Soma
Tools of the Path => Toltec [Public] => Topic started by: Michael on July 15, 2006, 11:13:35 AM
-
"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 maked 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."
cc
-
"When confronted by the unfathomable, a warrior either makes a joke about it or he takes it seriously, and it destroys him."
DJM
-
What makes us unhappy is to want. Yet if we would learn to cut our wants to nothing, the smallest thing we'd get would be a true gift. To be poor or wanting is only a thought; and so is to hate, or to be hungry, or to be in pain. They are only thoughts for me now, I have accomplished that feat. The power to do that is all we have, mind you, to oppose the forces of our lives; without that power we are dregs, dust in the wind.
DJ ASR
-
By the time knowledge becomes a frightening affair the man also realizes that death is the irreplaceable partner that sits next to him on the mat. Every bit of knowledge that becomes power has death as its central force. Death lends the ultimate touch and whatever is touched by death indeed becomes power.
A man who follows the paths of sorcery is confronted with imminent annihilation every turn of the way, and unavoidably he becomes keenly aware of his death. Without the awareness of death he would be only an ordinary man involved in ordinary acts. He would lack the necessary potency, the necessary concentration that transforms one's ordinary time on earth into magical power.
DJ ASR
-
I'm so far away from the sky where I was born. Immense nostalgia invades my thoughts. Now I am so alone and sad like a leaf in the wind, sometimes I want to weep, sometimes I want to laugh with longing.
~Don Juan Matus
-
One of my faves!!
-
Me too!
me too
:-*
-
Feeling Offended
"A warrior could be injured but not offended," he said. "For a
warrior there is nothing offensive about the acts of his fellow men
as long as he himself is acting within the proper mood.
"The other night you were not offended by the lion. The fact that
it chased us did not anger you. I did not hear you cursing it, nor
did I hear you say that he had no right to follow us. It could have
been a cruel and malicious lion for all you know. But that was not a
consideration while you struggled to avoid it. The only thing that
was pertinent was to survive. And that you did very well.
"If you would have been alone and the lion had caught up with you
and mauled you to death, you would have never even considered
complaining or feeling offended by its acts."
The Mood of a Warrior
JOURNEY TO IXTLAN
Carlos Castaneda
-
The conditions of a solitary bird are five:
The first, that it flies to the highest point;
the second, that it does not suffer for company,
not even of its own kind;
the third, that it aims its beak to the skies;
the fourth, that it does not have a definitive color;
the fifth, that it sings softly.
San Juan de la Cruz
'Dichos de Luz y Amor'
(from Carlos Castaneda, 'Tales of Power')
-
Sadness, for sorcerers, is not personal. It is not quite sadness. It's a wave of energy that comes from the depths of the cosmos, and hits sorcerers when they are receptive, when they are like radios, capable of catching radio waves. The sorcerers of olden times, who gave us the entire format of sorcery, believed that there is sadness in the universe, as a force, a condition, like light, like intent, and that this perennial force acts especially on sorcerers because they no longer have any defensive shields. They cannot hide behind their friends or their studies. They cannot hide behind love, or hatred, or happiness, or misery. They can't hide behind anything.
The condition of sorcerers is that sadness, for them, is abstract. It doesn't come from coveting or lacking something, or from self-importance. It doesn't come from me. It comes from infinity.
The Active Side of Infinity
Carlos Castaneda
-
It's a wave of energy that comes from the depths of the cosmos, The condition of sorcerers is that sadness, for them, is abstract. It doesn't come from coveting or lacking something, or from self-importance. It doesn't come from me. It comes from infinity.
The Active Side of Infinity
Carlos Castaneda
Thanks for this V
-
I get into a lot of trouble for this sadness thing - I love sadness.
Julie says it's because i had a happy childhood, that sadness for me holds no scared memories, so for me its 'OK' to let myself go into it. i think there is some truth in this.
Anyway, I do love instruments like the duduk and the oboe. I can sink into that universal sadness at the drop of a hat, as Julie says, perhaps because for me, it does not have personal demons waiting in the darkness. only archetypal demons.
-
I don't have the time to be sad.
I can't remember the last time I was. :'(
-
I get into a lot of trouble for this sadness thing - I love sadness.
I get ino the sadness thing lately too.
Sometimes it lasts a couple days and then I beat myself up
mostly because there doesn't seem to be any reason.
I can't figure out why the deep sadness as it's not sadness over any particular thing.
It just is. It's like it comes from somewhere outside of me.
-
I'm with Lori and m -- this sadness is a force, and it is almost sweet. It seems disconnected with issues of self, really -- a rather floating, global thing...
~the artist/writer/musician's friend...
-
We don't need anyone to teach us sorcery, because there is really nothing to learn. What we need is a teacher to convince us that there is incalculable power at our fingertips. What a strange paradox! Every warrior on the path of knowledge thinks, at one time or another, that he's learning sorcery, but all he's doing is allowing himself to be convinced of the power hidden in his being, and that he can reach it.
The Power of Silence
Carlos Castaneda
-
We don't need anyone to teach us sorcery, because there is really nothing to learn. What we need is a teacher to convince us that there is incalculable power at our fingertips. What a strange paradox! Every warrior on the path of knowledge thinks, at one time or another, that he's learning sorcery, but all he's doing is allowing himself to be convinced of the power hidden in his being, and that he can reach it.
The Power of Silence
Carlos Castaneda
I used a part of that quote in my book, like this.
"We don't need anyone to teach us sorcery, because there is really nothing to learn. What we need is a teacher to convince us that there is incalculable power at our fingertips."
"So it is this you have tried to convince me of, I asked."
Yes, said Don Juan, and I was as hard to convince as you are."
-
What we need is a teacher to convince us that there is incalculable power at our fingertips.[/i]"
what i need, moreso than someone to teach me
is to really believe it myself
(and to not forget) 8)
-
The self-confidence of a warrior is not the self-confidence of the average man. The average man seeks certainty in the eyes of the onlooker and calls that self-confidence. The warrior seeks impeccability in his own eyes and calls that humbleness. The average man is hooked to his fellow men, while the warrior is hooked only to himself. You're after the self-confidence of the average man, when you should be after the humbleness of a warrior. The difference between the two is remarkable. Self-confidence entails knowing something for sure; humbleness entails being impeccable in one's actions and feelings.
CC Tales of Power
-
It doesn't matter what anybody says or does. You must be an impeccable man yourself. The fight is right here in this chest. It takes all the time and all the energy we have to conquer the idiocy in us. And that's what matters. The rest is of no importance. To be an impeccable warrior will give you vigor and youth and power.
I have taught you to be dispassionate. The world of people goes up and down and people go up and down with their world; as sorcerers we have no business following them in their ups and downs. The art of sorcerers is to be outside everything and be unnoticeable. And more than anything else, the art of sorcerers is never to waste their power.
CC Second Ring of Power
-
A warrior is a hunter. He calculates everything. That’s control. Once his calculations are over, he acts. He lets go. That’s abandon. A warrior is not a leaf at the mercy of the wind. No one can push him; no one can make him do things against himself or against his better judgment. A warrior is tuned to survive, and he survives in the best of all possible fashions.”
CC~
-
“Intent is not a thought, or an object, or a wish. Intent is what can make a man succeed when his thoughts tell him that he is defeated. It operates in spite of the warrior’s indulgence. Intent is what makes him invulnerable. Intent is what sends a shaman through a wall, through space, to infinity.”
CC~
-
The Power Of Silence
At various times don Juan attempted to name his knowledge for my benefit. He felt that the most appropriate name was nagualism, but that the term was too obscure. Calling it simply "knowledge" made it too vague, and to call it "witchcraft" was debasing. "The mastery of intent" was too abstract, and "the search for total freedom" too long and metaphorical. Finally, because he was unable to find a more appropriate name, he called it "sorcery," although he admitted it was not really accurate.
Over the years, he had given me different definitions of sorcery, but he had always maintained that definitions change as knowledge increases. Toward the end of my apprenticeship, I felt I was in a position to appreciate a clearer definition, so I asked him once more.
"From where the average man stands," don Juan said, "sorcery is nonsense or an ominous mystery beyond his reach. And he is right - not because this is an absolute fact, but because the average man lacks the energy to deal with sorcery."
He stopped for a moment before he continued. "Human beings are born with a finite amount of energy," don Juan said, "an energy that is systematically deployed, beginning at the moment of birth, in order that it may be used most advantageously by the modality of the time."
"What do you mean by the modality of the time?" I asked.
"The modality of the time is the precise bundle of energy fields being perceived," he answered. "I believe man's perception has changed through the ages. The actual time decides the mode; the time decides which precise bundle of energy fields, out of an incalculable number, are to be used. And handling the modality of the time - those few, selected energy fields - takes all our available energy, leaving us nothing that would help us use any of the other energy fields."
