Journey to nowhereland

Prologue

I am not I.
I am this one
walking beside me whom I do not see,
whom at times I manage to visit,
and whom at other times I forget;
the one who remains silent while I talk,
the one who forgives, sweet, when I hate,
the one who takes a walk when I am indoors,
the one who will remain standing when I die.

    (Juan Ramon Jimenez, 1881-1958)

At times when we dream, we perceive the story unfolded in the dream as an observer, like in a drama movie. Then, suddenly, we become the main character in this drama, and feel it as “I” through all the ups and downs of the plot. 

Who, then, was the real “I”? The one who observed the drama, or the one who was the participant? 

There is a verse in the Vedas about two birds sitting on the same tree. One bird is enjoying a fruit from the tree, and the second one is merely watching the first. One is fascinated by the worldly experiences, and the other is observing. The former is our individual soul, the latter is our Higher Self.

Although the birds are inseparable, one is the Master, and the other is a servant. Having forgotten this connection, the first bird—the individual soul - flies from tree to tree, from body to body, from life to life and cannot stop. She will be able to escape the state of desire and find serenity only when she finally starts realizing the existence of the second bird. This (remembering who we really are) is the meaning of the phrase that was given as a mantra to followers of the ancient Vedic tradition: TAT TVAM ASI, which means “YOU ARE THAT”.
 


PART I. THE VEILED PEACOCK

 

THE HIGHER SELF

According to the Vedic philosophy, the world is an illusion, maya. Nowadays, the same notion can be rendered as the idea of “3D virtual reality”, which became part of our life through video games or blockbusters like The Matrix or Inception.

Thus, we can simile the world to a virtual matrix written in the Code of Creation. Outside of it, at the “Base” there exist our Higher Selves. In that realm, the distances are non-existent. The following metaphor can describe how the Higher Selves get in touch with each other behind the veil of the apparent reality. In the early days of telephony, operators enabled communication between any two phone numbers by manually connecting jacks on the switchboard. Although phone users could be far from each other, the respective jacks assigned to their numbers were side by side. All one needed to do is to connect them. While our bodies could be separated by many miles, our real Selves are all in a way set side-by-side on the same switchboard of the Creator... or on the same Base – however you prefer to see it.

Sometimes this arrangement transpires through the Matrix code, and the Self at the “Base” – your own or that of another person - comes as a vision or a dream. The representation of the Higher Selves could be so far from their embodiments that it would strike you. And if you are ever fortunate to perceive the Higher Self of a person who led you through a very intense life lesson, you’d never be able to blame that person.

Imagine that amidst a scene of a fierce fight in a play, one of the actors would suddenly take off his mask, and the audience would immediately remember that actors were not enemies at all, but were, on the contrary, bosom buddies. When the play is over, they will go for a beer together and will, perhaps, have a few laughs discussing their “battle”. We fail to see the real Players behind the veil, being involved in the act of play day after day. And the Master, says Rumi, continues to be “hidden in his workshop”.

               
IN THE LEATHER SACK


A certain king had a garden in which at any time of the year fragrant herbs and flowers bloomed, and exotic plants grew green, and beautiful birds of various kinds sang melodic songs. The pinnacle of this splendor was a family of peacocks – sublime and graceful creatures, who made the wonderful garden their habitat…
Thus begins the tale narrated by the mysterious Persian Sufi Shihabuddin Suhrawardi, called the “Master of Illumination”.

...One day the king, having caught one of the peacocks, ordered that it be sewn up in a leather sack, so that not a single feather of its multi-colored attire would remain visible, and no matter how cleverly the bird tried, it would not be able to see its true magnificence. In addition, the king ordered that a basket with a tiny hole be placed over the peacock’s head, through which only a few grains of millet passed, enough to support the bird’s existence.

Some time passed, and the peacock forgot who he really was. The memories of the wonderful garden and the other peacocks—his family - were erased from his mind. Wherever he looked, the peacock now saw only an ugly leather sack. Over time, he resigned himself to this, and the idea firmly settled in him that there is not and cannot be any other world outside the basket in which he was placed. He firmly believed that all stories about the abodes of perfection and a better world beyond it were complete heresy and nonsense.

Nevertheless, from time to time, when a gentle breeze blew the scent of flowers and trees, the aroma of roses, violets, jasmine or sweet herbs through the tiny opening of his wretched home, the peacock felt a strange pleasure. Then the peacock felt a strong yearning for something unknown, although he did not understand the source of this yearning.
 
Similarly, when he heard the call of peacocks or other bird songs, his heart was carried away in a passionate desire for the unknown, but even the voices of birds or the breath of the morning zephyr did not awaken him from the deep oblivion in which he was.

Sometimes the peacock seemed to remember his former home and tried to guess: “Where does this fragrant breeze come from, and what is the source of such harmonious overflows?” Not finding an answer, he, however, at such moments felt surges of inexplicable joy. Despite this, in general the peacock was at a loss, for he had forgotten himself and his homeland. He remained in such a confused state until one fine day the king gave the order: “Remove the leather sack from that bird and free it from the basket, so that it may appear before my eyes!”
As soon as the peacock got out of the tight sack, he found himself in the middle of a garden. Looking at his amazing plumage, admiring the beautiful garden with its many flowers, realizing that he could go wherever he wanted and even fly, marveling at all the melodies, shapes and diversity of things around him, the peacock froze, sighing as if enchanted. A bitter regret that, being imprisoned in the basket, he did not remember the magnificent garden and its Creator, overwhelmed the wonderful bird…

A blind man cannot see the sun, which is concealed from him by his disability. As long as the soul is hidden behind the veil of blindness (the Sufis use the term ghaflah, “forgetfulness”, to describe this state), it cannot overcome its identification with the body. It is attracted to status and things of this world. The “veil”, or barrier to the proper functioning of the essence is only possible due to the soul’s immersion in coarse stimuli. They create a semblance of imprisonment, in which humanity is confined.

In order for the “blind person” to see, a fundamental change must occur in their organ of spiritual vision, the “eye of the heart”, through which they would be able to see themselves as a prisoner in a cosmic dungeon. This serves as an impetus for his awakening.

When the soul awakens and realizes the illusory nature of its imprisonment, it can no longer aspire to anything except reunification with its true homeland, where it has always resided, and never ceased to be, but which it had forgotten while descending into matter.;


AVATAR


While eight centuries stretch between the veiled peacock tale and the movie Avatar by James Cameron, the philosophical context in these two works is remarkably similar. In Avatar, the consciousness of the main character was connected to an alien body created by hybridising human DNA with genes of an extraterrestrial race. The half-feline, half-humanoid avatar could function in the climate of the alien planet and be controlled by the mind of the main character remotely, as if it were his real body.

But is the phenomenon of remote-controlling an alien body possible? This fiction movie wouldn’t have become so popular had it not touched upon our intuitive knowledge of the true connection between body and consciousness. The idea of us owning our body is something taken for granted; however, recent researches demonstrated that the sense of belonging to a particular body can be changed by using tactile and visual illusions. Moreover, they showed that it was possible to convince a person that s/he has completely left their body; has swapped bodies with someone else; has moved into a small doll, has grown to gigantic proportions, and so on.

Such experiments were conducted by a research group led by the Swedish Professor, Doctor of Medicine Henrik Ehrsson. Ehrsson became interested in the studies of physical illusions  conducted in US laboratories in the late 1990s. Their essence was as follows: when the real hand of a subject was hidden under the table and a rubber dummy hand was placed in front of them, touching the dummy and the real hand with a brush simultaneously after some time made the subject feel the rubber hand as his own.

Moreover, the person started “feeling” the touch on the rubber prosthesis, even when their own hand, hidden from view, had not been touched anymore.
 
When a sharp object was brought close to the rubber dummy, the subject’s fear reaction was exactly the same as if their real body part was being threatened.
Ehrsson developed experiments with even more advanced physical illusions in his lab. Headphones, cameras, and dummies deceived the senses of sight and hearing, and synchronous tactile stimuli reinforced the effect by engaging the sense of touch. In one of his famous experiments, Ehrsson convinced his subjects that they had become a tiny doll, such as Barbie. When he touched the doll’s legs with a stick, the subjects felt as if they were being pushed by giant poles, while all the objects in the lab had suddenly became “huge” in their perception.
Henrik Ehrsson showed that the body can be trained to feel even an empty space as part of itself, without any dummy that would provide a visual effect. For example, he managed to “graft” an invisible third hand onto a person. And there’s more: Professor was able to create a sensation in the subject that they had left their body and were looking at it from the outside.

The out-of-body illusion, so easily created in a lab, reminds us that the nature of the mind-body connection is a mystery. Science, confined to the axiom that any sensations are generated by the nervous system (and not received by it, like by antenna, from something not perceivable by senses), fails to reach beyond its boundary.

If the illusion of being in someone else’s body is so easy to create, isn’t our self-association with a certain flesh, which we claim our own, really just an illusory projection? The body, of course, is quite real, but the notion of our consciousness belonging to the body – isn’t it perhaps the greatest self-deception ever, as all spiritual teachings unanimously say? Really, the question of whether the phenomenon of avatar is possible should be posed differently: is there anyone on this planet who would not already be, in a sense, an avatar?
Interestingly enough, experiments similar to Henrik Ehrsson’s were carried out long before his birth by ancient civilisations. During many years of his travelling through Asia in the 19-20th centuries, the Russian-speaking mystic George Gurdjieff collected the remains of this knowledge and apparently acquired impressive skills in its practical application.


THE FALSE EMBODIMENT


An experiment similar to the ones performed by Ehrsson, whereby a person under hypnosis “embodied” herself in a small figurine made of clay and wax, was described in Gurdjieff’s book Meetings with Remarkable Men:

“I made from a mixture of clay, wax and very fine shot a figure roughly resembling the medium I intended to bring into the hypnotic state… I then thoroughly rubbed some part or other of the body of the given medium with an ointment made of a mixture of olive and bamboo oil, then scraped this oil from the body of the medium and applied it to the corresponding part on the figure, and thereupon proceeded to elucidate all the details that interested me in this phenomenon.” When Gurdjieff then pricked the figurine with a needle in the place smeared with oil, the hypnotized person jerked, and when he pricked the figurine harder, a drop of blood appeared on the corresponding place of the person’s skin. When brought out of the state of hypnosis, the subject did not remember absolutely anything that happened to her during this time, and did not feel pain from the “injections”.

A similar reaction was observed in Ehrsson’s experiments: when a sharp object was brought to the rubber hand, the subjects’ heartbeat and sweating increased.
Gurdjieff believed that the reason why the sense of belonging to a body could be transferred to an external object (such as a wax figurine) is in the presence of a subtle “something” in us, which is the source of all senses. Apparently, it is this “something” (and not the nervous system, which is only a receiver-transmitter of its signals) that controls the body and decides which body to consider its own – a human flesh, a Barbie doll, or even a leather sack...


BEHIND THE VEIL


Although we can rarely perceive the real Self through the veil of the earthly realm, there is an aspect of our being, which can grow to reach the direct communication with it.

In the esoteric tradition, it is referred to as “essence” or “essential being”. The relation between Higher Self and essence can be described by the following metaphor.

Imagine a little hut with one window. The hut remains dark until a ray of sun enters it through the window. Sun is like the Higher Self, and the ray of light is like the presence of Higher Self in an individual. Sun is one, and so is Higher Self. Sun has countless rays, and in the same way the presence of Higher Self exists in countless creatures. Essence is like the window of the little hut. The ray of the sun can reach inside if the window glass is clean and polished. If it is grimy and dingy, the light of the Higher Self will not penetrate through the soot, and the hut will stay in darkness. Getting in touch with the Higher Self involves the work of cleaning and polishing the window glass in the first place. 

So, perceivable inner shifts start to occur when the seeker begins to work on their essence. Intellectual interest in transformation, knowledge gathering through reading are all but a preparatory stage, or, as dervishes describe it, “the donkey that brings to the doorstep”.

The door of wisdom opens when the work on essence begins.

The concept of essential being underlying the visible personality was taught in the ancient schools, such as Sufi brotherhoods, for many centuries before it was openly introduced to the West by George Gurdjieff and his followers.

The most famous of the Gurdjieff’s disciples, Pyotr Ouspensky, wrote in his book In Search of the Miraculous:

“It must be understood that man consists of two parts: essence and personality. Essence in man is what is his own. Personality in man is what is ‘not his own’. ‘Not his own’ means what has come from outside, what he has learned, or reflects, all traces of exterior impressions left in the memory and in the sensations, all words and movements that have been learned, all feelings created by imitation — all this is ‘not his own’, all this is personality.

“From the point of view of ordinary psychology the division of man into personality and essence is hardly comprehensible. It is more exact to say that such a division does not exist in psychology at all.

“A small child has no personality as yet. He is what he really is. He is essence. His desire, tastes, likes, dislikes express his being such as it is.

“But as soon as so-called ‘education’ begins, personality begins to grow. Personality is created partly by the intentional influences of other people, that is, by ‘education’, and partly by involuntary imitation of them by the child itself.

“Essence is the truth in man; personality is the false. But in proportion as personality grows, essence manifests itself more and more rarely and more and more feebly, and it very often happens that essence stops in its growth at a very early age and grows no further. [...] Essence has more chances of development in men who live nearer to nature in difficult conditions of constant struggle and danger. [...]

“A very important moment in the work on oneself is when a man begins to distinguish between his personality and his essence. A man’s real I, his individuality, can grow only from his essence. It can be said that a man’s individuality is his essence, grown up, mature. [...]  “If we take an average cultured man, we shall see that in the vast majority of cases his personality is the active element in him, while his essence is the passive element. The inner growth of a man cannot begin so long as this order of things remains unchanged”.


THE GRAMOPHONE MAN


Another outstanding disciple of G. Gurdjieff, Boris Muravyov, wrote in his book Gnosis: “The intellectual center of a child is a tabula rasa, a clean gramophone record on which a recording will be made. The entire system is extensive, well-regulated and, in addition, equipped with a mechanism that immediately replaces a record that has played to the end with the next one in content. When we hear and automatically record someone’s speech, the playback of the corresponding recording is also automatically turned on in us by association. This is how that purely mechanical process called ‘dialogue’ is created and maintained”. 

In the times of Boris Muravyov, the concept of computer files was non-existent. In our age of information technology, the idea of “mental record” is even easier to convey with the analogy of template files for routine operations. We use exactly the same “template files” in our mental operation. Our professional memory, for example, mostly consists of such “files” updated as we gain experience. As Muravyov points out, there is a way to tell if the person is speaking from “a template” or from his essence:

“The record library is extensive and the recording apparatus is very sensitive. At the same time, when a person speaks, it is easy to understand whether he is playing another record, or whether we are hearing his own speech – words that come from the deeper regions of his inner world. In the latter case, he usually uses figurative, simple and somewhat awkward language, whereas when playing a record, he speaks fluently and almost in a singsong voice. Self-observation is especially useful here, allowing us to identify such variations in speech” (Gnosis, ibid).

Besides variations in speech, tone of voice can signal of who is speaking – essence or personality. Essence talk is deep and of a lower frequency; it comes from lower chest and stomach area, while personality’s chatting is of higher pitch and comes from the head. That is why when a person lies, they often speak in higher tone of voice.

Boris Muravyov also noted another remarkable detail regarding the mechanical conversations: “Once the record ‘starts playing’, it is almost impossible to stop it until it has played to the end” (Gnosis, ibid). The following story about the famous character of the dervishes’ anecdotes, Hoja Nasruddin, illustrates such a characteristic of the “gramophone man”:

“Humanity is asleep,” said Nasruddin, accused of falling asleep during a reception at the palace. “The sleep of a sage is power, and the ‘wakefulness’ of an ordinary person is of almost no use to anyone.” The king was irritated. The next day, when Nasruddin fell asleep again after a good dinner, the king ordered him to be carried into the next room. Before the court was dismissed, the sleeping Nasruddin was brought back. “You have fallen asleep again”, said the king.

