WHAT DOES FREEDOM MEAN TO YOU? Is it a life devoted to leisure? Perhaps it means not having to do a specific thing – looking after your parents, or children, or not working in a particular job, or perhaps not even having to work at all?

This is the category into which most people fall, for, when asked, most of us would say that we could be really free “if only we did not have to ...”, or “if only we had ...”. However, all of these wishes have little to do with real freedom. This is because they leave us hooked to a specific outcome, and so we remain trapped until that outcome comes about.

Freedom for those wishing to follow the Warrior’s Path, is somewhat different, and is described in a series of books by Théun Mares, a Toltec author and teacher.

Warriors know that life is unpredictable, and that the outcomes we desire may never materialise. For example, how many people limp along in their jobs, because they only have 5 or 10 years to go before their retirement, consoling themselves that they will then be able to do what they’ve always wanted? Yet, even if our dreams do come to fruition we often find out that the freedom we have sought still eludes us – as most millionaires discover. Even with a million dollars in the bank, we find that we still have the same fears, the same relationship problems, and the same deep sense of regret that we could have lived life to the full, instead of having frittered it away.

Yet, through our social conditioning we have all been taught to “live for tomorrow”, and so most people spend their lives waiting to win the “lottery of life” that is going to transform their lives from a mediocre existence into an exciting adventure.

For the warrior, on the other hand, freedom is not escaping, or waiting for life to give you a better break, but is an attitude of mind. This attitude of mind will enable you to rise above the belief that you are a victim, and will imbue in you the knowledge and certainty that you can take charge of your life’s circumstances.

However, because such an attitude of mind is so contrary to all of our social conditioning, its cultivation is not only a long journey, but also a journey that is more akin to a constant battle than a stroll through a meadow.

In this regard, as a result of their social conditioning, people normally look upon their birth as having been beyond their control. Therefore they also think about their lives as being the product of their environment, social status, culture, religion, education, etc. In other words, most people see themselves as victims of their circumstances. However, a warrior is never a victim. By fighting for freedom from the debilitating effects of social conditioning warriors take full responsibility for their birth, their life and their death.

The warrior knows that whatever his or her life’s circumstances, or whatever “problems” have arisen, they have not come about as a punishment, but as an opportunity for growth. Each and every one is a challenge to enable us to claim our power. We are never given something that we cannot handle, and thus the warrior knows that the greater the challenge the greater the gifts of power will be at the end of the day.

How else is the warrior expected in a practical way to go about achieving freedom? The first three books by Toltec nagal, Théun Mares lay the foundations for both the concepts, as well as the practical teachings on this. These are some of the basic tools and techniques that are taught to every apprentice on the Path of Freedom. Although they may initially seem simple, once they are understood and put into practice, they are not only very powerful, but they also yield to greater and greater depths of complexity and understanding.

• Through the process of recapitulation we can learn to come to terms with our past and see our life for what it really is. Apart from the vital importance of gleaning every gift of power from all of our life experiences, unless we can also learn to see the folly in our behaviour patterns, we will simply continue to re-enact our folly, instead of truly living.
  
  
• Words are powerful tools for a warrior, for they literally shape our world. We therefore learn how a warrior approaches the correct use of words.
  
  
• We are all creatures of habit. Therefore, it is often not enough simply to achieve clarity on a particular issue. Only through the technique of not-doing can we break those destructive behaviour patterns which are ingrained, long-standing, and which always manifest in myriads of different, and obscure guises.
  
  
• A hunter is a master of stalking his prey. Our biggest prey is our self-destructive behaviour, and the warrior learns first and foremost to stalk his behaviour. However, because it is easier to see the faults in other people we start by learning to stalk the behaviour of other people.
  
  
• For the warrior, the whole world is nothing more than a mirror of potential behaviour that exists within us, whether this is past, present or future behaviour. Therefore, by using the concept of mirrors we first learn to recognise and then we change in ourselves the damaging behaviour we see reflected, for the truth is that we can never change other people – only ourselves. Naturally, with a correct application of this technique, the need to judge others also quickly falls away.

Freedom means many things, but perhaps the essence of freedom is the knowledge that whatever happens to us, we have a choice. Knowing that we have the ability to choose how to respond in any situation is the heart of freedom. Any other way is to leave us dangling like a puppet on the strings that have been set up for us by our parents, friends and society – in short, our social conditioning.

And the problem with dangling like a puppet or victim is that we not only debilitate ourselves, but also those around us, for at the end of the day, life is thoroughly interrelated, interdependent and interconnected.

Therefore the star upon which warriors fix their gaze, as they battle for freedom, carries the legend: “If you uplift yourself you automatically uplift all those around you, and if you shoot yourself in the foot, you automatically let all those other people down too.”

Implicit in this motto is another facet of freedom, namely, that we cannot force other people to change – we can only change ourselves. But through constantly working to uplift ourselves we can, and do, work miracles in the world around us.

© 2002 Charles Mitchley

A longer version of this article was originally published in “Light of Consciousness” magazine in their Spring/Summer 1999 edition.

Next month in the Toltec Way series: How to Let Go of Guilt and Learn to Forgive by Théun Mares

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Charles Mitchley is an apprentice of Toltec nagal, Théun Mares. He works closely withThéun to present his work to a wider audience. To find out more about the Toltec approach to living, please visit www.toltec-foundation.org.

Return of the Warriors is the first book in Théun Mares’ The “Toltec Teachings” series. This series describes the Warrior’s Path, a universal, timeless and practical approach to finding freedom, joy and power in one’s everyday life.

For more information about Théun Mares, his seminars and Toltec retreats, visit www.warriorskeep.com.