Controlled Folly as Described by Carlos Castaneda

Controlled Folly as described by Carlos Castaneda ~ Please note that these quotes were taken from many different pages of many different books. Thus, the comments below may not 'flow' very well, as in one reading a story. I attempted to get to the 'gist' of controlled folly from the books. 

"It's possible to insist, to properly insist, even though we know that what we're doing is useless," he said, smiling, "But we must know first that our acts are useless and yet we must proceed as if we didn't know it. That's a sorcerer's controlled folly."

"I wonder if you could tell me more about your controlled folly," I said.

"What do you want to know about it?"

"Please tell me, don Juan, what exactly is controlled folly?"

Don Juan laughed loudly and made a smacking sound by slapping his thigh with the hollow of his hand.

"This is controlled folly!" he said, and laughed and slapped his thigh again.

"What do you mean ... ?"

"I am happy that you finally asked me about my controlled folly after so many years, and yet it wouldn't have mattered to me in the least if you had never asked. Yet I have chosen to feel happy, as if I cared, that you asked, as if it would matter that I care. That is controlled folly!"

We both laughed very loudly. I hugged him. I found his explanation delightful although I did not quite understand it.

"With whom do you exercise controlled folly, don Juan?" I asked after a long silence.

He chuckled.

"With everybody!" he exclaimed, smiling.

"When do you choose to exercise it, then?"

"Every single time I act."

I felt I needed to recapitulate at that point and I asked him if controlled folly meant that his acts were never sincere but were only the acts of an actor.

"My acts are sincere," he said, "but they are only the acts of an actor."

"Then everything you do must be controlled folly!" I said truly surprised.

"Yes, everything," he said.

"But it can't be true," I protested, "that every one of your acts is only controlled folly."

"Why not?" he replied with a mysterious look.

"That would mean that nothing matters to you and you don't really care about anything or anybody. Take me, for example. Do you mean that you don't care whether or not I become a man of knowledge, or whether I live, or die, or do anything?"

"True! I don't. You are like Lucio, or everybody else in my life, my controlled folly."

I experienced a peculiar feeling of emptiness. Obviously there was no reason in the world why don Juan had to care about me, but on the other hand I had almost the certainty that he cared about me personally; I thought it could not be otherwise, since he had always given me his undivided attention during every moment I had spent with him. It occurred to me that perhaps don Juan was just saying that because he was annoyed with me. After all, I had quit his teachings.

"I have the feeling we are not talking about the same thing," I said. "I shouldn't have used myself as an example.

What I meant to say was that there must be something in the world you care about in a way that is not controlled folly. I don't think it is possible to go on living if nothing really matters to us."

"That applies to you," he said. "Things matter to you. You asked me about my controlled folly and I told you that everything I do in regard to myself and my fellow men is folly, because nothing matters."

"My point is, don Juan, that if nothing matters to you, how can you go on living?"

He laughed and after a moment's pause, in which he seemed to deliberate whether or not to answer, he got up and went to the back of his house. I followed him.

"Wait, wait, don Juan." I said. "I really want to know; you must explain to me what you mean."

"Perhaps it's not possible to explain," he said. "Certain things in your life matter to you because they're important; your acts are certainly important to you, but for me, not a single thing is important any longer, neither my acts nor the acts of any of my fellow men. I go on living, though, because I have my will. Because I have tempered my will throughout my life until it's neat and wholesome and now it doesn't matter to me that nothing matters. My will controls the folly of my life."

He squatted and ran his fingers on some herbs that he had put to dry in the sun on a big piece of burlap.

I was bewildered. Never would I have anticipated the direction that my query had taken. After a long pause I thought of a good point. I told him that in my opinion some of the acts of my fellow men were of supreme importance.

I pointed out that a nuclear war was definitely the most dramatic example of such an act. I said that for me destroying life on the face of the earth was an act of staggering enormity.

"You believe that because you're thinking. You're thinking about life," don Juan said with a glint in his eyes.

"You're not seeing."

"Would I feel differently if I could see?" I asked.

"Once a man learns to see he finds himself alone in the world with nothing but folly," don Juan said cryptically.

He paused for a moment and looked at me as if he wanted to judge the effect of his words.

"Your acts, as well as the acts of your fellow men in general, appear to be important to you because you have learned to think they are important."

He used the word "learned" with such a peculiar inflection that it forced me to ask what he meant by it.

He stopped handling his plants and looked at me.

"We learn to think about everything," he said, "and then we train our eyes to look as we think about the things we look at. We look at ourselves already thinking that we are important. And therefore we've got to feel important! But then when a man learns to see, he realizes that he can no longer think about the things he looks at, and if he cannot think about what he looks at everything becomes unimportant."

Don Juan must have noticed my puzzled look and repeated his statements three times, as if to make me understand them. What he said sounded to me like gibberish at first, but upon thinking about it, his words loomed more like a sophisticated statement about some facet of perception.

