Faithful to my agreement to wait for don Juan to initiate any comment ondreaming, only in cases of necessity did I ask him for advice. Ordinarily,though, he not only seemed reluctant to touch the subject but was somehowdispleased with me about it. In my estimation, a confirmation of hisdisapproval was the fact that whenever we talked about my dreaming activities,he always minimized the import of anything I had accomplished.

For me, at that time, the animate existence of inorganic beings had becomethe most crucial aspect of my dreaming practices. After encountering them in mydreams, and especially after my bout with them in the desert around don Juan'shouse, I should have been more willing to take their existence as a seriousaffair. But all these events had quite the opposite effect on me. I becameadamant and doggedly denied the possibility that they existed.

Then I had a change of heart and decided to conduct an objective inquiryabout them. The method of this inquiry required that I first compile a recordof everything that transpired in my dreaming sessions, then use that record asa matrix to find out if my dreaming proved or disproved anything about theinorganic beings. I actually wrote down hundreds of pages of meticulous but meaninglessdetails, when it should have been clear to me that the evidence of theirexistence had been gathered almost as soon as I had started my inquiry.

It took but a few sessions for me to discover that what I thought to bedon Juan's casual recommendation - to suspend judgment and let the inorganicbeings come to me - was, in fact, the very procedure used by the sorcerers ofantiquity to attract them. By leaving me to find it out for myself, don Juanwas simply following his sorcery training. He had remarked time and time againthat it is very difficult to make the self give up its strongholds exceptthrough practice. One of the self's strongest lines of defense is indeed ourrationality, and this is not only the most durable line of defense when it comesto sorcery actions and explanations but also the most threatened. Don Juanbelieved that the existence of inorganic beings is a foremost assailant of ourrationality.

In my dreaming practices, I had an established course, which I followedevery single day without deviation. I aimed first at observing everyconceivable item of my dreams, then at changing dreams. I can say in sinceritythat I observed universes of detail in dreams upon dreams. As a matter ofcourse, at one given moment my dreaming attention began to wane, and mydreaming sessions ended either in my falling asleep and having I regulardreams, in which I had no dreaming attention whatsoever, or in my waking up andnot being able to sleep at all.

From time to time, however, as don Juan had described it, a current offoreign energy, a scout, as he called it, was injected into my dreams. Beingforewarned helped me to adjust my dreaming attention and be on the alert. Thefirst time I noticed foreign energy, I was dreaming about shopping in a departmentstore. I was going from counter to counter looking for antiques. I finallyfound one. The incongruence of looking for antiques in a department store wasso obvious that it made me chuckle, but since I had found one, I forgot aboutthat incongruence. The antique was the handle of a walking stick. The salesmantold me that it was made of iridium, which he called one of the hardestsubstances in the world. It was a carved piece the head and shoulders of amonkey. It looked like jade to me. The salesman was insulted when I insinuatedthat it might be jade, and to prove his point he hurled the object, with allhis strength, against the cement floor. It did not break but bounced like aball and then sailed away, spinning like a Frisbee. I followed it. It disappearedbehind some trees. I ran to look for it, and I found ft, stuck on the ground.It had been transformed into an extraordinarily beautiful, deep green andblack, full-length walking stick.

I coveted it. I grabbed it and struggled to pull it out of the groundbefore anyone else came along. But, hard as I tried, I could not make it budge.I was afraid I would break it if I attempted to pry it loose by shaking it backand forth. So I began to dig around it with my bare hands. As I kept ondigging, it kept on melting, until only a puddle of green water was left in itsplace. I stared at the water; it suddenly seemed to explode. It turned into awhite bubble, and then it was gone. My dream continued into other images anddetails, which were not outstanding, although they were crystal clear.

When I told don Juan about this dream, he said, "You isolated ascout. Scouts are more numerous when our dreams are average, normal ones. Thedreams of dreamers are strangely free from scouts. When they appear, they are identifiableby the strangeness and incongruity surrounding them."

"Incongruity, in what manner, don Juan?"

"Their presence doesn't make any sense."

"Very few things make sense in a dream."

"Only in average dreams are things nonsensical. I would say that thisis so because more scouts are injected then, because average people are subjectto a greater barrage from the unknown."

"Do you know why is that so, don Juan?"

"In my opinion, what takes place is a balance of forces. Averagepeople have stupendously strong barriers to protect themselves against thoseonslaughts. Barriers such as worries about the self. The stronger the barrier,the greater the attack.

