Essays on the Main/About Carlos Castaneda

About Carlos Castaneda

Carlos Castaneda was known throughout the planet as a mystical writer from the United States of America. His books have been translated into many languages, including Russian. (And it will not be difficult to find them on the Internet).

What did Castaneda describe in his writings?

He had met in Mexico with a group of seekers of God (the “Nagual party” headed by Don Juan Matus) and for many years made periodical visits to them. He described these trips in his books.

They were narratives both about old mystical traditions and modern ways of developing consciousness among the Indians, as well as personal attempts by Castaneda to join the methods of their work.

The greatest benefit for us is the clear, as possible, records of his conversations with Don Juan and Genaro. (Although he did not correctly understand all in those conversations).

In general, the works of Castaneda have created a whole era, characterized by a surge of interest in mysticism, especially in the youth environment. But at the same time, both positive and negative trends were activated in the minds of readers — depending on the initial properties of souls.

For example, the greatest interest in readers was to using narcotics as the narrative heroes did at the beginning of their spiritual search. In this trend, Castaneda himself was involved ... — and died, in the end, from liver cancer...

Another negative trend led to the emergence of many groups of “Castaneda’s followers”, where the organizers wanted to “destroy the human form” of the participants. This was expressed in bullying them, also in mandatory “sexual initiations” of all newcomers... Of course, this could not bring any benefit to the “students”. But the organizers get the opportunity to satisfy their lowest feelings of souls.

The “human form” (the totality of false patterns of emotional and behavioral reactions, imparted by breeding and imitation, and now hinder spiritual growth) can indeed be destroyed, but not otherwise than against the background of the development of the spiritual heart.

About how Castaneda created his books, his wife told (M.R.Castaneda — “Magical journey with Carlos Castaneda”). In the beginning, he described everything, as it seemed to him, was in fact, and then he altered the texts in such a way as to intrigue the readers to a greater degree.

Is it possible to say that the author showed dishonesty by this?

I do not think so. After all, his interest — as a writer — was precisely mercantile, not spiritually-educational.

But, nevertheless, falseness in his books abounded! I mean almost all the “miracles” he described, in which he participated or which were witnessed by him.

How was this explained? Was this just a willful lie for the sake of popularity?

No. The reason is different. The leader of that group, Don Juan and His companions, at the beginning of their search, tried to grope techniques that would allow them to directly explore the nagual (intangible worlds, layers of multidimensionality). The first such unfortunate experience was drugs. The second was an attempt to learn to feel consciously oneself in dreams. To do this, it was necessary — in relaxation — to “catch” the self-feeling between the waking state and the dream. And further — to try to keep the fullness of self-awareness in the dream.

What actually happened? Man... as a rule, fell asleep, he or she saw the usual dreams... But Castaneda believed that it was a real mystical experience — and recorded, having woken up, everything — as if it was a highly valuable spiritual experience he had obtained. Plus a bit of intriguing fantasy…

This technique, in the end, was also recognized as not promising; from it, as well as from drugs, the members of the group of Don Juan refused.

But the real success was gotten only due to walking by the “path of love”. (I spoke about this in detail in the article “The Teaching of Juan Matus” published in the books “God Speaks” and then “Classics of Spiritual Philosophy and the Present”; this article was also reprinted from our website by one of the Russian talkers on a mystical theme and published by him under his own name).

Castaneda did not take for himself the “path of love”. Even to find his own success in personal spiritual progress is difficult. For example, he did not understand that he was tried to be taught by Don Juan about segments of the human body, as well as about “right-sidedness” and “left-sidedness”. In fact, it was a matter of the same segments, just not of the body, but of the developed consciousness existing outside the body. The using in the meditative work of both these structural units significantly increases the effectiveness of the meditative work.

Castaneda did not take the themes of either love or subtling of consciousness, he remained a “head” (ajnic) person. His personal interest in the knowledge of God — in his books is not traced.

But Don Juan, His closest friend Genaro, Silvio Manuel, and the Divine Lady from Their group (She did not enter into conversations with us and did not give us Her name) are now the Holy Spirits and participate in spiritual help to incarnate disciples of God.

For someone among the readers, it may be interesting to know that Don Juan and Babaji (from Haidakhan) have created, among other things, the common for both of Them forest working site, where They jointly help the worthy disciples. This fact, in particular, vividly demonstrates that for weak incarnate souls are dear the religious traditions of their ancestors, which are so different. But for Those Who have attained the Divine Perfection, there are no such differences: world-perception and methodology at the highest levels of spiritual ascent are common to all people.

Don Juan and Genaro during decades, along with other Perfects, gave step-by-step spiritual knowledge to us — Their disciples. And now, having mastered the Path offered by Them, we give this knowledge to you.

So, we must be sincerely grateful to Carlos Castaneda for the fact that he was able to collect and pass this knowledge to mankind!