All paths are the same: they lead nowhere. However, a path with heart makes for a joyful journey; you are one with it. The other will make you curse your life. One makes you strong; the other weakens you.
This wisdom reflects Don Juan’s emphasis on living with purpose and integrity, choosing a path in life that energizes and fulfills you, rather than one that drains you or leads to regret. Walking a path "with heart" means engaging fully, being impeccable, and aligning your actions with your deepest sense of truth and vitality.
The broader context of this teaching is that there is no "right" path universally. Instead, each individual must assess their own choices to ensure that they are meaningful and empowering. A warrior doesn’t waste time on paths without heart because they scatter energy and create unnecessary suffering.
Pema Chödrön references Don Juan's teaching about choosing a path with heart in her book When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times. In Chapter 7, titled "Hopelessness and Death," she discusses the importance of embracing uncertainty and letting go of fixed ideas. She cites Don Juan's advice to Carlos Castaneda:
Look at every path closely and deliberately. Try it as many times as you think necessary. Then ask yourself alone, one question... Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good; if it doesn't, it is of no use.
Chödrön uses this quote to illustrate the value of choosing a path that resonates deeply with one's true self, emphasizing the significance of personal integrity and heartfelt engagement in one's journey.
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The stated purpose of this subreddit is to aid in restoring the reputation of Carlos Castaneda and the knowledge he imparted, by pragmatically applying that knowledge IN PRACTICE. This means that we are sticking to what really works, as proven by direct experience by long-practicing members. We need to make clear our intent to move away, as a community, from the mistakes others have made. Content that is at-odds with this purpose will, upon review, be removed.
Over the past 25 years it has been "proven" that the whole be an impeccable warrior ethos, only applies once you can already move your assemblage point.
This critical step has been almost universally skipped over by readers.
Why?
Without silencing the inner dialogue first and foremost, none of the larger maneuvers advocated for in the first four books can actually occur.
No silence, and it's just pretending.
Without silencing the inner dialogue first and foremost, none of the larger maneuvers advocated for in the first four books can actually occur.
No silence, and it's just pretending.
How could you possibly know what the desires of your true self are, much less be able to pick a resonant path with heart, if you can't even silence the mind enough to actually reach that true self!
What a practitioner needs at the start is a clear and defined goal, dedication, discipline, and drive towards that goal.
And the goal we were given by Castaneda, essentially on his deathbed, was to shift our assemblage points to the position of Silent Knowledge.
From there, we can truly branch out and find an actual path with heart....
What total nonsense!!!
It doesn't say that.
So being a Jesus freak is a "path with heart"?
Being a jihadist bent on mass murder of jews is a "path with heart?
A path with heart is one with MAGIC.
That's the only way there's "heart". When you grow daily in knowledge of how reality and consciousness works, for real, in your face, with stunning magic.
Don Juan was likely referring to the other 8 or 9 lineages still surviving in Mexico.
Such as the "deer dancer" Zacatecas who danced to his own death.
Which by the way doesn't exist, so that lineage was kind of screwey.
B8t still had magic.
As La Gorda said of the other lineages, "But we don't like them".
At any rate, what a hideous misrepresentation of don Juan's words.
The kind only a bad player would come up with, to justify their greed for human attention.
And lack of concern for others as long as they can pretend freely to suck up attention.