magazine_interviews/mas_alla_jan_1995_deepl_translation

Mas Alla - No. 71 - January 1995 - Pages 20-29

CASTANEDA: THE ADVENTURE OF FREEDOM

“If one takes what don Juan says as a lie, one more of the many farces that exist, the loser is oneself, since by taking it this way one affirms the inviolability of the interpretative system of the everyday world and that whole system is already complete. The only thing that remains for us then is to grow old and enter senility. And if all that awaits us before death is senility, then the social order lied to us by making us believe that our options in the everyday world were multiple and extraordinary."

This is how Carlos Castaneda expresses himself when more than thirty years have passed since his life intersected with that of the incomparable Yaqui sorcerer Juan Matus. Carlos Castaneda was never the same after that decisive encounter, nor were the thousands and thousands of followers to whom the anthropologist helped define a new concept of reality. This month MÁS ALLÁ is pleased to offer its readers a world exclusive of an exceptional document: the most recent - and surprising - statements of the most elusive of characters, who emerges from a curtain of rumors.

Since we are all immersed in a shared interpretation of the world, Castaneda's proposal to perceive without such interpretations, to witness without judgment and without prejudice, to break our routines, even perceptual routines, is possibly the closest thing to freedom. And, in the face of such an invitation, questions about whether or not don Juan really existed, whether or not his apprentice invented his magical experiences, whether or not he flew like the crows or jumped into the abysses, become more than irrelevant and will never obtain an answer that satisfies everyone.

We will have to admit, in any case, that breaking the previous agreement on the nature of the world (to which we are also forced, more and more, by the latest discoveries of the scientific vanguard) and human possibilities is as intellectually attractive as it is difficult to put into practice. If it is true - as Don Juan once said and Castaneda continues to affirm today - that we have the possibility of traveling into the unknown, the story of the sorcerers whose lineage now ends deserves careful consideration. Don Juan, the sorcerer who taught us the ins and outs of the path with heart, calls it premeditated evolution. A good name for a definitive adventure.

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Interview with Carlos Castaneda

NAVIGATING THE UNKNOWN

His master, the Yaqui Indian don Juan Matus, conquered the hearts of millions of people around the world, and a whole generation was marked by Carlos Castaneda's books. Except for sporadic appearances, for years the heir of don Juan has remained inaccessible. Today Carlos Castaneda crosses the fog that envelops him and in an interview, a rigorous exclusive for MAS ALLA, breaks his silence to tell us about the adventure of the sorcerer who has perceived the inconceivable. His travels through the unknown have brought us back to a forceful Castaneda who continues to challenge our imagination and proposes, as Don Juan did in his day, a total revolution that he calls freedom.

More than three decades have passed since Carlos Castaneda undertook the great adventure of knowledge under the tutelage of that masterful figure who answered to the name of Juan Matus, unforgettable character and formidable and constant presence for the tens of thousands of readers around the world who, for years, were delighted with the stories and life adventures of the anthropologist turned sorcerer's apprentice.

Since the first book of the saga appeared in 1968, the reception and impact of his work were described as a true publishing phenomenon. Some saw in Castaneda the greatest literary and spiritual genius of the last generations; for others, it was a new and revolutionary way of doing anthropology; there were those who believed in Don Juan as an absolutely real character, and there were also those who assured that we were before an intelligently conceived literary fiction. Hundreds of articles were written about the "Castaneda phenomenon”, which divided the greatest anthropological authorities of the time; a multitude of books and essays, the most varied interpretations about the content of his books, apocryphal biographies and a whole universe of rumors: Castaneda is dead, he is a venerable old man, he never existed, he has committed suicide, he has disappeared, he has gone mad?

