A WARRIOR’S PRAYER
A Love Affair with the World
Excerpted from Tales of Power
By Carlos Castaneda
From the final chapter: The Predilection of Two Warriors
Pages 288-294
Pocket Books/Washington Square Press; 1974

We are all alone.  That is our condition.  We are alone, but to die alone is not to die in loneliness.

A warrior acknowledges his pain, but he doesn’t indulge in it.  Thus, the mood of a warrior, who enters into the unknown, is not one of sadness.  On the contrary, he feels joyful because he feels humbled by his great fortune, confident that his spirit is impeccable, and above all, fully aware of his efficiency.  A warrior’s joyfulness comes from having accepted his fate, and from having truthfully assessed what lies ahead of him.

The life of a warrior cannot possibly be cold and lonely and without feelings because it is based on his affection, his devotion, his dedication to his beloved.  A warrior’s love is the world.

The earth knows that a warrior loves it, and it bestows upon him its care.  That’s why a warrior’s life is filled to the brim, and his state, wherever he’ll be, will be plentiful.  A warrior roams on the paths of his love, and, wherever he is, he is complete.

This earth, this world, for a warrior, there can be no greater love.

Only if one love’s this earth with unbending passion can one release one’s sadness.  A warrior is always joyful because his love is unalterable, and his beloved, the earth, embraces him, and bestows upon him inconceivable gifts.  The sadness belongs only to those who hate the very thing that gives shelter to their beings.

This lovely being, which is alive to its last recesses, and understands every feeling, soothed me.  It cured me of my pains, and finally, when I had fully understood my love for it, it taught me freedom.

Without an unwavering love for the being that gives you shelter, aloneness is loneliness.  Only the love for this splendorous being can give freedom to a warrior’s spirit.  And freedom is joy, efficiency, and abandon in the face of any odds.  That is the last lesson.  It is always left for the last moment, for the moment of ultimate solitude, when a man faces his death and his aloneness.  Only then does it make sense.