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Book: Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge
Author: Carlos Castaneda
Year: 1968

Review

This book is the first in the original Don Juan Teaching's trilogy, with the second being "A Separate Reality: Further Conversations with Don Juan" and the third being "Journey to Ixtlan: The Lessons of Don Juan". While the late Carlos Castaneda stated on many occasions that this is an account of real events, it is seen by most people including myself as a novel of fiction.

In the book(s) Don Juan -- or Juan Matus -- is a seer, a shamans, a sorcerer of the Yaqui Indians in the state of Sonora, Mexico. These Indians are descendents of the Toltecs. The book describes the five-year apprenticeship of Castaneda to Don Juan in the early 1960s. These five years are a quest for knowledge and Indian spirituality. They use peyote and other traditional Indian herbal drugs to free themselves of any preconceptions and to cross gateways to the mysteries of "energy," "clarity," and "power." The drugs only serve as a means to an end, not as the end in themselves. Some people claim that while Buddhists try to reach enlightenment through meditation, Hindus through yoga, Christians via prayer, Don Juan reaches it through mind-alternating drugs.

In the second part of the first book Castaneda gives an anthropological/scientific interpretation of his experiences trying to add more credibility to the work. None of the following books contains any more scientific sections. In the second book of the trilogy Castaneda returns to Mexico to spend more time learning from Don Juan. Eventually the trilogy was expanded. By 1999 Castaneda had written 10 books outlining the philosophy of the Yaqui Indians. Today some 15 books exist on the teaching of Don Juan.

Spiritual Message

The experiences of Castaneda are fantastic, amazing, and unbelievable. But under the influence of hallucinatory drugs all sorts of un-real events can be perceived. What's true, what's not true is not so much the point. In general I think for many people the message is too radical, too strange, too unbelievable and hence the message cannot be digested. To these people the book becomes useless. Others are simply fascinated and read the complete series as they can't get enough. To me some of the ideas of Don Juan ring true, even if based on imagination.

Don Juan tells Castaneda that there are four inner obstacles he must overcome: fear, clarity, power, and old age. These four elements are both obstacles as well as necessary preconditions.

1. Fear
   If we give in to fear we will never conquer it. We must not run away. We must defy our fear. To become knowledgeable [=enlightened] we must first be afraid and then we must overcome the fear. [There is only one thing we must fear: and that is fear itself.] Once we have vanquished fear, we are free from it for the rest of our lives because, instead of fear, we have acquired clarity -- a clarity of mind which erases fear.

2. Clarity
   And thus we will encounter our second enemy: Clarity! That clarity of mind, which is so hard to obtain, dispels fear, but also blinds. It forces us never to doubt ourselves. Clarity will give a false sense of knowledge and stop us from continuing the path of knowledge [=enlightenment]. [Clarity will enable us to see. We will see anything and therefore we will lose modesty. We will think we have reached the end, the highest level. We have not yet realized that there is more. Despite the fact that we can see with clarity there are things beyond our scope, outside our vision. There are still things to learn.] We must do what we did with fear: we must defy our clarity and use it only to see. [We must stay humble and remain with a desire to learn, become knowledgeable, become enlightened.] Once we have overcome our second enemy, we will arrive at a position where nothing can harm us anymore. We will have power.

3. Power
   But we will also come across our third enemy: Power! With the power available to us we will feel invincible. We command; we make rules, we are masters. But this also can lead to our downfall. Power can turn us into cruel, capricious men. We have to learn when and how to use the power. [Anything we do affects other people or the environment and we are responsible for them as well.] We have to come to realize that the power we have seemingly conquered is in reality never ours. Clarity and power without control is dangerous. [We have to control the power or it controls us.]

4. Old Age
   Now the last of our enemies will attack: Old age! We have to overcome the desire to rest. This struggle will never end. [We will never be perfect. But it is our responsibility to use our powers/talents, instead of being idle.]

There are many paths in our life and we are free to chose any. No path leads anywhere! [It is the journey that counts, not the destination.] There is no final destination to reach. Some paths have "hearts," others don't. We must always chose a "path with heart". How will we know if a path has heart? Don Juan says that we will simply know. [Our subconscious will tell us. We must follow our instincts!] If we travel on a path with heart it will be a joyful journey. [It is always more important that we like what we do, then doing something that might lead us somewhere. We should live in the Now! We should not take a painful path that we do not like, thinking erroneously that we will be rewarded at the destination. The journey is the reward, not the destination. See "The Power of Now".]

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