The Power of Silence (2 page)

Don Juan's
instruction on the art of stalking and the mastery of intent depended upon his
instruction on the mastery of awareness, which was the cornerstone of his
teachings, and which consist of the following basic premises:

1.
 
The universe is an infinite
agglomeration of energy fields, resembling threads of light.

2.
 
These energy fields, called the
Eagle's emanations, radiate from a source of inconceivable proportions
metaphorically called the Eagle.

3.
   
Human beings are also
composed of an incalculable number of the same threadlike energy fields. These
Eagle's emanations form an encased agglomeration that manifests itself as a
ball of light the size of the person's body with the arms extended laterally,
like a giant luminous egg.

4.
   
Only a very small group
of the energy fields inside this luminous ball are lit up by a point of intense
brilliance located on the ball's surface.

5.
   
Perception occurs when
the energy fields in that small group immediately surrounding the point of
brilliance extend their light to illuminate identical energy fields outside the
ball. Since the only energy fields perceivable are those lit by the point of
brilliance, that point is named "the point where perception is
assembled" or simply "the assemblage point."

6.
   
The assemblage point can
be moved from its usual position on the surface of the luminous ball to another
position on the surface, or into the interior. Since the brilliance of the
assemblage point can light up whatever energy field it comes in contact with,
when it moves to a new position it immediately brightens up new energy fields,
making them perceivable. This perception is known as
seeing
.

7.
   
When the assemblage point
shifts, it makes possible the perception of an entirely different world - as
objective and factual as the one we normally perceive. Sorcerers go into that other
world to get energy, power, solutions to general and particular problems, or to
face the unimaginable.

8.
   
Intent is the pervasive
force that causes us to perceive. We do not become aware because we perceive;
rather, we perceive as a result of the pressure and intrusion of intent.

9.
   
The aim of sorcerers is
to reach a state of total awareness in order to experience all the
possibilities of perception available to man. This state of awareness even
implies an alternative way of dying.

A level of
practical knowledge was included as part of teaching the mastery of awareness.
On that practical level don Juan taught the procedures necessary to move the
assemblage point. The two great systems devised by the sorcerer seers of
ancient times to accomplish this were:
dreaming
, the control and
utilization of dreams; and stalking, the control of behavior.

Moving
one's assemblage point was an essential maneuver that every sorcerer had to
learn. Some of them, the naguals, also learned to perform it for others. They
were able to dislodge the assemblage point from its customary position by
delivering a hard slap directly to the assemblage point. This blow, which was
experienced as a smack on the right shoulder blade - although the body was
never touched - resulted in a state of heightened awareness.

In
compliance with his tradition, it was exclusively in these states of heightened
awareness that don Juan carried out the most important and dramatic part of his
teachings: the instructions for the left side. Because of the extraordinary
quality of these states, don Juan demanded that I not discuss them with others
until we had concluded everything in the sorcerers' teaching scheme. That
demand was not difficult for me to accept. In those unique states of awareness
my capabilities for understanding the instruction were unbelievably enhanced,
but at the same time my capabilities for describing or even remembering it were
impaired. I could function in those states with proficiency and assuredness,
but I could not recollect anything about them once I returned to my normal
consciousness.

It took me
years to be able to make the crucial conversion of my enhanced awareness into
plain memory. My reason and common sense delayed this moment because they were
colliding head-on with the preposterous, unthinkable reality of heightened
awareness and direct knowledge. For years the resulting cognitive
disarrangement forced me to avoid the issue by not thinking about it.

Whatever I
have written about my sorcery apprenticeship, up to now, has been a recounting
of how don Juan taught me the mastery of awareness. I have not yet described
the art of stalking or the mastery of intent.

Don Juan
taught me their principles and applications with the help of two of his
companions: a sorcerer named Vicente Medrano and another named Silvio Manuel,
but whatever I learned from them still remains clouded in what Don Juan called
the intricacies of heightened awareness. Until now it has been impossible for
me to write or even to think coherently about the art of stalking and the
mastery of intent. My mistake has been to regard them as subjects for normal
memory and recollection. They are, but at the mime time they are not. In order
to resolve this contradiction, I have not pursued the subjects directly - a
virtual impossibility - but have dealt with them indirectly through the
concluding topic of don Juan's instruction: the stories of the sorcerers of the
past.

He
recounted these stories to make evident what he called the abstract cores of
his lessons. But I was incapable of grasping the nature of the abstract cores
despite his comprehensive explanations, which, I know now, were intended more
to open my mind than to explain anything in a rational manner. His way of
talking made me believe for many years that his explanations of the abstract
cores were like academic dissertations; and all I was able to do, under these
circumstances, was to take his explanations as given. They became part of my
tacit acceptance of his teachings, but without the thorough assessment on my
part that was essential to understanding them.

Don Juan
presented three sets of six abstract cores each, arranged in an increasing
level of complexity. I have dealt here with the first set, which is composed of
the following: the manifestations of the spirit, the knock of the spirit, the
trickery of the spirit, the descent of the spirit, the requirements of intent,
and handling intent.

Don Juan,
whenever it was pertinent, used to tell me brief stories about the sorcerers of
his lineage, especially his teacher, the nagual Julian. They were not really
stories, but rather descriptions of the way those sorcerers behaved and of
aspects of their personalities. These accounts were each designed to shed light
on a specific topic in my apprenticeship.