Oblivious to controversy, oblivious even to those who dared to impersonate him or enrich themselves by presenting themselves as his disciples, the writer turned sorcerer never responded to criticism, as if none of them could affect him. Except for the very few interviews (almost all of them to American magazines) granted during all this time, he meticulously followed don Juan's instructions and completely erased his personal history, weaved around himself an impregnable mist and became, probably unintentionally, an almost legendary figure. Nevertheless, in his sporadic declarations, Castaneda continued to insist that the idea that he had invented don Juan was completely inconceivable, and that he was only "an informant of very ancient techniques". His disappearance from the public scene responded, in any case, to a well thought-out strategy: to acquire complete freedom to slip into all possible worlds, to perceive without prejudice and to squeeze the most out of the possibilities of human nature, freedom not to be trapped in the descriptions of reality, whatever they might be. "After meeting him," said the writer Graciela Corvalán nine years ago, after having had several meetings with him, "his books become credible."

A new book, El Arte de Ensoñar (ed. Seix Barral), recently published in Spain, has confirmed to his many followers that Castaneda is still alive and remains faithful to his trajectory, trying to unravel the vastness of the mystery that don Juan bequeathed him. But there are other novelties: two women, Florinda Donner-Grau (Ser en el Ensueño, ed. emecé) and Taisha Abelar (Donde Cruzan los Brujos, ed. Gaia), also students of don Juan, now break their anonymity and tell in both works their particular apprenticeship with the group of sorcerers led by Juan Matus. Their approach, different but complementary to Castaneda's own, fully coincides with his fundamental postulates: social consensus determines and limits, generally for life, our perception of reality, but we have the possibility of penetrating other worlds as real as this one if we manage to accumulate enough energy for such an undertaking; there is much, much more to witness than what we were told was possible, if we accept the revolutionary proposal of a total personal change that breaks the previous agreement about what we are.

The following is only one of the many possible interviews that could be done with someone as elusive and multifaceted as Carlos Castaneda (the writer continues to demand that there be no photographs or tape recorders to record his voice). It has not been our intention to return to old controversies that contribute nothing to the essential content of his proposal, but to try to clarify, as far as possible, some of the most common doubts of all those people for whom Castaneda's books have been a milestone in their lives, and who have even tried to put his suggestions into practice, with better or worse luck. As far as we know, this is the first time that Carlos Castaneda has spoken out publicly with such categoricalness on the thorny issue of all those who have "adopted" his knowledge and today give courses and seminars on "the way of the warrior", while providing us with new clues about his current position as a sorcerer and nagual, his aspirations, doubts and fears, even about the fate of the unrepeatable master and his group of "navigators of the unknown".

"You will learn in spite of yourself, that is the rule," Don Juan told him at the beginning of their association. On one occasion the apprentice described the master as someone who lived entirely in magical time, and who only occasionally settled into ordinary time. Possibly that is the author's position today, abandoning for a few moments his magical time to try to make us understand and invite us on a journey through the indescribable. Castaneda let don Juan's words speak for themselves and we do the same with his. And the Castaneda who speaks today seems to be at the end of the road. Beyond awaits the mystery.

-In your books, you have explained that each nagual brings new characteristics to his or her lineage. What are those new characteristics in your case? Does your own path and purpose differ in any way from that traced by your teacher don Juan?

First of all, I would like to make it clear that the term lineage, although I have used it extensively, is not entirely appropriate. In reality, in the world of sorcerers like don Juan there is no such thing as lineage as we understand it: an ancestry or descent. In that world there is only an aggregate of people who have a common goal or interest, there are participants, practitioners of the system of knowledge that don Juan sought to promulgate among us. The manager or leader of such practitioners is known as the nagual, a being whose energy allows it to enter areas closed to everyday perception. Each new nagual brings personal characteristics with which he or she influences the practitioners of his or her time. In my case, my personal contribution lies in my academic interest in the social sciences; the ultimate goal of this interest is the desire for the philosophical field of Western man to expand into the world of the sorcerers. And this is where don Juan's path and mine differ. He was not interested in conceptualizing his knowledge. If I forced him to do so, he would explain everything with a unique clarity and precision, but explaining was not his inclination. He acted without bothering to understand anything, and he said that either you waste your time in intellectual twists and turns, or you act. I am different, I want to understand the processes of don Juan's sorcery, but not in an intellectual way, but in an energetic way. By this I mean that I believe that it is possible to plunge into the energetic twists and turns of the universe without transforming it into a cerebral process.

