Version 2007.11.04

## Castaneda Casualties: An Interview with Amy Wallace
(Magical Blend Magazine, © MB Media 2004).

### Castaneda Casualties: An Interview with Amy Wallace

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Castaneda Casualties: An Interview with Amy Wallace (Magical Blend Magazine, © MB Media 2004)

by Michael Peter Langevin

When visionary author Carlos Castaneda died, as he almost certainly did of liver cancer in 1998, several female members of his inner circle disappeared, amidst much sinister speculation. Had they all "burned from within," as Carlos described a sorcerer's departure from this earth? Or was this another outrageous hoax from a man whose credibility had come to be questioned by just about everyone other than those still held in thrall by his personal magnetism and incomparable storytelling? Taisha Abelar and Florinda Donner-Grau-two of the three "witches" said to be master apprentices of Castaneda's Yaqui sorcerer mentor Don Juan-were among the missing. Nury Alexander, also known as The Blue Scout and described by Castaneda as an energetic entity rescued from the realm of inorganics (and later legally adopted by him), was gone as well, along with Kylie Lundahl and Talia Bey, two more of the annointed inner circle. Their phone numbers were all disconnected on the same day. All had been regular recipients of large sums of the money generated by the royalties from Casteneda's perpetually bestselling books and his community's well-attended workshops. Was this vanishing act-perhaps even Carlos' death itself-the result of a suicide pact? Or was this mystery further evidence of the nonordinary reality that Castaneda wrote about, evoked incessantly, and seemed largely to live in?

If anyone would be in a position to know, it would be Amy Wallace. Having been introduced to Castaneda when she was 16 by her author father, Irving Wallace, she reunited with Carlos in the early 1990s when he called to tell her he had spoken to her dead father in the dreaming realm. They fell in love, or something like it. Amy Wallace had the king's ear, as it were, and ostensibly, his heart. But, as she tells in her new book, Sorcerer's Apprentice (North Atlantic, 2003), being at the center of the psychic storm that Castaneda alternately calmed and created was a painful, confusing place to be. Sorcerer's Apprentice is a powerful yet deeply troubling book. It reveals Castaneda as cruel and manipulative yet charismatic and childlike in his relationships, mostly with women. It's a story told by a sadder but wiser and very honest woman whose self-image is still not quite sure what hit it. She recently told us some of what she knows:

MB: What happened to the witches when Carlos died, and why didn't Carol Tiggs, whom some saw as the most powerful of the witches and who claimed to be The Blue Scout's mother, go with them?

There's lot I can't tell you. But I was told that when I can speak, I should call Magical Blend. It turns out that the witches, including the Blue Scout, disappeared. I was told by a very drunken Taisha Ablelar that she was going to kill herself. Then I was told by Carol Tiggs that she had just arrived at the site of a suicide attempt by the Blue Scout. I believe she didn't succeed then, but it could be possible that she has since then. And one of the things that made me break with the group was that Carol was actually moving into my house, and she was just about insane--as anyone would be. On Tuesday she would say "They're dead! They're all dead" and then on Wednesday, she would say "They're all alive," and she'd get on the cell phone and say to someone, "Oh, I just talked to them," or "No, I haven't heard from them yet." And it was just too much for me. It was like a "suicide missing-in-action."

But then they settled on a party line, and this I can tell you: Debbie Drooz [Castaneda's lawyer and the executor of his estate-Ed.] is in charge of disbursing extremely large sums of money to these women. And she has not disbursed a single check since the day they left. And I understand that while they were making up their wills, she asked them, "Now, you're not going to do anything stupid, are you?" Now, that's a very odd question, isn't it?

MB: Yes. It also seems odd that they made out new wills days within a few days of Carlos' death. It sounds like perhaps a group suicide was planned.

Well, when Debbie Drooz asked them about it, they said, "Of course not." And she said, "Then I'll make the disbursals." But none of that happened. And some of their family members died-like Talia's father died and Florinda-who was in constant touch with her family- her father died in his 90s and her brothers couldn't get in touch with her and they were all distraught because they can't reach who they were used to reaching. And, in spite of the myth that Carlos insisted on a total cut-off from family members, that's not true for everybody. In Florinda's case particularly. So it's very dark.

So we have a couple of things to look at here. Either they literally left with millions in cash and had some kind of complex Swiss bank accounts-I don't know about those kinds of things-or they're not here anymore. They had so much money coming to them, and all that money will go to Carol-all of it.

