The Celestine Prophecy: An Adventure (2 page)

I shook my head and raised an eyebrow cynically. “Do you really believe all this?”

“Well,” she said. “I think…”

“Look around,” I interrupted, pointing at the crowd sitting in the room below us. “This is the real world. Do you see anything changing out there?”

Just as I said that, an angry remark erupted from a table near the far wall, a remark I couldn’t understand, but which was loud enough to hush the entire room. At first I thought the disturbance was another robbery, but then I realized it was only an argument. A woman appearing to be in her thirties was standing up and staring indignantly at a man seated across from her.

“No,” she yelled. “The problem is that this relationship is not happening the way I wanted! Do you understand? It’s not happening!” She composed herself, tossed her napkin on the table, and walked out.

Charlene and I stared at each other, shocked that the outburst had occurred at the very moment we were discussing the people below us. Finally Charlene nodded toward the table where the man remained alone and said, “It’s the real world that’s changing.”

“How?” I asked, still off balance.

“The transformation is beginning with the First Insight, and according to the priest, this insight always surfaces unconsciously at first, as a profound sense of restlessness.”

“Restlessness?”

“Yes.”

“What are we looking for?”

“That’s just it! At first we aren’t sure. According to the Manuscript, we’re beginning to glimpse an alternative kind of experience … moments in our lives that feel different somehow, more intense and inspiring. But we don’t know what this experience is or how to make it last, and when it ends we’re left feeling dissatisfied and restless with a life that seems ordinary again.”

“You think this restlessness was behind the woman’s anger?”

“Yes. She’s just like the rest of us. We’re all looking for more fulfillment in our lives, and we won’t put up with anything that seems to bring us down. This restless searching is what’s behind the ‘me–first’ attitude that has characterized recent decades, and it’s affecting everyone, from Wall Street to street gangs.”

She looked directly at me. “And when it comes to relationships, we’re so demanding that we’re making them near impossible.”

Her remark brought back the memory of my last two relationships. Both had begun intensely and both within a year had failed. When I focused on Charlene again, she was waiting patiently.

“What exactly are we doing to our romantic relationships?” I asked.

“I talked with the priest a long time about this,” she replied. “He said that when both partners in a relationship are overly demanding, when each expects the other to live in his or her world, to always be there to join in his or her chosen activities, an ego battle inevitably develops.”

What she said struck home. My last two relationships had indeed degenerated into power struggles. In both situations, we had found ourselves in a conflict of agendas. The pace had been too fast. We had too little time to coordinate our different ideas about what to do, where to go, what interests to pursue. In the end, the issue of who would lead, who would determine the direction for the day, had become an irresolvable difficulty.

“Because of this control battle,” Charlene continued, “the Manuscript says we will find it very difficult to stay with the same person for any length of time.”

“That doesn’t seem very spiritual,” I said.

“That’s exactly what I told the priest,” she replied. “He said to remember that while most of society’s recent ills can be traced to this restlessness and searching, this problem is temporary, and will come to an end. We’re finally becoming conscious of what we’re actually looking for, of what this other, more fulfilling experience really is. When we grasp it fully, we’ll have attained the First Insight.”

Our dinner arrived so we paused for several minutes as the waiter poured more wine, and to taste each other’s food. When she reached across the table to take a bite of salmon from my plate, Charlene wrinkled her nose and giggled. I realized how easy it was to be with her.

“Okay,” I said. “What is this experience we’re looking for? What is the First Insight?”

She hesitated, as though unsure how to begin.

“This is hard to explain,” she said. “But the priest put it this way. He said the First Insight occurs when we become conscious of the
coincidences
in our lives.”

She leaned toward me. “Have you ever had a hunch or intuition concerning something you wanted to do? Some course you wanted to take in your life? And wondered how it might happen? And then, after you had half forgotten about it and focused on other things, you suddenly met someone or read something or went somewhere that led to the very opportunity you envisioned?

“Well,” she continued, “according to the priest, these coincidences are happening more and more frequently and that, when they do, they strike us as beyond what would be expected by pure chance. They feel destined, as though our lives had been guided by some unexplained force. The experience induces a feeling of mystery and excitement and, as a result, we feel more alive.

“The priest told me that this is the experience that we’ve glimpsed and that we’re now trying to manifest all the time. More people every day are convinced that this mysterious movement is real and that it means something, that something else is going on beneath everyday life. This awareness is the First Insight.

She looked at me expectantly, but I said nothing.

“Don’t you see?” she asked. “The First Insight is a reconsideration of the inherent mystery that surrounds our individual lives on this planet. We are experiencing these mysterious coincidences, and even though we don’t understand them yet, we know they are real. We are sensing again, as in childhood, that there is another side of life that we have yet to discover, some other process operating behind the scenes.”

Charlene was leaning further toward me, gesturing with her hands as she spoke.

“You’re really into this, aren’t you?” I asked.

“I can remember a time,” she said, sternly, “when you talked about these kinds of experiences.”

Her comment jolted me. She was right. There had been a period in my life when I had indeed experienced such coincidences and had even tried to understand them psychologically. Somewhere along the way, my view had changed. I had begun to regard such perceptions as immature and unrealistic for some reason, and I had stopped even noticing.

I looked directly at Charlene, then said defensively, “I was probably reading Eastern Philosophy or Christian Mysticism at that time. That’s what you remember. Anyway, what you’re calling the First Insight has been written about many times, Charlene. What’s different now? How is a perception of mysterious occurrences going to lead to a cultural transformation?”