-What does the condition of being the new nagual imply and mean to you?

It means to be nominally at the head of a series of practitioners of don Juan's teachings. On an abstract level, it implies that the new nagual is responsible for the perceptual maneuvers of each of these practitioners. Since they are all involved in following in the footsteps of don Juan, the nagual has to use his or her personal effort and discipline to guide them through the energetic flows of the universe, and the nagual must possess the balance and sanity necessary to cope with such a task.

THE WORLD OF THE NAGUAL

-How would you describe the world of the Nagual?

It is the world of the sorcerers to which don Juan introduced us. It cannot be catalogued as a world apart from the everyday, but rather as something different, as a state of being. It is a world in which, for example, giving (one’s) word is a final act that cannot be cancelled. Such a promise is like a legal document with no possible change. In another more abstract aspect, the world of the nagual is a world where unusual things are perceived. Don Juan explained the incidence of unusual perceptions by saying that the primary requirement, for man in general, is to reach total silence. For the internal dialogue, he said, is the entrance to the witches' state of being, the entrance to a world where inconceivable perceptions are an everyday matter.

-It does not seem a simple thing to achieve....

The way in which don Juan managed to silence the internal dialogue of his disciples was by forcing them into silence from second to second. We could say that silence is agglutinated second by second, until it reaches a limit and individual point that exists in each one of us. Mine was fifteen minutes; when I reached it, by accumulation of silence, the everyday world was transformed and I came to perceive it in an indescribable way. To achieve it, the only advisable and possible practice is the effort, the intense desire to achieve it, taking one step after another. What is by no means admissible is that no one teaches us how to take those little steps, or takes us by the hand providing us with instruction at every moment. Don Juan said that the only essential thing is the personal decision of each one of us to reach silence.

-And who makes up the world of the nagual today?

Don Juan's disciples: Carol Tiggs, Taisha Abelar and Florinda Donner-Grau. There were other Indian disciples; however, only they came to sustain that required state of total silence. I know that in the United States and in Latin America several people declare themselves to be disciples of don Juan or ours, but the truth is that we do not have students, we have never had them, and not for lack of desire or interest on our part, but because no one dares to undertake and develop the change of habits and reasoning and the discipline that is needed to reach the sorcerers world. The sorcerers world is not a fiction or an idealization. It is a state of change, maneuvers, radical deeds. Don Juan defined himself neither as a sorcerer nor as a spiritual man, but as a navigator in the inconceivable sea of the unknown. To navigate in that sea, he said, you need discipline, sanity and guts of steel.

AN OPPORTUNITY FOR ALL

"We have no students because no one dares to undertake the change of habits and discipline necessary to reach the sorcerers world."

-You present access to sorcery as a matter of having accumulated sufficient energy, but not all people seem to be born equally gifted in this respect. Is there really an opportunity for everyone?

Indeed, access to the world of don Juan Matus is a matter of possessing sufficient energy, and you are right in saying that not all human beings seem to be born equally gifted. I would add that, in my opinion, no one is born endowed with sufficient energy. This reduces the problem to a common denominator: since no one has enough energy, all of us have a roughly equal chance. Certainly there are people who are born with a lot more energy than others, but this is only to cope with the daily chores. Such an amount of energy has no advantage for access to the world of sorcerers. There enter those who have a special quality of energy, the product of iron discipline and purpose.

-Is it possible to face the everyday world without losing energy?

Sorcerers like don Juan say yes, they say that the events of the everyday world are only disastrous for us if they are filtered through self-importance. We are so self-centered and think we are so important that the slightest setback overwhelms us. We expend so much energy in presenting and defending the self in the everyday world that we have nothing left to deal with any contradiction. Such total attrition is, it seems, unavoidable, since we keep exclusively in the lane laid out by our socialization. If we dared to change lanes, to change our way of being, by simply suppressing the onslaught of self-importance we would have achieved something unheard of: to cancel the daily wear and tear of energy and enter into energetic conditions that would allow us to perceive much more than we believe possible.

