Review - New Code and Toltec Sorcery with Damian Sinclair

[Hobgoblin]

I arrived at Earl's court in London for the first of five weekly sessions that would comprise a course in Toltec Sorcery, from an NLP perspective, with the wisdom and integrity of the New Code. I was surrounded by the buzz of London on a busy Saturday, and I was there to meet a modern day sorcerer who would teach us what he knows.

In the 1960's, an anthropologist, Carlos Castaneda, began his apprenticeship with Yaqui Indian sorcerer Don Juan Matus. Eleven books tell his story. Damian has applied the skills of NLP modelling to these, and two other texts by female apprentices Florinda Donner Grau and Taisha Abelar. From that, this unique course was produced.

Toltec Sorcery is inseperable from the original New Code, as presented in Turtles All The Way Down. There are three current approaches to the New Code that I am aware of; the John Grinder / Carmen Bostic St Clair games approach, Judith DeLozier's approach of accessing the unconscious thruogh the body, and Damian's approach which views New Code as the place where Toltec Sorcery and classic NLP can meet.

The first session covered, amongst other things, the area of Not Doing. Not Doing, in sorcery refers to 'not doing' habitual actions and behaviours, doing something else instead, in order to expand possibilities and flexibility. As part of Not Doing, each participant was invited to attend the course as someone else, the Not Doing of who you believe you are. This related to occupation, style of dress, name, behaviour and anything else the person wanted to explore. It produced some very interesting results, particularly in terms of people's behaviour and items of clothing worn. Going around the room, each person introduced the character they had come as. Finally, with absolute congruence, Damian introduced who he was going to be for the day - a Grigori angel. The introduction was so congruent that, for me, the moment was less jaw dropping than it otherwise might have been.

A woman asked him "Can I see your wings then?"
Damian's face betrayed nothing, as he slowly turned to her.
"Of course you can see my wings" he told her (gesturing to include the whole group) "We'll do that today."

Later, everyone left the venue to do exercises outside, the Walk of Power and Grace, Stopping the World and Active Dreaming. During Stopping the World, the foundation state for all sorcery practices, Damian, who was walking at the front of the group, offered to show us the wings, and described in detail his unfurling of them. I was expecting nothing to happen, I still had some internal dialogue, and almost wanted to smile. However, the events that followed came as a suprise to the whole group. A privacy agreement amongst the group prevents me describing exactly what happened, but what I can say is that it is one thing to accept intellectually the possibility of visual hallucination in trance, yet quite another to actually experience such an event. The wholt thing raised questions over the nature of reality and what constitutes proof, questions very relevant to sorcery and the New Code. What proof would determine a 'genuine' Grigori angel, when compared with someone who makes this claim falsely?

Not Doing homework was set at the end. This involved doing five things you regularly do, differently, and doing five things you would not normally do.

Before the second session, I wasn't sure that Damian could still take things to another level. I was wrong. Each session took things to a new level.

This session covered the principles and precepts of sorcery, Stalking, and the way in which we percieve then consolidate our own reality. Much was taught in metaphor; Damian is great at hypnotic metaphor, and hypnotic conversations. It can be difficult to sit opposite him, and look at him as he talks without noticing changes in your own state.

There are two predilections of sorcerers, Stalking and Dreaming. One of the Stalking exercises involved participants stalking a part of themselves, or another person with whom they had an issue. Another was an exercise on Petty Tyrants and how they can best be utilised. A lot of New Code material was used, following Damian's interpretation of, and developments to, the New Code.

Much of this session addressed the mystery of the assemblage point, the model of the world we uphold and experience, and how even small shifts in this can massively change our personal reality. There was an exercise, three points of Attention, which produced dramatic results for many people, certainly for me, with hallucinations in every modality occurring around the group. Even in normal states of consciousness it was hard not to be overly imaginative about what was seen, and what actually occurred in that room.

Over the sessions that followed, the limitations imposed by the social contract and personal history were discussed and explored, as well as the idea of Death as an Advisor. All of the capabilities of sorcerers are derived from the unconscious, and unconscious abilities are developed in sorcery, far beyond what occurs in NLP.

The third session dealt with the Toltec process known as the Recapitulation, a process involving reviewing life events in a detatched way, and reclaiming the energy and emotion still trapped in those contexts.

Dreaming was the main focus of the fourth session, with its processes, methodology, and practical applications being explored.

The final session was aimed at integrating all practical and intellectual material learned. So much has happened, and is still happening, and there is far more to this course, and to Toltec Sorcery than the limited comments I can make here.

Upon completion of the workshop, the oppurtunity is presented to commence a nine month practice period with structured daily activities and written work to cover the practical and conceptual aspects of Toltec Sorcery. If established criteria are met an invitation to participate in the Dreaming Cell, a group who meet to explore and develop sorcery, is issued.

At the beginning I wasn't sure how Damian would make this work. Modelling thirteen books into a five session, or three day course isn't an easy task, but the whole course worked really well.

Great material, great people and great results.



email addresses - ds131@hotmail.com (Damian)

lisadrandall@btinternet.com (company representative)