“No, I was awake as usual”.

“Then tell us what happened while you were in the next room”.

To everyone’s surprise, the Mulla repeated the long and complicated story that the king had been telling.

“How did you manage to do that, Nasruddin?”

“Very simple”, said the mullah. “From the expression on the king’s face I realized that he was going to tell this old story, and I decided to sleep while he told it”.

So long as the personality is busy operating with its ready-made records, our real self, essence, would remain sleeping like Nasruddin in this story. The various tools of the Tradition of ancient wisdom – teaching stories, fables and metaphors are arranged in such a way that none of the existing records in our mind are suitable for their interpretation, so our inner “Nasruddin”, or essence in this context, is forced to “wake up” and become actively engaged in the process.

But this works only under condition that a person uses special instruments prescribed by the school of wisdom, at the right time and with certain people.


PERSONAL ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE


There is no issue with personality’s mental templates per se, so far as they service mundane needs. The problem arises when we try the same approach in the field of the inner development, as it does not work there.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a sort of blessing for humanity, if only because it helps us in understanding our own mental design… and its problems. IT engineers created artificial intelligence in the image and likeness of the human one, because they had no other model. And the most dramatic thing revealed was not that AI came close and in some areas superseded its human prototype.

The most striking was the sobering discovery that our own thinking is machine-like. Right in front of our eyes, the veil is being torn off our false personality, and a key question arises: is there anything real in our thinking beside the stimulus-reaction, the search-download, the copy-paste?

As AI advances exponentially, it becomes more and more obvious that our own intellectual process, which predominantly consists of recording, retrieving and shuffling files in our heads, is also artificial in a sense. It marks only the beginning of true consciousness, basic level for one who can become a real Homo Sapiens – Man of Intelligence.

And it is not bad, this revelation. Neural networks bring us closer to searching for another kind of intelligence, the truly human one. The one in which the instant knowing comes “from another reactor”, from the essence, and not from the file storage. We get in touch with this kind of consciousness through symbols and images, not words.

Syntactic units arranged sequentially, discreteness and step-by-step processes are for machines. The essence sees the whole picture in one glimpse.
         
We consider people genius if they perceive something not by rearranging thoughts of others, but by reaching out beyond the known. I believe this is what will always distinguish machine from human, even if machines learn to imitate us perfectly in everything else.




PART II. THE AWAKENING




ESSENCE VS PERSONALITY


In Search of the Miraculous Ouspensky describes an “experiment” demonstrated to their group of disciples by George Gurdjieff, who, using a method which description was omitted in the book, “separated” essence from personality in two of their group members.

One was an older man who occupied a prominent position in society and was a highly educated and cultured person. At their group meetings he spoke a lot about himself, his ideas, current politics, philosophy, etc. The other subject was younger and not considered by many to be a serious person. He often rambled in a confused manner even about basic topics, often playing a fool.

When personality and essence were for a time separated in these two men by Gurdjieff, the being of each of them was apparently split into two aspects, which spoke in different voices, had completely different tastes, aims, and interests. Continuing the experiment further, Gurdjieff put their personalities to sleep, such that only their essence was active.

It was astonishing to see for the other group members, how the essential being of the older man with his exalted ideas, sympathies, antipathies, attachments and convictions, suddenly proved quite empty. Everything agitating his personality left his essence completely indifferent. In fact, his essence was childish and unsure. When asked what he desired the most, he said, a little hesitant, that he, perhaps, would like a cup of tea with some raspberry jam.

The experiment revealed so clearly that our ideas, concepts, beliefs – however sacred – are not organic to us, but are engrafted. That is why they are replaced or shaken so easily. The essence does not believe in this or that; its knowledge comes by insight and is unshakable.

The other, younger person in the experiment showed quite an opposite behaviour when his essence was activated, and his personality put to sleep. His very voice changed, and his manners became profound and serious.

As G. Gurdjieff explained, behind the joker personality of this young man there was a mature essence more knowledgeable, alert and observant, and when personality went to sleep, essence took its place, to which it had a greater right.

We find another example of a person whose essence was more mature and capable than his personality in the famous American psychotherapist Milton Erickson. Often during Erickson’s sessions with patients he would go into a spontaneous trance, from which he would emerge at the end of the session remembering nothing about what had happened, but finding a closed notebook with the notes, which he had kept during the session, in front of him. From the notes Erickson found that the session had been conducted not only professionally, but at such a high expert level that it surprised him.

But this type of person is very rare; as a rule, the essence of a person turns out to be primitive and childish.


TWO CONSCIOUSNESSES


In his book P.D.Ouspensky avoids direct references to the method used by G. Gurdjieff to bring the two subjects of the “experiments” into an altered state of consciousness.

Gurdjieff, however, shed some light on this topic in his main written work, Beelzebub’s Tales to His Grandson , narrated from the perspective of a fictional character, an ancient extraterrestrial being named Beelzebub, who for the sins of his youth was exiled by the Supreme Command to a remote part of the Universe – our Solar System. For the reader’s convenience, below I outline the content in chapters 31-33 of this rather hard-to-comprehend text, which is devoted to the subject of our interest.

...During his stay on various planets of the Solar System for many a thousand years, Beelzebub notices some oddities in the psyche of intelligent beings inhabiting the Earth. Having become interested in this and having conducted some experimental research, Beelzebub soon finds out that the causes of the oddities lie not in their regular consciousness, but in what is called the “subconscious”. Due to the abnormal existence of the human race, the latter was driven inward their psyche and, although it should have been a real consciousness, remains only in a primitive state.

Beelzebub reports that earlier people of the Earth, like all other intelligent beings in the universe, did not have a special mental property that made it easy to bring them into a hypnotic state. This property appeared soon after the destruction of Atlantis, since the consciousness of people began to bifurcate, and two completely different consciousnesses gradually formed in them, having nothing in common with each other.

If the human race did not exist on Earth, says Beelzebub, there would not even be an idea of hypnotism in the entire universe. But for the last twenty centuries, most people have spent almost their entire normal “waking” existence as if under hypnosis, in a dream, although they themselves call “hypnotic” only that state during which the process of suggestion occurs at an accelerated rate.
As Beelzebub further reports, this special property of the psyche was first discovered by scientists of an ancient civilization whose capital was located in today’s Gobi desert, and which preceded Babylon.

Scientists of the Gobi found out that it was possible to eliminate some negative properties of the false consciousness while putting a person into hypnotic state, so they began exploring ways to intentionally induce a state of trance. They managed to achieve this engaging a certain fluid of the subtle body.

The modern civilization came close to understanding the nature of this fluid in the concept of animal magnetism by Franz Mesmer. The process of bringing someone into a hypnotic state, continues Beelzebub, was considered sacred by ancient civilizations on Earth and performed only in specialized temples.

I will elaborate more on this temple tradition and a branch of the Sufi knowledge called nafsaniyatalinsaniyyat, translated by Idries Shah as “psycho-anthropology”, in the next chapter. Meanwhile, let’s get back to the Beelzebub’s Tales.

So, in order to understand better this strange duality of the human psyche, Beelzebub decided to become a hypnotherapist and began to conduct his experiments by putting people into a hypnotic trance. At first, he resorted to the method used by the ancient Karakum civilization, that is, by subjecting patients to the action of his own magnetism (or the vital fluid).

However, later on, when he had to perform this procedure on many people for healing purposes, this method turned out to be very taxing on his organism, and Beelzebub came up with another one. The new method entailed altering of the patient’s blood circulation.

The fact is, Gurdjieff explains, that as human psyche divided into two independent consciousnesses, two different types of blood flows began to circulate in people’s bodies. From a certain age, a specific type of blood circulation prompted a corresponding state of consciousness, and vice versa.
By changing the type of blood circulation, it was possible to temporarily suspend domination of the false consciousness, creating the bodily connection with the true consciousness. 

It is quite obvious that Gurdjieff here was describing his own experience as a practising hypnotherapist. According to the text Meetings in Paris , compiled from his lectures given in 1940-44, for nearly fifteen years during his life Gurdjieff worked in one of the largest psychiatric hospitals near Tashkent.

Gurdjieff’s findings on the connection between hypnotherapy and blood circulation were somewhat confirmed by unrelated studies conducted in the 1940-50s by Soviet medical scientists. They found that in hypnotic state blood flow in some parts of the body can completely stop due to partial or complete spasm of capillaries. In addition, recent studies  have confirmed that the state of hypnosis changes the nature of blood circulation in the brain.


IN THE TEMPLE OF DREAMS


The People of the Secret, the book published under the pseudonym Ernest Scott mentioned the experience of a “contemporary doctor studying a traditional form of medicine practised by the Afghan Sufis”.  The Sufi method in question included hypnosis, but was far from simply eliminating the symptoms of a disease with the help of post-hypnotic suggestion, which can potentially be harmful for the patient in the long term. The Sufi practice resembled the classic description of the ancient technique of the “Temple of Dreams,” which was considered only metaphorical.

Temples of sleep or Asklepion, dedicated to the god of medicine Asclepius, were a common form of spiritual healing in ancient Greece and Rome. The tradition probably came there from Egypt and the Middle East, where it arose no later than the 3rd millennium BC. In the temples of sleep, not only mental but also physical ailments were cured. Healing included ritual singing, immersion of the patient in a state of hypnotic trance or sleep. A similar tradition has been preserved in some Sufi communities, which use techniques similar to medical hypnosis. It is believed that the active factor in such a cure is not the personality of the healer - he only serves as a channel for the manifestation of the force that Sufis call Baraka or grace.

It appears that the doctor who was mentioned by Ernest Scott as the one who studied the hypnosis methods of the Afghan Sufis was Dr. Jafar Hallaji. He authored an article “Specialized Techniques in Central Asia,” which was included in the collection of essays The World of the Sufi .

During his visit to Afghanistan in 1961, Dr. Hallaji was allowed to observe the hypnotherapeutic techniques of a healers’ community completely isolated from the influences of Western medicine.

The elder healer claimed that their method dates back to the 12th century. The Afghan Sufis of the Naqshbandi order who practised these methods differed from most healers and religious figures in that they made no attempt to charge for their treatment or to preach their teachings.

They healed physical and psychosomatic disorders by a method reminiscent of mesmerism and claimed to cure even tuberculosis, cancer and poisoning. The training of Sufi healers was accessible only to select students and lasted for at least 16 years. Its goal was far beyond the scope of a technical training and aimed to create a “perfect man” with a fully developed mind and body. The “clinic” operated every Thursday evening before the Sufi group practices, which included physical exercises for the entire body. Dr. Hallaji observed treatment sessions with eighteen patients. All patients were given beds in a one-room clinic, asked to lie on their back and stare at one of the octagonal figures decorated with the enneagram attached to the ceiling.

The senior healer and his assistants approached each patient in turn. While the rest of the group chanted “Ya-Hoo, Ya-Hakk!” the senior healer extended his hands, palms down, horizontally above the patient, and made rhythmic passes along the patient’s body from the eyes to the toes, holding his palms six inches from the body. The technique resembled that of the mesmerists. An integral part of the procedure was the chief healer rhythmically blowing on the patient at a rate of two exhalations per second. This procedure was called “chuf” - breathing. Subjects reached the hypnotic state within 6 to 20 minutes. Not all patients closed their eyes. Rather, sharper inhalations and the cessation of small body movements indicated the onset of hypnotic sleep.

After the half-hour break, the healers examined each patient again in turn. If the patient did not flinch at the sound of the small gong above his head, the senior healer, reading the symptoms of his illness, informed the patient that the healing power of the Baraka was entering him, would continue its work in him, curing the ailment in any way possible, and would complete the healing before he awoke. This statement was repeated five times.

Fifteen of the patients observed by the author claimed to be cured immediately after the session; two patients did not feel the effect of the treatment. The author was later informed that these two people then came back and were cured.

Sufis believe that in this kind of healing, the Baraka, or imprint of spiritual and bodily perfection, is transmitted direct to the ailing person’s essence through the healer, who already reached the state of a perfected human. This transmission heals, or “makes whole” the person again, eliminating the cause of disease and not just symptoms.


AWAKENING OF THE INNER BEING


While there are methods to heal the person’s spiritual and bodily ailments by the direct transmission to their essence or even temporarily make it active, the latter can stay passive and underdeveloped most of the lifetime.

Gurdjieff mentioned two factors, which can awake a dormant essence in the course of the usual life—struggle and danger. The Sufis, alongside other schools of wisdom, believe that the person’s transformational work is the means to wake up the essence. Besides, presence of another individual can awaken a dormant essence, if their inner being has already achieved the state of maturity. Once, I had a chance to go through this experience with the help of a Master, whose essence was mature and powerful.

In this experience, my perception returned to the age of five, to the state of a child who is waiting for her mother at a bus stop, but the latter never comes. This child was abandoned in the inner space for all these years, waiting to be cared for. Everything that happened since year five - growing up, schooling, getting jobs, raising family, pursuing ambitions and desires of ego, even the search of knowledge - was incomprehensible and alien to the inner child. I found her in a state of deep grief and confusion. This realization occurred in just a few glimpses, leaving me bewildered and shocked.

Later on, I was thrilled to find a similar experience described in Richard Bach’s novel Running from Safety . Since then till now, I have been working on nurturing and empowering this inner child. At first it took effort and patience to get through to her, finding a common language with her. For a long time, this work had been connected with recapitulation of my whole life, starting with the first memory, which for me goes back to eighteen months of age or so. It has not always been a deliberate recapitulation as taught by the indigenous Mexican tradition and described by Carlos Castaneda in his books.

In my case, it was rather a recovery of events and memories, which surfaced to my daytime consciousness from time to time to be restored in their minute details, with smells, sounds and colours.

It felt as if once that has started, the memories rushed to be resurfaced, processed and compressed, all this to free up the energy, tied in the emotional knots, for more appropriate use.

Sometimes this happened while I was busy with something totally unrelated – for example, working in the office. Often it was accompanied by a nostalgic feeling like nothing I felt before. At times, I had to return to a certain moment again and again, until I felt that all the energy left in that “knot” was released to become available for use anew.

Now moments of spontaneous recapitulation do not come very often. I have long since trained myself to recollect the events of each day as they happen, and to release the energy tied in emotional “knots” immediately – this is part of a Sufi practice I follow, a rule that can be translated as “travelling in your home country”. “Home country” in this context can be understood as the inner self.

I found out that our inner child is sensitive to subtle energies that give her nourishment; she is drawn to people and places that possess them. You can’t deceive her with words, as she can easily distinguish the real gold from a counterfeit one, so to speak. Her connection with the body is more direct than with the mind, because body does not lie.

She responds to the sound and vibration of a prayer even stronger than to its meaning. She loves children, because their essence is pure yet; she is fond of all living creatures, trees and plants. Fundamental emotions – such as faith – also originate in her.

“And He said: Verily I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3).
“The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field, which is the smallest of all seeds; yet when it grows up it is the greatest of all herbs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in its branches” (Matthew 13:31-32).


THE SMALLEST OF ALL SEEDS


Once in the early years of my inner work, I had a spontaneous experience, in which I thought I had a glimpse of the Higher Self. It was not a dream, but rather a vision or a daydream, a fleeting entry into an alternative state of consciousness.

What I saw looked like a huge amphitheatre, but spherical in design. The heart of this formation was the purest dazzling white light, which had no shape or image and emanated the same vibe as a newborn baby. A baby is neither good nor evil - she is BEYOND good and evil. She does not judge; she is pure, untainted by ego and its passions, and she is neither pious nor sinful.

But the Child-Higher Self was also wise and all-knowing, and although it is difficult for us to connect the idea of a baby with the universal gnosis, this is how I can describe what I perceived.