-Is it possible to achieve that without the push of a nagual?

Don Juan's proposal is accessible to anyone who achieves total silence. Silencing the internal dialogue is a final proposition, which can be carried out through any means. The presence of a teacher or a guide is not superfluous, but neither is it absolutely indispensable. What is essential is the daily effort to accumulate silence. Don Juan used to say that reaching total silence is equivalent to "stopping the world". That is the moment in which one sees the flow of energy in the universe around us.

DREAMING AND RECAPITULATION

-In your books, you use the concept of the eagle that devours consciousness at the hour of our death, and you also speak of the spirit. Are they equivalent terms; is what you call the eagle somehow comparable to the spirit?

Your question is intellectually very real, but at the same time absurd. I could not answer it because I, personally, do not know what the eagle that devours consciousness is, nor do I know what spirit is. Both are operative terms that try to describe something ineffable, unheard of, that cannot be described. Every time I proposed to don Juan questions that had no answer, he would sing me a song: "Ask the stars that see me cry at night".

-What is the relationship between what you call Dreaming and what other authors have called "lucid dreaming"?

There is no relation. Dreaming is a maneuver of sorcerers who, with their iron discipline, transform ordinary dreams, whether lucid or vague, into something transcendental. I know of no one, in the normal everyday world, who possesses the discipline necessary to carry out this transformation. Lucid dreams are vivid dreams, but they cannot be used as an energetic gateway to take our consciousness of being into other worlds as real and forceful as the world of everyday chores.

-On numerous occasions you have stressed the importance of recapitulation, and many people inspired by what you say have tried to practice it. Could you comment on the methodology and concrete results of this exercise?

For Don Juan, recapitulation was the essential method to embark on the path to freedom; it is not a technique to recover energy, but a maneuver congruent with the vision of the sorcerers. They consider that the fact that we are conscious of being is a universal state. An enormous force lends consciousness of being to newborns, whether they are viruses, amoebas or human beings. At the end of life, this same enormous force takes away from each of these beings the borrowed consciousness of being, which has been enlarged by their individual experiences. The recapitulation, for the sorcerers, is the way to give back to that enormous force what it lent us at the moment of our birth. What is totally unheard of, Don Juan said, is that this force is content with recapitulation. Since the only thing it wants from us is the consciousness of being, by giving it to it in the form of recapitulation, it does not take away our life at the end, but lets us pass with it towards freedom. This is the theoretical interpretation that the sorcerers make of the recapitulation. The methodology to carry it out is very simple. First, one makes a list of all the people with whom one has had dealings, from the present until, probably, the moment of birth. The point is to relive each experience with each of the people on the list, not simply remembering them, but reliving them anew. To this is added a very slow rhythmic breathing, from right to left and exhaling in the center, which is called the fan, because it fans the memories. The belief of the sorcerers is that by reliving all our experiences, one gives them to the enormous force that destroys us. Since this maneuver has nothing to do with psychological exercises such as psychoanalysis, reliving lived experiences implies making use of energy that has already been spent.

"The sorcerers consider that an enormous Force lends us the consciousness of being and at the end of life takes it away from us. After having been magnified by individual experiences. Recapitulation is the way to give back to that Force what it lent us so that it lets us pass to freedom."

-And how to know if the recapitulation is being correctly performed?

Its incidental but concrete results are an increase in energy and a state of well-being. The presence of these two sensations are like an index that the recapitulation is being performed in an effective manner.

A ROMANCE WITH KNOWLEDGE

-Especially in your latest book, The Art of Dreaming (ed. Seix Barral), you describe what you call the Second Attention as a fierce world fraught with dangers and pitfalls, not at all like the accounts of a placid and happy world that other traditions tell us about. Why are these differences; why does the knowledge in your lineage differ so substantially from other sources?

