50 Carlos Castaneda Quotes From The Spiritual American Author

Carlos Castaneda (25 December 1925-27 April 1998) was an American author. He was known for his teachings inspired by his meetings with Don Juan in 1968. He wrote a series of books that gave detailed accounts of his learning from Shamanism.

Shamans are a group of people who practice an ancient form of sorcery native to the Toltecs to direct spirits or energies into the physical world. Carlos Castaneda wrote mostly non-fiction on this subject. Some of his works include 'Tales of Power', 'The Art of Dreaming', and 'The Fire From Within'.

Carlos Castaneda Book Quotes

Carlos Castaneda is famously known for his quotes. Here are a few Carlos Castaneda quotes from his books written based on his life experiences. Carlos Castaneda's quotes can be truly informative and inspiring.

1. "In a world where death is the hunter; my friend there is no time for regrets or doubts. There is only time for decisions." - 'Journey to Ixtlan'.

2. "We hardly ever realize that we can cut anything out of our lives, anytime, in the blink of an eye."

3. "You say you need help. Help for what? You have everything needed for the extravagant journey that is your life."

4. "Nobody knows who I am or what I do. Not even I. Don Juan Matus."

5. "Life in itself is sufficient, self-explanatory, and complete."

6. "For an instant, I think I saw. I saw the loneliness of a man as a gigantic wave which had frozen in front of me, held back by the invisible wall of a metaphor."

7. "The dying sun will glow on you without burning, as it has done today....and then your death will point to the south. To the vastness."

8. "Death is the only wise advisor that we have. Whenever you feel, as you always do, that everything is going wrong....nothing really matters outside its touch. Your death will tell you, I haven't touched you yet."

9. "To worry is to become accessible, unwittingly accessible. And once you worry you cling to anything out of desperation; and once you cling, you are bound to get exhausted or to exhaust whoever or whatever you are clinging to."

10. "The trick is in what one emphasizes. We either make ourselves miserable, or we make ourselves happy. The amount of work is the same." - 'Journey to Ixtlan'.

11. "Think about it: What weakens us is feeling offended by the deeds and misdeeds of our fellow men. Our self Importance requires that we spend most of our lives offended by someone." - 'Fire From Within'.

12. "Forget the self and you will fear nothing, in whatever level or awareness you find yourself to be." - 'The Active Side of Infinity'.

13. "Be aware of those who weep with realization, for they have realized nothing." - 'Fire From Within'.

14. "I would say that the best of us always comes out when we are against the wall when we feel the sword dangling overhead." - 'Tales Of Power'.

15. "If one must succeed in anything, the success must come gently, with a great deal of effort but with no stress or obsession." - 'Tales Of Power'.

16. "We are men and our lot in life is to learn and to be hurled into inconceivable new worlds." - 'A Separate Reality'.

17. "Only if they remain totally detached can they have the energy to be free. Theirs is a particular type of detachment which is born not out of fear or indolence, but out of conviction." - 'The Art of Dreaming'.

18. "...That was the way human beings are; they love to be told what to do, but they love even more to fight and not do what they are told, and thus they get entangled in hating the one who told them in the first place." - 'Second Ring Of Power'.

19. "We are men and our lot in life is to learn and to be hurled into inconceivable new worlds." -'The Fire From Within'.

20. "If one is to succeed in anything, the success must come gently, with a great deal of effort but with no stress or obsession." - 'Tales of Power'.

21. "We either make ourselves miserable or we make ourselves strong. The amount of work is the same." - 'Journey to Ixtlan'.

Carlos Castaneda Warrior Quotes

Carlos Castaneda believed that the most effective way to live was as a warrior. Here are some Carlos Castaneda quotes on the warrior lifestyle.

22. "The hardest thing in the world is for a warrior to let others be." - 'Second Ring of Power'.

23. "A warrior takes his lot, whatever it may be, and accepts it in the ultimate humbleness. He accepts humbleness what he is, not as a grounds for regret but as a living challenge." - 'Tales of Power'

24. "To be a warrior a man had to be, first of all, and rightfully so, keenly aware of his own death. But to be concerned with death would force any of us to focus on the self and that would be debilitating." - 'A Separate Reality'.

25. "A warrior thinks of his death when things become unclear. The idea of death is the only thing that tempers our spirit." - 'A Separate Reality'.

