The work of Carlos Castenada

Here is a 100, 000+ word web-site that took several important passages from 10 of Castenada's books and organized them as notes : great resource if you can't get your hands on the books yet.

http://www.prismagems.com/castaneda/

as usual - the image links to something good!

'Was curious to know of peoples experiences using Castaneda's techniques & philosophy.. Dreaming, Impeccability (obtaining and maintaining power), Tensigrity, etc.. ' ----


Thanks for posting such a challenging question , because what it comes down to , is , it is difficult to put such things into words ...

If asked , I would probably say Castenada's work had a profound impact on my worldview ... but then searching my own mind , it was difficult to explain how , or exactly what teaching's I had applied -

Rather than waiting for the perfect all inclusive answer to come to me , let me just mention a few things that have somewhat integrated themselves from the teachings into a level that goes beyond the words alone ....

First of all , probably the concept of living as a spiritual warrior .... to view everything in your reality as a challenge orchestrated for your personal growth ... and yet to know that our perception of reality is still a great mystery.....

The concept of personal power , and the ideas about how to obtain enough personal power to apply 'intent' or 'will' -

His ideas of letting go of self importance and trying not to reveal every experience to others as words , because sometimes that only reduces the experience that was not meant to be filtered down to words ...

The art of dreaming ... setting up dreaming , the techniques for entering and pro-longing lucid dreams ...

The concept of using our death as an ally , knowing that our time is short and seeing that death just over our shoulder can be a wake up call to take action.

The concept of 'Petty Tyrants' helped me many times to see challenging people in my life as oppurtunities for personal growth , rather than limits.

The ideas for stopping internal dialog , and realizing that our surface level consciousness is simply a collection of what we have been told and what we tell our self every day .... the process of looking for the deeper layers.

Don Juan believed that having a child would limit a man / woman in their search for knowledge - he believed that children suck so much energy out of us that they create that hole that can never be filled - and they make it impossible to practice some of the techniques he advises Castaneda (and I spelled his name wrong in the topic header... sorry).

This is true if you take those teachings literally and assume they are the only path to knowledge - but it was Don Juan who also said all paths lead to the same place 'nowhere' - and all that mattered was if your path had heart. Well certainly you can make a path of heart out of having children.

Some of the practices children compromise -

- Having no routines.
- Not having anyone expect anything from you.
- being with your solitude for long periods of time.

I would argue that if you have children, you just need to leverage the things they bring into your life that actually make your quest for knowledge even more intense - the biggest one is , If you have children, you get to know your inner children much more intimately because your children play out all the phases of development right before your eyes. There is no book or exercise that can replace this understanding.

The other thing is that children require you to be much more conscious of death , and Castaneda says that death is one of our greatest Allies.

I could go on for a bit, and will later, but my kids are up and demanding stuff right now!

See!

http://p197.ezboard.com/bsustainedreaction98489

Again if you want to test and challenge what you know about Castaneda here is the site where his ex-apprentices hang out. People that actually studied with him and some for ten or twenty years.

Me, I am on a different branch of the same liniege called the Sweet Medicin Sundance Path. The difference is that Castaneda's path was a stalkers path, the true path of the sorcerer. Whereas I am on a dreamers path. It all goes back to the same liniage though, just different ways of expressing itself. However, Swift Deer is still around, whereas good old Carlos lost the battle to Cancer. People are still talking about him and arguing weather what he taught was even real. LOL. all about perspective I suppose. Sustained reaction will tell you he is a fake. Mind you they don't have all the deatails. Then there are Stalker/dreamers and Dreamer/Stalkers, although I don't know much about these. Only that they combine the two. The stalkers do the reconnasance and don't have much to do with the world. The dreamers then take that knowledge and dream it in and dissiminate it to the people. Every system works with every other system at the top. Problem is you don't get all the pieces at the bottom. HeHe, then agian we allways say don''t beleive a fucking thing we say because we might be full of shit. Then where does that leave us, no where, that's where and that is all there is really once you deconstuct it all. Problem is you can spend a whole life time or many life times getting to that point. Or you can decide this is the life I will go all the way and take it to full resurection. Or die trying which is what I emagin happens most times, but what a ride. HeHe. I can hardly wait till I am ready to be bitten by a snake, what a trip that will be. LOL. If a moth can be that powerfull emagin a snake. HeHe. All of this is to break us out of our boxes. I am finding that my box keeps getting bigger, rather than breaking. So on I go on my venture towards formlessness. Sorry, I got babling, hope I made some sense in the process, lol.