What the sorcerers call Second Attention is indeed a world fraught with dangers and pitfalls, but such dangers and pitfalls are no more and no less than those of our world. And certainly Second Attention has nothing to do with a placid and happy universe. Don Juan explained this discrepancy by saying that the world of the sorcerers is a living world, concrete and real, which can be entered in a total way. He also said that the world of the mystics is a world that is a product of glimpses of the unknown, a dead, imaginary world that has nothing to do with the reality of struggle and incessant change of a living, real world. As I mentioned before, don Juan considered sorcerers as navigators in the sea of the unknown. I, at first, thought this was a poetic metaphor, but then I realized that it was a phenomenological description of a state of being. Don Juan said that it is not possible for Western man to be so simplistic as to believe in the mystical "complacencies" of those who have never sailed into the unknown deliberately and with full premeditation.

-Recently, Florinda Donner-Grau and Taisha Abelar have published books about their own training with don Juan. Is there a reason why they decided to break their silence?

They both decided to write about their experiences on the warrior's path after the return of Carol Tiggs, who was absent for ten years. The fact that she came back to us caused a total change in the perspective outlined by don Juan, and our isolation, imposed by don Juan, was transformed into the opposite. Because of this change, don Juan's three disciples: Florinda Donner, Taisha Abelar and Carol Tiggs, acquired an exhorbitant importance within the parameters of the sorcerers world. By virtue of their own impeccability, they became it’s genuine representatives. They themselves considered the option of writing about their apprenticeship, something I find extraordinarily appropriate since no one but them could give a full account of the complexity of don Juan as a colossal teacher.

-What happened then to the rest of the apprentices we became familiar with in your books? Do you continue to be linked to them in any way?

They are no longer with us for a very simple reason: they cannot meet my academic demands. It was imperative that the apprentices adapt to the temperament of the new nagual, which in my case is to live a romance with knowledge. The other apprentices wanted me to be like them, merely a practitioner of don Juan's knowledge. Such a thing is not possible, it had to be the other way around, as tradition dictates; so I did not abandon them, it was they who abandoned me. Now, their hope lies in that at the final moment don Juan will be able to help them. Once Florinda Donner-Grau and Taisha Abelar wrote their books, our relationship with the other apprentices ended because, by writing, they both reaffirmed their relationship with the intellect and, therefore, with the new nagual.

"Don Juan said that the world of the mystics is the product of glimpses of the unknown, dead and imaginary, while that of the sorcerers is a living, real world that can be entered fully."

THE ALTERNATIVE DEATH: WHERE IS DON JUAN?

-Should it be understood as a metaphor or as a real fact? Do you and your group aspire to reach it?

Let me clarify that we do not form a group. Each of us, students of don Juan's knowledge, is an isolated individual. What binds us together is the purpose of freedom, but not enough to make us a cohesive group. To be consumed in the inner fire is an alternative to physical death; it is not a metaphor, it is a real but incomprehensible fact. Don Juan explained the inner fire as a condition of energetic tension created by adhering to follow the premises of the warrior's path. This physical tension causes an energetic explosion in due time, an explosion that transforms every cell of the living being into consciousness of being, that is, into pure energy. Of course all of us, his students, aspire to reach this final state. Don Juan called it total freedom because, for him, this state implied the perception of the universe around us free of interpretations based on our socialization and language.

-Did he finally achieve his purpose?

Don Juan affirmed that to die as sorcerers die is to take the consciousness of being to a plane incomprehensible to the linear mind. To die consumed by the inner fire is equivalent to transforming our entire physical being into consciousness of being. Don Juan died this way, and in doing so achieved what sorcerers call total freedom. The consciousness of being, increased by the contribution of our physical part, reaches indescribable levels. Freedom for the sorcerers is the freedom to perceive as total beings and not as men: apes chained by socialization and language.

-And where did Don Juan go, if it is possible to describe him at all?

