The dark legacy of Carlos Castaneda

[Pele'sDaughter]

I read the books and early on took them to be fiction.

Me, too! I was unaware of the controversy until much, much later. I thought it was obvious.

[PufPuf93]

I read the books and early on took them to be fiction.

Me, too! I was unaware of the controversy until much, much later. I thought it was obvious.

When did you first read the books? Some of us are older and contemporary with publication of the first books. I have never opened anything after Journey to Ixtlan.

I read The Teachings of Don Juan soon after it was published in 1968; I became aware of the book at a liberal boarding school in the San Francisco area. How liberal? We had Esalon encounter groups on campus and field trips to Fillmore West and a North Beach cultural field trip that included meeting Anton LeVay and Carol Doda as well as Café Trieste and City Lights Bookstore. The school still exists but is very pricy and of different nature now. I was there for its 2nd, 3rd, and 4th year of existence. Just got an email today about the 50th year anniversary celebration.

I grew up and now live in hard core Indian Country.

The "Playing Don Juan" mentioned in my first post was 1969 prior to the publication of A Separate Reality. The book was very timely because of that late 60s thing going on in Northern California. Also the book was published to some acclaim by The University of California Press.

In 1973, age 20, I left my parent's home and moved in with a woman 7 years older who had a degree in Anthropology from Chico State and the coursework but never completed thesis for an Archeology Masters from University of Nevada. She was a US Forest Service Archeologist (one of first USFS hires of women as other than clerical) and much later retired as Zone Archeologist for Six Rivers and Klamath National Forests. I left her when I was 23 because I wanted something (and someone) else.

A Separate Reality and Journey to Ixtlan were published and we read while together. She took the books seriously. Frankly, the subject was just "trippy" to me as I was mostly a hedonist.

I have moved the books with me from place to place but have not read in them since the 1970s and was not aware of what went on with Castaneda until the internet in the 1990s; to me Castaneda became a growing rank on the bookstore shelves of a long ago interest. I knew nothing about his groups and later doings for about a 20 year period from mid 70s to mid 90s.

So by happenstance of life and career, I have been around far more Indians and Indian issues and Indian anthropology that probably 99% of white America. The anthropology field has always been rife with attention and status seeking anthropologists and there is a similar tendency in the cultures of study. I am far harder on Castaneda with hindsight because he knowingly from a position of influence and status (UCLA and University of California Press) pulled a fraud that muddied the science and made a fortune and a cult.

[BrandonD]

the "fictional character" don Juan actually specifically illustrates how Carlos Castaneda will fail, later in life.

I'm interested if you'd care to expand on that idea Brandon.

Sure. It is illustrated to Carlos over the course of his books that the two weaknesses that will destroy his quest for freedom are his lust for women and his desire to feel superior over other men, stemming (in part) from his insecurity regarding his very short stature. These things are alluded to and even explicitly discussed.

His life post-don Juan is IMO an example of a man who has acquired uncommon power and made the decision to exploit this power to indulge his weaknesses to their logical extreme.

[BrandonD]

The other (more mundane and straightforward) thing to remember is that Castaneda was wildly successful, by the metrics of some -- notably those who crave power and hedonistic pleasures and hold relatively few concepts of abstract ethics or morality. He had followers, fame, sex and drugs, i.e. considerable worldly power in comparison to the vast majority of people. Thus, his occult system "worked" insofar as it produced material success.

Deeper understanding of Creation? Maybe, maybe not. But babes and booze, definitely.

His method is for acquiring power, or rather re-acquiring the power that we've relinquished and is rightfully ours. What one chooses to do with that power is always still up to that person.

People with no power generally choose to see the acts of a person with power as random chance. In other words, he just happened to luck out and write a bestselling book and start a cult and gain a ton of followers. Lucky guy.

Instead, from my perspective he used the teachings of don Juan to acquire power, and then exploited this power to indulge his greatest weaknesses.

I'm sure the term "power" is coming across esoteric and spooky, I don't mean it to be that way, currently there just aren't better words in the english language to describe this subject. IMO there is something to this subject, it is not just nonsense.