I tried to think of a good question that would make him clarify his point, but I could not think of anything.

I asked him if he was in a mood to answer some questions.

"What do you want to know?" he replied.

"What you told me this afternoon about controlled folly has disturbed me very much," I said. "I really cannot understand what you meant."

"Of course you cannot understand it," he said. "You are trying to think about it, and what I said does not fit with your thoughts."

"I'm trying to think about it," I said, "because that's the only way I personally can understand anything. For example, don Juan, do you mean that once a man learns to see, everything in the whole world is worthless?"

"I didn't say worthless. I said unimportant. Everything is equal and therefore unimportant. For example, there is no way for me to say that my acts are more important than yours, or that one thing is more essential than another, therefore all things are equal and by being equal they are unimportant."

I asked him if his statements were a pronouncement that what he had called "seeing" was in effect a "better way" than merely "looking at things." He said that the eyes of man could perform both functions, but neither of them was better than the other; however, to train the eyes only to look was, in his opinion, an unnecessary loss.

"For instance, we need to look with our eyes to laugh," he said, "because only when we look at things can we catch the funny edge of the world. On the other hand, when our eyes see, everything is so equal that nothing is funny."

"Do you mean, don Juan, that a man who sees cannot ever laugh?'

He remained silent for some time.

"Perhaps there are men of knowledge who never laugh," he said. "I don't know any of them, though. Those I know see and also look, so they laugh."

"Would a man of knowledge cry as well?"

"I suppose so. Our eyes look so we may laugh, or cry, or rejoice, or be sad, or be happy. I personally don't like to be sad, so whenever I witness something that would ordinarily make me sad, I simply shift my eyes and see it instead of looking at it. But when I encounter something funny I look and I laugh."

"But then, don Juan, your laughter is real and not controlled folly."

Don Juan stared at me for a moment.

"I talk to you because you make me laugh," he said. "You remind me of some bushy-tailed rats of the desert that get caught when they stick their tails in holes trying to scare other rats away in order to steal their food. You get caught in your own questions. Watch out! Sometimes those rats yank their tails off trying to pull themselves free."

I found his comparison funny and I laughed. Don Juan had once shown me some small rodents with bushy tails that looked like fat squirrels; the image of one of those chubby rats yanking its tail off was sad and at the same time morbidly funny.

"My laughter, as well as everything I do, is real," he said, "but it also is controlled folly because it is useless; it changes nothing and yet I still do it."

"But as I understand it, don Juan, your laughter is not useless. It makes you happy."

"No! I am happy because I choose to look at things that make me happy and then my eyes catch their funny edge and I laugh. I have said this to you countless times. One must always choose the path with heart in order to be at one's best, perhaps so one can always laugh."

I interpreted what he had said as meaning that crying was inferior to laughter, or at least perhaps an act that weakened us. He asserted that there was no intrinsic difference and that both were unimportant; he said, however, that his preference was laughter, because laughter made his body feel better than crying.

At that point I suggested that if one has a preference there is no equality; if he preferred laughing to crying, the former was indeed more important.

He stubbornly maintained that his preference did not mean they were not equal; and I insisted that our argument could be logically stretched to saying that if things were supposed to be so equal why not also choose death?

"Many men of knowledge do that," he said. "One day they may simply disappear. People may think that they have been ambushed and killed because of their doings. They choose to die because it doesn't matter to them. On the other hand, I choose to live, and to laugh, not because it matters, but because that choice is the bent of my nature.

The reason I say I choose is because I see, but it isn't that I choose to live; my will makes me go on living in spite of anything I may see.

"You don't understand me now because of your habit of thinking as you look and thinking as you think."

This statement intrigued me very much. I asked him to explain what he meant by it.

He repeated the same construct various times, as if giving himself time to arrange it in different terms, and then delivered his point, saying that by "thinking" he meant the constant idea that we have of everything in the world. He said that "seeing" dispelled that habit and until I learned to "see" I could not really understand what he meant.

"But if nothing matters, don Juan, why should it matter that I learn to see?"

"I told you once that our lot as men is to learn, for good or bad," he said. "I have learned to see and I tell you that nothing really matters; now it is your turn; perhaps some day you will see and you will know then whether things matter or not. For me nothing matters, but perhaps for you everything will. You should know by now that a man of knowledge lives by acting, not by thinking about acting, nor by thinking about what he will think when he has finished acting. A man of knowledge chooses a path with heart and follows it; and then he looks and rejoices and laughs; and then he sees and knows. He knows that his life will be over altogether too soon; he knows that he, as well as everybody else, is not going anywhere; he knows, because he sees, that nothing is more important than anything else. In other words, a man of knowledge has no honor, no dignity, no family, no name, no country, but only life to be lived, and under these circumstances his only tie to his fellow men is his controlled folly. Thus a man of knowledge endeavors, and sweats, and puffs, and if one looks at him he is just like any ordinary man, except that the folly of his life is under control. Nothing being more important than anything else, a man of knowledge chooses any act, and acts it out as if it matters to him. His controlled folly makes him say that what he does matters and makes him act as if it did, and yet he knows that it doesn't; so when he fulfills his acts he retreats in peace, and whether his acts were good or bad, or worked or didn't, is in no way part of his concern.