Instead of seats, the “amphitheatre” had some kind of cells, myriads, countless individual cells. In an instant cognition I realized that each of the cells was invisibly connected to and inseparable from the central pure light. The cells were its daughter formation, and yet they were not equal to it—like a reflection of the sun on the water is not equal to the actual Sun, yet is inseparable from it.

Each cell was also like a tiny seed, which had the potential of the whole mother tree... which remains the potential until it unfolds. 

I also realized that one of those cells contained my earthly consciousness, from which I observed this image.

The whole experience lasted for mere seconds, but it left a lifetime imprint in my memory. I recollected it later for connecting to the essential being during my silent retreat, which I will describe in the following chapter. ;


THROUGH THE ONION’S LAYERS


Our inner world resembles an onion. What we consider our persona is only its topmost layer, its husk. These are the beliefs, “sacred cows”, and passions associated with the implanted ideas.

In my teenage years, a scientist was the ideal human being in my mind, because I grew up in a family of scholars. Now that I read so much spiritual literature, I find scholars quite confined in their materialistic worldview and admire people who are advanced in the inner development. Such is the nature of the “Pavlovian dog’s mind”, shifting effortlessly to the “conditioning of the day”.

These days I am attracted to like-minded people exploring the spiritual transformation, but if they leave this path, I find that their attractiveness for me fades instantly. Such is the nature of partiality, a superficial emotion, which easily turns into its opposite, and therefore never reflects our true self.

It is but the onion’s husk.

I found though that beneath the husk of my conditioning came another layer—something that was our own—deep reactions and patterns reflecting my individual self. These patterns are often inherited and remain surprisingly permanent throughout life. A significant part of people I know lives their lives without ever recognizing the presence of this layer.

Sometimes it makes itself known in dreams or alternative states, or as an inexplicable nostalgia that we all feel from time to time. Our inner self is never silent, constantly sending signals from the deepest regions of consciousness. However, the crude stimuli of everyday life override the subtle signals from within. As Idries Shah wrote, “Sufi experience is difficult to register in the mind only for those who are too accustomed to cruder impacts: rather as the sound of a watch ticking will not be audible to someone deafened by a church bell or even listening for a factory hooter".

That is why I decided to go into a complete silence for a few days to remove all interference and enable this subtle communication. When I was younger, the very thought of a solitary retreat filled me with horror, but as I worked with my fears, the prospect of remaining in a complete isolation for several days did not seem that dreadful any more. I found a community of followers of the great Indian Sufi Inayat Khan in the US, which offered support for silence retreats in their abode among the lash forests and gardens, and there I went.

There, in almost complete silence, I made my way beneath the onion’s husk.

Staying silent appeared no problem at all. Burdensome was the impossibility of turning away from your own stance, which G. Gurdjieff, speaking of all earthlings, called a “horror-situation”. I was able to see it objectively, but felt no capacity to transform it. That with which I saw it and that which needed to be changed were two different things.

My “normal” consciousness peered into a deep well or shaft, and at the bottom of it discovered another self—a frightened and despondent agnostic. Even the echoes of my affirmations of faith, hope and love did not reach there. As much as fear is the opposite of love, despondency is the opposite of hope, and unbelief is the opposite of faith. Faith, hope and love are tied together in the Gospels for a good reason, and it was not for nothing that Jesus deemed despondency the gravest of sins. It comes after fear and unbelief.

After countless attempts of trying to reach out to the inner disbeliever with positive thoughts, I gave up. I began invoking the Divine names, in the practice that Sufis call zikr. Sometimes I repeated the Names silently, and sometimes out loud, trying to make the sound resonate in my solar plexus instead of in my head of throat. I turned my body into a tuning fork, vibrating at the right pitch, and after a while, the inner agnostic finally seemed to start responding to the power of the Names.

I thought that there must be some key, some image of the Supreme Being that the disbeliever inside of me could respond to. And I remembered my old vision of the Divine Child, which I described previously. I started evoking the experience, restoring it in detail, trying to recall the way I felt when I had it.

Recollecting the vision of Higher Self turned out to be the key unlocking the prison cell of the disbeliever. The image of the Creator as an innocent child (not Father, not Beloved as we imagine God) suddenly began to resonate with that deeper consciousness, and I felt how something was thawing, opening in it.

A series of images unfolded before my inner eye, starting with beautiful, angelic faces. Then again, I saw that same brightest light surrounded by the spherical amphitheatre with little cells. It felt like my individual consciousness was very distant from the central light, but, at the same time, the light appeared very close, at an arm’s length to my right.

Suddenly, something like a protuberance emerged from this dazzling “sun” and stretched towards me. It felt like it was not a spontaneous outburst, but rather as if it reached out consciously in my direction and, before I could figure out anything, immersed me in its golden light. It was alive, thick, and nourishing; it felt utterly sweet to my essence. I can only define it as a “honey plasma”, “living golden honey”, but I know that words are powerless in describing it.

With an unbelievable speed, plasma particles spread to all corners of the body, each of them alive and conscious; they knew what to do, like sublime busy bees. I was numb, having lost the power of speech, and in the same astonished numbness was my inner being, which was being nourished by this golden honey light like a hungry child.

It lasted for about half an hour. I clung to it, realizing how difficult it would be to find myself here again. Now I knew what my retreat was for. The despondent disbeliever in me, although not yet completely transformed, would never be the same. The golden honey has permeated it, and the waves of hope penetrated to the depths of its well. And as hope appeared, faith and love have surely followed.


THE ALIVE, THE SON OF THE AWAKEN


...There is, as our good predecessors say, in the Indian Ocean a certain uninhabited island, which has the fullest predisposition for life. Opposite that island, they say, there is another - of enormous size and inhabited by people, in which lived a king who was very proud and jealous. The king had a sister, of such dazzling beauty that, having found no one worthy of her husband, the autocrat refused all who sought her hand. The king had a confidant named Yaqzan. Secretly from the king, he tied himself to his sister in marriage, which was permitted by the faith accepted at that time, and she bore him a son.

Fearing that her secret would be revealed and the king would destroy the child, the king’s sister placed her child in a tightly built chest and, with an aching heart, carried him to the seashore at nightfall. Bidding farewell to the child, she said: “All-Merciful God! I commend my child to Your good will, out of fear of the fierce, cruel and arbitrary king. So be with him and do not abandon him, O Most Merciful!” With that she cast her child into the sea. It so happened that the chest washed ashore on that very uninhabited island. The cries of the child reached the ears of a gazelle that had lost its young. And the gazelle began to nurture the human child and feed it, protecting it from misfortunes until the child grew up…

...Thus begins the story of Hayy ibn Yaqzan , whose name in Arabic means “The Living, the son of the Awaken”. In this version, it was told by the Moorish Sufi Abu Bakr ibn Tufayl from Cadiz, who served as a physician and vizier to the rulers of Andalusia and Morocco in the 12th century. Ibn Tufayl’s tale became widely known in Europe via Moorish Spain and inspired Daniel Defoe’s novel Robinson Crusoe.

...So, Hayy ibn Yaqzan grew up on a blessed island isolated from human influence, where there was everything for life and there were no predators. Hayy, possessing an innate curiosity and ability to learn, adapted to existence and mastered the world around him, using only contemplation, intuition and experience.

Studying the life of plants, animals and celestial bodies, Hayy came to understand the Creator who gave birth to all living things. By the age of thirty-five, the study of externals ceased to occupy Hayy—from now on, he saw in every object a manifestation of their Master, leaving the created without attention. Having realized that his real being was not identical with his flesh, Hayy turned his thoughts to his essence. He realized that death is pertinent only to the body.

In the series of ecstatic experiences, which the Abu Bakr ibn Tufayl named Pure Immersion, the Complete Disappearance in Union with the Divine, Hayy saw an immaterial essence—something like the image of the sun appearing in a mirror, which in itself is neither the sun nor the mirror, but at the same time is not different from them.

He saw in the incorporeal essence of that sphere a perfection and beauty too great for any language to describe them, and too subtle to be clothed in letters or sounds. He saw also that this essence is in a state of supreme delight and bliss from contemplating the True Being.

Hayy also saw many immaterial entities that resembled mirrors, rusty and covered with dirt, and who turned away from the sun. And he saw them abiding in endless suffering, lost in disunity and torn between vanity and greed.

...Introducing the story of Hayy, Ibn Tufayl discusses the difference between the two ways of knowing, comparing the state of a man born blind, but sane and intelligent, with the state of someone who has sight. A blind person is capable of forming an idea of the world from descriptions. If a miracle happens, and he acquires the vision, he will have to re-learn everything he knew before.

The state of those who know through intellect corresponds to the state of the blind, while the one who reaches the closeness to the Creator is like a man who has received his sight. It is rare, however, to meet a man who, having an open eye of the heart, still does not need intellect. The story written by ibn Tufayl is highly metaphorical, and each character in it represents a certain aspect of our being. It is obvious that The Living, son of the Awaken symbolizes our true essence, inherently connected to its Creator.

...When Hayy’s age reached seven times seven, he gets to meet Asal.


HAYY AND ASAL


...They say that on a certain island, located not far from the one where Hayy, the son of Yaqzan, grew up, there spread a true teaching received from the ancient prophets. It conveyed Reality through metaphors that imprinted the image of Truth in the minds.

And on that island two people were born and grew up, named Asal and Salaman, distinguished by their virtuous character and good intentions. Having become imbued with the greatest disposition towards the Teaching, they pledged to follow its laws and strictly observe all the rules prescribed by it. At the same time, Asal showed a greater ability to penetrate the spiritual content of the Teaching and a desire to avoid literal interpretation, while his friend Salaman was inclined to refrain from independent judgments and reflections. Both, however, showed zeal in performing rituals, educating the soul and taming desires.

The divergence of views between Asal and Salaman led to their separation. Earlier, Asal had learned about the island where Hayy, son of Yaqzan lived. Asal decided to move to that island and spend the rest of his life there. He bought a ship and went there.

Asal started his life on the island, spending time in worshipping God. Nothing extraneous either interrupted his contemplation or mixed with his thoughts. The fruits that he found on the island, or what he managed to get by hunting, were sufficient to sustain life.

When one day Asal suddenly met Hayy, the latter was puzzled and tried to capture Asal, who was very scared of this savage figure. Then he began to address Hayy in each of the languages he knew, but his efforts were in vain: Hayy was constantly amazed by the sounds that reached his ears, and the only thing he could catch in them was a friendly attitude. Nevertheless, soon they became friends. Gradually, Asal taught Hayy the language he himself spoke, and they were able to tell each other about their experiences and knowledge.

When Asal listened to Hayy’s story about his experience of the True Being, he had no doubts left: everything he knew about God, angels, messengers – they were symbols of what Hayy contemplated.

The eye of his heart opened—what was comprehended by the mind and what was transmitted by religious tradition united into one, and Asal became from now on one of those who possess understanding.

Hayy, son of Yaqzan, for his part, learned everything about the inhabited island: about their way of life and about what their religion says about the Divine world, and became convinced that nothing in it contradicted what he had contemplated in the elevated state.

Having decided to reveal the Truth to people, Hayy and Asal began to pray that a ship would be sent to them that would take them to an inhabited island. Their prayers were answered, and soon the ship, having lost its course, delivered them to the island of Asal, where they were greeted with joy by the locals, including Salaman. Hayy, the son of Yaqzan, took up the task of teaching people and introducing them to the secrets of wisdom. However, as soon as he rose just a little higher than the literal understanding of the Teaching, the students, including Salaman, began to distance themselves from him more and more, and his words began to arouse anger and indignation in them. Although they were benevolent people, due to the limitations of their mind, they tried to reach the truth through the wrong gates. Worse, they did not want to learn the truth in the way of those who had already mastered it.

And Hayy, the son of Yaqzan, despaired of guiding them on the true path. Turning to Salaman and his friends, Hayy advised them to continue to observe the commandments of religion and trust the sacred texts. With that, Hayy and Asal departed back to the uninhabited island. Hayy reached the highest station and remained there as long as he could. Asal imitated him until he came close to that level. And so they lived, worshiping the True Being…

Ibn Tufayl says that his book contains secret Knowledge, covered with a veil, “which will not hesitate to unfold before the one who is worthy of it, but will be too dense for the one who does not deserve the right to look behind the veil.”

Concluding the story, we should mention that the name Asal comes from the Arabic root S-L, which, among other things, means “to produce honey” and “to drowse” or “doze”. The name Salaman comes from the root S-L-M, which means “to be in peace, tranquility.”;


AZOTH, OR EZ-ZAT


“Azoth” once used to be a name of the Philosopher’s Stone in the Western alchemical tradition. The great alchemist and healer Paracelsus, as they say, wore a sword with an image of a circle with the word “Azoth” in its centre, which symbolized the secret quintessence, the vital force enabling the arts of healing and alchemy.

This word is believed to come from the Arabic word ez-zat (also spelled al-dhat), which means “essence”. The Philosopher’s Stone is the saturated ez-zat - essence so powerful that it can transmute everything that comes into contact with it.

According to the art of inner alchemy, a state of being equivalent in its perfection to the Philosopher’s Stone can be achieved by an individual and shared with another person. The latter will be healed and enlightened by this exposure, because this secret Stone, concentrated in the transformed being, is the source and essence of life itself.

“The jewel is lost in the mud, and all
are seeking for it;
Some look for it in the east, and some
in the west; some in the water
and some amongst stones.
But the servant Kabir has appraised
it at its true value, and has
wrapped it with care in the end of the mantle of his heart.”

(“Songs of Kabir”, translated by Rabindranath Tagore)

Idries Shah writes  that the reason for disharmony and unfulfillment of the human existence is the separation of man from his essence. The means of achieving this is found within man – it is the Philosopher’s Stone. Finding the Stone and putting an end to the separation is the purpose of human life. Spiritual search is nothing other than the purification of precious essence from dross to obtain the Stone.

One of the most mystical Sufi saints, Najmuddin Kubra (1145-1220) wrote: “Our Path (tariqa) is the path of alchemy. On this Path you should seek out and extract from the mine of your being substances of the highest subtlety, woven from light” .

According to surviving legends, Kubra achieved miraculous powers, such as healing and hypnosis, which affected not only people, but also animals, who obeyed his mental commands.

Kubra transmitted the grace, or Baraka, to so many disciples, who later became Sufi Masters, that in Persia he is referred to as “producer of saints”.


OVERTONE OF ESSENCE


Can a dormant essence be awaken by mere presence of a person, whose inner being is mature and active? The great Sufi Master, who taught in the West in the later half of the past century, Omar Ali-Shah, shed some light on it in his book Sufism as Therapy .

He said that an inner being communicates with another inner being in a language different from the one we are accustomed to. There can be no misunderstanding or distortion in this communication. It is a transmission in the form of a wave with a frequency natural and common to all people. Omar Ali-Shah brings up a musical analogy: if two musicians from different parts of the world decide to play together, and one refers to a C note of a certain pitch, the other will know exactly which specific sound to attune to. Thus, our essence communicates and receives a response signal within a very specific overtone, and perfectly recognizes its recipient. Even when the essence is dormant, it remains sensitive and responsive to signals given in the correct overtone.

The more often essence to responds to the essential overtone, the better this capacity becomes. According to Omar Ali-Shah, there are also methods by which Sufi Master can intentionally feed the disciple’s inner being to enhance the person’s capacity, if the teacher deems it possible and necessary. This channel of subtle communication between beings cannot be overused, misused or abused, as our inner being has many levels of protection from negative influences. One can nourish their essence by providing it with knowledge and energy that it recognizes as useful, writes Ali-Shah. The stronger, more awaken and active our inner being becomes, the more often it will turn us in the direction of the needed information and energy. The overtone used by the essence should be correctly attuned to, and this line of communication of inner beings must also be regularly used, so that the line remains, as Omar Ali-Shah put it, “clear”. This is part of what is called “knowing yourself”.


