Don Gogi, Stalker, Cygen, Slime: In principle, ChSV cannot tell me anything, because all these stresses are aimed at its destruction. Complete. Battle after battle. And this seems to me more effective than just lying on the couch and waiting until she suddenly understands her uselessness and leaves. Such a strange way of dealing with emergency situations has not been described by CC. (Unless, of course, you are in a position of ruthlessness. But KK placed his assemblage point in a place of lack of pity, ALSO WITH THE HELP OF STRESS)
That is, the question is how to more effectively deal with the emergency situation: lie on the couch and just wait (if it can be “overcome” at all like that (where is the actual fight here?!)) or fight it in battles and “cut off the head of a thousand-headed monster” behind your head"?!!!
Researcher: Well, you see, life pushed you to move to another city. She gives us all stress caused by necessity. Life stresses are part of the existence of each of us. And life stresses are the minimum without which the development of a person as an individual would cease altogether. BUT TRY TO FORCE YOURSELF TO ENTER INTO STRESS THAT IS NOT NECESSARY?!! And do it regularly. This is hardening. And about the stresses in life that were necessary, everyone here will give you a THOUSAND examples. Everyone has such stress in life. Simply necessity relieves stress. But these are battles. Battle is when you “do not act for the sake of a goal.” But for the sake of the Force. So you can forget about your life stories here - THIS IS THE NECESSARY MINIMUM.
Cygen: And those around us have nothing to do with it at all. It's a battle with yourself. And this is not a game with ChSV. This is an uncompromising fight against it.
Tensegrity: Of course there is adrenaline here. Just like anywhere there is fear. And in general, we were not talking about “insight,” but about increasing personal strength. About its accumulation in battles. What does “insight” have to do with it?
Stalker:
1) “sit on your head. . “And how do you build strength here? Or we are talking about different things. Energy can and can be gained in this way. BUT NOT PERSONAL POWER. Energy comes and goes. And your personal power is with you forever.
2) “And only in the storm does he see peace. . . "- AND WHAT ELSE IS THIS?!!
3) And so many emotions because such is the nature of force. Do you remember what KK writes about her?! “Personal power is a feeling. Something like a feeling of luck or happiness. You can call it a mood. A warrior is a hunter of power. »
“You must believe that personal power can be used and that it can be stored. »
4) “natural nutrition. . “- you are talking about energy again.
5) And about freedom, you simply didn’t find what to answer. So you brush it off. Is it hard to admit that you can’t accumulate will except in battles?!
Lord Orion: Well, I’m sorry, you actually wrote some kind of nonsense. Did you understand what you wrote? Nothing constructive. You write: “There is no strength in battle. . ". Let's conduct a public survey and ask: by overcoming your fear and your complexes, weaknesses in your battle, shouldn't a person become stronger?!!
You also write “Struggle is a struggle with meaning.” And I thought that I was fighting my fear, my anxiety. . .
Patient: Actually, fear is a thing that exists in many areas. In one area, for example, you defeated him, but in another, not quite.
Well, gentlemen. I look forward to constructive answers. (If there are any).
Bye!
Carlos Castaneda is an American of Peruvian origin, his cycle “The Teachings of Don Juan” tells about the years spent as an apprentice with an old Indian who learned the Truth, the relationship between matter and spirit, man’s place in the world and his interaction with nature. Castaneda's practice is aimed at teaching people not to go with the flow of their lives, but to become the helmsmen themselves, to directly influence surrounding reality and current events. A whole complex of practices is united by the term “stalking” - these are methods that give inner strength, increasing the level of energy of the neophyte, clarifying his consciousness. It is believed that all of Castaneda's followers are divided into two large groups: dreamers and stalkers. The magicians of antiquity, says the teacher, were fluent in both methods, but modern followers rarely reach this level.
What to practice according to Castaneda in order to compare with the magicians of antiquity?
The goal of any technique of the American guru is to get rid of personality, to erase one’s own “I”. This is best achieved through “recapitulation” - mentally returning to past events to pick up the energy left there. IN Everyday life It is recommended to practice “controlled stupidity” - every emotion, every experience is the action of our personality, to which we are in slavery. You need to get rid of passions, but imitate them so accurately that neither those around you nor yourself have any doubt that you really experience them. First of all, writes the American herald new era spiritual quest, you need to learn to be aware of yourself in dreams, this will be the first step along the Path of the Warrior. At night we do not control the matter of sleep. But this is a journey through an endless database, through embodied and potential worlds. The ancient masters, says Carlos, knew how to stay in this subspace for as long as they saw fit, so they could even travel between worlds. For the modern average person, it will be a feat to already learn to understand that he is sleeping. The next step will be to influence the fabric of the dream, the classic notorious flights of one's own free will and an instant change of scenery if the plot of the dream gets out of control. To do this, when you fall asleep, you need to focus your attention on your palms, try to look at them the smallest details. It just sounds simple, but in fact it takes neophytes weeks to master this basic exercise. Thus, through a dream, “from the inside out” of reality, one can influence front side, but there are others ways – Castaneda speaks of third attention, turning off internal dialogue, and managing the energy of intention. What can a person achieve who has mastered the art of the old Indian? Literally - everything. He becomes omnipotent. Moreover, he claims Carlos Castaneda, practice influencing your astral body, shifting the mysterious assemblage point that determines our perception, and other metaphysical exercises were the norm for our ancestors. Some of the magical practices of the ancients were transformed by Don Juan and his students, and this is how Tensegrity arose - the art of magical passes aimed at shifting the assemblage point and holding it in a new position.
