A timely book

Excerpts

“When the Guru fails what happens depends on each disciple’s merits.”–Sri Ramana Maharshi

Preface

In days long past (not fully aware of what I was doing, I must confess), I left everything behind in search of the eye of the dragon. At the beginning of my journey, I came across the teachings of don Juan, a Yaqui Indian shaman, through the books of Carlos Castaneda. Don Juan’s ancient Toltec wisdom was a beacon, but in the year 2001 I came across critical information, which proved conclusively that many of Castaneda’s claims were fraudulent. 

At the time, I had verified much of what he had written about, and the new and discrediting facts greatly puzzled me. They also forced me to question my findings and convictions, and to look in other directions to take new bearings.

Furthermore, it had been claimed that Castaneda had left this world in full consciousness taking his body with him. And the turmoil that Castaneda’s ordinary death (due to cancer of the liver) caused in many of his closest followers, made me realize how blind human beings can be, and how ready we are to miss a point and become either judges or victims.

I am writing these notes with a double purpose: To help me get a better perspective and a new direction, and to maybe help a few others do the same.

And in case you don’t know Castaneda, I’ll tell you a little about his work as I go along, for it was a great help in my search for the eye of the dragon. I will also juxtapose his work with other works that have also been helpful. I won’t delve into any of these works; that is unnecessary.

I will just say that their main and recurring theme is our destructive egomania, and I’ll let my own experience illustrate. It behooves you to do your own research, and confirm the damaging effects of an unchecked ego, for being the bane of humanity its study is worthy of our consideration.

Consider this: In an article I once came across in a monthly magazine, I read about a six-year-old boy who died after breaking his neck under an extremely heavy load, too heavy for the child to carry. The article also said that he had been a slave all his life.

The author knew this because archeologists are trained to read bones. And the child’s bones, together with other bones (a mass grave for slaves), had been found while excavating somewhere in New York City (of all places) to lay the foundations for a new building.

His bones not only told this archeologist how he had died but also how he had lived. They told him that he had been overworked all his life, that he had been malnourished, that he probably never had a loving arm around him. Those bones finally told the archeologist that that unbearable load had killed him at the tender age of six years old.

Should I ever feel sorry for myself? But perhaps a more pertinent question would be, should I ever feel sorry for that little boy? For just like that little boy I am going to die, and although longer, my life might well end up being much more miserable than his was.

For only by reducing my self-importance to the lowest, can I claim to be different from his captors and murderers; there is such a thing as collective responsibility, a social contract. We all endorse a social contract that thrives in egomania, an egomania that causes the suffering of humanity by rendering us blind to the Whole.

Carlos Castaneda is dead, but his controversial legacy remains.

More at: The Eye of the Dragon: Stalking Castaneda

Kindle edition: The Eye of the Dragon, Stalking Castaneda