Mr. Learns about plants in the desert and how the store operates on a higher level than you are currently aware of. There are very beautiful lessons such as finding your own energy spot (by rolling from hot to cold) and paying attention to nature and animals within oneself. Not everything is equally interesting. Certainly, the schematic explanation afterwards can be skipped by me.

Mr. Learns discovers the unique characteristics of plants in the harsh desert environment. He realizes that these plants have adapted in remarkable ways to survive the extreme conditions. The store, on the other hand, seems to have a mysterious and elevated mode of operation. It offers a wealth of knowledge and experiences that go beyond the ordinary.

The lessons he learns are not only educational but also spiritually enriching. Finding one's energy spot through the simple act of rolling from hot to cold is a fascinating concept. It teaches him to be in tune with his body and the environment. Paying attention to nature and animals within oneself helps him develop a deeper sense of connection and respect for all living things.

However, not every aspect of his learning journey is equally captivating. The schematic explanation that follows certain lessons can sometimes be a bit dry and uninteresting. But overall, Mr. Learns is grateful for the opportunity to expand his knowledge and awareness.

I really liked it. It's a combination of education and reflection.

It offers a great deal of valuable insights and makes you think deeply about various aspects.

The way it presents the information is engaging and thought-provoking.

It's not just about learning facts but also about understanding the underlying concepts and their implications.

I'm looking forward to seeing more such content on the channel.

It's a great resource for those who are interested in expanding their knowledge and enhancing their critical thinking skills.

I would highly recommend it to others.

Overall, it's a great piece that combines education and reflection in a very effective way.

Far out! as previous generations would say.

The book delves into the apprenticeship of an anthropology student with a medicine man of Native American descent. The student consumes psychotropic plants in an attempt to learn the 'correct way to live'. Beyond that, one can utilize these plants to foresee the unknown, pass through objects and cover great distances, transform into animals, and journey beyond this world into the realm of spirits and demons.

This book is truly captivating as it provides profound insights into the world of Native American shamanism and their beliefs. It is fascinating to consider how this religion evolved and was handed down through the centuries. Either due to hunger or curiosity, people were compelled to ingest these plants, and what they discovered was that the plants induced altered states of reality. The 'leap of faith' they took was believing that the plants, which were highly personified as allies and teachers, could be employed for magical purposes. This is not exclusive to the Yaqui; cultures worldwide have used plants for spiritual means, such as witchcraft, wizardry, healing, and divination.

The structural analysis in Part II is somewhat dull, and I skimmed through it. What would have been more engaging is if Castaneda had provided more details about what he believed he had experienced. The account in Part I is very objective. Additionally, it would be interesting to know whether he had prior experience with hallucinogens before his apprenticeship (which I assume he must have).

I recommend this book to anyone interested in shamanism. It combines the spirituality of Coehlo's The Pilgrimage (albeit more believable due to the use of psychotropics - I couldn't finish that one) with the mind-bending trips of Wolf's 'The Electric Koolaid Acid Test'.

Reseñar este libro es un poco complejo.

Al terminarlo, uno inevitablemente cae en la cuestión de si se trata de una obra de literatura fantástica o un tratado de antropología.

Uno podría arriesgarse a decir que lo uno no desvirtúa lo otro.

Sin embargo, si aceptamos esto como la descripción última del libro, se encuentra con dos formas de ver este trabajo.

Como obra de literatura corriente, la segunda parte mata la sensación fantástica de la primera.

La primera mitad crea un universo rico en posibilidades, gracias a la capacidad de Castaneda para describir los estados oníricos.

Las experiencias son ricas en descripción y matices.

Sin embargo, la segunda parte, al intentar un análisis antropológico, hace que la magia se esfume.

Desde el punto de vista antropológico, hay un fallo enorme.

La primera parte desvirtúa la segunda, ya que es imposible tener un rigor investigativo al documentar sensaciones individuales.

Los detractores critican que Castaneda no estudiara el efecto social de los rituales.

Sin embargo, desde el punto de vista espiritual, la obra está bien cargada de argumentos.

¿Me gustó? Definitivamente si.

Aunque hubiera sido mejor si se hubiera concentrado en describir las experiencias desde una experiencia de vida y del alma.

Para mí, un claro 3.5.

This is a book that the author believes is about a Western student's apprenticeship under a Yaqui sorcerer named Don Juan. However, in the author's opinion, it was more like getting high in the desert with an old man and playing with lizards.

The author thinks the book was misnamed. A more accurate title would have been "The Drug Trips of Don Juan: An Indian Way of Drug Tripping." The entire book seems to be a memoir of the author's drug trips and conversations about them. There is very little in the way of teachings or knowledge as the author understands those terms.