 
PART III. THE QUEST



NARRATIVES AND LIFE


“Old man, what are you doing sitting here?”
“I am telling myself my own story…”

(from The Tale of Mushkil Gusha)

“Self is a product of our telling. We become the autobiographical narratives
by which we tell about our lives. … Narrative organizes experience and constitutes reality. … A life is a work of art, probably the greatest one we produce.”

(Jerome Bruner, a founder of narrative psychology )
 

As a practising Sufi disciple, I am sometimes asked: is Sufism a spiritual path or a psychological teaching? To deconstruct this binary thinking pattern right from the start, I choose to answer: “Both”. The first does not exclude, but complement the latter - just like the study of Jungian psychology in contemporary theological schools does not interfere with the performance of a cult by their graduates.

And yet, Sufism is neither a religion nor a psychology, although none of these elements is alien to it. Sufis do not put psychotherapeutic patches on egos in distress; they do not ask to believe them: they teach by creating an experience that helps a person move to another level of being. In this process, everything that works is used: teaching stories, fairy tales or anecdotes.

The method resembles a procedure that modern psychologists call symbolodrama, although it is not identical to it. It can be looked upon as a game, but the symbols that become alive during this game are not an end in themselves, but a tool helping to bypass ego’s control.

Why use allegories? Why not tell a person directly what they should change in themselves? Because the person would not believe it, as they do not know themselves. And why do they not know themselves? Because no one wants to know the truth about themselves. And if they suddenly find out, they carefully hide what have been discovered, behind self-deception, because it is more convenient – one can continue to pretend that there is no need to change.

Symbolodrama seeps through the veil of self-deception, since it is played out using a special language of archetypes, which is well read by the essence. By developing active imagination, one can not only understand this language, but also convey messages to the inner being.

There is no better way to learn a language than to immerse yourself in the reality of the country where it is spoken. The archetypes of the teaching stories - wise old men, monsters, beautiful maidens and minstrels, genies, magic gardens, castles, palaces, treasures, etc. – all of them represent a kind of language or code. Using this code, important messages can be deciphered and transmitted to the inner being; however, certain skills and imagination are required to understand and speak that language.

Using encoded symbols is a way to bypass the control and censorship of the Commanding Self or ego, to get in touch with the impulses that are suppressed by it. Getting in touch means becoming aware of them. This is “telling yourself your own story” - the real story, not a self-deceptive one.

Interacting with stories and parables forces a person to temporarily abandon the tool of the Commanding Self - discursive thinking - and give free rein to imaginative thinking. This is not easy for everyone, especially if true imagination has been consistently suppressed by the activity of their dominant (left) hemisphere of the brain.

Stanford University’s psychology Professor Robert Ornstein, who made significant contributions to the study of how the right and left hemispheres function, argued that teaching stories help to unite linear and nonlinear modes of thinking. A friend and a student of Idries Shah, Ornstein included many Sufi stories in the later editions of his work Psychology of Consciousness .

I know many people who experience a psychological barrier when working with teaching stories, but this obstacle is not insurmountable. The dormant capacity for holistic perception can be restored by telling and studying stories in a properly selected group, where at least some people have the gift of interacting with internal images. The latter easily adopt new patterns of thinking through parables and tales, and they transmit this ability to other participants in an almost chemical process of exchange known as “osmosis”.

The Tradition of wisdom has used universal narratives touching upon the universal archetypal layers of consciousness since time immemorial. Most of these eventually took the form of legends, fairy tales or parables. One of such kind is The Tale of Mushkil Gusha – a dervishes’ tale pointing to a mysterious universal element that resolves difficulties. Working with such stories, especially if it happens within a group environment and in the presence of certain people, really helps in resolving problems, since the main source of difficulties is not outside, but inside our mind. (So is the means of their resolution). In one of the key scenes of The Tale of Mushkil Gusha, an old woodcutter, who is the main character of the story, discovers the possibility of changing his rather miserable life while telling himself his own story.

Universal narratives like The Tale of Mushkil Gusha are constructed in such a way that they can never be reduced to a single “morale” or interpretation, but always remain open-ended. To many, such stories seem incomprehensible, absurd, or confusing. The truth is, they are “things in themselves,” touchstones, and this is their role – their purpose is to reveal something about the readers themselves. As Idries Shah wrote, “…their true function as Sufi teaching-stories is so little known in the modern world that no technical or popular term exists to describe them.”

I think it is not entirely true anymore. Western psychology comes close to the essence of the Sufi approach through one of its branches, known as narrative psychology. The foundations of this method were laid in the 1980s by American psychologists Theodore Sarbin and Jerome Bruner.

The founders of narrative psychology believe that we formalize our life experience in the form of stories or narratives. Any person’s life consists of a significantly larger number of events than those that they select for their stories. We are often unaware of these narratives or take them for granted until we encounter another person’s narrative and compare it to ours. This is why group interaction is so valuable.

Sometimes our dominant narratives help us evolve; sometimes they hinder our development. In the latter case, they can be repaired. Sometimes something prevents us from creating the correct story - as if pages in the book of our life are missing or damaged. We can restore the lost pages.

Our story is unique. There is no better expert in improving our own consciousness than ourselves, just as there is no single correct version of our story. The essence of the narrative approach is that a person is asked to tell themselves the story of their life, and then encouraged to revise the story in the way they think it should sound. The one who acts as a guide only helps - the main role in the transmutation of the narrative always belongs to the storyteller.;


AT THE GATES OF NOWHERELAND


There are different ways to open the gates through which the rational can enter indescribable worlds that lie beyond them. Michael Talbot, a writer exploring the intersection of science and mysticism, defined this realm as “non-local aspect of consciousness in the holographic Universe”. What does non-local mean? It means that it is everywhere and at the same time nowhere – it is a “Nowhere-Land”.

Non-locality is not the only feature of this fairy-tale land, not found on maps. There is another paradox – Nowhereland is the one and only, yet everyone lives in their own Nowhereland. Our inner being serves as a guide in our personal Nowhereland, and we will dedicate this chapter to a quest, whose subject is ourselves. Of course, this virtual journey is just a game, a fairy tale, so it should not be taken too seriously, but… even the most incredible fairy tale has some truth behind it.

So, if you decide to set on this journey to Nowhereland, I suggest you get a piece of paper and a pen (tablet, phone or any other recording device). You will find yourself in various imagined situations and be prompted to answer questions, so your task would be to write down what first comes to mind. In a fairy tale, everything is possible, so you can and should use imagination. It is crucial to capture the instant thought or image that comes to mind, no matter how strange, wild or unacceptable it may seem at a second glance.

It is important, because our true guide to Nowhereland - the inner Self - is always followed by a shadow censor, which is sometimes called by Sufis the “Commanding Self”. We only have half a second to contact the inner Self before the censor interferes and generates a “worthy” answer approved by it.

But we want to learn something about ourselves, that is genuine, don’t we?
Each of us already has a version of the “censored” self-portrait - just look at your social media page! My Sufi guide called the image we create on social media “a direct link to Commanding Self”. But that’s not what we’re looking for, right?

Some find it easier to “hear” what they imagine, as if someone were telling them; others visualize it. Both ways are acceptable; the key things are sincerity and spontaneity.

The time and space of Nowhereland are different from ours, so there is no point in looking for a connection between the proposed fairy-tale situations - there might be none. And one more thing: there are no wrong answers in our quest – any answer leads us to our true self. You will need 25-35 minutes to complete the quest. At the end of the chapter, you will be given keys, which will help you to decode your answers, but do not rush to look there until you have completed the quest, if you wish to remain objective. With that, off we go!

 
THE QUEST


Imagine yourself lying on your back and looking up at the sky. It is completely clear - not a single cloud in sight. The deep blue above you relaxes and soothes you. Everything is calm and comfortable. Try to hold the image of a clear blue sky while you count to ten. 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10.

Now you turn your head to your left and notice that as far as you can see, there is an endless desert around you.

You turn your head the other way and see a cube. What does it look like? How big is it compared to the desert? What colour is it? What material is it made of, are its walls transparent? If so, can you peek inside it?

Looking closely, you notice a ladder. How is it positioned in relation to the cube? What material is it made of? What is the distance between the cube and the ladder? Is the ladder leaning on the cube?

You see a horse. What colour is this animal? What is it doing, and how is it positioned in relation to the cube?

You notice a storm in the desert. How far is it from where the cube is? Is it a big storm? How and where does it move?

You walk for a while in the desert, and suddenly at your feet you see a key, apparently lost by someone. What does the key look like? What would you do with it?

You continue on your way and see an erupting volcano. What is your first thought or feeling when you see it?

You go on and notice a burrow of some animal. How big is the burrow? Do you want to look inside and check who is inside, or maybe even lure the inhabitant out of their burrow?

After you finish with the burrow, you go on your way and suddenly notice a monster of terrible appearance approaching you. Judging by its look, the enraged monster would not listen to the words of reason or arguments. You think: “It is so angry because... (finish the sentence).”

Escaping from the monster, you dived into a nearby cave and, wandering through a network of winding passages, realized that you can’t find a way back to the surface. You need help! There is no one in the cave except some bats. One of them suddenly flies up to you and whispers something in your ear... What does it say?

You finally get out of the cave and find that the landscape has completely changed. You are standing on the edge of a cliff and looking at the abyss in front of you. You need to get to the other side using a bridge thrown over the abyss, but when you reach the middle of the bridge, you notice that your way is blocked by an evil little dwarf of an extremely ugly appearance. The bridge is so narrow that there is room for only one person, but the dwarf does not let you pass and would not listen to admonitions, or move from his place. What will you do?

One way or another, you got to the other side and found yourself in front of an ancient castle. You open the door, enter the castle and find that there is no one there. What is the first thing you see when you open the door?

While exploring the castle, you discovered a library. On the table in the middle of it lies one large book. You began to read it and suddenly realized that one of the characters in this book is you. Who is this character?

You continue reading the book and find that several pages are damaged and are unreadable. Which part of the story is contained in the damaged pages?

You leave the library and see a staircase, which you decide to climb. What do the stairs look like?
You climb up the stairs and find yourself in a small room with a single window. How big is this window? What do you see when you look out of the window?

Now you go back down the stairs and find yourself at the entrance to the dining room, where you see a dining table. Describe what you see on and around the table. Is the table square or round? How many chairs do you see around it?

You walk further through the castle and find an entrance to the dungeon. The dungeon’s door is not locked. Do you feel like entering the dungeon? If so, what do you find there? What do you feel about it? Do you want to stay in the dungeon to find out more about it, or do you feel like leaving it as soon as possible?

Now you leave the castle through the back door and, opening the door, suddenly knock over a barrel of garbage that was standing there. What falls out from under the lid of this garbage barrel?

You leave the castle and walk further along the road. Along the way, you come across a field of ripe strawberries. You feel very hungry. Only a fence separates you from the ripe berries, and there is no one around. How high is the fence? What will you do - pass by or pick the berries?

Suppose you climb over the fence and start picking strawberries. How many berries will you pick?

Suddenly the owner of the strawberry patch appears and starts shouting at you. What do you say in your defense?

You leave the strawberry patch and go on your way, thinking about what happened. What do you think about the strawberry theft situation now that you have been caught red-handed?

You walk on, and over the hill you see the sea. Describe the sea in three words. Is it calm or rough, what is the weather like at sea, is there sun, wind? Do you want to go in, and if so, how deep (just wet your feet or dive in head first)?

You see a ship at sea. What is it like, and how far is it from the shore? Can you reach it? Would you attempt reaching it?
You decide to get on the ship anyway, and, as you stand on its deck, you see a family of whales rising to the surface of the sea not far from you. What words best describe this family of whales? How many are there? What are they in relation to each other, and how are they arranged?

You get off the ship and walk along the road for a while and end up in a forest. Describe the forest in three words: are there many trees, is it light or dark, are there mushrooms and berries? What animals live in this forest?
Suddenly a bear comes out of the forest. Describe it. What happens between you and the bear?

Having resolved the situation with the bear, you walk on. It got dark in the forest, but you noticed a light, and following it, you discovered that it was coming from a small hut on the edge of the forest. What will you do - go straight to the house, or look around carefully before deciding to knock on the door and enter? Or will you pass by, since you don’t know what awaits you inside, and look for a place to spend the night by yourself?

You nevertheless entered the house. You see a jug of water standing on the table. How full is the jug?

Your path leads you further, and you come to a river bank. What does the river look like? Describe it in three words.

You need to cross the river, and you have reached the place where the current of the river is calmest. There you’ve noticed a boat. The boatman agrees to take you across, but on the condition that one of the six animals waiting on the bank will be transported along with you: a cow, a tiger, a unicorn, a sheep, a horse, or a pig. In the boat, besides you and the boatman, there is room for only one of these animals. Which one will you take?

You have crossed the river and again find yourself in a desert area. There is no one around, only an endless desert and a clear sky. You look up and see a sphere in the sky. Describe it in three words. How big is it? Can you see anything on its surface?

You walk further through the desert and come across a wall that seems to have no end. How high is this wall? You find a small hole in the wall and, looking through it, see an oasis. What will you do next? Will you look for a way to get over the wall, and if yes, how are you going to handle it?
Now, let’s assume you got over the wall and found yourself in the oasis, in the middle of which there is a magic garden. What kind of garden came to your mind? Is it easy to get into it, or is it fenced and inaccessible? What or who do you see in the garden?

There is a source of water in the midst of the garden. Describe it – how big is it? Is the water easy to access; does the stream of water spurt out like a fountain, or does it flow in small streams?
You find that there is a luxurious palace in the garden, with tables laden with delicious food and chests filled with treasures. A powerful genie appears out of nowhere and says that all these wonderful things belong to you. The genie awaits for your orders. What will you do?

You find that the main alley of the magic garden turns into a path leading to a mountain. What does the mountain look like; how big is it? Do you feel like climbing to its top?

Let’s assume you decided to conquer the mountain, and now, finally, after a difficult and long journey, you are approaching its top. At its peak you see a vague, mysterious figure. When you reach the top, the figure turns to you and says something... Who is it, and what did you hear?


KEY TO THE QUEST


Please use this key only after all the questions of the quest in the previous chapter have been answered.

The image of the blue sky at the beginning was a way to help you tune in and stop the flow of thoughts - for most people, visualizing the color blue has a calming effect and promotes introspection.

The cube represents what is called our social persona, the external aspect of our being, the Commanding Self. The relative size of the cube indicates how much our personality dominates over the internal aspects of being and can indicate the strength of the ego.

The surface of the cube represents how we interact with others. The material the cube is made of (smooth, rough, prickly, etc.) indicates how we get along with others. If the surface of the cube is smooth - you are a gentle person who avoids hurting others’ feelings or making them feel uncomfortable. If the surface is rough - you are more straightforward, love honest statements, regardless of how people perceive it. If the surface of the cube has protrusions or spikes, you might have a tendency to criticize others and make them feel inferior.

The color of the cube tells something about your character.

Red: you love physical activity and new experiences.

Yellow: you love communication and strive to be different from others.

Blue: you are intellectual; you respect other people’s opinions and ideas.

Purple: you are intellectual and prone to perfectionism. You are attracted to everything mysterious.

Gray: you are self-confident, independent; your emotional balance is not easily shaken.

Black: you have a strong desire for your own individuality and independence; you highly value personal space and time.

White: you are kind, independent and rely mainly on yourself.

A cube with a transparent surface means that you are confident enough to not hide your thoughts and feelings from others. You are deeply sincere.

A cube made of water or ice means that your personality is sensitive to social pressure; you are strongly influenced by what others think of you and by other external factors.

A hollow cube means that you are primarily concerned with your image and much less with what is going on inside. However, this does not mean that you have no inner life.

A cube made of metal or stone indicates your integrity. Your personality is so strong that no external forces can influence it. You are consistent and prone to dominance.

