Hi, d. C.,

Just a note to let you know I'm okay, as I haven't responded yet to your last email for quite awhile. I've been staggering through the consecutive days working at the ranch, but I'll make it. Saw my doctor yesterday for my annual physical, and except for having lost a lot of weight this year and being tired a lot, everything seems to be okay. I'll go on working every day through Sunday a week from tomorrow, and then I ought to have five days off in a row. Seems like a long, long time since I've had that luxury. But the money I've been making will have been worth it. I'll write to you at length then (if I'm not able to before then). I've really enjoyed your more recent emails, and thank you for the trouble you took with the last one, answering all my questions. I've been rereading these more recent emails and contemplating on the contents again and again out at the ranch. This is a most interesting and important subject, it seems to me. How can one have a sense of guidance (not based on fear, or guilt, or other more sentimental propensities such as I seem to have)? What is the "ethical foundation" for an impecable warrior, if such can be articulated? I think many people who have followed Carlos Castaneda's writings over the earlier years would be interested in this. I think I understand the perspective you are describing, but I still have a few more questions, if I may.

Talk to you later. Hope you are being well,

John

Hello again, d. C.!

I feel like I've walked across Australia, ending with driving twenty miles through the worst storm I've ever seen in Tucson last night, but my life is more my own again for the first time in a long, long time, it seems. And I feel stronger comin' out than I felt goin' in. So it's good.

I've gone on reflecting about our earlier conversation, and it's been like a "brain-buster," attempting to imagine what it is, exactly, that I'm trying to ask you in this area. I guess I'm keenly looking for more understanding about how to guide my own steps in these days. I've tried to express it in the form of some key, basic ethical foundation. How do I relate with my life and my fellow human beings and the life on this planet? What are the values that are enduring? How does an impecable warrior know "what is right" to do? Is it only pragmatism?

So many of your responses to me over our past conversations have seemed to imply that? Yet other responses imply otherwise. The ferocious, unyielding battle that you outline with any traces of egoism in our being, suggests that there is a value there, of course. Yet I realize that the eradication of ego, as possible, is the most pragmatic thing a person can do, after all.

But what of one's fellow humans? What of the members of one's family, or, the people one works with on the job who are beloved comrades in the daily shit of it all? Pragmatic?

"With as little energy as possible." (I don't have that email before me, so I may misquote you.") Well . . . . . yes, I do everything that way, even as a part of my conditioned personality (I am definitely lazy, believe it or not.), but also as an alert (and even cunning) strategy. In one sense I do everything with as little energy as possible. Yet I can conceive of doing less!!!--relating with other people as little as possible. Is that the idea of it? Little relationship with other people. Little talk. Suzuki Roshi did that. Yes, but am I ready for that? I don't know. Will the environment somehow "support" that? I don't know. I don't exactly have a monastery to retreat to. Unless it's here now, if I can learn how to "play it."

Well, I supposed, anyway, that this teaching of yours was addressed to the here-and-now of that time back then, given how hard I was overworking myself--and gratefully, very gratefully, I left off of keeping up correspondence with you and everyone else during that period, remembering and strengthened by your words, again and again. :-)

Perhaps all questions of ethical foundation could be expressed in common lingo in terms of "doin' the right thing." How do we know, d. C.? Or do we not need to know, in order to know?

What is the ethical foundation of an impecable warrior? How does he/she know what to do, with a trust that one's actions are in accord with the natural order of things, or the intent of Spirit?

Hasta la "vista,"

John

>But what of one's fellow humans? What of the members of one's family, or, the people one works with on the job who are beloved comrades in the daily shit of it all? Pragmatic?

I will answer that shortly, but I'll sum it up here: Yes, pragmatic.

>"With as little energy as possible." (I don't have that email before me, so I may misquote you.") Well . . . . . yes, I do everything that way, even as a part of my conditioned personality (I am definitely lazy, believe it or not.), but also as an alert (and even cunning) strategy. In one sense I do everything with as little energy as possible. Yet I can conceive of doing less!!!