"Dreamers, by contrast, have fewer barriers and fewer scouts in theirdreams. It seems that in dreamers' dreams nonsensical things disappear, perhapsto ensure that dreamers catch the presence of scouts."

Don Juan advised me to pay close attention and remember every singlepossible detail of the dream I had had. He even made me repeat what I had toldhim.

"You baffle me," I said. "You don't want to hear anythingabout my dreaming, and then you do. Is there any order to your refusals andacceptances?"

"You bet there is order behind all this," he said. "Chancesare, you'll do the same someday to another dreamer. Some items are of keyimportance because they are associated with the spirit. Others are entirelyunimportant by reason of being associated with our indulging personality.

"The first scout you isolate will always be present, in any form,even iridium. By the way, what's iridium?"

"I don't really know," I said in total sincerity.

"There you are! And what will you say if it turns out to be one ofthe strongest substances in the world?"

Don Juan's eyes shone with delight, while I nervously laughed at that absurdpossibility, which, I learned later, is true.

I began to notice from then on the presence of incongruous items in mydreams. Once I had accepted don Juan's categorization of foreign energy indreams, I totally agreed with him that incongruous items were foreign invadersof my dreams. Upon isolating them, my dreaming attention always focused on themwith an intensity that did not occur under any other circumstances.

Another thing I noticed was that every time foreign energy invaded mydreams, my dreaming attention had to work hard to turn it into a known object.The handicap of my dreaming attention was its inability to accomplish fullysuch a transformation; the end result was a bastardized item, nearly unknown tome. The foreign energy then dissipated quite easily; the bastardized itemvanished, turning into a blob of light, which was quickly absorbed by otherpressing details of my dreams.

When I asked don Juan to comment on what was happening to me, he said,"At this point in your dreaming, scouts are reconnoiterers sent by theinorganic realm. They are very fast, meaning that they don't stay long."

"Why do you say that they are reconnoiterers, don Juan?"

"They come in search of potential awareness. They have consciousnessand purpose, although it is incomprehensible to our minds, comparable perhapsto the consciousness and purpose of trees. The inner speed of trees andinorganic beings is incomprehensible to us because it is infinitely slower thanours."

"What makes you say that, don Juan?"

"Both trees and inorganic beings last longer than we do. They aremade to stay put. They are immobile, yet they make everything move aroundthem."

"Do you mean, don Juan, that inorganic beings are stationary liketrees?"

"Certainly. What you see in dreaming as bright or dark sticks aretheir projections. What you hear as the voice of the dreaming emissary isequally their projection. And so are their scouts."

For some unfathomable reason, I was overwhelmed by these statements. I wassuddenly filled with anxiety. I asked don Juan if trees also had projectionslike that.

"They do," he said. "Their projections are, however, evenless friendly to us than those of the inorganic beings. Dreamers never seekthem, unless they are in a state of profound amenity with trees, which is avery difficult state to attain. We have no I friends on this earth, youknow." He chuckled and added, "It's no mystery why"

"It may not be a mystery to you, don Juan, but it certainly is"to me."

"We are destructive. We have antagonized every living being J on thisearth. That's why we have no friends."

I felt so ill at ease that I wanted to stop the conversation altogether.But a compulsive urge made me return to the subject of inorganic beings."What do you think I should do to follow the ? scouts?" I asked.

"Why in the world would you want to follow them?" "I amconducting an objective inquiry about inorganic beings." "You'repulling my leg, aren't you? I thought you were unmovable on your stand thatinorganic beings don't exist."

His scoffing tone and cackling laughter told me what his thoughts andfeelings about my objective inquiry were.

"I've changed my mind, don Juan. Now I want to explore all thosepossibilities."

"Remember, the realm of inorganic beings was the old sorcerers'field. To get there, they tenaciously fixed their dreaming attention on theitems of their dreams. In that fashion, they were able to isolate the scouts.And when they had the scouts in focus, they shouted their intent to followthem. The instant the old sorcerers voiced that intent, off they went, pulledby that foreign energy."

"Is it that simple, don Juan?"

He did not answer. He just laughed at me as if daring me to do it.

At home, I tired of searching for don Juan's true meanings. I wasthoroughly unwilling to consider that he might have described an actualprocedure. After running out of ideas and patience, one day I let my guarddown. In a dream I was having then, I was baffled by a fish that had suddenlyjumped out of a pond I was walking by. The fish twitched by my feet, then flewlike a colored bird, perching on a branch, still being a fish. The scene was sooutlandish that my dreaming attention was galvanized. I instantly knew it was ascout. A second later, when the fish-bird turned into a point of light, I shoutedmy intent to follow it, and, just as don Juan had said, off I went into anotherworld.