The material and location of the stairs indicate how close your relationships are with friends and loved ones. The closer the stairs are to the cube, and the stronger the material it is made of (stone, metal), the stronger your friendships. If the stairs are located close to the cube or rest on the cube, you allow your friends and loved ones to rely on you and your help. If the stairs are far from the cube, you prefer to distance yourself from people, and it is difficult for you to let them into your personal space.

The horse represents your ideal partner (spouse, other relative or close friend). The distance at which the horse is located from the cube characterizes how close you would like your relationship with your partner to be.
If the horse is playful and frolics nearby, you prefer to have a partner who is easygoing and does not take problems seriously. A horse that runs away from the cube may mean that you like it when your partner leaves you enough personal space. If the horse is sleeping or peacefully grazing next to the cube, your ideal partner is even-tempered and, if possible, always close to you.

The color of the horse also indicates your preferences regarding the character of your partner.

Bay horse: you value reliability and comfort above all else in a relationship, but, other than that, you have no other serious expectations from a partner.

Black horse: your ideal partner dominates you; they are seductive; their character is complex.

White horse: you value loyalty, trust and honesty above all else in a relationship.

If the horse’s color is unusual and not among those listed above, you prefer a partner who would always surprise or challenge you.

The storm represents the degree and nature of stress or threat in your life at the moment. The stronger the storm, and the closer it is to the cube, the more stress you are feeling at this time.

The key you found is your attitude towards opportunities that arise in your life. What you did with the key – pick it up and carry it away, or leave it lying on the road – shows how you use the opportunities that come your way to change your life for the better.

The thoughts that you had about the erupting volcano show how you react to the release of negative emotions from other people, especially the anger and irritation expressed by a person of authority in your life (parent, teacher, boss, etc.).

The hole represents potential danger. How boldly you enter the hole or lure the beast out will show how brave (or foolhardy) you are, and how you feel about risk.

The angry monster represents the dark side of our personality, the Shadow, the unconscious, subhuman part of the psyche. The Shadow is present in each of us, and the anger of the monster is actually caused by a source of tension in our own lives. Any frightening image in self-examination usually shows us an unexpressed part of ourselves.

What you named as the cause of the monster’s rage is the main cause of your own tension.

By imagining what the bat might say to you, you demonstrate how you react and what you say to those who need your help.
Your attitude towards the ugly dwarf shows how you deal with the inevitable evil in your life: you put up with it and endure it, or you are ready to go to extreme measures, even if this means going against the principles of mercy.

The space inside the castle is how you would like to be perceived by others. Bookshelves may mean that you are a person who wants to create the impression of knowledge and helping people find answers to their life questions. A large fireplace or a blazing hearth means that you would like to evoke in others a feeling of warmth and love. If you saw a ballroom, you strive to impress others with spectacular external attributes. If you find yourself in a long corridor with closed doors, you may feel insecure and think that it is difficult for others to understand you, to “penetrate” you.

The character in the book that you identify with reflects the role that you would really like to play in life. It may or may not coincide with who you are in reality. The part of the story that is contained in the damaged pages reflects an unpleasant situation in the past that you would like to forget.

The staircase speaks about your idea of overcoming life’s difficulties. A steep and massive staircase shows a person who sees life as a hard work or even suffering, with many difficulties. An elegant spiral staircase can indicate that a person takes life easily or even frivolously, not treating problems seriously.

The window is how you feel about your prospects in life at the current moment. A small window might mean that you feel depressed or constrained by circumstances. A window that is too large, or the one that occupies the entire wall means that you feel invincible, confident that all your plans will come true, and your ambitions will be satisfied. A medium-sized window means moderate expectations from life.

The view from the window tells us how you would characterize your life with a single image. In our imagination, just like in life, we “discover” a place rather than “choose” it; we do not intentionally create a particular landscape, it simply emerges in the mind. A stormy sea shows a restless and disorderly life, and a forest covered with snow is more likely to appear to a person who prefers to live isolated and detached. A green valley shows that your life is calm and balanced, and you don’t experience much stress or anxiety. A city filled with lights can characterize a person who cannot imagine their life without interactions with many people.

Dining room: If you did not see food or flowers on the table, or people at the table, you may not be very satisfied with the current state of affairs in your life. If the table is square, you are quite stubborn and like to insist on your own way. If it is round, you are flexible and diplomatic. The number of chairs around the table speaks of your hospitality and generosity.

The image of dungeon witnesses your relation to the sphere of the unconscious in yourself. If you are uncomfortable in the dungeon, or even the thought of going there scares you, perhaps you are hiding a lot of unresolved issues there. Maybe you are afraid of your dreams, do not want to remember many moments of the past, are afraid to look into the future.

If going to the dungeon does not scare you, this may mean that you have done a lot of work with your suppressed fears and other inner issues.

The contents of the barrel which you accidentally kicked reveal those things inside you that you try to hide from others.

The height of the fence around the strawberry field speaks of your level of self-control and resistance to temptations. The more impregnable the fence seems, the greater your strength to resist temptation.

The number of berries you picked, and what you said in your defense indicates how far you are willing to go in breaking the taboo, and how you would justify yourself if caught. The way you felt while thinking about the episode with the strawberries characterizes how you evaluate past situations where you broke taboos.

The sea represents the emotional side of love. By how stormy or calm it seems to you, you can see what kind of relationship you are attracted to – dramatic or smooth without emotional upheavals and showdowns.

The depth of your diving into the sea indicates how deeply you are ready to immerse into love, how strongly the feeling of love embraces you.

A ship is the main dream of your life. Depending on what it looks like, and how far it is from the shore, you can judge how realistic you consider the fulfillment of your dream.

The way you imagined a family of whales is connected with your feelings about the relationship with your parents, especially with your mother.

The forest represents a person’s inner world, and the trees in the forest are their thoughts. A forest full of sunlight or a dark one, spacious or dense indicates the orderliness of thoughts and their quality. Lots of mushrooms and berries mean that you are optimistic and strive to see the positive in everything.

The animals in the forest are your friends, the people around you. If the animals are harmless, you trust people and are not afraid of communication, you have many friends. If the forest is an impenetrable jungle with many predators, you may not trust people or feel threaten by them. Your interaction with the bear – whether you attack first, seek refuge, play dead, or just wait for what happens - reveals how you handle threat and aggression (passively/aggressively/freezing /ignoring, etc.). If the bear is too huge and hungry, perhaps your concealed fears, constant expectation of threat or danger are exaggerated.

The ease with which you enter a stranger’s house in the forest shows how easily you enter into new relationships and connections (friendly, intimate). If you burst into the house without knocking, perhaps you are desperate for such a relationship.

The level to which the jug is filled with water indicates how filled you are with the feeling of love at the moment.

The river represents the flow of life and vital force in a broad sense. Depending on how wide and fast the flow appears to you, and how clean is the river’s water, what its bottom looks like, and whether there are any pitfalls, speaks about your ideas about your own capabilities, energy level, rhythm of life and problems encountered.

The animal which you chose to cross the river with you speaks about your main life priority:

Cow - career
Tiger - honor, dignity and pride
Unicorn - spiritual values
Sheep - love
Horse - family
Pig - money and material values

The sphere in the sky symbolizes your spirit, your true Self. Its size and appearance indicate the extent of its influence on your life. The drawings or patterns you see on the sphere may convey messages from your spirit.

A wall is a symbol of obstacles on the way to your life goal. The size of the wall and your actions (climbing the wall, getting a ladder, using help, etc.) show how surmountable these obstacles seem to you, and how you approach overcoming them - whether you rely only on yourself or seek someone else’s help, etc. If you were unable to get across, then perhaps you are now facing a problem that seems insoluble to you.

A magic garden is a metaphor for the essential being, the spiritual heart of a person, and the source of water that is in the middle of it is a life force that revives and resurrects our spirit. The source can also symbolize the power of unconditional, Divine love in the heart of a person.

The luxurious palace represents life’s bounties in a broad sense, and the genie represents extraordinary faculties. Would you prefer to stay in the magical palace to rule the genie, or would you decide to move on and conquer the mountain peak, which symbolizes a long and difficult inner transformation?

The size of the mountain in your imagination is how much inner work lies ahead of you. If you don’t feel like climbing the mountain, perhaps you do not feel the strength to begin the inner transformation.

And finally, the figure you see at the top is your true Self, so perhaps you should be mindful of what it wants to communicate to you.


NA-KOJA-ABAD


It is time to share with the reader that the name of the mysterious country of our quest - “Nowhereland”, or “The Place of No Place”, or Na-Koja-Abad – comes from the works of Shihabuddin Suhrawardi, the same Sufi who wrote the tale of the veiled peacock.

By this name Suhrawardi referred to the reality, which the Persian Gnostics defined as the “eighth sphere” - a region beyond the seven spheres of sensory experience.

Henry Corbin, the French researcher of the Sufi mystical teachings, wrote: “...It is spiritual reality that envelops, surrounds, contains the reality called material. That is why spiritual reality is not ‘in the where.’ It is the ‘where’ that is in it. Or, rather, it is itself the ‘where’ of all things; it is, therefore, not itself in a place, it does not fall under the question ‘where?’—the category ubi referring to a place in sensory space. Its place (its abad) in relation to this is Na-Koja (No-Where), because its ubi in relation to what is in sensory space is an ubique (everywhere)” .

Sufi and other mystics, like Suhrawardi, get to the Nowhereland by immersing inside themselves. Many of Suhrawardi’s works begin with him finding himself in a completely deserted area, where he begins his journey and meets various mysterious creatures.

(This area is our inner space and also the prototype of the desert, from which we set out on our quest in the previous chapter).

Often in Suhrawardi’s stories we also see the legendary Mount Qaf - a symbol of spiritual accomplishment.

Although the eighth sphere is in “nowhere,” anyone can get there by awakening the organ that perceives it. This organ is true imagination, which the great healer and alchemist Paracelsus followed as a guiding star in his search for the Ez-Zat, the Essence or Elixir. At the same time, true imagination should not be confused with fantasy run wild, as Paracelsus warned in his work De Virtute Imaginativa.

According to Corbin, the region beyond the tangible world is not a figment of imagination at all, although it is not inhabited by creatures of the flesh, but by prototypes of things, or their Archetypes. The word “archetype” consists of the Greek roots arche - “beginning” and tipos - “image.” To comprehend the notion of archetype, let’s use a metaphor.

Imagine a game of magical chess that takes place on two boards placed one above the other. The player moves the chess pieces only on the upper board, but the pieces on the lower board mysteriously shadow all the movements that happen on the level above.

Now let’s go one step further and imagine that the board and pieces on the upper level are virtual and invisible, and on the lower level they are material and three-dimensional. The latter are set in motion by a semblance of a “remote control” between the levels.

If we ask ourselves, where the virtual board and pieces are located, the possible answer is that they are in some analogue of an informational “cloud”. Do virtual pieces really exist? In a sense, they do. Are they being the root cause of what happens on the material board? Absolutely. Can someone with access to the virtual board predict how the game will unfold in its physical double? Certainly.

And if the Player knows the way to control virtual pieces, can He change the course of a chess game in the realm of three dimensions? The answer is obvious.
Now, let’s imagine that the pieces on the lower, material chessboard were created, or “3D-printed” using the intangible pieces of the higher dimension as prototypes. These heavenly prototypes were called “archetypes” by ancient philosophers – the original images.

The word “archetype” became popular in the West thanks to the outstanding Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung. That which the Sufi Suhrawardi called “the eighth sphere”, the scientist Jung defined as the “collective unconscious”, which he understood as a particularly deep level of mental space that stretches beyond personality. Carl Jung was the first in the West to use archetypes in understanding and healing the psyche. Jung claimed that “the real mystery… speaks a secret language, it adumbrates itself by a variety of images…” , so deciphering images leads to a deeper understanding of the problems and hidden needs of a person.

The archetypal Shadow (the monster representing the prehuman, dark part of our inner world), which we encountered in our quest, was discussed in detail in Jung’s works . Each seeker encounters his or her Shadow and must work to enlighten and integrate it in order to move forward in the journey of the soul. The same applies to the supra-cultural image of a sphere or circle as a metaphor for the soul or spirit described by Jung in Man and His Symbols.

Following Carl Jung, the monumental importance of images in therapy was reinstated by the American psychologist James Hillman, who founded a new branch of psychology in the 1950-70s, with the name “archetypal psychology” . By the way, he used the works of Henry Corbin and Sufi mystics as the base.

And there was more. In continuation of Hillman’s research, a series of situational tests with archetypal symbols were developed in the 1980-90s by a group of Japanese psychologists led by Isamu Saito. The methods of this non-academic direction in psychology with the unusual-sounding name of kokology (from the Japanese kokoro, which literally means “heart” and figuratively describes the spirit, or inner world of a person). Kokological tests became very popular as they were very much like a game, and even the most serious of adults love games no less than children.

Many of the images that we encountered during our quest in Nowhereland were taken from Saito’s tests: cube as a symbol of ego; horse representing an ideal partner; storm as a metaphor for impending tension; hole - a hidden danger; volcano as an expression of the anger; family of whales - a symbol of family relationships; barrel of garbage – as things we would like to hide from others, etc. Some believe that Saito’s works were based on Sufi methods of working with the “heart”, and although I was unable to find a direct reference to this connection in Saito’s works, it is truly so in spirit, if not in the letter.

The places where our quest journey unfolded were also archetypal. We can easily recognize some of them from the legends and fairy tales of different nations: magic forest with its inhabitants as a symbol of the inner world; secret garden with the water of life metaphorically representing our spiritual heart, and so on. On this note, the word “garden” is often found in the book titles by Sufi poets: The Rose Garden and The Fruit Garden by Saadi Shirazi, The Walled Garden of Truth by Hakim Sanai, etc.

The image of a genie is, of course, familiar to us from The Arabian Nights, but not everyone knows that Sufis consider genies to be a metaphorical indication of extraordinary powers and faculties concealed inside us.

Images of a castle with dungeons, a luxurious palace with table full of delicacies and all sorts of riches also come straight from fairy tales and do not always have a specific cultural and historical context: these can be Western or Oriental.

Carl Jung pointed out that the origins of the term “archetype” lie in the Eastern schools of wisdom. He wrote: “Psychoanalysis itself and the lines of thought to which it gives rise—a development which we consider specifically Western—are only a beginner’s attempt compared with what is an immemorial art in the East.” 

What was that “immemorial Eastern art” Jung referred to?


SUFIS AND ARCHETYPES


The idea that material objects are merely imprints of a deeper reality runs through the works of many Sufi Masters, of whom the greatest and most known is the Andalusian Sufi Muhyiddin Ibn Arabi. In his Bezels of Wisdom , Ibn Arabi wrote that there is a level of existence where prototypes exist in their pure form – this is the Divine Treasury.

Although in an imperfect form, its treasures or archetypes are embodied in the created world. Although the access to the Divine Treasury seems unattainable for a human being, the angels have built a bridge between the realms of the archetypes and their embodiments, so that each seeker, using the supreme faculties given to them (“angels”), can establish a connection with that which appears through the manifest.

Ibn Arabi follows the spirit of the saying “the manifest is the path to the Truth” (al-mujazu qantarat al-haqiqat), a Sufi aphorism and description of a practice by which the student acquires the skill of freely shifting his point of view between the infinite and the finite, between the phenomenon and the Archetype emerging through it.

In the book Awakening, the Sufi Vilayat Inayat Khan describes the shift in focus between the manifest and the archetypal on an example of a rose. He suggests us to compare the abstract idea of ‘the universal rose’ with the real roses growing in a garden. The former corresponds to the Divine quality, and the real red, yellow, or white roses are unique manifestations or instances of this archetype in material reality.  Meditation on the image of a rose—an exercise sometimes given to an individual dervish or to an entire Sufi group—helps to penetrate the essence of the Archetype behind the ordinary flower.