I knew you were a lazy bum. We all are, to some extent. We may be workaholics in some areas, but that is not the point. Being lazy is not conducting things "with as little energy as possible". You can work yourself into a sweat and yet use as little energy as possible. You can sit on your arse all day long and pour energy out of your body by the gallons. The type of energy I am talking about is personal power. Awareness. Don't spend it all at once, and most of all...don't waste any of it. It is not an endless supply.

>relating with other people as little as possible. Is that the idea of it? Little relationship with other people. Little talk. Suzuki Roshi did that. Yes, but am I ready for that? I don't know. Will the environment somehow "support" that? I don't exactly have a monastery to retreat to. Unless it's here now, if I can learn how to "play it."

_Relating_ with other people as little as possible in such a way that you do not entangle yourself in their dealings is a necessity, yes. Our fellow men are black magicians. Modern-day-man has forgotten the power of the Word, yet he wields it and slays all and everyone that steps in his way. We create worlds with the Word. We fixate our assemblage point of perception with it. The word fixates the awareness. A bidding for power is forever...not a door you can open or close as you please. Yet we do this all day long. But we pay the price too. A high price. We pay it by chaining ourselves onto the world and linking our chains with any other fellow man's chains so that we all can restrain anyone from seeking freedom. You know that all too well already. A lifetime of the word has made you fall to your knees more than once. Personal history is the chain that keeps us within the bounds of our "personality" or "psychological profile". To get rid of this we must create a mist around us, so thick it cannot be penetrated. People will relentlessly try to penetrate it...in an effort to pin you down...to categorize you...to define the You.

Recapitulation releases the hooks that you put in others as well as the hooks that others put in you. Stalking prevents new hooks from pinning you down. Make yourself inaccessible. Do the opposite of your ego's dealings. The ego endlessly chatters about what you are doing and what you want and what you have done etc. That is hooking onto personal history. It is a mighty spell to break indeed. You must be...impeccable to do it. And you will fall to your knees again and again, but it will get easier to get up for each time and finally you won't fall to the ground. When your past no longer matters...when you truthfully can say good-bye to one and all as if it were the last time you met them (for it could very well be the last time)...when your "personality" (the roadmap to everlasting indulgence) is but a hazy memory in the back of your head...that's when you have broken the chains of your personal history.

>Is contemplation of, or watching the flow along a difficult path sort of what you mean?

All you have to do is asking the path if it has heart. If it does, trod it. If it lacks heart, leave it be. You got it.

>What is the ethical foundation of an impecable warrior? How does he/she know what to do, with a trust that one's actions are in accord with the natural order of things, or the intent of Spirit?

How do you know with your smell what you just felt? How do you know with your eyes what you just heard? The link to Spirit is the counter-part of Reason. You can not possibly rationalize your way to know what to do. You can only "know" what to do. Trusting one's personal power no matter how small or big is the only choice a warrior has. When you are using Intent you always know you're doing so. There is no doubt. Whenever you have doubt you can be pretty sure it is not Intent but ego. Ask yourself: why do I do this? If your answer is "I don't know", it might very well be Intent after all. You just know. Trusting one's personal history is having guts enough to follow through these silent commands. After using Intent, when the reason sets back in, any warrior's mind may be filled to the brim with doubts. We all carry them with us until the day we become men and women of knowledge.

If you want a roadmap to Infinity I will give you one. Juan told Carlos about the four adversaries of the path to knowledge at the very earliest stages of his apprenticeship. Fear, Clarity, Power and Old Age.