"A man of knowledge may choose, on the other hand, to remain totally impassive and never act, and behave as if to be impassive really matters to him; he will be rightfully true at that too, because that would also be his controlled folly."

I involved myself at this point in a very complicated effort to explain to don Juan that I was interested in knowing what would motivate a man of knowledge to act in a particular way in spite of the fact that he knew nothing mattered.

He chuckled softly before answering.

"You think about your acts," he said. "Therefore you have to believe your acts are as important as you think they are, when in reality nothing of what one does is important. Nothing! But then if nothing really matters, as you asked me, how can I go on living? It would be simple to die; that's what you say and believe, because you're thinking about life, just as you're thinking now what seeing would be like. You wanted me to describe it to you so you could begin to think about it, the way you do with everything else. In the case of seeing, however, thinking is not the issue at all, so I cannot tell you what it is like to see. Now you want me to describe the reasons for my controlled folly and I can only tell you that controlled folly is very much like seeing; it is something you cannot think about."

He yawned. He lay on his back and stretched his arms and legs. His bones made a cracking sound.

"You have been away too long," he said. "You think too much."

He got up and walked into the thick chaparral at the side of the house. I fed the fire to keep the pot boiling. I was going to light a kerosene lantern but the semidarkness was very soothing. The fire from the stove, which supplied enough light to write, also created a reddish glow all around me. I put my notes on the ground and lay down. I felt tired. Out of the whole conversation with don Juan the only poignant thing in my mind was that he did not care about me; it disturbed me immensely. Over a period of years I had put my trust in him. Had I not had complete confidence in him I would have been paralyzed with fear at the prospect of learning his knowledge; the premise on which I had based my trust was the idea that he cared about me personally; actually I had always been afraid of him, but I had kept my fear in check because I trusted him. When he removed that basis I had nothing to fall back on and I felt helpless.

I told don Juan that my conflict arose from the doubts into which his words about controlled folly had thrown me.

"If nothing really matters," I said, "upon becoming a man of knowledge one would find oneself, perforce, as empty as my old friend and in no better position."

"That's not so," don Juan said cuttingly. "Your friend is lonely because he will die without seeing. In his life he just grew old and now he must have more self-pity than ever before. He feels he threw away forty years because he was after victories and found only defeats. He'll never know that to be victorious and to be defeated are equal.

"So now you're afraid of me because I've told you that you're equal to everything else. You're being childish.

Our lot as men is to learn and one goes to knowledge as one goes to war; I have told you this countless times.

One goes to knowledge or to war with fear, with respect, aware that one is going to war, and with absolute confidence in oneself. Put your trust in yourself, not in me.

"And so you're afraid of the emptiness of your friend's life. But there's no emptiness in the life of a man of knowledge, I tell you. Everything is filled to the brim."

Don Juan stood up and extended his arms as if feeling things in the air.

"Everything is filled to the brim," he repeated, "and everything is equal. I'm not like your friend who just grew old. When I tell you that nothing matters I don't mean it the way he does. For him, his struggle was not worth his while, because he was defeated; for me there is no victory, or defeat, or emptiness. Everything is filled to the brim and everything is equal and my struggle was worth my while.

"In order to become a man of knowledge one must be a warrior, not a whimpering child. One must strive without giving up, without a complaint, without flinching, until one sees, only to realize then that nothing matters."

Don Juan stirred the pot with a wooden spoon. The food was ready. He took the pot off the fire and placed it on an adobe rectangular block, which he had built against the wall and which he used as a shelf or a table. With his foot he shoved two small boxes that served as comfortable chairs, especially if one sat with his back against the supporting beams of the wall. He signaled me to sit down and then he poured a bowl of soup. He smiled; his eyes were shining as if he were truly enjoying my presence. He pushed the bowl gently toward me. There was such a warmth and kindness in his gesture that it seemed to be an appeal to restore my trust in him. I felt idiotic; I tried to disrupt my mood by looking for my spoon, but I couldn't find it. The soup was too hot to be drunk directly from the bowl, and while it cooled off I asked don Juan if controlled folly meant that a man of knowledge could not like anybody any more.

He stopped eating and laughed.

"You're too concerned with liking people or with being liked yourself," he said. "A man of knowledge likes, that's all. He likes whatever or whoever he wants, but he uses his controlled folly to be unconcerned about it. The opposite of what you are doing now. To like people or to be liked by people is not all one can do as a man."

