Текст книги "Sensei of Shambala"

29

On the way to the spiritual training, I noticed that the vocabulary of my friends began to change. It now consisted more of good words, positive moments, and wise thoughts. They even decided to get rid of the bad words that they had often used in their expressions. They decided that if someone uttered something bad, he or she would buy a cheesecake or patties for everybody. I, having slipped a couple of times myself, decided to carefully watch over my speech and over all my thoughts.

A small but quite packed-down snowy pathway had been treaded to our secret glade. Volodya, Stas, Eugene, Sensei, and Nikolai Andreevich already stood in the glade. Having joined them, we heard the continuation of the conversation, which had been interrupted by our arrival.

“… but using hypnosis in our practice, we found out that it turns off consciousness and works simply with the subconscious,” the psychotherapist said with enthusiasm. “And we made the conclusion that there is no concrete knowledge in the subconscious. It perceives everything as is: if we suggest to someone that he is a singer, and he has never sung in his life, he will sing. If we give him an onion and say that it is a sweet apple, he eats it with pleasure, not even making a wry face, and so forth. We even repeated a series of experiments performed by our colleagues from the capital regarding the inhibition of irritant reactions in cells of the cerebral brain cortex in the state of hypnosis. We placed an ampule with hot water (+65° C) into the hand of a man under hypnosis and rang a loud bell. There was no reaction in the vessels of the hand. The level of the plethysmogram didn’t change. The man hypnotized not to respond to these irritants answered that he felt nothing, and this was obviously seen in his physical reaction. We also suggested somatic effects that are impossible for a person to cause by himself. For example, we said that a piece of ordinary paper was a mustard plaster. A corresponding redness appeared on the surface of his skin where we had applied the paper. In other words, a man in a state of hypnosis literally executed all our commands, beginning with a psychological image and ending with the reactions of the body.”

“Absolutely correct,” answered Sensei, “because hypnosis is a clear manifestation of the animal nature in the human, it is a liberation from intellect and a disconnection of the soul. Hypnosis is only a function of the subconscious. In hypnosis, a human becomes who he really is if he is completely overwhelmed by the animal nature, a zombie, an obedient piece of meat, or, as Omar Khayyam correctly remarked, ‘a bag with bones, tendons, and bloody mucus.’”

“Who are zombies?” asked Tatyana.

“Zombies were what Afro-Caribbean tribes called people whose mind was oppressed by certain narcotic substances and who were programmed by special psychic influences. These people implicitly executed any order of the chief and could kill not only themselves, but their own mothers, their children. In short, a zombie is a body of a human whose soul has been taken out or disconnected and who has been deprived of intellect,” answered Sensei. Addressing Nikolai Andreevich, he continued, “Hypnosis is the breaking in of the individual, it is aggression, it is slavery. And you will find no knowledge there except that of a dumb, obedient animal.”

“I don’t completely agree with you in regard to a dumb animal obedience,” protested Nikolai Andreevich. “Because as far as I know, the “I” of the hypnotized person keeps control of reality all the time and can be restored at any moment. The hypnotizer can affect only something with which the patient subconsciously agrees. As it’s written in medical research, the mechanism of resistance and protection is not completely turned off.”

“If all this were so, as you say, in reality, then hypnosis wouldn’t have been used so actively in the secret services of all of the developed countries of the world. Do you know that all the newest discoveries, technologies, and the best ways of fishing out the information and methods of control over the human mind are used, first of all, in the military interests of states and only a small, not a significant part, in peaceful goals?”

“Alright, well. But hypnosis can be used in medicine to cure some diseases. Will you deny this fact?”

“I will. What is disease? It is, first of all, a signal from the body about a possible serious disorder in its functions and tissues. Posthypnotic suggestion, left by the hypnotizer and later executed by the human mind as its own idea, simply eliminates this signal of pain but doesn’t remove the cause of the disease. And a human, indeed, for some time won’t feel the pain, deceiving himself with elusive hopes. While practically, he will make himself even worse because the disease will keep progressing and in the end will appear again in an even worse, neglected state. To be cured by hypnosis doesn’t mean to be healthy. By such healing, even a light form of one disease can beget another disease, a more serious one.”

