In
the stories of Carlos Castaneda, the Death Defier is an ancient
sorcerer who hid within the world of dreams to escape death, and for
thousands of years he has had contact with the nahuals of Don Juan's
lineage to whom he offers greater shamanic abilities in exchange for a
portion of their energy.
Castaneda
said that the Death Defier took Carol Tiggs from the physical world
to another dimension, which he also calls 'The Second Attention', where
Carol Tiggs stayed for ten years and then returned to the physical
world.
And here I am going to chronologically regroup what Castaneda and his disciples said on this subject.
Castaneda's Declaration in 1991
In 1991 Castaneda visited Tula with a group of people and invited the scientist Jacobo Grinberg, who commented on this trip:
« When
we arrived in Tula, Castaneda took us to the central plaza and the
church where he had had his encounter with the Death Defier. We
entered the church where he had been interviewed by this ancient
sorcerer, and it seemed to me the saddest place in the world.
Later Castaneda told us that the Death Defier had merged with the Nagual woman
Carol Tiggs and that she contained them both within one. Everyone turned
to look at Carol, and she nodded.
“With this woman,” Castaneda said, “I have traveled where no one else can travel.”
We turned once more to look at Carol and she nodded again, saying "yes". »
Castaneda's Declaration in 1993
In 1993, Castaneda's ninth book, 'The Art of Dreaming,' was published, in which he details his encounter with the Death Defier in this church.
At
the end of his book, in chapter 13, Castaneda mentions that after
talking with the Death Defier, he loses consciousness and when he
wakes up, he finds himself in a cemetery with his head in Carol's lap; she tells him that she found him there naked and unconscious.
When
Castaneda tells Carol that the Death Defier is a woman, Carol
reveals that she already knows this because she has also been
communicating with the Death Defier for a couple of weeks before, when the Death Defier showed her how she actually escaped from her captors (p. 245).
Then
they go to the Hotel Catedral where they fall asleep together. When
Castaneda wakes up, he is alone, and the hotel reception manager tells
him that the American woman who had rented the room just left a moment
ago.
Castaneda
then walks to Don Juan's house, finding him and his companions in
"agony." Castaneda tells him what happened, and Don Juan deduces that
the Death Defier "used Carol's energy body in a dark and ominous
way... and created the Carol Tiggs of the hotel, a Carol Tiggs of pure
intention" (p. 258).
Don
Juan then shares the following interpretation: “I think there is no
Carol Tiggs anymore. Nor is there any woman in the church [the Death
Defier]; both have merged and flown away on the wings of intention, I
think, forward” (p. 258).
Castaneda asks him, "What do you think happened to Carol Tiggs?"
Don Juan replies: “Carol Tiggs is gone.”
Castaneda asks him: "But where has she gone?"
Don Juan replies: "Wherever the sorcerers of antiquity went. I told you that the gift
of the Death Defierwas endless dreaming possibilities" (p.260)
STATEMENTS BY RENATA AND NYEI IN 1995
The
workshop which took place on March 14 and 16, 1995, in Los Angeles, was
attended by the three main instructors of tensegrity: Renata Murez,
Nyei Murez, and Kylie Lundahl.
During
the second night, Renata began by saying she wanted to clarify a point about Carol Tiggs she had been asked about individually after Tuesday’s session. She said she had been asked why they had said there was so much energy available since the return of Carol Tiggs.
Reni explained that Carol is basically the Death Defier, having absorbed the Death Defier’s energy in the ten years she spent in the Second Attention.
She further explained that in recent months the three of them had seen Carol Tiggs in Tula. She took them into a dream while they were all awake, “another example of Carol’s tremendous energy.”
Nyei next elaborated on a previous question about parallel worlds, saying she knew it was a very confusing concept. She explained that the Witches “don’t share subjectivity with us,” so it was difficult for them to describe phenomena that are so much outside our awareness. In Nyei’s words, she said they were “all recently pulled into a weird darkness, at the center of which was Carol Tiggs.”
She described it as “a mysterious, subtle place,” said that “Carol is beautiful, young, funny, delightful, and the most enjoyable person you could imagine,” and claimed what they experienced with her in Tula and again recently was nonetheless “awesome and very hard to describe.”
She said she had known Carol for many years, “but I feel I don’t really know her at all.” Because Carol merged with the Death Defier, they entered into a dream that the Death Defier maintains. The Death Defier “holds the root of another Carol Tiggs of endless mystery and darkness and beauty,” and “if one is willing to suspend judgment something happens that can’t be described.” In the recent experience, she said the three of them all heard a song or tune that pulled them into a “beautiful mystery.”
At that point, in response to a questioner who interrupted to ask who the Death Defier was, Nyei explained the Death Defier’s traditional involvement with don Juan’s lineage and that when Castaneda met with the Death Defier, Castaneda didn’t want the Death Defier’s traditional gift in return for the Nagual’s energy.
As a result, when Carol Tiggs subsequently met with the Death Defier, they merged so that the Death Defier “rides” on Carol Tiggs.