He stared at me for a moment with his head tilted a little to one side.

"Think about that," he said.

"There is one more thing I want to ask, don Juan. You said that we need to look with our eyes to laugh, but I believe we laugh because we think. Take a blind man, he also laughs."

"No," he said. "Blind men don't laugh. Their bodies jerk a little with the ripple of laughter. They have never looked at the funny edge of the world and have to imagine it. Their laughter is not roaring."

We did not speak any more. I had a sensation of well-being, of happiness. We ate in silence; then don Juan began to laugh. I was using a dry twig to spoon the vegetables into my mouth.

"How does a man of knowledge exercise controlled folly when it comes to the death of a person he loves?" I asked.

Don Juan was taken aback by my question and looked at me quizzically.

"Take your grandson Lucio," I said. "Would your acts be controlled folly at the time of his death?"

"Take my son Eulalio, that's a better example," don Juan replied calmly. "He was crushed by rocks while working in the construction of the Pan-American Highway. My acts toward him at the moment of his death were controlled folly. When I came down to the blasting area he was almost dead, but his body was so strong that it kept on moving and kicking. I stood in front of him and told the boys in the road crew not to move him any more; they obeyed me and stood there surrounding my son, looking at his mangled body. I stood there too, but I did not look. I shifted my eyes so I would see his personal life disintegrating, expanding uncontrollably beyond its limits, like a fog of crystals, because that is the way life and death mix and expand. That is what I did at the time of my son's death. That's all one could ever do, and that is controlled folly. Had I looked at him I would have watched him becoming immobile and I would have felt a cry inside of me, because never again would I look at his fine figure pacing the earth. I saw his death instead, and there was no sadness, no feeling. His death was equal to everything else." Don Juan was quiet for a moment. He seemed to be sad, but then he smiled and tapped my head.

"So you may say that when it comes to the death of a person I love, my controlled folly is to shift my eyes."

I thought about the people I love myself and a terribly oppressive wave of self-pity enveloped me.

"Lucky you, don Juan," I said. "You can shift your eyes, while I can only look."

He found my statement funny and laughed.

"Lucky, bull!" he said. "It's hard work."

We both laughed. After a long silence I began probing him again, perhaps only to dispel my own sadness.

"If I have understood you correctly then, don Juan," I said, "the only acts in the life of a man of knowledge which are not controlled folly are those he performs with his ally or with Mescalito. Isn't that right?"

"That's right," he said, chuckling. "My ally and Mescalito are not on a par with us human beings. My controlled folly applies only to myself and to the acts I perform while in the company of my fellow men."

"However, it is a logical possibility," I said, "to think that a man of knowledge may also regard his acts with his ally or with Mescalito as controlled folly, true?"

He stared at me for a moment.

"You're thinking again," he said. "A man of knowledge doesn't think, therefore he cannot encounter that possibility. Take me, for example. I say that my controlled folly applies to the acts I performed while in the company of my fellow men; I say that because I can see my fellow men. However, I cannot see through my ally and that makes it incomprehensible to me, so how could I control my folly if I don't see through it? With my ally or with Mescalito I am only a man who knows how to see and finds that he's baffled by what he sees; a man who knows that he'll never understand all that is around him.”

To be continued...

The Crack Between The Worlds

The Crack Between The Worlds is the new name for this blog. I've changed it many times so stick with me. :-) So, what does 'crack between the worlds' mean? I'll quote from my favorite author, Carlos Castaneda, on the meaning, listed below. Understand that these are quotes snipped from different books and they may not flow together very well. I tried to just get the 'gist' of the meaning in regards to the crack between the worlds. 

Perhaps I will add my own comments, but not at this time. 

"The twilight is the crack between the worlds," he said softly.

"The particular thing to learn is how to get to the crack between the worlds and how to enter the other world. There is a crack between the two worlds, the world of the diableros and the world of living men. There is a place where the two worlds overlap. The crack is there. It opens and closes like a door in the wind. To get there a man must exercise his will. He must, I should say, develop an indomitable desire for it, a single-minded dedication. But he must do it without the help of any power or any man. The man by himself must ponder and wish up to a moment in which his body is ready to undergo the journey.

"It is the door to the unknown."

Don Juan had also talked to me at great length about the crack between the worlds. I had always believed that he was talking in a metaphorical sense about a subtle division between the world that the average man perceives and the world that sorcerers perceive.

La Gorda and the little sisters had shown me that the crack between the worlds was more than a metaphor. It was rather the capacity to change levels of attention. One part of me understood la Gorda perfectly, while another part of me was more frightened than ever.

"You have been asking where the Nagual and Genaro went," la Gorda said. "Soledad was very blunt and told you that they went to the other world; Lidia told you they left this area; the Genaros were stupid and scared you. The truth is that the Nagual and Genaro went through that crack."