“What about the patients who get into a habit when the medical effect shows itself? It has been proved many times that bad habits disappear and, on the contrary, good ones are formed, implemented, and the mind itself begins to work differently. Why? How can you explain it?” Nikolai Andreevich asked.

“Everything is very simple. The mind under hypnosis is, as a rule, in a state of the trusting listener. In other words, it looks at everything as an outsider, absolutely without any analysis. And if it’s ordered in this state not to listen or to forget, or to change habits, it will execute all this precisely. And afterwards, it will perceive this order as its own idea. Our mind isn’t perfect, very imperfect. The soul is perfect and its possibilities are unlimited. But the soul gets disconnected when a human is mesmerized because it evidently awakens the animal nature in the human. The soul, of course, loses and cannot then have an impact on the mind. That’s why hypnosis is, in general, awful for people.”

“What if a human is suggested to do good?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Sensei said simply.

“But the hypnosis response is unique in all people, simply of a different degree and in different forms.”

“Of course, just like the presence of the spiritual and the animal nature is unique in all people, to different degrees,” Sensei replied.

“But hypnosis has common features with other altered states of consciousness, such as dream or meditation. Hypnosis is also achieved by a reduction of the influx of signals into the brain; the subject concentrates on one sensor stimulus before it…” Nikolai Andreevich was cut off by Sensei.

“Yes, but you listed features that are peculiar to the beginning of any method of altering the state of consciousness. The main distinction of hypnosis is in this state itself, which is reflected on a physical level as well. I would call hypnosis a state of ‘doubling of command’. Take a look at how it manifests itself on a physiological level. If it is compared with a dream or meditation, then the content of oxygen and carbon dioxide doesn’t change as in those other states. Unlike the other altered states of consciousness, hypnosis isn’t accompanied by a physical deviation from the state of wakefulness. Waves of the electroencephalogram – brain waves – most often remain the same, as in an alert person, and so forth. But these are only facts that our science can actually detect at this stage.

“Meditation, on the other hand, is a completely different altered state of consciousness. Even the term meditation, which comes from Latin, means reflection. Meditation is a state in which the highest degree of concentration of attention on a certain subject is achieved, or, conversely, the complete deconcentration of attention. In this state, the processes of perception and thinking are halted. It is a peculiar form of isolation of the human from the external world and a full concentration on the internal, spiritual world, the spiritual essence. It’s natural that psychic immobilization on a physical level is associated with the temporary disconnection of the major integrative mechanisms of the brain. It facilitates the recovery of the nervous and psychic functions of a human, bringing a feeling of freshness, internal renovation, and joy of life. Hypnosis, on the other hand, brings about depression on the subconscious level, forming in this way the slavish psychology in the consciousness of a human.

“One more curious consideration in regard to meditation: the normal functioning of the sense organs during wakefulness creates in the central nervous system a high level of internal noise that impedes the flow of processes of integration and association. During meditation, this level of noise of the brain becomes extremely low. Consequently, a human gets an opportunity to use the associative and integrative processes for completion of certain tasks that he has formulated for himself. So, hypnosis and meditation are two completely different states of consciousness. Meditation is one of the ways of awakening the spiritual nature, while hypnosis, I emphasize, is just a function of the animal nature.”

“But are we allowed to suggest a human self-confidence and self-reliance at least for psychotherapeutic goals?” Nikolai Andreevich just couldn’t calm down.

“Hypnosis is a bad instrument for that, as it increases suggestibility, compliance to the will of other people. This is something unnatural to the essence of the human, to his true predestination in life. Because internally, on the subconscious level, he strives for true freedom, freedom of his soul. That is why people always strive for independence, for self-assertion in any form of external freedom.

“If you really want to help someone change, to believe in his own powers and potential, convince him with your word, your thoughts, and your argumentation. Because the power of words begets the power of thought, and the power of thought begets action… But hypnosis is not the answer, not with its open order into the consciousness of a human. Because you don’t know what you do, because you are not aware of the true nature of hypnosis and those negative forces it awakens in a human.”

