writer. With that idea, he resolved to fix his office. He
needed to have an office that was perfect. He had to keep in mind the
smallest detail, from the decorations of the wall to the type of light on his
work table. Once the room was ready, he spent much time looking for a
suitable desk for his task. The desk had to be of a determined measurement,
wood, color, etc. Another such incident occurred with the selection of the
chair on which he would sit. Later he had to select the suitable cover so as
to not ruin the desk's wood. The cover could be plastic, glass, leather,
cardboard. On this cover my father was going to rest the paper on which he
would write his masterpiece. Then, seated at his chair, in front of the blank
paper he didn't know what to write. That is my dad. He wants to begin writing
the perfect phrase. Surely you can't write that way! One is always an
instrument, an intermediary. I see each page in dreams, and the success of
each one of those pages depends on the degree of fidelity with which I am
capable of copying that model from the dream. Precisely, the page which
impresses or impacts most is that in which I have achieved reproducing the
original with most exactitude."
These commentaries of Castaneda reveal a particular theory of knowledge and
of intellectual and artistic creation. (I thought immediately of Plato and of
St. Augustine with his image of "inner teacher." To know is to discover and
to create is to copy. Neither knowledge or creation can ever be an
undertaking of a *personal nature*.
While we ate dinner I mentioned to him some of the interviews which I had
read. I told him that I had enjoyed greatly that which Sam Keen had done and
which had been published first in Psychology Today. Castaneda was also
satisfied with that interview. He has much appreciation for Sam Keen. "During
those years," he said, "I knew many people with whom I would have liked to
have continued being friends...one example is the theologian Sam Keen. Don
Juan, however, said, 'Enough."'
With respect to the interview in Time, Castaneda related to us that first a
male reporter came to meet with him in Los Angeles. It seems it didn't go
well, (he used some Argentine slang) and so he left. They then sent "one of
those girls that you can't turn down," he said making us all smile. It all
came out well, and they understood each other "magnificently." Castaneda had
the impression that she understood what he had told her. In the end, however,
she didn't do the article. The notes which she had taken were given to a
reporter that "I think is now in Australia," he added. It seems that this
reporter did what he wanted with the notes they gave him.
Every time that for one reason or another, the Time interview was mentioned,
his annoyance was evident. He had observed to Don Juan that Time was too
powerful and important a magazine. Don Juan, on the other hand, had insisted
that the interview be done. "the interview was done, 'just in case"'
concluded Castaneda informally using once again a typically port area
(Argentinian) expression.
We also spoke of the critics and of that which had been written about him and
his books. I mentioned to him Richard deMille and others who had put in doubt
the veracity of his works and the anthropological value of them.
"The work that I have to do," affirmed Castaneda "is free from all that the
critics can say. My task consists of presenting that knowledge in the best
way possible. Nothing they can say matters to me because I no longer am
Carlos Castaneda, the writer. I am neither a writer, nor a thinker, nor a
philosopher...in consequence, their attacks don't reach me. Now, I know that
I am nothing; nobody can take anything from me because Joe Cordoba is
nothing. There isn't in all this, any personal pride.
"We live," he continued, "on a level lower than the Mexican peasants, which
is already saying a lot. We have touched ground and we can't fall lower. The
difference between us and the peasant is that he has hopes, wants things, and
works to one day have more than he has today. We, on the other hand, don't
have anything and each time we will have less. Can you imagine this?
Criticisms can't hit the target.
"Never am I more full than when I am Joe Cordoba," he exclaimed vehemently
standing up and opening his arms in a gesture of plentitude. "Joe Cordoba,
frying hamburgers all day with my eyes full of smoke...Do you understand me?"
Not all the critics have been negative. Octavio Paz, for example, wrote a
very good preface for the Spanish edition of The Teachings of Don Juan. To me
his preface was most beautiful. "Yes," Castaneda said feelingly, "That
preface is excellent. Octavio Paz is a complete gentleman. Maybe he is one of
the last who remain."
The phrase, "a complete gentleman" doesn't refer to the undeniable qualities
of Octavio Paz as thinker and writer. No! The phrase points to the intrinsic
qualities of being, the value of a person as a human being. That Castaneda
might point out that he is "one of the last ones who remain" accented the
fact that he is relating to a species in danger of extinction.
"Well," continued Castaneda trying to soften the impact, "maybe there remain
two gentlemen." The other is an old Mexican historian friend of his whose
name wasn't familiar to us. He told us some anecdotes about him that
reflected his physical vitality and intellectual vivacity.
At this juncture in the conversation Castaneda explained to us how he selects
the letters that arrive to him. "Do you want me to explain how I did it with
yours?" he asked directing himself to me.
He told us that a young friend receives them, puts them in a bag and keeps
them until he arrives in Los Angeles. Once in Los Angeles, Castaneda always
follows the same routine: First he dumps all the correspondence into a large
box, "like a toy box," and then he only takes out one letter. The letter he
takes out is that which he reads and answers. Clearly nothing is done in
writing. Castaneda doesn't leave tracks.
"The letter I took out," he explained, "was the first one that you wrote.
Later I looked for the other one. You can't imagine how many problems I had
to get your phone number! When I already believed that I wasn't going to have
any luck, I obtained it by the intervention of the university. I had really
already thought that I wasn't going to be able to speak with you."
I was very surprised to know all the inconveniences that he had had to get
to me. It appears that once he had my letter m his hands, he had to try to
exhaust all means. In the magical universe much importance is given to 'signs.'
"Here in Los Angeles," continued Castaneda casually, "I have a friend who
writes me a lot. Each time I come I read all his letters, one after the other
as if it were a diary. One certain time, between the letters I bumped into
another one that without realizing I had opened. Even though I immediately
realized that it wasn't from my friend, I read it. The fact that it was in
the pile was for me a 'sign."'
That letter put him in contact with two people who reported a very
interesting experience to him. It was night and they had to enter the San
Bernardino Freeway. They knew that to meet it they had to continue ahead
until the end of the street. Then they had to take a left and continue until
they reached the freeway. So they did it, but after some 20 minutes they
realized that they were in a strange place. It wasn't the San Bernardino
Freeway. They resolved to get off and ask, but nobody helped them. At one of
the houses where they knocked they were met with screaming.
Castaneda continued telling us that the two friends went back down the road
until they reached a service station where they asked for directions. There
they were told what they already knew. So they again repeated the same steps,
and without any inconveniences arrived at the highway.
Castaneda met with them. Of the two of them, it seems that only one is truly
interested in understanding the mystery.
"On the earth," he said as means of explanation, "there are sites, special
places or openings, through which you can enter and pass through to something
else." Here he stopped and offered to bring us. "It's near here... in Los
Angeles... If you want, I can take you," he said.
"The earth is something alive. Those places are the entrances from where the
earth periodically receives force or energy from the cosmos. That energy is
that which the warrior must store up. Maybe, if I am rigorously impeccable, I
might get close to the eagle. May it be so!
"Every 18 days a wave of energy falls upon the earth. Count," he suggested to
us, "starting on the third of next August. You will be able to perceive it.
This wave of energy could be strong or not; it depends. When the earth
receives very large waves of energy, it doesn't matter where you might be, it
always reaches us. Before the magnitude of that force, the earth is small and
the energy reaches all parts."
We were still animatedly conversing when the waitress approached and in a
cutting tone asked if we were going to order anything else. As nobody wanted
dessert or coffee, we had no other remedy than to get up. No sooner had the
waitress moved away when Castaneda commented, "It seems we are being thrown
out. . ."
Yes, we were being thrown out and, maybe, with reason. It was late. In
surprise we checked the passing of time. We got up and left for the avenue.
It was night, the street and the people had the appearance of a fair. A mime
dressed in tails and top hat was clowning around behind our backs. Everything
we saw made us smile while our eyes searched for the plate that is always
passed during those representations. To our right, under the eaves of an old
theater, someone was trying another representation on a miniature stage. I
believe I saw a cat ready for its function. Really there you could see
everything. In other times; a man disguised as a bear tried to compete with a
human orchestra. "The question is to look for alternatives each time more
extravagant," someone commented. While we walked, returning to the campus,
Castaneda spoke about a prospective trip to Argentina.
"There a cycle is closed," he told us. "To return to Argentina is very
important for me. I'm still not sure when I can do it, but I will go. For now
I have things to do here. Just in August three years of tasks will be
accomplished, and it's possible that then I might go."
That afternoon, Castaneda spoke to us a lot about Buenos Aires, about its
streets, neighborhoods and sports clubs. He remembered nostalgically Florida
Street with its elegant stores and the itinerant multitude. He was even
reminded with precision of the famous street of cinemas. "Lavalle Street," he
said making memory.
Castaneda lived in Buenos Aires during his childhood. It seems he was
enrolled in a downtown school. Of that era he remembers with sadness that it
had been said that he was "wider than he was tall" words that when one is a
child hurt a lot. "I always looked with envy," he commented, "on those
Argentinians so tall and handsome.
"You know that in Buenos Aires you always have to belong to some club,"
continued Castaneda. "I was from Chacarita. To be from River Plate isn't
surprising, right? Chacarita, on the other hand, is always one of the last."
In those times, Chacarita always came out last. It was touching to see him
identified with those who lose, with the 'underdog.'
"Surely La Gorda will come with me. She wants to travel. Clearly she wants to
go to 'Parice', he declared. "La Gorda buys now in Gucci, is elegant and
wants to go to Paris. I always say to her, Gorda, why do you want to go to
Paris? There there is nothing. She has a certain idea about Paris, 'the city
of light' you know.
Many times that afternoon, La Gorda was named. With her, Castaneda brought us
to an extraordinary person due to the fact that he, without a doubt, feels
great respect and admiration for her. What would be the sense then, of all
that circumstantial information that he gave us about her? I believe that
with those commentaries, as well as those in which he referred to the way of
eating and sleeping of the Toltecs, Castaneda tried to prevent us from
forming a rigid image of what they are. The work that they are doing is very
serious and their lives are austere, but they aren't rigid nor can they be
squeezed into the traditional norms of society. The important thing is to
liberate oneself from schemes, not to replace them with others.
Castaneda gave us to understand that he hasn't traveled much in Latin
America, if you exclude Mexico. "Lately I've only been in Venezuela," he
said. "As I've already told you, I have to go to Argentina soon. There a
cycle is closed. After that I will be able to leave. Well. . . the truth is
that I don't know if I want to leave yet." His last words were said
smilingly, '"Who doesn't have things that hold him down."
He has traveled through Europe several times for business related to his
books. "In 1973, however, Don Juan sent me to Italy," he affirmed. "My task
consisted of going to Rome to obtain an audience with the Pope. I didn't
claim to obtain a private audience but one of those audiences which are
conferred on groups of persons. All I had to do in the interview was to kiss
the hand of the Supreme Pontiff."
Castaneda did everything that Don Juan had asked him. He went to Italy,
arrived in Rome and asked for the audience. It was one of those Wednesday
audiences, after which the Pope officiates at a public mass in the plaza of
San Pedro. They did confer on me an audience but.. . I couldn't go," he said.
"I didn't even arrive at the door."
That afternoon, Castaneda referred several times to his family and to his
typically liberal and frankly anticlerical background education. In The
Second Ring of Power, Castaneda also makes reference to the anticlerical
heritage that he received. Don Juan, who doesn't seem to justify all his
prejudices and battles against the Catholic Church, says: "To conquer our own
foolishness requires all our time and energy. This is the only thing that
matters. The others lack consistency. Nothing that your grandfather and your
father have said about the Church has made them happy. To be an impeccable
warrior, on the other hand, will give you force, youth and power. Thus, the
appropriate thing for you is to know how to choose." (p. 236) Castaneda
didn't theorize about these themes. With respect to the disjunctive
'clericalism-anticlericalism' he only wanted us to receive a teaching with
the example of his experience. That is to say, he makes us understand that
it is very difficult to break the schemes which have been formed in youth.
END
Kovalenko, благодарю!Kovalenko писал(а):Вт мар 21, 2017 12:43 pmНо в оригинале они перечислены так:
Fear, Indulgence, Complacency, Old Age.
На мой взгляд, индульгирование или потакание себе это не знание.
А удовлетворенность или самодовольство это не сила.
И возникает вопрос: того ли Кастанеду мы читаем?
Появился стимул обратиться к оригиналу.
В моем электронном экземпляре КК враги: Fear, Clarity, Power, Old Age.Kovalenko писал(а):Вт мар 21, 2017 12:43 pmВ русских переводах Кастанеды нам называют "врагов человека знания" таким образом:
Страх, Знание, Сила, Старость.
Но в оригинале они перечислены так:
Fear, Indulgence, Complacency, Old Age.
На мой взгляд, индульгирование или потакание себе это не знание.
А удовлетворенность или самодовольство это не сила.
И возникает вопрос: того ли Кастанеду мы читаем?
Вроде все правильно. И вообще мне софийский перевод нравится. Оригинал я читала только отрывками, но когда открываешь английский текст, то все очень знакомо, будто на английском и читала. Так, может, по мелочам и есть какая-то лажа, но это не особо существенно.
Страх. Ясность. Сила. Старость.
Но оригинал то был на Испанском
Дон Хуан Матус » передавал Знания Кастанеде » на Испанском,
Карлос Кастанеда » переводил на Английский,
изд. София » переводила на Русский
так и Живём
Но оригинал то был на Испанском
Дон Хуан Матус » передавал Знания Кастанеде » на Испанском,
Карлос Кастанеда » переводил на Английский,
изд. София » переводила на Русский
так и Живём
Читаю
перевод интервью и
сравниваю с
оригиналом. Пропущены слова, иногда предложения. В некоторых случаях хромает смысл. Термин intensity переводят как энергия, и
потому мне кажется, что
гугл знает лучше.
Еще интересен момент, что касается концепции "острия", которое якобы дети берут у родителей во время рождения. В оригинале написано "edge". И я теперь прям не знаю, что думать.
P.S.: ищу сканы книг of Carlos Castaneda.
Еще интересен момент, что касается концепции "острия", которое якобы дети берут у родителей во время рождения. В оригинале написано "edge". И я теперь прям не знаю, что думать.
P.S.: ищу сканы книг of Carlos Castaneda.
Как бы перевод:"At birth, I took everything from my father and mother," he said. "They were
all bruised! To them I had to return that edge that I had taken from them.
Now I have to recoup the edge that I lost."
-- Когда я родился, то я все взял у своих родителей.
Они многое потеряли из за этого. Для них было бы очень хорошо,
если бы я вернул им ту остроту, которую я взял у них. Теперь
уже мне нужно вернуть ту остроту, которую я потерял, --
объясняет он.
Из интервью:Natus Vincerus писал(а):Вт мар 21, 2017 11:12 pmНо оригинал то был на Испанском
After a short silence I asked him if The Second Ring of Power had been
translated in Spanish. According to Castaneda, a Spanish publishing house had
the right, but he wasn't sure if the book had come out or not.
Для меня слово "созерцать" и однокоренные с ним в контексте учения дон Хуана звучали как-то мистически. Мне почему-то в
голову не пришло, что в момент чтения текста я способен постичь, или хотя бы попробовать созерцать предметы.
На английском (в интервью) это оказывается написанно как "watching".
Просто "вочинг", от всем известного "воч". И как-то понятнее стало
Коваленко, может ты подскажешь, что Кастанеда имел в виду, когда говорил "watching"?
На английском (в интервью) это оказывается написанно как "watching".
Просто "вочинг", от всем известного "воч". И как-то понятнее стало
Коваленко, может ты подскажешь, что Кастанеда имел в виду, когда говорил "watching"?
Ordinary perception doesn't tell us all the truth
Это для тех кто читает интервью на русском.-- Обычное восприятие не позволяет нам видеть правду.
О чем идет речь? "Колесо Времени" - рано. Или было что-то еще о чем мы не знаем? В 1981 опубликован только "Дар Орла". Но на журнал или учебник как-то не похоже.-- Я лично, -- продолжил говорить он, после небольшой
паузы. -- Работаю над чем-то вроде журнала, это что-то вроде
учебника. Я ответственен за эту работу. Мне хотелось бы найти
серьезного издателя, чтобы опубликовать его и участвовать в его
распространении среди тех, кто им заинтересуется, а также
учебными заведениями.
