Mysteries Of The Assemblage Point

In his book, The Fire From Within, we read the following account of Juan
Matus shifting Carlos Castaneda’s assemblage point.

“It’s time for you to shift that assemblage point of yours just a bit,” he
said. “I can’t talk to you when you are in your idiot’s stage.”
He smacked me with the palm of his hand on three spots: right on the
crest of my right hipbone, on the centre of my back below my shoulder
blades, and on the upper part of my right pectoral chest muscle.
My ears immediately began to buzz. A trickle of blood ran out of my
right nostril, and something inside me became unplugged. It was as if
some flow of energy had been blocked and suddenly began to move
again.”
The ancient Chinese Zen Master, Ma Tsu, was once reported as suddenly
kicking a disciple in his chest, causing the disciple a great awakening.

Another ancient Chinese Zen Master, Tung Shan, would explain that this
initial stage of Zen should be called “Shift” because it is a shift in consciousness
from the ordinary state of cognition called “Guest Position” (Tonal’s perception)
into “Host Position” (Nagual Awareness).

When the Shift takes place, according to Tung Shan, it means the Inner Real
contains the Outer Appearance without being further imprisoned in it. He also
called it Host (Nagual)-looking-at-Guest (Tonal). About this matter, he also
wrote some explanatory verses:

“The Real containing the Seeming!

Early in evening, before the moon shines,
No wonder Host and Guest (Nagual and Tonal)
Meet without knowing one another,
For still hidden is their mutual aversion!”
“Moonlight” here symbolizes Enlightenment of Heightened Awareness before
which a human being does not realize that the duality of phenomenal objects and
the phenomenal body have their source in the Higher noumenal world of Energy
or Power.

In India, a Siddhayoga Sadguru will sometimes give Shaktipat (Descent of

Power) by physically contacting the disciple, often by a slap on the back.
According to Swami Muktananda in his book, Kundalini: The Secret of Life:

“After you receive Shaktipat, meditation starts spontaneously, and at the

same time, prana and apana, the incoming and outgoing life-energy-
 breath, become balanced, and long kumbhaka (retention of breath)
begins to take place effortlessly. The prana becomes extremely subtle
and moves in the sushumna (central subtle nerve channel in the spine),
and then the sushumna opens up and begins to unfold…After
Shaktipat, one may experience involuntary movements of the body,
such as shaking and movements of the arms and legs. The head may
even begin to rotate violently…”
Anthony Archer-Forbes, in his article, Dervish Ritual, within the volume,
The Diffusion of Sufi Ideas in the West reports a healing ritual where advanced
Sufi Dervishes transfer higher energy into suffering people to heal them:

“In one dramatic instance, the Chief pointed his finger at four sufferers,
and they began to tremble and shake almost uncontrollably; finally
collapsing on the floor, and then rising at a signal. A change certainly
seemed to have come over them: a load seemed shifted from their
shoulders. ‘That’, said Anwar, ‘was the Larz (shaking), which comes
through the utter concentration of force on the patient. It must be
removed at once, otherwise they develop a taste for it and indulge in it
in senseless orgies…This trembling can be accompanied by animal
noises and pantomime. It can only be removed by a Sufi Master…Some
(wrongly motivated) practitioners use such energization of people to
maintain power over them. These produce the Larz and then do not take
it off. As a result, the patients develop a dependency feeling for the
operator.”
Half-baked, semi-developed people, through Shamanic and Yogic practices,
get to the point or stage where they make their higher energy have an affect on
lower energy people, which can cause such people to have strange experiences. It
can indeed cause trembling, emotional excitement or occult visions. When such
things act upon the unprepared Assemblage Point, it should be stopped. Neither
the Transmitting Operator nor the recipient seeker should continue in their mutual
indulgence. Real higher development cannot happen until the emotional aspirants
develop certain preliminary qualities, such as what Juan Matus called “Developing
the simplified and fluid Tonal of a Warrior-Traveler.” What happens to raw
beginners who become dominated by an Energizer/Dominator is merely a signal of
a potential that will never become fully developed through an energetic
dependency. The aspiring occult, Shamanic or Siddhayogi student must learn to
raise his or her own energy level into Heightened Awareness through breathing
exercises up-and-down the spine, accompanied by Words of Power in the Mind.
In addition, it is indispensable to learn to stop the internal dialogue or brain
chatter.

In the ultimate analysis, Power Herself decides the necessary method or

timing of self-energization and energization-from-a-Teacher for balancing of
Energization and Heightened Awareness. To try an unbalanced approach of either
relying exclusively on an empowering Teacher or stubbornly sticking proudly to
some low energy breathing method for independence is to be nothing but a Sheep
or a Goat. An occasional boost from the Nagual, Siddhayogi or Sufi Master is
indispensable in conjunction with one’s own self-effort of patient practice and
development.