Nikolai Andreevich stood still in thought. Meanwhile, the last guys arrived at the glade. Greeting them, Sensei said, “Alright, everyone is here. Perhaps we’ll begin… Today, we will do the same meditation as last time, to purify thoughts. For those who were absent, I will repeat. So, stand more comfortably, legs as wide apart as shoulders. Hands should touch each other with the tips of the fingers at the level of the belly. Tip to tip, in other words, thumb to thumb, forefinger to forefinger, and so forth. Like that.”

Sensei showed me this connection.

“It is necessary to relax by taking away all thoughts and to concentrate only on normal breathing. Then, when you have reached a state of full relaxation of all extremities and a feeling of internal peace, you begin to imagine that you are a jug. In other words, the top part of your head is as if cut off like in a jug. The source of water is the soul. This water fills the whole body and, in the end, overfills it, spilling over the edge of the jug, streaming down the body and into the earth. During the process, when it fills the body and flows out into the earth, all bad thoughts, all problems leave you with it; in other words, all that dirt and unease present in your mind. It is as if you are cleansing yourselves inside. And when you do it, then you begin to feel a clear division of soul and thought: the soul located inside of you and the soul located above the jug that observes the process. And finally, practicing this meditation every day, you cleanse your thoughts of the negative ones and further learn to control them, all the while keeping your mind in a clean state. Any questions?”

“Why should the hands touch exactly this way?” I asked.

“Because during this meditation certain energies circulate inside of the body. I will tell you more about them later. The tips of the fingers need to enclose this circle. Moreover, there is an irritation of the nervous skin receptors located on tips of fingers, which positively and calmingly affects the brain. Are there any more questions?”

Everybody remained silent.

“Then let’s begin.”

Under Sensei’s guidance, we began to perform this meditation. I tried to imagine myself as a jug, but my imagination formed this image somehow half-way, because my mind just couldn’t agree with this definition. I stopped trying to prove anything to myself and simply thought, “I am a jug,” and concentrated on the internal source of water. An interesting feeling appeared, as if my consciousness went inside of me, went into my soul, and concentrated in the form of a point in the area of the solar plexus. That point began to widen gradually while crystal clear water spiralled in it. Finally, there was so much water that it boiled over, filling my entire body with its pleasant moisture. Filling the vessel this way, this pleasant feeling flew over the edge. A wave of small ants started to run over my body from top to bottom, as though going into the earth. I imagined that my body was cleansed of all bad thoughts. And in one moment, I felt so nice inside, so cozy, and so joyful that I couldn’t resist and slightly deviated from the meditation, thanking God for all that He gave me in life, for all His love for His children. In the next moment, I suddenly found out that my consciousness, in other words, my real “I”, was seemingly above my body. But my body didn’t look like a body at all. From its jug-like head emanated thousands of thin, multicolored threads, which constantly moved and went into the earth. In the depth of the jug, something bright was shining, transforming these threads into more vivid colors.

The beauty was of course simply charming. But then I heard the melodious voice of Sensei, reaching me from somewhere far, “And now take two deep, quick breaths in and out. Quickly close and open your fists. Open your eyes.”

I quickly came to my senses, though the state of this internal euphoria stayed somewhere in the depth of my “I”. As it later turned out, each one of the guys experienced this state differently. The senior guys did it better than I did, while my friends practiced it only in their bare imagination. Sensei told them that at first, it often happens this way with many people. But if they train intensively every day at home and if they have a desire to improve their moral qualities, then in a certain time they would experience new feelings and learn to permanently control their thoughts. The most important thing is to believe in themselves, in their powers, and not to be lazy.

When we were leaving the glade, I snatched a moment and quietly asked the Teacher, “The guys told me that when I was absent, you gave them new meditations. I probably missed out on a lot. What should I do now?”

Sensei, glancing at me very kindly, replied, “Believe me, the one who acts with good intention has no need to be upset about what he has missed because he acquires a lot greater power for cognition of his soul than when doing nothing.”