MB: Why didn't she go? Was it five women who disappeared?

Well, there was Kylie and Talia, Taisha and Florinda, and then the Blue Scout separately. And it gets confusing for me in some places because I was told for several days or a week that Carlos had left with the Blue Scout. And I thought, physically that's impossible because he was in a coma last I heard, so how could he be moved? She would have to put him in the car and his bodily functions weren't working; he would have to be injected for diabetes, so I didn't see how he could take a long drive with his adopted daughter-and lover. And of course now we know that none of that was true.

MB: Does this leave Carol Tiggs as the new leader of the community or of Cleargreen [Casteneda's business entity]?

The idea of Carol leading a group is as absurd as the idea of me redoing your plumbing. She's not a leader type. What she said to me was, "I hate what left and I hate what stayed." Now, if she stayed and the Blue Scout had stayed--at that point, she was still here; she was seen two weeks after they supposedly left town--who knows? They were supposed to be a loving mother and daughter but there was a lot of animosity between them, and it was quite a sight to see. At one point during that two-week period, Carol was wiggling her toes in the pool and saying, "Now I'm in charge! I get to be in charge!" I don't think she wanted to stay and have somebody like Nury still have some power over her while she was still here. And also I don't think she wants the job. She kept saying, "It's like the whole group of them are sucking on my tits like I'm a big sow or something. I just want to be left alone." It was like Greta Garbo time for her. In other words, she's used to being waited on hand and foot, and she still can be, it's just that she has to deal with all their problems.

If she had left with that group, she would be the lowest on the pecking order. She was here, and she would have been there. If she stayed, she would have basically had to have been consulting therapists because of all the people. So the last I heard was that she moved out to be near her mother. She may have left the country or she may be living in the Pacific Palisades with her mother, who takes an extraordinarily laissez-faire attitude toward what her daughter does. She thinks it's all a big lark.

MB: Do you think the other four committed suicide?

Yes. Taisha said to me, "Since I'm going to commit suicide, it doesn't matter anymore if I'm a drunk, right?" And Kylie said, "We both know what we're going to do, and there's no other way." She never used the word suicide, but I was worried. She'd gotten bottles of pills and given them to Carlos. She said if ever she couldn't make it, she would take them, and she knew what to do. She was hellbent--she's always talked about suicide. She said, "I know that you've reached that point, too, and that you're to do it." And she was blissed out (this is not in the book; Carol said it). But Talia said "I've never seen anyone look so scared." So they may have done different things or just stuck together, but I suspect they're all gone. Talia's brother was here. Nobody knows if Talia's dead or missing, but if wherever she is is unestablished, part of his estate is part of Talia's estate and it goes to Eagle's Gift [the trust established in Castaneda's will] in her name, so his own home is in danger. So he was really freaked out and in shock. Carlos always portrayed them as rich, but they're not. They don't have the money to hire a detective, but investigations are being undertaken.

MB: How do the remaining group members feel about your book?

One of the most damning things in the entire book Carol said to me after Carlos was gone. She said, "You know, you're very dangerous to us." And I said, "How could I be?" And she said, "Because you know too much. You're a time bomb." And I thought, it's a corrupt spiritual organization when you can know too much. It should have been open, truthful, honest, loving--these are my beliefs. I don't think there should be baroque secrets that make somebody a time bomb. So, by writing the book I let off the bomb.

MB: That's right. Are you in touch with Cleargreen? Is Tensegrity [the latest version of Castaneda's teachings] being run by Debra Drooz?

It's being run by Reni Murez; she's the person-in-chief there, but they won't answer anyone's phone calls. They might from you if they think they're gonna get a good story, but so many people have told me that they have tried to contact them, and they won't answer any calls.

MB: And yet they're still putting on Tensegrity workshops across the world?

Yes, they are. Now, they're getting smaller, of course. But what they do, is they say the witches are directing it from afar, and since there's no proof either way, yet, quite, about all of them, people choose to believe that. Also they have very little information. People ask me, "Did you ever see magic?" And the answer is no.

MB: No?

I've seen it in my life. I believe in it. I know it exists, but I didn't see it there. That really blew my mind because I'm a professional researcher and writer, and I've written about the paranormal and spontaneous human combustion. It happens, believe me. I've written 13 books. And I've seen magic. I mean, I've talked to cops who were there and witnessed it! But not from Carlos, or any of the others.

MB: Carlos's books changed the world. He was a great writer and a great performer on the world stage. Whether or not he was a sorcerer is hard to say.