He urged me with a subtle movement of his eyebrows to consider all this.
"This is what I mean when I say that the average man lacks the energy needed to deal with sorcery," he went on. "If he uses only the energy he has, he can't perceive the worlds sorcerers do. To perceive them, sorcerers need to use a cluster of energy fields not ordinarily used. Naturally, if the average man is to perceive those worlds and understand sorcerers' perception he must use the same cluster they have used. And this is just not possible, because all his energy is already deployed."
He paused as if searching for the appropriate words to make his point.
"Think of it this way," he proceeded. "It isn't that as time goes by you're learning sorcery; rather, what you're learning is to save energy. And this energy will enable you to handle some of the energy fields which are inaccessible to you now. And that is sorcery: the ability to use energy fields that are not employed in perceiving the ordinary world we know. Sorcery is a state of awareness. Sorcery is the ability to perceive something which ordinary perception cannot.
-
(heh, I had forgotten I had this book on my PC. Just found it. Yay! thanks R :-* Looks like I'll be doing soem reading ;D)
CARLOS CASTANEDA
THE WHEEL OF TIME THE SHAMANS OF ANCIENT MEXICO, THEIR THOUGHTS ABOUT LIFE, DEATH AND THE UNIVERSE
QUOTATIONS FROM THE TEACHINGS OF DON JUAN
Power rests on the kind of knowledge that one holds. What is the sense of knowing things that are useless? They will not prepare us for our unavoidable encounter with the unknown.
Nothing in this world is a gift. Whatever has to be learned must be learned the hard way.
A man goes to knowledge as he goes to war: wide-awake, with fear, with respect, and with absolute assurance. Going to knowledge or going to war in any other manner is a mistake, and whoever makes it might never live to regret it. When a man has fulfilled all four of these requisites - to be wide awake, to have fear, respect, and absolute assurance - there are no mistakes for which he will have to account; under such conditions his actions lose the blundering quality of the acts of a fool. If such a man fails, or suffers a defeat, he will have lost only a battle, and there will be no pitiful regrets over that.
Dwelling upon the self too much produces a terrible fatigue. A man in that position is deaf and blind to everything else. The fatigue itself makes him cease to see the marvels all around him.
Every time a man sets himself to learn, he has to labor as hard as anyone can, and the limits of his learning are determined by his own nature. Therefore, there is no point in talking about knowledge. Fear of knowledge is natural; all of us experience it, and there is nothing we can do about it. But no matter how frightening learning is, it is more terrible to think of a man without knowledge.
To be angry at people means that one considers their acts to be important. It is imperative to cease to feel that way. The acts of men cannot be important enough to offset our only viable alternative: our unchangeable encounter with infinity.
Anything is one of a million paths. Therefore, a warrior must always keep in mind that a path is only a path; if he feels that he should not follow it, he must not stay with it under any conditions. His decision to keep on that path or to leave it must be free of fear or ambition. He must look at every path closely and deliberately. There is a question that a warrior has to ask, mandatory: Does this path have a heart?
All paths are the same: they lead nowhere. However, a path without a heart is never enjoyable. On the other hand, a path with heart is easy - it does not make a warrior work at liking it; it makes for a joyful journey; as long as a man follows it, he is one with it.
There is a world of happiness where there is no difference between things because there is no one there to ask about the difference. But that is not the world of men. Some men have the vanity to believe that they live in two worlds, but that is only their vanity. There is but one single world for us. We are men, and must follow the world of men contentedly.
A man has four natural enemies: fear. clarity, power, and old age. Fear, clarity, and power can be overcome, but not old age. Its effect can be postponed, but it can never be overcome.
-
A warrior knows that he is only a man. His only regret is that his life is so short that he can't grab onto all the things that he would like to. But for him, this is not an issue; it's only a pity.
ASR
-
The self-confidence of a warrior is not the self-confidence of the average man. The average man seeks certainty in the eyes of the onlooker and calls that self-confidence. The warrior seeks impeccability in his own eyes and calls that humbleness. The average man is hooked to his fellow men, while the warrior is hooked only to himself.
Hooked only to himself is another way of saying that my focus is on Me - the real Self.
Self-confidence is trust and trust is another side of power.
-
He described the specific problems of sorcerers as twofold. One is the impossibility of restoring a shattered continuity; the other is the impossibility of using the continuity dictated by the new position of their assemblage points. That new continuity is always too tenous, too unstable, and does not offer sorcerers the assuredness they need to function as if they were in the world of everyday life.
"How do sorcerers resolve this problem?" I asked.
"None of us resolves anything." he replied. "The spirit either resolves it for us or it doesnt. If it does, a sorcerer finds himself acting in the sorcerers' world without knowing how. This is the reason why I have insisted from the day I found you that impeccability is all that counts. A sorcerer lives an impeccable life, and that seems to beckon the solution. Why? No one knows."
Don Juan remained quiet for a moment. And then, as if I had voiced it, he commented on a thought I was having. I was thinking impeccability always made me think of religious morality.
"Impeccability, as I have told you so many times, is not morality," he said. "It only resembles morality. Impeccability is simply the best use of our energy level. Naturally, it calls for frugality, thoughtfulness, simplicity, innocence, and above all, it calls for a lack of self-reflection. All of this makes it sound like a manual for a monastic life, but it isnt.
"Sorcerers say that in order to command the spirit, and by that they mean to command the movement of the assemblage point, one needs energy. The only thing that stores energy for us is our impeccability."
from The Power of Silence
-
"It is a revolution. To regard the lion and the water rats and our fellow men as equals is a magnificent act of a warrior's spirit. It takes power to do that." ~CC
-
"The path of knowledge is a forced one. In order to learn we must be spurred. In the path of knowledge we are always fighting something, avoiding something, prepared for something; and that something is always inexplicable, greater, more powerful than us. The inexplicable forces will come to you. Now it is the spirit of the water hole, later on it'll be your own ally, so there is nothing you can do now but to prepare yourself for the struggle. Years ago la Catalina spurred you, she was only a sorceress, though, and that was a beginner's trick.
"The world is indeed full of frightening things and we are helpless creatures surrounded by forces that are inexplicable and unbending. The average man, in ignorance, believes that those forces can be explained or changed; he doesn't really know how to do that, but he expects that the actions of mankind will explain them or change them sooner or later.
The sorcerer, on the other hand, does not think of explaining or changing them; instead, he learns to use such forces by redirecting himself and adapting to their direction. That's his trick. There is very little to sorcery once you find out its trick. A sorcerer is only slightly better off than the average man. Sorcery does not help him to live a better life; in fact I should say that sorcery hinders him; it makes his life cumbersome, precarious. By opening himself to knowledge a sorcerer becomes more vulnerable than the average man.
On the one hand his fellow men hate him and fear him and will strive to end his life; on the other hand the inexplicable and unbending forces that surround every one of us, by right of our being alive, are for a sorcerer a source of even greater danger. To be pierced by a fellow man is indeed painful, but nothing in comparison to being touched by an ally. A sorcerer, by opening himself to knowledge, falls prey to such forces and has only one means of balancing himself, his will; thus he must feel and act like a warrior. I will repeat this once more: Only as a warrior can one survive the path of knowledge. What helps a sorcerer live a better life is the strength of being a warrior. "
CC/DJ ASR
-
Super, Joshua!
-
"... A warrior has no compassion for anyone. To have compassion means that you wish the other person to be like you, to be in your shoes, and you lend a hand just for that purpose. The hardest thing in the world is for a warrior to let others be. The impeccability of a warrior is to let them be and to support them in what they are. That means, of course, that you trust them to be impeccable warriors themselves. If they are not then it's your duty to be impeccable yourself and not say a word. Only a sorcerer who sees and is formless can afford to help anyone. Every effort to help on our part is an arbitrary act guided by our own self-interest alone..."
The Second Ring of Power
Carlos Castaneda
"It's not the people around you who are at fault," he said. "They cannot help themselves. The fault is with you, because you can help yourself, but you are bent on judging them, at a deep level of silence. Any idiot can judge. If you judge them, you will only get the worst out of them. All of us human beings are prisoners, and it is that prison that makes us act in such a miserable way. Your challenge is to take people as they are! Leave people alone."
The Clear View
THE ACTIVE SIDE OF INFINITY
Carlos Castaneda
-
"for the warrior who has no personal history, no explanations are needed; nobody is angry or disillusioned with his acts. And above all, no one pins him down with their thoughts and their expectations.”
"The art of a warrior is to balance the terror of being a man with the wonder of being a man."