The importance of the skill in shifting mental focus from the manifest to the archetypal is explained in Idries Shah’s book The Commanding Self: “You look at an object, and judge it by the associations which it conjures up. You may like it or not. The reasons for liking it are seldom reasonable at all. A person may, legitimately, like a flower. He likes the colour, shape, total impact, smell and so on. But he has no conception of any deeper meaning of the flower. By this I do not mean the airy-fairy feeling ‘that this must really mean something’. Such an idea is far too imprecise and primitive. The flower has a meaning and a value, which I call the deeper meaning. Meaning here signifies the real relationship between the flower, the individual and the group, as well as its real function in relation to the totality of life. Some philosophers and poets talk and think about these things. Almost none participates in them.” 

“Almost none participates in them...” What exactly does Shah mean? Many people find this passage incomprehensible.

Trying to penetrate the veil of the manifest on our way to the Truth, we become not just a semi-conscious observer, but also a participant in the cosmic game, going from the lower chess board to the upper one (remember the magical chess from the previous chapter?). An archetype is not just an abstract idea; it is a source of certain energy.

This idea is developed by Vilayat Inayat Khan in Awakening: the contemplation of the Universe with its infinite wealth of archetypes is the basis of the Sufi practice of invoking the names of God, and by manifesting the Divine Qualities, defined by these Names, in everyday life, we become able to transform the Universe itself.

For example, a dervish who has been given the exercise of concentrating on the name As-Salam hopes to become familiar with such archetypal Qualities as peace, serene joy and harmony.

We encounter archetypal images through their reflection in various creative arts. We may say that any work of art is genius only to the extent that an artist, writer, or movie-maker managed to connect to the archetypal qualities of the “eight sphere” and express them in the characters of their creation.

According to Carl Jung, this is the secret of the influence of art on us. Perhaps this explains the astonishing popularity of the fantasy genre – from John Tolkien’s ballads like The Lord of the Rings to Harry Potter’s quest for the Philosopher’s Stone in Joanne Rowling’s books. This can also be said on the vogue of computer games like Heroes of Might and Magic—adults are as enchanted by fairy tale characters as children, and for a good reason: the right tale can be a life-changing tool.

Idries Shah told his son Tahir , that a teaching story was like a fine chessboard. We all know how we can be drawn into a game so complex that it demands the concentration of all our powers and abilities. If we imagine that this game had been lost to society for centuries, and then someone finds this beautiful chessboard and pieces. Everyone would gather around to admire them, but they might not even suspect that such exquisite objects once had a use other than simply to please the eye.

The inner essence of teaching stories has been lost in the same way. Everyone once knew how to use them, how to apply their meaning. But now the rules of this game have been forgotten, and the truth about how to play it must once again be revealed to people.


TASWIR


In each of us lives an ancient eye, which is able to penetrate into the past, the future and the hidden. It awakens when our physical eyes are closed. This all-seeing eye is a witness to our unique story and our inimitable design. This pattern, hidden in the unconscious, is made of the same fabric as our dreams.

Psychoanalysis and depth psychology consider dreams to be the “royal road”, via regia, to the unconscious. So said Sigmund Freud, who wrote in the preface to his book The Interpretation of Dreams: “The interpretation of dreams is the royal road to a knowledge of the unconscious mental life.”

Nowadays, no one is surprised if a psychotherapist asks a patient to talk about their dreams and assists in “reading” them. Not everyone knows, however, that long before Freud and Jung, dream interpretation was used by Sufi teachers to diagnose the state of a disciple and prescribe certain practices.

In his book The Way of the Sufi Idries Shah writes: “Western orientalists and others have noted, for instance, that the Afghan Jalaluddin Rumi (died 1273), Hakim Sanai of Khorasan (fourteenth century), Al-Ghazali of Persia (died 1111), and Ibn Arabi of Spain (died 1240) speak of psychological states, theories of psychology, and psychotherapeutic procedures, which would have been incomprehensible to readers without the contemporary ‘infrastructure’, which we have lately acquired in the West. These ideas are called ‘Freudian’ and ‘Jungian’ and so on, in consequence.” 

Shah’s remark applies in particular to such fields as somnology and oneirology, or the sciences of sleep and dreams. Many of the “discoveries” in this field were made as early as the 12th century in the medieval Andalusia.

In the 1940-50s, when Freud’s works were translated into Arabic, the translators used terms from Ibn Arabi’s works to express such ideas as the “unconscious,” etc. The Sufis have always believed that human being has an inherent capacity to perceive their real situation, but this capacity is hidden by a veil that prevents images of the world of subconscious from being reflected in the mirror of daytime consciousness. Nevertheless, something in us is irresistibly striving to verbalize its own story, to make it conscious. If our ego suppresses it, the inner Self will bring it up again and again—through dreams.

“A strange burden... As if within me
Thousands of eyes not closed in sleep...”

(from a poem by the Russian poet Pavel Antokolsky, 1896–1978) 

The unconscious speaks to us all the time. It yearns to be heard. The Iranian psychotherapist Nossrat Peseschkian writes about this: “Dreams are stories we tell ourselves. They are a form of inner dialogue, often without beginning or end. In dreams, imagination finds a space that is denied to it in everyday life, where reason dominates. Dreams are, in this sense, individual mythologies”.

But if we already tell ourselves everything in our dreams, why do we need an interpretation? Why did the Sufis attach such an importance to it?

They did so, because the stories we tell ourselves in dreams are not text messages. Almost never. Only half of our brain actually deals with words, but this is the half we use when we wake up. The speech of the other half (“the language of the birds”), in which the inner being conveys its messages, is often incomprehensible to us and requires interpretation.

Jalaluddin Rumi, the great Sufi poet and teacher, wrote: “The interpretation of dreams belongs to the Prophet, for he is the true interpreter. The affairs of this world are like dreams, and their meaning is not what appears outwardly. Only the one who is awake in God can interpret them rightly”. 

A Man of Knowledge who understands this special language of the unmanifested world can interpret dreams.

In his book The Way of the Sufi Idries Shah writes: “The sign of the rightly guided is not only the ability to evoke an image (naqsh), but also the correct interpretation of that image — an art called taswir”.

This passage puzzles many, and Shah doesn’t explain it, so let’s try to understand it. First, what is “image-evoking or naqsh”? It’s any process that uses symbolic drama to connect with the unconscious. It can be organized as a psychological quest, similar to our journey to Nowhereland. It can involve the use of symbolic narratives in the form of fairy tales or fables. Ultimately, it can be an immersion in a state of introspection, in which a symbolic message from the subconscious is received.

The book The Teachers of Gurdjieff, written under the pen name Rafael Lefort, contains an interesting passage. In this episode, a sheikh of the Mevlevi Sufi order in Konya guides the author through the experience of image-evoking. The sheikh invites Rafael to join a night of meditation with several Mevlevi dervishes in order to then convey the message received by Rafael in this special state to another Sufi, Hassan Karbali of Mashhad, for interpretation.

As the session begins, the room fills with the rhythmic pulse of a drum and the haunting sound of a flute.

Lefort closes his eyes, attempting to empty his mind. The music deepens, and the chant of “Hu, Hu” — a sacred Sufi invocation — rises softly. He joins in, not out of obligation, but from an inner compulsion. Gradually, he enters a trance-like state. He feels as if he’s gliding through space toward a radiant star emitting multicolored light. The experience intensifies as he hears a voice repeating a familiar Persian verse — the opening line of Rumi’s Mathnawi: “Listen to the reed flute’s lament…” The verse echoes again and again, merging with the music and chant.

When Rafael opens his eyes, dawn has arrived. What felt like minutes had lasted hours. He’s left with questions: was it hypnosis or a dream? But he’s reminded that his task is not to analyze, but to remember and describe the experience.

As instructed by the Mevlevi sheikh, Rafael Lefort travels east to Mashhad, seeking the guidance of Hassan Karbali, a Sufi master and enameller working in the Tilla Shahi bazaar. Karbali receives him with quiet attentiveness. Rafael recounts his experience in detail and when he finishes, Karbali looks up and speaks with calm clarity. The verse, he says, is Rafael’s passport — a symbolic key to his spiritual journey. Each person in the meditation heard something different, shaped by their own capacity to understand. What Rafael received was not random; it was tailored to his readiness.

Karbali urged him to begin slowly, patiently. The path ahead requires listening to the deeper call of the flute, the soul’s yearning, he said. If Rafael can accept what lies ahead without clinging to old ideas or intellectual habits, he may move forward.

To interpret the message evoked by the seeker’s special state, Hassan Karbali employed that very art that Idries Shah called taswir, or “image interpretation.” The Arabic word taswir means “image, picture, or symbol.” In medieval Turkeye, Persia, and India, taswir was used to describe translucent shadow puppets cut out of paper. By directing light on the figures and projecting images onto a fabric screen, shadow puppet operators created the illusion of reality.

If the screen were removed, the viewer would see the operator themselves, not illusory images.
 
If our true self were not hidden by a veil, it would reflect the essence of things in the mirror of our consciousness, and no interpretation would be necessary. But because our “operator” is hidden behind a veil, it is forced to project its messages as pictures or images. Therefore, in a dream, a person sees not the object itself, but only a symbol or sign— a taswir.

Let’s continue with the shadow play analogy. Normally, the screen is hidden by a curtain that opens only for the duration of the performance. If the curtain is lowered, we cannot even see the shadows on the screen.

When people are in the so-called waking state, the “theater curtain” between the other world and ordinary reality is lowered. As soon as we fall asleep or enter a special trance state, the curtain rises; the entrance to the shadow theater opens, and images—taswir—appear on the screen.

In the chapter titled “On Knowledge of the Soul” of his treatise The Alchemy of Happiness, the great Sufi Al-Ghazali writes: “When a man is asleep, the five senses are at rest, and the door to the world of spirits is opened. Then he sees what he cannot see when awake, and hears what he cannot hear with the ears of the body”.
   
This same idea is found in the allegorical story The Tale of the Western Exile by the Sufi mystic Suhrawardi, who wrote that the veils of the soul, represented by the five external and five internal senses (touch, smell, sight, hearing, and taste), are partially lifted during sleep.

Both Sufis draw on the Quranic verse that God calls human souls to Himself not only in the afterlife, but also during sleep (39:42).

During sleep, but not all kinds of sleep...

In his book The Meccan Revelations, Ibn Arabi writes that dream sleep is only one of the two types of sleep. It alternates with another type—deep, dreamless sleep, which allows the body to rest and recuperate.  This, incidentally, is entirely consistent with modern somnologists’ understanding of the two stages of sleep: slow-wave sleep, without dreams, and rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, with dreams. During the dream stage, Ibn Arabi writes, contact with the soul and the transmission of messages from it become possible.

This occurs through what the Sufi calls the Divine Treasury, where the templates, or archetypes, of all the various earthly forms, to which a particular person has access, are stored. We can compare these templates to a set of paper taswir figures from a shadow puppet theater.

When we sleep, the soul visits this treasure trove and examines the “props,” selecting those ones it deems most appropriate to deliver its message. Even such abstract concepts as God or Tradition can take symbolic form in the Divine Treasury, often in the anthropomorphic form.

In my dreams, the energy of the Sufi Tradition or its transformative essence —Baraka—most often appears personified as my Teacher. Before I met him, the Tradition was represented in my dreams as Idries Shah, whose books I was reading intensely. This doesn’t mean, of course, that Idries Shah or my Teacher literally entered my dreams—it only means that my soul found it most appropriate to express the message of the Tradition through their images.

And there is nothing wrong with this method of communication. The issue, however, is that the inner being – the “operator” of the shadow play - is limited by the availability of proper taswir figures in our inner theatre’s props. There aren’t many taswir, and they aren't always perfectly suited to the message being conveyed. What is stored within a person’s image bank depends on their experience, their mental capacity, and the development of their sensory organs.

Therefore, the same message can be conveyed in hundreds of different ways to different people, with varying degrees of accuracy.

In support of this, Ibn Arabi writes, for example, that people born blind cannot perceive visual images in dreams, and the deaf cannot hear in their dreams.  (And this is indeed true: according to modern research, people born blind do not “see” dreams in form and color, but interpret dream cues through touch, smell, or hearing. Although most people with normal vision dream in black and white, approximately one in five dreams in color, which distinguishes creative and imaginative individuals.)

Simply put, the soul in dreams utilizes the “props” of the body’s senses. Al-Ghazali writes that messages received in dreams are most often clothed in the garb of memories or familiar images.  The imprints evoked from the dreamer’s memory correspond not to the external appearance of events, but to their inner essence.

In other words, when interpreting dreams, what matters is not the form in which the sign appears, but the feeling or association the message was intended to evoke. The image of a tree in the forest seen in a dream, for example, may evoke completely different associations in a lumberjack, a carpenter, or a tree-hugger. Therefore, although there are universal archetypal images, dream interpretation is a sublime art that requires individual approach.

Symbols in dreams are important not only by themselves, but also in their relationship with one another. In this sense, written collections of dream interpretations are, to put it mildly, unreliable tools.

Once a few years ago, I had a discussion with a Moroccan Sufi named Khalil of the Qadiri order. We talked about the significance, which the Qadiri dervishes placed on interpretations of dreams and visions. Khalil said that there were different types of dreams, and not all were equal in the quality of their message.
Ordinary dreams are the result of processing daytime impressions, previously acquired emotional imprints or psychological traumas; signals from the physical body, and so on. These are the subjects of the conventional psychotherapy and medicine.

There are other dreams, too, those coming from a person’s essence, their Higher Self. They occur less frequently, but remain in the memory for a long time, sometimes forever. They typically contain a direction, even an imperative, a call to action. Messages from the spirit are direct and require no interpretation. According to Khalil, such dreams most often occur between midnight and three or four in the morning, before dawn.

That which Khalil told us about the timing of special dreams may be connected to the saying (hadith) of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him): “The most truthful dreams are those seen at the time of pre-dawn.”  According to his followers, he asked them every morning about their dreams and interpreted their meaning. He also advised his disciples not to share their dreams with random people, but only with those experienced and wise enough to understand their meaning.

The reading of signs can be performed by a person who sees the essence of things—the “operator’s” intention, hidden behind the taswir images on the screen of consciousness. If there is no veil at all, then the mirror of consciousness reflects the thing itself in its true form, and interpretation is unnecessary.

The more developed the organ of subtle perception in a person, the more direct the spiritual messages he or she receives in dreams or visions, and the less they need interpretation.

Suhrawardi writes that when the veil of ignorance falls completely, the signs of the upper world are reflected in the mirror of the soul without hindrance; therefore, prophets and saints have visions not in dreams, but in a waking state.   Al-Ghazali also speaks in a similar way: “What the ordinary person sees in dreams, the prophets see in waking life”.

Although we are still a long way from this, many dervishes note that their perception of the “world beyond” shifts from dreams to the waking state as they progress on the Path.

The approaches of Sufis and psychologists have much in common. Both rely on the method of introspection and deal not with the manifest part of the psyche (the personality), but with its hidden aspect (called the essence, the unconscious, the subconscious, etc.). However, in psychology, dreams are considered being primarily the product of emotional impacts or physiology, while Sufis attribute some dreams to a source beyond the physical dimension.

There is another fundamental difference. Psychotherapy works to correct and improve the ego. Sufi methods are designed to subordinate the ego to the higher aspects of the being. The psychologists’ desire is to bring the client’s daily life to an acceptable level by eliminating or controlling the most noticeable dysfunctions of their ego. The seeker’s desire is to rise to a level higher than ordinary existence. This is impossible without establishing a union with the inner Self and abandoning the notion of a separate, egotistical self.

In his works, Rumi compares the seeker after Truth to ruins hiding a treasure.   A psychotherapist’s patient tries to mend the ruins, making them somehow habitable. A Sufi will encourage their disciple to seek the treasure beneath the ruins and use it to build a palace of unprecedented beauty.;


TALKING TO THE OTHER SIDE


In the East, certain books, such as those of the great Persian Sufi poet Hafez of Shiraz, are often used for fortune-telling, and many people consider this superstitious.