Carol Tiggs and Florinda Donner-Grau claim to have a knowing relationship with don Juan; they have contributed the idea that he and the rest of the sorcerers with him have been trapped in one of the states of the world, something the witches call "the layers of the onion." They claim that don Juan could not escape from the twin universe, the universe of inorganic beings, because while he was an abstract man, his group was made up of very concrete practitioners. It is said that if the degree of abstraction of these practitioners had been greater, the leap of the consciousness of being of all of them would have had a much greater scope. Perhaps don Juan's consciousness of being is stuck in a place he did not wish to reach, a state that is not appropriate to his temperament. Be that as it may, a nagual is capable of modifying situations according to multiple circumstances. I personally believe that the only thing that exists for a nagual is struggle. A nagual conceives that where he is is precisely where he should be, and from there he goes on.

THE END OF A LINEAGE

-On more than one occasion you have stated that you are the last, that your lineage ends with you. Does that mean that the legacy of don Juan will be lost forever?

Indeed, with us the lineage of don Juan ends. But don Juan's wish is that I transform this negative situation into something very positive, by making the idea of freedom available to all. If such a thing were possible, his lineage would not end; on the contrary, it would be dispersed until it reached an enormous multitude. My desire for this to happen is intense, and my intent impeccable. I can only say that I desperately hope for it, but that everything is in the hands of the spirit and our own impeccability. It is true that something is nagging us so that we end up like Don Juan, consumed by internal fire. We do not wish to put up resistance, but to propose an argument of sufficient value to be able to continue our work and have the time we need.

-Meanwhile, there is a proliferation of people who give courses on his system of knowledge, use his concepts and carry out a "free adaptation" of don Juan's teachings. What is your opinion on this matter?

I don't think it is possible to teach or lecture on don Juan's knowledge. Over the years I have given many, many lectures about my learning with him, but it seems that the only thing I have achieved is to provide vocabulary to a number of people who have gained recognition because of it. What don Juan proposes leads to palpable facts, which require great care and dedication. The unfair thing about these apocryphal courses is that there really are many people interested in don Juan's knowledge, and it is unfortunate that there have arisen those who cynically take advantage of this situation; they charge money, but cannot teach anything. It is terribly obvious that in the background lies only economic interest. What is certain is that no one who attends these courses will ever be able to get anything out of them. None of us, the disciples of don Juan, can teach as he taught because we do not have the command to do such a thing. So the question that arises in my mind is, how could people who do not even realize what don Juan was doing do it?

THE MYSTERIES OF PERCEPTION

-Along with dreaming, stalking is another of the essential premises that appear in his work and which has also suffered the most diverse interpretations. What exactly does stalking mean?

Don Juan called stalking the act of displacing the assemblage point and keeping it fixed where it was displaced. The assemblage point is a concept of the sorcerers, who maintain that the perception of human beings takes place at a point invisible to the normal eye, a point located at the level of the shoulder blades, but not in the physical body but in the energetic mass, about a meter behind the back. This is where, according to the sorcerers, millions of energetic fibers of the universe converge, which, through an act of interpretation, are transformed into the perception of the everyday world. The sorcerers affirm that if the assemblage point is displaced to a different place than usual, another series of energetic filaments converge on it and, therefore, another world becomes accessible to our perception. The assemblage point is displaced through dreaming or through practical actions. Once this is achieved, keeping it fixed in it’s new position is a true art. Whoever cannot achieve this will never be able to perceive new worlds in an inclusive way; he will perceive them in a partial and chaotic way. We could say that perception becomes fixed as the assemblage point becomes fixed, and that, in essence, is a matter of having enough energy.

-You talked about shifting the assemblage point by practical actions. What kind of actions?

