Version 2007.11.05

## "Encounters With The Nagual" - ©2004 by Armando Torres
Part II. Warriors' Dialogue

### An Inventory Of Beliefs

"How is your recapitulation going?"

His question caught me unaware. I answered that I had still not tried the exercise, because I was waiting for conditions at home to be favorable.

He gave me a very serious, almost reproachful look and commented that, for sorcerers, the totality of a path can be summed up in its first step.

"That means that the ideal conditions are here and now."

Softening the tone of his voice, he granted:

"It happens to everyone at first. To observe our life is an agitating exercise because to get to the bottom of things scares us, and it is easy to postpone it from one day to the next. But, if we insist, after a time of scrutiny we begin to discover that what we always found to be obvious and correct ways of thinking are in fact implanted beliefs.

"The ideas we become addicted to are made up of the densest matter in our mental contamination. In general, they all start from a defect of syntax. If the way we speak changes, our old ideas stop making sense, and are substituted by new ideas. That's why there are so many belief systems in the world.

"From the center of silent knowledge we all know that. That is why we are so rarely willing to practice our beliefs. We can spend a lifetime speaking of loving our fellow man, or turning the other cheek, but who dares to actually do it? There you have the wars for religion motives, where people are killed because of the peculiar way they pronounce God's name.

"Sorcerers know that beliefs based on ideas are false."

He explained to me that the starting point of our convictions is usually something that someone told us in an imperative or persuasive tone when we were children- before we had our own inventory of experiences for comparison. Or our convictions are one of the effects of the massive and subliminal propaganda to which modern man is subjected. Frequently, they come from a sudden and deep emotional outburst, like that suffered by those who allow themselves to be swept away by religious hysteria. That modality of belief is merely associative.

"At the core of each one of our actions, customs, or reactions, there is a hidden belief. Therefore, the initial task on the path of knowledge is to make an inventory of all those things we have placed our faith in."

He suggested that I dedicate a new notebook to that exercise, where I should write down all my beliefs. He assured me that this practice would help to make a map of my motivations and attachments.

"In each case," he said, "you should look for the source of your beliefs, and make a profound analysis of each one. Determine when and why it arose, what was there before that, how you felt, and how much your faith has changed over the years. The intention is not to justify anything, but rather simply to get things clear. This exercise is called 'stalking the believer'."

He predicted that the result of the practice would be to liberate me of my second-hand convictions, and emphasized that in the world of sorcerers, only direct experimentation is valid.