I don't think he had powers or secret knowledge.

MB: Do you think the lost years between his first wife's book and your book were just spent doing the same sort of thing he did towards the end?

Yes, he was very focused on workshops during that period. He wanted to go public, and I don't know what his personal reasons were for that. He said it was some energetic need to preserve the lineage. He did try to offer the lineage to Tony Karam in Mexico, and it was very interesting to me that Tony walked away from millions of dollars and hot and cold running women. Now there's an impeccable guy.

MB: And rare.

Yes, and a wonderful person. I just think the world of him. Victor Sanchez, too. These are honorable people. I think there's got to be a lot of hard feelings among the other men in terms of competition who might have expected to be offered that. They weren't offered it.

MB: As far as you know he only offered it to Tony?

Yes, it's amazing. These are the reasons Tony gave me for not doing it. He said, "I never saw magic; it was always a dangled carrot, and I was being asked to tell lies about what places I'd been and things I'd seen. And I will not do that."

MB: Good for him. So as far as you're concerned, you're basically going on record as saying that Carlos was a good author, a good performer, a good storyteller, but not a magic worker at any point.

No. He had one of the most charismatic personalities I've ever seen in my life. I believe we're all psychic, and I believe that he could tune in, at a very high level, to your needs and the right timing. He was very astute, and although that's a form of psychism, it's not the same. He was honed in that way. For example, he once said he was going to bring a 200-pound pigeon from a different dimension. Well, that never happened. None of those things ever happened. Once a year, I would tell him a dream, and because I was so reticent, he was respectful and would answer. One time I said I had a dream in which we were levitating into another dimension while we were making love. I asked him, "So what was that?" And he said, "That's how it's going to be, chica--that's how it's going to happen." So I think what he did was take people, and confirm their fantasies. He would say your dreams or your waking fantasies are actually dreaming awake so therefore all that stuff happened. So some people believed they were living double lives that they were only aware of in a dream context. In other words, only he could tell them, "This really happened."

MB: The ultimate cult leader, the ultimate guru.

Exactly, and the only thing they remember is working a job, or going to school, and living a bizarre but regular life. None of them performed acts of magic, although Florinda had the closest to that kind of charisma. too.

MB: Does that, then, imply that Don Juan didn't exist on any level?

No one has ever seen Don Juan or spoken to him, and there have been no reported sightings and no reported meetings, ever. Carlos used to say, "Don Juan's oldest student is a woman named Joanie Barker." I met someone during my readings who said he said he had introduced Joanie and Carlos. Joanie claims never to have met Don Juan.

MB: So is Don Juan a composite fictional figure?

That's what I believe. I believe he was a composite figure for literary reasons. And I think this is a good question, "Did other people work on those books?" The series changed dramatically--and I recommend them as gorgeous parables of how to live--but Carlos used to say, "People ask me why I wrote these great books? I don't know, I don't know," he'd say. Well, I got an anonymous email from Simon and Schuster saying, "I can't risk losing my job, but those books were either heavily edited or basically ghost-written, at certain points."

MB: Right, and towards the end, like you said, there was definitely a change in the predominant force, originating from either the writers or the editors.

Right, and there was another change when Tensegrity took off. There was also another publisher involved in the last book, and another editor. I've never met an editor in my life who didn't work on a book.

MB: Right, in the industry it's a given.

It's clear to me that there is not one Carlos Castaneda who wrote all of those books that way.

MB: I was in Peru not long ago, and many of the spiritual teachings are very similar to Carlos's early books.

Well, he grew up there.

MB: Yeah, and it seemed to me he took it and grafted it to Northern Mexico in many instances.

Yeah, and I also think he traveled, because he spent a lot of time in Argentina and around Mexico and studied with other shamans as well. Probably the bulk of what you're saying is true.

MB: Even though you weren't in his life at this time, do you feel a lot of his earlier studies were to feed the books rather than to build a true magic or a true repetoire of knowledge?

Well, I think he was trying to get his doctorate; I don't think he knew it would turn into a bestseller. The world of academia meant the world to him. He wanted me to go to college. For him, the biggest kind of trophy he could have was academic respect.

MB: Which he really never got.

No, although they were split. The graduate committee who gave him his doctorate was split on the issue. He never got respect from UCLA--at least the kind of respect he wanted.

MB: You seem comfortable with the idea that there was a pre-European altered reality that he brought forward though.