I had heard
the same stories from the other fifteen members of don Juan's group of
sorcerers, but none of these accounts had been able to give me a clear picture
of the people they described. Since I had no way of persuading don Juan to give
me more details about those sorcerers, I had resigned myself to the idea of
never knowing about them in any depth.

One
afternoon, in the mountains of southern Mexico, don Juan, after having
explained to me more about the intricacies of the mastery of awareness, made a
statement that completely baffled me.

"I
think it's time for us to talk about the sorcerers of our past," he said.

Don Juan
explained that it was necessary that I begin drawing conclusions based on a
systematic view of the past, conclusions about both the world of daily affairs
and the sorcerers' world.

"Sorcerers
are vitally concerned with their past," he said. "But I don't mean
their personal past. For sorcerers their past is what other sorcerers in bygone
days have done. And what we are now going to do is examine that past.

"The
average man also examines the past. But it's mostly his personal past he
examines, and he does so for personal reasons. Sorcerers do quite the opposite;
they consult their past in order to obtain a point of reference."

"But
isn't that what everyone does? Look at the past to get a point of
reference?"

"No!"
he answered emphatically. "The average man measures himself against the
past, whether his personal past or the past knowledge of his time, in order to
find justifications for his present or future behavior, or to establish a model
for himself. Only sorcerers genuinely seek a point of reference in their
past."

"Perhaps,
don Juan, things would be clear to me if you tell me what a point of reference
for a sorcerer is."

"For
sorcerers, establishing a point of reference means getting a chance to examine
intent" he replied. "Which is exactly the aim of this final topic of
instruction. And nothing can give sorcerers a better view of intent than examining
stories of other sorcerers battling to understand the same force."

He
explained that as they examined their past, the sorcerers of his lineage took
careful notice of the basic abstract order of their knowledge.

"In
sorcery there are twenty-one abstract cores," don Juan went on. "And
then, based on those abstract cores, there are scores of sorcery stories about
the naguals of our lineage battling to understand the spirit. It's time to tell
you the abstract cores and the sorcery stories."

I waited
for don Juan to begin telling me the stories, but he changed the subject and
went back to explaining awareness.

"Wait
a minute," I protested. "What about the sorcery stories? Aren't you
going to tell them to me?"

"Of
course I am," he said. "But they are not stories that one can tell as
if they were tales.
You've got to think your way through them and then rethink them - relive them,
so to speak."

There was a
long silence. I became very cautious and was afraid that if I persisted in
asking him again to tell me the stories, I could be committing myself to
something I might later regret. But my curiosity was greater than my good
sense.

"Well,
let's get on with them," I croaked.

Don Juan,
obviously catching the gist of my thoughts, smiled maliciously. He stood and signaled
me to follow. We had been sitting on some dry rocks at the bottom of a gully.
It was mid-afternoon. The sky was dark and cloudy. Low, almost black rain
clouds hovered above the peaks to the east. In comparison, the high clouds made
the sky seem clear to the south. Earlier it had rained heavily, but then the
rain seemed to have retreated to a hiding place, leaving behind only a threat.

I should
have been chilled to the bone, for it was very cold. But I was warm. As I
clutched a rock don Juan had given me to hold, I realized that this sensation
of being warm in nearly freezing weather was familiar to me, yet it amazed me
each time. Whenever I seemed about to freeze, don Juan would give me a branch
to hold, or a stone, or he would put a bunch of leaves under my shirt, on the
tip of my sternum, and that would be sufficient to raise my body temperature.

I had tried
unsuccessfully to recreate, by myself, the effect of his ministrations. He told
me it was not the ministrations but his inner silence that kept me warm, and
the branches or stones or leaves were merely devices to trap my attention and
maintain it in focus.

Moving
quickly, we climbed the steep west side of a mountain until we reached a rock
ledge at the very top. We were in the foothills of a higher range of mountains.
From the rock ledge I could see that fog had begun to move onto the south end
of the valley floor below us. Low, wispy clouds seemed to be closing in on us,
too, sliding down from the black-green, high mountain peaks to the west. After
the rain, under the dark cloudy sky the valley and the mountains to the east
and south appeared covered in a mantle of black-green silence.

"This
is the ideal place to have a talk," don Juan said, sitting on the rock
floor of a concealed shallow cave.

The cave
was perfect for the two of us to sit side by side. Our heads were nearly
touching the roof and our backs fitted snugly against the curved surface of the
rock wall. It was as if the cave had been carved deliberately to accommodate
two persons of our size.

I noticed
another strange feature of the cave: when I stood on the ledge, I could see the
entire valley and the mountain ranges to the east and south, but when I sat
down, I was boxed in by the rocks. Yet the ledge was at the level of the cave
floor, and flat.

I was about
to point this strange effect out to don Juan, but he anticipated me.

"This
cave is man-made," he said. "The ledge is slanted but the eye doesn't
register the incline."

"Who
made this cave, don Juan?"

"The
ancient sorcerers. Perhaps thousands of years ago. And one of the peculiarities
of this cave is that animals and insects and even people stay away from it. The
ancient sorcerers seem to have infused it with an ominous charge that makes
every living thing feel ill at ease."