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Summary: I have another Bag of Magical Beans for you all...
Review: Look, people, if you want to actually learn the art of stalking rather than just read about it, eat some meat, if you are a vegan, or viceversa. If you think of yourself as being clever, try acting stupid. If you are a natural jerk, try being nice to people. If you think you are a very good person, try being rude to another. Do you get my drift? If you don't, maybe you DO need to read some more about stalking. Carlos himself once said that his books are nothing but an index to an alternate way of being. So! Stop reading and do some not-doing in your life. Bye.
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Summary: Made me think and opened up a new world
Review: Once I started reading this book, I stayed up all night to finish it. It was like a mystery--and showed me such a difference slice of human experience that I had to find out how it ended. Taisha's book was more satisfying to me than Castaneda's works, althought it travels in the same world. Maybe it's just the way she writes, or the fact that it is a woman's perspective, but I was totally captivated by this story. It showed me a way of life unlike anything I had imagined possible. Each person must decide for themself if her story is true. For me, I believe it.When I finished this book, I was left with several new ideas that didn't fit into my old way of thinking. Over the last year, I have been working them through, and have discovered the answers for myself. For a while, I wished that I could go to live with some scorcerers and have a similar growth experience. What I have accomplished is to find my own mystical path in the midst of everyday living, paying ! ! the rent, and keeping the fridge full. It's a solution that works for me. Taisha's book gave me a jump start into an area I didn't even know existed, and I'm grateful for that experience.
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Summary: The Stalker's Handbook.
Review: Read this book if you are curious about the world of the stalkers. Or to a lesser degree if the mechanics of sorcerer's training intrigues. Abelar writes succinctly about the main tool of the stalker's- recapitulation, in a way that Castaneda either couldn't or wouldn't? In addition, the examples of the personal 'recapitulation memories' she shares are ones that the average reader can certainly identify with and learn from. This book is a must for one previously guided by Castaneda and looking to make personal changes. Excellant!
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Summary: More than just an interesting book about indians in Mexico
Review: Sorcerers in Mexico believed that there where two paths to "freedom", practicing the Art of Dreaming or practicing the Art of Stalking. Castaneda, a dreamer, wrote mostly about the Art of Dreaming, which is associated with the left side. However, his books are somewhat sketchy about the Art of Stalking. Abelar was a Stalker, which is associated with the right side of the body. Sorcerer's Crossing provides a much better guide than Castaneda's books for learning stalking and is of interest to those who want to follow this path. Stalking is the art of stalking oneself, it reminds me of yoga in that it teaches you to calm your mind and get rid of bad influences from your past. It is a nice way to live, even if you do not make the sorcer's crossing.
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Summary: Taisha Abelar's book provides a woman's insight into sorcery
Review: Taisha Abelar's book provides a woman insight into sorcery and this is important, because as wonderful and significant as Castaneda's books are, they are from a male perspective, and men think or order reality in a way that is fundamentally different from women. Women are synthesizers, men categorisers. Men are experts on gathering inventories and splitting hairs, women on making a coherent whole. Both are obviously useful and necessary ways of dealing with the cosmos, but Abelar's book shows for one thing how much more direct is women's dealings with life than men's. She does not have to engage in endless dialectics in order to reach the place where she can simply give herself permission to try. Her rationality was not as much of a bar to her in exploring these revolutionary concepts and her book is therefore direct and candid. Try it. If you like Castaneda, you'll find this one equally delightful and insightful and important.
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Summary: Gets under your skin..
Review: Taisha's book is one of the very few I found a very threatening read the first time around. This meant of course that the book hit the nail on the head and felt too close for comfort as a result. A few years later upon re-reading her story, I am amused to discover that I apparently have started to understand at least some of it - I feel no longer threatened. Books that challenge my pet beliefs about myself to this extent are rare. This one is written without sentimentality but instead manages to offer honesty and insight into the particular difficulties women are likely to encounter along the way of spiritual training of any kind. I have found it very helpful and I recommend it highly. Of course everybody's path will be different - but Taisha's book will be of interest to anyone striving to understand and control their own conditioning through (particularly Western) society. The only other book I can remember ever having had a similar effect on me, "The Marriages Between Zones 3, 4 & 5" by Doris Lessing - is the sequel to the equally relevant "Shikasta". Both of those books are written from an observer's point of view and expertly illustrate the mechanisms of conditioning; how they cripple our abilities to perceive and evolve.
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Summary: practical magic
Review: take it as a tale, take it as an instruction manual, take it as a navigation map, but take it!
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Summary: A Total Waste of Time
Review: This book is hardly believable, and not inspriational. I can't see why the author wasted her time doing these excercises, and I feel like I wasted my time reading about them. I don't believe a word of the book, or her experiences--they are written as if they happened, but so totally screwy and nonsensical that the whole book lacks credibility. Don't bother, is my recommendation.
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Summary: A GREAT BOOK HIGHLIGHTING IMPORTANT SHAMANIC TECHNIQUES
Review: This is a very important book to read for those interested in shamanism and sorcery. Abelar was a female apprentice to those sorcerers who taught Carlos Castaneda. She describes some of the teachings specific for women. She also places a greater emphasis than did Castaneda on some very important aspects of sorcery/shamanism. These aspects are those of visualization and breathing techniques. She also emphasizes the practice of physical movements called Magical Passes, the purpose of which is to draw energy in to the chakras. I found it difficult to figure out how to execute these movements from the descriptions in the text however and would therefore recommend buying the Tensegrity videos. I also highly recommend "Being In Dreaming" by Florinda Donner. Donner was another female apprentice but unlike Abelar who is a Stalker, Donner is a Dreamer so the tone of the book is a bit different. I consider both of these to be advanced texts on shamanism. The Path (Esmeralda Arana) is a concise easy to read text conveying basic shamanic principles.
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Summary: Vital companion to Castaneda's books
Review: This is an extraordinary book that should be read by all the followers of Carlos Castaneda's books. It's a vital gloss to the Toltec philosophical system and explains the importance of the act of "recapitulation" to don Juan Matus' philosophical system. It also has several new magical passes explained; those are always welcome. All in all, an important (and very easy to read) book!
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