The Active Side of Infinity (28 page)

"It is
a very predatory mood," don Juan went on. "It's not difficult at all
to enter into it,
because man is a predator
by nature. You could
see,
aggressively, anybody in this little village,
or
perhaps someone far away, while
they are asleep; anyone would do for the purpose at hand.
What's important is that you arrive at a complete
sense of indifference. You are in search of
something, and you are out to get it. You're going to go out looking for
a person, searching like a
feline,
like an animal of prey, for someone to descend on."

Don Juan had told me, laughing at my apparent chagrin, that the
difficulty with this technique
was the mood, and that I couldn't be
passive in the act of
seeing,
for the sight was not something
to
watch but to act upon. It might have been the power of his suggestion, but that
day, when he had told me all this, I felt astoundingly aggressive. Every muscle
of my body was filled to the brim with energy, and in my
dreaming
practice
I did go after someone. I was not interested in
who that
someone might have been. I needed someone who was asleep, and some force I was
aware
of, without being fully conscious of it, had guided me to find that someone.

I never knew who the person was, but while I was
seeing
that
person, I felt don Juan's
presence. It was a strange sensation of
knowing that someone was with me by an undetermined
sensation of
proximity that was happening at a level of awareness that
wasn't
part of anything that 1 had ever experienced. 1 could only focus my attention
on the
individual at rest. 1 knew that he was a male, but I
don't know how 1 knew that. I knew that he
was asleep
because the ball of energy that human beings ordinarily are was a little bit
flat; it was
expanded laterally.

And then I saw the
assemblage point at
a position different from
the habitual one, which is right behind the shoulder blades. In this instance,
it had been displaced to the right of where it
should have
been, and a bit lower. I calculated that in this case it had moved to the side
of the
ribs. Another thing that I noticed was that there was no
stability to it. It fluctuated erratically and
then abruptly
went back to its normal position. I had the clear sensation that, obviously, my
presence, and don Juan's, had awakened the individual. I had experienced
a profusion of blurred
images right after that, and then I
woke up back in the place where I had started.

Don Juan had also told me all along that sorcerers were divided into two
groups: one group
was
dreamers;
the other was stalkers. The
dreamers
were those who had a great facility for
displacing the
assemblage
point.
The stalkers were those who had a great facility for
maintaining
the
assemblage point
fixed on that new position.
Dreamers and stalkers complemented each
other, and
worked in pairs, affecting one another with their given proclivities.

Don Juan had assured me that the displacement and the fixation of the
assemblage
point
could
be realized at will by means of the
sorcerers' iron-handed discipline. He said that the sorcerers of
his
lineage believed that there were at least six hundred points within the
luminous sphere that we
are, that when reached at will by the
assemblage
point,
can each give us a totally inclusive world;
meaning
that, if our assemblage
point
is displaced to any of those points and
remains fixed on it,
we will perceive a world as inclusive
and total as the world of everyday life, but a different world
nevertheless.

Don Juan had further explained that the art of sorcery is to manipulate
the assemblage point
and make it change positions at will on
the luminous spheres that human beings are. The result of this manipulation is
a shift
in the point of contact with the
dark sea of
awareness,
which brings as its concomitant a different
bundle
of zillions of energy fields in the form of luminous filaments that converge on
the
assemblage
point.
The consequence of new energy
fields converging on the assemblage
point
is
that awareness of a different sort
than that which is necessary for perceiving the world of
everyday life enters into action, turning the new
energy fields into sensory data, sensory data that is interpreted and perceived
as a different world because the energy fields that engender it are different
from the habitual ones.

He had asserted that an accurate definition of sorcery as a practice
would be to say that
sorcery is the manipulation of the
assemblage
point
for purposes of changing its focal point of
contact
with the dark
sea of awareness,
thus making it possible to perceive
other worlds.

Don Juan had said that the art of the stalkers enters into play after
the assemblage
point
has
been displaced. Maintaining the
assemblage point fixed in its new position assures sorcerers that
they
will perceive whatever new world they enter in its absolute completeness,
exactly as we do
in the world of ordinary affairs. For the
sorcerers of don Juan's lineage, the world of everyday life
was
but one fold of a total world consisting of at least six hundred folds.

Don Juan went back again to the topic under discussion: my journeys
through the dark sea
of
awareness, and said that what 1 had
done from my
inner silence
was very similar to what is done in dreaming
when one is asleep. However, when journeying through the dark sea
of
awareness,
there was no interruption of any sort caused by
going to sleep, nor was there any attempt
whatsoever at
controlling one's attention while having a dream. The journey through the dark
sea of awareness entailed an immediate response. There was an overpowering sensation
of the here
and now. Don Juan lamented the fact that some idiotic
sorcerers had given the name dreaming-
awake to this act of reaching
the dark
sea of aware
ness directly, making the term
dreaming
even
more ridiculous.