At that time, of course, I did not understand what Sensei meant by that because everything that I did, I simply considered common everyday care. Nevertheless, these words sunk into my soul, and the very same evening a corresponding record appeared in my diary.

The days flew by in the twinkling of an eye. I liked this new meditation so much that I performed it with pleasure before going to bed though, just like all the previous ones, in turn, one by one. One day, I asked Sensei whether it’s harmful to do them one after another in one evening. He replied that, quite on the contrary, it was very useful because then a human works more on himself spiritually, while the Lotus Flower also awakens the soul. “It’s better to perform them in the evening before going to bed and in the morning when you wake up. These are the simplest meditations to work on the concentration of attention, the awakening of internal sight, and the control over thoughts. They are absolutely harmless; that’s why everybody can learn them, even those who have never come across any spiritual practices. And at the same time, these meditations, being simple and clear, bring the most results.”

30

At the training, I tried to catch up with the guys, doing all my best to study both the new and the old techniques. These days, everything interesting and cognitive was happening at the spiritual trainings. At one of such trainings, Nikolai Andreevich began to argue with Sensei about reincarnation. It seemed to me that he wasn’t really arguing but rather provoking the Teacher in order to start a conversation about it. I noticed that despite the fact that Nikolai Andreevich was a psychotherapist, zealous atheist, and the common sense of our company (as we jokingly nicknamed him), he didn’t miss a single training and treated Sensei with delicate respect. “Reincarnation is a fable invented by people, because most of them, I would say, have pathological thanatophobia. That’s why they imagine different tales about reincarnation, about life after death.”

“Not at all,” objected Sensei. “Concerning a fear of death, it’s begotten solely by the animal nature in a human being, by the instinct of self-preservation and the power of imagination, cultivated by egoistic negativism. Fear is just an emotion, switched on only where information is absent or where there is too little of it. The phenomenon of reincarnation really exists in nature. And you can’t even imagine how long it has existed.”

Recently Sensei had begun to speak with Nikolai Andreevich in a familiar way, like a friend.

“No, if it were really so, we would remember something, some excerpts or something else.”

“And do you remember what happened this very day a year ago?” Sensei asked.

Nikolai Andreevich reflected and uncertainly said, “I was probably at work, if it wasn’t Sunday.”

“So then you can’t exactly remember this day?”

“No.”

“Right. So why do you speak about another time, whether you had a previous life? We already examined, in regard to your hypnosis, that there is mind, and there is an animal nature and a soul. You are located in the soul, exactly you, the genuine you. The mind is that part of you which perceives.

And it also has a particle of your “I”. It means that you are divided: in your soul you feel yourself as one person, while you think completely differently. You should reflect on yourself, who you really are, how you think, how you speak, how you see. Not in the meaning of brain activity, verbal, nonverbal, excitation of acoustic fields: all that is rubbish. But exactly you! Look inside of your consciousness. It is endless. Think about that, how the universe is endless. And try to explain the fact that the universe is reflected in every atom of your body.”

“Is the universe really reflected in every atom?” Nikolai Andreevich was surprised.

“Of course. If you doubt, read the corresponding literature on atomic structure and compare it with the organization of the universe. Even today, there is enough evidence to support the realization of this fact. Or take, for example, a vacuum. It’s empty, it looks like there is nothing in it, at first glance. But life is born in it. What from? From emptiness? Think about these global questions seriously. But what’s most important is to find out: Who are you? Then you’ll understand that the body is only a carriage, which carries you from birth to death, first in one reincarnation, then in another. Where you arrive will depend on how you use this carriage. Either it will run by itself, or you will drive it.

“A human that is, his soul is just the coachman of this carriage. If your soul is asleep, the carriage will rumble in the same direction as others. The coachman will be riding in circles. But if the soul wakes up, he will ride in the right direction, the direction of spiritual development, in the one he himself chooses. But what’s most important is for a human to understand that he is the driver of this carriage. Having realized that, he will be able to simply stop riding in circles and go to Nirvana. In other words, he will be like God.”