Fear is not daring to follow through. Defy it and you will receive Clarity. Ego may deceive you by making you believe in this make-believe-power of Clarity. Defy it as if it were almost a mistake and you will receive power. Power is the strongest of the adversaries. It can corrupt even the purest of intents. Defy it as you know it is not yours to wield. Old age is the last natural enemy, and the one we cannot defeat...only defy. It can make you weary and make you fear again, make your clarity grow dim and dull the edge of your power. Defy it and you will be a man of knowledge. We all must die. But death is two-fold, and you have a choice of how to leave this earth. Which will it be?

D.C.

Hi, d.C.

I've gotten a lot of ride for my dime out of your last posting. It's one of those times when I can open and take all of that in. Fundamentally, I have stopped my life for the time being, so to speak, as I take stock of things. Indeed, I am writing to you now in awareness of the Spirit moving me to do so.

For the fun of it, I've noticed the whole gamut of spiritual teachings in what you've written, whereas, these usually incorporate rules about altruism, etc., your model has rules also. And it "covers" everything as well, with this pragmatic non-egoistic approach that you describe. I can dig it.

Ah yes, I've laughed and I've cried.

So far, I haven't related your teachings much to "the practical considerations" of my life, such as how to make a living, how to survive in civilization.

I also take into consideration the context in which trainings are given. In the case of the teaching of mindfulness over the centuries, and certainly the teaching of sorcery in the don Juan era on, this is done in a very private context, monastic, hidden, secret even. When you mentioned awhile back that the--I forget how you put it--era of don Juan's way had come to an end, I wondered if the ensuing era might have anything to do with bringing these teachings out of the desert and mountains, and into the human population somewhat more.

I also understand--correct me if I'm missing something here--that if I turn out to be loving, that is tender and caring, compassionate, willing to take actions to heal, etc, etc. that can just be my destiny "that is," if that's what really turns out to be in a given moment/event of the present when I am practicing the pragmatism of a sorcerer. This would be accompanied by the sense of appropriateness, aliveness, and "here-for-it-ness" that I am aware of in my body now, as I write.

>The type of energy I am talking about is personal power. Awareness. Don't spend it all at once, and most of all....don't waste any of it. It is not an endless supply.

Does this just mean that by being "asleep," and acting out my "ego-driven personality," I am wasting energy? Or, is this an admonition not to "practice too much," because practicing too much uses up too much awareness? How does one waste this energy? I suppose you would mean that one wastes one's energy by being hooked into other people's dramas, and hooking others into our own life. But I am not sure, after all, if I've got you on this. For me, either I forget about awareness entirely, or I remember awareness and it "stands on its own," so to speak. What is "the source" of the energy? I suppose you would say Spirit is the source.

Is there any difference between the energy of which Spirit is the source, and the energy of which ego-driven activity in life is sourced?

About recapitulation. Just as a "sorcerer's pragmatism" can be substituted for a Buddhist's "altruism," in formulating "a whole teaching," is it possible that another form of practice, such as what I teach in the methods of "the awareness game" could substitute--first of all authentically, and then, adequately--for a methodology in the sorcerer's "whole teaching such as recapitulation?" If the intended result is freedom from the hooks of others and hooking others, can this not be approached "from the other end," so to speak? In the present? Your method goes back researching the past and of course finding ties that are still in the body in the present, to be let go of. The method I've practiced seems to be at least compatible with what you are teaching. Yet it deals with waking up and experiencing the obvious manifestations of one's behavior (and that of others) in the present, and dealing with that in a healthy way that enables one to "step aside from it," if it's ego-driven, and play-in, instead, by aware intention, another strategy that comes from one's natural strengths.

Perhaps your methods are more rapid. If you say they are more thorough I will not doubt you. Yet, in my own experience, I've only recently begun waking up in dreams, for brief moments, perhaps once or twice a week. I had a couple of beautiful, acid-like, experiences in gazing, where the whole of it that lay before me was all in focus at the same time. But I didn't think that was your intention in having me do that exercise. So I've laid off of it for a couple of weeks. What I'm wondering in this paragraph, is if we may each be "certain types of people," so to speak, in such a way that we may be more disposed to altruism than pragmatism, for instance, more disposed to recapitulation instead of playing the awareness game, etc., etc.