Reflections
As one of the classics ironically said, a person consists of “heart and body,” and the former has always been the object of unflagging interest of philosophers, scientists and ordinary people. Firstly, the very fact of its existence raises strong doubts, because it is unprovable, and secondly, if the needs of the body are clear, then how to train and develop an abstract substance is a big question. However, there is such a need, and subconsciously everyone feels it. Otherwise the proposed practice, Carlos Castaneda was a pioneer of its kind, but not a unique phenomenon. Writers Richard Bach, Paulo Coelho, Vadim Zeland write about the same thing. Moreover, if you pay close attention to Eastern religions - Buddhism, Taoism, Shinto and others - it turns out that there is no secret sacred knowledge no, everything was said thousands of years ago. They all say in different words the same thing: at the center of your unique universe is you. It’s up to you to decide what it will be like, and we will just give you a weapon for this and teach you how to use it.
castaneda practices
Good afternoon, my readers. For a long time now I have wanted to open you to Castaneda’s “twilight gaze” or “vision” practice, and now the time has come to do it. In his books, Carlos Castaneda describes a special perception of reality, which he calls vision, but he doesn’t really tell how to develop it. I don’t use this practice now, since other, deeper forms of perception are available to me through lucid dreams.
Nevertheless, this is a basic spiritual practice that opens the first screens of illusions to the mystic and gives certain, completely specific opportunities. Having skillfully mastered the practice, you will be able to show people the boundaries of transcendental reality and creatures invisible to the ordinary eye. This practice is accessible to any natural mystic and acquirer of spiritual knowledge.
I will describe here not only the twilight gaze or vision of Castaneda, but also all the more complex methods of use that accompany it. Since the practice existed long before Castaneda, I am more accustomed to calling it “twilight gaze” and then you will understand why.
Having Maslow's pyramid of needs as the basic basis for the development of our body and mind, we find that for obtaining food and finding shelter, such things as seeing astral projection, emanations and energies were useless to people. Such matters were usually entrusted to one person in the tribe, who was called a shaman and who dealt with communication with spirits and Gods in the interests of the entire tribe. The rest of the people dealt with issues of physical well-being and survival. In those distant times, every person did what he had the ability to do. A person prone to violence became a warrior or a hunter, others became fishermen or farmers, and some became shamans.
Now mysticism in society is officially considered a safe and tolerable form of madness. Although modern mystics are not locked in a madhouse, they are nevertheless not taken seriously. So, if before it was very honorable to become a shaman and the parents of such a child were proud of his qualities, now they will be ashamed that their son or daughter does not go to work in an office in order to buy a Mercedes in twenty years, but instead is content with only the necessary material goods, while doing eccentricities. Therefore, although many of us have the ability to see a special reality, it is not developed and is practically not used from birth.
The practice of “twilight gaze” is quite real and it has disadvantages. For atheists and atheists who read my blog in order to catch me on schizophrenia, I will say right away that everything is scientifically substantiated for me, I am officially mentally healthy and at the end of the material, I will tell you what it looks like from the point of view of science. Now I will describe everything in order from a mystical point of view. I'll start with the formation of the twilight look itself in its basic form.
I will also note that it will be especially easy for mystics with poor eyesight, because they do not cling to forms and distances so much and their minds are more flexible in terms of perceiving images. I know of some shamans with whom I have crossed paths who have a real ability to show transcendental reality ordinary people and they all had poor eyesight. The practice works with good vision, but at the same time your eyes will hurt more and you will need to restore them with special exercises.
How to practice the twilight gaze or Castaneda vision
To master the basic skills, you will need to start with a simpler exercise called "vision of emptiness." To do this, sit in spacious room or better yet, in a city park.
It is advisable that no one disturbs you while doing this. Ideal place There will be a bench in the park, but in cold weather, you can limit yourself to the living room.
Practice does provide transcendental abilities, but it will require time and diligence on your part. If you want it quickly and immediately, then this is not the place for you. It took me about two years to fully master it, and the first results were already within a month. Everyone learns differently. There are geniuses of mysticism, whose soul in past incarnations had a lot of experience and such will master the practice quickly, and there are people with weak abilities, but with a certain diligence, they will also master the practice well.
Sit in a comfortable position and focus your vision on objects. The gaze should be directed straight ahead, just above the horizon. Usually we are accustomed to focusing our eyes on certain objects, be it a house, a bird, a person or a wall. Attention runs from one object to another and the mind is always excited. Calm your mind and focus your attention. It should cover the entire picture, without focusing on certain objects, but not a single detail should escape your gaze. A seeing practitioner is able to notice the slightest details and movements precisely because he is not attached to a specific object and his attention covers the entire picture.
Spend as much time as possible on this practice; experience decides everything here. Ideally, you should see everything that happens not only within the radius of your vision, but beyond its boundaries. Skilled shamans in this way are able to see what is happening behind them as clearly as what is happening in front of them. With the vision of emptiness one can see the energetic emanations of physical reality. You may have a headache at first because your brain has to process more information, but it will get used to it.
When you achieve tangible results in this practice, you can move on to the main, basic practice - the twilight gaze. To do this, you will need a medium or large mirror.
Sit indoors, opposite a mirror, and turn on your vision of emptiness. Your image in the mirror will begin to change and after about an hour you will see your astral essence or soul. She will begin to flicker in the image of a reflection. You may immediately see other creatures nearby, but don’t be alarmed, if they wanted to harm you, they wouldn’t wait until you saw them. The inhabitants of the astral world may have the most unattractive appearance, but have sufficient intelligence to renounce violence and aggression. In fact, you are more like the aggressor here, so calm your mind and watch the changes.
The second stage of the exercise is not just to maintain blurred vision, but to turn it into a big minus. Using a directed effort of the eye muscles, concentrate your attention as much as possible, try to increase the degree of defocus and its duration each time. Your eyes may hurt, but it’s not a big deal if you do the right exercises afterwards.
You will get a twilight look after the world around you transforms into something completely different. You will see not only energy beings, but also streams of emanations. Everything becomes darker than usual and that is why the practice is called twilight gaze. The ability to hold a twilight gaze for more than 20 seconds can be considered success.
If you have mastered this skill, you can congratulate yourself. This is a basic practice that opens up wide possibilities in mysticism. When using these techniques, starting with the gaze of emptiness, your internal dialogue should automatically turn off. If this does not happen, read my material: it describes working with internal talkers.
As for eye pain, in order not to spoil your vision, you will have to do additional exercises. In general, it should be done in any case if you spend time at the computer. It allows you to avoid vision loss even when working in front of a monitor for more than 10 hours a day.