Он сказал нам, что этот журнал состоит из 18 частей, в
которых он обобщил все учение Тольтеков. Для того, чтобы
сделать эту работу понятной и создать теоретическое
обоснование, он использовал феноменологию Гуссерля.
-- На прошлой неделе я был в Нью Йорке, -- сказал он.
-- Я пришел с этим проектом к Саймону и Шустеру, но получил
отказ. Похоже, что они испугались. Это такое произведение, что
оно вряд ли будет иметь успех.
-- Только я один несу ответственность за то, что
написано в этих 18 частях, и как видите, я потерпел неудачу.
Словно 18 раз я упал и ударился головой. Я согласился с
издателями, что это действительно тяжело читать. Дон Хуан, дон
Хенаро и остальные, они совсем другие чем я. Они так
непостоянны! -- (Позже, в телефонном разговоре Кастанеда
сказал, что Саймон и Шустер в конце концов решили принять
проект журнала, о котором он так беспокоился).
-- Я называю эти части журнала элементами, потому что
каждая из них показывает, как разрушить элементы обыденности.
Наше единственное восприятие может быть нарушено множеством
способов.
1980-1981 год.
А вот интервью с Флориндой Доннер из журнала "Измерение":
Dimensions, February 1992
BEING-IN-DREAMING
FLORINDA DONNER IN CONVERSATION WITH ALEXANDER BLAIR-EWART
Florinda Donner is a longtime colleague and fellow dream-
traveler of Carlos Castaneda and the acclaimed author of The
Witch's Dream and Shabono. Her latest book Being-In-Dreaming: An
Initiation into the Sorcerer's World, an autobiographical account
of her halting, sometimes unwilling, often bewildering initiation
into the works of being-in-dreaming, has recently been released
and will be available in Canada in the Spring. Anthropologist and
sorceress, Florinda Donner lives in Los Angeles, California and
Sonora, Mexico.
ALEXANDER BLAIR-EWART: Now, at the beginning of the book, you
talk about how you become drawn into a living myth. Can you talk
about that mythology?
FLORINDA DONNER: It's a living myth. Well the myth of the Nagual
is a myth, but a myth that is being relived over and over again.
You see, the myth that exists is the myth that there is the
Nagual and that he has his troop of people, apprentices,
sorcerers. Actually I'm not an apprentice of Don Juan. I was an
apprentice of Castaneda who was an apprentice of Don Juan. And I
am one of the 'sisters' who were actually of the women of
Florinda, and she gave me her name. So, in that sense, it is a
myth which exists. They didn't care that I called them witches.
It has no evil connotations for them . From the western point of
view, the idea of a brujo, or a witch, has always a negative
connotation. They couldn't care less, because for these people,
the abstract quality of sorcery voids automotatically [sic] any
positive or negative connotation of the term. We are apes on one
level, but we have this other magical side. In that sense we
relive a myth.
ABE: So the myth of the Nagual is that there is an unbroken
lineage from the ancient Toltecs right down to modern times. I'm
wondering if I can get you to talk about what the pattern of the
myth actually is.
FLORINDA D: Well, there is no pattern of the myth. That's why
the whole thing is so baffling and so difficult. When I first got
involved with these people my main quest, my main aberration,
which I came to call it later, was that I wanted to have some
rules and regulations about what the hell it is I had to do.
There were none. There is no blueprint. Because each new group
has to find their own way to deal with this idea of trying to
break the barriers of perception. The only way we can break the
barriers of perception, according to Don Juan, is that we need
energy. All our energy is already deployed in the world to
present the idea of self- what we are, who we want to be
perceived as, how other people perceive us. So Don Juan says 90%
of our energy is deployed in doing that, and nothing new can come
to us. There's nothing open to us, because no matter how
"egoless" we are, or we pretend to be, or we want to believe we
are, we are not. Even let's say "enlightened" people, or gurus
that I have met- at one time Carlos Castaneda was going around
trying to meet gurus- and the ego of those people was so
gigantic, in how they wanted to be perceived in the world . And
that's, according to Don Juan, exactly what kills us. Nothing
is open to us anymore.
ABE: A real Nagual, a real seer wouldn't care how the world
perceives them, particularly, would they?
FLORINDA D: No, they don't. But they still have to fight it.
Castaneda has been at this for thirty years. I've been at this
for over twenty years, and it's ongoing; it doesn't stop.
ABE: What's the nature of the battle? Because you use the
language of the warrior. What's the nature of the battle? What
are you fighting?
FLORINDA D: The self.
ABE: The self.
FLORINDA D: It's not even the self; it's an idea of the self,
because if we would really get the self below the surface, we
don't really know what it is. And it is possible to curtail this
idea, this bombastic idea we have of the self. Because whether
it's a negative idea or a positive idea doesn't really matter.
The energy employed to sustain that idea is the same.
ABE: So there's tremendous emphasis in this tradition on
overcoming what is called self-importance.
FLORINDA D: Self-importance, exactly. That's the main battle.
To shut off our internal dialogue. Because even if we're isolated
someplace, we are still constantly talking to ourselves. That
internal dialogue never stops. And what does the internal
dialogue do? It always justifies itself, no matter what. We
replay things, events, what we could have said or could have
done, what we feel or don't feel. The emphasis is always on me.
We're constantly spouting this mantra- me...me...me, silently
or verbally.
ABE So, an opening emerges when...
FLORINDA D: ...when that dialogue shuts off. Automatically. We
don't have to do anything. And the reason people reject Castaneda
as not true is because it's too simple. But its sheer simplicity
makes it the hardest thing there is to do for us. There are about
six people in our world engaged in the same pursuit. And the
difficulty we all have is totally shutting off that internal
dialogue. It's fine if we're not threatened. But when certain
buttons arc pushed, our reactions arc so ingrained in us that
it's so easy to go back on automatic pilot. You see, there's one
great exercise that Don Juan prescribes- the idea of
recapitulation. The idea is that you recapitulate your life,
basically. And it's not a psychological recapitulation. You
want to bring back that energy you left in all the interactions
you've had with people throughout your life, and you start of
course from the present moment and you go backwards in lime. But
if you really do a good recapitulation, you discover, by the
time you are three or four years old, you have learned all your
reactions already. Then we become more sophisticated, we can hide
them better, but basically the pattern has already been
established, how we're going to interact with the world and with
our fellow human beings.
ABE: So here is the image, then, or the awareness of a kind human
being who is travelling a parallel path to the world of the
Tonal, or the world of the person, the social person. This other
world, his other opening, is something that has apparently always
been there.
FLORINDA D: Yes, it's always there. It's available to all of us.
Nobody wants to tap into it, or people think they want to tap
into it, but as Don Juan pointed out, the seeker is involved in
something else, because a person who seeks already knows what
he's seeking.
ABE: Yes, that's clear.
FLORINDA D: The disappointment that so many people who are
"seekers" have with Castaneda is because, when he talks to them,
well, they have already made up their mind how things should be.
And they are not open. Even if they're listening, they're not
open to anything anymore, because they already know how it should
be, what it is they're seeking.
ABE: My version of that is that I am not interested in
self-improvement. I'm interested in self-realization, but not im-
provement, and I'm not concerned with whether or not what I turn
out to be in the process of recapitulation is something nice and
spiritual and acceptable, because it's going to contain elements
of madness as well as everything else.
FLORINDA D: Exactly.
ABE: But this is a very deeply disturbing idea for most people.
FLORINDA D: It is, yes, definitely. You see, we believe in this
idea that we are basically energetic beings. Don Juan said
everything hinges on how much energy we have. Our energy to
fight, even to fight the idea of the self, requires an enormous
amount of energy. And we go always to the easiest path. We go
back to what we know, even us who have been involved in this for
so long. It would be a lot easier just to say, oh, to hell with
it, you know, I' m just going to indulge a little bit. But the
thing is, that little bit of indulging would plunge you right
back to point zero again.
ABE: Except for one thing that we both know, Florinda, which is
this: that once you pass a certain point within yourself, if you
have reached that silence, I believe, even for one moment, if
its real...
FLORINDA D: ...you can't stop it. Exactly. But to reach this
moment of silence you need the energy. You can stop it, what Juan
calls this momentary pause, this cubic centimetre of chance, and
you can stop it immediately.
ABE: And once it's happened, you'll never be the same again.
FLORINDA D: Absolutely.
ABE: And you might want to go back to your old ways and indulge,
but you can 't get any satisfaction out of it.
FLORINDA D: Exactly. No, you can't. There's no satisfaction.
That's totally correct. I think, if we would really
arrive...let's say a critical mass would arrive at that feeling
or at that knowledge, we could change things in the world. The
reason nothing can change is because we're not willing to change
ourselves, whether it's political dogma, economic or social
issues, it doesn't really matter. What the hell is the whole
thing with the rainforest and the environment at the moment? How
can we expect someone to change if we're not willing to change
ourselves? Thc change is phony; the change is restructuring or
replaying the pieces, but there's no change. Basically we are
predatory beings, you see. That hasn't changed in us. We could
use that predatory energy to change our course, but we're not
willing to change ourselves.
ABE: Now, in the myth, the individual seer and/or Nagual is
selected by providence, the unknown, the ineffable.
FLORINDA D: ...actually selected. Carlos has been "tapped"
energetically. Let's look at our energetic configuration....some
people are basically energetically different. They call Carlos a
three-pronged Nagual; Don Juan was a four-pronged Nagual. So what
does that really entail? Basically, they have more energy than
the rest of the group, and that's something very curious. Why the
hell him, or why, for instance, are always the men Naguals? We
have women Naguals in the lineage, but the men have more energy,
the one's that have been selected so far. They're not better.
There were people in Don Juan's world who were infinitely more
spiritual, better prepared, bigger men of knowledge in the sense
that they knew more, and it didn't make any difference. It is not
that he is more or less than somebody else. It's just that he has
that energy to lead.
ABE: And he can give some of that energy to somebody, too, and
give them a boost.
FLORINDA D: We draw from that energy, yes. It is not that you
get that energy, but he has that energy, if nothing else, not to
become whatever the world presents. For instance, in that sense,
being with Castaneda for so long, the worldly goodies that have
been presented to him are unbelievable. He has never wavered
from his path. And I, personally, could say now, that if I had
been put in that position for that many years, I could not
honestly say that I would have been so impeccable. And you see, I
have to acknowledge that, because the worst thing, of course,
we can do is to try to hide certain things. And for me to have
witnessed Castaneda's journey, I mean, there were incredible
worldly things presented to him which he never took. And you see,
for that you need energy. That's where energy comes in; that's
when you need whoever is then the leader of the group to point
out that way. Because if somebody else would have been the Nagual
that doesn't have the energy, he would have succumbed.
ABE: Can a Nagual succumb and then recover?
FLORINDA D: No. There is no chance.
ABE: How come?
FLORINDA D: Go back to the myth. The eagle flies in a straight
line. It doesn't turn around. You might be able to say okay, you
have to run harder after it. But what does that mean? It's a
metaphor.
ABE: So, the Nagual works in different ways to fulfill the
unfolding of the myth.
FLORINDA D: Don Juan had more people behind him. Energetically he
had a larger mass, so he could practically pluck you in and put
you some place. Carlos will not do that. For him, whatever the
people he is working with- and there are six of us- it's a matter
of decision. That's all. Our decision is all that counts, nothing
else. He will not cajole us; he will not beg; he will not tell us
what to do. We have to know. Having been exposed to this for so
long, having been with Don Juan, any way we can try to walk on
this path, that has to be enough for him. There was nothing he
would do forcefully to make sure that we stayed on this path.
ABE: Different Naguals work in different ways. Is it true of
Carlos Castaneda, I've heard him described as the Nagual of
stalkers?
FLORINDA D: Yes, but I would say...I don't know. He's a dreamer.
ABE: Yeah, that emerges, too.
FLORINDA D: And then, what is this idea of dreaming, dreaming and
being awake? It's a different state. It's not that you're zonked
out. No, you are totally normal and coherent, but something in
you plays energetically on a different level.
ABE: There's something in your eyes, too.
FLORINDA D: Yes.
ABE: Something in your eyes that is too to learn to look at two
worlds simultaneously.
FLORINDA D: Exactly. And again this idea is that you have
collapsed the barrier perception in terms of what we see;
whatever we perceive has been defined us by the social order, no
matter what. Intellectually we are willing to accept at
perception is culturally defined, but we will not accept it on
any other level. But it's absurd, because it exists on another
level. And I can only say, because we been involved with these
people- and certainly I'm also in the world- that is possible to
see on those two levels and to be totally coherent in both, and
impeccable on both levels.
BE: Talk about impeccability. What is impeccability?
FLORINDA D: You know exactly what you have to do. Especially for
women, we are reared to be very petty beings. Women are so petty,
it's unbelievable. And I'm not saying that men are not, but with
men, no matter how we want to express it, men always are on the
winning side. Whether they are losers or not, it's still male.
Our world is a male world, regardless how well off they are or
not, regardless whether or not they believe in any kind of
feminist ideology, it doesn't really matter. But the men are the
winners in our society.
ABE: In the book you talk about how women are actually enslaved
by their attachment to the sexuality of men. Can you talk about
that?
FLORINDA D: Definitely. First of all, to me, one of the most
shocking things which I denied and refused to believe for quite
some time, was this idea of the fog created by sexual
intercourse. They went even further to explain that basically
what really goes on is that, when we have sexual intercourse,
when the male ejaculates, not only do we get the semen, but in
that moment of energetic outburst, what really happens is that
they are what Don Juan calls 'energetic worms', filaments. And
those filaments stay in the body for. From a biological point of
view, those filaments ensure that the male returns to the same
female and takes care of the offspring. Thc male will recognize
that it is his offspring by the filaments at a total energetic
level.
ABE: What is the exchange of energy in sexual intercourse?
FLORINDA D: She feeds the man energetically. Don Juan believes
that the women are the cornerstone for perpetuating the human
species, and the bulk of that energy comes from women, not only
to gestate, to give birth and nourish their offspring, but also
to ensure the male's place in the whole process.
ABE: So, the woman is enslaved, then, by this fog. How does she
release herself?
Dimensions, February 1992
BEING-IN-DREAMING
FLORINDA DONNER IN CONVERSATION WITH ALEXANDER BLAIR-EWART
Florinda Donner is a longtime colleague and fellow dream-
traveler of Carlos Castaneda and the acclaimed author of The
Witch's Dream and Shabono. Her latest book Being-In-Dreaming: An
Initiation into the Sorcerer's World, an autobiographical account
of her halting, sometimes unwilling, often bewildering initiation
into the works of being-in-dreaming, has recently been released
and will be available in Canada in the Spring. Anthropologist and
sorceress, Florinda Donner lives in Los Angeles, California and
Sonora, Mexico.
ALEXANDER BLAIR-EWART: Now, at the beginning of the book, you
talk about how you become drawn into a living myth. Can you talk
about that mythology?
FLORINDA DONNER: It's a living myth. Well the myth of the Nagual
is a myth, but a myth that is being relived over and over again.
You see, the myth that exists is the myth that there is the
Nagual and that he has his troop of people, apprentices,
sorcerers. Actually I'm not an apprentice of Don Juan. I was an
apprentice of Castaneda who was an apprentice of Don Juan. And I
am one of the 'sisters' who were actually of the women of
Florinda, and she gave me her name. So, in that sense, it is a
myth which exists. They didn't care that I called them witches.
It has no evil connotations for them . From the western point of
view, the idea of a brujo, or a witch, has always a negative
connotation. They couldn't care less, because for these people,
the abstract quality of sorcery voids automotatically [sic] any
positive or negative connotation of the term. We are apes on one
level, but we have this other magical side. In that sense we
relive a myth.
ABE: So the myth of the Nagual is that there is an unbroken
lineage from the ancient Toltecs right down to modern times. I'm
wondering if I can get you to talk about what the pattern of the
myth actually is.
FLORINDA D: Well, there is no pattern of the myth. That's why
the whole thing is so baffling and so difficult. When I first got
involved with these people my main quest, my main aberration,
which I came to call it later, was that I wanted to have some
rules and regulations about what the hell it is I had to do.