And what of stalking? The word "stalking' would seem to fit pretty well with what I call "the awareness game," which is practicing being awake and noticing the obvious feeling-thinking-wanting-behaving of one's self, and that of others, and acting intelligently in the insights that obtain.

>You cannot rationalize your way to know what to do. You can only "know" what to do.

I get it d. C. As with everything I catch on to with you, I'm giving it the best ride I can.

>When you are using Intent you always know you're doing so.

This is sure beautiful stuff that flows through your space, my friend. I've got a ways to go before tackling your roadmap to Infinity.

Juanito

>I wondered if the ensuing era might have anything to do with bringing these teachings out of the desert and mountains, and into the human population somewhat more.

Well Castaneda did that and by doing so he marked the end of don Juan's line-age. There are other line-ages still dwelling in the shadows, and choose to remain that way for very good reasons. When it comes down to it, it is rather a matter of in which direction spirit blows that mankinds wishes.

>So far, I haven't related your teachings much to "the practical considerations" of my life, such as how to make a living, how to survive in civilization.

That would be where stalking comes in. Live in the world, and not out of it...valid words two millenias ago...valid words today. A warrior lives and acts in the midst of every-day commotion, interacts with it, bathes in it, but remains untouched by it. A warrior has abandoned the every-day world and its way of life, but still acts as if he had not. He acts as if it mattered, when it does not. That is controlled folly.

>I also understand--correct me if I'm missing something here--that I'f I turn out to be loving, that is tender and caring, compassionate, willing to take actions to heal, etc, etc. that can just be my destiny "that is," if that's what really turns out to be in a given moment/event of the present when I am practicing the pragmatism of a sorcerer.

In a word, yes.

>Does this just mean that by being "asleep," and acting out my "ego-driven personality," I am wasting energy?

In such a way that you deploy the little energy you got by scattering it away from the center out to the edges of your luminous body. That creates a toe-level awareness. That is the level on which most of mankind dwells today. The only thing that can survive on this level is ME ME ME. By feeding ego, scattering your energy, you are sinking back to your toes. A terrible waste indeed.

>In other words, is this an admonition not to "practice too much," because practicing too much uses up too much awareness?

Some energetic manouvers must be practiced very sparingly, yes. Others you can soak your body with without "overdoing" it. Imagine yourself being a rubber-band. Stretch it too far for too long and it will eventually snap.

>How does one waste this energy? I suppose you would mean that one wastes one's energy by being hooked into other people's dramas, and hooking others into our own life. But I am not sure, after all if I've got you on this.

>What is "the source" of the energy? I suppose you would say Spirit is the source.

>About recapitulation...If the intended result is freedom from the hooks of others and hooking others, can this not be approached "from the other end," so to speak? In the present?

Recapitulation is in fact going from the present to the most distant past, leaving no stone unturned as you pass. Stalking is seeing to it that no waste is being made from this point and on. But stalking is so much more. Its ulterior purpose is to achieve discipline and control enough to fixate the point of assembly onto another location than the habitual one. That is a feat of pure magic. Dreaming is shifting and moving the assemblage-point from its location onto another. The two makes a perfect whole. This is pure magic.

>The method I've practiced seems to be at least compatible with what you are teaching. Yet it deals with waking up and experiencing the obvious manifestations of one's behavior (and that of others) in the present, and dealing with that in a healthy way that enables one to "step aside from it," if it's ego-driven, and play-in, instead, by aware intention, another strategy that comes from one's natural strengths.

That sounds like the part of stalking that I have refered to as "stalking the self", yes.

>I had a couple of beautiful, acid-like, experiences in gazing, where the whole of it that lay before me was all in focus at the same time. But I didn't think that was your intention in having me do that exercise. So I've laid off of it for a couple of weeks.