Usually, stalkers gain enough energy to master the art of stalking through behavioral maneuvers, such as voluntarily engaging in cognitive dissonance. This is, for example, how Taisha Abelar was taught to stalk. One of the behavioral maneuvers that the sorcerers put her through was to turn her into a beggar. For a year, she was sent daily, very dirty and ragged, to the door of churches to beg for money. Taisha's task was to transform herself so completely into a beggar that her behavior would fit perfectly with the preconceived ideas people have of a beggar. Taisha was not doing this as an actor, for whom a performance is only a matter of a few moments, but rather she was completely a beggar. Another example of stalking is what Don Juan's partner, Doña Florinda, did to me when she sent me to work for almost two years as a cook, a task that took up all my time every day; and yet another example of stalking is the one described by Taisha Abelar in her book: being made to live for more than a year up some huge trees. The fruit of these maneuvers is that one is transformed to the point of becoming one's own transformation. That is stalking.

-Do you recommend this kind of maneuvers to those who wish to get involved in your proposals?

Of course it is a very difficult sorcerer's maneuver to perform under the circumstances of the everyday world. I don't know how anyone could lead another person to stalk without first achieving command of stalking. I have been told that there are people out there who claim to be able to teach stalking. My opinion is that such a thing is a very calculated deception, and it is not fair that genuinely interested people should fall into such a trap. Among other things, to stalk you need to be impeccable with others and with yourself, in order to be able to see yourself without lies. One can only stalk when one reaches a balance of attachment and detachment from the world around us. As long as this state is not reached, it is an absurdity. Whoever manages to reach it would practice stalking, would not teach it, much less charge for teaching it. Don Juan once made a very appropriate comment about teaching without knowing what one teaches: "avoid at all costs the compulsion to be a weekend warrior. It is very easy to believe that one day's effort is enough. It isn't. To get out of the bad place we all find ourselves in, you have to use all the effort you have at your disposal."

THE BIOLOGICAL MANDATE OF EVOLUTION

-When Don Juan spoke of evolution, what was for him the meaning and direction of that evolution?

In the course of my stay with don Juan I came to understand that it is vital to become aware that we have to change our state of being. Don Juan called this change evolution. He argued that the social order emphasizes reproduction as a biological mandate, but that it was time to take into account another biological mandate: evolution. For him, the sign of this premeditated evolution in a human being was to come to "see" the flow of energy in the universe. To "see" ourselves as energy fields, as "luminous eggs," as he put it, meant that we had come to cancel the interpretative system that allows us to see the world only as we see it. Don Juan referred to this interpretive system as a system of perception that takes sensory data and transforms it, through an act of intentionality, into the perception of the world. Let us take as an example when we consider the sensory data of the building that houses the "securities bank." All that our senses capture is the presence of an architectural structure that we call a building, which in itself is already an interpretation. However, the act of total intentionality that leads us to "see" the "securities bank" is an act of pure interpretation, since to "see" the "securities bank" we have to make use of all our whole sense of civilization. Don Juan asserted that for our interpretive system to remain in force, all of us have to engage in cynical and deceptive perceptual maneuvers, maneuvers that we have to put an end to. Unless we devote every heartbeat to this task, we are the ones being blackmailed.

-What then is the alternative?

Don Juan's knowledge is a vital option to get out of such maneuvers. He said that if one takes it as a lie or invention, one more of the many farces that exist, the loser is oneself, since by taking it this way one affirms the validity and inviolability of the interpretative system of the everyday world, and that whole system is already complete. The only thing that remains for us then is to grow old and enter senility. A great drug guru of the sixties declared not long ago that he had discovered a tremendous homemade drug to keep us in the clouds twenty-four hours a day, and that drug was called senility. If all that awaits us before death is old age and senility, the social order lied to us by making us believe that our options in the everyday world were multiple and extraordinary. Don Juan's vision was to achieve that denied multiplicity of choices by canceling the effect of our interpretive system. This is the crux of his teachings. Whoever sets out to elucidate them in a classroom setting is a cynic and a phony, because there is no way to do so without first having corporeally internalized don Juan's conceptual paradigm. By proposing the idea of premeditated evolution, which would cancel our system of perception, he proposes a total revolution which he calls freedom.

Concha Labarta

(post with scans of the original pages of the magazine)

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)