-
"for the warrior who has no personal history, no explanations are needed; nobody is angry or disillusioned with his acts. And above all, no one pins him down with their thoughts and their expectations.”
One of my favorites... ;) :-*
-
~Sorcerers say that in every explanation there is a hidden apology. So, when you are explaining why you cannot do this or that, you’re really apologizing for your shortcomings, hoping that whoever is listening to you will have the kindness to understand them.
Don Juan Matus, The Active Side of Infinity
One of my Faves!
-
"The Eagle's gift of freedom is not a bestowal, but a chance to have a chance."
-
"The world of people goes up and down and the people go up and down with their world; warriors have no business following the ups and downs of their fellow men"
"People's actions no longer affect a warrior when he has no expectations of any kind. A strange peace becomes the ruling force in his life. He has adopted one of the concepts of a warrior's life- detachment."
-
warriors have no business following the ups and downs of their fellow men"
8)
Nice
Thanks Derek
-
:-*
-
An unconquerable pessimism overtakes a warrior at a certain point on his path. A sense of defeat, or perhaps more accurately, a sense of unworthiness, comes upon him almost unawares. A warrior's resolution to live impeccably in spite of everything cannot be approached as a strategy to ensure success. The warrior enters into a state of unsurpassed humility; when the true poverty of his human resources becomes undeniable, the warrior has no recourse but to step back and lower his head. It is monstrous to think that the world is understandable or that we ourselves are understandable. What we are perceiving is an enigma, a mystery that one can only accept in humbleness and awe. The two sides of a human being are totally separate and it takes great discipline and determination to break that seal and go from one side to the other. We have been put together by forces incomprehensible to our reason. The only thing we do not have is time. Every minute might be our last; therefore, it has to be lived with the spirit...
The Eagle's Gift
Carlos Castaneda
-
The only thing we do not have is time.
yes. drive it into the brain with a jackhammer!
-
“"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 have 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 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!"”
Carlos Castaneda, A Separate Reality
-
“"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 the need to recapitulate at that point and I asked him if controlled folly meant his 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 really don’t care about anything or anybody. Take me, for example. Do you meant 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.”"
Carlos Castaneda, A Separate Reality
-
"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.
“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 moments 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 is not possible to explain,” he said. “Certain things in your life matter to you because they’re important to you, but for me, not a single thing is important any longer, neither my acts nor the acts 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 is neat and wholesome, and now it doesn’t matter to me that nothing matters. My will controls the folly of my life.”"
Carlos Castaneda, A Separate Reality
-
"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 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 are 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.
“your acts, as well as the acts of your fellow men in general, appear 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.
“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!”"
Carlos Castaneda, A Separate Reality
-
For a while I've been playing with a thought that if one looks at the quotes of DJ long enough, it becomes pretty much like Bible. Using mental, it becomes possible to find a quote for every occasion in life, to justify and explain almost everything, every desire, attachment, attitude, every deed. How easy it is to get lost, lose the way at the mental level!
It is the feeling behind these words that wouldn't let them to be misinterpreted.
-
DJ: “You’re afraid of me?” he asked.
CC: “Not of you, but of what you represent.”
DJ: “I represent the warrior’s freedom. Are you afraid of that?”
CC: “No. But I’m afraid of the awesomeness of your knowledge. There is no solace for me, no haven to go to.”
DJ: “You’re confusing issues. Solace, haven, fear all of them are moods that you have learned without ever questioning their value. As one can see, the black magicians have already engaged all your allegiance.”
CC: “Who are the black magicians, don Juan?”
DJ: “Our fellow men are black magicians. And since you are with them, you too are a black magician. Think for a moment. Can you deviate from the path that they’ve lined up for you? No. Your thoughts and your actions are fixed forever in their terms. That is slavery. I, on the other hand, brought you freedom. Freedom is expensive, but the price is not impossible. So fear your captors, your masters. Don’t waste time and your power fearing me.”
CC: I knew that he was right, and yet in spite of my genuine agreement with him I also knew that my lifelong habits would unavoidably make me stick to my old path. I did indeed feel like a slave.
--=Carlos Castaneda
-
He came to my side and poked my chest with his fingers; it was a very light tap. “These are the boundaries I’m talking about,” he said. “One can get out of them. We are a feeling, an awareness encased here.”
--=Carlos Castaneda
-
"Self-importance is our greatest enemy. Think about it - what weakens us is feeling offended by the deeds and misdeeds of our fellow men. Our self-importance requires that we spend most of our lives offended by someone."
--=Carlos Castaneda, The Fire From Within
"The only worthwhile course of action, whether for sorcerers or average men, is to restrict our involvement with our self-image."
--=Carlos Castaneda, The Power Of Silence
"The world around us is very mysterious. It doesn't yield its secrets easily. As long as you feel that you are the most important thing in the world you cannot really appreciate the world around you. You are like a horse with blinders, all you see is yourself apart from everything else."
--=Carlos Castaneda, Journey To Ixtlan
-
Stopping Internal Dialog
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
"Whenever we finish talking to ourselves the world is always as it should be. We renew it, we kindle it with life, we uphold it with our internal talk. Not only that, but we also choose our paths as we talk to ourselves. Thus we repeat the same choices over and over until the day we die, because we keep on repeating the same internal talk over and over until the day we die."
--=Carlos Castaneda, A Separate Reality
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
DJ: “I’ve told you that internal dialog is what grounds us,” don Juan said. “The world is such and such or so and so, only because we talk to ourselves about its being such and such or so and so.”
Don Juan explained that the passage into the world of sorcerers opens up after the warrior has learned to shut off the internal dialog.
“To change our idea of the world is the crux of sorcery,” he said. “And stopping the internal dialog is the only way to accomplish it. The rest is just padding.”
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
CC: It was as if I were not the person I knew myself to be.
DJ: “I don’t see why you make such a fuss out of this,” don Juan said. “Whenever the dialog stops, the world collapses and extraordinary facets of ourself surface, as though they had been kept heavily guarded by our words. You are like you are, because you tell yourself that you are that way.”
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
DJ: “Your knowledge of the world told you that in the bushes one can only find animals prowling or men hiding behind foliage. You held that thought, and naturally you had to find ways to make the world conform to that thought.”
CC: “But I wasn’t thinking at all, don Juan.”
DJ: “Let’s not call it thinking then. It is rather the habit of having the world always conform to our thoughts. When it doesn’t, we simply make it conform.”
--=Carlos Castaneda, Tales of Power
-
Personal Power
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
DJ: “It doesn’t matter what one reveals or what one keeps to oneself,” he said. “Everything we do, everything we are, rests on our personal power. If we have enough of it, one word uttered to us might be sufficient to change the course of our lives. But if we don’t have enough personal power, the most magnificent piece of wisdom can be revealed to us and that revelation won’t make a damn bit of difference.”
“I’m going to utter perhaps the greatest piece of knowledge anyone can voice,” he said. “Let me see what you can do with it.
“Do you know that at this very moment you are surrounded by eternity? And do you know that you can use that eternity if you so desire?”
[having pointed at the horizon] “Do you know that you can extend yourself forever in any of the directions I have pointed to?” he went on. “Do you know that one moment can be eternity? This is not a riddle; it is a fact, but only if you can mount that moment and use it to take the totality of yourself forever in any direction.”
“You didn’t have this knowledge before,” he said, smiling. “Now you do. I have revealed it to you, but it doesn’t make a bit of difference, because you don’t have enough personal power to utilize my revelation. Yet if you did have enough personal power, my words alone would serve as the means for you to round up the totality of yourself and get the crucial part of it out of the boundaries in which it is contained.”
--=Carlos Castaneda, Tales of Power
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
CC: “What happens if one doesn’t have enough power?”
DJ: “Death is always waiting, and when the warrior’s power wanes death simply taps him. Thus, to venture into the unknown without power is stupid. One will only find death.”
--=Carlos Castaneda, Journey To Ixtlan
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
DJ: “We are luminous beings,” he said. “And for a luminous being only personal power matters. But if you ask me what personal power is, I have to tell you that my explanation will not explain it.”
--=Carlos Castaneda, Tales of Power
-
"When a man embarks on the paths of sorcery he becomes aware, in a gradual manner, that ordinary life has been forever left behind; that knowledge is indeed a frightening affair; that the means of the ordinary world are no longer a buffer for him; and that he must adopt a new way of life if he is going to survive."
--=Carlos Castaneda, A Separate Reality
-
"Do you mean that I won't see you anymore, don Juan?"
"Not ever again," he said. "Genaro and I will be then what we always have been, dust on the road."
I had a jolt in the pit of my stomach.
"What are you saying, don Juan?"