Oh yes, and I think if people could take that, and use it, and refrain from dropping off cliffs into other dimensions...If people would keep their power... I'm very moved by people's reactions to my book. I've been getting letters saying they're saved.

MB: You're setting people free; what a great service.

Yeah, it's kind of hard to take in. It's like, it didn't turn into this big bestseller because I parted ways with Simon and Schuster, so it's hard to pay the mortgage, but...

MB: Yeah, writing isn't consistent; we know that. But the movie's coming out, and with interviews and stuff, it could hit. There are a lot of books that come to life late.

There are a lot of books that come to life late, and my publisher's terrific because they keep books in print. I'm better off where I am, going through the hard times. The sense of service is so deep, when I get these letters. I sometimes cry, because to have literally saved a life. That's amazing.

MB: What better purpose to live for?

I know, I mean, it's the most beautiful thing. Or to have saved a marriage, or a family...

MB: Have you come in contact, either when you were in the group or since then, with people who, like you, responded to Victor Sanchez, with people that you really feel are living a Toltec existence or a spiritual existence?

Merilyn Tunneshende, no, and at the office we get a postcard a day from her saying, "Hi Honeybuns, love you, kissy kissies." And I saw her come to the workshop, if it was her, acting really crazy. I have read her publications, and I don't believe her. I don't know much about Ken Eagle; I'm kind of a "no comment there." Victor Sanchez has my total vote of confidence; I think he's the real thing. Tony is primarily Tibetan-oriented, but is really what you would call a spiritual human being. Miguel-Ruiz--they didn't try to sue him. He's kind of a watered-down, lightweight, but honest.

MB: Sort of a Christian, middle-American Castaneda.

Exactly. They didn't try to sue him; they left him alone. They didn't find grounds. It's incredible how litigious Carlos got.

MB: Regardless of that, his devout fans were furious at anyone that he didn't speak well of--loyal to a T.

And you know, I don't think that will ever end.

MB: No, because the books did touch so many lives and inspire so many people that regardless of who he changed into or who he really was, it almost doesn't matter.

Yeah, at Simon and Schuster, when I tried to leave, and it turned out I was contractually bound, I couldn't leave, and finally I pissed them off by telling my truth. My editor said, "Pablo Picasso put his cigarettes out on the arms of his mistresses; that doesn't mean he was any less a great artist, or a human being." Now I thought that was a pretty weird statement, because it means he was a creepy human being.

MB: Right, but his art is separate.

Right, but Carlos did create beautiful art, and if you can take it as such and separate that, then you've got the best. But people have so much trouble making that separation, because at certain points Carlos would say, "you have to follow all my commands" and at other days, "Throw out all my books. Don't read them, burn them; they're old stuff. They don't count anymore; they're meaningless." He really was like the weather.

The video, Enigma of a Sorcerer really ends with saying he was the perfect guru because he had feet of clay at the end.

Why does that make a man perfect?

MB: It was an interesting place to go with the ending.

I thought that was such a weird ending. Why does that make you a good guru? Because you have to wake up and find your own path? I ended my book with, "Don't give your power away."

MB: Amen. As you describe him in the book, he was the archetypal cult leader.

Does this cult remind you more of one than another?

MB: I think, in general, that they tended to go that way. You have a charismatic leader, and he falls into one temptation or another, and they become very "in-crowd-out-crowd."

And you'll never get in enough within the in-crowd.

MB: Right, and that's whole goal, and that's what keeps everybody running on the merry-go-round.

Exactly. The one thing I thought was really weird for a long time was that you couldn't join with money. He would take all your personal possessions, but that was my choice, he didn't make me do it. And if I had a really expensive piece of jewelry, but he thought that it had a bad vibe, he'd say, "Try to get some money by selling it." Florinda saved a couple things, because she knew better. And I was so enamored that I was willing to do anything. She comes off badly in the book, but I really love her.

MB: No person is black and white.

No, and she had that moment where she was like, "Save this, the day will come when it's really yours and you're gonna want it and be sorry." The only thing that I found was that was different than most groups was that you couldn't just join.

MB: You had to be invited to go.

Are there other groups like that?

MB: To the inner circles, yeah. There's always the Tensegrity workshops somewhere, so you can be in the outer circle, with the hope of catching someone's attention.

I've heard people say, "He looked in my eyes, and then I had hope for the rest of my life." And then they would go on these long tangents on the internet about what it all meant. As someone who was in this for so long, I can only say I was totally brainwashed and susceptible to it. But I see people there that are....nothing could move them. I like to think it could be otherwise, but maybe I got the best of it because I was closer in.