But the worst thing happened to you in Mexico City; there he pushed you one day and you went into an office and in that office you went through the crack between the worlds. He intended only to dispel your attention of the tonal; you were worried sick over some stupid thing. But when he shoved you, your whole tonal shrunk and your entire being went through the crack. He had a hellish time finding you. He told me that for a moment he thought you had gone farther than he could reach. But then he saw you roaming around aimlessly and he brought you back. He told me that you went through the crack around ten in the morning. So, on that day, ten in the morning became your new time."

"My new time for what?"

"For everything. If you remain a man you will die around that time. If you become a sorcerer you will leave this world around that time.

"Did he disappear like that, over a bridge?"

"Not over a bridge. But you witnessed how he and Genaro stepped into the crack between the worlds in front of your very eyes. Nestor said that only Genaro waved his hand to say good-bye the last time you saw them; the Nagual did not wave because he was opening the crack. The Nagual told me that when the second attention has to be called upon to assemble itself, all that is needed is the motion of opening that door. That's the secret of the Toltec dreamers once they are formless."

TMMK

The Warrior's Discipline - Conclusion

The Warrior's Discipline - Conclusion Part 5

I wrote the three parts of this thread with a considerable time span in between them. The purpose of these brief notes is the rendering of some philosophical/pragmatical results that have arisen after thirty years of work on the field of exploring awareness. During this period, some other persons were involved in my own learning. Some of those persons took separate roads at one time or another. A few of us still remain in the same line of work.

Here are the previous articles on this topic:

The Warrior's Discipline Part 1

The Warrior's Discipline Part 2

The Warrior's Discipline Part 3

The Warrior's Discipline Part 4

The Warrior's Discipline Part 5

Exploring awareness, or the Art of Freedom, is, as far as I can tell, an ever-changing field. Mutation, or perhaps evolution, seems to be its main component.

The idea of forums, message boards and Facebook groups have always appealed to me as a very interesting and fruitful option for the observation and discussion of topics in which we all share an interest. Furthermore, I find it very useful to find references in other people that could be sharing the same path.

During most of the 30-year period that I mentioned, my partners and I were not only alone, but isolated in some way.

We had very serious disadvantages in relation to our learning processes, disadvantages that proved to be, in time, too heavy a burden for some of us.

The most poignant dissonance between the object of our interest and our real possibilities was the absence of continuity. I am fully convinced now that a Nagual, or a man of knowledge, brings about this continuity to those that he/she leads into the unknown. The only problem is that a Nagual only works as such within the context of shamanistic lineages. The term "Nagual" itself is referred exclusively to this context.

We knew that we couldn't volunteer into that world from the beginning. The only abstract and logical possibility was, as far-fetched and absurd as it may seem, to create a sorceric unit among ourselves.

Thus, we opted for that very uncertain and dangerous way. One of us even acted as sort of an advocated "Nagual". The others, willingly or not, were forced to follow his steps.

This created a scenario in which the most dramatic and funny circumstances arose. Some of the members of this brave and sorry-looking "party" actually went into the unknown in one way or another several times, using any tool available that served this purpose.

The outcome was twofold. On one hand, we managed to create a living inferno that crushed our old continuity. On the other hand, we were forced to acquire at all costs and in quite a hurry, an unending sobriety. The practical results, in terms of enhancing our awareness, were however too insignificant in relation to the effort exerted in this regard.

At the end, some of us decided to continue on the same path for the sake of impeccability. Our bet was placed upon our intimate conviction that things would be solved by themselves, whatever the outcome.

Others took quite a separate road.

I can only account for those of us who decided to walk to the end of that path.

Our efforts in this sense were rewarded with a complete victory. Abstract forces beyond our understanding arranged events so that we could finally enter a true shamanistic realm. Only, this time, we did it from a lateral gateway. The timing in which the first seminar that I attended in Mexico City was held in relation to our energetic environment was, simply and plainly, magical.

The previous period and exercise was dissolved into a distant mist. We now behold it as an amateur shamanistic play, in which we handled very real and professional forces, so to speak. We emerged, by the skin of our teeth, alive and with a bonus. We did gather knowledge and sobriety. We learned many things. We are also certain, on the other hand, that the decision of our survival was taken in another realm, by abstract and impersonal forces.

The bonus is our absolute conviction of what we're doing now. We are absolutely convinced, even beyond death, that we will not return to the social order under any of its manifestations, whether they are disguised under a cloak of social or "shamanistic" syntax. To us, these out-of-context manifestations are but masks under which self-importance hides its face.

