Chapter 23. Excursion into Death
When the days passed, which Jeanne had been waiting for all her life as the fulfilment of her sentence, and it became finally clear that she was not going to die, she again felt the taste for life and interest in new endeavours. She decided to work in the direction of healing, as I suggested. We started without delay. I explained to her the specifics of the Teaching in this context, we noted important details, discussed the practical application of the emerging methods, and so on. In the meantime, she was getting used to perceiving herself as a person who could do something in this field and who had to work in it. Everything was going towards the fact that in the near future we would try out the nascent methodology.
There was quite a bit of stuff going on beyond that. Here is one of the most notable cases.
Jeanne once told me about a friend of hers who found herself in a strange situation. Her family bought a house a few years ago and moved into it. Soon the family members started getting sick, weak, losing strength, having problems with their nerves and psyche. Several deaths occurred. Even the dog grew nervous, constantly shying away from something, and eventually met its end, fleeing in panic and impaling itself on thick wire or a piece of rebar. The inconsolable owners claimed that she had thus killed herself in a fit of terror. When Jeanne visited them again, fear and despondency reigned there. So she asked me to find out by the means available to me what was going on.
When I looked, I found a strong and aggressive energy being — also a kind of parasite — attached to the house and living in it for decades. It sucked the energy out of the inhabitants, which led to the already described consequences: people experienced mental problems, became weak and died. Every new owner, without realising it, bought it together with the house, to their own misfortune. Now a friend of Jeanne's, who had lost several relatives and who herself felt constantly weak and sick, got into trouble.
I told Jeanne about everything. We discussed the problem and decided that those people do not need to know all this, and I will try to destroy the parasite. I tried, and it didn't work. It was necessary to act right there — being, so to speak, in his very lair. I had to invent a special way. I took a pebble — the so-called moonstone, which used to be a pendant — and treated it in such a way that when it came into contact with the parasite's energy, it attracted the latter into itself. That is, the parasite had to be enclosed in the stone. We wrapped the stone itself in a dense, well-insulating fabric. Jeanne took it with her when she went back to her friend's house. I warned her that when the stone was in the house, the inhabitants might feel nausea and other unpleasant sensations. This would mean that the trap had been triggered and the energy environment had changed dramatically. There is no need to be frightened, and there is no need to tell them about it either.
When Jeanne got there, the friend who opened the door to her felt sick, dizzy, and almost fainted. But it lasted only a few minutes. And afterwards all the bad things that were happening in the house stopped. The residents returned to normal, there were no more deaths.
Jeanne gave the stone to me. Now it was dangerous, because it contained negative energy of great power. Touching it without an insulator would almost inevitably have lethal consequences. It was obviously impossible to just throw the stone away. In the evening of the same day Hantur and I tried to make it safe by the modest means available at home. The stone, holding the string on which it hung, was dipped several times in melted paraffin, which, having solidified, turned into a protective shell. Then it was tied in a cloth bag, put into a glass jar and screwed on with a lid. The jar was placed in a locked metal casket, the casket was placed in a closed section of a bookcase and also locked. At that time nothing more could be done, as I would not have had the strength to destroy the parasite imprisoned in the stone. I was only able to do so a few years later.
Then I had another chance to do the same operation with another parasite and with the help of another person. Everything followed a similar pattern, with the difference that this one was not caught, but destroyed immediately.
...We were communicating, working little by little on the method of healing, Jeanne was studying the Teaching. She asked questions, one of which I answered with a message addressed to her. She helped me digitise it herself. By that time, this was no longer a unique case: in the third book of the pandect, which includes messages, there were as many as three addressed to Hantur.
I was silent about my feelings, and I intended to remain silent. It was both a pleasure and a torment to see her near me. I thought about her all the time, dreamed about her. The impossibility of being together was killing me. I was living, but it seemed I wasn't living. If it wasn't for the Teaching, which helped me to expand my perception and not to focus 100% on my own, I would probably have died. However, it did help me to live, and even to continue working. At the same time, the feeling of inner death was very strong. Those experiences were reflected in my poems, many of which I never showed to anyone.