You didn't think that was my intention? Exactly what did you think was my intention? Gazing is a powerful tool of dreaming-awake to mention one facet of its use. The other is remembering. Making every part of you remember itself and its part in the whole. A lawn turns into a magical forest of an infinite number of straws as you gaze at its whole. You see them all at once - still remembering the whole. That's when you can feel the pull from the Earth. Take it in, a burst or two, just don't overdo it. You'll have "maintainance-energy" that keeps you running for a couple of days. The power is supreme and could smash you like a bug if you lose yourself in it.

>What I'm wondering in this paragraph, is if we may each be "certain types of people," so to speak, in such a way that we may be more disposed to altruism than pragmatism, for instance, more disposed to recapitulation instead of playing the awareness game, etc., etc.

There are certain types of people yes. Very distinct types as well. A man and a woman type for each direction of the wind. The nagual represents all these four parts as a hub. Recapitulation, however, is mandatory for all these types - especially the nagual. Some of us however, have a natural ability for stalking or dreaming, but that does not mean that we can skip the other part. It rather puts us into a specific position of the whole.

Let's see how the cage is rattling shall we?

D.C.

> When it comes down to it, it is rather a matter of in which direction spirit blows that mankinds wishes.

Just as it seemed I was without direction, not knowing if I'd continue work on the site, then a few days ago I understood how the whole "Phase 3" of the project lay before me. And I realized I *couldn't* have proceeded earlier, because in the writing of even the first pages of it, I had to know what the whole thing was, so to speak. Now I understand why I held back, or better perhaps to say was powerless to do other, until the wind shifted and I had an ability to understand what I was doing. (Does that make any sense?) Now I'm proceeding (at a slower pace) with that same enthusiasm as before, as if "on a path of heart" in the going on with it. It "seems right." Do such perceptions relate as you are teaching me?

Today, and during the last several days, I've been "beset" with a series of financial demands, prices for things suddenly increased, unexpected expenses, a friend beating me for a few dollars on the shared bill at a restaurant, with his eyes wide open, a variety of such things, small and in a few cases painful. I can see more and more what you say of the harmful sorcery that one's fellow humans do indeed deal. I can see one friend being jealous and working hard to bring me down, and the next time he's being "my friend" again, and wishing me well, showing he's "in my corner."

>That would be where stalking comes in. Live in the world, and not out of it...valid words two millenias ago...valid words today. A warrior lives and acts in the midst of every-day commotion, interacts with it, bathes in it, but remains untouched by it.

I keep bringing this point back to memory over the days. Do you know, I read somewhere that Jesus was called the "annointed" because it was "as if he was slippery, annointed with oil all over" and was able to slip through smoothly, "untouched" among people--in a way that brings to mind the metaphors of your model.

>A warrior has abandoned the every-day world and its way of life, but still acts as if he had not.

Yes. But darn it, I've (pursuant to the above litany) checked over my accounts--which I'd long ignored and regarded as running fiscally okay on the blind--and . . . . . it's not good, yet it's not exactly bad, either. I appear to have enough resources to hold out until after the site is finished (my intent is to have it done on December 21 of this year) (Yet I don't know where my "intent" was when I was aimless and not knowing what to do.)

>He acts as if it mattered, when it does not. That is controlled folly.

This makes perfect sense to me. I've never appreciated this term rightly before. Maybe I'm moving in that direction now.

If I am following a path of heart, I can realize it doesn't matter (let's say, the financial uncertainties of the future), yet to act as if it matters, is to . . . . . what? . . . . . I know this is a stupid question. Yet, whereas I imagined I understood you a week ago, I since have realized I don't.

> ...you deploy the little energy you got by scattering it away from the center out to the edges of your luminous body.

I can only imagine if I grasp what you say here.

> That creates a toe-level awareness. That is the level on which most of mankind dwells today. The only thing that can survive on this level is ME ME ME. By feeding ego, scattering your energy, you are sinking back to your toes. A terrible waste indeed.