I flew through a seemingly dark tunnel as if I were a weightless flyinginsect. The sensation of a tunnel ended abruptly. It was exactly as if I hadbeen spewed out of a tube and the impulse had left me smack against an immensephysical mass; I was almost touching it. I could not see the end of it in anydirection I looked. The entire thing reminded me so much of science fictionmovies that I was utterly convinced I was constructing the view of that massmyself, as one constructs a dream. Why not? The thought I had was that, afterall, I was asleep, dreaming.

I settled down to observe the details of my dream. What I was viewinglooked very much like a gigantic sponge. It was porous and cavernous. I couldnot feel its texture, but it looked rough and fibrous. It was dark brownish incolor. Then I had a momentary jolt of doubt about that silent mass being just adream. What I was facing did not change shape. It did not move either. As Ilooked at it fixedly, I had the complete impression of something real butstationary; it was planted somewhere, and it had such a powerful attractionthat I was incapable of deviating my dreaming attention to examine anythingelse, including myself. Some strange force, which I had never beforeencountered in my dreaming, had me riveted down.

Then I clearly felt that the mass released my dreaming attention; all myawareness focused on the scout that had taken me there. It looked like afirefly in the darkness, hovering over me, by my side. In its realm, it was ablob of sheer energy I was able to see its energetic sizzling. It seemed to beconscious of me. Suddenly, it lurched onto me and tugged me or prodded me. Idid not feel its touch, yet I knew it was touching me. That sensation wasstartling and new; it was as if a part of me that was not there had beenelectrified by that touch; ripples of energy went through it, one afteranother.

From that moment on, everything in my dreaming became much more real. Ihad a very difficult time keeping the idea that I was dreaming a dream. To thisdifficulty, I had to add the certainty I had that with its touch the scout hadmade an energetic connection with me. I knew what it wanted me to do theinstant it seemed to tug me or shove me.

The first thing it did was to push me through a huge cavern or openinginto the physical mass I had been facing. Once I was inside that mass, Irealized that the interior was as homogeneously porous as the outside but muchsofter looking, as if the roughness had been sanded down. What I was facing wasa structure that looked something like the enlarged picture of a beehive. Therewere countless geometric-shaped tunnels going in every direction. Some went upor down, or to my left or my right; they were at angles with one another, orgoing up or down on steep or mild inclines.

The light was very dim, yet everything was perfectly visible. The tunnelsseemed to be alive and conscious; they sizzled. I stared at them, and the realizationthat I was seeing hit me. Those were runnels of energy. At the instant of thisrealization, the voice of the dreaming emissary roared inside my ears, soloudly I could not understand what it said.

"Lower it down," I yelled with unusual impatience and becameaware that if I spoke I blocked my view of the tunnels and entered into avacuum where all I could do was hear.

The emissary modulated its voice and said, "You are inside aninorganic being. Choose a tunnel and you can even live in it." The voice stoppedfor an instant, then added, "That is, if you want to do it."

I could not bring myself to say anything. I was afraid that any statementof mine might be construed as the opposite of what I meant.

"There are endless advantages for you," the emissary's voicecontinued. "You can live in as many tunnels as you want. And each one ofthem will teach something different. The sorcerers of antiquity lived in thismanner and learned marvelous things."

I sensed without any feeling that the scout was pushing me from behind. Itappeared to want me to move onward. I took the tunnel to my immediate right. Assoon as I was in it, something made me aware that I was not walking on thetunnel; I was hovering in it, flying. I was a blob of energy no different fromthe scout.

The voice of the emissary sounded inside my ears again. "Yes, you arejust a blob of energy," it said. Its redundancy brought me an intenserelief. "And you are floating inside one inorganic being," it wenton. "This is the way the scout wants you to move in this world. When ittouched you, it changed you forever. You are practically one of us now. If youwant to stay here, just voice your intent." The emissary stopped talking,and the view of the runnel returned to me. But when it spoke again, somethinghad been adjusted; I did not lose sight of that world and I still could hearthe emissary's voice. "The ancient sorcerers learned everything they knewabout dreaming by staying here among us," it said.