Time passed. And one day Emere said it was time to tell Jeanne what was happening. Her birth is one of the unusual ones, it is purposeful, like Hantur's and mine. That is, she came into this present life with a specific purpose that she needs to know about.
I felt so hurt, like my soul was being torn in two. I had no idea how I could tell her this, and at the same time I had to follow Emere's word. I agonised for many, many days, gathering my courage, searching for the strength to do it. And I didn't find it. For the first time in my life I could not do what my Teacher had said was necessary. I just couldn't. I realised that I couldn't turn my tongue — I couldn't literally turn my tongue — to say the proper words. Whenever she came and I thought about it, it was as if a muteness would come over me. Finally I gave up. It was horrible. I never thought it was possible. That I couldn't fulfil Emere's order. I wanted to and I tried, I just couldn't — but I don't think that's an excuse.
Emere said nothing about what had happened. Or rather, what had not happened. But since then, I've stopped seeing and hearing my guardian for some reason. What the connection is, I've never quite figured out. I won't voice my assumptions about it. I will only add that it lasted for about a year; then contact began to be restored little by little. Although my communication with the guardian was never as active as before.
Jeanne, on the contrary, made some progress in this direction. Her progress in cognition was significant, her awareness was becoming more and more profound, which led to noticeable results. This was expressed, among other things, in the fact that she began to see her guardian. Not very clearly, but enough to make it clear that it was not a human being, but a member of some other, non-earthly intelligent race. It did not frighten her. On the contrary, it aroused great interest and inspired her to further spiritual work.
In addition, she began to remember another past life, the one that preceded the Japanese one. This was a very significant success. I was able to verify what she remembered, sometimes being able to add something to it. But as I rejoiced in her achievements, I was beginning to realise what this might lead to. If it went on like this, then unravelling her memories of Indian life and why she was here would be only a matter of time.
And so it came to pass. One day she said she felt a connection between us in past lives. Feels that we loved each other and were together. And she asked me if I could check it out. It was as if the ground had opened up under me. Barely fainting, I replied that there was no need to check anything, everything was already known. Then I told her what I knew, without mentioning my current feelings. Jeanne was stunned. What she heard clearly exceeded her expectations. It took her a few days to sort through everything in her mind and come to terms with what had been revealed. When she came again, she asked, "How do you feel about me now?" I couldn't, I didn't have the strength to say the words that needed to be said. So I answered, "The same as I did then, in my previous life." Can this be considered a declaration of love? I think so. And I think she understood.
From that day on, a new psychological distance was arisen between us. We agreed that we should avoid touching each other. Maybe she feared what I feared. We both didn't want the situation to develop towards a rapprochement — each for our own reasons. We didn't tell each other about them.
However, at some point it became clear that this was exactly what was needed. Our energies had to touch in order for the reunion to take place. Otherwise, the situation was going to be fatal — at least for me. Emere told me this and added that she should know too. This time I found the strength to follow his word. It took very little: at least just a touch of the hand to the hand. That would have been enough to reveal what could and was ready to be revealed. When I told Jeanne about it, she refused. As to the possible fatal outcome for me, she said: "I'm sure you won't be allowed to die." When I heard her answer, I was very relieved. I thought, "Let it be as it will be. If I die, it's better. A week later she came and said that she had changed her mind and she was ready to do what was necessary for what was to be done. But I refused, realising what it cost her to agree. I decided to just wait for the outcome, and take any outcome for granted. She was right, though. Someone up there — maybe Emere, maybe someone else — had done something, and I really didn't die.
Jeanne continued to come regularly. We chatted about the Teaching. She helped digitise something if the need arose. But during our conversations, there was such tension hanging in the air that it seemed to grow thick and it was hard to breathe. The topic of past lives never came up again. No one started talking about our situation. Why would we?
