(nemo) I post these excerpts from CC's books and this sermon from The reverend Lawrence M. Krauss to show the importance of intent. The known unknown and the unknowable are in play here, as he talks, he never strays into the field of action of what attention can do to emanations at large, or does not talk in terms of awareness or attention at all, but he has drawn for us the boundaries of the band of man as a scientist.
Lawrence M. Krauss (2014) "Universe from NOTHING!"
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<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/sbsGYRArH_w" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>From the book magical passes
I asked don Juan on another occasion something that had been bothering me for a long time. He had
stated that the sorcerers of ancient Mexico discovered the magical passes, which were some sort of hidden
treasure, placed in storage for man to find. I wanted to know who would put something like that in storage
for man. The only idea that I could come up with was derived from Catholicism. I thought of God doing it,
or a guardian angel, or the Holy Spirit.
"It is not the Holy Spirit," he said, "which is only holy to you, because you're secretly a Catholic. And
certainly it is not God, a benevolent father as you understand God. Nor is it a goddess, a nurturing mother,
watching over the affairs of men, as many people believe to be the case. It is rather an impersonal force that
has endless things in storage for those who dare to seek them. It is a force in the universe, like light or
gravity. It is an agglutinating factor, a vibratory force that joins the conglomerate of energy fields that
human beings are into one concise, cohesive unit. This vibratory force is the factor that doesn't allow the
entrance or the exit of energy from the luminous ball.
The fire from within
He said that the Eagle’s emanations are an immutable thing initself, which engulfs everything that
exists, the knowable and the unknowable.
„There is no way to describe in words what the Eagle’s emanations really are,” don Juan continued.
„A seer must witness them.”
„Have you witnessed them yourself, don Juan?”
„Of course I have, and yet I can’t tell you what they are. They are a presence, almost a mass of
sorts, a pressure that creates a dazzling sensation. One can catch only a glimpse of them, as one can
catch only a glimpse of the Eagle itself.”
„Would you say, don Juan, that the Eagle is the source of the emanations?”
„It goes without saying that the Eagle is the source of its emanations.”
„I meant to ask if that is so visually.”
„There is nothing visual about the Eagle. The entire body of a seer senses the Eagle. There is
something in all of us that can make us witness with our entire body. Seers explain the act of seeing
the Eagle in very simple terms: because man is composed of the Eagle’s emanations, man need
only revert back to his components. The problem arises with man’s awareness; it is his awareness
that becomes entangled and confused. At the crucial moment when it should be a simple case of
the emanations acknowledging themselves, man’s awareness is compelled to interpret. The result is
a vision of the Eagle and the Eagle’s emanations. But there is no Eagle and no Eagle’s emanations.
What is out there is something that no living creature can grasp.”
From magical passes again
The shamans of ancient Mexico, according to don Juan, described intent as a perennial force that
permeates the entire universe—a force that is aware of itself to the point of responding to the beckoning or
to the command of shamans. By means of intent, those shamans were capable of unleashing not only all the
human possibilities of perceiving, but all the human possibilities of action. Through intent, they realized the
most far-fetched formulations.
Don Juan taught me that the limit of man's capability of perceiving is called the band of man, meaning
that there is a boundary that marks human capabilities as dictated by the human organism. These boundaries
are not merely the traditional boundaries of orderly thought, but the boundaries of the totality of resources
locked within the human organism. Don Juan believed that these resources are never used, but are kept in
situ by preconceived ideas about human limitations, limitations that have nothing to do with actual human
potential.
Don Juan stated, as categorically as he was able to, that since perceiving energy as it flows in the
universe is not arbitrary or idiosyncratic, seers witness formulations of energy that happen by themselves
and are not molded by human interference. Thus, the perception of such formulations is, in itself and by
itself, the key that releases the locked-in human potential that ordinarily has never entered into play. In
order to elicit the perception of those energetic formulations, the totality of human capabilities to perceive
has to be engaged.
