Excerpt from “Journey to Ixtlan” by Carlos Castaneda

It all began with my grandfather’s explosion of anger upon taking a count of his young Leghorn chickens. They had been disappearing in a steady and disconcerting manner. He personally organized and carried out a meticulous vigil, and after days of steady watching we finally saw a big white bird flying away with a young Leghorn chicken in its claws. The bird was fast and apparently knew its route. It swooped down from behind some trees, grabbed the chicken and flew away through an opening between two branches. It happened so fast that my grandfather had hardly seen it, but I did and I knew that it was indeed a falcon. My grandfather said that if that was the case it had to be an albino.

We started a campaign against the albino falcon and twice I thought I had gotten it. It even dropped its prey, but it got away. It was too fast for me. It was also very intelligent; it never came back to hunt on my grandfather’s farm.

I would have forgotten about it had my grandfather not needled me to hunt the bird. For two months I chased the albino falcon all over the valley where I lived. I learned its habits and I could almost intuit its route of flight, yet its speed and the suddenness of its appearance would always baffle me.

I could boast that I had prevented it from taking its prey, perhaps every time we had met, but I could never bag it.

In the two months that I carried on the strange war against the albino falcon I came close to it only once. I had been chasing it all day and I was tired. I had sat down to rest and fell asleep under a tall eucalyptus tree. The sudden cry of a falcon woke me up. I opened my eyes without making any other movement and I saw a whitish bird perched in the highest branches of the eucalyptus tree. It was the albino falcon. The chase was over. It was going to be a difficult shot; I was lying on my back and the bird had its back turned to me. There was a sudden gust of wind and I used it to muffle the noise of lifting my .22 long rifle to take aim. I wanted to wait until the bird had turned or until it had begun to fly so I would not miss it.

But the albino bird remained motionless. In order to take a better shot I would have needed to move and the falcon was too fast for that. I thought that my best alternative was to wait. And I did, a long, interminable time. Perhaps what affected me was the long wait, or perhaps it was the loneliness of the spot where the bird and I were; I suddenly felt a chill up my spine and in an unprecedented action I stood up and left. I did not even look to see if the bird had flown away.

– Carlos Castaneda, Journey to Ixtlan, Chapter 4: Death as an Advisor

I picked up this book because along with “History of the Peloponnesian War” by Thucydides, it was recommended by Robert Greene as one of the two books that had the most profound effect on him. Greene is best known for “The 48 Laws of Power” but this book doesn’t seem to be focused on obtaining “power” in the common way that “power” is understood, meaning the ability to control the world (and people) to suit one’s personal desires.

Instead, it’s a book that’s more about mysticism and timeless knowledge. The character teaching and explaining this knowledge to Carlos Castaneda (the introduction explains that the book is based on actual events and conversations, however embellished) is Juan Matus, or “Don Juan” and the very first line of the introduction describes Don Juan as a “Yaqui Indian sorcerer.”

After reading the introduction and the first chapter I must admit that I was a bit cynical about how I would feel about this book, whether it was worth reading or not. It reminds me of “Way of the Peaceful Warrior” which I read when I was in 7th grade. It was my introduction to philosophy and mysticism and will always be an important book to me, but was more revelatory for me as a 7th grader (and now I am an old man!) I think I picked up “Way of the Peaceful Warrior” again in college or shortly after and quickly put it down, and I thought my relationship to “Journey to Ixtlan” might be similar. (I was particularly critical of the parenting advice that Don Juan gave Castaneda to relay to his friend.)

But I’ve been enjoying these last chapters and even if the revelatory ideas I’ve heard before, it seems to be proving worth my time.

There are a lot of one-liner quotes that I could pick out, let me just pick a couple:

“But, you yourself know who you are, don’t you?” I interjected.

“You bet I… don’t,” he exclaimed and rolled on the floor, laughing at my surprised look.

“You take yourself too seriously,” he said slowly. “You are too damn important in your own mind. That must be changed! You are so goddamn important that you feel justified to be annoyed with everything.”

As long as you feel that you are the most important thing in the world you cannot really appreciate the world around you. You are like a horse with blinders, all you see is yourself apart from everything else.

And to relate to Robert Greene and power:

Don Juan’s reply was that the young man was a fool who did not know what he was looking for. He did not know what “power” was, so he could not tell whether or not he had found it.