It went on like that for about a year. During that time, we were both mentally exhausted. And even on the physical state it was reflected quite visibly: both of us lost weight. I didn't know how much longer it could go on. Finally she said that she was leaving the Teaching. When I asked her to explain the reason for leaving, she replied, "I cannot follow the principles of the Teaching, and therefore I do not consider it possible to remain in it." I did not inquire what was behind this wording. When she left, she also took my word not to find out anything about her, not to seek information anywhere and in any way.
After that, we exchanged a few more letters — now electronic ones — finalising the remaining shared matters. She even came by and brought a disc with her notes on our work on healing and other things, her poems, which she had asked me to delete from my computer before, and some other notes. Then we said our final goodbyes. I never heard from her again.
After she left, the pigeons stopped flying to my window regularly. They land on the window sill only occasionally, by chance, just as they did before I met her. But I still, after all these years, inwardly shudder when it happens. And I catch myself listening for the phone to ring.
I felt a desolation and loneliness so complete that it's hard to compare it to anything else. I felt as if I were in space, in its emptiness, silence and cold, completely alone. There was no one around. Absolutely no one.
In fact, there were people around. There were at least Hantur and Mum. But I felt like they were gone. Or rather, that I didn't exist for them.
How do I explain it? It felt like that area of my life that could be called personal was gone. There was nothing left at all. Only the Teaching remained. But that part of me that was personal in it was also gone. I was thinking about who needs me. I mean, me as a person. It turns out nobody. I mean, take my mum. She loves me like a son. If I was different, she'd love me the same way. In other words, if someone else were her son, she'd love him. My relatives don't care about me. At the same time, my relatives treat me well, so to speak, in absentia. If I die, they'll even shed a tear. Because I'm a relative. They don't know me as a person. And my mum, hand on heart, knows me externally and doesn't know me internally. No friends, — not disciples, but friends. There will be no family with the woman I love. I had known this for a long time — but now I felt it most acutely. It was as if something had finally snapped inside. Hantur... We weren't very good at being friends before. Now we are, and he's a wonderful friend. But he's a disciple. That's what's important. He came here for the Teaching, — and even our former strange friendship-dislike existed only because the Teaching was to come. Now it is precisely this that binds us, providing the foundation for our current friendship. If it disappears, we will have nothing in common. So, to summarise. Mum has a son. Relatives have a relative. Hantur has a Teacher. What else? Nothing else. And if it were not me, but someone else, another person, in all these roles, nothing would change. There'd be another son, another relative, another Teacher.
For other people, I represent a function. The human fulfilment of the function could be different. My personality does not matter. The two cases in which it would be decisive — friendship and love — are absent as a given. That is, as a person, I do not exist for anyone. I don't exist.
When I came to this conclusion, I felt even more clearly that I was dead. It's not because I don't have something without which life isn't worth living, but because I myself don't exist. If no one sees you, perceives you, needs you, then you don't exist. That's death.
I can imagine how that sounds. And I won't insist that those feelings I had were objective. No, they were just subjective. It was my own inner death. I felt that way.
What did I have left? Only the Teaching. Without it, I would have gone mad and died physically: simply neither my psyche nor my heart could withstand living in the void of open space that now surrounded me. The Teaching gave me the strength to endure it. It also gave me the meaning of life. Let the meaning be in the form of a function, — a Teacher, a prophet, — but the meaning. I had to fulfil my duty. I had to fulfil it here, in this world. There is still much to do. Atarkhat must remain in its place.