"When you thought that you had the dream-fantasy of going to that
town of our choice," he
continued, "you had actually
placed your
assemblage point
directly on a specific position on the
dark
sea of awareness
that allows the journey. Then the
dark
sea of awareness
supplied you with
whatever was
necessary to carry on that journey. There's no way whatsoever to choose that
place at will. Sorcerers say that
inner silence
selects it unerringly.
Simple, isn't it?"

He explained to me then the intricacies of choice. He said that choice,
for
warrior-travelers,
was not really the act of choosing, but
rather the act of acquiescing elegantly to the solicitations
of
infinity.

"Infinity
chooses,"
he said. "The art of the warrior-traveler is to have the ability to move
with
the slightest insinuation, the art of acquiescing to
every command of
infinity.
For this, a warrior-trav
eler
needs
prowess, strength, and above everything else, sobriety. All those three put
together
give, as a result, elegance!"

After a moment's pause, I went back to the subject that intrigued me the
most.

"But it's unbelievable that I actually went to that town, don Juan,
in body and soul," I said.

"It is unbelievable, but it's not unlivable," he said.
"The universe has no limits, and the
possibilities
at play in the universe at large are indeed incommensurable. So don't fall prey
to the
axiom, 'I believe only what I see,' because it is the
dumbest stand one can possibly take."

Don Juan's elucidation had been crystal clear. It made sense, but I
didn't know where it made
sense; certainly not in my daily world
of usual affairs. Don Juan assured me then, unleashing a
great
trepidation in me, that there was only one way in which sorcerers could handle
all this
information: to taste it through experience, because the
mind was incapable of taking in all that
stimulation.

"What do you want me to do, don Juan?" I asked.

"You must deliberately journey through the
dark
sea of awarene
ss," he replied, "but you'll
never
know how this is done. Let's say that
inner silence
does
it, following inexplicable ways,
ways that cannot be understood, but
only practiced."

Don Juan had me sit down on my bed and adopt the position that fostered
inner silence.
I
usually
fell asleep instantly whenever I adopted this position. However, when I was
with don
Juan, his presence always made it impossible for me to
fall asleep; instead, I entered into a
veritable
state of complete quietude. This time, after an instant of silence, I found
myself walking.
Don Juan was guiding me by holding my arm as we
walked.

We were no longer in his house; we were walking in a Yaqui town 1 had
never been in before.
I knew of the town's existence; I had
been close to it many times, but I had been made to turn
around
by the sheer hostility of the people who lived around it. It was a town where it
was nearly impossible for a stranger to enter. The only non-Yaquis who had free
access to that town were the
supervisors from the federal bank
because of the fact that the bank bought the crops from the Yaqui farmers. The
endless negotiations of the Yaqui farmers revolved around getting cash
advances
from the bank on the basis of a near-speculation process about future crops.

I instantly recognized the town from the descriptions of people who had
been there. As if to
increase my astonishment, don Juan whispered
in my ear that we were in the Yaqui town in
question. I
wanted to ask him how we had gotten there, but I couldn't articulate my words.
There
were a large number of Indians talking in argumentative
tones; tempers seemed to flare. I didn't
understand a
word of what they were saying, but the moment I conceived of the thought that I
couldn't understand, something cleared up. It was very much as if more
light went into the scene.
Things became very defined and neat,
and I understood what the people were saying although I
didn't
know how; I didn't speak their language. The words were definitely
understandable to me, not singularly, but in clusters, as if my mind could pick
up whole patterns of thought.

I could say in earnest that I got the shock of a lifetime, not so much
because I understood what
they were saying but because of the
content of what they were saying. Those people were indeed
warlike. They were not
Western men at all. Their propositions were propositions of strife,
warfare, strategy. They were measuring their
strength, their striking resources, and lamenting the
fact that they had no power to deliver their
blows. I registered in my body the anguish of their
impotence. All they had were sticks and stones to
fight high-technology weapons. They mourned
the fact that they had no leaders. They coveted, more than anything else
one could imagine, the
rise of some
charismatic fighter who could galvanize them.

I heard then the voice of cynicism; one of them expressed a thought
that seemed to devastate
everyone equally, including me, for 1
seemed to be an indivisible part of them. He said that they
were
defeated beyond salvation, because if at a given moment one of them had the
charisma to
rise up and rally them, he would be betrayed because of
envy and jealousy and hurt feelings.

1 wanted to comment to don Juan on what was happening to me, but 1
couldn't voice a single
word. Only don Juan could talk.

"The Yaquis are not unique in their pettiness," he said in my
ear. "It is a condition in which
human beings are trapped, a
condition that is not even human, but imposed from the outside."

1 felt my mouth opening and closing involuntarily as 1 tried desperately
to ask a question that
I could not even conceive of. My mind
was blank, void of thoughts. Don Juan and 1 were in the middle of a circle of
people, but none of them seemed to have noticed us. I did not record any
movement,
reaction, or furtive glance that may have indicated that they were aware of us.