But thinking about this deeper: fortune-telling or reading signs, just like dreams or visions, can also be ways of getting messages from the Other Side. When the Other Side calls us, it sends messengers - like the White Rabbit in Alice in Wonderland or The Matrix. Through fortune-telling, we call the Other Side proactively.

In order to give us a sign the Other Side needs a messenger. This is discussed, for example, in a story from Idries Shah’s collection The Magic Monastery   about a man named Zaki. He was talented and promising, so a spiritual teacher, Hoja, decided to help him. Hoja assigned a being from the subtle world to watch over Zaki and assist him where possible. As years passed, Zaki found his affairs prospering. He did not regard his favorable circumstances as entirely dependent on himself, and he began to pay attention to coincidences.

When his affairs were going well, he would notice a small dove hovering somewhere nearby, because the subtle being assigned to him could not perform its work without manifesting itself in some proximity to Zaki. However, Zaki started merely associating doves with good luck, and good luck with doves. And so he began to keep pigeons, sprinkle food on any pigeon he encountered, and wear clothes with doves embroidered on them. But his affairs ceased to flourish, because he shifted his focus from conception to manifestation. And the subtle being in the form of a dove assigned to him was forced to distance itself from him, lest it cause Zaki’s self-destruction.

Messengers from the Other Side can take any form and shape, although some people have a predilection for one or more familiar media.

Traditional divination tools, such as I Ching, runes, Tarot, Lenormand cards, or even coffee grounds are merely mediators that work effectively when the inquirer is in the right state of mind. The poems of Hafez, if they do help a person enter the right frame of mind, are no different from all of the above mediators. Ironically, during divination process, a person always receives an answer from within themselves - their inner self responds to their mind through a medium.

Being messages from the inner Self, mystical signs we receive in the course of a normal life are no different from visions and certain dreams, which come in an altered state of consciousness. Such signs, visions and dreams have a special “flavor” to them. They come through the subtle aspect of our soul that the Sufis call ruh, which is responsible for inspiration and insights. Sufis see certain dreams as veils lifted briefly, offering glimpses into deeper realities. “Trust in dreams, for in them is hidden the gate to eternity”, said the great mystical poet Kahlil Gibran .

Some Sufis Masters, such as the sheikhs of the Turkish Jerrahi-Halveti Sufi order, have the Baraka, or blessing, for reading and interpreting this kind of signs, visions, or dreams. They are able to perform this due to unveiled communication with their own ruh. This connection is fully established and matured in them through their devotional practices.

As a follower of the Naqshbandi Sufi path, I heard the saying: “Sufis read minds that cannot read themselves.” This statement, passed down through oral tradition, is attributed to Master Bahauddin Naqshband, the founder of the Naqshbandi order, and reflects the subtle perception cultivated in the Sufi Path.

Let’s see what it means.


SUFIS AND DREAMWORK


One of the Jerrahi-Halveti Sufi sheikhs, the late Muzaffer Ozak Efendi, in his book Irshad – Wisdom of a Sufi Master recounted his own initiation through dreams evoked by his first Sufi teacher .

The incident described dates back to the time when Muzaffer Ozak owned a small second-hand bookstore in the old part of Istanbul. In addition to his secular activities, Muzaffer Ozak was a respected imam in the city and delivered sermons to parishioners, believing he needed no mentor. One day, Muzaffer Ozak dreamed that he was in the middle of the Bosphorus Strait between Uskudar and Topkapi Palace, in a small boat which sails were torn and the mast broken. A terrible storm was raging around him, but someone handed him a piece of paper and told him to read what is written on it in order to be saved from death.

When he came to his shop the next morning, Ozak continues, he saw the same man, who had given him the piece of paper in the previous night’s dream, walking past his shop window. He couldn’t summon the courage to call out to that man. A couple of days later, Ozak dreamed of the same man again: the latter was walking on the opposite side of the street and waving his cane at Ozak.

The next morning, he was astonished to see the man from the dream again walking past his shop. He felt that such dreams contained a message from the spirit, but still did nothing about them. Soon after, he saw the same man again in a dream, in which he hugged Muzaffer so tightly that it felt like every bone in his body was about to break. Then the man let go of Ozak, took the turban of the Halveti Order, and placed it on Muzaffer’s head. He felt as if he was being crushed by the weight of this turban, and the seven heavens had descended upon his head.

He had just arrived to open his shop in the morning, when he saw the man from his dream passing by, walking stick in hand.
Muzaffer thought that there was some mystery and spiritual message in this situation, but, still, he would not call this man; he wanted the man to come to him. The man came closer, stopped in front of Ozak’s shop, poked his head in the door, and said, “Idiot, you’ve seen me three times already. When will you finally develop faith?” “Right now,” said Ozak, taking his hand and respectfully kissing it.

This holy man’s name was Seyyid Sheikh Ahmed Tahir ul-Marashi, and he was a sheikh of the Halveti-Shabani order. Muzaffer Ozak became his dervish, and the teacher began coming to his shop every day. Sometimes he would speak, sometimes he remained silent, but in both cases, the teaching took place. This continued for seven years. In the following years, until Muzaffer Efendi himself became Sheikh of Halveti, dreams repeatedly played a key role in his important decisions.

There are no set formulas in interpreting dreams—it’s more of an art, requiring talent rather than science. The same image appearing to different people can convey different messages; the discerning mind reads not the letter, but the spirit of it. Muzaffer Efendi recounts the following story, which occurred during the Ottoman Empire.

One day, two men came to the Halveti Sheikh Abdul-Rahman, one after the other. The first man told the Sheikh that he had dreamed of climbing a minaret and calling the faithful to prayer. The Sheikh immediately replied, “You should begin preparing for your journey to Mecca. This year, you will make the pilgrimage.” As soon as he left, the second man came to the Sheikh and recounted the same dream: he had dreamed of climbing a minaret and calling the faithful to prayer. The Sheikh said, “You’d better return what you stole, because otherwise you’ll be caught, and it will be very bad for you!” The man, gasping in amazement, admitted that the interpretation was correct and promised never to steal again.

Just like Sufi Baraka, the ability to interpret dreams is not acquired through effort or imitation, but comes from within, as a gift to the most worthy—the ones who can best utilize it.

The Master’s summoning of a destined disciple through a dream was not unique to Halveti order. It can also be found in the following episode from Maqamat, the spiritual biography of Bahauddin Naqshband, recorded on his behalf by a disciple:

“One night, I dreamed of one of the greatest Turkish sheikhs, Hakim Ata. He entrusted me to the care of a dervish. Upon awakening, his appearance was imprinted on my memory. My grandmother, Saliha, was visiting, and I told her my dream. She said, ‘You have received favor from the Turkish sheikhs,’ and I began to dream of meeting this dervish.

“One day, as I was leaving the Akhangaran Gate, I bumped into him. His hair hung like the branches of a weeping willow, he wore a patched cap, and in his hands he carried a gnarled staff made from the root of the oud tree. I followed the dervish. He didn't look back, and I kept pace with him. Reaching Murgkushi Street, he entered a house, and I turned back.

“That night, an acquaintance came to see me. He said, ‘A Turkic sheikh named Khalil is looking for you.’ I rose joyfully. It was autumn. I took some Bukharan fruit as a gift and went there. There was only one room, and the dervish was sitting in a corner of it, surrounded by a group of people. After greeting him, I sat down. I was tempted to tell him about my dream, but he forestalled me, addressing me in Turkish: ‘The one you're thinking of is known to us, so why bother with words?’ I was amazed, and my affection for him grew even stronger.” 

Sufi Khalil, whom Bahauddin found through a prophetic dream, became his mentor for the following years. Over time, when Naqshband himself began teaching, he used dreams to attract students. One of the disciples, later also a Sufi sheikh, recounted how he came to study with Naqshband.

“I lived in Qasr-i-Arifan, not far from the Teacher. Upon reaching the age of twenty, my only occupations were eating and sleeping. [...] Every day, the Teacher, on his way to the mosque, would pass by the door of my house; look at me, and chuckle. Sadness began to arise in my soul: why wasn’t I praying? One night, I fell asleep in melancholy and saw the Teacher in a dream. He held a large, bright mirror, which he handed to me. I saw myself in the mirror. Upon awakening, I was overcome with sobs, wanting to scream without ceasing—I could barely contain myself. While I was in this state, the Teacher entered the door. ‘What happened to you?’ he asked. I remained silent. ‘Who gave you the mirror?’ I replied, ‘You did.’ He said, ‘I will provide everything necessary for your education.’ Truly, by the grace of his sacred attention, I was granted the happiness of two worlds.”

It was said that Bahauddin Naqshband would not accept a disciple until he received an instruction regarding them in a special dream. This dream would come when evoked by focusing one’s intention to obtain an answer to an important question—istikhara.

The gift of the Master Naqshband—the Designer—enabled him not only to see the hidden design (Naqsh) of any person and the events of their life, past and future. This gift allowed the Master to influence these events from the world of true imagination—the spiritual realm where the seeds of events are conceived. This is evidenced by numerous stories recorded in the Maqamat. One of Naqshband’s students recounted:

“When the Master was teaching me uqufi adadi [a special exercise involving holding the breath while reciting a prayer formula and focusing on the center of the heart], I dreamed that I fell into a large clear body of water. Afterward, I went to the Teacher and told him about my dream, to which he said: ‘This is evidence of the acceptance of your prayers, purification through dhikr—remembrance of Divine Names—and the resurrection of your heart.

The heart is a fish, and dhikr its sea—
Its life is found in God’s memory”. 

In another account, the image of Naqshband in a dream saves a disciple from danger in waking life:

One day, Bahauddin Naqshband sent a dervish on an errand. On his way back, the dervish fell asleep beneath a tree. In his dream, he saw the Master brandishing a staff and exclaiming, “This is no place for sleep!” The dervish awoke instantly and saw ten wolves approaching. He leapt up and hurried toward Qasr-i-Arifan. As he neared the village, he saw the Master standing on the road, who greeted him with the words: “That’s what happens when one sleeps in an unworthy place!”

Besides guiding their followers through dreams, Sufi Masters were capable to alter the predestined future of their disciples, redirecting misfortune from the physical realm into the symbolic realm of dreams. In this way, a person could endure a negative experience destined for them with minimal consequences. One such story, dating back to the 12th century, is recounted in Abdurrahman Jami’s renowned collection of Sufi hagiographies, Breaths of Fellowship:

A Baghdad merchant had a bad dream on the eve of setting out on a trade caravan. He approached a local religious authority and asked for an interpretation. The man told him that his caravan would be robbed en route, and he himself would be killed by bandits. The merchant was deeply distressed and decided to seek advice from the great Sufi teacher, Abdul Qadir Gilani. Abdul Qadir told him to set out without fear and promised to ensure his protection.

The merchant departed for Syria and sold his goods profitably.
On the return journey, while taking a stool to relieve himself, he placed his purse of money nearby and forgot it. When he went to bed that night, he dreamed that his caravan had been attacked by bandits, who had killed all his men. In the dream, someone struck him, and he felt himself dying. The merchant awoke in horror from pain and discovered drops of blood on his neck. At that moment, he suddenly remembered his purse of money, realized where he had left it, and, returning, found the money in its original place.

Thus, the merchant endured the fear of losing both his life and his property, yet in reality, he retained both. Returning to Baghdad, the merchant hurried to Abdul Qadir with the story of what had happened, who told him: “I have prayed seventy times that the loss of your life and wealth predestined for you will not occur in reality, but only in the world of dreams.”

We mentioned above that Sufis used a method of focused intent, called istikhara, to invoke (or “summon”) an answer to an important question during contemplation, lucid dreaming, or vision. In the latter case, special formulas were used to induce a prophetic dream. The most famous of these is an Aramaic phrase first mentioned in the magical treatise The Goal of the Wise (Ghayat al-Hakim), believed to have been written in Moorish Andalusia in the 11th century. In Arabic transcription, the phrase read: Tamagis bagdisawad wagdas nufanagadis. The explanation for the phrase stated that it was a spell by which the dreamer establishes a connection with their higher and more perfect nature.

The treatise, however, continued with a warning: “But the practical use and knowledge of this science—may the Lord strengthen you!—is accessible only to those in whom its original quality has already been established.”  In other words, the incantation has no power in itself, but only if the one pronouncing it is already sufficiently purified to meet their perfect nature.

The magical phrase from the Ghayat al-Hakim was later quoted by the Moorish Sufi Ibn Khaldun, calling it “a word for inducing a dream about the perfect nature of man.” Ibn Khaldun explains that one should recite these words before falling asleep, mentioning the object of one’s inquiry, and it will certainly be revealed to the seeker in a dream. He also writes of knowing a man who, after a partial fast and several nights devoted to dhikr, performed a ritual using this phrase, after which a being in human form appeared to him and identified itself as his “perfect self.”

Neither Ghayat al-Hakim nor Ibn Khaldun, however, say anything about the literal meaning of the words of the spell, which they simply call a “name.” The translator of Ibn Khaldun’s book suggested that the original Aramaic phrase meant something like: “As it is spoken in words, so it will be in the dream.”  Apparently, as with many foreign formulas having migrated into another language, it lost its original meaning and became gibberish. This, however, does not mean that the use of this particular phonetic pattern was initially meaningless: sound patterns play an important role in such practices.

To put the topic of dream interpretation in Sufi practices in the proper perspective, I should note that dreams and visions, despite their use as diagnostic or corrective tools in some cases, have not generally been a defining element on the path of teaching. Moreover, Sufis believe that excessive attention to this area of mental life is undesirable and can hinder real development. Therefore, I conclude the topic of dreams with the following excerpt from Omar Ali Shah’s book Sufism as Therapy:

“Let me make a brief comment about what are called visions or visionary experiences. When someone has a particularly vivid visual experience or dream, it should be subjected to a careful ‘inspection’ in all its details.
“Of course, there are a great number of books written about how to interpret dreams—from Freud, Jung, and so on—and these sources contain attempts to interpret dreams in all sorts of ways. Although the first ‘inspection’ of a visual experience or dream need not be cold and detached, it should still be viewed with a critical eye and a certain degree of skepticism. If, after such a critical look, the dream can be dismissed and not thought about again, then let it be so. ‘Ah, it was probably the cheese I ate at dinner.’ Or ‘maybe it was because of the funeral I attended today,’ or something else. If your experience passes the first test—‘was it because I ate something? Yes’—then you can proceed to study it in another way. Did the experience contain any positive and recognizable elements of the Tradition? If it contained one or more such elements, then how did that element relate to one of the Ninety-Nine Divine Names? Was it a wish, a sign, a command? Did it relate in any way to your healing practice or your life?”

Further, Omar Ali-Shah narrates a story of Nasruddin traveling through the Gobi desert with his companion. It came a time when the travelers had only one bottle of water left. So that night, they decided to go to bed early and rise early the next morning to share that last bottle of water before setting off in search of an oasis. When they awoke the next morning, Nasruddin’s companion discovered the bottle was empty. With difficulty, he croaked to Nasruddin: “How could you drink all the water?” Nasruddin replied: “You know, you and I are both dervishes; we swore to follow the orders of our teachers. Last night, Mevlana Rumi appeared to me in a dream and said, ‘Nasruddin, drink your share of the water, right now.’” The other dervish answered: “But he told you to drink only your share. Why did you drink the whole bottle?” “Well, that’s obvious,” said Nasruddin. “My share was at the bottom of the bottle”.

So, as you see, continues Omar Ali-Shah, the interpretation of dreams can be a tricky pursuit.


WE ARE NOT THEM


Dreams may be our first key to getting in touch with our real Self. This soul is immortal in its essence, despite the changes it undergoes through various forms manifesting in different places at different times. The soul never ceases its search for immortality—it wants to be immortal in form, just as it is already immortal in essence.

However, we have all forgotten this.