"I'm saying that we all are unfathomable beings, luminous and boundless. You, Genaro and I are stuck together by a purpose that is not our decision."
"What purpose are you talking about?"
"Learning the warrior's way. You can't get out of it, but neither can we. As long as our achievement is pending you will find me or Genaro, but once it is accomplished, you will fly freely and no one knows where the force of your life will take you."
"What is don Genaro doing in this?"
"That subject is not in your realm yet," he said. "Today I have to pound the nail that Genaro put in, the fact that we are luminous beings. We are perceivers. We are an awareness; we are not objects; we have no solidity. We are boundless. The world of objects and solidity is a way of making our passage on earth convenient."
Carlos Castaneda
TALES OF POWER
-
Sheer Joy - Frightening Sadness
Every time I entered into heightened awareness I could not cease marveling at the difference between my two sides. I always felt as if a veil had been lifted from my eyes, as if I had been partially blind before and now I could see. The freedom, the sheer joy that used to possess me on those occasions cannot be compared with anything else I have ever experienced. Yet at the same time, there was a frightening feeling of sadness and longing that went hand in hand with that freedom and joy. Don Juan had told me that there is no completeness without sadness and longing, for without them there is no sobriety, no kindness. Wisdom without kindness, he said, and knowledge without sobriety are useless.
Introduction
The Fire From Within
Carlos Castaneda
-
That dog's barking is the nocturnal voice of a man. It comes from a house in that valley towards the south. The man is shouting through his dog, since they are companion slaves for life, his sadness, his boredom. He's begging his death to come and release him from the dull and dreary chains of his life. That barking, and the loneliness it creates, speaks of the feelings of men. Men for whom an entire life was like one Sunday afternoon, an afternoon which was not altogether miserable, but rather hot and dull and uncomfortable. They sweated and fussed a great deal. They didn't know where to go, or what to do. That afternoon left them only with the memory of petty annoyances and tedium, and then suddenly it was over; it was already night.
The Predilection of Two Warriors
TALES OF POWER
Carlos Castaneda
-
Elegant Acquiescence
He explained to me then the intricacies of choice. He said that choice, for warrior-travelers, was not really the act of choosing, but rather the act of acquiescing elegantly to the solicitations of infinity.
"Infinity chooses," he said. "The art of the warrior-traveler is to have the ability to move with the slightest insinuation, the art of acquiescing to every command of infinity. For this, a warrior-traveler needs prowess, strength, and above everything else, sobriety. All those three put together give, as a result, elegance!"
Journeys Through the Dark Sea of Awareness
THE ACTIVE SIDE OF INFINITY
Carlos Castaneda
-
Sheer Joy - Frightening Sadness
Every time I entered into heightened awareness I could not cease marveling at the difference between my two sides. I always felt as if a veil had been lifted from my eyes, as if I had been partially blind before and now I could see. The freedom, the sheer joy that used to possess me on those occasions cannot be compared with anything else I have ever experienced. Yet at the same time, there was a frightening feeling of sadness and longing that went hand in hand with that freedom and joy. Don Juan had told me that there is no completeness without sadness and longing, for without them there is no sobriety, no kindness. Wisdom without kindness, he said, and knowledge without sobriety are useless.
Introduction
The Fire From Within
Carlos Castaneda
The title given to this says it all... :-* Nice find!
-
That dog's barking is the nocturnal voice of a man. It comes from a house in that valley towards the south. The man is shouting through his dog, since they are companion slaves for life, his sadness, his boredom. He's begging his death to come and release him from the dull and dreary chains of his life. That barking, and the loneliness it creates, speaks of the feelings of men. Men for whom an entire life was like one Sunday afternoon, an afternoon which was not altogether miserable, but rather hot and dull and uncomfortable. They sweated and fussed a great deal. They didn't know where to go, or what to do. That afternoon left them only with the memory of petty annoyances and tedium, and then suddenly it was over; it was already night.
The Predilection of Two Warriors
TALES OF POWER
Carlos Castaneda
:o I dont remember ever reading this before, its an awsome quote. The dogs barking is the nocturnal voice of man has this sort of sad/real/yes!/longing/lost feel to it doesnt it.
-
"Genaro and I will be then what we always have been, dust on the road."
"I'm saying that we all are unfathomable beings, luminous and boundless. You, Genaro and I are stuck together by a purpose that is not our decision."
Ellen!
-
Don Juan had told me that there is no completeness without sadness and longing, for without them there is no sobriety, no kindness. Wisdom without kindness, he said, and knowledge without sobriety are useless.
Taimi!
-
"Infinity chooses," he said. "The art of the warrior-traveler is to have the ability to move with the slightest insinuation, the art of acquiescing to every command of infinity.
insinuation => command
this is so ... but who can see the slightest skein of insinuation from the silent whirlwind?
insinuation => command
-
That dog's barking is the nocturnal voice of a man. It comes from a house in that valley towards the south. The man is shouting through his dog, since they are companion slaves for life, his sadness, his boredom. He's begging his death to come and release him from the dull and dreary chains of his life. That barking, and the loneliness it creates, speaks of the feelings of men. Men for whom an entire life was like one Sunday afternoon, an afternoon which was not altogether miserable, but rather hot and dull and uncomfortable. They sweated and fussed a great deal. They didn't know where to go, or what to do. That afternoon left them only with the memory of petty annoyances and tedium, and then suddenly it was over; it was already night.
Oh so true! so sadly true.
but have any of us escaped this fate? is that possible? with all our achievements? is this still not the case?
when i look down on life from the dreamer, one channel shows "memory of petty annoyances and tedium" .. what i called the fret of life ..
-
“You must lose your human form. . . A warrior must drop the human form in order to change, to really change. Otherwise there is only talk about change. One cannot change one iota as long as one holds on to the human form. . . Warriors, must be IMPECCABLE in their effort to change, in order to scare the human form and shake it away. After years of impeccability a moment will come when the form cannot stand it any longer and it leaves.” don Juan talking to Carlos
-
Syntax
A man staring at his equations
said that the universe had a beginning.
There had been an explosion, he said.
A bang of bangs, and the universe was born.
And it is expanding, he said.
He had even calculated the length of its life:
ten billion revolutions of the earth around the sun.
The entire globe cheered;
They found his calculations to be science.
None thought that by proposing that the universe began,
the man had merely mirrored the syntax of his mother tongue;
a syntax which demands beginnings, like birth,
and developments, like maturation,
and ends, like death, as statements of facts.
The universe began,
and it is getting old, the man assured us,
and it will die, like all things die,
like he himself died after confirming mathematically
the syntax of his mother tongue.
**************************
The Other Syntax
Did the universe really begin?
Is the theory of the big bang true?
These are not questions, though they sound like they are.
Is the syntax that requires beginnings, developments
and ends as statements of fact the only syntax that exists?
That's the real question.
There are other syntaxes.
There is one, for example, which demands that varieties
of intensity be taken as facts.
In that syntax nothing begins and nothing ends;
thus birth is not a clean, clear-cut event,
but a specific type of intensity,
and so is maturation, and so is death.
A man of that syntax, looking over his equations, finds that
he has calculated enough varieties of intensity
to say with authority
that the universe never began
and will never end,
but that it has gone, and is going now, and will go
through endless fluctuations of intensity.
That man could very well conclude that the universe itself
is the chariot of intensity
and that one can board it
to journey through changes without end.
He will conclude all that, and much more,
perhaps without ever realizing
that he is merely confirming
the syntax of his mother tongue.
-
nice numbers (and content) for an 11th post.. (my time, anyway :) )
-
This human begins to lose his form by listening to and obeying his body. I remind myself more and more to not "think so much" about what I am doing or partaking.
I listen, taste and smell a situation by pausing and basically rising above the sounds, sights and prevailing mental reactions. I listen for something I cannot here, almost as in a meditative pause.
It's almost thrilling now when I find myself unconsciously reminding myself to do it through habit.
-
"we have intended since birth"
“A warrior considers himself already dead, so there is nothing to lose. The worst has already happened to him, therefore he’s clear and calm; judging him by his acts or by his words, one would never suspect that he has witnessed everything."
-
Any movement of the assemblage point means a movement away from an excessive concern with the individual self. Shamans believe it is the position of the assemblage point which makes modern man a homicidal egotist, a being totally involved with his self-image. Having ever lost hope of ever returning to the source of everything, the average man seeks solace in his selfishness.
-CC
-
“A warrior considers himself already dead, so there is nothing to lose. The worst has already happened to him, therefore he’s clear and calm; judging him by his acts or by his words, one would never suspect that he has witnessed everything."
How easy it is to say it and how hard it is to die step-by-step, day-by-day, one aspect at a time.