And there was something else that the Teaching helped me with. Over the previous years I had managed to realise the universal unity deeply enough, I had learnt to feel my unity with the Universe. Even so: I learnt to feel myself as the Universe. Of course, not in its entirety—because the human essence cannot grasp the full vastness of the Universe. If all of it were to suddenly overwhelm someone, they would simply "burn out," mentally and physically, like a light bulb during a massive power surge. However, even with the modest human capabilities, perception through awareness expands tremendously. You feel like something immeasurably greater than human. And this is another time when I am not going to describe what I am talking about. It could only be described very roughly, using many words, and not on the pages of this book. I will only say that I have learnt to "switch", to arbitrarily pass from the state "I am a human being" to the state "I am the Universe" and vice versa. This is not just an incredible spiritual experience, after which it is impossible to stay the same. This is what helped me not to drown in death. This is what helped me to survive where the soul had nothing to breathe and where it was dying from the freezing cold. It was the "switches" that saved me. Here you are dying, suffocating, the whole world is filled with pain, and through its veil you can't see anything. Now you "switch to the mode of the Universe" — and against the background of the open expanse of the great unity your personal problems become tiny, hardly noticeable, painful no more than a barely perceptible prick of a dry blade of grass. It is as if you look at the world and yourself in it from a cosmic height. And you are no longer suffocating, but breathing through the outer space, as if with titanic lungs. And thought is no longer paralysed by pain: it is clear, calm, and moves freely. After being in this state, you "switch back to the human mode". The pain and everything else comes back again, but you have already rested a little, gained new strength, and now you can hold on and work again for a while. Until the next moment when it becomes unbearable and you need such a "reset".
Only thanks to this and thanks to my work, for which I had to live, I was able to survive physically. I was able to not fade away. Torches don't burn in space. But mine kept burning.
Does that sound pathetic? So be it. The right to this pathos was paid for with tears that made my pillow wet.
I don't know how I managed to hide from others everything I described above. Somehow I did... Only Hantur would look at me and say, "Something's wrong." He simply stated it. He didn't ask, knowing that if I could tell him, I would tell him, and if I couldn't, it was useless to ask. And Mum, while helping me turn onto my other side in bed and feeling the damp pillow, would ask, "Have you been crying?" I would remain silent. But I wasn't crying. The tears just flowed on their own. In bed, and while I sat at the computer. But my beard and shirt dried faster than the pillow.
...All this time I tried to work, no matter what. Even though there wasn't much to do back then. Apart from what we were doing with Hantur, I was always writing. I was trying to explore the question of the possibilities offered by the Internet for spiritual searching. How do people search, where do they search, what exactly are they looking for? After all, the topic of spiritual seeking is far from being as unambiguous as it may seem. And so is the topic of offering. How can you offer what you have to offer to those who are looking for it in the World Wide Web? How do you get them interested? What methods can you use — both technically and morally? Where are the boundaries beyond which the offer ends and the imposition and manipulation begins? What do you have to be prepared for if you do this kind of work and reach such a large audience? And a lot of other questions...
While studying this issue, I read forums on spiritual and near-spiritual topics. As a rule, I did not register on them myself, and did not participate in the discussions, but only observed their course, analysed them, and noted various points of importance. And here on one of such forums, at the end of summer 2008, I came across a post of a girl from Moscow named Anna, who was looking for a Master. It was obvious that she meant someone experienced in the spiritual sphere, but at the same time it was not quite clear what she meant. I was curious. I wrote to her and asked her who the Master was in her understanding and what exactly she would expect from him. My intention was to get a brief explanation, thank her, and leave. However, she began to ask counter questions. We exchanged views, then found something to discuss. Soon she began to ask who I was — was I not the Master? I was embarrassed, because it could have appeared as if I had intended to reduce it to that from the beginning. I dodged the subject for a while. Then I had to briefly describe what I did and let her judge for herself whether I was what she meant by Master or not. She decided that I probably was, and began to ask questions she hoped to get answers from the Master.
It turned out that she was an Orthodox Christian, but she was accumulating those very questions about the world, man and spiritual life. One day she realised that she would not find convincing answers there, and for some time now she had been looking for someone who could give them. She managed to communicate with several people who called themselves Masters, but every time she met them with a huge conceit and arrogance with a minimum of constructiveness, with verbal equilibrium and general phrases, with a desire to profit from the disciples. Nevertheless, she had enough optimism and persistence not to be disappointed and to continue her search.