There were none. There is no blueprint. Because each new group
has to find their own way to deal with this idea of trying to
break the barriers of perception. The only way we can break the
barriers of perception, according to Don Juan, is that we need
energy. All our energy is already deployed in the world to
present the idea of self- what we are, who we want to be
perceived as, how other people perceive us. So Don Juan says 90%
of our energy is deployed in doing that, and nothing new can come
to us. There's nothing open to us, because no matter how
"egoless" we are, or we pretend to be, or we want to believe we
are, we are not. Even let's say "enlightened" people, or gurus
that I have met- at one time Carlos Castaneda was going around
trying to meet gurus- and the ego of those people was so
gigantic, in how they wanted to be perceived in the world . And
that's, according to Don Juan, exactly what kills us. Nothing
is open to us anymore.
ABE: A real Nagual, a real seer wouldn't care how the world
perceives them, particularly, would they?
FLORINDA D: No, they don't. But they still have to fight it.
Castaneda has been at this for thirty years. I've been at this
for over twenty years, and it's ongoing; it doesn't stop.
ABE: What's the nature of the battle? Because you use the
language of the warrior. What's the nature of the battle? What
are you fighting?
FLORINDA D: The self.
ABE: The self.
FLORINDA D: It's not even the self; it's an idea of the self,
because if we would really get the self below the surface, we
don't really know what it is. And it is possible to curtail this
idea, this bombastic idea we have of the self. Because whether
it's a negative idea or a positive idea doesn't really matter.
The energy employed to sustain that idea is the same.
ABE: So there's tremendous emphasis in this tradition on
overcoming what is called self-importance.
FLORINDA D: Self-importance, exactly. That's the main battle.
To shut off our internal dialogue. Because even if we're isolated
someplace, we are still constantly talking to ourselves. That
internal dialogue never stops. And what does the internal
dialogue do? It always justifies itself, no matter what. We
replay things, events, what we could have said or could have
done, what we feel or don't feel. The emphasis is always on me.
We're constantly spouting this mantra- me...me...me, silently
or verbally.
ABE So, an opening emerges when...
FLORINDA D: ...when that dialogue shuts off. Automatically. We
don't have to do anything. And the reason people reject Castaneda
as not true is because it's too simple. But its sheer simplicity
makes it the hardest thing there is to do for us. There are about
six people in our world engaged in the same pursuit. And the
difficulty we all have is totally shutting off that internal
dialogue. It's fine if we're not threatened. But when certain
buttons arc pushed, our reactions arc so ingrained in us that
it's so easy to go back on automatic pilot. You see, there's one
great exercise that Don Juan prescribes- the idea of
recapitulation. The idea is that you recapitulate your life,
basically. And it's not a psychological recapitulation. You
want to bring back that energy you left in all the interactions
you've had with people throughout your life, and you start of
course from the present moment and you go backwards in lime. But
if you really do a good recapitulation, you discover, by the
time you are three or four years old, you have learned all your
reactions already. Then we become more sophisticated, we can hide
them better, but basically the pattern has already been
established, how we're going to interact with the world and with
our fellow human beings.
ABE: So here is the image, then, or the awareness of a kind human
being who is travelling a parallel path to the world of the
Tonal, or the world of the person, the social person. This other
world, his other opening, is something that has apparently always
been there.
FLORINDA D: Yes, it's always there. It's available to all of us.
Nobody wants to tap into it, or people think they want to tap
into it, but as Don Juan pointed out, the seeker is involved in
something else, because a person who seeks already knows what
he's seeking.
ABE: Yes, that's clear.
FLORINDA D: The disappointment that so many people who are
"seekers" have with Castaneda is because, when he talks to them,
well, they have already made up their mind how things should be.
And they are not open. Even if they're listening, they're not
open to anything anymore, because they already know how it should
be, what it is they're seeking.
ABE: My version of that is that I am not interested in
self-improvement. I'm interested in self-realization, but not im-
provement, and I'm not concerned with whether or not what I turn
out to be in the process of recapitulation is something nice and
spiritual and acceptable, because it's going to contain elements
of madness as well as everything else.
FLORINDA D: Exactly.
ABE: But this is a very deeply disturbing idea for most people.
FLORINDA D: It is, yes, definitely. You see, we believe in this
idea that we are basically energetic beings. Don Juan said
everything hinges on how much energy we have. Our energy to
fight, even to fight the idea of the self, requires an enormous
amount of energy. And we go always to the easiest path. We go
back to what we know, even us who have been involved in this for
so long. It would be a lot easier just to say, oh, to hell with
it, you know, I' m just going to indulge a little bit. But the
thing is, that little bit of indulging would plunge you right
back to point zero again.
ABE: Except for one thing that we both know, Florinda, which is
this: that once you pass a certain point within yourself, if you
have reached that silence, I believe, even for one moment, if
its real...
FLORINDA D: ...you can't stop it. Exactly. But to reach this
moment of silence you need the energy. You can stop it, what Juan
calls this momentary pause, this cubic centimetre of chance, and
you can stop it immediately.
ABE: And once it's happened, you'll never be the same again.
FLORINDA D: Absolutely.
ABE: And you might want to go back to your old ways and indulge,
but you can 't get any satisfaction out of it.
FLORINDA D: Exactly. No, you can't. There's no satisfaction.
That's totally correct. I think, if we would really
arrive...let's say a critical mass would arrive at that feeling
or at that knowledge, we could change things in the world. The
reason nothing can change is because we're not willing to change
ourselves, whether it's political dogma, economic or social
issues, it doesn't really matter. What the hell is the whole
thing with the rainforest and the environment at the moment? How
can we expect someone to change if we're not willing to change
ourselves? Thc change is phony; the change is restructuring or
replaying the pieces, but there's no change. Basically we are
predatory beings, you see. That hasn't changed in us. We could
use that predatory energy to change our course, but we're not
willing to change ourselves.
ABE: Now, in the myth, the individual seer and/or Nagual is
selected by providence, the unknown, the ineffable.
FLORINDA D: ...actually selected. Carlos has been "tapped"
energetically. Let's look at our energetic configuration....some
people are basically energetically different. They call Carlos a
three-pronged Nagual; Don Juan was a four-pronged Nagual. So what
does that really entail? Basically, they have more energy than
the rest of the group, and that's something very curious. Why the
hell him, or why, for instance, are always the men Naguals? We
have women Naguals in the lineage, but the men have more energy,
the one's that have been selected so far. They're not better.
There were people in Don Juan's world who were infinitely more
spiritual, better prepared, bigger men of knowledge in the sense
that they knew more, and it didn't make any difference. It is not
that he is more or less than somebody else. It's just that he has
that energy to lead.
ABE: And he can give some of that energy to somebody, too, and
give them a boost.
FLORINDA D: We draw from that energy, yes. It is not that you
get that energy, but he has that energy, if nothing else, not to
become whatever the world presents. For instance, in that sense,
being with Castaneda for so long, the worldly goodies that have
been presented to him are unbelievable. He has never wavered
from his path. And I, personally, could say now, that if I had
been put in that position for that many years, I could not
honestly say that I would have been so impeccable. And you see, I
have to acknowledge that, because the worst thing, of course,
we can do is to try to hide certain things. And for me to have
witnessed Castaneda's journey, I mean, there were incredible
worldly things presented to him which he never took. And you see,
for that you need energy. That's where energy comes in; that's
when you need whoever is then the leader of the group to point
out that way. Because if somebody else would have been the Nagual
that doesn't have the energy, he would have succumbed.
ABE: Can a Nagual succumb and then recover?
FLORINDA D: No. There is no chance.
ABE: How come?
FLORINDA D: Go back to the myth. The eagle flies in a straight
line. It doesn't turn around. You might be able to say okay, you
have to run harder after it. But what does that mean? It's a
metaphor.
ABE: So, the Nagual works in different ways to fulfill the
unfolding of the myth.
FLORINDA D: Don Juan had more people behind him. Energetically he
had a larger mass, so he could practically pluck you in and put
you some place. Carlos will not do that. For him, whatever the
people he is working with- and there are six of us- it's a matter
of decision. That's all. Our decision is all that counts, nothing
else. He will not cajole us; he will not beg; he will not tell us
what to do. We have to know. Having been exposed to this for so
long, having been with Don Juan, any way we can try to walk on
this path, that has to be enough for him. There was nothing he
would do forcefully to make sure that we stayed on this path.
ABE: Different Naguals work in different ways. Is it true of
Carlos Castaneda, I've heard him described as the Nagual of
stalkers?
FLORINDA D: Yes, but I would say...I don't know. He's a dreamer.
ABE: Yeah, that emerges, too.
FLORINDA D: And then, what is this idea of dreaming, dreaming and
being awake? It's a different state. It's not that you're zonked
out. No, you are totally normal and coherent, but something in
you plays energetically on a different level.
ABE: There's something in your eyes, too.
FLORINDA D: Yes.
ABE: Something in your eyes that is too to learn to look at two
worlds simultaneously.
FLORINDA D: Exactly. And again this idea is that you have
collapsed the barrier perception in terms of what we see;
whatever we perceive has been defined us by the social order, no
matter what. Intellectually we are willing to accept at
perception is culturally defined, but we will not accept it on
any other level. But it's absurd, because it exists on another
level. And I can only say, because we been involved with these
people- and certainly I'm also in the world- that is possible to
see on those two levels and to be totally coherent in both, and
impeccable on both levels.
BE: Talk about impeccability. What is impeccability?
FLORINDA D: You know exactly what you have to do. Especially for
women, we are reared to be very petty beings. Women are so petty,
it's unbelievable. And I'm not saying that men are not, but with
men, no matter how we want to express it, men always are on the
winning side. Whether they are losers or not, it's still male.
Our world is a male world, regardless how well off they are or
not, regardless whether or not they believe in any kind of
feminist ideology, it doesn't really matter. But the men are the
winners in our society.
ABE: In the book you talk about how women are actually enslaved
by their attachment to the sexuality of men. Can you talk about
that?
FLORINDA D: Definitely. First of all, to me, one of the most
shocking things which I denied and refused to believe for quite
some time, was this idea of the fog created by sexual
intercourse. They went even further to explain that basically
what really goes on is that, when we have sexual intercourse,
when the male ejaculates, not only do we get the semen, but in
that moment of energetic outburst, what really happens is that
they are what Don Juan calls 'energetic worms', filaments. And
those filaments stay in the body for. From a biological point of
view, those filaments ensure that the male returns to the same
female and takes care of the offspring. Thc male will recognize
that it is his offspring by the filaments at a total energetic
level.
ABE: What is the exchange of energy in sexual intercourse?
FLORINDA D: She feeds the man energetically. Don Juan believes
that the women are the cornerstone for perpetuating the human
species, and the bulk of that energy comes from women, not only
to gestate, to give birth and nourish their offspring, but also
to ensure the male's place in the whole process.
ABE: So, the woman is enslaved, then, by this fog. How does she
release herself?
продолжение:
FLORINDA D: If we talk about it from a biological point of view,
is she enslaved? The sorcerers say yes, in the sense that she
always views herself through the male. She has no option. I used
to be excruciatingly mad about this whole discussion; I used to
go over and over it with them, and go back to this whole idea,
especially because this was in the early seventies when the
women's movement was at its peak. And I said "No, women have come
a long way. Look at what they have accomplished.", and they said,
"No, they haven't accomplished anything." To them, the sexual
revolution- and they were not prudes- they were not interested
in morality, they were only interested in energy- so they said,
that for women to be liberated sexually, in a way enslaved them
even more, because suddenly they were feeding energetically not
just one male, but many males.
ABE: That's interesting.
FLORINDA D: So for them it was absurd, and whatever's happening
at the moment, he foresaw that in the seventies. He said they're
going to dive down on their noses. They're going to be weakened.
And they are. The few women I've talked to- I've given
certain lectures, and the books- and when I've talked about this,
it's very interesting that the women do agree. And I first
thought I would have a great deal of difficulty with this
subject, but especially women who have gone through the process
of having multiple lovers said they were exhausted, and they
don't know why.
ABE: So we are talking about something beyond the sexual.
FLORINDA D: Originally, beyond the the sexual aspect, the female,
the womb ensures that the woman is the one that's closest to
the spirit in this process of approaching knowledge as being-in-
dreaming. The man cones upward, and by the sheer definition of
the cone, it comes to a finite end. It's an energetic force. He
strives because he is not close to the spirit, or whatever we
want to call that great energetic force out there. According to
the sorcerers, the woman is exactly the opposite. The cone is
upside down. They have a direct link with it, because the womb
for the sorcerer is not just an organ of reproduction; it is an
organ for dreams, a second brain.
ABE: Or heart.
FLORINDA D: Or heart, and they do apprehend knowledge directly.
Yet we have never been allowed to define what knowledge is in our
society or in any society. And the women who do create or help to
formulate the body of knowledge, it has to be done in male terms.
Let's say a woman does research. If they do not abide by the
rules already established by the male consensus, they won't be
published. They can deviate slightly, but always within that
same matrix. It is not allowed for women to do anything else.
ABE: So the sorceress is removed from the hypnotism of all that.
FLORINDA D: Of the social, yes. It's very interesting that you
mention the idea of hypnotism, because Don Juan always said at
the time when psychology produced Freud, we were too passive. We
would have followed either Mesmer or Freud. We are mesmeric
beings. We never really developed that other path...
ABE: Yes. The path of energy.
FLORINDA D: ...and this would never have happened to us if Freud
wouldn't have had the upper hand.
ABE: Well, he's lost it now.
FLORINDA D: No, not really, because with all we do, who knows how
many generations it takes? Let say he has been discredited
intellectually, but our whole cultural baggage...We still talk in
those terms, even people who don't even know who Freud is. It's
part of our language, our culture.
ABE: Yes, I know. It's very frustrating, dealing with people who
approach the whole of reality from this hackneyed psychological
viewpoint.
FLORINDA D: Yes. And they don't even know where it comes from.
It's part of our cultural baggage.
ABE.: So the sorceress is freed from this condition.
FLORINDA D: Well, free in the sense that once you see what the
social order really is- it's an agreement- at least you are more
cautious in accepting that. People say, "Oh but look how
different life is from your grandmother's or mother's time." I
say, it's not. It's only different in degree. But nothing is dif-
ferent. If I would have lived my life the way it had been
established for me...yes, I was more educated, I had a better
chance. But that's all. I still would have ended up the same way
they had ended up. Married, frustrated, with children that by
now I probably would hate, or they would hate me.
ABE: I keep trying to get you now to cross that line, and talk
about what occurs now that you've realized that there is that
thralldom and you begin to free yourself from it. What is it that
opens up to perception?
FLORINDA D: Everything.
ABE: Everything. Good.
FLORINDA D: First of all, in your dreams you can see. For
instance, my work is done in dreaming. Not that I don't have to
do the work, but it comes in dreaming.
ABE: Now you're using the word dreaming in this very specific
sense, which is in this tradition. Can you talk about what
dreaming actually is?
FLORINDA D: In the traditional sense, when we fall asleep, as
soon as we start entering a dream, in that moment when we're half
awake and half asleep, and still conscious, you know from Casta-
neda's work that the assemblage point flutters, it starts
shifting, and what the sorcerer wants to do is that he wants to
use that natural (that happens to every one of us) shift to move
into other realms. And for that you need an exquisite energy.
Again it comes down to energy. We need an extraordinary amount of
energy because you want to be conscious of that moment and use it
without waking up.
ABE: Yes, a very high accomplishment.
FLORINDA D: For me, it's very easy to enter, to use it. The thing
is, I had no control at that time- although I have now- over when
it was going to happen. But I could center into this state of
what they call...I mean, the women were not interested in calling
it the 'second attention'; they were interested in calling it
'dreaming awake', because it is the same thing. And you'd reach
different levels, and what you do is that in that dreaming state
eventually you have the same control you have in your daily life.
And that's exactly what the sorcerers do. It's the same thing;
there's no difference anymore.
ABE: So you are now able to exist in another reality?
FLORINDA D: Well, I don't really know. You see, we don't have the
language to talk about it, except to talk about it in known
terms. So in a weird way, when I ask myself, "Do I exist in
another reality?", yes and no. It's not quite right to really
say that, because it is one reality.