26. "A warrior takes his lot, whatever it may be, and accepts it in ultimate humbleness. He accepts in humbleness what he is, not as a grounds for regret but as a living challenge." - 'Tales of Power'.

27. "Nothing can temper the spirit of the warrior as much as the challenge of dealing with impossible people in positions of power. Only under those conditions can warriors acquire the sobriety and serenity to withstand the pressure of the unknowable." - 'Fire from Within'.

28. "Man lives only to learn. And if he learns it is because it is the nature of his lot, for good or bad." - 'Journey to Ixtlan'.

29. "To seek the perfection of the warrior's spirit is the only task worthy of our temporariness, our manhood."

30. "There are lots of things a warrior can do at a certain time which he couldn't do years before. Those things themselves did not change; what changed was his idea of himself." - 'Tales of Power'.

31. "The basic difference between an ordinary man and a warrior is that a warrior takes everything as a challenge while an ordinary man takes everything as a blessing or a curse."

32. "A warrior must cultivate the feeling that he has everything needed for the extravagant journey that is his life. What counts for a warrior is being alive. Life in itself is sufficient, self-explanatory, and complete."

33. "The art of a warrior is to balance the terror of being a man with the wonder of being a man."

34. "A warrior must learn to make every act count since he is going to be here in this world only for a short while, in fact, too short for witnessing all the marvels of it."

35. "Only as a warrior can one withstand the path of knowledge. A warrior cannot complain or regret anything. His life is an endless challenge, and challenges cannot possibly be good or bad. Challenges are simply challenges."

36. "All of us, whether or not we are warriors, have a cubic centimeter of chance that pops out in front of our eyes from time to time.

The difference between an average man and a warrior is that the warrior is aware of this, and one of his tasks is to be alert, deliberately waiting, so that when his cubic centimeter pops out he has the necessary speed, the prowess, to pick it up."

Don Juan Carlos Castaneda Quotes

Don Juan greatly inspired Carlos Castaneda. Here are quotes from Don Juan as well as from Carlos Castaneda, based on the learnings Carlos Castaneda got from his interactions with the spiritual leader.

37. "Don Juan had always said to me that our great enemy is the fact that we never believe what is happening to us." - 'Second Ring Power'.

38. "...Freedom to dissolve; to lift up; to be like the flame of a candle, which in spite of being up against the light of a billion stars, remains intact, because it never pretended to be more than what it is: a mere candle." - 'Don Juan: The Sorcerer'.

39. "Seek and see the marvels around you. You will get tired of looking at yourself alone, and that fatigue will make you deaf and blind to everything else." - 'The Teachings Of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way Of Knowledge'.

40. "Power rests on the kind of knowledge one holds. What is the sense of knowing things that are useless?" - 'The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge'.

41. "I've been experiencing brief flashes of disassociation or shallow states of nonordinary reality." - 'The Teachings Of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way Of Knowledge'.

42. "A man goes to knowledge as he goes to war, wide awake, with fear, with respect, and with absolute assurance." - 'The Teachings Of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge'.

43. "For me, there is only traveling on paths that have heart... and the only worthwhile challenge is to traverse its full length --and there I travel looking, looking breathlessly." - 'The Teachings of Jon Duan: A Yaqui Way Of Knowledge'.

44. "Anything is one of million paths. Therefore you must always keep in mind that a path is only a path; if you feel you should not follow, you must not stay with it under any circumstances." - 'The Teachings of Jon Duan: A Yaqui Way Of Knowledge'.

45. "I had been experiencing brief flashes of disassociation, or shallow states of non-ordinary reality." - 'The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge'.

46. "Power rests on the kind of knowledge one holds. What is the sense of knowing things that are useless." - 'The Teachings of Jon Duan: A Yaqui Way Of Knowledge'.

47. "A man of knowledge lives by acting, not by thinking about acting."

48. "The aim is to balance the terror of being alive with the wonder of being alive."

49. "Look at every path closely and deliberately. Try it as many times as you think necessary. Then ask yourself alone, one question...does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good, if it doesn't it is of no use."

50. "For me, the world is weird because it is stupendous, awesome, mysterious, unfathomable; my interest has been to convince you that you must assume responsibility for being here in this marvelous world, in this marvelous desert in this marvelous time."

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