[km artlu]

Got it. Thank you for filling in the details Brandon.

I was peripheral to his scene toward the end of his life and I agree with your assessment. By that time it seemed that those two weaknesses/appetites had aligned operationally. The numerous women he had captivated were effectively deployed as instruments to exploit his power.

[Pele'sDaughter]

When did you first read the books? Some of us are older and contemporary with publication of the first books. I have never opened anything after Journey to Ixtlan.

It was 1975-ish, and I can't remember which book. I was out of school and living in Dallas, and he wasn't a big deal here. Anyway, if there's too many people walking to the beat of a certain drum I'm usually found going in the other direction. While I have found some "truthiness" in Castenada's work, what good is it when entwined with lies.

[Jerky]

I read the books and early on took them to be fiction.

Me, too! I was unaware of the controversy until much, much later. I thought it was obvious.

You realize we live in a world where people who consider themselves to be brilliant go around saying The Blair Witch Project is actually made up of real found footage, right?

J

[Sounder]

You realize we live in a world where people who consider themselves to be brilliant go around saying The Blair Witch Project is actually made up of real found footage, right?

J

Well maybe BWP is a poor example*, but I not only realize, I count on brilliant people being wrong in their assessment and perceptions of a great many things.

As was mentioned before, I took my dad and brother as sort of anti-gurus because they were brilliant and yet they could be so wrong is such simple ways. I noted that this happened because they were so heavily invested in promoting and protecting their self image that their large brain power was expended doing just that, with nothing much left over for higher quality thinking.

This was later shaped into a general theory about ‘smart’ people that suggested because smart people achieve their self identity through their superior abilities in establishing correlations between categories, (so as to show they are ‘smart’), they are seldom able or willing to understand limitations and assumptions that shaped the categories from the start. Establishing internal consistency within any set of categories is enough to create the appearance of truth. Yet if ones goals serve to protect consistency (dogmas) then the value of appearance of truth becomes elevated over that of truth itself.

(In a vertical authority distribution system such as we operate under, the appearance of truth becomes our god while Truth serves as the devil.)

Hence, the (apparent) fubar of a world that we live in today.



* I never saw the movie, but brilliant people don't really believe that, do they?

[Pele'sDaughter]

Yes, ego protection is something we have all fallen prey to. Also, being intelligent doesn't necessarily include intuition or even common sense.

[RocketMan]

As was mentioned before, I took my dad and brother as sort of anti-gurus because they were brilliant and yet they could be so wrong is such simple ways. I noted that this happened because they were so heavily invested in promoting and protecting their self image that their large brain power was expended doing just that, with nothing much left over for higher quality thinking.

This was later shaped into a general theory about ‘smart’ people that suggested because smart people achieve their self identity through their superior abilities in establishing correlations between categories, (so as to show they are ‘smart’), they are seldom able or willing to understand limitations and assumptions that shaped the categories from the start. Establishing internal consistency within any set of categories is enough to create the appearance of truth. Yet if ones goals serve to protect consistency (dogmas) then the value of appearance of truth becomes elevated over that of truth itself.

Beautiful!

[BrandonD]

It was 1975-ish, and I can't remember which book. I was out of school and living in Dallas, and he wasn't a big deal here. Anyway, if there's too many people walking to the beat of a certain drum I'm usually found going in the other direction. While I have found some "truthiness" in Castenada's work, what good is it when entwined with lies.

Imagine a very successful plastic surgeon, married with children. It is discovered that he's been sleeping with and robbing his patients for the past 5 years.

This is a pretty abhorrent thing to do, and it could easily be argued that he specifically went into the plastic surgery field in order to have access to wealthy women that he could take advantage of. Yet few would conclude from this that he's been perpetuating fraudulent surgery all these years. His medical skills are judged upon their own merit.

This is an illustration of why IMO Castaneda starting up a cult and doing immoral creepy things has no relation to the information contained in his books.

On the other hand, if a person says, "Hey I read the books and nothing in my experience matches what is described," well then that is a perfectly valid argument.