There is no difference. Let's say there are different layers,
like an onion. But it's all the same. And it becomes very
bizarre. How am I going to talk about it? In metaphors? Our
metaphors are already so defined by what we already know.
ABE: Yes, the problem of language.
FLORINDA D: You see we don't have the language to really talk
about what then really happens when you are in the 'second
attention', or when we 'dream awake' . Bul it is as real as any
other reality. What is reality? It is, again, a consensus. And
you see, the thing is, we only want to agree about this
intellectually on one level. But it's more than just an
intellectual agreement. Let's say, it can be more. And for
that, again, we go back to that same thing- it all hinges on
energy.
ABE: That's right. But it also hinges on something called 'intent'.
FLORINDA D: Exactly. But in order to hook yourself to
'intent'...See, 'intent' is out there, it's this force- Don
Juan was not interested in religion- but, in a weird way maybe it
is exactly what we call God, the supreme being, the one force,
the spirit. You see, each culture knows what it is. And the thing
is, Don Juan, again, said you don't beg for it. You ask, and in
order to ask for it, you need energy. Because not only do you
need energy to hook yourself onto it, but you want to stay
hooked.
ABE: Ycs. So, this thing of intent, I mean it's an easy word to
say, but it's actually a quite complex operation.
FLORINDA D: Yes, exactly, very complex. For Don Juan and his
people, to talk about sorcery and witchcraft, with all those
negative connotations, they couldn't care less what we called the
practices. For them it was very very abstract. To them sorcery is
an abstraction, and it was this idea of expanding the limits of
perception. Because, for them, our choices in life are limited by
the social order. We have boundless options, but by accepting
these choices, of course, we set a limit to our limitless
possibilities.
ABE: And yet the human being seems...
FLORINDA D: ...constantly searching for that which has been...
ARE: ... lost...
FLORINDA D: ....lost or caged in by the social order. They put
blinds on us the moment we are born. Look at the way we coerce
the child to perceive the way we perceive.
ABE: Yes, the transmission of culture.
FLORINDA D: It's the most perfect example. Children truly
perceive more, obviously, a great deal more. But they have to
make some order out of that chaos, and we, of course, are the
perennial teachers of what is proper to perceive within our
group. And if they don't abide by that, my god, we shoot them
with drugs, or lock them up in therapy with psychiatrists.
ABE: There have been these traditions, which have existed for a
long, long time, and now in the last, say, twenty or thirty years
in particular, we start to hear about them. Why did Castaneda
write his books?
FLORINDA D.: Bccause it was a task; it was a sorceric task. That
Don Juan impressed upon him. Castaneda is the last of his
line. There is no one else. There's a group of Indians that we
work with. You see, Don Juan, in a weird way made almost a
mistake with Castaneda, when he first was put in touch, whatever
the design or power of the spirit was which put Don Juan face to
face with Castaneda. And he rallied right away. His circle of
apprentices- and I think it's in Tales of Power and The Second
Ring of Power, when he talks about the people in Oaxaca and the
Little Sisters and all those people. And then, years later, Don
Juan realizes that that's not the way Castaneda is going.
Castaneda was even more abstract than Don Juan was. His path
was a totally different path. And then when he gathered these
other people, because the people that are with Castaneda, we all
met Don Juan before we met Castaneda. Actually there was only
five of us before- four of us and Castaneda.
ABE: So, there was the sorcerer's task of writing the books. What
I'm trying to get at is, that this knowledge, just as knowl-
edge, becomes available now and is available to millions of
people in this form. What is the purpose of that?
FLORINDA D: Well, somebody has to get hooked by it. And people
do. For us, for our mentality as the westem ape, as Don Juan
always called us, you see, we have to be hooked first
intellectually, because obviously that's how our whole being
works. When I was in school, I was just a step away from going
into graduate school, and l had been in this world for two or
three years, and I said, "What am I doing by continuing school?
Why should I get a PhD.? It's absolutely redundant." And Don Juan
and all the women said it's absolutely not redundant, because in
order to reject something you have to understand it at its most
sophisticated. Because for you to say you're not interested in
philosophy, or you're not interested in anthropology, it's
meaningless. You can only say it after you have at least have
made some attempt to understand it. There's no reason to reject
it, and when plunging into this world of the 'second attention'
and 'dreaming awake', your mind has to be so well trained for you
to emerge again, to come out with the knowledge. Because if you
have not the brain or the mind to do it, you might as well just
go throw stones in the desert; because it's meaningless. And for
them it was extremely important that all of us are very well
trained. Everyone working within this little group has a degree.
There are historians, anthropologists, librarians.
ABE: So, the knowledge is made available to millions of people,
and people become hooked by it.
FLORINDA D: On one level, they will, yes.
ABE: And does that mean that the tradition has now begun to
proliferate itself in that way, also?
FLORINDA D: I don't know. If I go by Castaneda's mail, which he
doesn't read, I would say yes. But then, most of the stuff... I
mean I open letters from time to time, and they're mad, they're
crackpots most of them. Some of them are very, very serious
enquiries, and most of them are just truly cracked people.
(laughter) I mean they're cracked. Like, "I am the new Nagual."
or "I have been visited by you in dreams." I mean truly bizarre
things.
ABE: Well, there are many levels to that, as you know. But I
think that you women, you sorcerers there, and the whole Casta-
nedan reality has actually affected the mass collective
consciousness of, particularly, North America.
FLORINDA D: It is as you say; the work is out there. There's a
great many people reading it. And some people are truly very
serious about it.
ABE: And some of them are people who are non-Natives who have
become involved in Native spirituality. In a way, the work that
has come from your group has had a tremendous quickening effect
on Native spiritualities all over this continent, who have
found a track back into their traditions.
FLORINDA D.: You see, the whole point of Don Juan was that you
don't go back, because we are caught again in the myth and the
rituals. And for Don Juan, myth and rituals...myth in the sense
that yes, that you're part of this matrix, but not in the sense
that you're going to live it by invoking certain rituals, certain
powers that were, let's say, successful in the l9th century.
Because, he said, that's exactly the fallacy, because originally
a ritual is only to hook your attention. Once your attention is
hooked, you drop it. As the apes that we are, we of course are
very comforted by the ritual. People that truly transcend a
certain knowledge do it by exactly getting out of it. Yet the
rest of the mass is mesmerized by the ritual.
ABE: Seeing the truth of that and the fact that Castaneda
describes you as the new seers, how does that emerge?
FLORINDA D: The new seers? For the women it is very important,
this idea that the womb is not just an organ of reproduction.
In order to activate this, our intent has to be different. In
order to change our intent we go back again to energy. You see,
we don' t really know what it means to use the womb as an organ
for being, an organ of light, of intuition. For us, intuition
really is something that has already been defined. There is no
real intuition anymore, because we intuit with our brains. Don
Juan was interested in women, and people always ask, "Well, how
come there's always so many women? Do you have orgies? Is there
all kinds of stuff going on?" He said, "No, it's because the male
doesn't have the womb. He needs that magical 'womb power'
(laughter). " It's very important, you see.
ABE: Let me ask some technical questions there, if I may, on
behalf of my female readers. Does the womb have to be fully
functioning? I mean, if a woman had her tubes tied, would her
womb still work?
FLORINDA D: Yes, as long as she doesn't have a hysterectomy.
ABE: So long as the womb isn't removed...
FLORINDA D: ...if the womb is there, yes.
ABE: Then it can work.
FLORINDA D: Oh, absolutely. But the only thing is you need to
summon that intent. Like certain of the Goddess cults- "When God
Was A Woman"- and I was talking to some women a month ago, and
they were all in goddess groups. And every month they go into the
forest; they go someplace up to Sequoia and they groove in the
forest, in the trees, and oh, they have a great time hanging out,
debating, making rituals in the river. And I said, "But what the
fuck are you doing? You go back home, and then you are the same
assholes you were always. You open your legs whenever the master
says "I need you"" And they were shocked. I mean, they quite dis-
liked me, because they don't like to hear that. They said, "But
we felt so good for three days." And I said, "But what's the
point of feeling good for three days if your life continues the
same way?" What are we resting from? Because our life is going to
continue. Why don't we change? This idea of the rituals and even
going back to the Native beliefs, it didn't even work back then,
on one level. We were conquered.
ABE: So it's something that has to live now in a completely
authentic way.
FLORINDA D.: It has to be fluid, and the practitioner has to be
fluid to accept these changes. Even within us, things are
changing constantly, and we're so comfortable in a certain
groove, until something blasts us out of it. And we resent it,
but we have to be fluid. Only energy will give us that fluidity.
ABE: How do you accummulate energy?
FLORINDA D: To start off with, at least at the beginning, it was
Don Juan's idea that the best energy that we have is our sexual
energy. It's the only energy that we really have, and most of our
sexual energy is squandered.
ABE: Now, is it the same for men and women?
FLORINDA D: Of course it's the same for men and women. The only
thing is with women you see that energetically the woman takes on
the burden of feeding the man through their energetic fila-
ments. So, in that sense, it's worse for women. And for the man
too, because the man is hooked. Energetically he is hooked, no
matter what. And we have all kinds of psychological explanations.
People who we've had affairs with, and we can't get her out of
our minds, whatever. You see, we have this gray barrage of
description, but what really is going on is on a totally
different level that we don't want to talk about because it's not
part of our cultural kit.
ABE: So the primary way of accumulating energy, then, is to be celibate?
FLORINDA D: Well, it's very difficult, but it would be a good
try, at least to start out with.
ABE: If a woman was called to this way, if she got hooked, or
a man got hooked by this tradition, how would they know? How
would they know that they had been hooked by a tradition and
not just by some damn obsession?
FLORINDA D: For instance, Castaneda's books spell out very
clearly...if you read Castaneda's books carefully, they're al-
most manuals.
ABE: Yes, I know. And you read them again and again, and you
finally understand what they're talking about
FLORINDA D: You will know that something has changed, because you
will feel it energetically. And then there's this whole idea that
you can abandon this idea of the self. It's not that you're going
to laugh at others. But you find them despicable, and yet you
don't want to judge them, either, because who the hell are we to
judge anybody anyway? But you know that you are not part of it,
in the sense of the social agreement, and it's almost like a
phony part of you that is clinging to you, because you do have to
function in the world. You have to present a coherent idea Of the
self. You know, Don Juan always said if some truthful change has
taken place there is no way to be rejected, whatever it means to
be rejected. I don' t know. By intent coming in contact with us?
I don't really know. There have been two people that have come in
contact with us, and they are there. I mean, we're never together
anyway; each person lives on their own, and just from time to
time we do get together. Originally we had this little class
when Castaneda was here. He teaches certain very interesting
movements, basically to store up energy. So, these people have
been there for two years, and they're changing little by
little. And it's amazing. You see, if you let something go, some-
thing in you will know.
ABE: You have published this book, for instance, and I read it.
Now I don't have a physical image of you, but my feelings form a
sense of who you might be, or what you might be like. Now, does
that energy field affect you, now that there's this book out
there?
FLORINDA D: One of the things that Don Juan made very clear to
Castaneda...see, once the book is out, the book is out. It has
nothing to do with you anymore. For you to be wondering, living
in hope- is the book doing well or not doing well?- see, that's a
very, very difficult thing to divorce yourself from. Because
somehow you are involved. To truly let go is very very
difficult. I had two other books- The Shabono and The Witches
Dream- and it was very easy. With this one, because it's the first
time I talk about my involvement with Don Juan, it's very
difficult. And maybe because for the first time I'm talking more
openly-- with the other ones I did absolutely nothing. With this
one I am more involved. I have given lectures in bookstores to
groups of people, which is very interesting, because, as you
said before, there are a great many people who are truly very
seriously interested, but intellectually, again.
ABE: Oh, I think I know a know people who've gone a little beyond
intellect with it.
FLORINDA D: If we talk about it from a biological point of view,
is she enslaved? The sorcerers say yes, in the sense that she
always views herself through the male. She has no option. I used
to be excruciatingly mad about this whole discussion; I used to
go over and over it with them, and go back to this whole idea,
especially because this was in the early seventies when the
women's movement was at its peak. And I said "No, women have come
a long way. Look at what they have accomplished.", and they said,
"No, they haven't accomplished anything." To them, the sexual
revolution- and they were not prudes- they were not interested
in morality, they were only interested in energy- so they said,
that for women to be liberated sexually, in a way enslaved them
even more, because suddenly they were feeding energetically not
just one male, but many males.
ABE: That's interesting.
FLORINDA D: So for them it was absurd, and whatever's happening
at the moment, he foresaw that in the seventies. He said they're
going to dive down on their noses. They're going to be weakened.
And they are. The few women I've talked to- I've given
certain lectures, and the books- and when I've talked about this,
it's very interesting that the women do agree. And I first
thought I would have a great deal of difficulty with this
subject, but especially women who have gone through the process
of having multiple lovers said they were exhausted, and they
don't know why.
ABE: So we are talking about something beyond the sexual.
FLORINDA D: Originally, beyond the the sexual aspect, the female,
the womb ensures that the woman is the one that's closest to
the spirit in this process of approaching knowledge as being-in-
dreaming. The man cones upward, and by the sheer definition of
the cone, it comes to a finite end. It's an energetic force. He
strives because he is not close to the spirit, or whatever we
want to call that great energetic force out there. According to
the sorcerers, the woman is exactly the opposite. The cone is
upside down. They have a direct link with it, because the womb
for the sorcerer is not just an organ of reproduction; it is an
organ for dreams, a second brain.
ABE: Or heart.
FLORINDA D: Or heart, and they do apprehend knowledge directly.
Yet we have never been allowed to define what knowledge is in our
society or in any society. And the women who do create or help to
formulate the body of knowledge, it has to be done in male terms.
Let's say a woman does research. If they do not abide by the
rules already established by the male consensus, they won't be
published. They can deviate slightly, but always within that
same matrix. It is not allowed for women to do anything else.
ABE: So the sorceress is removed from the hypnotism of all that.
FLORINDA D: Of the social, yes. It's very interesting that you
mention the idea of hypnotism, because Don Juan always said at
the time when psychology produced Freud, we were too passive. We
would have followed either Mesmer or Freud. We are mesmeric
beings. We never really developed that other path...
ABE: Yes. The path of energy.
FLORINDA D: ...and this would never have happened to us if Freud
wouldn't have had the upper hand.
ABE: Well, he's lost it now.
FLORINDA D: No, not really, because with all we do, who knows how
many generations it takes? Let say he has been discredited
intellectually, but our whole cultural baggage...We still talk in
those terms, even people who don't even know who Freud is. It's
part of our language, our culture.
ABE: Yes, I know. It's very frustrating, dealing with people who
approach the whole of reality from this hackneyed psychological
viewpoint.
FLORINDA D: Yes. And they don't even know where it comes from.
It's part of our cultural baggage.
ABE.: So the sorceress is freed from this condition.
FLORINDA D: Well, free in the sense that once you see what the
social order really is- it's an agreement- at least you are more
cautious in accepting that. People say, "Oh but look how
different life is from your grandmother's or mother's time." I
say, it's not. It's only different in degree. But nothing is dif-
ferent. If I would have lived my life the way it had been
established for me...yes, I was more educated, I had a better
chance. But that's all. I still would have ended up the same way
they had ended up. Married, frustrated, with children that by
now I probably would hate, or they would hate me.
ABE: I keep trying to get you now to cross that line, and talk
about what occurs now that you've realized that there is that
thralldom and you begin to free yourself from it. What is it that
opens up to perception?
FLORINDA D: Everything.
ABE: Everything. Good.
FLORINDA D: First of all, in your dreams you can see. For
instance, my work is done in dreaming. Not that I don't have to
do the work, but it comes in dreaming.
ABE: Now you're using the word dreaming in this very specific
sense, which is in this tradition. Can you talk about what
dreaming actually is?
FLORINDA D: In the traditional sense, when we fall asleep, as
soon as we start entering a dream, in that moment when we're half
awake and half asleep, and still conscious, you know from Casta-
neda's work that the assemblage point flutters, it starts
shifting, and what the sorcerer wants to do is that he wants to
use that natural (that happens to every one of us) shift to move
into other realms. And for that you need an exquisite energy.