When I was an occultly greedy young man back in the early 1970’s, I made
the acquaintance of a semi-developed Siddhayogi from Kerala State in South
India. I asked for and was given Shaktipat from him, which he administered in
the form or Prasad, food empowered by him in the form of two plums. The first
plum turned me every way but loose. As for the second plum, I never ate it
because it took me a long time to assimilate the first plum, plus I instinctively
wanted to avoid forming a dependency on that particular Siddhayogi. Later on I
had developed myself to the point where I found I could also administer
Shaktipat, so stupidly I formed a cult of Energy Dependents. Later on I dissolved
this cult and went on to more mature development, having learned my lesson. As
a Nagual, I no longer try to work with volunteers. Real Sufis and Siddhas also
understand this principle. However, Carlos Castaneda never understood it and it
destroyed him. We also can observe how accepting volunteers is presently
destroying Merilyn Tunneshende.

Advanced Adepts can also give Shaktipat Empowerment through their

Energy Doubles just on the edge of physical visibility or even quasi-physically as
Don Genaro would sometimes do for Castaneda as his Benefactor. I have myself
experienced this kind of blessing or transmission from a variety of great people for
over forty years. I once even received Shaktipat coming out of a photograph of a
Godwoman of India. It was so powerful that I fainted. Respect and receptivity
can sometimes open an inner door for us that argumentative pride of the Tonal or
Social Self only keeps closed.

When the Tonal, the Social Self, is told (in its ordinary position of the
assemblage point), the ordinary New Age advice to take-up “lucid dreaming”, Bob
Monroe “out-of-the-body”, “astral traveling”, “Castaneda dreaming exercises” or
the like, then it, the Tonal, the Social Self, immediately begins to make efforts of a
kind during the sleeping hours that are not to the point because only the Nagual,
the Spirit Self, having learned to be in a state of self-starting Heightened
Awareness, can rightly and fully develop the Art-of-Dreaming and the
Materialization-of-the-Double. The Tonal cannot do what only the Nagual can
do. Also, the Tonal wants to do it for the wrong reason, which is for social
purposes rather than the Intent of the Spirit, which, again, is due to lack of
Heightened Awareness.

The New Age Tonal is usually stuck in the illusion that “lucid dreaming” is
the bee’s knees of socially self-important “occult development” in order to be a
“healer” and “counselor”. Therefore, the purpose of this article is not yet another
hokey set of New Age “instructions” for learning to do “astral traveling”. No!
Nor is it to excite the Social Self to learn to “project the double” and become a
seemingly “powerful sorcerer or sorceress”. No! This, as I have said, is about
shifting-the-assemblage point from socially ambitious occult practices to Intent of
the Spirit! But of course our usual garden variety Castaneda occultist who visits
this Website is psychologically impatient about Fundamental Orientation and
only wants to become spiritually impressive as soon as possible! The wretched
mediocrity of such a motive is already a huge barrier to the Descent of the Spirit.
Once there is real shifting into Heightened Awareness, the Nagual Spirit Self
is awake to the inner barrier of the Tonal Social Self’s counter-productive occult
social ambitions. So, the next step is to train the Tonal Social Self to look to the
Nagual Spirit Self for Intent of the Spirit as Inner Guidance and Right Direction.
Otherwise, for instance, there is danger of consciousness becoming trapped in
some realm of the Inorganic Beings as an alternative to Name and Fame, or, as
with Castaneda himself, there can be an endlessly stupid oscillation between both
foolish or dangerous motives, both of which “eat or sell the Soul” in a Faustian
manner.
It is the innocent but awakening Nagual who is the should-be student of the
Occult Arts under a proficient Benefactor; not some clever or emotional Tonal, the
“Volunteer”! The Social Occult Seeker cannot “meet the Benefactor” or be
accepted for the training. Real connections or decisions are made only by the
Nagual, which are assisted by the alert Benefactor, when the right signs or
coincidences are arranged by Power. The socializing would-be occult trainee
would do nothing but argue with the Benefactor on the one hand or become
emotionally dependent and avoid self-responsibility like members of cults. It is
for this double reason that most of those who are fascinated with Nagualism would
be better off to put it away for the time-being and thoroughly study the less
occultly exciting books of Idries Shah as a preparation. This does not mean
joining the Sufis exclusively or “converting to Islam” (God forbid), but simply
learning how to learn indispensable principles of higher human evolution.
However, as for all those hundreds of jerk-off would-be “experts” or “teachers”
who try to personally impress possible followers or students on various “spiritual”
or “occult” Internet forums, it doesn’t mean a thing whether it is Nagualism,
Sufism or any other superficial grouping. The Great Mother Giant Sea Tortoise
lays thousands of eggs in the sand. When they hatch out, they rush in huge groups
of hundreds toward the sea, but they become utterly decimated by predators, such
as seagulls. Each year, out of millions, only a small number reach Sea Turtle
maturity. That is Nature’s Way! The same applies with the socially titillated
“Nagualists” or “Sufists” on the Web. They are all prey in the Predatory
Universe. This is Reality if you want it. Your personal chance of Higher
Development borders on nil because you keep doing the very things of spiritual or
occult mediocrity that so many others do, which means that you remain trapped in
the usual Tonal purposes without sufficient Heightened Awareness.
If you are not trapped in social considerings or the urge to teach, argue or
emotionally belong, I congratulate you! For such an individual, your spiritual
adventure is about to move into more intense coincidences and possibilities.