Let go of everything, each thing departing with a piece of 'me'.
Until one moment one discovers that where there used to be something - there is emptiness.
And it grows.
-
and how hard it is to die step-by-step, day-by-day, one aspect at a time.
there is emptiness.
And it grows.
Having ever lost hope of ever returning to the source of everything, the average man seeks solace in his selfishness.
There’s no emptiness in the life of a warrior. Everything is filled to the brim. Everything is filled to the brim, and everything is equal.
yay!
-
Words.
What's on the other side of the death?
the Nagual
-
Are you there?
-
One of the greatest forces in the lives of warriors is fear, it spurs them to learn.
Learning is never what one expects.
People's actions no longer affect a warrior when he has no more expectations of any kind. A strange peace becomes the ruling force in his life. He has adopted one of the concepts of a warrior's life- detachment.
-
Wintersong, are you on the other side of the death?
In the Nagual?
-
Don't even try to play these games here.
After my post I saw how little that one applies to you:
People's actions no longer affect a warrior when he has no more expectations of any kind. A strange peace becomes the ruling force in his life. He has adopted one of the concepts of a warrior's life- detachment.
With all due respect - come clean and be what you are.
Don't come here to play games.
-
Like any body of work, from the Bible to the Koran to the works of Edgar Cayce, "Don Juan's Quotes" can be used out of context, to say in coded language that which we don't really want to say.
You see the trend a lot in Christian fundamentalist/fundie forums, where the recriminations of the biblical scriptures are usually used to validate some judgement or another: and usually, the message is "You suck!" :P
I'm sure "You suck" has its place somewhere in the machinations between humans, but I wonder if it's what we want here?
Is it?
I see this place more about exploration, journeying, practicing, dreaming and sharing, but maybe I've over-ideallized it?
Just my 2 cents --- please advise me differently if I'm all washed up.
-
I agree fully.
-
usually used to validate some judgement or another: and usually, the message is "You suck!" :P
That is quite naturally the reaction one feels when S.I. is focused on, self-pity. The worst thing we can do is indulge in it, placing more attention to the problem. We are all fools, every single one of us, so we shouldn't feel so special about it. We should not place that importance.
-
Sure thing, we shouldn't place importance -- and the judgement shouldn't have been presented to start with.
It could go on all day and all night, eh?
Here's one of my favorite passages which might fit here:
Leave People Alone
"It's not the people around you who are at fault," he said. "They cannot help themselves. The fault is with you, because you can help yourself, but you are bent on judging them, at a deep level of silence. Any idiot can judge. If you judge them, you will only get the worst out of them. All of us human beings are prisoners, and it is that prison that makes us act in such a miserable way. Your challenge is to take people as they are! Leave people alone."
The Clear View
THE ACTIVE SIDE OF INFINITY
Carlos Castaneda
-
Meanwhile, I can only speak for me. I'm here for other things -- to work through dreams, and pieces of my own recap, my own shtuff. I guess we all have our own reasons.
-
"It's not the people around you who are at fault," he said. "They cannot help themselves. The fault is with you, because you can help yourself, but you are bent on judging them, at a deep level of silence. Any idiot can judge. If you judge them, you will only get the worst out of them. All of us human beings are prisoners, and it is that prison that makes us act in such a miserable way. Your challenge is to take people as they are! Leave people alone."
I like to say S.I. is like a joke played on us, by us.
-
I like to say S.I. is like a joke played on us, by us.
Back to basics - what's your name?
-
I like to say S.I. is like a joke played on us, by us.
Oh, don't get me started laughing again!! I'm at work, with a lot of stuff to do. Oh, well, thanks for the laughter!
HAHAHAHA!
-
I like to say S.I. is like a joke played on us, by us.
Indeed! :D
-
You see the trend a lot in Christian fundamentalist/fundie forums, where the recriminations of the biblical scriptures are usually used to validate some judgement or another: and usually, the message is "You suck!" :P
I'm sure "You suck" has its place somewhere in the machinations between humans, but I wonder if it's what we want here?
Is it?
No N.
-
Like any body of work, from the Bible to the Koran to the works of Edgar Cayce, "Don Juan's Quotes" can be used out of context, to say in coded language that which we don't really want to say.
You see the trend a lot in Christian fundamentalist/fundie forums, where the recriminations of the biblical scriptures are usually used to validate some judgement or another: and usually, the message is "You suck!" :P
Been thinking about this... and while I agree with you that like any body of work, quotes can be used out of context, I generally see quotes as reflecting what the quoter is perhaps going through and not necessarily as a replacement for "you suck" - ie of relevance to the quoter, not directed at who is reading it.. (never been on those fundie forums..)
You wondered if you were perhaps an "idealist", well.. I am wondering if perhaps I am naive.. :)
-
Been thinking about this... and while I agree with you that like any body of work, quotes can be used out of context, I generally see quotes as reflecting what the quoter is perhaps going through and not necessarily as a replacement for "you suck" - ie of relevance to the quoter, not directed at who is reading it.. (never been on those fundie forums..)
You wondered if you were perhaps an "idealist", well.. I am wondering if perhaps I am naive.. :)
Sure, Daphne --- not necessarily does any quote mean "you suck", heheh. I myself have quoted a lot from DJ, and had no one else in mind but self. No aggressive Intent whatsoever. Yes, it might reflect what someone is going through.
I suppose one has to rely upon one's senses to read through. In that, one takes chances, of course -- one could err in the read, always.
Here's what I see happening sometimes in a lot of toltec forums:
We communicate something to another, intended for the other. Then, when someone responds to the intent, there are these 2 claims:
1.) You are making assumptions.
2.) You're self-important, because you took this personally.
Convenient how that works, eh?
And then it goes around and around, and sure, the original responder might have done better to not respond at all -- to have simply blown it off would have been the wiser course of action.
But this is when I see "toltec" trends turned into a mindgame, because regardless of whether someone personalized something or not, the intent was put out there to begin with. This becomes a cumulative thing, and before you know it, "attack" becomes justified and routine -- hiding behind the 4 Agreements. And Ninja swordsmen. Energetically, what do you have then? Some sort of battlefield. Burning bodies, blood, the smell of gunpowder.
Is it impeccable? Does it have integrity? Does it grease the wheels of creativity -- does it get us closer to the apprehension of Infinity? Or is it just petty meanness?
And then you have a tyrant like me, running in to stop the whole thing.
If I erred, I am sorry.
-
And then you have a tyrant like me
:D :D :D
-
Michael is quite right, that if we are offended, then we are in the wrong.
But I don't think that is carte blanche for the habit of attack -- be the attack blatant or subtle.
-
Michael is quite right, that if we are offended, then we are in the wrong.
But I don't think that is carte blanche for the habit of attack -- be the attack blatant or subtle.
Another issue is - what is an 'attack'?
I have interfered many times when I've perceived that the energy is being diluted and that the original thing is step-by-step converted/talked into something very different.
When something very basic is ignored.
Then it has been for me about 'What is the purpose of this place (forum) if something like that is allowed to pass?'
Has it been an attack?
Anything else?
I don't know.
-
I like this one alot..
Leave People Alone
"It's not the people around you who are at fault," he said. "They cannot help themselves. The fault is with you, because you can help yourself, but you are bent on judging them, at a deep level of silence. Any idiot can judge. If you judge them, you will only get the worst out of them. All of us human beings are prisoners, and it is that prison that makes us act in such a miserable way. Your challenge is to take people as they are! Leave people alone."
The Clear View
THE ACTIVE SIDE OF INFINITY
Carlos Castaneda
If you judge them, you will only get the worst out of them.
Your challenge is to take people as they are!
-
Kinda reminds me of what my mom always said..
"If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all"
I know it would be a land of fluffy bunnies.. if everyone was just nice and accepting.. but hey...
Peace.
-
Stalking this, I hear a lil voice saying to me, it's none of my business whether someone wants to hide behind the 4 Agreements. The voice is right. I suppose I have an aging flower child in me.
Sorry to all.
Peace indeed!
-
I generally follow the rule of "leave people alone". If I draw someone that is intent on not leaving me alone, I must be telling myself something. That something varies. When I perceive the attack, I usually withdraw myself from the person and the situation, step to the side and let their energy pass. Then, I wonder why I perceived the action as an attack. In a group situation, this is more difficult because some of the individuals are drawing the attack. In the case of a country, it's damn near impossible not to participate, somehow.
I'm generally accepting of others, but that doesn't mean I have to commit suicide (used as a metaphor). In a group situation, I prefer not to participate in the group. However, if I value my group participation enough, I may take steps to move the group to change their "draw" of the attack, or, in the recent case, to lock the attacker out. WE remove OURSELVES from the attack. I still accept that person, but I'd prefer not to participate in this group with her because that frustrates my purposes here. It limits my choices.