Cut out a small 1 centimeter circle from a magazine or newspaper. You can just carefully tear it off. Stick the circle at eye level on the window, after wetting it. Next, close your right eye with your hand and look at the circle with your left for 15 seconds. After that, look out the window at the farthest object that you can clearly see for the same amount of time. Try to focus on it properly to work the eye muscles. Then close your left eye with your hand and look at the circle for 15 seconds, then move your gaze to a distant object for the same 15 seconds. Repeat the same for both eyes at the same time and continue from the very beginning for the entire series 4-5 times. It is recommended to carry out the exercise after every three hours at the monitor or after the above-described practice. It is advisable to do it regularly, at least twice a day, and this will preserve your vision or even improve it.
Now I will tell you how you can use the practice for purposes other than seeing emanations and energy.
Paired practice of magicians to transfer experience and knowledge. Practice seeing the astral essence
In ancient times, when communicating with each other, magicians sometimes used the twilight gaze to convey transcendental experience in a more effective way than verbal.
To begin with, so that you understand the approximate essence of the practice, I will tell you about the technique used by especially dangerous clans of killers in Japan and China, called “ninjas” or translated as “forest demons” with the goal of raising a real beast in a person. The child was being prepared for hard work assassin not only physically, but also spiritually.
The teenager was locked in a room with a tiger and he had to look the beast in the eyes for so long until he took on his animal nature. Weak individuals were eliminated in a certain way, being killed by a tiger, and the strong ones truly became like demons and deservedly bore this title.
The practice of magicians in pairs does not require you to expose yourself to such dangers and, moreover, only one of the two participants can be a magician. The second in this case will see the transcendental reality without the preparation to which the mystic subjected himself to mastering the twilight gaze.
Sit in such a way that it is comfortable enough for both of you to spend an hour and a half like this and not have to walk anywhere. You cannot interrupt your practice, so do everything in advance, turn off Cell phones and intercoms.
Many people played staring games as children, where you look your opponent in the eyes and you are not allowed to blink. The one who doesn't blink the longest wins. Here everything is different and you can blink, but looking into each other’s eyes without moving your gaze to other objects will take a long time, and talking is extremely undesirable. Have a good chat later.
Take this practice responsibly and if you doubt that you can sit for that long without turning away, then don’t start. So, you are still capable of this, then set the alarm for an hour and a half from the moment you start practice and stop looking into each other’s eyes.
A mystic who has mastered the twilight gaze can immediately turn on the vision of the void and sit like that for about thirty minutes. It's different for everyone, but your partner should stop giggling and calm down by this time. When you feel that your partner has approached the exercise responsibly, then after about ten minutes, change the vision of emptiness to a twilight gaze.
You will see the essence of your partner, and he or she will see your essence. If your partner is not a mystic, then what he sees will be a shock to him, so be understanding. His face will become frightened and serious and this will mean that your twilight gaze is real.
Continue the practice from time to time, to the best of your ability, including the twilight gaze. Indeed, this method is capable of showing the transcendental reality to ordinary people, but they will forget about what happened quite soon, so do not flatter yourself. Habitual patterns are more valuable to them than gold and silver; do not destroy them without mutual consent. At the end of the material I will write a scientific version of what is happening, and now the next practice.
How to get to another world. Power walk or transition to parallel reality
The two past practices are quite working and you can be convinced of this, but if they are relatively safe, then the next practice can bring irreparable consequences. I will give it to you, since it will not harm others, and what you do with yourself is everyone’s personal responsibility. This practice allows you to move between worlds literally and without exaggeration. By doing it, you move to another world irrevocably. Usually these are extremely similar and almost identical worlds, but the further you dive, the more dramatic changes may come.
This practice allows you to change your personal environment to a more comfortable one. By moving deep enough into other worlds, you will be able to receive the benefits and favors of those people who are interesting to you. You can improve your financial situation and so on. Objects and faces of acquaintances can change as the practice is repeated, and this often happens to those who have mastered the practice well. It has a significant disadvantage, so I abandoned this practice as soon as I received the selfish benefits that I wanted and understood the shortcomings of the method. First I will tell you the essence of the practice, and then its disadvantages.
Walking down the street or other area, turn on your twilight gaze with the clear intention of moving into a world where you have what you want to get. Or into a world where events have the development you need.
Create in your mind a strong intention to get what you want and at the same time turn on the twilight gaze. You should see the paths between worlds. They look like luminous paths. In other words, you will see your path and numerous branches from it. From the outside, people will see that you walk at an uneven pace, turn in strange places and zigzag like a drunkard. By turning on the twilight gaze and forming an intention, you will see branching paths and one of the many lines will be especially bright. Follow it wherever it turns, even if it leads into the forest or into a gateway.
Follow the bright line and then, having a strong enough intention and having practiced the twilight gaze, you will be able to move to other worlds. I think the way it works is that you exchange consciousness with yourself from a parallel universe. But considering that you will have to go through many worlds in order for reality to change in the right direction, for you from parallel reality, it won’t be a shock when you take his place, and he takes yours. In theory, you can go so far that in the end, you will be surrounded by completely different landscapes, even similar in their similarity to the worlds of fantasy works.
For me personally, Entrance door the apartment has changed completely and forever. So, once before practice it was covered with light foam rubber, and after practice it was already upholstered with dark linoleum. Moreover, according to my brother, it was always covered with linoleum. I've met people practicing similar methods who have had fancy new buildings or vacant lots pop up in their home area. In fact, the universe is limitless and everything exists in it, including an infinite number of options for the development of events. Nothing that the mind is capable of imagining cannot exist in it. Thus, having an infinite number of realities and probabilities, you can move between them. The practice does work, but it has a huge drawback.
Firstly, having received the necessary benefits, you leave the past world and its inhabitants forever, becoming a wanderer. Secondly, as far as I now have enough experience and understanding of the universe, it has levels. Each time, you only move down. Simply put, you fall into a world that is an order of magnitude lower and located closer to the very hell that is located at the bottom. Hellish worlds also have a level structure and you can dive to the most disgusting of the worlds.
