The Teachings of Don Juan was a very different kind of story because you don’t think the stuff going on in the book is happening out in the world, but it 100 percent is. This story was about a researcher named Castaneda who travels to Mexico in 1940 to learn Yaqui sorcery under Don Juan. It takes him about 1 year before Don Juan truly accepts that he is ready to meet Mescalito, once he digested the peyote he feels like he is having a terrible reaction to it but in actuality he is playing with Mescalito in his dog form which is very rare. Soon after Don Juan shows him allies, allies are neither guardians or spirits but they assist whoever uses them, but you must be precise in the way you use them or they will betray you.
There is two allies the Castaneda is shown, the devils weed and the smoke, Castaneda first tries the devils weed, after taking the potion he puts together for him, he is convinced that the Allie likes him. While learning how to recreate the potion Don Juan tells him that learning is a hardship that all can take on but few can achieve, I feel like that is a great representation of most tattoo apprenticeships, anybody can walk into a shop and say they want to learn how to tattoo but few are willing to put in insane amount of hours upon hours just to get one drawing right. Few are willing to beat against their craft until they can mold it into their style and be able to be comfortable and confident with their drawings.
He also says to become a man of knowledge, he needs to defeat four natural enemies, fear, clarity of mind, power and old age. So far I’ve had to defeat two of those wishing myself, fear and clarity of mind. Fear of uprooting myself from my home the last 21 years and fear of being good enough to be a good tattooer, and clarity of mind with being able to shut out the outside world and not worrying about what line is suppose to be where and that it’s okay to redo a drawing 50 times because eventually it will come together. I feel like a lot of my apprenticeship has been like this story, granted I haven’t been tripping off of drugs in the desert but a lot of the stuff I’ve had to do, like as of late find my own style I feel like is finding my ally, I had to replicate 50 or so flash sheets, the way Castaneda had to replicate the directions for his ally. I really enjoyed this book though and it opened my eyes to a new way of looking at things and of some of the things going on in the world.
There is two allies the Castaneda is shown, the devils weed and the smoke, Castaneda first tries the devils weed, after taking the potion he puts together for him, he is convinced that the Allie likes him. While learning how to recreate the potion Don Juan tells him that learning is a hardship that all can take on but few can achieve, I feel like that is a great representation of most tattoo apprenticeships, anybody can walk into a shop and say they want to learn how to tattoo but few are willing to put in insane amount of hours upon hours just to get one drawing right. Few are willing to beat against their craft until they can mold it into their style and be able to be comfortable and confident with their drawings.
He also says to become a man of knowledge, he needs to defeat four natural enemies, fear, clarity of mind, power and old age. So far I’ve had to defeat two of those wishing myself, fear and clarity of mind. Fear of uprooting myself from my home the last 21 years and fear of being good enough to be a good tattooer, and clarity of mind with being able to shut out the outside world and not worrying about what line is suppose to be where and that it’s okay to redo a drawing 50 times because eventually it will come together. I feel like a lot of my apprenticeship has been like this story, granted I haven’t been tripping off of drugs in the desert but a lot of the stuff I’ve had to do, like as of late find my own style I feel like is finding my ally, I had to replicate 50 or so flash sheets, the way Castaneda had to replicate the directions for his ally. I really enjoyed this book though and it opened my eyes to a new way of looking at things and of some of the things going on in the world.
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