The Yaqui were never specifically mentioned in the book, and even Don Juan referred to himself as "an Indian." There was some discussion of the culture's mythology and beliefs, but it was basically just personifying drug trips. Absurd claims were made, like the ability to fly or turn into a crow while on drugs. When the author asked Don Juan if he was actually flying or just imagining it, Don Juan told him not to think that way. The word "hallucinating" was never used.

The end of the book is a long string of made-up jargon words, like "put positive emphasis on the idea" and "the rule of the undertaking of non-ordinary reality." The author calls hallucinating "non-ordinary reality" because he claims it's not imagined but real, just not ordinary. Since there are two different realities, a new term is needed to describe what are really just drug trips.

Not being an anthropologist, the author can't evaluate the book's quality as an anthropological work. But from what he's read, anthropologists don't seem to be impressed either. As a memoir, the author thinks it's terrible. He can see how hippies in the 60s might have loved it, thinking they were practicing Yaqui spirituality and experiencing non-ordinary reality when really they were just getting high and being lazy.

When I started reading the book, I recalled the phrase that "Castaneda is not as scary as his reader", so I expected the book to contain descriptions of exciting drug experiences that would surely lead you to the Sect of the Mysterious and Bewitched sooner or later.

However, the very first described experience with Mescalito (that is, peyote, a cactus with psychoactive mescaline) is simply wonderful in its simplicity and vividness. When the disciple/author describes what he went through, what he saw after chewing peyote - his harmony with the surroundings and understanding with the yard dog that shone with a blue inner light, his teacher admits that in reality the author was just running after the dog and trying to help it. A beautiful illustration of what can happen to you in your reality while you are in a psychoactive state, catching pleasant and fulfilling revelations somewhere. But the author decides that it is worth continuing the learning, waiting for the lizards (sewing their eyelids and mouths shut, among other things), learning to transform into a crow, learning to fly, and so on.

Don Juan himself is a highly unpleasant person who surely had a sad experience with women, judging by his irritability and wariness towards them.

The second part, where the author tries to structure everything experienced somehow by names, is difficult to read and probably not worth it.

In a word, the book is about how a white person (yes, yes, he is from Peru, one could say a "western" person) meets an old non-white aborigine who knows a thing or two about beneficial encounters, and that's what the white/"western" person uses. It's interesting whether such exotic tours to drunk Mexico are popular nowadays, where each person is assigned their own don Juan who produces high-quality and safe trips and deep emotional experiences for the client during the entire vacation.

Nevertheless, this is only the first of 12 books, and I think I will read a couple more.

An interesting, logical, and erudite account of a man's anthropological study into the minds of a subculture that was so unrestricted. It deviated from much of what we would deem as mainstream.

The experiences are documented in a manner that recalls an old scientist. However, the experiences described are vivid and mind-altering, presenting two jarring views juxtaposed in a fixed focus, creating a fixed yet surreal experience.

The 40th anniversary audiobook features a chapter on the belief structure of the ancient shamans of Mexico. This chapter alone makes the time spent digesting the book worthwhile. The "dark sea of awareness" is a concept that a man could dwell on for a long time, potentially uncovering new insights into our existences and their true meanings.

I highly recommend reading this book if you have an interest in studies of perception, neuroscience, and consciousness. As the great poets and seers have always asserted, the reality beyond the ordinary veil of limitations that we impose on our senses is truly infinite.

SPOILER ALERT

I discovered parallels between "the dark sea of awareness" and the Buddhist concept of Indra's Net. If anyone else has any thoughts on these two schools of thought and how they complement each other, please feel free to share your insights.

Something happened that I received, but due to the distance I felt towards the subject, it was a bit difficult for me to read and understand.

Of course, this does not diminish the value and importance of this book. The content within it may hold great significance and offer valuable insights. However, my personal connection or lack thereof with the topic made the initial process of engaging with it a bit of a challenge.

Perhaps with more effort and an open mind, I can overcome this initial hurdle and truly appreciate the essence of what the book has to offer. It serves as a reminder that sometimes, even when faced with a subject that may not immediately resonate with us, there is still potential for learning and growth.

A book that is difficult to categorize, it could well be seen as fiction or as anthropological research. In it, Carlos Castaneda narrates the learning process he underwent to become a man of knowledge.

What for Castaneda would be a simple anthropological study of the use of hallucinogenic plants among the indigenous groups of Sonora and New Mexico, turned into a whole journey with first-hand experiences regarding the rituals and effects of three different plants named: Mescalito, the Devil's Weed, and the Little Smoke. Always guided by the Yaqui Indian Don Juan Matus, whose conversations have the purpose of helping to unravel the knowledge and power that the use of such plants can provide.

Something worth highlighting is the introduction titled “The Previous Look” that Octavio Paz makes of the book, which I recommend you read if you have doubts about delving into the reading. This introduction offers valuable insights and perspectives that can enhance your understanding of the complex and mysterious world that Castaneda presents in his work. It provides a context and a framework that can help you better appreciate the significance and implications of the experiences and teachings described in the book.