This does not mean that you will not get what you wanted, just one day you will understand that in addition to material wealth or the person you need, you are surrounded by real devils. In any hell, the soul is able to find joy, but this does not change the reality. So, I really received certain benefits from this practice, which I did more out of scientific curiosity, but I didn’t order the war, but it began, and in my city, from which I now had to leave. I’m not going to dive further and will somehow cope with what I have. This is a theoretical argument and maybe I’m wrong, if you want, you can try it at your own risk and then tell me in the comments.
At the same time, check whether there is a Temple of the Way in the worlds at lower levels or if I took other paths there.
Now, as I promised the atheists, I will give a scientific version of what happens during the practices. The twilight gaze is probably a state of special meditative trance in which the shaman sees strong hallucinations.
During pair practice, when the shaman shows the transcendental reality to the common man, some kind of unconscious hypnosis probably occurs as a result of which the naive victim sees hallucinations.
As for the transition to other worlds and changes in the faces of friends and habitats, we are also probably dealing with irreversible changes in the cerebral cortex caused by deep trance. In a dream, a person often realizes that he is a completely different person and has a large supply of false memory. Considering that false memory is possible in a dream, it can replace the real memory of the mystic. The shaman, who found himself as a result of practice in Tolkien's fantasy world, actually lived in it always, but received a false memory that he lived in the industrial age of cities, cars and electronics.
I hope that this material will be useful to you. If you have any questions, do not hesitate to ask them in the comments below, the same applies to other materials on the site. As for pair practice, don’t even think about asking me. Yes, I can show the transcendental reality to any person, but I have been observing a vegetarian fast for a long time, communicating in lucid dreams with information entities, keeping myself energetically clean, and I don’t want such intimacy at all, especially for money.
I have described to you the powerful and at the same time basic practices of mysticism, use them wisely.
The essence of Castaneda's teachings is not easy to express in a couple of phrases. I read all his books (some more than once), and repeatedly successfully applied the practices described there. And to the question “What is the point?” Of course, I will give my answer. I will also explain the basic concepts of the teachings of this great writer. You just need to keep in mind that Castaneda’s works are multi-layered and multifaceted, any shortcuts will be a simplification.
Just magic
If you want simple, understandable answers, then it would be easier to say that the teachings of Carlos Castaneda are the transfer of magical knowledge and skills, the essence of which is to comprehend the Unknown.
But Carlos Castaneda himself never simplified to such an extent.
The teaching is presented in detail in the books of this author, the main characters of which are Carlos himself and his teacher, the Indian shaman Don Juan. Actually, the teachings of Castaneda are actually the teachings of don Juan. Throughout the action of all the books, the author is precisely a student - and far from the most understanding and capable.
The difficulty is precisely that it is impossible to perceive don Juan’s knowledge from the position of an ordinary person, guided by the usual logic and stereotypes. Everything don Juan teaches is magic in pure form, for the mind it is incomprehensible. This is not throwing fireballs or turning stone into gold - it has no material purpose. You could say it's magic for magic's sake. No not like this, this is magic for the sake of Freedom - in the broadest and even transcendental sense of the word.
Below are some of my thoughts on the veracity of Castaneda’s books, a list of books in chronological order and a brief summary of them. If you want a quick summary of Castaneda's teachings, skip straight to chapter
True or not?
It is unknown whether Don Juan actually existed. And if he was, how true is everything said about him in the books. After all, there he is a powerful shaman, capable of doing completely impossible things. He even manages to deceive death.
Castaneda tried to confuse everyone - it is impossible to accurately describe the events of his own biography, it is impossible to confirm or deny the very fact of his travels to South America, where basically all the action took place. And the personality of don Juan remains even more elusive for truth seekers.
I, like many skeptics, am inclined to think that Castaneda is one of the greatest mystifiers of all times, who managed to invent and describe in detail the world of magic, seriously and for a long time capturing the minds of millions of people. Thousands and thousands of followers preach his teachings and apply the practices described in the books. Carlos Castaneda definitely wrote his name in history.
The difficulty for those who seek to get to the bottom of the truth also lies in the fact that his books are not fiction, this is not a fairy tale that one wants to listen to with reverence and in which one wants to believe. No matter which translation you take of Castaneda, you will see complex, muddled language. This is most similar to documentary, to real notes from a person who has been faced with the incomprehensible for a long time and strives to master this incomprehensible. It seems that everything is written incredibly honestly - all the complexes, troubles, and fears of the author come to the surface.
Detailed (sometimes rather tedious) descriptions of magical practices, the meaning of which the author himself cannot fully understand, a detailed description of the sensations during these practices - all this was difficult to simply “invent.”
I see it as akin to poetry. I know talented poets who are able to write beautiful, complex poetry in a state of flow. They may contain words that the author does not even know. In fact, one of my friends writes excellent poems, but she sometimes finds out their meaning only when she looks on the Internet to “decipher” what she has written. Words from dead or rare languages may appear there.
There is also such a phenomenon as channeling, when people, using their brains, communicate with beings from the immaterial world, who can dictate entire volumes of their thoughts, as if without the participation of the person himself.
As I said, recently I have become a skeptic and I would say that all these texts come from somewhere, but I will only say that we still do not know the capabilities of our own brain, but it is capable of a lot. And even “inventing worlds” is far from the limit.
There are those who claim that everything described is simply hallucinations captured on paper, resulting from the use of psychedelic substances. But this is said either by those who have not read these books at all, or who have read only the very first ones, called “The Teachings of Don Juan” (1968) and “A Separate Reality” (1971). There the author actually describes the use of the substance mescaline, extracted from a cactus called “Peyote”. But in the same books it was repeatedly mentioned that for Castaneda these were a kind of “crutches” that accelerated the process of entering an altered state of consciousness, but which could have been completely dispensed with.
Skeptics' take on the life of Carlos Castaneda in the BBC film:
Books
Here I will give a list of Carlos Castaneda's books in order - in the chronology in which they were originally published and give a brief description.
"The Teachings of Don Juan" (1968)
Perhaps the most difficult work of Castaneda to understand.
