Martin Goodman - I Was Carlos Castaneda: The Afterlife Dialogues

Table of Contents

FOR JAMES

Crazy old men are essential to society.
Otherwise young men have no suitable models.

JAMES BROUGHTON

Praise for I WAS CARLOS CASTANEDA

In the beginning, I thought this was a book of metafiction or magical realism. It is something else entirely: a discussion between new friends, a dreamy travelogue, a teaching. It is a magical mystery tour in humility, truth, death, betrayal, forgiveness, the envelopment of nature, written as clearly and powerfully as a French Pyrenees river where Goodman and Castaneda stop to swim and talk.

Karla Kuban,
author of Marchlands

From the Pyrenees to the Amazon rain forest, Martin Goodman vividly describes Castanedas most powerful and important teachings the nature of the journey beyond death.

Alberto Villoldo, Ph.D.,
author of Shaman, Healer, Sage and Dance of the Four Winds

Carlos Castaneda lives! Martin Goodman is a mystic, poet, and superb storyteller, and with his rare combination of gifts he has brought the legendary sorcerers apprentice to vivid life in this enchanting tale about life and death, truth and illusion, fate and freedom.

John Horgan,
author of The End of Science

The Old Trickster has done it again! Having stirred up a storm of controversy and speculation in his lifetime with his astonishing tales of sorcerers and shamans, Castaneda now makes a posthumous appearance in Martin Goodmans story. But now Goodman plays the role of bewildered student, to Carloss amused and provocative pronouncements.

Ralph Metzner, Ph.D.,
author of The Unfolding Self

To invite someone like Carlos Castaneda into ones life, especially when hes dead, is asking for it. Martin Goodman, who barely escaped death in Amazonas, gets the full treatment from the old master and learns a thing or two to his own and the readers advantage.

Francis Huxley,
author of The Way of the Sacred

Goodman, writing with warmth and humor, has woven a story of a modern day shamans apprentice, cast adrift amid the turbulent outer zones of consensus reality before returning once again to solid ground. It is a delightful read, and I recommend it highly.

Charles S. Grob, M.D.,
professor of psychiatry at the UCLA School of Medicine

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

At the close of a ceremony sometime after the events described in this book, the participants held a thanksgiving. Thanks were given to friends, and also to those who had made lives hell for a while. They were all part of the history that had brought us to the present moment, and that moment was absolutely fine. Worth all the thanks we could ever give.

So the distinction between friends and enemies was dropped, and everybody was thanked by name. When we ran out of names we moved on to species, so even mosquitoes and malarial parasites got a mention.

Many people are part of the fabric of this book in some way. They have my thanks, even though they are not necessarily named here. Names are withheld to honor their privacy most of all. For the same reason, I have disguised, renamed, omitted, and merged characters in the narrative. People are free to declare their own interests and involvement in the story told here. I intend that they also be free to keep their anonymity.

This book could not have happened without my earlier practice in breaking bounds. My years in Scotland introduced me to an alternative and vigorous take on culture, and I thank the Scottish Arts Council for their generous funding for my writing career.

In teaching terms, my weekly tutorials with Professor Peter Geach engaged me with a master of Socratic dialogue. Professor Geoffrey Hill brazenly confounded lecture halls filled with students who wanted their literature simplified or explained in psychological terms, and showed the way to wonder. I appreciated this renowned poets advice that my own writing must first be grounded in the study of those who have gone before me. Its hard to break the bounds without recognizing them.

James Broughtons first gift to me was a copy of his Androgyne Journal, a manual for transcending all known categories of wonder. He led life on his own terms, and those terms were dictated by love. Even in illness his encouragement for my writing was constant, and I have enjoyed trying to implement some of the lessons he gave. He now blesses heaven as well as Earth.

Jeanette Watson gave inspirational and truly generous support at a crisis point in my career, an act that helped make this book possible.

My thanks to Christobel Haward, whose readiness to gift her little house in the French Pyrenees ultimately saw me in place for the events in this book. My thanks to Pam Clark and Mel Clark, and Madame Rosa Capela, for their care for me and my home in the village. It is a magical land.

As is my home in mountains near Santa Fe, New Mexico, where I am writing now. The land here has nurtured this book.

On the morning I was to begin writing, a coyote stepped out of the surrounding woodland and paced around the yard. I have glimpsed coyotes bodies gliding between the trees, and I wake regularly to the primeval chorus of their celebration howls as they gather in the night outside our house, but this is the only such daytime sighting in my years here. I took the appearance as a special blessing on the nature of this book, and so I thank the coyote.

When I walked from the house to begin that days writing, I came up to the bothy. This is a sublime and beautiful writing studio gifted to the land by Emma Thompson and designed by Greg Wisethe architectural work itself an astonishing gift. Greg speaks of the design as a fallen tepee, for the structure is angled for its roof to rest on a lattice of massive and graceful hand-hewn beams as it shoots high to embrace the view of mountains. The building redefines Santa Fe style in a most appropriate way, for it embodies the union of sky and Earth that is so strong a feature of the high-altitude life here. It is a blessing to have worked here.

My thanks to Lynette Herring, Dr. Romig, and the staff of St. Vincents Hospital here in Santa Fe. Without their urgent care and expertise I would not have lived to finish this tale.

Not all stories are meant to be told. After writing the first episodes, I set this book aside. It seemed enough to have survived the personal experience, and there was still a lot to learn from the lessons I had received. I doubted my strength to bring this particular book into being and thus engage with the energy of the world. So I thank my mother, Kay ONeill, for reading that early portion and urging me to continue. You might notice from the nature of this book what an unusual mother I have. She was my first lesson in breaking bounds.

Toinette Lippe recognized the merit in that early portion, and worked selflessly and resourcefully with my agent Lorraine Kisly to bring it to its publishing home. My editor Patricia Gift moved swiftly to create that publishing home at Three Rivers Press. They are my blithe spirits. I couldnt have written this book without their encouragement and support, so I thank them very much.

My thanks to Ralph Metzner and Dr. Charles Grob, who gave early and expert help in putting my experiences of ayahuasca into perspective. Also to Colleen Kelly, Robert Ott, George Greer, and Requa Tolbert for their inspired listening and pleasing counsel, and Mac Hawley for his reminiscences of Castaneda that should have prepared me better for my meeting.