WallyWrote:
Has anyone got any theories on why Don Juan *see's* people who have had children as having a hole in their being(or should I say 'egg'? I don't recall the exact terminology)

I discovered CC last year, quite by accident, I found the books to be fascinating...really they are why I joined this group, would love to hear others who've read the books ideas about them.

As a woman has a child fibers attach to that child form the mother and the father. The birthing process will rip a hole in the womans luminouse egg. It is just a matter of patching it up with a mixture of burned smudge and some corn paho (blue corn Meal) The biggest reason why it is bad for a sorcer to have children is because the parents are constantly giving the child(ren) energy threw their fiber connection. This connection cannot be cut until the child is over 18 years of age. It is a contract the parent has with the child. Even fathers that take off have this connection. People that do not cut at the age of 18 will generally have this connection thier whole life. Family connections. Unless some dramatic event happens where one is able to somehow cut from the other. A child is an energy investment. The sorcerer needs all of their energy to become humans of power.

I think this was meant to be more subjective and less literal. There is not some outside force cutting a literal connection. (this is just my perspective.) Cutting the connection is a state of mind , an awareness - an agreement to no longer be responsible for that child - why would this not be done? Because people are bonded and connected to their families and they want to stay close and love each other. This in itself is not a limitation - Yes - having children is going to drain your energy, but you can find new ways to renew it and absorb energy from your children and so much is learned - I think that the lesson applies more to what Castaneda himself needed in order to break free - this does not mean it applies to you.

You are in contract with your child till 18. Their is a luminouse cord that attaches you to this child. You can cut this cord after 18. When I cut someone's cord I use a knife to cut it. It is sore for a while after. It is not physical, but it is just as real as the cord to your astral body. If you don't cut it, it will stay attached. It has to be cut in some way. So no, it doesn't naturally disconnect itself unless one of the two parties does something to cut it. We Are attached by cords to many people we encounter in our lives. We call these karmic cords as there is usually a karmic reason for the cord being in place, meaning the two people have a contract to meet. These can also be cut. I would call these cords literal. they come out of your naval. Some traditions seem to think they come from different parts of the body, I say what ever works for you. One thing to note is that if you are attached to someone, like your parents, you can cut the cord and it will just reatach. You have to make a consiouse effort to make sure that it doesn't reattach. Often a person has to cut more than once because of this reason. Our close friends we are attached to. We have a cord attached to every one of our lovers. There are lots of cords. Cutting from people is part of the healing process. Think of it as pulling a pile of garbage behind you. It takes a lot of energy to maintian the connection. We cut so that we free up energy for use. But remember, we have contracts, often they need to be fulfilled.

Shaun ThreeWolves

This is more or less a repost of a topic I posted earlier:
Considering the particular name of this group, this topic may or may not have been discussed before; however, I would still be interested in anything my fellow members would be willing to discuss on the matter.
I'm currently reading "The Eagle's Gift", and find all of the Castaneda books very addictive. I've stayed away from them for the longest time because I've heard and read countless rumors that the entire series is a farce. Nonetheless, Castaneda argues with the occasional disclaimer that everything written is in fact true to his personal experience.
I would be interested in hearing the various viewpoints on these books. I find them enthralling. Whether I believe them or not, I'm finding they outline a very ideal way to approach one's reality. I have even attempted to follow some of the suggestions Don Juan gives Castaneda concerning dreaming, and I've had some interesting results.
Opinions and/or personal experiences welcome.