But the cult argument is simply the lazy man or "debunker" way out.

[Twyla LaSarc]

My only quibble with that are the witches. So far I can find no testimony that the witches or any of his followers ingested datura.

He might be righf on with the mushrooms and peyotl, but I have yet to see any proof of the datura, and his testimony filtered thru urban legend and psychedelic lore is often why stupid kids do that stuff.

IMO, datura does work with a competant shaman leading you there, think of ayuhuasca admixtures, then think of scopolamine and it's action in less than benign situations.

Think of Tex Watson and the family taking belladonna and carrying out charlie's advice to the letter without really thinking about it.

Carlos with the tacit approval of the university press led a generation of kids with limited swimming abilities out on to a 50 foot high dive over the deep end of the pool.

[Searcher08]

It was 1975-ish, and I can't remember which book. I was out of school and living in Dallas, and he wasn't a big deal here. Anyway, if there's too many people walking to the beat of a certain drum I'm usually found going in the other direction. While I have found some "truthiness" in Castenada's work, what good is it when entwined with lies.

Imagine a very successful plastic surgeon, married with children. It is discovered that he's been sleeping with and robbing his patients for the past 5 years.

This is a pretty abhorrent thing to do, and it could easily be argued that he specifically went into the plastic surgery field in order to have access to wealthy women that he could take advantage of. Yet few would conclude from this that he's been perpetuating fraudulent surgery all these years. His medical skills are judged upon their own merit.

This is an illustration of why IMO Castaneda starting up a cult and doing immoral creepy things has no relation to the information contained in his books.

On the other hand, if a person says, "Hey I read the books and nothing in my experience matches what is described," well then that is a perfectly valid argument.

But the cult argument is simply the lazy man or "debunker" way out.

Very similar to Osho Rajneesh in some ways. He was able to read a dozen books on zen and then give an amazing series of talks for a week, without notes, that teemed with wisdom and insight and coherence on the subject. The next week he did the same with Christianity etc. He also attracted sociopaths to the top of his organisation (like Sheela) who helped turn it into a Jonestown waiting to happen.

I tried the Tensegrity exercises for several weeks and the result? Opening a portal to some very dark place indeed - the atmosphere in the flat was horrible, we started to get poltergeist effects. I ended up with a guy who had a camera capable of photographing energy that clearly showed a frickken skull shape on my bed. We ended up doing a Christian based banishing ritual, which closed whatever had been opened. It sure as hell was not a love-based path the "Witches" were on.

I did have some amazing experiences, such as having my Assemblage Point moved to the Place of No Concern (total inner silence, deep clarity, the consciousness centered in the Solar Plexus area rather than the head, no emotions - a great state to be a surgeon for example)
I also had an years before experience of doing a ceremony that created a bridge to an actual Other Reality
and bringing back an object from that place to this world.

Castaneda talked about how this world was a reality woven by and created by Agreement, a kind of consensual hallucination - one of the theories of conscious that is on the cutting edge right now (similar to Nick Bostrom's life as a digital simulation) is that it comes about as a form of Peer to Peer Networking between human nervous systems...

My favorite of his books is Journey to Ixtlan, which is free of any drug experiences or artifacts; just him and Don Juan and Don Genaro in the desert; as characters they were full of love, which I dont think Carlos was...

That and a love of crows and their magical consciousness...

Deep Dream Crow

deepdreamcrow.jpg

[backtoiam]

is that it comes about as a form of Peer to Peer Networking between human nervous systems

Under the right conditions I'm willing to vouch for that.

[Sounder]

Thanks Searcher08, I love it when things that are intended to be destructive ( this OP) become constructive.

Castaneda talked about how this world was a reality woven by and created by Agreement, a kind of consensual hallucination - one of the theories of conscious that is on the cutting edge right now (similar to Nick Bostrom's life as a digital simulation) is that it comes about as a form of Peer to Peer Networking between human nervous systems...

I agree with this but there is a question of whether Carlos's dominant effect is as a promoter or a poison pill for the concept.