In his book, The Fire From Within, we read the following account of Juan Matus shifting Carlos Castaneda’s assemblage point.

“It’s time for you to shift that assemblage point of yours just a bit,” he said.  “I can’t talk to you when you are in your idiot’s stage.” 

He smacked me with the palm of his hand on three spots: right on the crest of my right hipbone, on the centre of my back below my shoulder blades, and on the upper part of my right pectoral chest muscle.

My ears immediately began to buzz.  A trickle of blood ran out of my right nostril, and something inside me became unplugged.  It was as if some flow of energy had been blocked and suddenly began to move again.”

The ancient Chinese Zen Master, Ma Tsu, was once reported as suddenly kicking a disciple in his chest, causing the disciple a great awakening.    

Another ancient Chinese Zen Master, Tung Shan, would explain that this initial stage of Zen should be called “Shift” because it is a shift in consciousness from the ordinary state of cognition called “Guest Position” (Tonal’s perception) into “Host Position” (Nagual Awareness).

When the Shift takes place, according to Tung Shan, it means the Inner Real contains the Outer Appearance without being further imprisoned in it.  He also called it Host (Nagual)-looking-at-Guest (Tonal).  About this matter, he also wrote some explanatory verses:

“The Real containing the Seeming! 

Early in evening, before the moon shines,

No wonder Host and Guest (Nagual and Tonal)

Meet without knowing one another,

For still hidden is their mutual aversion!”

“Moonlight” here symbolizes Enlightenment of Heightened Awareness before which a human being does not realize that the duality of phenomenal objects and the phenomenal body have their source in the Higher noumenal world of Energy or Power.

In India, a Siddhayoga Sadguru will sometimes give Shaktipat (Descent of Power) by physically contacting the disciple, often by a slap on the back.  According to Swami Muktananda in his book, Kundalini: The Secret of Life:

“After you receive Shaktipat, meditation starts spontaneously, and at the same time, prana and apana, the incoming and outgoing life-energy-breath, become balanced, and long kumbhaka (retention of breath) begins to take place effortlessly.  The prana becomes extremely subtle and moves in the sushumna (central subtle nerve channel in the spine), and then the sushumna opens up and begins to unfold…After Shaktipat, one may experience involuntary movements of the body, such as shaking and movements of the arms and legs.  The head may even begin to rotate violently…”

Anthony Archer-Forbes, in his article, Dervish Ritual, within the volume, The Diffusion of Sufi Ideas in the West reports a healing ritual where advanced Sufi Dervishes transfer higher energy into suffering people to heal them:

“In one dramatic instance, the Chief pointed his finger at four sufferers, and they began to tremble and shake almost uncontrollably; finally collapsing on the floor, and then rising at a signal.  A change certainly seemed to have come over them: a load seemed shifted from their shoulders.  ‘That’, said Anwar, ‘was the Larz (shaking), which comes through the utter concentration of force on the patient.  It must be removed at once, otherwise they develop a taste for it and indulge in it in senseless orgies…This trembling can be accompanied by animal noises and pantomime.  It can only be removed by a Sufi Master…Some (wrongly motivated) practitioners use such energization of people to maintain power over them.  These produce the Larz and then do not take it off.  As a result, the patients develop a dependency feeling for the operator.”

Half-baked, semi-developed people, through Shamanic and Yogic practices, get to the point or stage where they make their higher energy have an affect on lower energy people, which can cause such people to have strange experiences.  It can indeed cause trembling, emotional excitement or occult visions.  When such things act upon the unprepared Assemblage Point, it should be stopped.  Neither the Transmitting Operator nor the recipient seeker should continue in their mutual indulgence.  Real higher development cannot happen until the emotional aspirants develop certain preliminary qualities, such as what Juan Matus called “Developing the simplified and fluid Tonal of a Warrior-Traveler.”  What happens to raw beginners who become dominated by an Energizer/Dominator is merely a signal of a potential that will never become fully developed through an energetic dependency.  The aspiring occult, Shamanic or Siddhayogi student must learn to raise his or her own energy level into Heightened Awareness through breathing exercises up-and-down the spine, accompanied by Words of Power in the Mind.  In addition, it is indispensable to learn to stop the internal dialogue or brain chatter.

In the ultimate analysis, Power Herself decides the necessary method or timing of self-energization and energization-from-a-Teacher for balancing of Energization and Heightened Awareness.  To try an unbalanced approach of either relying exclusively on an empowering Teacher or stubbornly sticking proudly to some low energy breathing method for independence is to be nothing but a Sheep or a Goat.  An occasional boost from the Nagual, Siddhayogi or Sufi Master is indispensable in conjunction with one’s own self-effort of patient practice and development.

When I was an occultly greedy young man back in the early 1970’s, I made the acquaintance of a semi-developed Siddhayogi from Kerala State in South India.  I asked for and was given Shaktipat from him, which he administered in the form or Prasad, food empowered by him in the form of two plums.  The first plum turned me every way but loose.  As for the second plum, I never ate it because it took me a long time to assimilate the first plum, plus I instinctively wanted to avoid forming a dependency on that particular Siddhayogi.  Later on I had developed myself to the point where I found I could also administer Shaktipat, so stupidly I formed a cult of Energy Dependents.  Later on I dissolved this cult and went on to more mature development, having learned my lesson.  As a Nagual, I no longer try to work with volunteers.  Real Sufis and Siddhas also understand this principle.  However, Carlos Castaneda never understood it and it destroyed him.  We also can observe how accepting volunteers is presently destroying Merilyn Tunneshende.

Advanced Adepts can also give Shaktipat Empowerment through their Energy Doubles just on the edge of physical visibility or even quasi-physically as Don Genaro would sometimes do for Castaneda as his Benefactor.  I have myself experienced this kind of blessing or transmission from a variety of great people for over forty years.  I once even received Shaktipat coming out of a photograph of a Godwoman of India.  It was so powerful that I fainted.  Respect and receptivity can sometimes open an inner door for us that argumentative pride of the Tonal or Social Self only keeps closed.