So, in this sense, the concept of shamanism has suffered a profound change in our view. We don't recognize the linear activity of Carlos Castaneda's reports anymore as a feasible option for us. We firmly believe that, if one were somehow subscribed to that stream of old shamanism, one would not have to ask the question of being there or not. In other words, we take very seriously the statement of Carlos Castaneda and his party regarding their position as the end of Don Juan's lineage. We also take very seriously his statement regarding himself as being the last Nagual of such lineage.

We don't know of any other lineages of sorcerers but from hearsay. We have read and discussed the written works of other self-appointed sorcerers.

And we haven't found anything that rings a bell in us.

When I say, "ring a bell" I am referring to pragmatical issues. We have, to the best of our possibilities, put to the practice some techniques or practical suggestions provided by these persons. The results have been very poor, to say the least.

Therefore, we don't recognize, at least for the moment, any other group of active Shamanism in the traditional sense. And, of course, we don't recognize the existence of "Naguals", other than Carlos Castaneda and Carol Tiggs, for any practical purpose. Nor do we view ourselves as a traditional part of their lineage in any sense whatsoever.

I already told you that we were involved in an attempt to enhance our awareness via traditional shamanism. I can assure you that we gave our very best effort. The results, I repeat, were not satisfactory in terms of the enhancement of our awareness.

Therefore, I find it very hard to believe that we all stand on significantly different battlefields. In the best of cases, we are a mass of very serious people with a dead-serious interest in freedom, whatever freedom means.

But we are NOT shamans.

Why should we be?

"Shaman" is a term that denotes a being of exception; it denotes alienation. I don't know, but it seems to me that, in a world of shamans, there are no more shamans. And the world is based upon the mass. The world is a consensus, a description. The power of that description is provided by its relative mass.

What I'm saying, in other words, is that the end of shamanism isn't necessarily a loss, but it could also mean an evolutionary step. And, if someone offers me a very healthy and delicious cake, I would be a complete fool if I insisted in eating it uncooked.

Again, we believe that shamanism has suffered a very powerful and definite mutation. To us, shamanism has evolved into something else, far richer and even more intriguing. To us, the gates of freedom are open now to anyone who wants to walk through them.

We have changed.

It IS possible.

Draw your own conclusions.

With a Warrior’s affection,

TMMK

P.S. - Here are the others posts in this thread:

The Warrior's Discipline Part 1

The Warrior's Discipline Part 2

The Warrior's Discipline Part 3

The Warrior's Discipline Part 4

The Warrior's Discipline Part 5

TMMK

The Issue of Continuity

 THE ISSUE OF CONTINUITY - The Warrior's Discipline Part 4

The Warrior's Discipline Part 1

The Warrior's Discipline Part 2

The Warrior's Discipline Part 3

The Warrior's Discipline Part 4

The Warrior's Discipline Part 5

The social order is an energetic phenomenon. It is something-in-itself. As such, it has its own set of rules and its own dynamics. To understand the social order, we must first scrutinize its gears, the tools that it uses to reproduce itself. 

We possess, as members of the social order, a continuity based upon three-time units and two space units. Past, Present and Future are the time units. Here and There are the spatial units. Around these five basic elements we build our world. 

They form an apparently dynamic unit that keeps all things in place for the purposes of what is known to man, also referred to as the "tonal". The only problem with this unit is that it leaves the issue of awareness out of the picture. Awareness, being a purely energetic phenomenon, deals with energetic issues, which are intimately related to a very different type of continuity in the case of human beings. 

The issues of death and life fit into this category. Our relationship with the universe at large and its deepest mysteries can only be upheld from the perspective of this other type of continuity. Death occurs always in a here/now environment. Death is never related to our ideas of the future, present and past. Nor is it to our idea of here and there. Death, as an energetic phenomenon, compresses all of our five measuring units into one. The energetic shock brought about by this is of such magnitude that our life force is dissolved, unable to keep our energetic fields together anymore. Such is death, as we know it, proven by the fact that, in spite of all our wishful thinking, the dead never return. We are composed of such a huge number of energetic fields that the probabilities for them to reunite again to form the exact same combination, the exact same being, amidst an infinite number of other possibilities, are simply and plainly inexistent. Therefore, it could be said that the phenomenon of Death is, in itself, a proposition to find a new continuity, related to its mystery and that of life. 

This continuity begins with acquiescing to the notion of a force that binds everything in the universe. A third, impersonal force that allows us as individuals to develop awareness. This binding force, the force of life, is Intent. After acquiescing to the existence of this impersonal force, or rather while doing it, we physically incorporate our role as aware beings. This is given in the form of a corporeal conviction that has to do with our perception. We are, first and last, perceivers. And what we perceive is the infinite, independent and eternal motion of Intent. Thus, the awareness of the ultimate phenomena, such as Death, brings about this new type of continuity to our lives. Continuity based in one single, dynamic space/time unit: The Here/Now. 