I was going to ask if they had learned everything they knew by just livinginside those tunnels, but before I voiced my question the emissary answered it."Yes, they learned everything by just living inside the inorganicbeings," it said. "To live inside them, all the old sorcerers had to dowas say they wanted to, just like all it took for you to get here was to voiceyour intent, loud and clear." The scout pushed against me to signal me tocontinue moving. I hesitated, and it did something equivalent to shoving mewith such a force that I shot like a bullet through endless run-3. I finallystopped because the scout stopped. We hovered for an instant; then we droppedinto a vertical tunnel. I did not feel the drastic change of direction. As faras my perception as concerned, I was still moving seemingly parallel to theground.

We changed directions many times with the same perceptual 'effect on me. Ibegan to formulate a thought about my incapacity to feel that I was moving upor down when I heard the 'emissary's voice. "I think you'll be morecomfortable if you crawl rather than fly," it said. "You can alsomove like a spider or a fly, straight up or down or upside down."

Instantaneously, I settled down. It was as if I had been fluffy andsuddenly I got some weight, which grounded me. I could f not feel the tunnel'swalls, but the emissary was right about my being more comfortable whencrawling.

"In this world you don't have to be pinned down by gravity," itsaid. Of course, I was able to realize that myself. "You don't have tobreathe either," the voice went on. "And, for your convenience alone,you can retain your eyesight and see as you see in your world." Theemissary seemed to be deciding whether to add more. It coughed, just like a manclearing his throat, and said, "The eyesight is never impaired; therefore,a dreamer always speaks about his dreaming in terms of what he sees."

The scout pushed me into a tunnel to my right. It was somehow darker thanthe others. To me, at a preposterous level, it seemed cozier than the others,more friendly or even known to me. The thought crossed my mind that I was likethat tunnel or ; that the tunnel was like me.

"You two have met before," the emissary's voice said.

"I beg your pardon," I said. I had understood what it said, butthe statement was incomprehensible.

"You two wrestled, and because of that you now carry each other'senergy." I thought that the emissary's voice carried a touch of malice oreven sarcasm.

"No, it isn't sarcasm," the emissary said. "I am glad thatyou have relatives here among us."

"What do you mean by relatives?" I asked.

"Shared energy makes kinship," it replied. "Energy is likeblood."

I was unable to say anything else. I clearly felt pangs of fear.

"Fear is something that is absent in this world," the emissarysaid. And that was the only statement that was not true.

My dreaming ended there. I was so shocked by the vividness of everything,and by the impressive clarity and continuity of the emissary's statements, thatI could not wait to tell don Juan. It surprised and disturbed me that he did notwant to hear my account. He did not say so, but I had the impression that hebelieved all of it had been a product of my indulging personality.

"Why are you behaving like this with me?" I asked. "Are youdispleased with me?"

"No. I am not displeased with you," he said. "The problemis that I can't talk about this part of your dreaming. You are completely byyourself in this case. I have said to you that inorganic beings are real. Youare finding out how real they are. But what you do with this finding is yourbusiness, yours alone. Someday you'll see the reason for my staying away."

"But isn't there something you can tell me about that dream?" Iinsisted.

"What I can say is that it wasn't a dream. It was a journey into theunknown. A necessary journey, I may add, and an ultrapersonal one."

He changed the subject then and began to talk about other aspects of histeachings. From that day on, in spite of my fear and don Juan's reluctance toadvise me, I became a regular dream traveler to that spongy world. I discoveredright away that the greater my Capacity to observe the details of my dreams,the greater my facility to isolate the scouts. If I chose to acknowledge thescouts as foreign energy, they remained within my perceptual field for a while.Now, if I chose to turn the scouts into quasi town objects, they stayed evenlonger, changing shapes erratically. But if I followed them, by revealing outloud my intent to go with them, the scouts veritably transported my dreamingattention to a world beyond what I can normally imagine. Don Juan had said thatinorganic beings are always poised to teach. But he had not told me thatdreaming is what they are poised to teach. He had stated that the dreamingemissary, since it is a voice, is the perfect bridge between that world andours. I found out that the dreaming emissary was not only a teacher's voice butthe voice of a most subtle salesman. It repeated on and on, at the proper timeand occasion, the advantages of its world. Yet it also taught me invaluablethings about dreaming. Listening to what it said, I understood the oldsorcerers' preference for concrete practices.

"For perfect dreaming, the first thing you have to do is shut offyour internal dialogue," it said to me one time. "For best results inshutting it off, put between your fingers some two- or three-inch-long quartzcrystals or a couple of smooth, thin river pebbles. Bend your fingers slightly,and press the crystals or pebbles with them."