Charlene looked down at the table for an instant and then back at me. “Don’t misunderstand,” she said. “Certainly this consciousness has been experienced and described before. In fact, the priest made a point to say that the first insight wasn’t new. He said individuals have been aware of these unexplained coincidences throughout history, that this has been the perception behind many great attempts at philosophy and religion. But the difference now lies in the numbers. According to the priest, the transformation is occurring now because of the number of individuals having this awareness all at the same time.”

“What did he mean, exactly?” I asked.

“He told me the Manuscript says the number of people who are conscious of such coincidences would begin to grow dramatically in the sixth decade of the twentieth century. He said that this growth would continue until sometime near the beginning of the following century, when we would reach a specific level of such individuals—a level I think of as a critical mass.

“The Manuscript predicts,” she went on, “that once we reach this critical mass, the entire culture will begin to take these coincidental experiences seriously. We will wonder, in mass, what mysterious process underlies human life on this planet. And it will be this question, asked at the same time by enough people, that will allow the other insights to also come into consciousness—because according to the Manuscript, when a sufficient number of individuals seriously question what’s going on in life, we will begin to find out. The other insights will be revealed … one after the other.”

She paused to take a bite of food.

“And when we grasp the other insights,” I asked, “then the culture will shift?”

“That’s what the priest told me,” she said.

I looked at her for a moment, contemplating the idea of a critical mass, then said, “You know, all this sounds awfully sophisticated for a Manuscript written in 600 B.C.”

“I know,” she replied. “I raised the question myself. But the priest assured me that the scholars who first translated the Manuscript were absolutely convinced of its authenticity. Mainly because it was written in Aramaic, the same language in which much of the Old Testament was written.”

“Aramaic in South America? How did it get there in 600 B.C?”

“The priest didn’t know.”

“Does his church support the Manuscript?” I asked.

“No,” she said. “He told me that most of the clergy were bitterly trying to suppress the Manuscript. That’s why he couldn’t tell me his name. Apparently talking about it at all was very dangerous for him.”

“Did he say why most church officials were fighting against it?”

“Yes, because it challenges the completeness of their religion.”

“How?”

“I don’t know exactly. He didn’t discuss it much, but apparently the other insights extend some of the church’s traditional ideas in a way that alarms the church elders, who think things are fine the way they are.”

“I see.”

“The priest did say,” Charlene went on, “that he doesn’t think the Manuscript undermines any of the church’s principles. If anything, it clarifies exactly what is meant by these spiritual truths. He felt strongly that the church leaders would see this fact if they would try to see life as a mystery again and then proceed through the other insights.”

“Did he tell you how many insights there were?”

“No, but he did mention the Second Insight. He told me it is a more correct interpretation of recent history, one that further clarifies the transformation.”

“Did he elaborate on that?”

“No, he didn’t have time. He said he had to leave to take care of some business. We agreed to meet back at his house that afternoon, but when I arrived he wasn’t there. I waited three hours and he still didn’t show up. Finally, I had to leave to catch my flight home.”

“You mean you weren’t able to talk with him any more?”

“That’s right. I never saw him again.”

“And you never received any confirmation about the Manuscript from the government?”

“None.”

“And how long ago did this take place?”

“About a month and a half.”

For several minutes we ate in silence. Finally Charlene looked up and asked, “So what do you think?”

“I don’t know,” I said. Part of me remained skeptical of the idea that human beings could really change. But another part of me was amazed to think that a Manuscript which spoke in these terms might actually exist.

“Did he show you a copy or anything?” I asked.

“No. All I have are my notes.”

Again we were silent.

“You know,” she said, “I had thought you would be really excited by these ideas.”

I looked at her. “I guess I need some proof that what this Manuscript says is true.”

She smiled broadly again.

“What?” I asked.

“That’s exactly what I said, too.”

“To whom, the priest?”

“Yes.”

“What did he say?”

“He said that experience is the evidence.”

“What did he mean by that?”

“He meant that our experience validates what the Manuscript says. When we truly reflect on how we feel inside, on how our lives are proceeding at this point in history, we can see that the ideas in the Manuscript make sense, that they ring true.” She hesitated. “Does it make sense to you?”

I thought for a moment. Does it make sense? Is everyone as restless as me, and if so, does our restlessness result from the simple insight—the simple awareness built up for thirty years—that there is really more to life than we know, more that we can experience?

“I’m not sure,” I finally said, “I guess I need some time to think about it.”

I walked out to the garden beside the restaurant and stood behind a cedar bench facing the fountain. To my right I could see the pulsating lights at the airport and hear the roaring engines of a jet ready for take off.

“What beautiful flowers,” Charlene said from behind me. I turned to see her walking toward me along the walkway, admiring the rows of petunias and begonias which bordered the sitting area. She stood beside me and I put my arm around her. Memories flooded my mind. Years ago, when we had both lived in Charlottesville, Virginia, we had spent regular evenings together, talking. Most of our discussions were about academic theories and psychological growth. We had both been fascinated by the conversations and by each other. Yet it struck me how platonic our relationship had always been.

“I can’t tell you,” she said, “how nice it is to see you again.”

“I know,” I replied. “Seeing you brings back a lot of memories.”

“I wonder why we didn’t stay in touch?” She asked.

Her question took me back again. I recalled the last time I had seen Charlene. She was telling me good-bye at my car. At the time I felt full of new ideas and was departing for my home town to work with severely abused children. I thought I knew how such children could transcend the intense reactions, the obsessive acting out, that kept them from going on with their lives. But as time had progressed, my approach had failed. I had to admit my ignorance. How humans might liberate themselves from their pasts was still an enigma to me.

Looking back over the previous six years I now felt sure the experience had been worthwhile. Yet I also felt the urge to move on. But to where? To do what? I had thought of Charlene only a few times since she had helped me crystallize my ideas about childhood trauma, and now here she was again, back in my life—and our conversation felt just as exciting as before.