Carlos Castaneda’s Don Juan’s Teachings

M: Given this process something positive is gained although it might have been derived from a “non-impeccable” process: a lesson was learned; and, that lesson taught something about the detachment required for true objectivity.

M: Our lives are in general replete with “learning curve” decisions of the “not-impeccable”. To find these, it is not necessary to go beyond self and often very non-productive to do so. Ultimately, the most “non-impeccable” decision is to NOT learn the lessons offered from the errors or the negative result. To learn, is to immediately convert a negative into a positive that may be integrated throughout life.

M: There are warnings when reviewing “non-impeccability” from, or in the actions of, others. This is because the observer is “not” necessarily aware of the number or quality of parameters that were invoked in making the decisions or in taking the actions. A good example is to view “our parents” – i.e., anyone’s parents – and their impact on the child. All parents – all – did their best. Certainly, the actions and the result may be truly flawed throughout the spectrum of causation and result. The truth though, good, bad, nefarious, or indifferent, all parents did their best with the attribute set that they had at the time.

M: It is no different relative to impeccability. Study not the perceived impeccability of others because it is sufficiently saturating to understand the impeccability of self.

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R: I had an interesting dream Sunday night. It was the first time I was in a dream where the events were telling me that I was dreaming and yet, with all the clues, I never recognized it as a dream and continued it to the end believing it was “real life.”

M: In my understanding of the way these truly function, you experienced a second attention “visit”. Generally the distinction between these and casual dreams are exactly what you have said “it wasn’t recognized as a dream, it seemed like real life”. For me, there is no question that this was a second attention event, whether or not you might recognize it as such.

R: I have assumed that they are second attention situations whenever I’ve been about to act volitionally and from the standpoint of knowing that I was dreaming. That you call this recently described dream a second attention experience, I have no problem with that, I just wish that I’d caught the dreamness of it so that I could have broadened my scope of actions.

M: Many second attention experiences are truly the “alternate reality” mode of perception and they in general are not “wispy” or vague: they have their own reality that can be integrated into our wholeness. It might assist you to consider that 2nd attention, even 3rd attention, experiences are, well, experiences. They don’t really need labels, per se, just recognition. The manner that I use is to “quietly” experience the mode, absorbing the experience like a sponge, then process it later.

R: What happened was that I was counting items and the count kept changing. I’d count 6 and then count them again and there would be 7 or eight, so I would recount and there would again be an extra. I actually said to myself “this has to be a dream, I have to be dreaming”.

M: This is another characteristic of a second attention event, it’s essentially like you are experiencing real life, and dreaming at the same time. There are deeper second attention experiences where this is occurring, the real life component, and one tiers into a dream also – and knows that it’s a dream AND that the existence of real life – is also held within a dream. The fact that you made the last statement “this has to be a dream … ” again confirms the process. The second attention is an alternate reality, and it is experienced just in this manner – initially. Later it can be experienced in a known awake state, like when walking around for example.

R: How does that begin? How is it brought on.

M: It comes rather “naturally”: it doesn’t work to force it. A truly quiet “first attention” mind becomes open to the other attentions. The problem with most of humanity is that they cling onto the 1st attention so deeply – and this is done through a noisy mind – that they just don’t open to other states of being. I’ve come to think of the noisy mind as a reflex dependency. The very best concept I can suggest is to just relax, and enjoy the experience. Record the experience to memory and use 1st attention intellect later, after the fact. Once, though, I was driving a car through a toll booth area in New Jersey (a few years ago). I was attentive but relaxed. Poof! everything within my vision vanished and I was in the fog of the 2nd attention. That was amazing, but had to be corrected and intent accomplished that because it placed my first attention existence in jeopardy (driving a car). Also, in driving a car, the “stop the world” mode works also, where everything about you is stopped or in very slo-mo, so the alternate reality is that YOU can move slowly through the crowd.

R: When I’ve gone from lying in bed awake directly into dreaming it has been similar to what CC described. It will start with an image of anything, a clear image that I then have to “hold” in place and after “holding it for a few moments it turns to a full scene and I then am able to easily keep it going for, I don’t know, 20 or 30 minutes, although I’ve never considered how to actually measure it, time wise.

M: Don’t try to measure in time – waste of effort. In the 2nd and 3rd attentions, the experiences can be so dramatic that seconds might have the equivalent of hours in 1st attention matters. The depth of the experience is what is important, not the duration.

R: But the initial stage of those seems quite precarious and sometimes I can’t hold the beginning image but rather it slips away and I’m back to just lying there in bed.

M: Just guessing, but you probably try to “think” rather than “feel” to “live” the experience. Another attempt at analogy would be that of an armchair traveller – watching a film. Lie back, and observe. This sets a pattern of process. The skill about being more interactive will come after this “observational” pattern becomes standard procedure.

R: Usually, though, if I can find that initial image, I’m home free because even if it slips away I’ll go into dreaming after falling asleep. One of the things don Juan explains to Carlos it the task of becoming aware of falling asleep. That is how I interpret what I just described.

M: Another description might be to be that relaxed so that one can just slip into the state of reality. To fall asleep is to relax sufficiently so that can occur and surrender into the sleep mode: same sort of process.

R: The strange thing is that I didn’t believe it and continued acting in the dream, not as I do as a dreamer when I know it is a dreamer, I continued as if it WAS real life and just went ahead and let go of the fact that I was seeing the funny count.

M: It’d help if you would just admit that you have been experiencing events in the second attention, accept that, and place it into the category of “experience”.

R: My acceptance has always been an assumption. The assumption being that CC was accurately reporting don Juan’s teachings. So, had you not come along, I might well have accepted another explanation had one been presented to me.

M: Ultimately, all you have to accomplish is to accept your experiences for yourself and integrate them into your being. It’s all just self acceptance, really. Then, once the information based on the experiences is achieved, then intent and will may be utilized to make alterations as may be understood as beneficial.

R: I feel like I really blew a chance to have a great volitional dream. I’m so ready to intend to see the lady in the dress, etc. and here was a dream that was actually showing itself to be a dream and I wouldn’t “switch” to knowing it as a dream, interesting.

M: You don’t have to “switch” and just understand it as “an experience” and don’t get hung up on if it’s a volitional dream, blah-blah or what, just accept it as an experience. If people try to “partition” these experiences it handicaps integrating all of the experienced into a whole form of “knowledge”.

R: Yes, I see the value of not getting hung up on if it’s a volitional dream, blah-blah, etc. and at the same time it is my intention to know when I’m dreaming/in the second attention, so in the related case I did miss that chance. As for trying to “partition” it seems to me that that is simply part of discrimination and unavoidable to perception, that is to say, it can’t be helped. I did what I did, I was aware of it, it is part of a whole form of knowledge, but isn’t it unavoidable to distinguish the differences and doesn’t it even help to so distinguish so that perhaps one is better prepared the next time such a dream occurs. OK, what I need to ask is: How does partitioning handicap integrating experiences into a whole form of knowledge.