I guess what I'm saying is, if there is conflict, chances are there's at least one person holding to a belief as if it were an absolute. Where I am not noticing that, I'm looking to that other person to blame for their attack on me, so I'm holding another belief as an absolute. Were I to look at myself, first, I'm likely to just step aside, learn what the belief is, learn how it manifests as "absolute", and let it pass. It may or may not have an uncontrolled contact with the ground, taking the attacker with it. It matters not.
Assertions like, "You are too self important", and "You suck!" are projections from one person onto another of their own discounting of self. "You are making assumptions," is an assumption in and of itself. I find these quite comical. Indeed, I laugh myself silly at them.
On quotations, in every day usage, I try to avoid them, as they are either used because I can't say it better, or it's an argument from authority. I make a living in the practice of law to quote from authority, either from a previous case or a statute. It's rare that there's only one authority. In everyday usage, it's rare so as to be impossible that there's not another authority. Some quotes are so eloquent that I use them. Some are so beautiful, I want to share them. But it's not my business to pontificate and quotate to another person. In the reverse, I swear that I'm mostly oblivious to it when someone does it to me. I just don't care.
If someone is offended, it's their choice. Folks may attack me, and no, they don't have the blank check to do so from me, yet it is their choice. So, I exercise my choice to have more choices than that, and I step aside, if I can. It's always a "removal of myself". You can't remove another person. It's always been simple for me, when I am noticing and not holding onto some "absolute".
Namaste'
Todd
-
Some are so beautiful, I want to share them.
Yes!! Most of the quotes and poems I share I do because I'm usually dazzled or awestruck by them myself! It doesn't bear any analysis, and I never could have have captured what "they" said so well!
Great post, Todd!
-
I like this one alot..
Leave People Alone
reading this the other day and working with this has reminded me of my position and what I need to do. thanks for the reminder. allready it has relieved a few stressed points in the everyday. freeing up just that much more of personal power !! i have been reading everything that has been written here since the beginning. i feel like such a student!!!!!!! it's awesome.
-
i feel like such a student!!!!!!! it's awesome.
:) :) :) Me too!
-
"Leave people alone"
Sometimes i get the feeling i have left people too alone, if that's possible.
-
"Leave people alone"
Sometimes i get the feeling i have left people too alone, if that's possible.
I understand what you mean, yes dreamers have that vein. I am much like that myself.
-
I get caught in the trap of ignoring people.
-
For the average man, the world is weird because if he's not bored with it, he's at odds with it. For a warrior, the world is weird because it is stupendous, awesome, mysterious, unfathomable.
A warrior must assume responsibility for being here, in this marvelous world, in this marvelous time.
-
Impeccability begins with a single act that has to be deliberate, precise and sustained. If that act is repeated long enough, one acquires a sense of unbending intent which can be applied to anything else. If that is accomplished the road is clear. One thing will lead to another until the warrior realizes his full potential.
-
:) :)
For the average man, the world is weird because if he's not bored with it, he's at odds with it. For a warrior, the world is weird because it is stupendous, awesome, mysterious, unfathomable.
A warrior must assume responsibility for being here, in this marvelous world, in this marvelous time.
-
To seek freedom is the only driving force I know.
Freedom to fly off into that infinity out there.
Freedom to dissolve; to lift off; to be like the flame
of a candle, which, in spite of being up against the
light of a billion stars, remains intact, because it
never pretended to be more than what it is:
a mere candle.
Carlos Castaneda
The Art of Dreaming
-
A warrior must cultivate the feeling that he has everything needed for the extravagant journey that is his life. What counts for a warrior is being alive. Life in itself is sufficient, self-explanatory and complete.
Therefore, one may say without being presumptuous that the experience of experiences is being alive.
-
"My experiences with my fellow men have proven to me that very, very few of them would be willing to listen. And of those few who listen, even fewer would be willing to act on what they have listened to. And of those who are willing to act even fewer have enough personal power to profit by their acts." ~ToP
-
"Once the apprentice has been hooked, the instruction begins," he continued. "The first act of a teacher is to introduce the idea that the world we think we see is only a view, a description of the world. Every effort of a teacher is geared to prove this point to his apprentice.
"But accepting it seems to be one of the hardest things one can do. We are complacently caught in our particular view of the world, which compels us to feel and act as if we knew everything about the world. A teacher, from the very first act he performs, aims at stopping that view. Sorcerers call it stopping the internal dialogue, and they are convinced that it is the single most important technique that an apprentice can learn." ~ToP
-
All paths are the same: they lead nowhere. However, a path without a heart is never enjoyable. On the other hand, a path with heart is easy—it does not make a warrior work at liking it; it makes for a joyful journey; as long as a man follows it, he is one with it.
-
Warriors do not win victories by beating their heads against walls, but by overtaking the walls. Warriors jump over walls; they don’t demolish them.
-
"Look at me," he said. "I have no doubts or remorse. Everything I do is my decision and my responsibility. The simplest thing I do, to take you for a walk in the desert, for instance, may very well mean my death. Death is stalking me. Therefore, I have no room for doubts or remorse. If I have to die as a result of taking you for a walk, then I must die.
"You, on the other hand, feel that you are immortal, and the decisions of an immortal man can be cancelled or regretted or doubted. In a world where death is the hunter, my friend, there is no time for regrets or doubts. There is only time for decisions." ~J2X
-
"Death is not like a person. It is rather a presence. But one may also choose to say that it is nothing, and yet it is everything. One will be right on every count. Death is whatever one wishes.
"I am at ease with people, so death is a person for me. I am also given to mysteries, so death has hollow eyes for me. I can look through them. They are like two windows, and yet they move like eyes move. And so I can say that death with its hollow eyes looks at a warrior while he dances for the last time on earth."
"But is that so only for you, don Juan, or is it the same for other warriors?"
"It is the same for every warrior that has a dance of power, and yet it is not. Death witnesses a warrior's last dance, but the manner in which a warrior sees his death is a personal matter. It could be anything: a bird, a light, a person, a bush, a pebble, a piece of fog, or an unknown presence." ~J2X
-
He said, "You think there are two worlds for you- two paths. But there is only one. The protector showed you this with unbelievable clarity. The only world available to you is the world of men, and that world you cannot choose to leave. You are a man!
"The protector showed you the world of happiness where there is no difference between things because there is no one there to ask about the difference. But that is not the world of men.
"The protector shook you out of it and showed you how a man thinks and fights. That is the world of man! And to be a man is to be condemned to that world. You have the vanity to believe you live in two worlds, but that is only your vanity.
"There is but one single world for us. We are men, and must follow the world of men contentedly. I believe that was the lesson."
~Teachings of DJ
-
"It's funny the way you sometimes remind me of myself," he went on. "I too did not want to take the path of a warrior. I believed that all that work, was for nothing; and since we are all going to die what difference would it make to be a warrior?
"I was wrong. But I had to find that out for myself.
"Whenever you do realize that you are wrong, and that it certainly makes a world of difference, you can say that you are convinced. Then you can proceed by yourself; and by yourself you may even become a man of knowledge."
I asked him to explain what he meant by a man of knowledge.
"A man of knowledge is one who has followed truthfully the hardships of learning," he said. "A man who has, without rushing or faltering, gone as far as he can in unravelling the secrets of personal power."
He discussed the concept in brief terms and then discarded it as a topic of conversation, saying that I should only be concerned with the idea of storing personal power.
"That's incomprehensible," I protested. "I can't really figure out what you are driving at."
"Hunting power is a peculiar event," he said. "It first has to be an idea, then it has to be set up, step by step, and then, bingo! It happens."
~J2X
-
When one has nothing left to lose one becomes courageous. We are timid only when we have something left to cling to.
-
What is wrong with us human beings, and has been wrong since time immemorial, is that without ever stating it in so many words, we believe that we have entered the realm of immortality. We behave as if we are never going to die - an infantile arrogance. But even more injurious than this sense of immortality is what comes with it: the sense that we can engulf this inconcievable universe with our minds.
-
I have spent thirty-five years of my life seeking the maturity of a warrior. I have gone to places that defy description, seeking that sensation of being seasoned by the onslaughts of the unknown. I went unobtrusively, unannounced, and I came back in the same fashion. The works of warriors are silent and solitary, and when warriors go, or come back, they do it so inconspicuously that nobody is the wiser. To seek a warrior's maturity in any other fashion would be ostentatious, and therefore, inadmissible.
