My dear friend who is a powerful shaman and a psychiatrist--although he owns psychiatrist and not the former, went to lunch with me one day so I could tell him what I was so excited about having experienced out on the planes of journeying. I can't remember what these experiences were, but I remember him listening intently and looking about a bit when I used the words sorcery and sorcerer to make sure our airspace was private. Apparently it was because we spoke quite intensely, but I can't remember the exact conversation or topics."To be a sorcerer," don Juan continued, "does not mean to practice witchcraft, or to work to affect people, or to be possessed by demons. To be a sorcerer means to reach a level of awareness that makes inconceivable things available.
The term 'sorcery' is inadequate to express what sorcerers do, and so is the term 'shamanism.' The actions of sorcerers are exclusively in the realm of the abstract; the impersonal. Sorcerers struggle to reach a goal that has nothing to do with the quests of an average man. Sorcerers' aspirations are to reach infinity, and to be conscious of it."
Don Juan continued, saying that the task of sorcerers was to face infinity, and that they plunged into it daily, as a fisherman plunges into the sea. It was such an overwhelming task that sorcerers had to state their names before venturing into it. He reminded me that, in Nogales, he had stated his name before any interaction had taken place between us. He had, in this manner, asserted his individuality in front of the infinite."
The Active Side of Infinity, Castaneda, Part 1, Chapter 6
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