It must be noted that, although the first kind of continuity discussed, that of the social order, appears to be dynamic, it really is not. The circular motion that it adopts creates the illusion of movement, when in fact it is a very static whirl of events that repeat themselves under the surface. It's like the case of the Maelstrom, which possesses a rotator motion, but not translation. On the other hand, as long as we are able to recognize the independent existence of this abstract and impersonal force, the Here/Now continuity is, although apparently static, completely dynamic. It is this external force the one that plays, ever changing, like a river, its own abstract games and combinations. We are, then, just perceivers of this infinite, eternal and unfathomably mysterious motion. We are, in essence, unprejudiced witnesses. 

We are here, as Don Juan said to Carlos, to See and feel awe. A human being cannot survive without continuity. But we have to understand at all costs, if we are interested in these essential issues, that there is, in fact, another possibility for us in this regard. Anyone that fully adopts this type of essential continuity is, by definition, a man or woman of knowledge, a being who is going to die, a warrior, someone who walks the path with heart. Ultimately, and beyond all labels, this is the only legitimate human being. 

THE STRATEGIST 

The warrior's strategy is to become a strategist. This may sound truly idiotic, but in its simplicity lies the key that opens all doors. The social order's continuity, based upon five measuring units, creates a concrete world. In fact, concreteness could be defined as all those phenomena that deal with this type of continuity. On the other hand, the Here/Now continuity that defines a warrior, or a sorcerer, or whatever we want to call a complete human being, has to do with the abstract. Again, the abstract could be defined as all those phenomena that deal with a Here/Now continuity. So, in short, a warrior is an abstractionist. He/she reduces every single little event of his/her life to the last possible reduction. And, at this point, we always find one thing: energy. 

We live in a universe of energy, a universe that, first and last, is based upon an abstract continuity. Sobriety is, to a warrior, the exercise of abstracting. And when a warrior is confronted with the results of his abstractions, an infinite feeling of awe immediately replaces the remaining of the old continuity. The way we deal with our world in the social order could be defined as a circular, inefficient attempt of strategy. The highest peak of this attempt to deal with a concrete world is always the same: defeat. 

We appear to follow three basic steps in our interactions with the world as social beings. First, we plan; second, we fight for victory; third, whether we win or lose, we lose. The problem with this pattern of behavior is that none of its three elements bear a shred of efficiency for a being who's going to die. All they succeed in creating is an insurmountable feeling of boredom. This boredom reaches such levels, in time, that it has to come out in the form of absurd violence, which we exert upon our whole environment and ourselves. And the failure, as it was explained, has to do with leaving out essential elements of our existence, such as death. To a being who is going to die, concrete victories have no value whatsoever. Not in themselves, at least, for he knows that death will take all that is concrete away, dissolving it into utter nothingness. This is why, being our goal as concretely biased beings and the concrete victory, we are ultimately losers. The social order is defeat. 

The Here/Now continuity that defines a warrior is a quite different affair. First of all, a warrior includes abstract issues every time. One of these abstract elements is the awareness of death. As a being who's going to die, a warrior simply cannot seek concrete gaining. From the start, he aims at something else. The only issue of interest to a sorcerer, like Miles Reid said during the last seminar, is awareness. From awareness stems everything else. Therefore, since our awareness is intimately related to the feeling of abstract awe, a warrior aims at awe, and at the feeling of impeccability and elegance that also comes with it. This derives into a very peculiar inversion of things in the warrior's strategy. 

It turns out that, to a warrior, victory comes first. In other words, a being who is going to die has nothing to lose. Thus, whatever he does, victory is ensured even before the fight begins. Impeccability, within an everyday context, means exactly what Don Juan said: doing everything the best you can, no matter what. Here/Now. Stalking is the other side of the coin to being impeccable. An impeccable behavior, for some mysterious reason, liberates streams of awareness that fixate our perception of the world, providing clarity and efficiency. And this is precisely what is called "Stalking", to fixate our perception of the world in order to emulate the universe's perception of itself, which is clear and efficient beyond imagination. 

Then, after victory, comes the strategy. A warrior, through his impeccable behavior, stalks his whole world, starting with himself. He does this in order to recognize himself on the abstract mirror of Intent, which is the first stalker. In doing this, he finds the essential nature of his being. And finally, after victory and strategy, a warrior finds knowledge and awe. 

It could be said, therefore, that the only active part of a warrior's life is his impeccability. The strategy is to become a strategist, to be impeccable. Victory cannot be taken away from a warrior, since he simply cannot lose as a being who is going to die. And the reverent awe that knowledge brings to a warrior has to do with the interaction of the universe at large with his/her individual awareness. 

The warrior's discipline is, then, impeccability.