The more ego, the less awareness. It seems to me, in my experience, quite apparent that the activities generated by ego in the mind take up the space in the mind and "drive awareness out."

I don't get the "toe-level awareness." Does that mean literally "toe-level." No, I think I see what you mean. Filled up with the ego activity in the mind, we only have minimal awareness, enough to get through the doorway without bumping into the doorjam, but without really being aware of anything. (yes?)

> But stalking is so much more. Its ulterior purpose is to achieve discipline and control enough to fixate the point of assembly onto another location than the habitual one. That is a feat of pure magic. Dreaming is shifting and moving the assemblage-point from its location onto another. The two makes a perfect whole. This is pure magic.

This part is beyond my comprehension. "to fixate the point of assembly." You seem to be saying that one can be aware of this point, as if it is an actual point within the body (I'm guessing). How does one know how to recognize what this point is. Does one experience it as one experiences the hum of a fan, the yellow of an oriole? From the words "point of assembly," it sounds like a place, or an "organ," so to speak to which the whole false personality of ego is joined. Or is this a point which either assembles the ego world or the world of the sorcerer . . . and which can be intentionally shifted from the one to the other in stalking and dreaming?

> >I had a couple of beautiful, acid-like, experiences in gazing, where the whole of it that lay before me was all in focus at the same time. But I didn't think that was your intention in having me do that exercise. So I've laid off of it for a couple of weeks.

> You didn't think that was my intention? Exactly what did you think was my intention?

Well, I thought the exercise (plausible in the doing of it) was to weaken the mind's customary automatic focus, and loosen it up, so to speak--this to help my difficulties being distracted by here-and-now phenomena while I was attempting recapitulation, and possibly assist my being able to move laterally in time, that is not just focus in on one memory, but be able to move back to what happened before that memory, or forward to what happened after that. (Does this make any sense?) When I had that beautiful experience of total focus, so to speak, the second time, I noticed that I began "wanting" to have that experience again. There it seemed to set up a kind of self-defeating "double-bind," or so I seemed to sense. Prone to "reach for it," it didn't happen, and setting that temptation aside was, in itself, distracting. Rather than "combat it directly," which again seemed at odds with itself somehow, I decided to lay off the exercise to see if I can pick it up again and not have that kind of mental distraction. I know this doesn't explain my experience adequately. It was no big thing.

"Dreaming-awake?" I seem to be failing to sense experientially what you are getting at with this set of terms here.

> You'll have "maintainance-energy" that keeps you running for a couple of days. The power is supreme and could smash you like a bug if you lose yourself in it.

Yes, I think I do feel this "maintainance-energy" at certain times, at times I remember when I've stopped and just remarked about it--how unusually and suddenly I was feeling so strong and so absolutely *right on my path*. This would be in sharp contrast to the way I was feeling just previously. And it's as if I can "ride" this energy for prolonged periods of time.

> There are certain types of people yes. Very distinct types as well. A man and a woman type for each direction of the wind. The nagual represents all these four parts as a hub.

Do you know, don Coyotl, this sounds very much like those petroglyphs I was telling you about. "a man and a woman type"--that would make eight. Would these man and woman types be reciprocals, such as yang and yin ends of the same stick? Like, aggressive and passive, or as out-going and in-staying are examples of reciprocals?

> Recapitulation, however, is mandatory for all these types - especially the nagual. Some of us however, have a natural ability for stalking or dreaming, but that does not mean that we can skip the other part. It rather puts us into a specific position of the whole.

Even though you don't hear from me, I'm "with you" and your teachings every day. This response has been written over the course of this week. In between, I'm getting back in a writing groove again, and *much* more cheerful than before! I guess writing is "my thing" when I can "buy" my body back from the world for it.