If you want to get acquainted with his teachings, but you do not want to wade through the jungle
meanings and long strange descriptions, DO NOT start with this book.
In general, in my opinion, best book to start dating
with Castaneda is the ninth book in the series: “The Art of Dreaming”.
It is interesting that “The Teaching” is a dissertation on anthropology, which makes it easy to readobviously does not add.
The author, while a student at the University of California in search of information about medicinal plants meets an Indian from the Yaqui tribe, Don Juan Matus. A year later, don Juan tells the author that he has magical knowledge and that he chose Carlos as his student.
Having collected a significant part of the material from the shaman’s stories, the author understands that the only path to true comprehension of Knowledge is the experience of magical reality. This path leads to the acquisition of Power. Some of the helpers in this are the so-called “allies”, certain magical entities that you interact with. A warrior (a person who has taken the path of magic) comprehends this new reality and gains Power.
"Separate Reality" (1971)
The author is not ready to accept new reality, which did not fit into the usual picture of the world at all. After writing his first book, Carlos tries to forget everything he experienced. But a couple of years after the last events described in the previous book, he still returns.
Begins next stage magical training. Carlos is being reinitiated. We are introduced to a new character - another shaman, a friend of don Juan, don Genaro. A significant part of the book is devoted to the mental processes associated with “vision” - one of the superpowers that the author is taught. Carlos watches the so-called “peyote ceremony” and enters into a discussion with don Juan and his relatives (it’s funny that many of them consider the shaman to be just a crazy old man). They talk about magic and other things - even politics. Don Juan introduces Carlos to one of the key concepts of his teaching - Controlled Stupidity.
This book largely repeats what has already been described in the previous one - this is quite typical for Castaneda. He often returns to what he said and looks at it from slightly different angles.
In general, it’s worth saying that Castaneda’s books are endowed with some amazing quality: you can read the work for the tenth time in a row, immersing yourself in events and dialogues that seem to be well known to you, but each time you don’t exactly discover something for yourself. something completely new... No - you are amazed that it is as if you are reading certain passages for the first time. And this happens again and again when you pick up a book that has been read to holes.
“A Separate Reality,” just like the first book, will seem very difficult for a beginner to understand.
"Journey to Ixtlan" (1972)
The title of the book is an allegory told to the author by Don Genaro. Ixtlan in his story is the homeland to which a magician who has acquired Knowledge is trying to return. But it turns out that returning to the previous way of life, having become a different person, is no longer possible. Being in the old picture of the world, communicating with ordinary people who now seem like ghosts, becomes completely uninteresting.
The book describes the stages of the Path of the Warrior - a magician who hunts for Power. In search of her, Carlos travels with don Juan through the mountains of Mexico. Continuing to describe his training with his mentor, Castaneda talks about the practices of Stopping the World, Erasing Personal History and Dreaming.
Carlos tries his best to be a skeptic and explain the unusual things happening to him from a rational perspective. In the end, he still gives up clinging to the usual picture of the world and “stops the world.”
"Tales of Power" (1974)
One of the most interesting works masters
Don Juan teaches Carlos to enter an altered state of consciousness using the Stop. Carlos learns that magicians can be in two places at the same time by creating a double (Double). Don Juan also talks about Tonal and the Nagual.
Carlos's training is coming to an end and he needs to make a real leap into the abyss - together with two other students, he must jump from the top of the mountain. Don Juan and don Genaro themselves leave this world forever.
"Second Ring of Power" (1977)
Jumping from a cliff into an abyss, Carlos survived. He returns to Mexico and meets several of don Juan's students. He discovers the ability to leave his own body, continues to realize and remember much of what don Juan taught him... Everything goes towards Carlos taking on the functions of the leader of a new detachment of magicians.
"Eagle's Gift" (1981)
Carlos decides to become the leader of a squad of magicians, but things don't go very well. Students begin to remember events that did not exist in the world of habitual perception of reality. Castaneda quarrels with his charges. As a result, it turns out that Carlos cannot be a leader due to the unusual structure of his energy body.
The students leave Castaneda, and he himself heads to Los Angeles.
"Fire from Within" (1984)
Carlos is worried new stage- another revolution occurs in the perception of don Juan’s teachings. As the author shifts his Assemblage Point into a state of heightened awareness, he continues to recall events related to his training. The reader is introduced to the concept of Petty Tyrants, which provides the opportunity to view any negative situation as a learning tool.
"The Power of Silence" (1987)
Continuations of Carlos' memories, in which don Juan talks about his teachers, about Intention - the main force in the universe, about Stalking - the art of Warrior behavior in the ordinary world.
“The Art of Dreaming” (1995)
This book reveals techniques for entering a lucid dream and using it to travel to other worlds. Carlos's visits to other realities and meetings with their inhabitants - inorganic beings - are described. At the end of the book, the author meets with an ancient shaman - the Death Defier.
"The Active Side of Infinity" (1995)
This book is interesting because it does not contain not only the already familiar conversations with don Juan and magical practices, but also a description of the author’s life and work in Los Angeles - in conditions that are far from magical.
"Wheel of Time" (1998)
This is no longer a full-fledged work, but a collection of quotes.
"Magic Passes" (1998)
Here Castaneda describes the Tancegrity system of energy exercises. The origin and technique of performing magical passes is described.
It is also worth mentioning that in addition to Castaneda’s books, there are books by his students, known under the pseudonyms Taisha Abelar and Florinda Donner.
Basics of Castaneda's teachings
Basic concepts of Castaneda's teachings
Path of the Warrior- a way of living, the goal of which is to achieve complete freedom and endless awareness. This is the path from the world of imposed beliefs, values, stereotypes to the world of freedom. A set of certain life attitudes leads a person who has chosen the path of magic (“Warrior”) through life (“Battlefield”). A warrior who has passed the Path becomes a Man of Knowledge and reaches the highest degree of awareness. Infinite awareness implies that a person retains all acquired knowledge and continues to be aware of himself even when he leaves this world forever.
Unbreakable Intent- one of the key qualities that a Warrior possesses and without which it is impossible to achieve his goal.