Here are the others posts in this thread:

The Warrior's Discipline Part 1

The Warrior's Discipline Part 2

The Warrior's Discipline Part 3

The Warrior's Discipline Part 4

The Warrior's Discipline Part 5

TMMK

Heart, Spirit and Solitude

HEART, SPIRIT AND SOLITUDE - The Warrior's Discipline Part 3

The Warrior's Discipline Part 1

The Warrior's Discipline Part 2

The Warrior's Discipline Part 3

The Warrior's Discipline Part 4

The Warrior's Discipline Part 5

I have the intimate conviction that a human being has an energetic frame designed to last united for millions of years. In other words, our natural and individual life-span is that of several million years of evolving awareness. To a warrior, the suggestion of human life as a fistful of decades of suffering and decay is an aberration. Fighting the forces that siege us means going back to our true nature. It's the way back home. Sorcery is not alien knowledge, rituals, strange practices. Life as we know it is, ironically and precisely, alien knowledge, rituals and strange practices.

Our mind is not ours; our routines are empty rituals designed to drain us of all our resources, and our ways of dealing with the world are, consequently, based upon the strangest practices. The heart is, simply and plainly, our connection with intent, the binding force that relates everything in the universe. Sorcerers also call this force Spirit. It is only natural that if we become aware of what we should have been aware in the first place, if those alien forces hadn't seized us; we will access our true nature and rightful knowledge. This is to say, if I become conscious of the very force that binds and relates everything together, I will know everything. I will always be at the right place at the right time. Why shouldn't I? Self-destruction only operates within the limits of the conspiracy of fear and pain. 

So, if all that takes is the unceasing use of our true nature, of our heart, to access total knowledge and freedom, why the hell don't we do it? Why do we stop and stumble once and once again? Yes, the forces that keep us under siege certainly don't give up. But this explains nothing, since its predatory nature is but the foundation of the conspiracy. They are not going away if we call them names or curse them. It is the conspiracy in itself that must be attacked. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link. As humans subscribed to the social order, we are those forces' accomplices. All of us are sick, remember? So, every sick person is an accomplice. Complicity will be measured by the intensity of the person's disease. 

A warrior on the other hand, is basically, someone involved in a true healing process. The dementia of the social order's disease tends to diminish in a warrior. He or she has reversed the inertia of events, the direction of his/her life. Sorcerers refer to this as "facing a new direction", facing time as it comes towards us, not as it goes away.

We are forced by the social order to behave in a certain manner and following certain patterns. Many of these patterns are just too strong for us to break. The point is to find the weakest link, a pattern that we can disassemble with the minimum possible effort. This is not laziness. Death is extremely, terrifyingly quick. So, a warrior must be very quick too if he/she wants to regain completeness before death gets him or her. 

Humanity is a feeling. It is imperative to understand this. Humanity is an idea, a sentiment, something-in-itself. It is a conviction that each one of us treasures, and which could be referred to with these words: "We are together, I belong with you". It is the compulsive necessity of worshiping the human inventory in order to feel like a part of something bigger than oneself, of a confraternity. This feeling, this compulsive need to belong is incredibly strong. It is not just a thought, but also an energetic phenomenon in itself of the most devastating force. This feeling is the social order. It is so powerful that we are ready to sacrifice anything, absolutely anything, to keep it going. In fact, we as a race are submitted to terrible pain every day in our blind effort to perpetuate this state of things. And when pain goes too far in an individual, we put him in a hospital, bury him, forget him as a being who died, and keep going. The human capability for suffering is both astounding and disgusting. 

However, this is the weakest link. And it is so because, even if we cannot escape the inventory of the social order, we can indeed escape the need to worship it. This worshiping represents our main energetic leak, the one that will eventually kill us, the one that keeps us in a perpetual slumber of saddening and unnecessary pain; the one that deprives us of our natural legacy: the awareness of those who navigate infinity. The antidote is, of course, the opposed feeling. We must breed a sense of loneliness, of not belonging, of solitude. To face infinity, you must turn your back on the social order, on your human fellowship. It is almost funny, a terrible irony that we refuse to do this in order to honor a sense of belonging, to avoid betrayal. And, in doing it, we betray the only possible thing that results honorable for a conscious being, the claim of his/her natural awareness. We betray our fellow humans in the very act of trying not to betray them, in betraying ourselves. 

Only from solitude does the heart operate. The warrior's discipline is solitude, because solitude is necessary in order to become aware of the binding force that holds the universe together. Solitude is not the goal, but the means to an end. And at the end, our rightful legacy, our nature, lies up there, in the sky. And the goal is awe, awe before infinity, before the unfathomable mystery. Look at your fellow humans, at the social order, at yourself. And then look up. Man is the only creature that looks up, searching for what is beyond the stars. We lost it, but we can take it back. It's up to us. Did you look? Now, choose.

Here are the other posts in this thread: 

The Warrior's Discipline Part 1

The Warrior's Discipline Part 2

The Warrior's Discipline Part 3

The Warrior's Discipline Part 4

The Warrior's Discipline Part 5

TMMK