The emissary said that metal pins, if they were the size and width ofone's fingers, were equally effective. The procedure consisted of pressing atleast three thin items between the fingers of each hand and creating, an almostpainful pressure in the hands. This pressure had the strange property ofshutting off the internal dialogue. The emissary's expressed preference was forquartz crystals; it, said that they gave the best results, although withpractice anything was suitable.

"Falling asleep at a moment of total silence guarantees a perfectentrance into dreaming," said the emissary's voice, "and it alsoguarantees the enhancing of one's dreaming attention."

"Dreamers should wear a gold ring," said the emissary to meanother time, "preferably fitted a bit tight."

The emissary's explanation was that such a ring serves as a bridge forsurfacing from dreaming back into the daily world or for sinking from our dailyawareness into the inorganic beings' realm.

"How does this bridge work?" I asked. I had not understood whatwas involved.

"The contact of the fingers on the ring lays the bridge down,"the emissary said. "If a dreamer comes into my world wearing a ring, thatring attracts the energy of my world and keeps it; and when it's needed, thatenergy transports the dreamer back to this world, by the ring releasing it intothe dreamer's fingers.

"The pressure of that ring around a finger serves equally well toensure a dreamer's return to his world. It gives him a constant, familiar senseon his finger."

During another dreaming session, the emissary said that our skin is theperfect organ for transposing energy waves from the mode of the daily world tothe mode of the inorganic beings and vice versa. It recommended that I keep myskin cool and free from pigments or oils. It also recommended that dreamerswear a tight belt or headband or necklace to create a pressure point thatserves as a skin center of energy exchange. The emissary explained that theskin automatically screens energy, and that what we need to do to make the skinnot only screen but exchange energy from one mode to the other is to expressour intent out loud, in dreaming.

One day the emissary's voice gave me a fabulous bonus. It said that, inorder to ensure the keenness and accuracy of our dreaming attention, we mustbring it from behind the roof of the mouth, where an enormous reservoir ofattention is located in all human beings. The emissary's specific directionswere to practice and learn the discipline and control necessary to press thetip of the tongue on the roof of the mouth while dreaming.

This task is as difficult and consuming, the emissary said, as findingone's hands in a dream. But, once it is accomplished, this task gives the mostastounding results in terms of controlling the dreaming attention. I received aprofusion of instructions on every conceivable subject, instructions that Ipromptly forgot if they were not endlessly repeated to me. I sought don Juan'sadvice on how to resolve this problem of forgetting.

His comment was as brief as I had expected. "Focus only on what theemissary tells you about dreaming," he said.

Whatever the emissary's voice repeated enough times, I grasped withtremendous interest and fervor. Faithful to don Juan's recommendation, I onlyfollowed its guidance when it referred to dreaming and I personally corroboratedthe value of its instruction. The most vital piece of information for me wasthat the dreaming attention comes from behind the roof of the mouth. It took agreat deal of effort on my part to feel in dreaming that I was pressing theroof of my mouth with the tip of my tongue. Once I accomplished this, mydreaming attention took on a life of its own and became, I may say, keener thanmy normal attention to the daily world.

It did not take much for me to deduce how deep must have been theinvolvement of the old sorcerers with the inorganic beings. Don Juan'scommentaries and warnings about the danger of such an involvement became morevital than ever. I tried my best to live up to his standards ofself-examination with no indulgence. Thus, the emissary's voice and what itsaid became a superchallenge for me. I had to avoid, at all cost, succumbing tothe temptation of the emissary's promise of knowledge, and I had to do this allby myself since don Juan continued to refuse to listen to my accounts.

"You must give me at least a hint about what I should do," Iinsisted on one occasion when I was bold enough to ask him.

"I can't," he said with finality, "and don't ask again.I've told you, in this instance, dreamers have to be left alone."

"But you don't even know what I want to ask you."

"Oh yes I do. You want me to tell you that it is all right to live inone of those tunnels, if for no other reason than just to know what theemissary's voice is talking about."

I admitted that this was exactly my dilemma. If nothing else, I wanted toknow what was implied in the statement that one can live inside those tunnels.

"I went through the same turmoil myself," don Juan went on,"and no one could help me, because this is a superpersonal and finaldecision, a final decision made the instant you voice your desire to live inthat world. In order to get you to voice that desire, the inorganic beings aregoing to cater to your most secret wishes."

"This is really diabolical, don Juan."

"You can say that again. But not just because of what you arethinking. For you, the diabolical part is the temptation to give in, especiallywhen such great rewards are at stake. For me, the diabolical nature of theinorganic beings' realm is that it might very well be the only sanctuary dreamershave in a hostile universe."