John

>Now I understand why I held back, or better perhaps to say was powerless to do other, until the wind shifted and I had an ability to understand what I was doing. (Does that make any sense?) Now I'm proceeding (at a slower pace) with that same enthusiasm as before, as if "on a path of heart" in the going on with it. It "seems right." Do such perceptions relate as you are teaching me?

Many times you just know "what" and "when" to do. The "why" is something that is just as ever present for the Seeing eye. However for Reason to translate this knowledge into something on the island of Tonal may take years. Don't worry about it. Let your awareness follow the flow and it won't matter.

>If I am following a path of heart, I can realize it doesn't matter (let's say, the financial uncertainties of the future), yet to act as if it matters, is to . . . . . what? . . . . . I know this is a stupid question. Yet, whereas I imagined I understood you a week ago, I since have realized I don't.

Worrying is like water hitting a cliff. In time it eventually wears it down. There are no guarantees, no matter how "safe" your world may seem on paper. The worst has already happened to you - you're dying. The rest is nothing. Worrying and other states of mind have their certain strongholds in your body. By shifting your attention to such a spot you will activate the state of being that origins from that spot. Personal history for instance is gathered on the back of your thighs. What an absurd idea huh? Each time you are in a mood, examine it. From what point in your body does it emanate? Don't lose your marbles if you find that certain states seem to origin from positions beyond your physical body.

>I don't get the "toe-level awareness." Does that mean literally "toe-level." No, I think I see what you mean. Filled up with the ego activity in the mind, we only have minimal awareness, enough to get through the doorway without bumping into the doorjam, but without really being aware of anything. (yes?)

I do mean toe-level. To the seeing eye awareness is a bright sheen covering the luminous body. If the glow does not cover the whole it is replaced by a dull shine. The only place that glows on modern-day-man is from toe-level and down. What a predicament eh?

>In a way, I can see that my blockage in recapitulation appears to be the same as that with regard to finding dreams and waking up in them.

You are on to something here. You'll have to figure it out for yourself. Seek the answer not in intellectual riddles, but in a certain mood, a state of being, a location.

>This part is beyond my comprehension. "to fixate the point of assembly." You seem to be saying that one can be aware of this point, as if it is an actual point within the body (I'm guessing). How does one know how to recognize what this point is. Does one experience it as one experiences the hum of a fan, the yellow of an oriole? From the words "point of assembly," it sounds like a place, or an "organ," so to speak to which the whole false personality of ego is joined. Or is this a point which either assembles the ego world or the world of the sorcerer . . . and which can be intentionally shifted from the one to the other in stalking and dreaming?

There may come a time John, when you on a bodily level realize that the world you have lived is nothing but a tiny spot in front of your eyes.

>Well, I thought the exercise (plausible in the doing of it) was to weaken the mind's customary automatic focus, and loosen it up, so to speak--this to help my difficulties being distracted by here-and-now phenomena while I was attempting recapitulation, and possibly assist my being able to move laterally in time, that is not just focus in on one memory, but be able to move back to what happened before that memory, or forward to what happened after that. (Does this make any sense?)

It is rather the lack of truly being here-and-now that cripples. There is really no past or future. All there is is energy. And it flows...

>"Dreaming-awake?" I seem to be failing to sense experientially what you are getting at with this set of terms here.

After you have found your hands while dreaming you might eventually recall the location where its state of being dwells. With that knowledge you can move your attention to that spot and Dream while being awake. As I said before - it is pure magic.

>Do you know, don Coyotl, this sounds very much like those petroglyphs I was telling you about. "a man and a woman type"--that would make eight. Would these man and woman types be reciprocals, such as yang and yin ends of the same stick? Like, aggressive and passive, or as out-going and in-staying are examples of reciprocals?

The male form is rather an extention of the female form than its opposite. Complements they may be, but let's not kid ourselves - the universe at large is female and male energies are flickering candles in coparison to its blaze. There is a striking resemblance with the petroglyphs, but on another level. It's rather a roadmap than anything else.

D.C.

Continued =>

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