“Intention is one of those forces that exist in the universe. Magicians call upon Intention and it comes to them. Intention paves the way to achieving a goal. This means that magicians always achieve their goals..."
Knowledge- the art of mastering Intention, searching for complete freedom, magic.
Personal Power- what allows the Warrior to move along his Path. Everything a person does is determined by the level of his Personal Power. We can say that this is a certain energy resource, which the magician can collect and accumulate in various ways.
Indulgence- V in a broad sense this is what replaces the action adequate to the moment. (for example, reflection, fear) Indulgence takes as much or even more Personal Power than is required to perform the action.
Sense of Self-Importance- one of the key problems that prevents the magician from achieving his goal. Castaneda describes FSA as a feeling of superiority over someone or something, the importance of oneself and one’s actions.
Controlled Stupidity- this is detachment from one’s “I”and the Sense of Self-Importance associated with it. Controlled Stupidity allows the Warrior to interact with society and its representatives.
Assemblage point- this is the point at which the perception of a living being is formed. Described as a rounded spot of intense luminosity at a subtle level. By shifting the Assemblage Point, the magician changes his perception (or moves to a different reality altogether) - he enters an altered state of consciousness, in which he is able to otherwise perform actions that are impossible for him in his normal state.
Not doing- a magical practice that involves performing absurd actions. Its goal is to move the Assemblage Point.
Stalkers And Dreamers- types into which magicians are divided depending on the magical practices performed.
Dreamers interact with the world through . With its help, they move between worlds, can be in different places at the same time, turn into animals and do other incredible things.
Stalkers interact with reality with the help of Controlled Stupidity. From the point of view of the average person, Stalkers do not do anything supernatural. For example, they can very naturally and believably play the role of a completely different person, easily negotiate with people and generally get what they need within the confines of normal everyday reality.
Dream is a practice known as Lucid Dreaming. According to Castaneda, however, this is a broader phenomenon. He distinguishes seven Dream Gates, which refer to the level of mastery of the dreamer. The fourth gate, for example, refers to the possibility, emerging from own body, travel to other places - that is, essentially Astral Flights in esoteric terminology.
Tonal- in fact, all the perception that a person can in any way voice and designate.
Nagual- everything that lies beyond any comprehension. Everything that is beyond the limits of reason and feelings. That which cannot be named or defined.
Castaneda also often uses the concept of Nagual in a different meaning: he is a teacher, a leader of magicians (Warriors), leading them to comprehend the unknown.
Energy body – a satellite of the physical body, which is a ghostly configuration that consists of pure energy. It has an external appearance (vaguely reminiscent of an egg), which can be seen by magicians (using, in fact, Vision) - a Glowing Cocoon.
Inorganic beings- beings in the form of formless energy fields with awareness.
Allies(Ollies) are inorganic creatures that inhabit the Earth along with organic ones, which magicians can use to deepen Knowledge and accumulate Personal Power.
How will Castaneda's teachings help in ordinary real life?
If you are not going to follow the Path of the Warrior for the sake of a not very clear goal, sacrificing your usual reality, without any guaranteed “benefits,” you should be wondering whether at least something from Castaneda’s teachings can be used in your everyday life. Let's say you're just interested in self-development. You don’t want to plunge into the wilds, but you want to learn some useful skills. Well, here's something for you:
Stop indulging!
The most obvious “usefulness” of Castaneda’s teachings. Here, it would seem, everything is simple: Instead of being afraid, worrying, or thinking a lot about any matter, you just need to take it and do it. Follow the path that you have chosen, no matter what. But in fact, we all engage in indulgence all the time. Carlos himself in his works is simply a source of uninterrupted indulgence. One way to avoid indulging is
“Don Juan to Castaneda: “Carlos, stop indulging - people are watching”” Joke
Stopping Internal Dialogue
It would be more correct to call it an internal monologue. It's just the flow of our thoughts. The theme of stopping the incessant “talking” in our heads is not new at all and existed long before Castaneda - mainly in Eastern spiritual teachings. It is obvious that 90 percent (or even more) of all the reflection that occurs in the head and accompanies our entire life is useless mental garbage that does not carry any constructiveness. It only wastes energy and distracts from the main thing. Getting rid of internal dialogue, at least for a while, can bring calm, clarity, and fulfillment.
The methods of stopping Internal Dialogue that Castaneda gives are unlikely to be mega-effective for beginners. Easier to use.
In any case, only regular training will bring tangible results. And you can start them right now, without Castaneda and without yoga. Just relax, focus on your breathing and take a few seconds to feel the silence and get rid of thoughts in your head. For the same few seconds - after all, the “talker” will immediately return to you. But if you do this regularly, little by little, calmly, without fanaticism, the effect will not be long in coming.
The Practice of Revising Personal History
Personal History is everything you know about yourself and your life. Castaneda's teachings presuppose its Erasure, and Revision is only a step towards this. But still useful. The complete Erasure of Personal History can be questioned. But many psychologists consider Revision to be a rather useful practice. What is she? This is remembering all the more or less significant moments of your life.
Moreover, you don’t just remember everything - you relive it all again, reproduce all your thoughts and feelings that took place during this or that event.
At the same time, you seem to remove the energy charge from everything you have experienced and return this energy to yourself. You can imagine and talk through this process. It makes sense to linger longer on strong, especially negative, memories.
Upon completion, if you did everything correctly, you will receive an unprecedented energy boost - a resourceful state.
The practice is long-term. You will have to devote many hours - or rather, even days - to this. You will have to use a pen and notepad to write down all the memories, dwell on each one in more detail, work through it carefully, take breaks and return to the starting point.
Before going to bed, I myself sometimes use the practice of reviewing the past day. I remember everything that happened to me that day, from waking up to the current moment. I also focus more carefully on the most significant and emotional moments. I remove the “energy charge” - for simplicity, I often accompany this with a deep inhalation and exhalation.
Important!
This practice can also be useful in the context of a separate event that just happened to you. For example, you had a fight with someone. You can become aware and practice Revision this event - regain the energy you spent, restore your calm, balance and continue doing your business.