Castaneda also merged with the Death Defier in the period of nine days described at the end of The Art of Dreaming. Carol assertedly merged with the Death Defier for ten years, and when she returned she was “both.” And she’s continuing to “uncover” and to “merge” more since her return.
Castaneda's statement through Carol in 1995
Carol took Cleargreen members on a "top secret" guided tour of Tula (it was probably on May 20, 1995).
In her speech, presumably written by Castaneda, she stated: “I was once an M.D. and I am now pursuing my degree in symbolic logic.”
(Cid's note: neither of those two statements is true.)
Using the Cathedral and then the plaza in Tula as backdrops, she tells the group the highly X-rated version of her supposed encounter with the Death Defier in the Cathedral (which involved a lot crotch flashing and fingering as described in detail in the speech).
After they mutually pleasure each other, the Death Defier offers to make Carol a “superpussy.”
In an insult to Nury (Castaneda's adopted daughter) and making the ridiculous claim that Carol’s looks had dramatically changed as a result of the Death Defier encounter, Castaneda has Carol tell the group via the scripted remarks:
“Of course I have to tell you that I didn’t look then as I look today. I looked like Nuri, a twerp. The death defier took my nose, my twiggy body … The death defier was, naturally, the spitting image of that thing in the museum, the one I look like now.”
(Cid's note: this statement is also false since photos taken of Carol when she was a teenager show that she did have curves.)
Castaneda had her take them from the plaza to the hotel where they supposedly spent nine days fucking.
The stage directions Castaneda wrote for her in the speech tell Carol: "Walk them to the hotel, after showing them the two restaurants of the town. Stand at the corner and point to the last two rooms, at the very corner, on the second floor.
Then Castaneda has her tell them: “I as the new creature who wasn’t Carol Tiggs took Carlos there and inspite [sic] of the fact he was my brother I seduced him as if there is no tomorrow. But I wasn’t Carol Tiggs, I was something else. Something bound and determined, cold and yet passionate. When I closed my eyes I could see scenarios that didn’t belong to any experience, strange beings like shadows come to me and examine me. They poked me and turned me around, looking for something unsaid.”
And the sorcery porn story continues like that for a few more paragraphs before shifting to Carol supposedly waking up and trying to track down Castaneda 10 years later.
Castaneda has her conclude with these claims about the Death Defier: “She said that she had been alive for thousands of years not because she was greedy for life but because she loved life and mankind. Her one dream, which had nothing to do with survival, was to help mankind reach a level of reason and intelligence which we do not have. She said that we are ritualistic and repetitious and we have deleriums [sic] of grandeur that have no justification. We are a mess. She said that to evoke her name in Tula would be like a cue to wake her. And that there could be some daring beings who would evoke her name in my presence. By invoking her name in my presence which is her presence, their internal dialogue would stop and they may even catch a glimpse of dreams upon dreams that were woven in this marvelous locale, now occupied by this absurd crummy little town.”
She also invoked the creature’s supposed name and read the Nahuatl poem the Death Defier supposedly gave her.
Carol then led the group to the nearby park and had them gather in a group bordering the grass. She selected Taisha, Florinda, Kylie, Reni, Nyei, Bruce and Tracy, grouping them on the lawn. She stared into their eyes (wearing her black contact lenses), whispered the Death Defier’s name into one ear, and instructed them to fall stiffly into the arms of two helpers.
(This came to be known as Carol giving them “the Eye,” which she did for selected individuals on a number of occasions, including at a workshop the next year.)
Per Amy’s account in Sorcerer’s Apprentice, each of the seven fell back and lay quietly, except Bruce, who went into spasmodic convulsions. After a few minutes, Carol “woke” them with her assistants’ help.
THE STATEMENTS OF FLORINDA AND TAISHA IN 1995
From
May 26 to 29, 1995, a workshop was held in New York. When a woman asked
about the Death Defier and Carol Tiggs, Florinda Donner replied
that the Death Defier “is riding Carol Tiggs, so on one level, she
is Carol Tiggs.”
In fact, after the Mexico City experience, they said,
“we don’t know at this point if she is the Carol Tiggs we have always
known. We are trying to bring her back in dreams, which is very
difficult when we have to be so present in the world, giving a workshop
for four days.”
Taisha
answered a question about Carol Tiggs and the Death Defier by
saying that Tiggs's merging with the Death Defier was explained in
the book 'The Art of Dreaming,' due to the gift of nahual energy that
Castaneda bestowed upon the Death Defier. But even now, something
has changed.
“Right
now we don’t know if there is Carol Tiggs. Every time she takes us in
a dream to old Tula, she changes. On this recent trip to Mexico, she
changed even more. She is in transition, dreaming again or reorganizing
energetic units into something else, we don’t yet know what.”
Carlos
and Carol always had the same energy, as Don Juan said, but what the
Death Defier caused was a kind of total fusion of this energy.
CAROL'S STATEMENT IN 1995
In the workshop held from October 6-8, 1995, in
the auditorium of Culver City High School, Carol briefly described meeting don Juan again as a young art student, studying in Mexico, her intent being to act as a “cultural bridge” to the Spanish-speaking world.