Again it comes down to energy. We need an extraordinary amount of
energy because you want to be conscious of that moment and use it
without waking up.
ABE: Yes, a very high accomplishment.
FLORINDA D: For me, it's very easy to enter, to use it. The thing
is, I had no control at that time- although I have now- over when
it was going to happen. But I could center into this state of
what they call...I mean, the women were not interested in calling
it the 'second attention'; they were interested in calling it
'dreaming awake', because it is the same thing. And you'd reach
different levels, and what you do is that in that dreaming state
eventually you have the same control you have in your daily life.
And that's exactly what the sorcerers do. It's the same thing;
there's no difference anymore.
ABE: So you are now able to exist in another reality?
FLORINDA D: Well, I don't really know. You see, we don't have the
language to talk about it, except to talk about it in known
terms. So in a weird way, when I ask myself, "Do I exist in
another reality?", yes and no. It's not quite right to really
say that, because it is one reality.
There is no difference. Let's say there are different layers,
like an onion. But it's all the same. And it becomes very
bizarre. How am I going to talk about it? In metaphors? Our
metaphors are already so defined by what we already know.
ABE: Yes, the problem of language.
FLORINDA D: You see we don't have the language to really talk
about what then really happens when you are in the 'second
attention', or when we 'dream awake' . Bul it is as real as any
other reality. What is reality? It is, again, a consensus. And
you see, the thing is, we only want to agree about this
intellectually on one level. But it's more than just an
intellectual agreement. Let's say, it can be more. And for
that, again, we go back to that same thing- it all hinges on
energy.
ABE: That's right. But it also hinges on something called 'intent'.
FLORINDA D: Exactly. But in order to hook yourself to
'intent'...See, 'intent' is out there, it's this force- Don
Juan was not interested in religion- but, in a weird way maybe it
is exactly what we call God, the supreme being, the one force,
the spirit. You see, each culture knows what it is. And the thing
is, Don Juan, again, said you don't beg for it. You ask, and in
order to ask for it, you need energy. Because not only do you
need energy to hook yourself onto it, but you want to stay
hooked.
ABE: Ycs. So, this thing of intent, I mean it's an easy word to
say, but it's actually a quite complex operation.
FLORINDA D: Yes, exactly, very complex. For Don Juan and his
people, to talk about sorcery and witchcraft, with all those
negative connotations, they couldn't care less what we called the
practices. For them it was very very abstract. To them sorcery is
an abstraction, and it was this idea of expanding the limits of
perception. Because, for them, our choices in life are limited by
the social order. We have boundless options, but by accepting
these choices, of course, we set a limit to our limitless
possibilities.
ABE: And yet the human being seems...
FLORINDA D: ...constantly searching for that which has been...
ARE: ... lost...
FLORINDA D: ....lost or caged in by the social order. They put
blinds on us the moment we are born. Look at the way we coerce
the child to perceive the way we perceive.
ABE: Yes, the transmission of culture.
FLORINDA D: It's the most perfect example. Children truly
perceive more, obviously, a great deal more. But they have to
make some order out of that chaos, and we, of course, are the
perennial teachers of what is proper to perceive within our
group. And if they don't abide by that, my god, we shoot them
with drugs, or lock them up in therapy with psychiatrists.
ABE: There have been these traditions, which have existed for a
long, long time, and now in the last, say, twenty or thirty years
in particular, we start to hear about them. Why did Castaneda
write his books?
FLORINDA D.: Bccause it was a task; it was a sorceric task. That
Don Juan impressed upon him. Castaneda is the last of his
line. There is no one else. There's a group of Indians that we
work with. You see, Don Juan, in a weird way made almost a
mistake with Castaneda, when he first was put in touch, whatever
the design or power of the spirit was which put Don Juan face to
face with Castaneda. And he rallied right away. His circle of
apprentices- and I think it's in Tales of Power and The Second
Ring of Power, when he talks about the people in Oaxaca and the
Little Sisters and all those people. And then, years later, Don
Juan realizes that that's not the way Castaneda is going.
Castaneda was even more abstract than Don Juan was. His path
was a totally different path. And then when he gathered these
other people, because the people that are with Castaneda, we all
met Don Juan before we met Castaneda. Actually there was only
five of us before- four of us and Castaneda.
ABE: So, there was the sorcerer's task of writing the books. What
I'm trying to get at is, that this knowledge, just as knowl-
edge, becomes available now and is available to millions of
people in this form. What is the purpose of that?
FLORINDA D: Well, somebody has to get hooked by it. And people
do. For us, for our mentality as the westem ape, as Don Juan
always called us, you see, we have to be hooked first
intellectually, because obviously that's how our whole being
works. When I was in school, I was just a step away from going
into graduate school, and l had been in this world for two or
three years, and I said, "What am I doing by continuing school?
Why should I get a PhD.? It's absolutely redundant." And Don Juan
and all the women said it's absolutely not redundant, because in
order to reject something you have to understand it at its most
sophisticated. Because for you to say you're not interested in
philosophy, or you're not interested in anthropology, it's
meaningless. You can only say it after you have at least have
made some attempt to understand it. There's no reason to reject
it, and when plunging into this world of the 'second attention'
and 'dreaming awake', your mind has to be so well trained for you
to emerge again, to come out with the knowledge. Because if you
have not the brain or the mind to do it, you might as well just
go throw stones in the desert; because it's meaningless. And for
them it was extremely important that all of us are very well
trained. Everyone working within this little group has a degree.
There are historians, anthropologists, librarians.
ABE: So, the knowledge is made available to millions of people,
and people become hooked by it.
FLORINDA D: On one level, they will, yes.
ABE: And does that mean that the tradition has now begun to
proliferate itself in that way, also?
FLORINDA D: I don't know. If I go by Castaneda's mail, which he
doesn't read, I would say yes. But then, most of the stuff... I
mean I open letters from time to time, and they're mad, they're
crackpots most of them. Some of them are very, very serious
enquiries, and most of them are just truly cracked people.
(laughter) I mean they're cracked. Like, "I am the new Nagual."
or "I have been visited by you in dreams." I mean truly bizarre
things.
ABE: Well, there are many levels to that, as you know. But I
think that you women, you sorcerers there, and the whole Casta-
nedan reality has actually affected the mass collective
consciousness of, particularly, North America.
FLORINDA D: It is as you say; the work is out there. There's a
great many people reading it. And some people are truly very
serious about it.
ABE: And some of them are people who are non-Natives who have
become involved in Native spirituality. In a way, the work that
has come from your group has had a tremendous quickening effect
on Native spiritualities all over this continent, who have
found a track back into their traditions.
FLORINDA D.: You see, the whole point of Don Juan was that you
don't go back, because we are caught again in the myth and the
rituals. And for Don Juan, myth and rituals...myth in the sense
that yes, that you're part of this matrix, but not in the sense
that you're going to live it by invoking certain rituals, certain
powers that were, let's say, successful in the l9th century.
Because, he said, that's exactly the fallacy, because originally
a ritual is only to hook your attention. Once your attention is
hooked, you drop it. As the apes that we are, we of course are
very comforted by the ritual. People that truly transcend a
certain knowledge do it by exactly getting out of it. Yet the
rest of the mass is mesmerized by the ritual.
ABE: Seeing the truth of that and the fact that Castaneda
describes you as the new seers, how does that emerge?
FLORINDA D: The new seers? For the women it is very important,
this idea that the womb is not just an organ of reproduction.
In order to activate this, our intent has to be different. In
order to change our intent we go back again to energy. You see,
we don' t really know what it means to use the womb as an organ
for being, an organ of light, of intuition. For us, intuition
really is something that has already been defined. There is no
real intuition anymore, because we intuit with our brains. Don
Juan was interested in women, and people always ask, "Well, how
come there's always so many women? Do you have orgies? Is there
all kinds of stuff going on?" He said, "No, it's because the male
doesn't have the womb. He needs that magical 'womb power'
(laughter). " It's very important, you see.
ABE: Let me ask some technical questions there, if I may, on
behalf of my female readers. Does the womb have to be fully
functioning? I mean, if a woman had her tubes tied, would her
womb still work?
FLORINDA D: Yes, as long as she doesn't have a hysterectomy.
ABE: So long as the womb isn't removed...
FLORINDA D: ...if the womb is there, yes.
ABE: Then it can work.
FLORINDA D: Oh, absolutely. But the only thing is you need to
summon that intent. Like certain of the Goddess cults- "When God
Was A Woman"- and I was talking to some women a month ago, and
they were all in goddess groups. And every month they go into the
forest; they go someplace up to Sequoia and they groove in the
forest, in the trees, and oh, they have a great time hanging out,
debating, making rituals in the river. And I said, "But what the
fuck are you doing? You go back home, and then you are the same
assholes you were always. You open your legs whenever the master
says "I need you"" And they were shocked. I mean, they quite dis-
liked me, because they don't like to hear that. They said, "But
we felt so good for three days." And I said, "But what's the
point of feeling good for three days if your life continues the
same way?" What are we resting from? Because our life is going to
continue. Why don't we change? This idea of the rituals and even
going back to the Native beliefs, it didn't even work back then,
on one level. We were conquered.
ABE: So it's something that has to live now in a completely
authentic way.
FLORINDA D.: It has to be fluid, and the practitioner has to be
fluid to accept these changes. Even within us, things are
changing constantly, and we're so comfortable in a certain
groove, until something blasts us out of it. And we resent it,
but we have to be fluid. Only energy will give us that fluidity.
ABE: How do you accummulate energy?
FLORINDA D: To start off with, at least at the beginning, it was
Don Juan's idea that the best energy that we have is our sexual
energy. It's the only energy that we really have, and most of our
sexual energy is squandered.
ABE: Now, is it the same for men and women?
FLORINDA D: Of course it's the same for men and women. The only
thing is with women you see that energetically the woman takes on
the burden of feeding the man through their energetic fila-
ments. So, in that sense, it's worse for women. And for the man
too, because the man is hooked. Energetically he is hooked, no
matter what. And we have all kinds of psychological explanations.
People who we've had affairs with, and we can't get her out of
our minds, whatever. You see, we have this gray barrage of
description, but what really is going on is on a totally
different level that we don't want to talk about because it's not
part of our cultural kit.
ABE: So the primary way of accumulating energy, then, is to be celibate?
FLORINDA D: Well, it's very difficult, but it would be a good
try, at least to start out with.
ABE: If a woman was called to this way, if she got hooked, or
a man got hooked by this tradition, how would they know? How
would they know that they had been hooked by a tradition and
not just by some damn obsession?
FLORINDA D: For instance, Castaneda's books spell out very
clearly...if you read Castaneda's books carefully, they're al-
most manuals.
ABE: Yes, I know. And you read them again and again, and you
finally understand what they're talking about
FLORINDA D: You will know that something has changed, because you
will feel it energetically. And then there's this whole idea that
you can abandon this idea of the self. It's not that you're going
to laugh at others. But you find them despicable, and yet you
don't want to judge them, either, because who the hell are we to
judge anybody anyway? But you know that you are not part of it,
in the sense of the social agreement, and it's almost like a
phony part of you that is clinging to you, because you do have to
function in the world. You have to present a coherent idea Of the
self. You know, Don Juan always said if some truthful change has
taken place there is no way to be rejected, whatever it means to
be rejected. I don' t know. By intent coming in contact with us?
I don't really know. There have been two people that have come in
contact with us, and they are there. I mean, we're never together
anyway; each person lives on their own, and just from time to
time we do get together. Originally we had this little class
when Castaneda was here. He teaches certain very interesting
movements, basically to store up energy. So, these people have
been there for two years, and they're changing little by
little. And it's amazing. You see, if you let something go, some-
thing in you will know.
ABE: You have published this book, for instance, and I read it.
Now I don't have a physical image of you, but my feelings form a
sense of who you might be, or what you might be like. Now, does
that energy field affect you, now that there's this book out
there?
FLORINDA D: One of the things that Don Juan made very clear to
Castaneda...see, once the book is out, the book is out. It has
nothing to do with you anymore. For you to be wondering, living
in hope- is the book doing well or not doing well?- see, that's a
very, very difficult thing to divorce yourself from. Because
somehow you are involved. To truly let go is very very
difficult. I had two other books- The Shabono and The Witches
Dream- and it was very easy. With this one, because it's the first
time I talk about my involvement with Don Juan, it's very
difficult. And maybe because for the first time I'm talking more
openly-- with the other ones I did absolutely nothing. With this
one I am more involved. I have given lectures in bookstores to
groups of people, which is very interesting, because, as you
said before, there are a great many people who are truly very
seriously interested, but intellectually, again.
ABE: Oh, I think I know a know people who've gone a little beyond
intellect with it.
продолжение:
FLORINDA D: If we talk about it from a biological point of view,
is she enslaved? The sorcerers say yes, in the sense that she
always views herself through the male. She has no option. I used
to be excruciatingly mad about this whole discussion; I used to
go over and over it with them, and go back to this whole idea,
especially because this was in the early seventies when the
women's movement was at its peak. And I said "No, women have come
a long way. Look at what they have accomplished.", and they said,
"No, they haven't accomplished anything." To them, the sexual
revolution- and they were not prudes- they were not interested
in morality, they were only interested in energy- so they said,
that for women to be liberated sexually, in a way enslaved them
even more, because suddenly they were feeding energetically not
just one male, but many males.
ABE: That's interesting.
FLORINDA D: So for them it was absurd, and whatever's happening
at the moment, he foresaw that in the seventies. He said they're
going to dive down on their noses. They're going to be weakened.
And they are. The few women I've talked to- I've given
certain lectures, and the books- and when I've talked about this,
it's very interesting that the women do agree. And I first
thought I would have a great deal of difficulty with this
subject, but especially women who have gone through the process
of having multiple lovers said they were exhausted, and they
don't know why.
ABE: So we are talking about something beyond the sexual.
FLORINDA D: Originally, beyond the the sexual aspect, the female,
the womb ensures that the woman is the one that's closest to
the spirit in this process of approaching knowledge as being-in-
dreaming. The man cones upward, and by the sheer definition of
the cone, it comes to a finite end. It's an energetic force. He
strives because he is not close to the spirit, or whatever we
want to call that great energetic force out there. According to
the sorcerers, the woman is exactly the opposite. The cone is
upside down. They have a direct link with it, because the womb
for the sorcerer is not just an organ of reproduction; it is an
organ for dreams, a second brain.
ABE: Or heart.
FLORINDA D: Or heart, and they do apprehend knowledge directly.
Yet we have never been allowed to define what knowledge is in our
society or in any society. And the women who do create or help to
formulate the body of knowledge, it has to be done in male terms.
Let's say a woman does research. If they do not abide by the
rules already established by the male consensus, they won't be
published. They can deviate slightly, but always within that
same matrix. It is not allowed for women to do anything else.
ABE: So the sorceress is removed from the hypnotism of all that.
FLORINDA D: Of the social, yes. It's very interesting that you
mention the idea of hypnotism, because Don Juan always said at
the time when psychology produced Freud, we were too passive. We
would have followed either Mesmer or Freud. We are mesmeric
beings. We never really developed that other path...
ABE: Yes. The path of energy.
FLORINDA D: ...and this would never have happened to us if Freud
wouldn't have had the upper hand.
ABE: Well, he's lost it now.
FLORINDA D: No, not really, because with all we do, who knows how
many generations it takes? Let say he has been discredited
intellectually, but our whole cultural baggage...We still talk in
those terms, even people who don't even know who Freud is. It's
part of our language, our culture.
ABE: Yes, I know. It's very frustrating, dealing with people who
approach the whole of reality from this hackneyed psychological
viewpoint.
FLORINDA D: Yes. And they don't even know where it comes from.
It's part of our cultural baggage.
ABE.: So the sorceress is freed from this condition.
FLORINDA D: Well, free in the sense that once you see what the
social order really is- it's an agreement- at least you are more
cautious in accepting that. People say, "Oh but look how
different life is from your grandmother's or mother's time." I
say, it's not. It's only different in degree. But nothing is dif-
ferent. If I would have lived my life the way it had been
established for me...yes, I was more educated, I had a better
chance. But that's all. I still would have ended up the same way
they had ended up. Married, frustrated, with children that by
now I probably would hate, or they would hate me.
