Once again I take up the subject of inorganic beings. Last week, in Recapitulation & Inorganic Beings I stressed the importance of familiarizing ourselves with our own energy and being able to recognize the good inorganic energy that is present in our lives, such as my own connection to Jeanne, an inorganic being on a mission of aiding those of us who are seeking to evolve, whom I am energetically compatible with. I also stressed the importance of recognizing the incessant chatter of the mind as inorganic energy. Today, I write about another type of inorganic being from the seers’ world of ancient Mexico, energy that wants something from us. Though it also wants to teach us something, its main intent is first and foremost to find a means of attaching to us, the ultimate goal being to siphon our awareness, our energy, for its own survival. However, our ultimate challenge, in all of these cases, is to train our awareness so that we may be in a position that is energetically strong, grounded, utterly sober and pragmatic, so that we may be able to navigate all worlds.

In The Active Side of Infinity and The Art of Dreaming don Juan teaches Carlos Castaneda about the power of inorganic beings. He tells him that they exist as outside forces, predatory beings that seek control of human awareness. He calls them scouts, probes from the universe looking for awareness. They are always present in some form. As I wrote about last week even our thoughts are considered, by the seers of ancient Mexico, to be inorganic beings, which they call Flyers and when they are busy chomping away at us, our thoughts swirling and driving us crazy, they refer to us as being in the throes of the Flyer’s Mind. The only recourse we have is to learn how to manipulate them to our best advantage, but this takes work in strengthening our awareness. On page 217 in The Active Side of Infinity don Juan says:

“There are scores of outside forces controlling you at this moment,” he says. “The control that I am referring to is something outside the domain of language. It is your control and at the same time it is not. It cannot be classified, but it can certainly be experienced. And above all, it can certainly be manipulated. Remember this: It can be manipulated, to your total advantage, of course, which again is not your advantage, but the energy body’s advantage. However, the energy body is you, so we could go on forever like dogs biting their own tails, trying to describe this. Language is inadequate. All these experiences are beyond syntax.”

During recapitulation we are given the opportunity to train our awareness through re-experiencing our pasts. This is the ultimate gift of doing a thorough and fearless recapitulation; our awareness not only grows, but eventually becomes a seamless and natural accompanist as we navigate our lives. During my own recapitulation I often met inorganic beings in dreams, often frighteningly odd creatures that captivated my attention. One day when I mentioned them to Chuck he told me not to focus on them. “They are the scouts in the universe looking to grab your awareness,” he said, “and take you back to an old place, attempting to usurp your energy for their own use.” I took this very seriously. Don Juan basically tells Carlos the same thing in The Art of Dreaming. On page 28 he says:

“…Dreaming has to be a very sober affair. No false movement can be afforded. Dreaming is a process of awakening, of gaining control. Our dreaming attention must be systematically exercised…”

Lately, perhaps because I have been reading and writing about them, inorganic beings have been appearing in my dreams. In one dream, Chuck and I travel to a Mexican desert town by car. Upon arrival at a crowded bus station we come upon two strange men covered from head to toe with yellow dirt. I know that they have been fighting and that we are in the midst of drug-related gang territory, that everyone at the bus station is somehow connected to a drug cartel. Chuck tosses them a towel from the car so they can wipe the sand off. At this point my awareness kicks in and I am immediately cautious. It is then that I begin to notice that everyone in this town is odd in some way and many of the people have large pumpkin shaped heads on skinny bodies. I thwart my gaze so that I do not look at anyone directly. The dream goes on, but the point I am making is that my awareness took note of the oddness of the situation and without hesitation took appropriate action to protect my energy. As opposed to earlier dreaming during my recapitulation when my awareness would speak to me, saying, “Don’t look!” at such times (essentially warning me, as Chuck had, to not get caught), now my awareness and I are in synch.

In a second dream, a tiny naked man, about a foot tall, appears several times, crossing slowly and suggestively back and forth in front of me, obviously trying to get my attention. He looks like a tiny skinny naked Waldo from the Where’s Waldo series of books. Once again my awareness takes note and without hesitation, my guard kicks in and I shift my gaze. I do not focus on him, though at an earlier stage in my awareness training I might have been very drawn to his comical appearance.