MB: I think so. Otherwise people live on fantasies and hopes.

And stories. I've heard about the current Tensegrity workshops, and people are saying, "I went here, and I went therewith The Blue Scout," and so on, and I don't believe that.

MB: On a sexual level in the book you portray Castaneda as almost superhuman.

Well, you know--because he had diabetes, he wasn't able to get a full erection--that's a sign of having diabetes, and sometimes of age. But he had an ability to have frequent, very frequent, orgasms. And I thought this was impossible, but I did some research and found out it was. Because I know a friend of my father's, just turned 90 and had twins. And Norman Lear, in his 70s, has little children. So obviously they're having sexual activity with their wives. Carlos and I had great chemistry; he and I just really clicked in a lot of ways, sexually. And I think that because of that, he put more into it.

MB: And yet, in the inner circle, he had sex with 10,20, 30 women.

I found out, and it was really hard to get answers, that some women he would only have sex with once every year, or once every six months or something, whereas we were having a lot more sex than the others, like, once a week.

MB: So he wasn't quite Wilt Chamberlain.

No, the numbers may have been great, but could he do it with frequency with everybody? No. And could he do it with a genuine... I mean, Florinda and I talked about this, if you can believe it or not, about his not having a full erection and stuff like that. And that's something I didn't want to talk about in the book. I don't mind you're using it; I just don't want it to sound distasteful.

MB: Right, you know, sex sells, and yet, if you do it wrong, people get so turned off.

Exactly, but this is a critical point: He had this orgasmic capacity, but he wasn't really performing the way you would normally make love that many times in a row. So he had capacity to have repeated orgasms. But his urge to have sex with as many people as possible was so strong, it meant so much to him... I know this sounds silly, but he was so obsessed with his height, that I wouldn't be surprised if it stemmed from that.

MB: Sure. Napoleon conquered all of Europe.

There you go, and he and I were exactly the same size. When I came into the group, Florinda said, "At last someone his size" in front of all the other women, and they looked at me like they were gonna kill me. And although he was very amorous with some of the taller women, I think there were a handful of us...like his adopted daughter--he was completely infatuated with her sexually, so I think he must have been having as much sex with her as he was with me, or more. But, with other women, it wasn't that way. I knew one woman in the book whose name I changed--she was in the group for years before he even approached her sexually. Whereas, he approached me sexually before I was in the group. So, whether it was a judgment call of how to get someone in the group, or whether it was attraction, or whether it was because my father was famous and there was some competition there, I don't know. You know that they really, really liked each other but he also wanted to show that he could have his.... I have a friend who he wanted to have the daughter of, and... I don't know.

MB: Did he ever use herbs?

Yeah, he gave me rosemary, which he cut himself from the side of the house, and I was told this was from a cutting by don Juan. He would send them via the witches or hand them to me in big bags, and I was supposed to bathe in them, and never immerse myself in water, although I took baths anyway and no one ever knew the difference. We used to swim in my pool, the witches and I--no one ever knew the difference. And he wanted me to fill the pool in with dirt, and I couldn't afford it, so we promised never to use it but we (Carol, Taisha, and I) used it every day. So, he couldn't see, you know, psychically that way. And the herbs were supposed to be used on a footstool with a little douche bag, and they were to take away the ugly sperm of anyone else I'd ever had sex with. I did this religiously forever, and its actually a very healthy herb for the genitals for the woman; it helps prevent against infections, and what-have-you. It wasn't really dangerous, just a general cleansing. But then Taisha said I could buy it at the store, and I told her I couldn't--it was Don Juan's. And she went, "Oh, oops." And then she said, "You know, we cut down all the rosemary." And I asked her why, and she said, "Well, we had to change everything magically." And it was just kind of to piss everybody off. I don't think it was Don Juan's cutting, it was a beautiful plant that grows everywhere in Southern California, but they made it into something that was larger than it really was.

MB: Did the number of the inner circle change over time?