"Is it really a haven for dreamers, don Juan?"

"It definitely is for some dreamers. Not for me. I don't need propsor railings. I know what I am. I am alone in a hostile universe, and I havelearned to say, So be it!"

That was the end of our exchange. He had not said what I wanted to hear,yet I knew that even the desire to know what it was like to live in a tunnelmeant almost to choose that way of life. I was not interested in such a thing.I made my decision right then to continue my dreaming practices without anyfurther implications. I quickly told don Juan about it.

"Don't say anything," he advised me. "But do understandthat if you choose to stay, your decision is final. You'll stay thereforever."

It is impossible for me to judge objectively what took place during thecountless times I dreamt of that world. I can say that it appeared to be aworld as real as any dream can be real.

Or I can say that it appeared to be as real as our daily world is I real.Dreaming of that world, I became aware of what don Juan had said to me manytimes that under the influence of dreaming, reality suffers a metamorphosis. Ifound myself then facing the two options which, according to don Juan, are theoptions faced by all dreamers either we carefully revamp or we completelydisregard our system of sensory input interpretation.

For don Juan, to revamp our interpretation system meant to intend itsreconditioning. It meant that one deliberately and carefully attempts toenlarge its capabilities. By living in accordance with the sorcerers' way,dreamers save and store the necessary energy to suspend judgment and thusfacilitate that intended revamping. He explained that if we choose torecondition our interpretation system, reality becomes fluid, and the scope ofwhat can be real is enhanced without endangering the integrity of reality.Dreaming, then, indeed opens the door into other aspects of what is real.

If we choose to disregard our system, the scope of what can be perceivedwithout interpretation grows inordinately. The expansion of our perception isso gigantic that we are left with very few tools for sensory interpretationand, thus, a sense of an infinite realness that is unreal or an infiniteunrealness that could very well be real but is not.

For me, the only acceptable option was reconstructing and enlarging myinterpretation system. In dreaming the inorganic beings' realm, I was facedwith the consistence of that world from dream to dream, from isolating thescouts through listening to the dreaming emissary's voice to going throughtunnels. I went through them without feeling anything, yet being aware thatspace and time were constant, although not in terms discernible by rationalityunder normal conditions. However, by noticing the difference or the absence orprofusion of detail in each tunnel, or by noticing the sense of distancebetween tunnels, or by noticing the apparent length or width of each tunnel inwhich I traveled, I arrived at a sense of objective observation.

The area where this reconstruction of my interpretation system had themost dramatic effect was the knowledge of how I related to the world of theinorganic beings. In that world, which was real to me, I was a blob of energy.Thus, I could whiz in the tunnels, like a fast-moving light, or I could crawlon their walls, like an insect. If I flew, a voice told me not arbitrary butconsistent information about details on the walls on which I had focused mydreaming attention. Those details were intricate protuberances, like theBraille system of writing. When I crawled on the walls, I could see the samedetails with greater accuracy and hear the voice giving me more complexdescriptions.

The unavoidable consequence for me was the development of a dual stand. Onthe one hand, I knew I was dreaming a dream; on the other, I knew I wasinvolved in a pragmatic journey, as real as any journey in the world. This bonafide split was a corroboration of what don Juan had said that the existence ofinorganic beings is the foremost assailant of our rationality.

Only after I had really suspended judgment did I get any relief. At onemoment, when the tension of my untenable position - seriously believing in theattestable existence of inorganic beings, while seriously believing that it wasonly a dream - was about to destroy me, something in my attitude changeddrastically, but without any solicitation on my part.

Don Juan maintained that my energy level, which had been steadily growing,one day reached a threshold that allowed me to disregard assumptions andprejudgments about the nature of man, reality, and perception. That day Ibecame enamored with knowledge, regardless of logic or functional value, and,above all, regardless of personal convenience.

When my objective inquiry into the subject of inorganic beings no longermattered to me, don Juan himself brought up the subject of my dream journeyinto that world. He said, "I don't think you are aware of the regularityof your meetings with inorganic beings.".

He was right. I had never bothered to think about it. I commented on theoddity of my oversight.

"It isn't an oversight," he said. "It's the nature of thatrealm to foster secretiveness. Inorganic beings veil themselves in mystery,darkness. Think about their world stationary, fixed to draw us like moths to alight or a fire.

"There is something the emissary hasn't dared to tell you so far thatthe inorganic beings are after our awareness or the awareness of any being thatfalls into their nets. They'll give us knowledge, but they'll extract a paymentour total being."