In a third dream, my mother appears, looking very odd, her head large, her features distorted, acting in an uncharacteristic manner. I immediately know that the inorganic beings are trying to trick me. They know that we are drawn to attach to those who are most familiar, yet my awareness is immediately aroused by this strange version of my mother. I do not fall for the attempted trickery. Again, I turned my gaze downward and watch sideways through my eyelashes as this odd being does some exceedingly strange things, not at all like my mother in her true form. Eventually she meets up with two strange looking men whom she links arms with and the three of them go wildly dancing and skipping down the street, like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz prancing down the yellow brick road with the lion and the scarecrow. Without attachment I turn away and go back into the dream that had been unfolding before I was interrupted.

In these examples, I stress the importance of being aware, of training our awareness. And how do we do that? The first thing is to understand the “Not I” of our dreams. Jung suggests that everything in our dreams is us, but he also cautions that we must learn about archetypal energy so that we do not get caught by it. In essence, he warns us to not engage the collective unconscious, inorganic beings, until we are ready, even though archetypal energy seeks us out all the time. As don Juan suggests to Carlos regarding inorganic beings: they exist all the time and they are trying to control us; which is equally true for the archetypes that exist in the collective unconscious.

So, by questioning what is “Not I” we begin a process of inner work that eventually will lead to recognizing the scouts, the inorganic beings that come to us in whatever shape or form they may use. Their attempts may be very personal, they may come in the form of our biggest fears or they may be comical, clownish attempts to attract our attention. We can begin training this aspect of recognition by intending this step before we dream or even before we begin our day. Perhaps a simple mantra will do: Please help me to recognize and be aware of that which is “Not I” in my dreams and in my life, or something like that.

The next step is to decide what to do about these inorganic beings once we do recognize them as “Not I.” Don Juan says that it is always an individual’s choice what to do with them, but he also cautions not to engage them until we have enough energy and awareness or we risk getting into trouble. As Jung suggests, engaging the collective unconscious without doing our homework can lead to psychosis. The dangers are that we might get fascinated by them, that we might get inflated and think we can handle them, or that we might underestimate them, seeing them as harmless and funny. It is equally important to not get frightened by them and run away. If we are indeed to gain awareness, we must learn to stand our ground. Here are some practical precautions, as inorganic beings approach in dreaming and perhaps in real time as well:

Don’t play with them.

Don’t stare at them.

Don’t draw them to you.

Don’t engage or speak to them.

Don’t throw yourself at something you don’t understand.

Be suspicious and cautious.

Protect your energy.

Learn to use the inorganic beings that appear in dreaming and in life to strengthen awareness. In strengthening our dreaming awareness we eventually arrive at a place where we can begin to engage what appears so strange and mysterious in our dreams, but from a place of power, just as we train our awareness to recognize the Flyer’s Mind in our everyday reality. This training leads to appropriate detachment and new stores of energy that we can then use for ourselves alone.

When we get to this place of strength, with enough personal power to navigate the world of the inorganic beings and the collective unconscious, when we are naturally more aware, acting from instinct and knowledge, our journey becomes fascinating rather than frightening. When we have worked with our personal energy, successfully contained and trained it, then are we ready to find out why the inorganic beings are present and what they are trying to tell us. For they do in fact have something to teach us, they come to challenge us, but they also want payback. They give, but they also take. There is always an exchange and until we are prepared and strong enough, we may get ourselves into trouble, caught in energy draining unawareness.

I have been aware of the inorganic beings in both my dreaming world and my everyday world for a long time now, but that doesn’t mean I don’t get caught by them. Again and again we fall for their trickery, we let them entertain us, and we get caught in old habits of repetitive behavior that keep us stuck. There is always the opportunity to learn from them, but the first challenge is always the same, and it resides in the choices we make. For even though we may have learned to recognize the inorganic beings in our lives, we are still apt to engage them, inflatedly thinking that we can outwit them this time. Or even, as I have been doing in my dreams, avoiding them, perhaps because of an underlying fear of what they might have to tell us about ourselves, or because we fear they may take us into unknown territory.

Fortunately, being the seekers that we are, we eventually get the message that it’s time to confront our nemeses and take our awareness to a new level. And that is what I intend to do next in my dreams. At least I think I might do that, but of course I may decide at the last minute that I’m not ready yet, and that’s okay too!

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Sending you all love and good wishes; and watch out for those inorganic beings!
Jan

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