All the guys carefully listened to Sensei, while I, having gathered enough courage, asked the Teacher my acute question, “Tell me, what is the sense of the existence of the soul, in other words, of myself?”

“The sense is simple: in the end, to arrive before God as a mature creature. A human is the synthesis of the spiritual and the animal nature. This synthesis is necessary so that the soul can obtain a certain form; it has to go through matter, in other words, to ripen. A human, like a butterfly, goes through the stages of development of his soul. Metaphorically speaking, at first, hatching from the egg, a human goes through the material stage of larva or ‘animal human’ when he crawls on Earth with mostly material interests, like a caterpillar. He doesn’t see a soul in himself and considers himself to be one and the same with his matter, in other words, with his body.

“Then a certain time of realization passes, either in the course of several reincarnations, from one to another, or during one life – it is different for everyone – when his soul matures from good thoughts of spiritual love. Gradually, a human changes into a cocoon, into the stage of ‘human human,’ when he clearly realizes his true “I” (soul) and “cocoon” (body). Now the body is regarded just as a matter for the ripening of his soul. Externally it may not be shown in any way, but internally, rapid, global changes take place in him.

“Finally, when the soul ripens, the cocoon bursts open and a glaringly beautiful, divine creature flies out of it, the butterfly or soul, which is free in its flight. Joining other beautiful creatures, it takes part in the creation of new souls, the creation of new larvae that will follow the same path. This is the stage of ‘God human.’

“That’s why the whole sense lies in the development from animal to divine, in order to become a full-fledged particle of God. This is implied in us primordially and deep inside. That’s why we search for God; that’s why we know about God.”

Smiling, Nikolai Andreevich said, “And if I am an atheist and deny God?”

“Nobody denies God really, whoever that one is. Because everyone feels it in his soul. Everyone is scared in darkness, however courageous he is. Everyone thinks about eternity, about death, about the sense of his life and his existence. Many people just don’t have enough information and turn on the protective functions of their mind and try to muffle these thoughts.”

“Well, I’m like that, I need real proof. If only I really could come across a case, at least in a memory, of past reincarnation, I would believe in it, making sure of myself.”

Sensei thought for a little and answered, “Alright, I will grant you such an opportunity. After training, I will tell you about one interesting technique of altering the state of consciousness, which will let you awaken a human soul and evoke a conversation with it. But I’m warning you, nobody else should know about this technique, because society is still in the stage of ‘animal human.’ People will receive this knowledge in the future, when the majority of them will change to the stage ‘human human.’ You can do it with any of your patients, do everything exactly as I tell you. But, jumping ahead, I’m warning you right now that in reincarnations, the notion of time is absent. In other words, one man, for example, lived two hundred years ago, and was reborn only now. Another died a year ago and was born in a minute, and a third one maybe lived in the distant, distant future, and was born in our time, and so forth. In other words, there are certain laws there, so don’t be surprised too much. Alright?”

“Of course!” Nikolai Andreevich uttered with admiration.

Suddenly Stas, who had kept silent before, thoughtfully asked, “Concerning reincarnation, do people in Shambala also undergo it, or do they exist eternally?”

“If you mean the life of the Bodhisattvas in Shambala, they exist under completely different laws. And they don’t have such bodily, rough matter as people. Shambala is a completely different side of reality. Well, for you to understand it better, their bodies are subtle matter, which exists under its own laws in time and space. And if in the human world the mind serves the body, at home I mean in Shambala” the Teacher quickly corrected himself, “the body serves the mind. Why can’t Shambala be found? Because it exists at a completely different frequency level of perception.”

“So, a human cannot get there in his body?” Andrew asked with surprise.

“Why? He can if he knows and is able to transform his body to that frequency of the perception of reality.”

“It sounds like a fantasy,” Kostya sniffed quietly.

“For today’s human perception, maybe. But it’s a fact. If people believe that this is fantasy, let them… But a human cannot make up anything on his own because all this knowledge was, is, and will be in spite of his desires. His capabilities of perception are limited only by his egocentrism. In general, fantasy is only an unrealized reality.”