"Do you mean, don Juan, that the inorganic beings are likefishermen?"

"Exactly. At one moment, the emissary will show you men who gotcaught in there or other beings that are not human that also got caught inthere."

Revulsion and fear should have been my response. Don Juan's revelationsaffected me deeply, but in the sense of creating uncontainable curiosity. I wasnearly panting.

"Inorganic beings can't force anyone to stay with them," donJuan went on. "To live in their world is a voluntary affair. Yet they arecapable of imprisoning any one of us by catering to our desires, by pamperingand indulging us. Beware of awareness that is immobile. Awareness like that hasto seek movement, and it does this, as I've told you, by creating projections,phantasmagorical projections at times."

I asked don Juan to explain what "phantasmagorical projections"meant. He said that inorganic beings hook onto dreamers' innermost feelings andplay them mercilessly. They create phantoms to please dreamers or frightenthem. He reminded me that I had wrestled with one of those phantoms. Heexplained that inorganic beings are superb projectionists, who delight inprojecting themselves like pictures on the wall.

"The old sorcerers were brought down by their inane trust in thoseprojections' he continued. "The old sorcerers believed their allies hadpower. They overlooked the fact their allies were tenuous energy projectedthrough worlds, like in a cosmic movie."

"You are contradicting yourself, don Juan. You yourself said that theinorganic beings are real. Now you tell me that they are mere pictures."

"I meant to say that the inorganic beings, in our world, are likemoving pictures projected on a screen; and I may even add that they are likemoving pictures of rarefied energy projected through the boundaries of twoworlds."

"But what about inorganic beings in their world? Are they also likemoving pictures?"

"Not a chance. That world is as real as our world. The old sorcerersportrayed the inorganic beings' world as a blob of caverns and pores floatingin some dark space. And they portrayed the inorganic beings as hollow canesbound together, like the cells of our bodies. The old sorcerers called thatimmense bundle the labyrinth of penumbra."

"Then every dreamer sees that world in the same terms, right?"

"Of course. Every dreamer sees it as it is. Do you think you areunique?"

I confessed that something in that world had been giving me all along thesensation I was unique. What created this most pleasant and clear feeling ofbeing exclusive was not the voice of the dreaming emissary, or anything I couldconsciously think about.

"That's exactly what floored the old sorcerers," don Juan said."The inorganic beings did to them what they are doing to now; they createdfor them the sense of being unique, Exclusive; plus a more pernicious sense yetthe sense of having power. Power and uniqueness are unbeatable as corruptingforces. Watch out!"

"How did you avoid that danger yourself, don Juan?" "I wentto that world a few times, and then I never went back."

Don Juan explained that in the opinion of sorcerers, the universe ispredatorial, and sorcerers more than anyone else have to take this into accountin their daily sorcery activities. His I idea was that consciousness isintrinsically compelled to grow, I and the only way it can grow is throughstrife, through life-or- death confrontations.

"The awareness of sorcerers grows when they do dreaming," Hewent on. "And the moment it grows, something out there acknowledges itsgrowth, recognizes it and makes a bid for it. The inorganic beings are thebidders for that new, enhanced awareness. Dreamers have to be forever on theirtoes. They are prey the moment they venture out in that predatorialuniverse."

"What do you suggest I do to be safe, don Juan?" "Be onyour toes every second! Don't let anything or anybody decide for you. Go to theinorganic beings' world only when you want to go.".

"Honestly, don Juan, I wouldn't know how to do that. Once I isolate ascout, a tremendous pull is exerted on me to go. I don't have a chance in hellto change my mind."

"Come on! Who do you think you're kidding? You can definitely stopit. You haven't tried to, that's all."

I earnestly insisted that it was impossible for me to stop. He did notpursue the subject any longer, and I was thankful for that. A disturbingfeeling of guilt had begun to gnaw at me. For some unknown reason, the thoughtof consciously stopping the pull of the scouts had never occurred to me.

As usual, don Juan was correct. I found out that I could change the courseof my dreaming by intending that course. After all, I did intend for the scoutsto transport me to their world. It was feasible that if I deliberately intendedthe opposite, my dreaming would follow the opposite course.

With practice, my capacity to intend my journeys into the inorganicbeings' realm became extraordinarily keen. An increased capacity to intendbrought forth an increased control over my dreaming attention. This additionalcontrol made me more daring. I felt that I could journey with impunity, becauseI could stop the journey any time I wanted to.

