The Twin Positions

Castaneda described a technique in his book “the art of dreaming” to achieve what he called “total perception/cohesion” in dreaming.

It’s really simple:

Dream yourself going to sleep in the exact body position you when to sleep, being sideways, upside down or on your back.

Try it and see. :tongue:

Didn’t really understand what you were trying to say…maybe you could explain it more?

I used to be a huge Carlos Castaneda fan, and I still like his earlier books, but my trust in him has greatly fallen since I learned more about him after reading his books. He really went coo coo after Don Juan left him.

Well… think about it. The problem of dreaming control is our fleeting, uncontrolled attention. This technique fixes our attention, giving us full control over our dreams.

As for Castaneda, his personal history is irrelevant. His books are not about him, but about the teachings of the nagual seers.

“Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water”

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I’ll agree his personal history is irrelevant, and I have gotten many nuggets of knowledge from reading his books, but I think his books are a better reflection on his …personal reconditioning… than on nagual teachings… just my opinion…

As for the technique, I have yet to try this, thank you for reminding me,

For anyone else that didn’t quite understand, basically, while Lucid , you want to lay back down in the position you originally fell asleep in, and “fall asleep again”, (maybe a good means for a teleport technique too?)

I don’t recall if their was much explanation on how this technique achieves the purpose, (and imho is likely as effective as a good “Increase Lucidity!” shout), but I am interested in trying it, and would like to hear if other people or Speculator has had much of success with this technique as well?

Thinking about it a bit more, I think the act may help focus attention, by focusing your awareness on moderating your emotions, and tricking your mind to dream a dream of dreaming, so to speak, even if you lose some lucidity; I can suspect a few hurdles to successfully accomplish this technique, but practicing in this manner would be a good means to practice overcoming those hurdles as well.

Try it (again and again and again) and see. For many others this did the job. Do you need convincing in order to try it for yourself?

In the end it only matters if it works for you.

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Greetings All -

This is a very interesting, and hot topic for me. Within the last month, I have been devoting my lucid dreaming to exploring some of Castaneda’s techniques. I have specifically been working with “seeing energy” in dreams. I have only been able to try out twice within the last month, but with very limited success. I know that sometimes these ideas can take a while before they can completely take hold in the dream state, so I plan to keep experimenting with this.

But what I want to relate here is that a few days ago, I became lucid in a dream, and tried the “Twin positions” technique for the first time.
When I became lucid, I found myself in in a building. I got the feeling it was some kind of dormitory or something. I walked in to a room with lots of empty beds, and I tried to remember what I wanted to do once I was lucid. I did not remember that I wanted to “see energy,” but the beds made me remember the twin positions technique that Castaneda got from the “The Tenant” I immediately decided to try this. I walked over to a bed in front of me, and got into the same position I had fallen asleep in. After moment, a voice began speaking in my mind. It was speaking english, and I heard what it was saying, but it seemed peripheral, so I did not really try to understand what it was saying. In the next instant, my entire dream body felt the sensation that one gets when the astral body “slams” instantly back into the physical body due to a powerful repercussion. The only difference was that I did not end up back in my physical body. I was still dreaming! Lying in bed. Only now, there were a small group of people around me that seemed to know what was going on. I sat up and asked one of them (an Asian woman) if I had done it [meaning successfully used the technique] They indicated that I had. The woman and her companions were giving me their very careful attention. In the next moment, they helped me out of the bed I was in then put me in another bed next to it that had a bright red covering, and it seemed they wanted me to lay down again. I did, and in the next few moments the dream ended, and I “woke up” in my own physical bed.

This was a very interesting first experience with the Twin Positions technique. I believe the sensation of repercussion (which was not painful at all) was related to my consciousness locking into the dreaming position. I experienced a similar sensation (though less powerful) once when I was experimenting with another Castaneda technique that involved using your hands as a “point of departure,” and exploring the dream aspects. Both of these techniques are meant to stabilize the dreaming position, or as Carlos Castaneda would say “fix the assemblage point on a particular dreaming position”
I think the voice that I was hearing may have been what Castaneda calls the “voice of seeing” or “the dreaming emissary”

I would be interested in hearing about any experiences other people have had with the “Twin Positions” technique.
~ Larther

just wondering, who is castenada?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Dreaming
scribd.com/doc/9561310/Casta … f-Dreaming

Besides, if I get another high-lucid, I’m definitely gonna try this one. A suggestion for everyone, watch out for FA’s after attempting :tongue:

This sounds really interesting. I have read the Art of Dreaming but i had forgotten about this technique. Using my hands as a point of focus once i have become lucid helps me maintain lucidity very well. This sounds like quite an intense technique.