Fasting in Christianity and Gurdjieff by Joseph Azize

 Joseph Azize, a student of George Adie who was direct student of Gurdjieff, researches Gurdjieff's attitude towards fasting, especially as compared to fasting traditions in Orthodox Christianity.  Azize draws on many sources, including his own teacher, most of which are first hand.

In the final analysis, it seems that Gurdjieff used his own eclectic approach to fasting, that doesn't fit neither in the strictly proscribed Orthodox Christian practices, nor in the practices of the Muslim and Buddhist faiths that he researched and took part in.

Azize wrote that most of the time Gurdjieff prescribed fasting in the form of abstaining from a certain type of food (or multiple types), which did not usually correspond to the foods that are usually excluded in Orthodox Christianity during the "light fasts" which were meant for everyone (the public).

The "heavy fast" in Orthodox Christianity, which is usually practiced only in monastic conditions, and not by the wider public, consists of refusal of all food, except regular water - what we call "water fast" in modern times.  This type of fast has very rarely been a part of Gurdjieff's fasting choices, according to Azize, though it has popped up once or twice.

Art of Dreaming by Carlos Castaneda

 This is the eight volume in Castaneda's opus, and probably the last one that has some value, as the last three volumes (the last two published after his death), are either attempts to (further) commercialize his teachings with inventions like Tensegrity, or just collections of snippets from previous books that the publisher tried to make a bit more money on, before the whole Castaneda craze is gone and he is forgotten, like the case is today (2021).

 1.The Art of Dreaming is a collection of all dreaming instructions by Don Juan from all the time that Carlitos spent with him, and which were just mentioned in passing in the previous volumes.  Castaneda spends a lot of time explaining the Four Gates of Dreaming.  While the first three gates, Castaneda is able to pass by themselves (being 1. finding ones hands in a dream 2. stabilizing a dream and following a "Scout" to the realm of inorganic beings 3. Seeing your own physical body while asleep), the fourth gate is about the ability to create a dream which looks like reality and where other people who can do Dreaming can enter and look around.  This fourth gate is only passed with the help of the "Tenant" - a 5,000+ years old "Death Defier" who is an ancient toltec from pre-columbian mesoamerica and who escaped the realm of the "Inorganic Beings" where all the ancient sorcerers are imprisoned.

The realm and nature of the Inorganic Beings are explored in detail and Castaneda has close contacts with many of them, including the Dreaming Emissary which constantly whispers in his ear, whether in Dreaming or in real life.  The world of Inorganic Beings is explored in detail, with its conscious tunnels and shadows and shapes which live infinitely longer than mankind (though not forever), but who cannot contain as much energy in their luminous bodies, so they trick humans to stay forever in their world and use them as sources of energy, something like domesticated animals for energy. 

One interesting thing mentioned is that all Inorganic Beings are female, so they are only interested in entrapping male sorcerers, having no interest in females.  Don Juan also mentions that "the entire Universe is female" and claims that maleness is a very rare phenomenon in the Universe, as most species and beings are single-sex females races.  

The book ends with the disappearance of Carol Tiggs during the crossing of the Fourth Gate and nobody knows where she went or how to get her back.

Power of Silence by Carlos Castaneda

 The next volume in Castaneda's odyssey is similar to the previous one - he remembers events he's forgotten because he was in a Higher State of Consciousness, which he previously called Second Attention, but that term is rarely used in this volume.  

The backbone of the book consists of the conceptual analysis of the "cores" of the sorcery stories that Don Juan was telling Castaneda in the previous volumes.  It seems each story has a specifically constructed body, consisting of one or more cores, which are intended to lead the apprentice on the path of sorcery exactly in the way previous apprentices (especially for a Nagual) were led. 

We find out more details about Don Juan's teachers and benefactors, Don Elias and Don Julian, as well as events that transpired while Don Juan was a young nagual apprentice.  The main point from these stories is that Don Juan had to 'die' in order to continue his apprenticeship for nagual. This is not a conceptual death, but rather a physical one where he was buried in a shallow grave and was without pulse for many hours, only coming back to Earth because The Eagle refused to devour his awareness.  

The assemblage point and its shifts and moves are also discussed in great detail, and the most intriguing statement Don Juan makes is that the movement of the assemblage point is always a work of "the spirit" and the techniques and methods he taught Castaneda were there only to misdirect his attention. Castaneda learns to be (or the spirit teaches him) in two places at the same time, which happens during the incident when they are attacked by a jaguar in the mountains of Northern Mexico (where jaguars don't live) and are able to escape by Castaneda shutting down his "reasonable mind" and operating only within his "lake of quiet knowledge" mind.

The title of the book is related to the concept introduced in this volume of "lake of knowledge" which is the antithesis of the "reasonable mind" where a person has to put effort and time to learn new things.  By being able to access "the lake of knowledge" inside oneself, a person is automatically connected to any knowledge, without the need of learning, thinking, repeating and storing.  Don Juan says that sorcerers learn to silence their "reasonable mind" in order to operate from the silent lake of knowledge.  This reminds of the Gurdjieff's "Reservoir of Knowledge/Energy" concept which he claimed one is able to connect to by going beyond the physical and mental limits of oneself. 

Fire from Within by Carlos Castaneda

 This is the seventh volume in Castaneda's opus.  It is difficult book to write about, and is probably the most abstract of all the volumes so far.  The same concepts and principles and stories are visited from the previous books, but in more detail and from a different perspective.  The Assemblage Point and its shifting is described in great and painful detail, which makes very little sense for the lay reader which doesn't have the luxury of being an apprentice to a thousands year old sorcery tradition.

