Wonderland

My dear brother, let me welcome you to a beautiful place called Wonderland. Whoever comes to join us is welcomed in our circle of sharing. We will receive you in trust. We know who you are since you reached us. We know where you went through to get here. We know you. We love you. We know you have doubts. We know you are afraid. We know.

Take it easy, you do not know, but you will.
Do not worry dear child, you cannot hide, but you will find.

We understand you. We will treat you with care. We will answer your questions. We will never put pressure on you.

You left your jail, you think you are strange.
Life is different out here, you are free.
You need some time, and you have enough.

AUM and me found a place in Anjuna called Wonderland. The days here are wonderful. It is true that everything we need is here and it is less than I thought. We live in a hut close to the nature together with four of our brothers. Every morning we start the day with a short meditation. With a calm state of mind we go to the beach afterwards. More intensively than ever before I can feel the sun touching my skin and filling me up with energy. More than ever I can feel the breeze that cools me down again. I can feel the high and low tide of the sea. I can feel HER, the sea, HER different characters, moods, emotions, HER being. In this state of mind, feeling every grain of sand on my toes we start doing some basic yoga practice. The connection to my own body increases even more through that. Afterwards we go swimming. SHE is so calm on these mornings. Swimming does not feel exhausting at all. It almost feels like levitating. The fresh water flows all around my body and cleans me. After this routine we have breakfast all together. We sit next to each other and there is no separation of the younger and elder brothers nor the masters.

The masters appear in strong bodies even though they are old and only eat small amounts of food, mostly fruits. But this does not mean they would judge us for eating too much, meat, or other kinds of unhealthy food. They do not even advise us to do as they do. And they would not do so with any of our actions. They simply demonstrate their thinking system, their philosophy and wisdom in their actions and offer the possibility to do the same. Actually everybody does that. Everybody is teaching his understanding of life through his actions to anybody around himself. But the one who mastered life demonstrates something else and more gracefully than others.

Many people come and go here in Wonderland. Some stay for a short, some for a longer time period. While being here, some learn a lot, others nothing. Everyone is free to do what he wants and to achieve as much as he is willing to. There are young ones who need to learn a lot and masters who learned a lot.

One of my brothers who arrived just a couple of days earlier than me is REI. From the very first moment I could feel that he undertook a greater learning process than I did. He is not in the circle of masters jet but for sure he is an elder brother to me. We became friends quickly and had many conversations. AUM, REI and I spent most of our time together. But actually it took me a while to realize that he was teaching me. Whenever he told something, there was obviously meaning in it. But the depth of all this was not obvious to me in the first place. He is just very kind and respectful. He told us about his believes. He asked a question now and then.

“Why do you not heal people?”

Was one question that reached me deeply. And the only answer that I found was:

“Because I did not have teaching.”

I am sure he saw potential in me and had trust in my alibies.

“You do not have to know much. It is all about your intention.”

Later in this conversation REI told me about something that raised my interest:

“Shiva Valley is a place close to the Wonderland. Big and important gatherings are happening there. You might want to go there.”

The next night AUM and me went there, to find out what it is about. We were supported by a group of people of the Wonderland.

In the valley of Shiva we met many others who are on a similar path as we are. Everyone came there to exchange thoughts, to learn from each other and simply to be together. But before everything else to celebrate. To express freely and let oneself drawn into the trance of the music. To leave the thoughts behind for a while and let the body move as it wants to. The dance was wild and ecstatic. Just as Shiva taught us the dance.

I did not know a lot about lord Shiva so I kindly asked one of the Indians in our round for some information.

“The good and bad, love and hate, creating and destructing, both is in the hands of Shiva. And so both is within you. You are the creator. You are the destructor. You dance the dance of live. The dance of the universe. A dance that is its own reason. A dance that does not follow a certain agenda but still searches to be beautiful and to enfold its highest potential.”