"Your confidence is very scary" was don Juan's comment when Itold him, at his request, about the new aspect of my control over my dreaming attention.

"Why should it be scary?" I asked. I was truly convinced of thepractical value of what I had found out.

"Because yours is the confidence of a fool," he said. "I amgoing to tell you a sorcerers' story that is apropos. I didn't witness itmyself, but my teacher's teacher, the nagual Elias, did."

Don Juan said that the nagual Elias and the love of his life, a sorceressnamed Amalia, were lost, in their youth, in the inorganic beings' world.

I had never heard don Juan talk about sorcerers being the love ofanybody's life. His statement startled me. I asked him about thisinconsistency.

"It's not an inconsistency. I have simply refrained all along fromtelling you stories of sorcerers' affection," he said. "You've beenso oversaturated with love all your life that I wanted to give you a break.

"Well, the nagual Elias and the love of his life, the witch Amalia,got lost in the inorganic beings' world," don Juan went on. "Theywent there not in dreaming but with their physical bodies."

"How did that happen, don Juan?"

"Their teacher, the nagual Rosendo, was very close in temprament andpractice to the old sorcerers. He intended to help Elias and Amalia, butinstead he pushed them across some deadly boundaries. The nagual Rosendo didn'thave that cross-mg in mind. What he wanted to do was to put his two disciplesinto the second attention, but what he got as a result was theirdisappearance."

Don Juan said that he was not going to go into the details of that longand complicated story. He was only going to tell me how they became lost inthat world. He stated that the nagual Rosendo's miscalculation was to assumethat the inorganic beings are not, in the slightest, interested in women. Hisreasoning was correct and was guided by the sorcerers' knowledge that theuniverse is markedly female and that maleness, being an offshoot of femaleness,is almost scarce, thus, coveted. Don Juan made a digression and commented thatperhaps that scarcity of males is the reason for men's unwarranted dominion onour planet. I wanted to remain on that topic, but he went ahead with his story.He said that the nagual Rosendo's plan was to give instruction to Elias andAmalia exclusively in the second attention. And to that effect, he followed theold sorcerers' prescribed technique. He engaged a scout, in dreaming, andcommanded it to transport his disciples into the second attention by displacingtheir assemblage points on the proper position.

Theoretically, a powerful scout could displace their assemblage points onthe proper position with no effort at all. What the nagual Rosendo did not takeinto consideration was the trickery of the inorganic beings. The scout diddisplace the assemblage points of his disciples, but it displaced them on aposition from which it was easy to transport them bodily into the realm of theinorganic beings.

"Is this possible, to be transported bodily?" I asked. "Itis possible," he assured me. "We are energy that is kept in aspecific shape and position by the fixation of the assemblage point on one location.If that location is changed, the shape and position of that energy will changeaccordingly. All the inorganic beings have to do is to place our assemblagepoint on the right location, and off we go, like a bullet, shoes, hat, andall."

"Can this happen to any one of us, don Juan?"

"Most certainly. Especially if our sum total of energy is right.Obviously, the sum total of the combined energies of Elias and Amalia wassomething the inorganic beings couldn't overlook. It is absurd to trust theinorganic beings. They have their own rhythm, and it isn't human."

I asked don Juan what exactly the nagual Rosendo did to send his disciplesto that world. I knew it was stupid of me to ask, knowing that he was going toignore my question. My surprise was genuine when he began to tell me.

"The steps are simplicity itself," he said. "He put hisdisciples inside a very small, closed space, something like a closet. Then hewent into dreaming, called a scout from the inorganic beings' realm by voicinghis intent to get one, then voiced his intent to offer his disciples to thescout.

"The scout, naturally, accepted the gift and took them away, at anunguarded moment, when they were making love inside that closet. When thenagual opened the closet, they were no longer there."

Don Juan explained that making gifts of their disciples to the inorganicbeings was precisely what the old sorcerers used to do. The nagual Rosendo didnot mean to do that, but he got swayed by the absurd belief that the inorganicbeings were under his control.

"Sorcerers' maneuvers are deadly," don Juan went on. "Ibeseech you to be extraordinarily aware. Don't get involved in having someidiotic confidence in yourself."

"What finally happened to the nagual Elias and Amalia?" I asked.

"The nagual Rosendo had to go bodily into that world and look forthem," he replied.

"Did he find them?"

"He did, after untold struggles. However, he could not totally bringthem out. So the two young people were always semiprisoners of thatrealm." "Did you know them, don Juan?"

"Of course I knew them, and I assure you, they were very range."