This is an extremely old book.

I have desired to read it for an incredibly long time. It was penned when I was merely a child.

My father used to possess it and would read a few snippets about it to me.

Several years later, now married, my husband also has this book and urged me to commence reading when I initiated my spiritual path, which was over 13 years ago.

Now, after so many distractions, I finally had the opportunity to pick up this magnificent masterpiece.

This is the story of Carlos Castañeda's experience with Don Juan and the magical plants of peyote as well as the psilocybin mushrooms.

I am very familiar with this mushroom as my father resides in the mountain in Oaxaca where these mushrooms always grow between May and July.

Carlos undertakes an investigation regarding magical plants like peyote, a plant that is highly sacred and significant in some parts of Mexico, particularly where the shamans and brujos dwell.

Don Carlos truly had no idea what would occur during this investigation, but Don Juan indeed led him on a journey that he will never forget and that will cause him to grow tremendously as a person and a spiritual being.

Many of the stories Carlos narrates in his book are difficult to comprehend and believe.

However, only when one encounters these experiences from peyote and mushrooms will one understand what he meant and the symbology these two magical plants bring to the person who ingests them.

Don Carlos and Don Juan elucidate in this book how these are sacred matters that should never be taken lightly.

This always necessitates being done under the guidance of someone who truly knows what they are doing.

This is not a recreational drug; it demands a great deal of maturity and the evolution of the soul.

The teachings of Don Juan illustrate the numerous astral travels and experiences Carlos had during those years with the remarkable teachings and knowledge of Don Juan.

Many will sound very strange and even magical, but as I mentioned earlier, it is a realm that is not understood in a normal state of mind.

After many years, I am extremely glad that I was finally able to read this astonishing experience.

But I am also glad that it took me so much time to engage with it because now I understand in a better way what this book is all about.

I don't know how correct the word "literary" is in relation to this book. It is more of an experience than a book, a kind of checkpoint in the biography from the reader's perspective. The study of Don Juan is not just a study, more precisely, it is not a theory, but an immediate test, an immediate error. Theory implies the transmission of information, while Castaneda asserts that the flow of information is not knowledge. What is known does not occur in narrow linguistic conditions, it is more natural, more obvious. Moreover, even the mystical episodes described in the writings cannot be known by the author as mystical, because mysticism implies inspiration, while the fact that Castaneda's character ingests peyote, takes mescaline, etc., is absolutely incomprehensible. An interesting feature of the works is that the more they are subjected to rational analysis, the better they are understood. I myself read the book during a period of great stress, when even the usual reactions were suppressed. It was precisely this that made it possible for me to partly understand the situation described by Castaneda. It is a big mistake to think that Castaneda writes only about hallucinogens. This is a book about meditation and requires a very well-developed ability to empirically theorize in order to understand the direction, vector, and meaning of the writings. I would also like to note that it is precisely the meaning and not the writings themselves. Finally, perhaps the biggest mistake is to neglect these writings, because neglecting the experience is like not being able to move from the spot and fetch water, while the study of Don Juan is precisely an experience.

I read it with one sitting. The 5-star attempt to evaluate the literary style of Kastaneda and the journey through Don Juan's guidance is quite remarkable.

Many say that the events in the book are the result of Kastaneda's shamanism, but I can't believe it, it's impossible. One of the reasons for not believing is that I don't want to believe the guide, that all this is preordained. The second reason is that this book made many incomprehensible things clear to me. I say it made incomprehensible things clear, but if you ask what, I can't give a clear answer. This experience takes place within a person, there is a lot of confusion, and often it is impossible to give a rational explanation or description of that experience.

Many also say after reading that the book is about the use of different types of hallucinogens by the guide and the time effects that occur under them. And I say that if a person has such an opinion after reading, then this book is not for him. One must be prepared to accept Kastaneda's attempt as it should be, as it is correct.

I prefer the Castanedian style of speaking, that it passes through such words. Now, after reading the book, without thinking, I will immediately agree to take a step on such a path, and then I will wonder how firm those steps will be.

Besides being amazing, the book contained a variety of practical tips and guidelines for me, which are very useful. Sometimes, the ability to look at an unknown, incomprehensible and scary life with a simple look or the possibility of taking action can be given by this book, if the guidelines are followed with sufficient breadth. The book also definitely shows the importance of understanding life, living in harmony with oneself, being free, strong and at the same time peaceful.

In a few words, it is impossible to express all those feelings and that attitude that I have towards Costaneda, or Don Juan, or just the book as an artistic value.

Costaneda has carried out his attempt in 12 books, and this was the first book in the series. I have read all the books, and of course, otherwise, I would not be able to fully understand and embrace what I consider so wonderful and real.

The guide was amazing. I am very grateful to the person who told me about this book. I have a great desire to have discussions about the book with my friends.

I end this short and concise review with a smile.