She was not in a hurry to declare herself my disciple, asking me first to present the Teaching to her so that she could comprehend it as a system. Parallel to this topic, we had a discussion about the Christian worldview. She compared everything with Christianity, still considering herself to be Orthodox to some extent. It was obvious that first she had to overcome this inertia, and only then something else could find a place in her soul. She herself wanted this, but at the same time she clung to her former views, as if she did not dare to finally part with them and lose the shaky but familiar ground under her feet. Therefore our discussion immediately took the form of a heated debate, in which Anna defended certain points of Christian doctrine, and I criticised them. We also discussed various passages from the Bible. My interlocutor reasoned very sensibly and did not reject her opponent's arguments outright, but really thought about them, weighed them, and evaluated them. There was no denying her logic, common sense, and the ability to admit defeat when there was nothing to object to. Her adherence to Christianity did not follow blind faith, but reason. But it was reason that lacked a foothold in it.
We talked not only about the Teaching and Christianity, but also about other topics, very different ones — about life in general, about ourselves, about our tastes and hobbies, about our families and work. I spoke in general terms about my activities, said a few words about Hantur and Jeanne, whose departure was just days away. When I mentioned her, Anne suddenly asked: "Does she love you?" I was dumbfounded by this question, everything squeezed inside. Why did she ask that, and what should I say to her?.. After gathering my thoughts, I decided to sort of make a joke, "Everybody loves me — except those who can't stand me." Luckily, that conversation didn't continue.
We communicated via email. The correspondence reached record speeds. We exchanged several letters a day, and in a little over two years the total number of them was, according to my estimates, something like 3,000.
As has already been said, Anna was in no hurry to recognise herself as a disciple, although in fact she was. But we quickly developed a great liking for each other. Being a very open, communicative and easy-going person, after a few months she said that she would like to come and see me. I declined her initiative. After Jeanne's departure I felt very bad. In addition, I felt uncomfortable that Anna would bother about my person. After all, I was nothing to her, not even a Teacher. She insisted that we were friends — but I disagreed. It had been too long since I'd had just friends, and I doubted that a friendship could form so quickly. Sympathy, a warm, trusting relationship, yes. But friendship...
After another year of intense correspondence, however, I couldn't help but recognise that we were friends. And when she asked me again for permission to come over, I agreed.
I saw her at the beginning of March 2010. She came with her husband, who did not take part in the conversation, but accompanied her. We talked for a little while, just over an hour, and the next day they travelled back. I was greatly impressed by the fact of someone coming from such a far away place, from another country, just to see me.
But hardly more impressive was the fact that she hugged me when she arrived and hugged me again when she said goodbye. It was a completely new sensation. No one had ever hugged me before her. In our family it was not customary to show warm feelings openly. If someone did it, they would immediately start giggling and teasing in the style of "Oh, oh, look at the tenderness!" Even as a child in Manastyrok, I observed such things, and once or twice I was mocked myself. It was unpleasant and somehow embarrassing. Since then I have tried to be restrained in this regard. I was not used to kisses (only my grandmother and guests from Kazakhstan kissed me on the cheek when they came to visit us), hugs, I never knew how to tell someone how dear he is to me, how I love him, I never knew how to call other people diminutive and affectionate names. And now I don't know how. But Anna had it all right, and she was not ashamed to express her feelings with words and hugs. I had seen such an attitude only in the cinema. I could say that in this sense she opened a new world to me. And even though I did not become an inhabitant of this world myself, a lot of things changed for me.
The key thing was that we had been communicating not as a Teacher and a disciple, but as friends. And she came to me as a friend, and embraced me as a friend. I saw that someone needed me not only as a relative or a Teacher, but also as a person. Not a status that someone else can be packed into, but just me, as I am. I exist for someone. That means I am alive.