“How do higher creatures come into this world? You said that they, if needed, can get into contact with people.”

“Simply, through reincarnation. Their soul enters the body of an infant on the eighth day, in other words, just like all people are born.”

“I wonder,” remarked Nikolai Andreevich, “What made you think that the soul enters a human on the eighth day of life? In the Christian religion, for example, it is believed that the soul enters him while still in his mother’s womb.”

“It’s a wrong opinion. Evidently, someone understood something incorrectly and another one incorrectly translated it. A third one added his own thoughts coming from his logic; in this way, the real knowledge was lost. In reality, the soul enters the human body on the eighth day. It can even be materially traced. A soul, though being an energy substance, enters the body, acquires a quality of subtle matter. That’s why the weight of a newborn baby sharply increases on the eighth day from three to twenty grams, and sometimes, in exceptional cases, up to fifty grams. This can be traced if one exactly measures the weight of an infant starting from the seventh day, taking into account the nutrients he ingests and expels. In other words, on the eighth day, there occurs a sharp increase in the weight of a newborn baby. Moreover, exactly on the eighth day, the gaze of a child becomes alive, luminous. It is impossible not to notice that.”

“How do Bodhisattvas differ then from ordinary people?” Kostya asked with interest.

“They don’t. They are consciously reborn into the matter of the human in order to experience all the severities, hardships, and also the temptations of the world. During their human lives they make their contribution, which they should do. Sometimes they come to Earth with a certain goal, to realize a decision made in Shambala, but most often as observers. Bodhisattvas live as common people, quietly and modestly performing their work, though inside, this human is quite aware that he is a Bodhisattva. But he will never yell this and drum on his chest. As a rule, no one around knows this. This could be anybody: your close friend, your acquaintance, relative, and so forth.”

“Why do they come as observers?” asked Victor.

“Yes, why?” I thought. “Our world probably seems like a dirty and egoistic place to these higher creatures.”

“Well, they have such a rule or, to be more precise, a responsibility. Each one of the Bodhisattvas of Shambala should, at least once in a thousand years, reincarnate into this world. What for? In order to live a human life, to see how and what mankind thinks about, at what level people should be given knowledge. In other words, to know the human nature because in Shambala the animal nature is absent in individuals. In Shambala, there is a completely different reality. So, for a Bodhisattva who lives there, to understand what is going on here, he is thrown out into this world so that he won’t forget, so to say, won’t relax too much. Even Rigden Jappo cannot avoid this rule, this fate. However, he comes, as a rule, to this world before the beginning of global changes in the course of human civilization, approximately once every ten or twelve thousand years, not as a Messiah, but as a judge. He checks the work of his forerunners, assessing the level of human perception, the degree of their spirituality or absorption by matter. Depending on that, Shambala then returns a verdict, to be or not to be, for mankind.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, if mankind in its majority is evaluated as a spiritually progressing society, then it is preserved. While if more of the beast, in other words, the material nature, predominates in it, then the same story of global cataclysms that affected previous civilizations is repeated. Less than one-tenth of the total people are left for the breeding of matter for the souls of the next civilizations. Mankind chooses the path for itself, while the actions of Shambala are just the consequences of that choice.”

“As I understood it,” Victor joined the conversation, “their main predestination is the spiritual development of humankind.”

“Almost right,” answered Sensei. “Their main predestination given from Heaven, in other words, from the Cosmic Hierarchy or God, call it as you wish, is the cultivation of the human soul during all cycles of its reincarnation. They actively help develop it when the spiritual nature awakens in a human.”

“I bet this egoistic world seems horrible, from the point of view of their spirituality,” I spoke my thoughts aloud.

Sensei grinned and continued, “Right, it’s not quite a gift. This reincarnation is similar to if a butterfly were put into a caterpillar – that is inconvenient for both the butterfly and the caterpillar. But these are the rules. Each Bodhisattva should serve his time here, live an entire life. Any Bodhisattva is free to go to Nirvana any minute, though; it is a big temptation for them.”