Oh God, it was constantly changing. There was a small handful that remained the same, but even people who were in the original group got kicked out. There was an Orange Scout that had the highest honors, The Blue Scout, kicked out. One had a complete nervous breakdown, and now wears a colostomy bag, but still believes in all this. It is so sad, and so heartbreaking, and Carole said such horrible things. She said, "Well, we'll throw her $10,000; that's what Carlos gives when he wants to get rid of people." This is some brutal stuff. The inner circle was constantly changing, and there was this very small, small core of about half a dozen people that remained. Some of them are now gone of course, and now I would say Tracy, and Bruce, and Deborah, but she didn't come to the classes....and I think she got herself in hot water, because she's a lawyer, and she's gonna come in for some very heavy questioning and she's in a very tight spot so she minded her p's and q's when she said, "Are you gonna do something stupid?" It's very weird for Carlos to die and within three days for these women to come in draw out their wills. That's not normal.

MB: Yeah, anymore than keeping the body for, how long before reporting it?

Well, they took it to... I don't know how many days. Richard knows all this, and he would be very willing to help, He's good with facts, about how many days before they took him to the crematorium, and the people who were going through the garbage, Rick and Gabby, they went to the crematorium, and they identified the body as appearing to them like Carlos so they took the body right away. He was cremated, and we don't know what they did with it. But they didn't keep the body, but once he died, they got rid of the body; the doctor, wrote out a false death certificate, and that's really illegal. I said, "Why did you say this? Why did you say that?" And I was worried that we might all have AIDS, because we all had sex with him. And she said, "Well, all I can tell you is that it was a noncommunicable liver disease, and someday maybe I'll be able to tell you more. And we know that it was liver cancer, as well as advanced diabetes. But Florinda said, "We think he was a death defier; we think you did it to him." I was accused of killing him on more than one occasion because I had poisoned his past or I.... The whole thing about the antidepressants was weird because I had taken them and then I flushed them all down the toilet. Well, they were like drinking, certain people, and taking Vicodin,

MB: Where do you think he went wrong? Do you think there was ever a moment he could have become something greater, something more noble?

I like to think that, because when you love someone you kind of love them forever. I still love him, and maybe there is a part of me that does believe that. I think that having all these women went to his head, and unfortunately I'm starting to learn that it started very early, before the books. He left his pregnant fiancée in Peru, and was fooling around, and he was the roommate of this guy named Alan Cummings, that had come to the readings, while he was writing the first book, and before the first book. And that's how he met Joanie and Lenore, and he was bringing women all the time. So something happened in that family--maybe the story he told about his grandfather saying "You're short and unattractive and you have a handsome cousin, but you have to get women this other way," maybe that really happened. And maybe that scarred him so much that from the moment he could start seduction he did, and then the books helped so much, that I think that probably was an irresistible pull.

I think that, if he had realized that he was basically a sexaholic because of reasons of severe insecurity and had sought help or had done something about it, or written about that, I think he could've saved himself. But I think this all started long before he left... and what's sad, or good, is that he really did have knowledge.

One of the things I noticed is this: People said of him, "Did he ever stop acting like a guru?" And I said, "When he would fall asleep." And he stopped dreaming in some lucid dreaming, and those moments, he would just say, "Oh sweetie." He would act like an absolutely normal person in the most normal, normal, normal, sweet way that a lover could act at that moment. And then, when he would wake up, if it was a nap, and he would start telling me some bizarre tale about how he murdered people--he was really into telling me about how me murdered people. That was one of his favorite stories.

MB: Yeah, he was working on a love story, that....

...it was called Assassins. Carol first told me it was so garbled, I guess by the medications, and it was so horrendous and so ugly that it should be burned and destroyed and no one should ever see it. And then a week later I said, "So what did you do it?" And she said, "Oh, it's a beautiful book, gorgeous; it's going to be published." So we may see a ghostwritten, posthumous, version of that.

MB: Yeah that would be weird, wouldn't that be weird. I'm sure it'll see the light of day. Or somebody will create it just to sell it.

I know. People can go on forever. There's a guy who came out with a book saying, " I was Carlos Castaneda; I'm channeling him." And he's probably selling better than I am. I'm taking people's religion away from them. And, on one hand, people are writing me these beautiful letters, but on the other hand, I'm really upsetting people.

MB: Oh, when we were printing Marilyn Tunneshende's articles, we got some of the worst hate mail; they made the Christians look loving.

But she was kind of more pro-Carlos.

MB: But in her articles she was questioning....

And they made the Christian mail look loving?

MB: Yeah because they were so devoted to Carlos and the myth that they didn't want to hear that he was human or that some of it might be fictional.

Did she say some of the things I'm saying in her own words?

MB: Yeah.

Really, well, she switches around a lot, though, because she has her own workshops... Sometimes she says, "I was a student of Don Juan." I mean, was she saying, "I was and he wasn't"?