This knowledge has settled at the bottom of the unconscious and has been covered by a thick layer of illusions. We cannot achieve happiness until we break through this layer, which prevents the unconscious from being reflected in the mirror of consciousness. This long history, preserved in the unconscious, is made of the same fabric as our dreams. Whoever remembers this will attain knowledge, beyond which there is no ignorance.

At the beginning of my work with the Sufi group, I had a vivid dream—one of those unclouded visions that come not from any of the earthly “selves,” but from the Higher Self. In it, I was a soul descending like a feather from the planetary spheres down to Earth, drifting through layers of cloud. I remember a strange sensation: I was not separate from anything, and yet I was aware of myself as a distinct “I,” a feminine being. It was a state of complete serenity and union with all that exists. I was not bodiless—I had a semblance of a human form, though I did not feel it physically.

As I slowly and gently descended into Earth’s atmosphere, I saw the top of a tall tree emerging from the mist. At its crown, there was something like a nest, where I was awaited with wild joy and anticipation by a host of strange little zoomorphic creatures. Some resembled rodents with fluffy tails and bulging eyes. An unseen force drew me into the nest, and the creatures immediately rushed toward me, somehow becoming part of me.

I was overwhelmed by a feeling of aversion toward them, yet at the same time I sensed their desperation— their existence without me was sort of a dead-end, and their joy was because they won the chance to be reunited with the light. I was their hope for something. At that moment, I awoke.

The dream etched itself into my memory, but its meaning unfolded gradually over the years. One by one, the strange semi-animal forms, which fused with the nature of my soul at the inception of my journey on Earth, began to reveal themselves to my consciousness—to be transformed by light… or to leave.

When we enter this world, we merge with these forms so completely that we begin to mistake them for ourselves. But we are not them—though they are part of our presence on this planet. In the Sufi teaching, these aspects of our instinctive and reflexive nature are often referred to as nafs. Nafs in Arabic means “breath,” “self” or “individual soul”. The unrefined nafs is often compared to a wild animal, and that is the way it often symbolically appears in dreams.


THE DREAMING NAFS


My own experience and that of other Sufi disciples shows that at the initial stage of the transformational journey, the seeker should expect to come face to face with the manifestations of their unenlightened nature - their nafs, which can symbolically appear in dreams and visions in the form of various animals. These images can also emerge during mind concentration exercises. If, instead of visualizing the symbol or object indicated by the Teacher during such exercises, the student persistently sees something zoomorphic, this might mean that a certain aspect of nafs is hindering their progress.

There are certain archetypal images inherent to the collective unconscious of humanity, which exist beyond time and place.

The German researcher of Sufism, Annemarie Schimmel, noted that the Sufi sources often mention dreams of dervishes in which a hungry black dog, a symbol of nafs, appears.  The dog must be tamed or driven away. Javad Nurbakhsh, Sheikh of the Persian Nimatullahi Sufi Order, writes in his book The Psychology of Sufism that there are as many symbolic expressions of the nafs as there are Sufis following the Path, but the most common of these are animal images, such as those of a snake, dog, wolf, rat, monkey, or donkey:

“If cruelty and violence are dominant, the nafs may appear in the form of a snake. If deceit and fraud predominate, it may appear as a fox or a witch. If hatred and malice are dominant, it may take the form of a dog or a wolf. If greed and acquisitiveness are dominant, it may appear as a rat. If lust and sensuality predominate, it may take the form of a monkey, bear, or donkey.”

In his book Revelation of the Hidden (Kashf al-Mahjub), the Persian Sufi Ali al-Hujwiri records several testimonies from early Sufi masters about the forms taken by the nafs in dreams and visions. One of such testimony was from a Master Junaid’s close companion, who once spoke of an early moment on the Path when he came to understand the destructive nature of the nafs and the cunning places where it lays its traps. He said he carried a deep, unwavering hatred for it in his heart. Then, one day, he had a vision how a fox-like creature leapt from his throat. In that moment, he recognized it as his nafs. He tried to crush it underfoot, but with each blow, it grew larger. Bewildered, he asked, “Why do you grow when struck? Other creatures perish under such force.” The nafs replied, “Because I was born of inversion. What torments others brings me delight—and what delights them, I find unbearable.”

Other testimony was about Sufi Abu'l-Qasim Gurgani, who said that one day he saw his nafs in the form of a snake.

Yet another dervish, according to al-Hujwiri, recounts that he saw his nafs in the form of a rat. He asked, “Who are you?” The nafs replied: “I am the destroyer of the negligent, for I incite them to do evil. I am the salvation of the friends of God: were it not for me and my evil existence, they would become proud of their impeccability and their deeds. When they reflect on the purity of their hearts and deep consciousness, the light of their friendship with God, their constancy in spiritual practice, pride overcomes them. But when they see me within themselves, all their pride disappears.”

I can personally relate such stories. Once, a couple of years after I started doing the exercises and dhikr, I saw hordes of large black dogs or wolves rushing down the mountain directly toward me, causing me to wake up in fear. Then, for a while, I dreamed of bears again and again. At first, the bears in the dream scared me so much that my heart sank in my sleep, but then, time after time, the fear began to subside, and eventually the bears became tamed and were even riding bicycle through the forest.

From time to time rats or unknown rodents, resembling ugly fat mice, appeared in my dreams. I tried to trample them with my feet – which sometimes succeeded – but then I felt sorry for them, since they didn’t even tried to defend themselves. In one of my dreams at that stage someone invisible pulled a whole pack of non-aggressive, human-sized zoomorphs out of me and transported them to an unknown location.

In later years, I stopped seeing animals in my dreams.

We recognize the nafs by its cruder manifestations, but it does contain the capacity for refinement and development. Although the nafs cannot know God in the same way the Divine in us does, it can be instilled with love for the Supreme Being—to the extent it is capable of doing so. Like a dog that devotedly loves its master and thereby becomes closer to the human stage of development, the nafs can be guided toward serving the higher and thus be transformed.

The symbol of the enlightened nafs in the Islamic tradition is Al-Buraq, a magical creature upon which the Prophet (God witness to his secret), made his legendary journey from Mecca to Jerusalem and then ascended to the seventh heaven. The Arabic word buraq means “dazzling, shining” and is cognate with the word “lightning.” Traditionally, Al-Buraq is depicted with the head of a man and the body of a white winged horse.

The spirit is immaterial, so it requires Al-Buraq of the refined nafs to undergo all stages of development in its material embodiment. Ascending through the stations of the Path, from the lowest, the animal-instinctive self, to the highest, the nafs becomes worthy of the Divine mandate to the soul embarking on its journey through the manifested worlds.

So what, or whom, awaits us at the peak of this ascending Path?


THE GUIDE


Sooner or later on their journey, every seeker encounters their guarding angel. They are called by various names—Guide, Guardian, Higher Self, Divine Self, or something else. The aim of a spiritual Teacher on earth is to facilitate this inner encounter and entrust the disciple to their own higher guidance.

An Angel appears in different forms. The Prophet Moses saw it as a flaming thorn bush—the Burning Bush. (Exodus, 3:2) The angel appeared to the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) sometimes in the form of a real person from his circle—an extraordinarily handsome youth named Dihya Al-Kalbi.  According to mystical tradition, Hafiz is said to have once seen an angel appear during nighttime prayer, taking the form of a woman of indescribable beauty—a vision that echoes through his poetry as the eternal Beloved.

The Persian Master of illumination, Shihabuddin Suhrawardi, saw his Guide as an eternally youthful sage with snow-like hair—a sign of belonging to the world of Light. In one of his mystical conversations, the Angel-Guide told Suhrawardi that the Sufi himself was an angel. According to the Angel’s explanation, the soul embodied on earth is divided into two parts: one remains in the supermundane abode, while the other descends into the bonds of the body. While in the world, the soul feels incomplete—it yearns for its heavenly double, as a lover pines for their Beloved. To regain its self and find completeness, the soul must reunite with its angel.

To Suhrawardi’s question about the Angel’s whereabouts before their current meeting, the Sufi receives the following answer:

“O simple-minded one! The sun is constantly present in the sky, and if a blind man cannot see, sense, or comprehend it, his lack of sight does not cause the sun’s absence and does not prevent the luminary from completing its course. If a blind man is freed from his defect, he does not reproach the sun—saying, ‘Why weren’t you in the world before, and why didn’t you control it before?’—for it has always been in its course; the change occurred in the state of the blind man, not in the state of the sun.” 

Our angel, therefore, is always with us. “The one you love is hidden between your ribs, moved from side to side by your breath,” wrote the Andalusian Sufi Master Ibn Arabi in his book, “The Interpreter of Desires.” 

But the encounter with the guiding angel, or the enlightenment regarding our true nature, occurs when the organ of spiritual vision awakens within us, and Truth reveals itself through the veils. This meeting leads to a fusion—an alchemical wedding—the union of the Lover and the Beloved, as described in Ibn Arabi’s quatrain from The Secret of God’s Most Beautiful Names:  “The servant is the bridal chamber of the Real, and the veil is lifted only for the one who annihilates the illusion of separation.”

Continuing with the bridal chamber metaphor, we can recall that in the Gospels Christ repeatedly returns to the theme of the wedding feast and the image of the royal bridegroom. Jesus uses it in the fable of the ten virgins with lamps (Matthew 25:1–13); the allegory about the sons of the bridechamber (Matthew 9:15), and in the parable of the wedding feast personifying the Kingdom of Heaven (Matthew 22:1–14).

Although biblical parables, like Sufi stories, never have a single interpretation, the wedding feast can be perceived as a metaphor for the soul’s reunion with its Guide, the Higher Self. In the Christian tradition, female nuns are called the brides of Christ. Perhaps this is not just a figure of speech, and most of them meet their Angel-Guide in the form of Christ. I wouldn’t be surprised if they do.


THE MYSTICAL ENCOUNTER


Once before my contact with the Sufi Tradition, I was attending a class on sacred geometry. During a concentration exercise, I entered a state close to trance and experienced something like a waking dream, vivid and unforgettable.

Let me emphasize: I was not asleep. What unfolded in the vision was intimately connected to me, though not to the physical form I inhabit in this life. I was a young bride, waiting for her bridegroom with a trembling heart. I sat in a small bedroom of an adobe house with three rooms—two side chambers and a central space with a hearth. Such dwellings can be found in remote villages of India or other Eastern lands, though I had not yet been to India at the time. Around the house stretched open land, and beyond it, tall trees typical of southern latitudes.

I wore a bridal gown and sat curled in a corner, waiting for him to enter at any moment. I knew my bridegroom was of royal stature—radiant as the sun, beloved and desired by all—while I was a simple commoner, utterly unworthy of him. The miraculous impossibility of what was happening made my whole being surge with emotion.

And then—he entered the house. I was afraid to lift my eyes, stealing a glance at him. He was impossibly tall, of unearthly beauty and form—a true prince. In the doorway of my room I saw his wedding headdress, towering like a tiara or crown, adorned with gold and jewels. A golden pectoral lay upon his chest, his black hair fell in waves over his shoulders, and his body was clothed in garments of the finest white fabric.

His face was eternally youthful, and in his eyes shone the wisdom of the ages. He was immeasurably above me in every way. He was a deity, a celestial being—I was but a simple village girl. Yet I entrusted him without hesitation with my body, my soul, my love, my entire life.

The impossibility of this union, the overwhelming awe, the trembling anticipation, the heart pounding with the fear and ecstasy of merging with him—the desire to dissolve into him—these feelings were utterly unknown to me in earthly life. They bore no resemblance to anything I had ever felt toward real people. Perhaps something faintly akin to this reverent adoration is what our pets feel toward us—as a higher form of life, whose perfection is beyond their grasp.

The royal bridegroom looked at me silently, standing at the threshold, smiling gently. He knew everything about me and all that I felt. Nothing could compare to the love and wisdom radiating from his eyes. His gaze calmed my wildly beating heart. He stood there, watching me. And I understood: he would wait until I was ready.

That’s where the vision ended. But it was never forgotten. The image of the royal bridegroom—then mysterious to me—remained with me for many years, until I finally recognized that he was my Angel. I will return to this later.

Of course, angels don’t have human form, or any form whatsoever. They are not bound by the shackles of time and space. They are “by our side” not in the sense of hovering somewhere nearby—we are the ones who dwell within them. We see them in the form our consciousness selects from the set of taswir – the thought forms existing in our mental “database.”

We have had the opportunity to observe the diversity of forms, in which the True Self appears to us. When we climbed the magic mountain during the journey through the inner space of our Nowhereland, we encountered the Angel in the form of a wise elder, a shaman, a sorceress, an angel, a hermit, a beautiful maiden, or a fairy. Perhaps some of us saw themselves, which was a direct indication of what our Angel really is...

...Imagine you’re sitting in a closed, dark room with a single opening through which the sunlight could enter. This light falls on a mirror and is reflected. If we look directly through the opening, the sun’s rays would blind us. Therefore, we can only see sunlight as reflected by a mirror.
Now, that mirror’s surface is not perfect; it has roughness or a textured pattern, and when a ray of sunlight hits it, we see an image on it, and it is from this image that we form an idea of what the sun is.

It’s the same with the image of our Angel—like a ray of sunlight falling on the mirror of our consciousness, the sunray is transformed by the mirror’s surface. If the mirror is dim, we see nothing. The sun has an infinite number of angels or rays, and each dark room receives only one of those rays. However, all the rays of the sun are inseparable parts of it and form a single whole...

In The Meccan Revelations, Ibn Arabi described a vision he had in Mecca during a visit to the Kaaba, where he saw his Angel in the guise of a beautiful Greek woman. Ibn Arabi said that the qualities we idolize in an earthly beloved are but a reflection of our own deepest qualities, the supreme qualities of our Self. We like in others what is within ourselves.

Returning to my Angel… It was less than ten years after my extraordinary waking dream, when the face of the Guide began to appear in my visions—at first very briefly, like a sudden flash, most often during meditations or spiritual exercises, somewhere at the edge of my inner sight. I was never able to hold his image for more than a second before it vanished, but his face was unmistakable. His appearances were rare at first, but over the years they became more frequent, and in the past few years, not a day passed without beholding his beautiful countenance. Even now, as I write these lines, he is beside me. Perhaps he is the one writing.

Since in this life I inhabit a female body shaped by a given genetic code, the filter of my consciousness presents the Angel as an extraordinarily beautiful man of certain appearance. But I understand that this is merely a mental imprint—the relief on the surface of the mirror; the most beautiful of the taswir.
In truth, angels are neither male nor female; they are pure light. In my experience, it is far easier to summon the Angel not by focusing on the human imprint of his form, but by visualizing a radiant sphere of light.

On our journey to Nowhereland, the radiant sphere—along with the magical garden, the spring of life, the mountain, and the one who greets us at its summit—was one of the most important symbols used. We can call it the root cause of the entire journey, which felt like a playful psychological experience or quest. The point is that the aforementioned archetypes, which are keys to interacting with our inner being, are sometimes impossible to access directly. A journey of introspection is necessary, along the way observing other aspects of our being. The sphere is a unique form that encompasses all possible forms in the universe, and at the same time, it is the absence of form.

In Suhrawardi’s parables, the encounter with the Angel is preceded by the seeker’s passage through a special place of inner space, which he calls the khanaqa—a Sufi abode. This inner khanaqa has two doors: one leads to the spiritual world (a vast field, a desert), the other to the “town”—the world of sensory perception. When the first door opens and the second closes, the seeker enters the world of the “eighth sphere” beyond the seven sensory worlds.

This is Na-Koja-Abad, Nowhereland—the world of true imagination. There Suhrawardi met the Angel.

It is there, in our personal Nowhereland, that each of us too will meet our Angel one day.



EPILOGUE: ON THE THRESHOLD OF LIGHT



In the silence beyond thought and feeling, the khanaqa opens.

The town fades.

The field stretches wide.

And there the Angel waits—as Light, as Knower, as Love.

We do not seek That.

We are That.












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