"I'm never angry at anybody! No human being can do anything important enough for that. You get angry at people when you feel that their acts are important. I don't feel that way any longer.'
Power rests on the kind of knowledge one holds. What is the sense of knowing things that are useless?'
"The twilight is the crack between the worlds,"
Is there a special way to avoid pain?'
'Yes, there is a way.'
'Is it a formula, a procedure, or what?'
"It is a way of grabbing onto things. For instance, when I was learning about the devil's weed i was too eager. I grabbed on things the way kids grab onto candy. The devil's weed is only one of a million paths. Anything is one of a million paths lun camino entre cantidades de caminos). Therefore you must always keep in mind that a path is only a path; if you feel you should not follow it, you must not stay with it under any conditions. To have such clarity you must lead a disciplined life, Only then will you know that any path is only a path, and there is no affront, to oneself or to others, in dropping it if that is what your heart tells you to do. But your decision to keep on the path or to leave it must be free of fear or ambition. I warn you, Look at every path closely and deliberately. Try it as many times as you think necessary. Then ask yourself, and yourself alone, one question. This question is one that only a very old man asks. My benefactor told me about it once when I was young, and my blood was too vigorous for me to understand it. Now I do understand it. I will tell you what it is: Does this path have a heart? All paths are the same: they lead nowhere. They are paths going through the bush, or into the bush. In my own life I could say I have traversed long, long paths, but I am not anywhere. My benefactor's question has meaning now. Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good; if it doesn't, it is of no use, Both paths lead nowhere; but one has a heart, the other doesn't.
One makes for a joyful journey, as long as you follow it, you are one with it."
in Don Juan by Carlos Castañeda