MB: No, she's saying she was after him. Once Don Juan threw Carlos out, then Marilyn and Don Juan became lovers, according to Marilyn.

And what about her affair with Carlos, and "Honeybunny"?

MB: She tried to hide it for the longest time, and then she came up with the cover story that Don Juan had sent her as an undercover agent to find out what Carlos was doing.

So that's why she became a lover and then we got daily postcards?

MB: Well, that's where it really broke down--at the questioning of that is when she stopped writing for us.

I see.

MB: I traveled in Peru doing research for my book, and I didn't meet one person in Cahamaca who knew that Casteneda was born there.

Well, his father was supposedly a jeweler.

MB: But its not like they have shrine there or even tourist tickets to a house that he was born in or anything at all.

Isn't that amazing? Florinda just gave me such a bad goodbye that it was horrible, but one of the last things she did was give me this really weird piece of jewelry, which was a pendant with some stones in it, and I showed it to so many jewelers and nobody had ever seen anything like it. It looked like a kind of eye-shaped thing; she said, "Don't wear it; it'll look like a cow bell. It'll make you look like a cow. Besides, Nury and Kylie will get jealous, so we can't have you wearing it. Just keep it." Well, actually, because it was from her and it was her final gift, and I love her, sometimes I do wear it, occasionally, but one jeweler I showed it to said that it was a kind of Argentinean work, and I wonder if Carlos didn't learn some trade from his father.

MB: I would bet.

And maybe he made that thing. And that was why it was really big...

MB: Yeah, that would make sense. Do you think the Tensegrity was stolen from a martial arts teacher that Carlos studied with?

I took Howard Lee's class; I took a private session, and when Howard found out that I knew Carlos and that I wasn't just coming to him for information, he was all over me with questions. Because Carlos tried to ditch him and deny him, and they were down the street from one another at one point, and there was a crowd around them, and Howard is tall, and he said, "Carlos, Carlito!" And Carlos hid and cowered, and Bruce covered him like a football player, and Howard decided he wouldn't have any of it, and he broke right into the circle and said, "Carlos, why are you doing this?" And Carlos decided the only way to play it was to break huddle and open his arms, put his arms around him and say "Howard, how are you?" So I think a great deal was taken from his many years of study with Howard. We also know the other women studied karate, but I don't know about the other martial arts. I also think Carlos probably made up some beautiful things, because some of them, I haven't seen them anywhere else. But I don't know if they're taught in the Peruvian tradition you learned about. Are they?

MB: No, well, I didn't see anything down there when I was down there.

It's amazing that no one knows the family, I don't know the real family name.

MB: It's Spiter.

And nobody knows the family?

MB: Well, I looked in the phone book, and there was nothing, and I asked around and nobody knew, so...

Now, he would be...he died X number of years ago, his parents have died, there's probably no one around. And I think he was an only child, so there probably just isn't anyone to remember him.

MB: Yeah, it's sort of ironic. He took the pre-Incan and Peruvian beliefs and brought them to world knowledge without telling the world what they really were, and yet no one in his hometown knows who he was.

It's extremely ironic. I've never talked to anyone who's been there to find out and told me. I'm actually really glad to hear that he brought that here.

MB: No, it's beautiful, because there's so much down there that stays down there, and its never exposed to the world. It's a convoluted path it took.

I believe that Carlos benefited from the martial arts, and took probably most from Howard, and maybe a lot from other people over the years. Recapitulation has done very powerful things for me; it's very powerful. I've heard other variants on ways to do it and stuff like that, but they claim it its their lineage.

MB: There was once a Nagual newsletter.

What happened to that?

MB: Well, it went away, and the fellow joined the group, but I'm not sure to what degree or what happened to him.

I know what happened. He was invited to what was called the Sunday class.

MB: Which was the forty chosen?

Which I was in charge of until Carlos got really pissed off at me, in the final months of his life, and kicked me out and put someone else in charge. But for years I was in charge of this class, and it was really sad because he would tell people there was no class, and they'd be kicked out, and I'd call, and they'd never know if I was telling them the truth. And sometimes he really was taking a break, so it was just agony for these people and every week they got more and more scared. He'd say, "Any questions?" And every time you opened your mouth, you said something wrong and you were never invited back, so there would be this terrible silence, and he said, "None of you have questions?" So that was awful. But then, the Nagual newsletter, he was really brave and eccentric, and he would ask questions, and Carlos took a liking to him, and never kicked him out. But Carlos went to Florinda and told her to "get this thing stopped." And at that time he was into it, and he stopped it at their request. He writes about that on the Sustained Action site. He's still active there.