She then described in detail the fateful day on which she met the Death Defier. As a result of this meeting, she said, “there are three possibilities as to whether Carol Tiggs still exists. The first is that she does, the second is that she doesn’t, and the third is that she has the essence of Carol Tiggs, but also something else.”
She described it as a “hot, bright day.” She mimicked herself lisping. There was a little cut-out door into the church that required one to step over to get inside. As she nervously started to step over (which she demonstrated) a hand reached out and grabbed her by the arm to pull her in.
In an eerie, gravel voice, the Death Defier, whom she couldn’t bring herself to look at, said, “I’m pleased to see you Carol Tiggs. I’ve been watching you a long time.”
Carol found the mention of her name flattering and somehow soothing. The Death Defier told her to look at her, but she couldn’t. But Carol’s energy body felt drawn to her.
The Death Defier told her, “I’m all woman,” and grabbed Carol’s other hand and placed it on her breast. The Death Defier then kissed Carol on the lips, and Carol fell back onto the floor, her long hair disheveled, lisping, in a horrified tone, “But people will see us.”
(Carol explained her horrified reaction by saying that, “at the time, I was a serious heterosexual.”)
The Death Defier responded that no one could see, because “we’re dreaming within a dream.” The Death Defier told Carol that she wanted something from her, and would give her anything in return.
Carol couldn’t answer. The Death Defier said it was not something she could decide for her, that it was totally up to Carol, but that “It would be a great adventure.”
This was the key phrase to convince Carol, who was always looking for adventures. So Carol said “Yes.”
The Death Defier then said, “Let’s change this dream and sit beside the Sea of Awareness.”
Carol said she was excited, envisioning they were going to the beach.
The Death Defier took her back outside through the small doorway. They went from the blackness of the church to the brilliance of the outdoors. It was very bright, and eventually, Carol said, she started getting “some flashes of something. The sea awareness was somehow alive, like I thought God was as a child, and impersonal but somehow personal to each person.”
As a person, she felt “like a speck, but somehow very intimate with this impersonal entity. Then I suddenly felt pain in my left foot. I found myself walking in the streets of Tucson. I saw a newspaper, and the date was ten years later.”
Carol claimed she then struggled to become aware of her surroundings, to recover, and to find the money she’d buried per don Juan’s prior instructions.
She then went to find her “brother” Carlos. She calls him her brother “because we have the same configuration of energy.” She found him at the Phoenix Bookstore, where “he talked for an interminably long time as a result of the shock of seeing me.”
Carol described how they had learned that, upon returning from her ten years in the second attention, she had acquired “the sorcerer’s eye.” One evening Carol was looking at Castaneda and his eyes were glassy and the side of his jaw dropped. She was afraid he was having a stroke. She figured she would have to give him an injection, and somehow focused on the stimulation point in the scrotum as the place to do it.
She asked Castaneda if he wanted “the thin needles or the thick needles?” (This was an ongoing joke between them.)
He mumbled, “Why ask? You know you’ll give me the thick anyway.” Then he hit her. She was just thrilled that he was alright.
Then she went home and was looking at herself in the full length mirror in her bedroom. Next thing she knew she started feeling a pain in her leg and head and realized she’d “mesmerized” herself and had been leaning against the mirror for five hours.
In the ensuing days, she found that her left eye had the effect of stopping people. She started practicing and used it at the supermarket, where they wouldn’t charge her. She did it with lots of people, and it had “very disturbing results” with some. All she is doing, she claimed, is “stopping them for a moment. You can come back to that moment and try to extend it, in bits, with Tensegrity.”
SUMMARY
In
summary, Castaneda and his disciples claimed that Carol Tiggs also met
the Death Defier in this church located in Tula, where the Death
Defier revealed to Carol that he was a woman, they had
sexual encounters, and afterwards the Death Defier proposed to Carol
to take her to the "Sea of Consciousness".
Carol
accepted; her stay in this other dimension seemed to her like only a
short time, but when she returned to the physical world, ten years had
already passed.
Then Carol reunited with Castaneda, and they discovered that Carol and the Death Defier had merged.
And
it must be pointed out that this story contradicts what Castaneda had
been saying before: that Carol had gone to this other dimension with Don
Juan and his sorcerers, not with the Death Defier.
OBSERVATIONS
I
don't know if the Death Defier really exists or was another lie
invented by Carlos Castaneda, but what I do know is that those ten years
that Carol Tiggs supposedly spent in this other dimension, in reality she spent physically continuing with her life in Los Angeles and simply in
1973 she separated from Castaneda, and in 1983 she reunited with him.
This erotic encounter that Carol had with the Death Defier sounds like
fantasies invented by Castaneda, who while demanding that his followers
be very chaste, was himself tremendously obsessed with sex.
And
this claim that Carol Tiggs and the Death Defier merged is very
false because it is understood that the Death Defier has great
knowledge and abilities about dreaming, but outside of the small group I
mentioned above, people who knew Carol Tiggs indicated that she is a
very ordinary woman without shamanic knowledge or powers.
And
given that in the workshops where she participated she displayed a
great deal of charlatanism and fraudulence, I conclude that this
assertion must be true.