The man who I just met hit me right into my heart with the things he told me. It seemed as he would know exactly what I needed to hear. He took my left and right hand. His black eyes looked sharp and strong but nonetheless trustworthy into mine and he kept on talking.

“You have to bring them together. You cannot separate them. You cannot have one aspect of something or any event without its opposite. You have to bring them into balance. Then you will find peace.”

I gave him a hug and we came back to the conversation with the rest of the group, in which I realized something that impressed me again.

“Can we please just hold that moment.”

I said.

“While looking in our group I am realizing something beautiful. It is AUM, an Atheist. Me, a Christ. Itai, a Jude. Ali, a Muslim. And our two new friends who are Hindus. We came to the home of Shiva to meet. We are together as brothers. We live together freely. In love. In unity. And we came here to celebrate. So my dear brothers let us hold that moment in time and let us celebrate exactly this. Our unity.”

We got up and danced together. The energy of this moment was amazing. It felt like we just set a sign. Like we truly strengthened the idea that will lead to the unity of the religions on our planet one day.

Just a few days later something extraordinary happened in Wonderland. One of the masters, who we made friends with offered us his help. He gave us a special treatment for our minds that helped us to open up and make greater realizations. After a ritual practice we reached a sharp and interesting state of consciousness.

A state that reviled the secret of the power that ones mind has on his surroundings. How much the perception is a result of perspective. It is a stunning experience to realize that all perception of the outer world can be changed radically only through a tiny impact on the body and mind. The moment in that the world you see right in front of your eyes starts to change its appearance, is to same moment you are confronted with the question how real this world can be. And how much the things you perceive are depending on your perspective, your conditioning, your concepts, your filters, your state of mind, your think and your believe system.

This realization led to the next insight. If the outer world is something really different from the world that I am actually perceiving and only my mind creates an experience with the information that it is working with, I, with the power of my mind, am in full control of the world that I am perceiving. I am the creator of my individual experience. I am the destructor. Things and events, the entire world is empty, is neutral by its nature. It is all me who gives the meaning to it. It is me who categorizes and judges. It is me creating my own suffer through calling some happenings bad and thus not accepting them.

In the same moment I also could see the trap and danger of this thought. The thought of unlimited power and control over the world is the idea of the devil. It is an idea of control and manipulation. It is an idea of being superior. It is an idea of total separation and excluding all collectiveness.

Even though I am responsible for my individual experience of this world, I am not controlling it. The events and objects indeed become what they are through my consciousness lenses, that I am looking through, but nevertheless they are existing. Even though everything is empty and meaningless by its nature I do not have the power to manipulate its nature. I simply interpret and judge it.

There is an ultimate, absolute reality behind the world that I perceive, which I cannot influence. But my perspective on things, my point of view, my lenses, my interpretation are the cause for my perception. Yes, I am in control of this. But only of this. The result of this is, that I have the responsibility for my perspective. And eventually my perception of the world leads to my experience of it.

Bo – India, Goa, Anjuna, 17.01.2018

What you just read is the second page of BOs diary that he started to write with the beginning of the journey that he undertook together with AUM. We will leave this one with only a little comment to you.

After we analyzed this writing we tried to find ashrams or spiritual teachings in Goa that we could link to Wonderland and Shiva Valley. We found some different places and events called Wonderland. But even though it does not fit perfectly into our first expectation of the place, in which BO found these teachings, we assume that it was a simple Hotel or Hostel called Wonderland. BO and AUM stayed there for a while. We came to the conclusion, that it was not some sort of school or training they attended, but the main reason for his extraordinary experience and teachings in the place was the people they attracted. Obviously, REI, the masters and the meetings in Shiva Valley were a huge influence and factor for what has happened there.

However, it is not very important who exactly were the teachers, and were they taught BO. What is important is the outcome. The outcome of an awakening experience for BO. The waking up experience to the understanding of perspective.

Perspective creates perception. Perception creates experience.