-
"It's not the people around you who are at fault," he said. "They cannot help themselves. The fault is with you, because you can help yourself, but you are bent on judging them, at a deep level of silence. Any idiot can judge. If you judge them, you will only get the worst out of them. All of us human beings are prisoners, and it is that prison that makes us act in such a miserable way. Your challenge is to take people as they are! Leave people alone."
-
"It's not the people around you who are at fault," he said. "They cannot help themselves. The fault is with you, because you can help yourself, but you are bent on judging them, at a deep level of silence. Any idiot can judge. If you judge them, you will only get the worst out of them. All of us human beings are prisoners, and it is that prison that makes us act in such a miserable way. Your challenge is to take people as they are! Leave people alone."
I always rather liked this one..
-
:P
-
seasoned by the onslaughts of the unknown.
i like that
-
"It's not the people around you who are at fault," he said. "They cannot help themselves. The fault is with you, because you can help yourself, but you are bent on judging them, at a deep level of silence. Any idiot can judge. If you judge them, you will only get the worst out of them. All of us human beings are prisoners, and it is that prison that makes us act in such a miserable way. Your challenge is to take people as they are! Leave people alone."
yes, good quote, however, unfortunately, this is one of those that we all like to use on one side of the coin. I mean we like to think he is talking to those who judge us, instead of to us who judge others.
Personally I have no problem with 'judging', except that it is used to block - it is not judgements but poor judgements that are the problem. Wise and insightful assessments of the world around us is called discernment. But instead of that, we slap a quick attitude upon another because we don't like something, which is often petty, or worse, they in some way prod our self-importance.
But all this is once again, always interpreted by our so clever minds as I who is the enlightened one, looking at you who has the problem. Not I who has the problem. It's just human nature. In the end, such mental insights get sabotaged by our little inner emperors.
Much better to become seasoned over the grill!
-
Well said.
-
"Your friend is not a warrior," he said. "If he were, he would know that the worst thing one can do is to confront human beings bluntly."
"If one wants to stop our fellow men one must always be outside the circle that presses them. That way one can always direct the pressure."
"Fright never injures anyone. What injures the spirit is having someone always on your back, beating you, telling you what to do and what not to do."
Just a couple of my favs from the Intro to Journey to Ixtlan.
-
"One of the great maneuvers of stalkers is to pit the mystery against the stupidity in each of us."
-
"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."
~ A Separate Reality, Carlos Castaneda ~
-
My favourite of all time (helps me to remember not to over explain myself ::))
A sorcerer knows that in every explanation is a hidden apology, so while you are explainining why you failed to do some thing you are really apologising for your shortcomings....
don Juan M
No need for warriors to apologise.
Just do it and know it!
-
Amen!, Sister ........................
Amen!
-
The spirit listens only when the speaker speaks in gestures. And gestures do not mean signs or body movements, but acts of true abandon, acts of largesse, of humor. As a gesture to the spirit, warriors bring out the best of themselves and silently offer it to the abstract
-
One must have something to die for, in order to have something to live for.
-
We either make ourselves miserable or we make ourselves strong. The amount of work is the same.
-
A rule of thumb for a warrior is that he makes his decisions so carefully that nothing that may happen as a result of them can surprise him, much less drain his power.
A warrior acts as if he knows what he is doing, when in effect he knows nothing.
-
;D ;)
-
It is much easier for warriors to fare well under conditions of maximum stress than to be impeccable under normal circumstances.
-
The spirit listens only when the speaker speaks in gestures. And gestures do not mean signs or body movements, but acts of true abandon, acts of largesse, of humor. As a gesture to the spirit, warriors bring out the best of themselves and silently offer it to the abstract
That is a good one:
The spirit listens only when the speaker speaks in gestures.
Thus we have to turn our thoughts into real gestures, else they are like seeds on barren land.
just so, we must act in order to know - it is no use reading, we must find a way to apply and act on that - only in the action... no, more, in the way we act - the finesse, the flair, the humour and sincerity of our act. only then will we hear the tinkle tones of something in the ether, the mist, laughing and calling to us.
-
"We will never be together again," he said softly. "You don't need my help anymore; and I don't want to offer it to you, because if you are worth your salt as a warrior-traveler, you'll spit in my eye for offering it to you. Beyond a certain point, the only joy of a warrior-traveler is his aloneness. I wouldn't like you to try to help me, either. Once I leave, I am gone. Don't think about me, for I won't think about you. If you are a worthy warrior-traveler, be impeccable! Take care of your world. Honor it; guard it with your life!"
He moved away from me. The moment was beyond self-pity or tears or happiness. He shook his head as if to say good-bye, or as if he were acknowledging what I felt.
"Forget the self and you will fear nothing, in whatever level of awareness you find yourself to be," he said.
He had an outburst of levity. He teased me for the last time on this Earth.
"I hope you find love!" he said.
He raised his palm toward me and stretched his fingers like a child, then contracted them against the palm.
"Ciao," he said.
-
Not hunter anymore but: warrior -traveler,
or Wayfarer as I know it.
-
“Most of us,” don Juan Matus told, “face time as it recedes from us, repeating stories of an unexamined past, and projecting a future based on defense of the self. Shamans face the oncoming time—an active state of inner silence in which there are no antecedents.”
-
From 'The Art of Dreaming' http://www.scribd.com/doc/2582198/THE-ART-OF-DREAMING
Dreaming is sustaining the position where the assemblage point has shifted in dreams. This act creates a distinctive energy charge which attracts their [inorganic beings'] attention. It's like bait to fish: They'll go for it. Sorcerers, by reaching and crossing the first two gates of dreaming, set bait for those beings and compel them to appear.
...
Dreamers, whether they like it or not, in their dreaming seek associations with other beings. This may come to you as a shock, but dreamers automatically seek groups of beings; nexuses [* nexuses- connected series or groups] of inorganic beings in this case. Dreamers seek them avidly.
...
The novelty for us is the inorganic beings. And the novelty for them is one of our kind crossing the boundaries of their realm. The thing you must bear in mind from now on is that inorganic beings, with their superb consciousness, exert a tremendous pull over dreamers and can easily transport them into worlds beyond description.
...
He did not answer me. Instead, he explained that the whole realm of inorganic beings is always poised to teach. Perhaps because inorganic beings have a deeper consciousness than ours, they feel compelled to take us under their wings.
"I didn't see any point in becoming their pupil," he added. "Their price is too high."
"What is their price?"
"Our lives, our energy, our devotion to them. In other words, our freedom."
"But what do they teach?"
"Things pertinent to their world. The same way we ourselves would teach them, if we were capable of teaching them, things pertinent to our world. Their method, however, is to take our basic self as a gauge of what we need and then teach us accordingly. A most dangerous affair!"
"I don't see why it would be dangerous."
"If someone was going to take your basic self as a gauge, with all your fears and greed and envy, et cetera, et cetera, and teach you what fulfills that horrible state of being, what do you think the result would be?"
I had no comeback. I thought I understood perfectly well the reasons for his rejection.
"The problem with the old sorcerers was that they learned wonderful things, but it was on the basis of their unadulterated lower selves," don Juan went on. "The inorganic beings became their allies, and by means of deliberate examples, their allies taught the old sorcerers marvels. Their allies performed the actions, and the old sorcerers were guided step by step to copy those actions; but the old sorcerers did so without changing anything about their basic nature."
"Do these relationships with inorganic beings exist today?"
"I can't answer that truthfully. All I can say is that I can't conceive of having a relationship like that myself. Involvements of this nature curtail our search for freedom by consuming all our available energy. In order to really follow their allies' example, the old sorcerers had to spend their lives in the realm of the inorganic beings. The amount of energy needed to accomplish such a sustained journey is staggering."
-
"Inorganic beings can't force anyone to stay with them," don Juan went on. "To live in their world is a voluntary affair. Yet they are capable of imprisoning any one of us by catering to our desires, by pampering and indulging us. Beware of awareness that is immobile. Awareness like that has to seek movement, and it does this, as I've told you, by creating projections, phantasmagorical projections at times."
I asked don Juan to explain what 'phantasmagorical projections' meant. He said that inorganic beings hook onto dreamers' innermost feelings and play them mercilessly. They create phantoms to please dreamers or frighten them. He reminded me that I had wrestled with one of those phantoms. He explained that inorganic beings are superb projectionists, who delight in projecting themselves like pictures on the wall.
"The old sorcerers were brought down by their inane trust in those projections," he continued. "The old sorcerers believed their allies had power. They overlooked the fact their allies were tenuous energy projected through worlds, like in a cosmic movie."
-
"Because both the old sorcerers fell prey and mankind in general falls prey to the position of the assemblage point: the old sorcerers because, although they knew all about the assemblage point, they fell for its facility to be manipulated; mankind in general, because by not knowing that the assemblage point exists, we are obliged to take the by-product of its habitual position as something final and indisputable.