ABE: I keep trying to get you now to cross that line, and talk
about what occurs now that you've realized that there is that
thralldom and you begin to free yourself from it. What is it that
opens up to perception?
FLORINDA D: Everything.
ABE: Everything. Good.
FLORINDA D: First of all, in your dreams you can see. For
instance, my work is done in dreaming. Not that I don't have to
do the work, but it comes in dreaming.
ABE: Now you're using the word dreaming in this very specific
sense, which is in this tradition. Can you talk about what
dreaming actually is?
FLORINDA D: In the traditional sense, when we fall asleep, as
soon as we start entering a dream, in that moment when we're half
awake and half asleep, and still conscious, you know from Casta-
neda's work that the assemblage point flutters, it starts
shifting, and what the sorcerer wants to do is that he wants to
use that natural (that happens to every one of us) shift to move
into other realms. And for that you need an exquisite energy.
Again it comes down to energy. We need an extraordinary amount of
energy because you want to be conscious of that moment and use it
without waking up.
ABE: Yes, a very high accomplishment.
FLORINDA D: For me, it's very easy to enter, to use it. The thing
is, I had no control at that time- although I have now- over when
it was going to happen. But I could center into this state of
what they call...I mean, the women were not interested in calling
it the 'second attention'; they were interested in calling it
'dreaming awake', because it is the same thing. And you'd reach
different levels, and what you do is that in that dreaming state
eventually you have the same control you have in your daily life.
And that's exactly what the sorcerers do. It's the same thing;
there's no difference anymore.
ABE: So you are now able to exist in another reality?
FLORINDA D: Well, I don't really know. You see, we don't have the
language to talk about it, except to talk about it in known
terms. So in a weird way, when I ask myself, "Do I exist in
another reality?", yes and no. It's not quite right to really
say that, because it is one reality.
There is no difference. Let's say there are different layers,
like an onion. But it's all the same. And it becomes very
bizarre. How am I going to talk about it? In metaphors? Our
metaphors are already so defined by what we already know.
ABE: Yes, the problem of language.
FLORINDA D: You see we don't have the language to really talk
about what then really happens when you are in the 'second
attention', or when we 'dream awake' . Bul it is as real as any
other reality. What is reality? It is, again, a consensus. And
you see, the thing is, we only want to agree about this
intellectually on one level. But it's more than just an
intellectual agreement. Let's say, it can be more. And for
that, again, we go back to that same thing- it all hinges on
energy.
ABE: That's right. But it also hinges on something called 'intent'.
FLORINDA D: Exactly. But in order to hook yourself to
'intent'...See, 'intent' is out there, it's this force- Don
Juan was not interested in religion- but, in a weird way maybe it
is exactly what we call God, the supreme being, the one force,
the spirit. You see, each culture knows what it is. And the thing
is, Don Juan, again, said you don't beg for it. You ask, and in
order to ask for it, you need energy. Because not only do you
need energy to hook yourself onto it, but you want to stay
hooked.
ABE: Ycs. So, this thing of intent, I mean it's an easy word to
say, but it's actually a quite complex operation.
FLORINDA D: Yes, exactly, very complex. For Don Juan and his
people, to talk about sorcery and witchcraft, with all those
negative connotations, they couldn't care less what we called the
practices. For them it was very very abstract. To them sorcery is
an abstraction, and it was this idea of expanding the limits of
perception. Because, for them, our choices in life are limited by
the social order. We have boundless options, but by accepting
these choices, of course, we set a limit to our limitless
possibilities.
ABE: And yet the human being seems...
FLORINDA D: ...constantly searching for that which has been...
ARE: ... lost...
FLORINDA D: ....lost or caged in by the social order. They put
blinds on us the moment we are born. Look at the way we coerce
the child to perceive the way we perceive.
ABE: Yes, the transmission of culture.
FLORINDA D: It's the most perfect example. Children truly
perceive more, obviously, a great deal more. But they have to
make some order out of that chaos, and we, of course, are the
perennial teachers of what is proper to perceive within our
group. And if they don't abide by that, my god, we shoot them
with drugs, or lock them up in therapy with psychiatrists.
ABE: There have been these traditions, which have existed for a
long, long time, and now in the last, say, twenty or thirty years
in particular, we start to hear about them. Why did Castaneda
write his books?
FLORINDA D.: Bccause it was a task; it was a sorceric task. That
Don Juan impressed upon him. Castaneda is the last of his
line. There is no one else. There's a group of Indians that we
work with. You see, Don Juan, in a weird way made almost a
mistake with Castaneda, when he first was put in touch, whatever
the design or power of the spirit was which put Don Juan face to
face with Castaneda. And he rallied right away. His circle of
apprentices- and I think it's in Tales of Power and The Second
Ring of Power, when he talks about the people in Oaxaca and the
Little Sisters and all those people. And then, years later, Don
Juan realizes that that's not the way Castaneda is going.
Castaneda was even more abstract than Don Juan was. His path
was a totally different path. And then when he gathered these
other people, because the people that are with Castaneda, we all
met Don Juan before we met Castaneda. Actually there was only
five of us before- four of us and Castaneda.
ABE: So, there was the sorcerer's task of writing the books. What
I'm trying to get at is, that this knowledge, just as knowl-
edge, becomes available now and is available to millions of
people in this form. What is the purpose of that?
FLORINDA D: Well, somebody has to get hooked by it. And people
do. For us, for our mentality as the westem ape, as Don Juan
always called us, you see, we have to be hooked first
intellectually, because obviously that's how our whole being
works. When I was in school, I was just a step away from going
into graduate school, and l had been in this world for two or
three years, and I said, "What am I doing by continuing school?
Why should I get a PhD.? It's absolutely redundant." And Don Juan
and all the women said it's absolutely not redundant, because in
order to reject something you have to understand it at its most
sophisticated. Because for you to say you're not interested in
philosophy, or you're not interested in anthropology, it's
meaningless. You can only say it after you have at least have
made some attempt to understand it. There's no reason to reject
it, and when plunging into this world of the 'second attention'
and 'dreaming awake', your mind has to be so well trained for you
to emerge again, to come out with the knowledge. Because if you
have not the brain or the mind to do it, you might as well just
go throw stones in the desert; because it's meaningless. And for
them it was extremely important that all of us are very well
trained. Everyone working within this little group has a degree.
There are historians, anthropologists, librarians.
ABE: So, the knowledge is made available to millions of people,
and people become hooked by it.
FLORINDA D: On one level, they will, yes.
ABE: And does that mean that the tradition has now begun to
proliferate itself in that way, also?
FLORINDA D: I don't know. If I go by Castaneda's mail, which he
doesn't read, I would say yes. But then, most of the stuff... I
mean I open letters from time to time, and they're mad, they're
crackpots most of them. Some of them are very, very serious
enquiries, and most of them are just truly cracked people.
(laughter) I mean they're cracked. Like, "I am the new Nagual."
or "I have been visited by you in dreams." I mean truly bizarre
things.
ABE: Well, there are many levels to that, as you know. But I
think that you women, you sorcerers there, and the whole Casta-
nedan reality has actually affected the mass collective
consciousness of, particularly, North America.
FLORINDA D: It is as you say; the work is out there. There's a
great many people reading it. And some people are truly very
serious about it.
ABE: And some of them are people who are non-Natives who have
become involved in Native spirituality. In a way, the work that
has come from your group has had a tremendous quickening effect
on Native spiritualities all over this continent, who have
found a track back into their traditions.
FLORINDA D.: You see, the whole point of Don Juan was that you
don't go back, because we are caught again in the myth and the
rituals. And for Don Juan, myth and rituals...myth in the sense
that yes, that you're part of this matrix, but not in the sense
that you're going to live it by invoking certain rituals, certain
powers that were, let's say, successful in the l9th century.
Because, he said, that's exactly the fallacy, because originally
a ritual is only to hook your attention. Once your attention is
hooked, you drop it. As the apes that we are, we of course are
very comforted by the ritual. People that truly transcend a
certain knowledge do it by exactly getting out of it. Yet the
rest of the mass is mesmerized by the ritual.
ABE: Seeing the truth of that and the fact that Castaneda
describes you as the new seers, how does that emerge?
FLORINDA D: The new seers? For the women it is very important,
this idea that the womb is not just an organ of reproduction.
In order to activate this, our intent has to be different. In
order to change our intent we go back again to energy. You see,
we don' t really know what it means to use the womb as an organ
for being, an organ of light, of intuition. For us, intuition
really is something that has already been defined. There is no
real intuition anymore, because we intuit with our brains. Don
Juan was interested in women, and people always ask, "Well, how
come there's always so many women? Do you have orgies? Is there
all kinds of stuff going on?" He said, "No, it's because the male
doesn't have the womb. He needs that magical 'womb power'
(laughter). " It's very important, you see.
ABE: Let me ask some technical questions there, if I may, on
behalf of my female readers. Does the womb have to be fully
functioning? I mean, if a woman had her tubes tied, would her
womb still work?
FLORINDA D: Yes, as long as she doesn't have a hysterectomy.
ABE: So long as the womb isn't removed...
FLORINDA D: ...if the womb is there, yes.
ABE: Then it can work.
FLORINDA D: Oh, absolutely. But the only thing is you need to
summon that intent. Like certain of the Goddess cults- "When God
Was A Woman"- and I was talking to some women a month ago, and
they were all in goddess groups. And every month they go into the
forest; they go someplace up to Sequoia and they groove in the
forest, in the trees, and oh, they have a great time hanging out,
debating, making rituals in the river. And I said, "But what the
fuck are you doing? You go back home, and then you are the same
assholes you were always. You open your legs whenever the master
says "I need you"" And they were shocked. I mean, they quite dis-
liked me, because they don't like to hear that. They said, "But
we felt so good for three days." And I said, "But what's the
point of feeling good for three days if your life continues the
same way?" What are we resting from? Because our life is going to
continue. Why don't we change? This idea of the rituals and even
going back to the Native beliefs, it didn't even work back then,
on one level. We were conquered.
ABE: So it's something that has to live now in a completely
authentic way.
FLORINDA D.: It has to be fluid, and the practitioner has to be
fluid to accept these changes. Even within us, things are
changing constantly, and we're so comfortable in a certain
groove, until something blasts us out of it. And we resent it,
but we have to be fluid. Only energy will give us that fluidity.
ABE: How do you accummulate energy?
FLORINDA D: To start off with, at least at the beginning, it was
Don Juan's idea that the best energy that we have is our sexual
energy. It's the only energy that we really have, and most of our
sexual energy is squandered.
ABE: Now, is it the same for men and women?
FLORINDA D: Of course it's the same for men and women. The only
thing is with women you see that energetically the woman takes on
the burden of feeding the man through their energetic fila-
ments. So, in that sense, it's worse for women. And for the man
too, because the man is hooked. Energetically he is hooked, no
matter what. And we have all kinds of psychological explanations.
People who we've had affairs with, and we can't get her out of
our minds, whatever. You see, we have this gray barrage of
description, but what really is going on is on a totally
different level that we don't want to talk about because it's not
part of our cultural kit.
ABE: So the primary way of accumulating energy, then, is to be celibate?
FLORINDA D: Well, it's very difficult, but it would be a good
try, at least to start out with.
ABE: If a woman was called to this way, if she got hooked, or
a man got hooked by this tradition, how would they know? How
would they know that they had been hooked by a tradition and
not just by some damn obsession?
FLORINDA D: For instance, Castaneda's books spell out very
clearly...if you read Castaneda's books carefully, they're al-
most manuals.
ABE: Yes, I know. And you read them again and again, and you
finally understand what they're talking about
FLORINDA D: You will know that something has changed, because you
will feel it energetically. And then there's this whole idea that
you can abandon this idea of the self. It's not that you're going
to laugh at others. But you find them despicable, and yet you
don't want to judge them, either, because who the hell are we to
judge anybody anyway? But you know that you are not part of it,
in the sense of the social agreement, and it's almost like a
phony part of you that is clinging to you, because you do have to
function in the world. You have to present a coherent idea Of the
self. You know, Don Juan always said if some truthful change has
taken place there is no way to be rejected, whatever it means to
be rejected. I don' t know. By intent coming in contact with us?
I don't really know. There have been two people that have come in
contact with us, and they are there. I mean, we're never together
anyway; each person lives on their own, and just from time to
time we do get together. Originally we had this little class
when Castaneda was here. He teaches certain very interesting
movements, basically to store up energy. So, these people have
been there for two years, and they're changing little by
little. And it's amazing. You see, if you let something go, some-
thing in you will know.
ABE: You have published this book, for instance, and I read it.
Now I don't have a physical image of you, but my feelings form a
sense of who you might be, or what you might be like. Now, does
that energy field affect you, now that there's this book out
there?
FLORINDA D: One of the things that Don Juan made very clear to
Castaneda...see, once the book is out, the book is out. It has
nothing to do with you anymore. For you to be wondering, living
in hope- is the book doing well or not doing well?- see, that's a
very, very difficult thing to divorce yourself from. Because
somehow you are involved. To truly let go is very very
difficult. I had two other books- The Shabono and The Witches
Dream- and it was very easy. With this one, because it's the first
time I talk about my involvement with Don Juan, it's very
difficult. And maybe because for the first time I'm talking more
openly-- with the other ones I did absolutely nothing. With this
one I am more involved. I have given lectures in bookstores to
groups of people, which is very interesting, because, as you
said before, there are a great many people who are truly very
seriously interested, but intellectually, again.
ABE: Oh, I think I know a know people who've gone a little beyond
intellect with it.
FLORINDA D: If we talk about it from a biological point of view,
is she enslaved? The sorcerers say yes, in the sense that she
always views herself through the male. She has no option. I used
to be excruciatingly mad about this whole discussion; I used to
go over and over it with them, and go back to this whole idea,
especially because this was in the early seventies when the
women's movement was at its peak. And I said "No, women have come
a long way. Look at what they have accomplished.", and they said,
"No, they haven't accomplished anything." To them, the sexual
revolution- and they were not prudes- they were not interested
in morality, they were only interested in energy- so they said,
that for women to be liberated sexually, in a way enslaved them
even more, because suddenly they were feeding energetically not
just one male, but many males.
ABE: That's interesting.
FLORINDA D: So for them it was absurd, and whatever's happening
at the moment, he foresaw that in the seventies. He said they're
going to dive down on their noses. They're going to be weakened.
And they are. The few women I've talked to- I've given
certain lectures, and the books- and when I've talked about this,
it's very interesting that the women do agree. And I first
thought I would have a great deal of difficulty with this
subject, but especially women who have gone through the process
of having multiple lovers said they were exhausted, and they
don't know why.
ABE: So we are talking about something beyond the sexual.
FLORINDA D: Originally, beyond the the sexual aspect, the female,
the womb ensures that the woman is the one that's closest to
the spirit in this process of approaching knowledge as being-in-
dreaming. The man cones upward, and by the sheer definition of
the cone, it comes to a finite end. It's an energetic force. He
strives because he is not close to the spirit, or whatever we
want to call that great energetic force out there. According to
the sorcerers, the woman is exactly the opposite. The cone is
upside down. They have a direct link with it, because the womb
for the sorcerer is not just an organ of reproduction; it is an
organ for dreams, a second brain.
ABE: Or heart.
FLORINDA D: Or heart, and they do apprehend knowledge directly.
Yet we have never been allowed to define what knowledge is in our
society or in any society. And the women who do create or help to
formulate the body of knowledge, it has to be done in male terms.
Let's say a woman does research. If they do not abide by the
rules already established by the male consensus, they won't be
published. They can deviate slightly, but always within that
same matrix. It is not allowed for women to do anything else.
ABE: So the sorceress is removed from the hypnotism of all that.
FLORINDA D: Of the social, yes. It's very interesting that you
mention the idea of hypnotism, because Don Juan always said at
the time when psychology produced Freud, we were too passive. We
would have followed either Mesmer or Freud. We are mesmeric
beings. We never really developed that other path...
ABE: Yes. The path of energy.
FLORINDA D: ...and this would never have happened to us if Freud
wouldn't have had the upper hand.
ABE: Well, he's lost it now.