MB: Sustained Action?

Sustainedaction.org has a huge list. I've been off the board because of computer problems for about a month, but I was answering questions, five thousand hits, four thousand hits, or something like that somebody told me the last time they checked. But there's all kinds of other stuff. Richard did a chronology of all of Carlos's students and all the history of the group, and all the people he talked to. So that would be an incredible board for some of your questions.

MB: What about your other books. How are they doing?

The Book of Lists series were #1 on the New York Times Bestsellers List. The psychic healing book was a cult classic and is about to go into its 30th anniversary edition.

MB: Wow, congratulations.

Thank you, we just sold it to North Atlantic books. Carlos hated it, and told me to destroy it, and then he used to pull me aside and say, "You know, you really are psychic, and there are such things as psychics, but I can't let your ego blow up, so I have to keep blowing it apart."

MB: And its my show, not yours. [laughter]

Yeah, exactly--don't you dare. I wrote it with a collaborator, Bill Henkin, and he wrote all the essays, which I don't necessarily go along with, but I wrote all the techniques, and the book is, I think, popular, because it tells you, for the cost of a paperback, how you can sit down and meditate on your chakras for self-healing and for reading, and you don't need a guru.

MB: That's what you should be teaching workshops on.

Exactly, and I've been giving lectures and readings and saying, "The power's in you". What I'd love to teach is accessing one's own power and ways to proceed.

MB: Having spoken to you, I would encourage you deeply. I think you have a lot to offer on that level, I really do.

Thank you.

MB: I meet a lot of people who know and don't know, over the years. You have a very clean essence; I think you could bring forth something that would really empower people.

Carlos spoke some truisms, and one of them was, "Service was very high, if not the highest, form." And that would be an act of service, and for that reason, I want to do it. It's very, very kind of you to say that.

MB: Carlos spoke of major changes and the witches spoke of major changes coming in the world.

They were never specific. Richard kept notes, and most of them are on the website. He might be able to actually say they said this. Nothing they ever predicted happened. And there was nothing even of note that I recall. But, Richard, he and I are like night and day; the difference is that because Carlos was homophobic, they wouldn't let him in. They used him kind of, you know, as a consultant, but he couldn't be in the group because he was homosexual. Maybe now he feels better off, but at the time it hurt him terribly. We're very, very close, and I feel like we're the only two that left. But on the other hand, we're in different situations, because I was the only one that left that was actually inside. Everyone else got kicked out, and I was the only one that chose to walk away. I don't want to be "victim-y," buts it's different; our experiences are different. We all have our own pain, and his pain may have been greater, because he never got in. He works on this website an hour-and-a half every night--just on my part--to keep people from slandering me and to keep only honest questions. He also works a million hours a day at his regular job. This is true loyalty. His therapist told him he had to let go of all this, and he said not until this book is out and we get some truth out. He's very devoted to that. He's done so much to help with the relatives, and also I've had kind of a break. I just was so....

MB: Oh God, such an experience. Most people, when they leave intense cults, go through huge trauma for a long, long time.

I became accident prone, I fell down some stairs, I started losing things. People kept saying, "I'm worried about you, I'm worried about you, I don't understand why. Wasn't it a catharsis?" I said, "Yeah, it was a catharsis, but it's not over. People's bodies are found, and there are people who want to kill me, and it's really tough. It was a lot of years, you know. I mean, it's so great to hear you understand that. I'm so tired of explaining to people why I'm not all better now.

MB: Yeah, well, anyone who's been through that at any level has some level of empathy that you can only get that way, I think.

Yeah, and it sounds like you've probably been through things in your life.

MB: I've touched a few nightmares and a few heavens.

Have you written a book?

MB: Yes.

What is it? I'd like to get it.

MB: It's the Secret of the Ancient Incas. What do you feel Carlos's most important accomplishment was?

I think the first three books.

MB: Yeah, I agree.

And after that, I think, everything was downhill.

MB: How do you think people should remember him?

I think people should remember him as a writer, a fiction writer, who compiled parables, and used some real truths of ancient practices in his work. And they should not believe in the cult's whole group myth. That's very important.

Copyright Magical Blend Magazine, © MB Media 2004

Last Edited By: Abramelinn 07/02/07

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