Teachings of Don Juan as presented by Carlos Castaneda

Tonal, the order – everything we can think about.

Nagual, the chaos – everything else. That, from which Tonal creates order.

Teachings for the right side – the task of cleaning and reordering the island of the Tonal.

Teaching for the left side – undeniable demonstration of the Nagual and how to get to it.

On the path of knowledge, strong change is needed – transformation of the island of the Tonal.

Power provides according to impeccability – if one is impeccable, power opens all avenues.

Personal Power decides who can and cannot profit from learning and revelations. End result is to accumulate enough Personal Power to focus an unwavering attention on the wings of perception.

To help stop internal dialogue and bring the participant into the training process, warrior places his gaze on the right eye – then Nagual takes over.

Warrior must learn to focus his will – there is no way to practice that, one day it just happens.

The secret is in the left eye – as the warrior progresses, his left eye begins to clasp anything.

The 7 steps of training:

1 st step: To introduce the idea that the world we experience is only a view, a description of the world. Set aim to stop that view by stopping the internal dialogue.

To stop internal dialogue one needs a practical task (ex: right way of walking).

The task must saturate the Tonal: its attention must be placed on its creation.

Tonal needs to be attentive to its elements to uphold its view as internal dialogue.

Tonal, without its one-to-one relation to its description, becomes unable to talk to itself and one becomes silent.

Another way to stop the internal dialogue is through a special way of looking, by gazing at any point before the eyes, without focusing the eyes. That allows to detect enormous amounts of features of the world without being clear about them. In turn that saturates and overloads the Tonal.

Stopping internal dialogue is a key to sorcerer’s world – everything else is just props to assist that.

2nd step: To introduce the possibility of acting without believing and expecting results.

2 main activities that help buffer students in temperance and strength : Erasing personal history and Dreaming.

The secret to everything is our attention. Teacher must trap student’s attention by pushing him out of his element.

3rd step: To introduce a warrior’s way of life – a glue that holds everything together in the sorcerer’s world. It must be forged and developed bit by bit.

Sturdiness and level-headedness are needed to withstand path of knowledge.

3 techniques to help erase personal history: Loosing self importance, Assuming responsibility, Using death as an advisor.

These are the four main techniques for changing the facade of the elements of the Tonal, by assigning second place to some and moving others to forefront.

4th step: Power Plants. Used in case the student doesn’t take on the 4 techniques above that lead to Nagual.

Power plants are used to shake us out of the form.

Note: All meaningful transformation is done in states of sober consciousness.

Power plants open us up by flooding the Tonal and stopping inner dialogue. That leads the apprentice to the Nagual - Ally being an aspect of the Nagual.

At this point, apprentice needs to become aware of the two centers: Reason is right, Will is left.

Normally we function from the center of Reason – it can account for anything that happens within its view.

Nagual and Ally can only be witnessed from the center of Will.

Sorcerer’s use Will to enlarge their view of the world – yet, it is another trap. To become a man of knowledge, one must arrive at the Totality of Oneself, which is to go beyond a world view, by putting one view against the other, and realizing directly that the world is only a view. What matters is not to learn a new description, but to arrive at totality, beyond description.

5th step: Worthy opponent.

After enough views of the Nagual, every apprentice wants to get out. A worthy opponent hold the student, and gives him a point of reference for future use.

A worthy opponent is not an enemy, but a dedicated adversary.

At this point the apprentice is either blasted to pieces or changes radically by adapting a warriors way.

Worthy opponent forces the apprentice to a choice of his life – ordinary world or sorcerer’s world.

In reality, the apprentice has to become aware that he already chose the sorcerer’s world – and that that decision lives in the realm of Nagual.

Note: the only thing undecided is how far one will go on the path of knowledge.

Impeccability is the only free act, hence it is a measure of warriors spirit.

6th step: To empower dreaming.

3 techiques that empower dreaming – Disrupting routines of life - to remove habits, Gait of power – to establish acting with abandon, Not-doing by focusing on normally overlooked aspects of the world (ex: shadows).

New ways of perceiving give the warrior an inkling of incredible possibilities of action.

Dreaming is seeking the usefulness of Nagual, by training the Tonal to let go for a moment, then grab again. The trick is learning to let go without loosing the marbles.

7th step: Impeccable demonstration of the Nagual.

Leaves apprentice with knowledge that defies reason, hence disassembles the world view.

Sorcerer’s explanation:

When we are born, we are placed in the bubble of perception.

First the bubble is open, but then it closes.

On its round walls, we witness the reflection of our world view.

This view is first only a description, but then our attention is caught by it, and it becomes a view.

Teacher rearranges the view and prepares the student to open the bubble.

That opening allows the view of totality.

The view is rearranged to place everything on the side of Reason and activate the side of Will.

The secret of Luminous Beings is that we are perceivers – we perceive the Tonal with the Reason and the Nagual with the Will.