FLORINDA D: No, not really, because with all we do, who knows how
many generations it takes? Let say he has been discredited
intellectually, but our whole cultural baggage...We still talk in
those terms, even people who don't even know who Freud is. It's
part of our language, our culture.
ABE: Yes, I know. It's very frustrating, dealing with people who
approach the whole of reality from this hackneyed psychological
viewpoint.
FLORINDA D: Yes. And they don't even know where it comes from.
It's part of our cultural baggage.
ABE.: So the sorceress is freed from this condition.
FLORINDA D: Well, free in the sense that once you see what the
social order really is- it's an agreement- at least you are more
cautious in accepting that. People say, "Oh but look how
different life is from your grandmother's or mother's time." I
say, it's not. It's only different in degree. But nothing is dif-
ferent. If I would have lived my life the way it had been
established for me...yes, I was more educated, I had a better
chance. But that's all. I still would have ended up the same way
they had ended up. Married, frustrated, with children that by
now I probably would hate, or they would hate me.
ABE: I keep trying to get you now to cross that line, and talk
about what occurs now that you've realized that there is that
thralldom and you begin to free yourself from it. What is it that
opens up to perception?
FLORINDA D: Everything.
ABE: Everything. Good.
FLORINDA D: First of all, in your dreams you can see. For
instance, my work is done in dreaming. Not that I don't have to
do the work, but it comes in dreaming.
ABE: Now you're using the word dreaming in this very specific
sense, which is in this tradition. Can you talk about what
dreaming actually is?
FLORINDA D: In the traditional sense, when we fall asleep, as
soon as we start entering a dream, in that moment when we're half
awake and half asleep, and still conscious, you know from Casta-
neda's work that the assemblage point flutters, it starts
shifting, and what the sorcerer wants to do is that he wants to
use that natural (that happens to every one of us) shift to move
into other realms. And for that you need an exquisite energy.
Again it comes down to energy. We need an extraordinary amount of
energy because you want to be conscious of that moment and use it
without waking up.
ABE: Yes, a very high accomplishment.
FLORINDA D: For me, it's very easy to enter, to use it. The thing
is, I had no control at that time- although I have now- over when
it was going to happen. But I could center into this state of
what they call...I mean, the women were not interested in calling
it the 'second attention'; they were interested in calling it
'dreaming awake', because it is the same thing. And you'd reach
different levels, and what you do is that in that dreaming state
eventually you have the same control you have in your daily life.
And that's exactly what the sorcerers do. It's the same thing;
there's no difference anymore.
ABE: So you are now able to exist in another reality?
FLORINDA D: Well, I don't really know. You see, we don't have the
language to talk about it, except to talk about it in known
terms. So in a weird way, when I ask myself, "Do I exist in
another reality?", yes and no. It's not quite right to really
say that, because it is one reality.
There is no difference. Let's say there are different layers,
like an onion. But it's all the same. And it becomes very
bizarre. How am I going to talk about it? In metaphors? Our
metaphors are already so defined by what we already know.
ABE: Yes, the problem of language.
FLORINDA D: You see we don't have the language to really talk
about what then really happens when you are in the 'second
attention', or when we 'dream awake' . Bul it is as real as any
other reality. What is reality? It is, again, a consensus. And
you see, the thing is, we only want to agree about this
intellectually on one level. But it's more than just an
intellectual agreement. Let's say, it can be more. And for
that, again, we go back to that same thing- it all hinges on
energy.
ABE: That's right. But it also hinges on something called 'intent'.
FLORINDA D: Exactly. But in order to hook yourself to
'intent'...See, 'intent' is out there, it's this force- Don
Juan was not interested in religion- but, in a weird way maybe it
is exactly what we call God, the supreme being, the one force,
the spirit. You see, each culture knows what it is. And the thing
is, Don Juan, again, said you don't beg for it. You ask, and in
order to ask for it, you need energy. Because not only do you
need energy to hook yourself onto it, but you want to stay
hooked.
ABE: Ycs. So, this thing of intent, I mean it's an easy word to
say, but it's actually a quite complex operation.
FLORINDA D: Yes, exactly, very complex. For Don Juan and his
people, to talk about sorcery and witchcraft, with all those
negative connotations, they couldn't care less what we called the
practices. For them it was very very abstract. To them sorcery is
an abstraction, and it was this idea of expanding the limits of
perception. Because, for them, our choices in life are limited by
the social order. We have boundless options, but by accepting
these choices, of course, we set a limit to our limitless
possibilities.
ABE: And yet the human being seems...
FLORINDA D: ...constantly searching for that which has been...
ARE: ... lost...
FLORINDA D: ....lost or caged in by the social order. They put
blinds on us the moment we are born. Look at the way we coerce
the child to perceive the way we perceive.
ABE: Yes, the transmission of culture.
FLORINDA D: It's the most perfect example. Children truly
perceive more, obviously, a great deal more. But they have to
make some order out of that chaos, and we, of course, are the
perennial teachers of what is proper to perceive within our
group. And if they don't abide by that, my god, we shoot them
with drugs, or lock them up in therapy with psychiatrists.
ABE: There have been these traditions, which have existed for a
long, long time, and now in the last, say, twenty or thirty years
in particular, we start to hear about them. Why did Castaneda
write his books?
FLORINDA D.: Bccause it was a task; it was a sorceric task. That
Don Juan impressed upon him. Castaneda is the last of his
line. There is no one else. There's a group of Indians that we
work with. You see, Don Juan, in a weird way made almost a
mistake with Castaneda, when he first was put in touch, whatever
the design or power of the spirit was which put Don Juan face to
face with Castaneda. And he rallied right away. His circle of
apprentices- and I think it's in Tales of Power and The Second
Ring of Power, when he talks about the people in Oaxaca and the
Little Sisters and all those people. And then, years later, Don
Juan realizes that that's not the way Castaneda is going.
Castaneda was even more abstract than Don Juan was. His path
was a totally different path. And then when he gathered these
other people, because the people that are with Castaneda, we all
met Don Juan before we met Castaneda. Actually there was only
five of us before- four of us and Castaneda.
ABE: So, there was the sorcerer's task of writing the books. What
I'm trying to get at is, that this knowledge, just as knowl-
edge, becomes available now and is available to millions of
people in this form. What is the purpose of that?
FLORINDA D: Well, somebody has to get hooked by it. And people
do. For us, for our mentality as the westem ape, as Don Juan
always called us, you see, we have to be hooked first
intellectually, because obviously that's how our whole being
works. When I was in school, I was just a step away from going
into graduate school, and l had been in this world for two or
three years, and I said, "What am I doing by continuing school?
Why should I get a PhD.? It's absolutely redundant." And Don Juan
and all the women said it's absolutely not redundant, because in
order to reject something you have to understand it at its most
sophisticated. Because for you to say you're not interested in
philosophy, or you're not interested in anthropology, it's
meaningless. You can only say it after you have at least have
made some attempt to understand it. There's no reason to reject
it, and when plunging into this world of the 'second attention'
and 'dreaming awake', your mind has to be so well trained for you
to emerge again, to come out with the knowledge. Because if you
have not the brain or the mind to do it, you might as well just
go throw stones in the desert; because it's meaningless. And for
them it was extremely important that all of us are very well
trained. Everyone working within this little group has a degree.
There are historians, anthropologists, librarians.
ABE: So, the knowledge is made available to millions of people,
and people become hooked by it.
FLORINDA D: On one level, they will, yes.
ABE: And does that mean that the tradition has now begun to
proliferate itself in that way, also?
FLORINDA D: I don't know. If I go by Castaneda's mail, which he
doesn't read, I would say yes. But then, most of the stuff... I
mean I open letters from time to time, and they're mad, they're
crackpots most of them. Some of them are very, very serious
enquiries, and most of them are just truly cracked people.
(laughter) I mean they're cracked. Like, "I am the new Nagual."
or "I have been visited by you in dreams." I mean truly bizarre
things.
ABE: Well, there are many levels to that, as you know. But I
think that you women, you sorcerers there, and the whole Casta-
nedan reality has actually affected the mass collective
consciousness of, particularly, North America.
FLORINDA D: It is as you say; the work is out there. There's a
great many people reading it. And some people are truly very
serious about it.
ABE: And some of them are people who are non-Natives who have
become involved in Native spirituality. In a way, the work that
has come from your group has had a tremendous quickening effect
on Native spiritualities all over this continent, who have
found a track back into their traditions.
FLORINDA D.: You see, the whole point of Don Juan was that you
don't go back, because we are caught again in the myth and the
rituals. And for Don Juan, myth and rituals...myth in the sense
that yes, that you're part of this matrix, but not in the sense
that you're going to live it by invoking certain rituals, certain
powers that were, let's say, successful in the l9th century.
Because, he said, that's exactly the fallacy, because originally
a ritual is only to hook your attention. Once your attention is
hooked, you drop it. As the apes that we are, we of course are
very comforted by the ritual. People that truly transcend a
certain knowledge do it by exactly getting out of it. Yet the
rest of the mass is mesmerized by the ritual.
ABE: Seeing the truth of that and the fact that Castaneda
describes you as the new seers, how does that emerge?
FLORINDA D: The new seers? For the women it is very important,
this idea that the womb is not just an organ of reproduction.
In order to activate this, our intent has to be different. In
order to change our intent we go back again to energy. You see,
we don' t really know what it means to use the womb as an organ
for being, an organ of light, of intuition. For us, intuition
really is something that has already been defined. There is no
real intuition anymore, because we intuit with our brains. Don
Juan was interested in women, and people always ask, "Well, how
come there's always so many women? Do you have orgies? Is there
all kinds of stuff going on?" He said, "No, it's because the male
doesn't have the womb. He needs that magical 'womb power'
(laughter). " It's very important, you see.
ABE: Let me ask some technical questions there, if I may, on
behalf of my female readers. Does the womb have to be fully
functioning? I mean, if a woman had her tubes tied, would her
womb still work?
FLORINDA D: Yes, as long as she doesn't have a hysterectomy.
ABE: So long as the womb isn't removed...
FLORINDA D: ...if the womb is there, yes.
ABE: Then it can work.
FLORINDA D: Oh, absolutely. But the only thing is you need to
summon that intent. Like certain of the Goddess cults- "When God
Was A Woman"- and I was talking to some women a month ago, and
they were all in goddess groups. And every month they go into the
forest; they go someplace up to Sequoia and they groove in the
forest, in the trees, and oh, they have a great time hanging out,
debating, making rituals in the river. And I said, "But what the
fuck are you doing? You go back home, and then you are the same
assholes you were always. You open your legs whenever the master
says "I need you"" And they were shocked. I mean, they quite dis-
liked me, because they don't like to hear that. They said, "But
we felt so good for three days." And I said, "But what's the
point of feeling good for three days if your life continues the
same way?" What are we resting from? Because our life is going to
continue. Why don't we change? This idea of the rituals and even
going back to the Native beliefs, it didn't even work back then,
on one level. We were conquered.
ABE: So it's something that has to live now in a completely
authentic way.
FLORINDA D.: It has to be fluid, and the practitioner has to be
fluid to accept these changes. Even within us, things are
changing constantly, and we're so comfortable in a certain
groove, until something blasts us out of it. And we resent it,
but we have to be fluid. Only energy will give us that fluidity.
ABE: How do you accummulate energy?
FLORINDA D: To start off with, at least at the beginning, it was
Don Juan's idea that the best energy that we have is our sexual
energy. It's the only energy that we really have, and most of our
sexual energy is squandered.
ABE: Now, is it the same for men and women?
FLORINDA D: Of course it's the same for men and women. The only
thing is with women you see that energetically the woman takes on
the burden of feeding the man through their energetic fila-
ments. So, in that sense, it's worse for women. And for the man
too, because the man is hooked. Energetically he is hooked, no
matter what. And we have all kinds of psychological explanations.
People who we've had affairs with, and we can't get her out of
our minds, whatever. You see, we have this gray barrage of
description, but what really is going on is on a totally
different level that we don't want to talk about because it's not
part of our cultural kit.
ABE: So the primary way of accumulating energy, then, is to be celibate?
FLORINDA D: Well, it's very difficult, but it would be a good
try, at least to start out with.
ABE: If a woman was called to this way, if she got hooked, or
a man got hooked by this tradition, how would they know? How
would they know that they had been hooked by a tradition and
not just by some damn obsession?
FLORINDA D: For instance, Castaneda's books spell out very
clearly...if you read Castaneda's books carefully, they're al-
most manuals.
ABE: Yes, I know. And you read them again and again, and you
finally understand what they're talking about
FLORINDA D: You will know that something has changed, because you
will feel it energetically. And then there's this whole idea that
you can abandon this idea of the self. It's not that you're going
to laugh at others. But you find them despicable, and yet you
don't want to judge them, either, because who the hell are we to
judge anybody anyway? But you know that you are not part of it,
in the sense of the social agreement, and it's almost like a
phony part of you that is clinging to you, because you do have to
function in the world. You have to present a coherent idea Of the
self. You know, Don Juan always said if some truthful change has
taken place there is no way to be rejected, whatever it means to
be rejected. I don' t know. By intent coming in contact with us?
I don't really know. There have been two people that have come in
contact with us, and they are there. I mean, we're never together
anyway; each person lives on their own, and just from time to
time we do get together. Originally we had this little class
when Castaneda was here. He teaches certain very interesting
movements, basically to store up energy. So, these people have
been there for two years, and they're changing little by
little. And it's amazing. You see, if you let something go, some-
thing in you will know.
ABE: You have published this book, for instance, and I read it.
Now I don't have a physical image of you, but my feelings form a
sense of who you might be, or what you might be like. Now, does
that energy field affect you, now that there's this book out
there?
FLORINDA D: One of the things that Don Juan made very clear to
Castaneda...see, once the book is out, the book is out. It has
nothing to do with you anymore. For you to be wondering, living
in hope- is the book doing well or not doing well?- see, that's a
very, very difficult thing to divorce yourself from. Because
somehow you are involved. To truly let go is very very
difficult. I had two other books- The Shabono and The Witches
Dream- and it was very easy. With this one, because it's the first
time I talk about my involvement with Don Juan, it's very
difficult. And maybe because for the first time I'm talking more
openly-- with the other ones I did absolutely nothing. With this
one I am more involved. I have given lectures in bookstores to
groups of people, which is very interesting, because, as you
said before, there are a great many people who are truly very
seriously interested, but intellectually, again.
ABE: Oh, I think I know a know people who've gone a little beyond
intellect with it.
окончание:
FLORINDA D: There are, definitely. I do believe that, yes.
ABE: Because we talk about different kinds of luminous bodies.
There are people who read these books and suddenly it's self
recognition time.
FLORINDA D: Precisely, yes.
ABE: Now these books, then, are affecting a change in the way
people perceive themselves.
FLORINDA D: Yes. Basically the goal is how we perceive the world,
and breaking those parameters of perception, in terms of how we
perceive ourselves, too. But, we don't want the focus on the 'I'.
We want to be a witness. Because everything in our society is
filtered through the 'I', through the 'me', we are incapable of
telling a story or recounting an event without making us the main
protagonist, always. You see, Don Juan was interested to let
the event unfold itself, and then it becomes infinitely richer,
because then it opens up. And even in the world, as an exercise,
just become a witness; don't be the protagonist. It's amazing
what opens up.
ABE: Now, on this long path, one of the things that's described
in the literature is that the person, the seer and the Nagual,
everybody, will reach a period of despondency, where they're
sure it's going to fail, nothing's going to ultimately happen.
And the reason I raise this is because I have a sense that this
feeling is actually being shared by many people now. So, please
talk to that for a moment.
FLORINDA D: Yes, exactly. (laughter) I'm going to add to your
depression (laughter). No, it is true. Something in us knows, and
that's why there's the urgency with Don Juan. The imperative
from the point of view of Nature is the perpetuation of the
species, and we are no longer interested. We are interested in
evolution, because evolution is an equal, if not a greater,
imperative than procreation. Because if we don't evolve, if we
don't mutate into something different, we are truly going to
blast ourselves out of this planet, I think irredeemably. We have
destroyed our resources, I mean totally. Whether we have fifty or
a hundred more years in terms of time, as a planet, is
immaterial. It doesn't really matter. We as a species are doomed.