The moment I realised this, I felt resurrected. The agonising feeling of death that had filled me for so long was gone. There was no more cosmic loneliness and coldness. The world was back to its former colours and it was as if it was easier to breathe. A miracle had happened. I've been raised from the dead. I'm alive. I'm alive! I felt like I'd been brought back from a place that no one ever comes back from.
This excursion into death helped me understand a lot about life. I had the experience of remembering a past birth — but that was something very different. Death within the present life showed life in a new light. It's hard to put into words.
Anna, on the other hand, when she returned home, wrote a few days later that she now considered herself my disciple. If she had written about it before her arrival, perhaps things would have been different and the resurrection would not have happened. But now it couldn't make any difference. Now I knew that even if she didn't eventually join the Teaching, we would still be friends. She would still need me. She wouldn't let me die again.
And after a little more time, she shared the happy news that she was pregnant. But I already knew that. When she arrived, the knowledge that she was pregnant and that she was having a girl had "dropped" into my head. But I did not dare to tell her about it. Maybe it was because she wasn't used to such things, and it would have sounded too strange to her. Or maybe I was afraid of being wrong for some reason. Or maybe it was all of the above... And when she wrote about it, it was too late to tell. I didn't say anything.
friends. And when she asked me again for permission to come over, I agreed.
I saw her at the beginning of March 2010. She came with her husband, who did not take part in the conversation, but accompanied her. We talked for a little while, just over an hour, and the next day they travelled back. I was greatly impressed by the fact of someone coming from such a far away place, from another country, just to see me.
But hardly more impressive was the fact that she hugged me when she arrived and hugged me again when she said goodbye. It was a completely new sensation. No one had ever hugged me before her. In our family it was not customary to show warm feelings openly. If someone did it, they would immediately start giggling and teasing in the style of "Oh, oh, look at the tenderness!" Even as a child in Manastyrok, I observed such things, and once or twice I was mocked myself. It was unpleasant and somehow embarrassing. Since then I have tried to be restrained in this regard. I was not used to kisses (only my grandmother and guests from Kazakhstan kissed me on the cheek when they came to visit us), hugs, I never knew how to tell someone how dear he is to me, how I love him, I never knew how to call other people diminutive and affectionate names. And now I don't know how. But Anna had it all right, and she was not ashamed to express her feelings with words and hugs. I had seen such an attitude only in the cinema. I could say that in this sense she opened a new world to me. And even though I did not become an inhabitant of this world myself, a lot of things changed for me.
The key thing was that we had been communicating not as a Teacher and a disciple, but as friends. And she came to me as a friend, and embraced me as a friend. I saw that someone needed me not only as a relative or a Teacher, but also as a person. Not a status that someone else can be packed into, but just me, as I am. I exist for someone. That means I am alive.
The moment I realised this, I felt resurrected. The agonising feeling of death that had filled me for so long was gone. There was no more cosmic loneliness and coldness. The world was back to its former colours and it was as if it was easier to breathe. A miracle had happened. I've been raised from the dead. I'm alive. I'm alive! I felt like I'd been brought back from a place that no one ever comes back from.
This excursion into death helped me understand a lot about life. I had the experience of remembering a past birth — but that was something very different. Death within the present life showed life in a new light. It's hard to put into words.
Anna, on the other hand, when she returned home, wrote a few days later that she now considered herself my disciple. If she had written about it before her arrival, perhaps things would have been different and the resurrection would not have happened. But now it couldn't make any difference. Now I knew that even if she didn't eventually join the Teaching, we would still be friends. She would still need me. She wouldn't let me die again.
And after a little more time, she shared the happy news that she was pregnant. But I already knew that. When she arrived, the knowledge that she was pregnant and that she was having a girl had "dropped" into my head. But I did not dare to tell her about it. Maybe it was because she wasn't used to such things, and it would have sounded too strange to her. Or maybe I was afraid of being wrong for some reason. Or maybe it was all of the above... And when she wrote about it, it was too late to tell. I didn't say anything.
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