Get rid of the Sense of Self-Importance
A sense of Self-Importance does not allow us to adequately perceive the world around us and ourselves in this world, and becomes the cause of resentment and irritation. HSV is comparable to such a concept as Pride. Although Castaneda interprets it somewhat more broadly. EHS gives rise to an overly serious attitude towards one’s thoughts, feelings and, in general, everything that happens.
Anxiety is accompanied by anxiety and fear of doing something wrong. In general, a huge amount of tension accumulates if you consider something important. This tension binds and prevents you from acting in a relaxed, impartial manner.
"I asked, meansIs it that he never acts sincerely, and that his actions are just acting.
“My actions are always sincere,” don Juan replied. —But they are not more, how acting a game.
- But after all Then absolutely Allwhat you do mustbecontrolled stupidity, -I was amazed.
Yes, t“Yes, it is,” he confirmed.”
The practice of Controlled Stupidity, when you treat what you do consciously and easily, helps to get rid of emotional distress. More precisely, you yourself choose how to relate to something. If, for example, something bad happened, you turn on awareness and choose for yourself exactly what you want to feel and how you want to relate to what happened: to experience grief, joy or indifference.
Constant practice of Controlled Stupidity allows you to treat life as a game and thereby makes life much easier.
Regular, calm awareness of the fact that you are mortal helps to get rid of emergency situations. Don Juan calls death the best adviser to the Warrior and calls to constantly remember it.
The listed practices relate to Stalking - essentially the art of interacting with everyday reality, according to the teachings of Castaneda.
Lucid dreaming
It makes sense to highlight them separately. Lucid dreams, i.e. Dreams in which you are fully aware of yourself and are able to control events, can enrich and brighten your life. However, it is hardly worth starting with Castaneda - he can frighten a beginner and instill considerable fear of the OS. If you want to do them, I suggest reading articles about.
It is worth saying that the very teachings of Don Juan in the light of Castaneda’s works sometimes look quite frightening. What are some inorganic creatures worth, capable of not only killing, but also kidnapping and locking up yours forever? thin body in their worlds. During the learning process, Carlos is almost always afraid of something, apprehensive, or at least perplexed. So, if you are approaching these books with a practical purpose, filter the information.
At the same time, Don Juan appears more in the form of a cheerful old man-provocateur, who constantly laughs at his incompetent student and plots all sorts of intrigues for him.
Bottom line
Despite the abundance of interesting philosophical opinions and magical practices, the essence of Castaneda’s teachings cannot be reduced to either one or the other. Yes, if you set out to find as many wise thoughts as possible, you will find them. If you want to engage in self-development, there are techniques here.
Just like there are mystical revelations, adventures, funny dialogues, although, I repeat, this literature can be called easy to read with a stretch.
There is a common saying that yogis often cite when they want to tell what the essence of their teaching is. They say that there is a Path and there are flowers that grow along this path. The flowers are wonderfully beautiful and smell magical. But they are not the purpose of the journey, they are only a kind of “bonus” to this journey. Moreover, it is not always present.
Also, the magical world described by Castaneda, with movements in space and between worlds, with transformations into animals, with communication with incredible creatures - these are the same “flowers”.
All these incredible possibilities and superpowers attract the average person. Especially if his reality is gray and ordinary. He strives into this magical world, sometimes collecting along the way everything that Castaneda warned against, further increasing his Sense of Self-Importance, boasting of his achievements (to himself and others), indulging at every step,
According to Castaneda, the ultimate goal of the path is Freedom. Including freedom from the need for self-affirmation, recognition, consolation. The Warrior's path is always uncertainty and loneliness.
All magical practices can, with some degree of convention, be divided into two groups:
1. First group - these are practices for preserving, extracting, saving, multiplying and distributing the energy necessary to move the assemblage point (AP). The need for such techniques arose due to the fact that the assemblage point of an ordinary person is firmly fixed in one specific position, corresponding to the perception of the ordinary everyday world, and in order to move it to another position, a colossal supply of energy (personal strength) is needed.
2. Second group - These are techniques for controlled shifting of the assemblage point and holding it in a new position.
Stopping internal dialogue.
Internal dialogue — a way of holding the assemblage point in a position that corresponds to the perception of the ordinary human world. Constant internal chatter takes up most of a person’s free energy. By stopping the internal dialogue, a person, firstly, gets the opportunity to move his assemblage point from a rigid fixation, and secondly — releases a large number of energy. But since internal dialogue has been our habit since early childhood, it cannot be stopped with just one desire: for this there are various techniques, basically boiling down to not doing anything in his different forms. Some of them are listed below.
NOT-Doing.
Non-doing can include focusing attention on objects of the daily world, which are usually outside the scope of normal attention, and, accordingly, perception and awareness. To those elements that do not make up our daily picture of the world. For example, instead of observing objects, you can examine their shadows, not leaves, but the gaps between the leaves, until a new picture emerges.
Non-doing can be practiced by performing any action or inaction that is not included in the standard inventory —
for example, by doing normal actions in an unusual way. This is what one of the ways of not walking looks like (“Tales of Strength,” words by JH): “By bending his fingers in a special way, the warrior draws attention to his hands; then, directing his defocused gaze to a point directly in front of him above the horizon, he literally floods his tonal with information. The tonal, without one-on-one interaction with the elements of description, is unable to talk to itself and therefore becomes silent."
The Right Way of Walking.
This is a movement with curled fingers and attention on the hands, in which you need to direct your gaze forward, without specifically focusing on anything, in order to see the entire space in front of you at the same time. This method “overwhelms” the tonal’s attention with information, and it turns out to be unable to maintain the connection between the elements of the world. This slows down the internal dialogue, and the tonal becomes silent.
Contemplation (Gazing).
A special technique, a “way of looking” without focusing on any one part of what is visible. When you contemplate, you see everything... and nothing in particular. Contemplation can be used in the practice of “not doing”, for example, by looking at a tree, a person creates this tree — finds its trunk, branches, leaves, i.e. records those key elements, of which, according to his experience, a TREE should consist. In the practice of “contemplation,” one can look not at the leaves themselves, but at the gaps between them, not at the branches, but at the space limited by these branches. Thus, a kind of “ghost tree”, “donut hole” is obtained. Such things are not allocated special descriptive structures in the human inventory list, so the usual course of internal dialogue changes, which in itself shifts the Assemblage Point (AP).