From the Power of Silence:
Juan had maintained in the past that my knowledge and control of intent were not adequate to
withstand the impact of that sight. He had explained that normal perception occurs when intent,
which is pure energy, lights up a portion of the luminous filaments inside our cocoon, and at the
same time brightens a long extension of the same luminous filaments extending into infinity outside
our cocoon. Extraordinary perception, seeing, occurs when by the force of intent, a different cluster
of energy fields energizes and lights up. He had said that when a crucial number of energy fields
are lit up inside the luminous cocoon, a sorcerer is able to see the energy fields themselves.
On another occasion don Juan had recounted the rational thinking of the early sorcerers. He told me
that, through their seeing, they realized that awareness took place when the energy fields inside our
luminous cocoon were aligned with the same energy fields outside. And they believed they had
discovered alignment as the source of awareness.
Upon close examination, however, it became evident that what they had called alignment of the
Eagle's emanations did not entirely explain what they were seeing. They had noticed that only a
very small portion of the total number of luminous filaments inside the cocoon was energized while
the rest remained unaltered. Seeing these few filaments energized had created a false discovery.
The filaments did not need to be aligned to be lit up, because the ones inside our cocoon were the
same as those outside. Whatever energized them was definitely an independent force. They felt
they could not continue to call it awareness, as they had, because awareness was the glow of the
energy fields being lit up. So the force that lit up the fields was named will.
Don Juan had said that when their seeing became still more sophisticated and effective, they
realized that will was the force that kept the Eagle's emanations separated and was not only
responsible for our awareness, but also for everything in the universe. They saw that this force had
total consciousness and that it sprang from the very fields of energy that made the universe. They
decided then that intent was a more appropriate name for it than will. In the long run, however, that
name proved disadvantageous, because it does not describe its overwhelming importance nor the
living connection it has with everything in the universe.
Don Juan had asserted that our great collective flaw is that we live our lives completely
disregarding that connection. The busyness of our lives, our relentless interests, concerns, hopes,
frustrations, and fears take precedence, and on a day-to-day basis we are unaware of being linked to
everything else.
Don Juan had stated his belief that the Christian idea of being cast out from the Garden of Eden
sounded to him like an allegory for losing our silent knowledge, our knowledge of intent. Sorcery,
then, was a going back to the beginning, a return to paradise.
In a calm voice don Juan told me that for the very first time in my life I had seen the spirit, the
force that sustains the universe. He emphasized that intent is not something one might use or
command or move in any way - nevertheless, one could use it, command it, or move it as one
desires. This contradiction, he said, is the essence of sorcery. To fail to understand it had brought
generations of sorcerers unimaginable pain and sorrow. Modern-day naguals, in an effort to avoid
paying this exorbitant price in pain, had developed a code of behavior called the warrior's way, or
the impeccable action, which prepared sorcerers by enhancing their sobriety and thoughtfulness.
Don Juan explained that at one time in the remote past, sorcerers were deeply interested in the
general connecting link that intent has with everything. And by focusing their second attention on
that link, they acquired not only direct knowledge but also the ability to manipulate that knowledge
and perform astounding deeds. They did not acquire, however, the soundness of mind needed to
manage all that power.
So in a judicious mood, sorcerers decided to focus their second attention solely on the connecting
link of creatures who have awareness. This included the entire range of existing organic beings as
well as the entire range of what sorcerers call inorganic beings, or allies, which they described as
entities with awareness, but no life as we understand life. This solution was not successful either,
because it, too, failed to bring them wisdom.
In their next reduction, sorcerers focused their attention exclusively on the link that connects
human beings with intent. The end result was very much as before.
Then, sorcerers sought a final reduction. Each sorcerer would be concerned solely with his
individual connection. But this proved to be equally ineffective.
He asserted that all modern-day sorcerers have to struggle fiercely to gain soundness of mind. A
nagual has to struggle especially hard because he has more strength, a greater command over the
energy fields that determine perception, and more training in and familiarity with the intricacies of
silent knowledge, which is nothing but direct contact with intent.
Examined in this way, sorcery becomes an attempt to reestablish our knowledge of intent and
regain use of it without succumbing to it. And the abstract cores of the sorcery stories are shades of
realization, degrees of our being aware of intent.