And in that sense, evolution is our only way out. And again, as
Don Juan stresses, evolution is in the hands of women, not of
men.
ABE: So, as a male, what do I do? I just sit here and wait for
women to save the world?
FLORINDA D: Yes and no. You see the man has to relinquish his
power, and he's not going to do it, not peacefully. He's not. I'm
not saying that, you know, you're beating your chest, saying "I
will not relinquish my power". No, it's much more insidious
than that.
ABE: Go into that. Talk about it.
FLORINDA D: Well, I don't think it's ever stated. For instance,
okay, here's these sensitive men who have been in men's groups,
trying to come to terms with their spirituality, and have become
totally in agreement with their wives, their partners, the female
they are with- but not quite. There are certain things they will
not relinquish, it's too threatening. Even this whole idea of the
men's movement originally started out as a truly spiritual
movement. But something in the male is threatened. It is this
fear of relinquishing something that some of them do sense will
have to be relinquished, for us as a species to go on. We
certainly know that the female has to be given time, and has been
given time in the past for something to evolve. For instance,
for us to become erect, when the vagina had to change position,
well, who had to adapt? The males. The penis had to grow larger.
The female again needs time. And the male has to give her that
time. From one point of view the male has to give the female time
for the womb to try to switch into its secondary function.
ABE: And that can't happen if the man is relating to the woman
sexually. Is that what you're saying?
FLORINDA D: No. See, there have to be enough females who have
that time that something will have to change in the womb. They
have to drawn a new possibility. Don Juan said our evolution is
intent. You see, that leap from the large reptiles to flying,
this idea of wings, was intended. It was an act of intent
ABE: That's very interesting. So you feel that women all over the
world currently, sisterhoods of different kinds, are intending
a new human future?
FLORINDA D: They're not aware of it. Some women, I think, are, totally.
ABE: So the man is now going to take a back seat in the evolution
of the species.
FLORINDA D: Exactly, right. Not a back seat. Again, those are
words that define a positive/negative kind of connotation. No.
You have to provide the time.
ABE: How can the man do that? Talk about that functionally.
FLORINDA D: You see, we women are relegated to the status of
second class citizens. No matter what power we have, we still
don't have any real power. We don't decide anything. And even for
us to talk in little groups, it's almost Iike banging against a
huge iron door, because whoever decides, whoever's in power, is
not going to relinquish this for the hell of it. Let's look in
terms of politics, let's say Washington or your capital. I mean,
do you think for a moment those men are going to even listen to
what we're saying? Not in the least. But some kinds of pockets
have to be found for something new to develop. Otherwise we're
doomed. And this idea for us to save the planet, the environ-
ment, all we are really thinking is that we as a species will not
survive. The earth will certainly survive; it might go into some
kind of horrendous winter, but eventually it will come out of
it. But we as a species will not survive.
ABE: Why would a woman read this book Being-in-Dreaming?
FLORINDA D: Very interesting, hm. Well, if nothing else, I think
people who have been interested in the Castaneda work, would be
interested to see it presented from a female's perspective,
from somebody who has been in that work for over twenty years. I
do approach the problems differently, probably more directly. The
thing is perception. Even our human bodies...the body is, again,
a consequence of perception. We are trapped as persons; we are
trapped in language, and that's exactly what the sorcerer,
through energy, wants to get out of.
END
FLORINDA D: There are, definitely. I do believe that, yes.
ABE: Because we talk about different kinds of luminous bodies.
There are people who read these books and suddenly it's self
recognition time.
FLORINDA D: Precisely, yes.
ABE: Now these books, then, are affecting a change in the way
people perceive themselves.
FLORINDA D: Yes. Basically the goal is how we perceive the world,
and breaking those parameters of perception, in terms of how we
perceive ourselves, too. But, we don't want the focus on the 'I'.
We want to be a witness. Because everything in our society is
filtered through the 'I', through the 'me', we are incapable of
telling a story or recounting an event without making us the main
protagonist, always. You see, Don Juan was interested to let
the event unfold itself, and then it becomes infinitely richer,
because then it opens up. And even in the world, as an exercise,
just become a witness; don't be the protagonist. It's amazing
what opens up.
ABE: Now, on this long path, one of the things that's described
in the literature is that the person, the seer and the Nagual,
everybody, will reach a period of despondency, where they're
sure it's going to fail, nothing's going to ultimately happen.
And the reason I raise this is because I have a sense that this
feeling is actually being shared by many people now. So, please
talk to that for a moment.
FLORINDA D: Yes, exactly. (laughter) I'm going to add to your
depression (laughter). No, it is true. Something in us knows, and
that's why there's the urgency with Don Juan. The imperative
from the point of view of Nature is the perpetuation of the
species, and we are no longer interested. We are interested in
evolution, because evolution is an equal, if not a greater,
imperative than procreation. Because if we don't evolve, if we
don't mutate into something different, we are truly going to
blast ourselves out of this planet, I think irredeemably. We have
destroyed our resources, I mean totally. Whether we have fifty or
a hundred more years in terms of time, as a planet, is
immaterial. It doesn't really matter. We as a species are doomed.
And in that sense, evolution is our only way out. And again, as
Don Juan stresses, evolution is in the hands of women, not of
men.
ABE: So, as a male, what do I do? I just sit here and wait for
women to save the world?
FLORINDA D: Yes and no. You see the man has to relinquish his
power, and he's not going to do it, not peacefully. He's not. I'm
not saying that, you know, you're beating your chest, saying "I
will not relinquish my power". No, it's much more insidious
than that.
ABE: Go into that. Talk about it.
FLORINDA D: Well, I don't think it's ever stated. For instance,
okay, here's these sensitive men who have been in men's groups,
trying to come to terms with their spirituality, and have become
totally in agreement with their wives, their partners, the female
they are with- but not quite. There are certain things they will
not relinquish, it's too threatening. Even this whole idea of the
men's movement originally started out as a truly spiritual
movement. But something in the male is threatened. It is this
fear of relinquishing something that some of them do sense will
have to be relinquished, for us as a species to go on. We
certainly know that the female has to be given time, and has been
given time in the past for something to evolve. For instance,
for us to become erect, when the vagina had to change position,
well, who had to adapt? The males. The penis had to grow larger.
The female again needs time. And the male has to give her that
time. From one point of view the male has to give the female time
for the womb to try to switch into its secondary function.
ABE: And that can't happen if the man is relating to the woman
sexually. Is that what you're saying?
FLORINDA D: No. See, there have to be enough females who have
that time that something will have to change in the womb. They
have to drawn a new possibility. Don Juan said our evolution is
intent. You see, that leap from the large reptiles to flying,
this idea of wings, was intended. It was an act of intent
ABE: That's very interesting. So you feel that women all over the
world currently, sisterhoods of different kinds, are intending
a new human future?
FLORINDA D: They're not aware of it. Some women, I think, are, totally.
ABE: So the man is now going to take a back seat in the evolution
of the species.
FLORINDA D: Exactly, right. Not a back seat. Again, those are
words that define a positive/negative kind of connotation. No.
You have to provide the time.
ABE: How can the man do that? Talk about that functionally.
FLORINDA D: You see, we women are relegated to the status of
second class citizens. No matter what power we have, we still
don't have any real power. We don't decide anything. And even for
us to talk in little groups, it's almost Iike banging against a
huge iron door, because whoever decides, whoever's in power, is
not going to relinquish this for the hell of it. Let's look in
terms of politics, let's say Washington or your capital. I mean,
do you think for a moment those men are going to even listen to
what we're saying? Not in the least. But some kinds of pockets
have to be found for something new to develop. Otherwise we're
doomed. And this idea for us to save the planet, the environ-
ment, all we are really thinking is that we as a species will not
survive. The earth will certainly survive; it might go into some
kind of horrendous winter, but eventually it will come out of
it. But we as a species will not survive.
ABE: Why would a woman read this book Being-in-Dreaming?
FLORINDA D: Very interesting, hm. Well, if nothing else, I think
people who have been interested in the Castaneda work, would be
interested to see it presented from a female's perspective,
from somebody who has been in that work for over twenty years. I
do approach the problems differently, probably more directly. The
thing is perception. Even our human bodies...the body is, again,
a consequence of perception. We are trapped as persons; we are
trapped in language, and that's exactly what the sorcerer,
through energy, wants to get out of.
END
Спасибо за статьи! Кое-что прояснилось
Видимо, о журнале, который вышел только в 96 году под названием "Путь воина", позже переименованном в "Читателей бесконечности", и состоял всего из четырех выпусков.oldzpace писал(а):Чт мар 23, 2017 8:43 amО чем идет речь? "Колесо Времени" - рано. Или было что-то еще о чем мы не знаем? В 1981 опубликован только "Дар Орла". Но на журнал или учебник как-то не похоже.
"My attempts to publish this journal go back as far as 1971, when I presented this format to some book editors, who promptly turned me down because it did not conform to the preconceived notion of a scholarly journal, nor did it conform to the format of a magazine, or even a newsletter. My argument that the ideas contained in the journal were foreign enough to dictate a format that was an amalgamation of all three of those established genres did not have the sufficient force to convince them to publish it. The title that I had for the journal, at that time, was The Journal of Ethno-Hermeneutics. Years later, I actually found that a publication bearing that name was in circulation.
Now, I find myself in the position of publishing this journal. It is not an attempt at commercializing anything, nor is it a vehicle for apologetics of any sort. I envision it as an attempt to join the Western man’s world of philosophical speculation with the seeing-observations of the Indian sorcerers who lived in Mexico in ancient times and whose cultural descendants were don Juan Matus and his cohorts."
https://alamogordo.wordpress.com/2008/1 ... -infinity/
Спасибо за инфу. Не знал об этих журналах. Интересно, есть ли их переводы на русский?Nameless писал(а):Чт мар 23, 2017 8:23 pm
И все же, интересно, в каком оригинале написано: "Fear, Indulgence, Complacency, Old Age"?Kovalenko писал(а):Вт мар 21, 2017 12:43 pmВ русских переводах Кастанеды нам называют "врагов человека знания" таким образом:
Страх, Знание, Сила, Старость.
Но в оригинале они перечислены так:
Fear, Indulgence, Complacency, Old Age.
На мой взгляд, индульгирование или потакание себе это не знание.
А удовлетворенность или самодовольство это не сила.
И возникает вопрос: того ли Кастанеду мы читаем?
Я нашел книгу в которой написано: Fear, Clarity, Power, Old age.
Правда, ПДФ версия книги опубликована в 2006 году, а данных о книге с которой взят текст нету.
Черт, один я замечаю эту лажу в переводе статьи?
И я понимаю автора перевода. В одном месте и, вероятно, отсылка к роману Хемингуэя, и тружнопереводимый ended up. Но можно же было заменить чем-то хотя бы близким по смыслу.
Kovalenko, после таких твоих постов ты теперь просто обязан поделиться настоящим Кастанедой.
Хотябы со мной.
---
Перевод:"To break that perceptive arc isn't an easy task; it could take years. The
difficulty with me," he affirmed laughing, "is that I am very pigheaded.
Quite unwillingly I went on learning: For this reason, in my case, Don Juan
had to use drugs...and so I ended up...with my liver in the stream!
-- Разрушить это восприятие нелегко, на это могут уйти
годы. Сложности в моем случае возникали из за того, что я был
очень упрям, -- сказал он, смеясь. -- Я был довольно таки
нерасположен к тому, чтобы учиться: поэтому дону Хуану пришлось применить наркотики.. И ВСЁ! ТЕКСТА НЕТ!.
И я понимаю автора перевода. В одном месте и, вероятно, отсылка к роману Хемингуэя, и тружнопереводимый ended up. Но можно же было заменить чем-то хотя бы близким по смыслу.
-- Разрушить эту дугу восприятия [контекст: речь идет о внимании тоналя или "первом кольце силы"] нелегкая задача, могут уйти
годы. Сложность со мной в том, -- сказал он, смеясь, -- что я был
очень упрямый. Довольно неохотно я взялся за обучение: поэтому дон Хуану пришлось применить наркотики... и это был конец... конец моей печени!
Kovalenko, после таких твоих постов ты теперь просто обязан поделиться настоящим Кастанедой.
Хотябы со мной.
---
Kovalenko писал(а):Вт мар 21, 2017 12:43 pm
В софийской книжке "Карлос Кастанеда. Лекции и интервью" вроде бы они целиком или почти целиком приведены, только не по порядку и вперемешку с другими материалами, эти же отрывки, кажется, можно найти в интернете.oldzpace писал(а):Чт мар 23, 2017 9:53 pmСпасибо за инфу. Не знал об этих журналах. Интересно, есть ли их переводы на русский?
Еще раз благодарю. Посмотрю.Nameless писал(а):Пт мар 24, 2017 7:25 amВ софийской книжке "Карлос Кастанеда. Лекции и интервью" вроде бы они целиком или почти целиком приведены, только не по порядку и вперемешку с другими материалами, эти же отрывки, кажется, можно найти в интернете.
Поддерживаю! Зародилось сомнение в русском переводе...узелок писал(а):Пт мар 24, 2017 2:42 amKovalenko, после таких твоих постов ты теперь просто обязан поделиться настоящим Кастанедой.
Нашел теневой сайт в англоязычном сегменте Интернета. Там есть все: и журнал, и интервью, и книги. Но нету тех
оригиналов, в которых не обычные 4 врага человека знания.
Не знаю, как скопировать. Попробую отправить рисунком.
Нужно учесть, что автор книги, из которой я взял абзац, читал Кастанеду во времена президента Кеннеди.
Возможно, поначалу было так, а потом появились другие трактовки и правки. Автор Кейн утверждал, что лично знал Хенаро, учился у него и был одним из "хенарос".
Возможно, поначалу было так, а потом появились другие трактовки и правки. Автор Кейн утверждал, что лично знал Хенаро, учился у него и был одним из "хенарос".
Если вдруг кому интересно, то вот та самая
церковь, в которой КК встречался с Арендатором.
oo0o0oo, Здорово!
Примерно такую картину Церкви --> в которой КК встречался с Арендатором --> показывало Воображение!
Раз Место уже Известно, довольно Красивое, Ухоженное
Едем на Встречу с Арендатором ?
Примерно такую картину Церкви --> в которой КК встречался с Арендатором --> показывало Воображение!
Раз Место уже Известно, довольно Красивое, Ухоженное
Едем на Встречу с Арендатором ?
Круто! Это точно она?oo0o0oo писал(а):Сб мар 25, 2017 2:22 pmЕсли вдруг кому интересно, то вот та самая церковь, в которой КК встречался с Арендатором.
А нет статичной фотки?
Это точно она
Нас туда
водили знакомиться с Арендатором...
Фоточки:
Нас туда
водили знакомиться с Арендатором...Фоточки:
Ещё фоточки. На первой церковь со стороны площади неподалёку. На 2 и 3 - внутренний дворик, вход в него виден на первой
фотке в предыдущем посте, справа от центрального входа в церковь.
Интересное совпадение! Мое воображение показало мне тоже такую картинкуNatus Vincerus писал(а):Сб мар 25, 2017 3:14 pmoo0o0oo, Здорово!
Примерно такую картину Церкви --> в которой КК встречался с Арендатором --> показывало Воображение!
Что, если мы когда-то были в парке и Церкви "Арендатора",
и вот теперь наша память отрывками Выдаёт то, что мы и так Знали,
т.е Видели в определённый период Жизни ?
а во Время чтения текста Карлоса Кастанеды -->
просто Вспомнили то, что и так Знали\Видели ?
есть же Люди, которые способны Вспомнить свои прошлые Жизни,
свои прошлые Воплощения на Земле,
описать всё с точностью до Камушка,
что и Подтверждается в Последствии.
и вот теперь наша память отрывками Выдаёт то, что мы и так Знали,
т.е Видели в определённый период Жизни ?
а во Время чтения текста Карлоса Кастанеды -->
просто Вспомнили то, что и так Знали\Видели ?
есть же Люди, которые способны Вспомнить свои прошлые Жизни,
свои прошлые Воплощения на Земле,
описать всё с точностью до Камушка,
что и Подтверждается в Последствии.
Удивительно, но мне эта церковь тоже знакома... дежавю какое-то
Вот и Собирается потихоньку партия воинов