Lucid dreaming OS (Dreaming).
The practice of using the natural shift of the TS (assemblage point) that occurs during sleep. Lucid dreaming is the ability to perceive new worlds. Gives the warrior the ability to perform incredible actions in the world of dreams. In order to start practicing OS, you need not only a supply of Personal Power (PS), but also a lot of patience. Without a certain supply of drugs, a person will not be able to enter a lucid dream. Dream — practically the only conditionally safe (as far as one can even talk about safety in magic) way of entering other worlds. In addition, OS — this is a kind of training ground where you can learn to control intention, since in dreams nothing (except the creatures present there) has own strength and will. For example, when shooting from a gun in a dream, you cannot be sure that the bullet will fly out of the barrel at all, since there it is driven only by the intention of the shooter, and not by the “power of gunpowder.” In magic, mastering the art of dreaming has its practical significance — through it it is possible to both influence another person and obtain the necessary information about something.
Getting rid of the feeling of self-importance and self-pity ChSV-ChSZH (Losing Self-Importance).
One of the key aspects without which any spiritual growth is hardly possible. Getting rid of ChSV, ChSZh — this is the awareness that we have the habit of feeling sorry for ourselves in order to reduce and then completely eradicate this habit. Conceit, a sense of self-importance — one of the main energy “anchors” of the assemblage point. Just as internal dialogue deprives the assemblage point of mobility, so the sense of self-importance absorbs almost all of a person’s free energy. Self-importance is multifaceted and pervasive, and its elimination — is far from an easy task. The KK books talk about this in sufficient detail.
Action without connection to the result.
An action is performed not for the sake of achieving something, but for the sake of the action itself. In Castaneda’s books, a lot is written about the so-called “impeccability of a warrior.” Doing for the sake of action, moving for the sake of the path, and so on.
Erasing personal history.
With the help of practices of erasing personal history, the “traces” left in the world are removed. This makes war inaccessible and makes it possible to free oneself from the traps of other people's attention. These techniques help release feelings of self-importance and self-pity. A person is connected with the world and society by thousands of threads. As a rule, a person has many destructive attachments — to people of the past, memories, some social connections. The destruction of ties to the outside world helps to achieve impeccability and freedom and makes war inaccessible to the attention of others.
Erasing personal history (PHE) is usually practiced using the following techniques:
REVIEW (Recapitulation).
A technique that allows you to plunge into and relive the events of the past (up to the prenatal period) and take back your strength left in those events. It is best practiced in a dark, compressed space along with proper breathing. In fact, the technique is used to release power that is captured by the world. In addition to Castaneda’s books, the technique is described in great detail in V. Sanchez’s book “The Toltec Way. Recapitulation".
Disrupting the Routines of Life.
Stopping “schematic” behavior begins first of all with eliminating habits. Habits — this is what allows death to track us. Patterns of behavior are, as a rule, determined by the presence of a personal history and are a means of maintaining and creating it. Thus, the destruction of everyday habits — it is not making a personal story and a way of remaining inaccessible to the world. We highly recommend subscribing to a free seminar on the topic of breaking free from habits (you can subscribe to it on the main page of our website below).
Assuming Responsibility.
It involves awareness of full responsibility for one’s own actions and results, instead of wasting energy on searching for supposedly objective reasons that prevented one from performing correctly (or not performing) certain actions (that is, indulgence). Acceptance of responsibility for every action committed in this world, renunciation of all regrets about its commission and acceptance of any of its consequences; refusal of any excuses and self-justifications for any reason. This technique helps to eradicate the habit that people have of blaming others for their problems.
Stalking.
1. Fixation of the vehicle in the current position, providing a stable perception of the world, which is specific to this particular position of the vehicle.
2. The practice of “noticing yourself” in all states of consciousness, whether in “everyday life”, in dreams or anywhere. The stalker uses the world of everyday life as a hunting ground. Essentially stalking — a way to remain unavailable in the world, but still achieve your goals. Although in the generally accepted sense, a warrior practicing stalking has no goals, since the warrior applies controlled stupidity to everything without exception.
Controlled Folly.
Stalking in practical application. Since the “man of knowledge” understands that there is nothing that is more important than something else —
through controlled stupidity he acts as if it matters.
The man of knowledge “sees” and knows that there is not one thing that is more important than any other thing; he has only his controlled stupidity, and he acts without expecting a result, practicing controlled stupidity. In other words, controlled stupidity —
This is the non-doing of everyday ordinary behavior in a social environment, and at the same time it does not matter at all whether the practitioner is a seer or not.
Using Death as an Advisor.
Treat every action as if it were your last battle. It doesn't matter if you win this battle or lose —
act without ever lowering your hand. This method replaces the usual “advisor” for a person, which is self-pity.
The greatest hunter in this world —
death. She can touch each of us on the shoulder at any moment. Therefore, the most reasonable course of action —
approaching each of your actions as if it were the last battle. Actions prompted by death as an advisor are filled with power. By practicing the above techniques, a person gets the opportunity to enter the mood of a warrior.
You're just filled to the brim with all sorts of nonsense! —
he exclaimed.
The only truly wise adviser we have is death. Every time you feel, as often happens to you, that everything is going very badly and you are on the verge of complete collapse, turn to the left and ask your death if this is so. And your death will answer that you are wrong, and that apart from its touch there is nothing that really matters. Your death will say: “But I haven’t touched you yet!”
Mood of a Warrior.
Steady retention of the assemblage point in a position in which there is no self-pity, but impeccability. This position of the vehicle is called “Place Without Pity”.
Realizing his Death as an “adviser” who can touch your shoulder at any moment, the warrior treats every action as if it were his last. —
like the last battle on this earth. These techniques help to accumulate energy without wasting it, as is common among ordinary people, and gives the maximum possible, in specific situation, opening of channels of perception. Stalking helps strengthen and maintain the mood of war.