"You must avoid falling into those traps," he continued. "It'd be really disgusting if you sided with mankind as if you didn't know about the existence of the assemblage point. But it'd be even more insidious if you sided with the old sorcerers and cynically manipulate the assemblage point for gain."
"Unless you know exactly what you are doing and what you want out of alien energy, you have to be content with a brief glance. Anything beyond a glance is as dangerous and as stupid as petting a rattlesnake."
"Scouts are always very aggressive and extremely daring," he said. "They have to be that way in order to prevail in their explorations. Sustaining our dreaming attention on them is tantamount to soliciting their awareness to focus on us. Once they focus their attention on us, we are compelled to go with them. And that, of course, is the danger. We may end up in worlds beyond our energetic possibilities."
-
Don Juan explained that there are many more types of scouts than the two I had classified, but that at my present level of energy I could only focus on three. He described the first two types as the easiest to spot. Their disguises in our dreams are so outlandish, he said, that they immediately attract our dreaming attention. He depicted the scouts of the third type as the most dangerous in terms of aggressiveness and power- and because they hide behind subtle disguises.
"You have again fallen prey to words; this time the culprit word is 'items', which you have taken to mean only things, objects. Well, the most ferocious scout hides behind people in our dreams. A formidable surprise was in store for me in my dreaming when I focused my gaze on the dream image of my mother. After I voiced my intent to see, she turned into a ferocious, frightening bubble of sizzling energy."
"It's annoying that they are always associated with the dream images of our parents or close friends," he went on. "Perhaps that's why we often feel ill at ease when we dream of them." His grin gave me the impression that he was enjoying my turmoil. "A rule of thumb for dreamers is to assume that the third type of scout is present whenever they feel perturbed by their parents or friends in a dream. Sound advice is to avoid those dream images. They are sheer poison."
-
"And this brings us to something we've never talked about. What color were the scouts you've seen so far?"
Until the moment he mentioned it, I had never thought about this. I told don Juan that the scouts I had seen were either pink or reddish. And he said that the deadly scouts of the third type were bright orange.
I found out myself that the third type of scout is outright scary. Every time I found one of them, it was behind the dream images of my parents, especially of my mother. Seeing it always reminded me of the blob of energy that had attacked me in my first deliberate seeing dream. Every time I found it, the alien exploring energy actually seemed about to jump on me. My energy body used to react with horror even before I saw it.
-
"To seek freedom is the only driving force i know. Freedom to fly off into that infinity out there. Freedom to dissolve; to lift off; to be like the flame of a candle, which, in spite of being up against the light of a billion stars, remains intact, because it never pretended to be more than what it is: a mere candle." ~DJ
(http://i250.photobucket.com/albums/gg259/cynicalmystic/candle.gif)
-
"The concealed advantage of luminous beings is that they have something which is never used: “intent.” The maneuver of shamans is the same as the maneuver of the average man. Both have a description of the world. The average man upholds it with his reason; the shaman upholds it with his “intent.” Both descriptions have their rules; but the advantage of the shaman is that “intent” is more engulfing than reason." ~DJ
-
“Your state only seems to be final,” she said to me, “but it isn’t. A moment will come when you will change venues. Perhaps you will chuck every thought about the shamans of ancient Mexico. Perhaps you may even chuck the thoughts and views of the very shamans you worked with so closely, like the nagual Juan Matus. You might refuse his being. You’ll see.
The warrior has no limits. His sense of improvisation is so acute that he will make constructs out of nothing, but not just mere empty constructs; rather, something workable, pragmatic. You’ll see. It is not that you’ll forget about them, but at one moment, before you plunge into the abyss, if you have the gall to walk along its edge, if you have the daring not to deviate from it, you will the arrive at warriors’ conclusions of an order and stability infinitely more suited to you than the fixation of the shamans of ancient Mexico.” ~PoS
-
Be impeccable. I have told you this over dozen times. To be impeccable means to order your life to make all your decisions firm and unwavering, and then give more than everything to implement these decisions. If you do not decide, you will blindly play roulette with your own life.
The Art of Dreaming
-
"To seek freedom is the only driving force i know. Freedom to fly off into that infinity out there. Freedom to dissolve; to lift off; to be like the flame of a candle, which, in spite of being up against the light of a billion stars, remains intact, because it never pretended to be more than what it is: a mere candle." ~DJ
(http://i250.photobucket.com/albums/gg259/cynicalmystic/candle.gif)
-
Repost. One of my favs:
"It's not the people around you who are at fault," he said. "They cannot help themselves. The fault is with you, because you can help yourself, but you are bent on judging them, at a deep level of silence. Any idiot can judge. If you judge them, you will only get the worst out of them. All of us human beings are prisoners, and it is that prison that makes us act in such a miserable way. Your challenge is to take people as they are! Leave people alone."
The Clear View
THE ACTIVE SIDE OF INFINITY
Carlos Castaneda
-
“If a warrior is to succeed at anything, the success must come gently, with a great deal of effort but with no stress or obsession.”
— Carlos Castaneda
-
“Whenever the internal dialogue stops, the world collapses, and extraordinary facets of ourselves surface, as though they had been kept heavily guarded by our words.”
— Carlos Castaneda
-
“Forget the self and you will fear nothing, in whatever level or awareness you find yourself to be.”
— Carlos Castaneda
-
“Warriors do not win victories by beating their heads against walls, but by overtaking the walls. Warriors jump over walls; they don’t demolish them.”
— Carlos Castaneda
-
“It takes all the time and all the energy we have to conquer the idiocy in us.”
— Carlos Castaneda
-
"Intent is present everywhere. Intent is what makes the world. People, and all other living creatures for that matter, are the slaves of intent. We are in its clutches. It makes us do whatever it wants. It makes us act in the world. It even makes us die. When we become warriors, though, intent becomes our friend. It lets us be free for a moment; at times it even comes to us, as if it had been waiting around for us." - don Juan, The Eagle's Gift
-
"It is monstrous to think that the world is understandable or that we ourselves are understandable. What we are perceiving is an enigma, a mystery that one can only accept in humbleness and awe. The two sides of a human being are totally separate and it takes great discipline and determination to break that seal and go from one side to the other. We have been put together by forces incomprehensible to our reason. The only thing we do not have is time. Every minute might be our last; therefore, it has to be lived with the spirit." -don Juan, The Eagle's Gift
-
“Discipline, as understood by a warrior, is creative, open, and produces freedom. It is the ability to face the unknown, transforming the feeling of knowing into reverent astonishment; of considering things that exceed the scope of our habits, and daring to face the only war that is worthwhile: The battle for awareness.”
-
“Malicious acts are performed by people for personal gain … Sorcerers, though, have an ulterior purpose for their acts, which has nothing to do with personal gain. The fact that they enjoy their acts does not count as gain. Rather, it is a condition of their character. The average man acts only if there is a chance for profit. Warriors say they act not for profit but for the spirit.”
-
So I get home from work. I got the cats' new scratching pads and dishes. So the scratching pads come with catnip you can sprinkle all over them. Now, all four of them are running through the house like its a racetrack! They immediately went to scratch on the pads and get high. So quite amusing to watch them do this.
I will probably skip gym tonight and workout at home. I just did some lifting and situps. I am going to jog the trampoline and do the dance app soon. But work is going good. I did have one lady upset she got rescheduled. Sometimes you gotta say you are sorry, let folks vent, try to explain things a bit, without defending too much. Those moments I just go like the midde man as much as I can. I do get that often, always have "Im not mad at you!" I try to be understanding, do the empathic ear till I can release them and be free. Aint easy lol.
But yes tonight I want to read. It looks like a light weekend of readings this time which is actually ok. I want to go visit The Boy and all my grandkids this weekend. Hopefully The Kid is up for it. We got many to visit now lol.
-
"Discipline, as understood by a warrior, is creative, open, and produces freedom. It is the ability to face the unknown, transforming the feeling of knowing into reverent astonishment; of considering things that exceed the scope of our habits, and daring to face the only war that is worthwhile: The battle for awareness." - CC
-
""Only if one loves this earth with unbending passion can one relieve one's sadness," don Juan said. "Warriors are always joyful because their love is unalterable and their beloved, the earth, embraces them and bestows upon them inconceivable gifts. The sadness belongs only to those who hate the very thing that gives shelter to their beings." Don Juan again caressed the ground with tenderness. "This lovely being, which is alive to its last recesses and understands every feeling, soothed me, it cured me of my pains, and finally when I had fully understood my love for it, it taught me freedom." - DJ