There are more stories about the nagual Julian, Don Juan's teacher, and the nagual Elias, Julian's teacher.  There are more stories about the sorcerer's party of Don Juan, mostly Genaro, Silvio Manuel and Vicente Medaro.  

The new concept that is introduced is about the "Death Defiers", a group of ancient sorcerers who found a way to close the gap in their abdomen where the Rolling Force hits against and from where Death takes the human being by destroying the luminous cocoon.  The Death Defiers found a way to close the gap and also to align their inner fibers (light them up) that correspond to the Allies, the inorganic beings which live for a very long time, almost infinite.  In this way the Death Defiers also became almost immaterial like the Allies, and live in a similar world like them, but spend much of their time buried underground, where the energy of the Earth can protect them against the Tumbler/Rolling Force.  One specific Death Defier is told by Don Juan to be the originator of his line of New Seers/sorcerers, who taught the first in the line, nagual Sebastian many secrets in exchange for energy to keep living.  Don Juan describes him as a very thin, dried out man with dark eyes and otherworldly countenance.

Sometimes I wonder if these books are written the Sufi way, i.e. it doesn't make much sense to your conscious mind but it is your unconscious that is really the target of the writings.

I got laid off.

Eagle's Gift by Carlos Castaneda

 This is the sixth volume of Castaneda's works, and it continues the narrative thread of Carlos remembering all the things that were said and done when Don Juan has pushed him into the Second Attention, which is a higher version of the First Attention, the one we use in everyday life.  There are many stories about seeing and Carlos working with La Gorda and all the warriors of Don Juan's group ike Silvio Manuel, Florinda and others.  Florinda teaches Carlos the art of stalking, which is a counterpart to the art of dreaming, the warrior's in a Nagual's party being divided into two main groups, Stalkers and Dreamers, with Couriers rounding up the group.

Another concept that is developed in detail is "The Eagle" which could be described as the Godhead, or the Creator/Destroyer in other traditions.  Don Juan says that even calling it "The Eagle" is somewhat false, as it doesn't look like an eagle, and nobody knows or can know how it really looks.  The name of Eagle was something that the previous seers came up with to describe it, but it could have been any other metaphor.  

The Eagle is the one who gives consciousness to humans when they are born and then, upon their death, it consumes their consciousness.  The entire point of all the previous seers and their parties, just like Don Juan and his warrior party, all of the practices, all of the effort, all of the denials, all of it is for the purpose not to be consumed by the Eagle but to "dart" past it.  Dart into where?  Nobody knows.  Don Juan calls it "Freedom" but what does that actually mean is anyone's guess.  The logic goes that anything is better than being consumed by The Eagle.

My father died of covid three days ago.  I hope The Eagle had mercy on him.

Second Ring of Power by Carlos Castaneda

 The fifth book in the series starts with Castaneda going back to Mexico to talk to his friend, the apprentice of Don Genaro, but when he arrives at his house, the mother, Dona Soledad, attacks him and tells him that Don Juan told her to kill him and take his luminosity.  Castaneda, shocked, defends himself properly.  Then the three girls and La Gorda ("Fatty") who Castaneda thought were daughters of Dona Soledad, also try to trick him and attack him, trying to take his luminosity for themselves, but, at a crucial moment, Castaneda's double comes out of his body and almost kills the girls.

Then Castaneda discovers that Dona Soledad and the girls were actually apprentices of Don Juan as well and that he doesn't remember much of the time he spent with them and Don Juan.  Eventually he goes with La Gorda to various secret places that Don Juan told La Gorda in order to become the Nagual of the new group or "warrior party".  Towards the end of the book he and La Gorda start remembering that they spent time and trained with Don Juan's warrior party, but they were in the Second Attention (First Attention is of the physical body and the physical world) and they cannot remember it, or have very difficult time remembering exactly what happened, who they met and what they did.

This book is more exciting than the others, as it doesn't simply narrate the events as they happen, but it has the quality of a thriller with so many unknowns that one cannot help but simply keep turning the pages, which about with new characters and personalities, never before mentioned in the previous books.  It also makes a definite break with the non-fiction pretense of the previous books and dives deep into what most people would call pure fiction, but it is a good fiction, so there.

Tales of Power by Carlos Castaneda

 Continuing my self-imposed tasks to read all the books Castaneda wrote, I moved on to the fourth volume in the series.  This book is the last one in the "real" Don Juan timeline, i.e. where the apprenticeship of Castaneda was described in a linear manner.  At the end of this book Don Juan and Don Genaro and their "band" of sorcerers leave this plane of existence and can never be encountered in what we call the physical world.  Other books, later in the series, feature Don Juan however it is in a form of memories or more detailed dive into the meaning of the teaching, not a linear explanation of their camaraderie.

This volume concentrates further on the ability to "see" that Don Genaro is trying to develop in Carlos.  Don Juan tells Carlos that Don Genaro is Castaneda's "benefactor" while he, himself is his teacher.  He says that every apprentice needs to have a teacher and a benefactor.  Here both of his instructors are explaining to him the world of the "Tonal" that is the everyday physical world we live in, and the world of the "Nagual" which is everything else, the unexpressed, formless or otherness that exists in the infinity.  These terms, although Spanish and used for other functions in Latin America, are used by Castaneda to mean something completely different.

At the end, the final test is for Castaneda to jump into an abyss (and survive).  Don Juan and Don Genaro say goodbye before that and "fold into the darkness".  The book ends with Castaneda jumping into the abyss.