The Secret of Shambhala: In Search of the Eleventh Insight (17 page)

I was in a house, or what seemed to be a house. The temperature was warm and I was lying on a lounger made from a blue-green
fabric. The floor was a smooth brown stone tile, and numerous plants in ceramic pots were sitting close by. Yet above me were
blue sky and the overhanging branches of several large trees. The dwelling didn’t seem to have a roof or outside walls.

“You should be feeling better now. But you must breathe.” The woman spoke in fluent English.

I looked at her, spellbound. She was Asian in appearance, dressed in a colorful, embroidered Tibetan ceremonial dress and
soft-looking, simple slippers. Judging from the depth of her gaze and the wisdom in her voice, she was about forty years of
age, but her body and movements gave her the appearance of a much younger person. And while her body was perfectly proportioned
and beautifully shaped, every feature was exceptionally large.

“You must breathe,” she repeated. “I know that you know how to do this or you wouldn’t be here.”

Finally I understood what she meant, and began to breathe in the beauty of my surroundings and envisioned the energy coming
into me.

“Where am I?” I asked. “Is this Shambhala?”

She smiled approvingly and I couldn’t believe the beauty of her face. It was slightly luminous.

“Part of it,” she replied. “What we call the rings of Shambhala. Farther to the north are the holy temples.”

She went on to tell me her name was Ani, and I introduced myself as she looked down on me.

“Tell me how you got here,” she said.

In a rambling way I told her the whole story, beginning with a brief description of my talk with Natalie and Wil, the Insights,
and my trip to Tibet, including meeting Yin and Lama Rigden and hearing about the legends, and then finally finding the gateway.
I even mentioned my perceptions of the light, apparently the work of the dakini.

“Do you know why you are here?” she asked.

I looked at her for a moment. “All I know is that I was asked to come by Wil and that it was important to find Shambhala.
I was told there is knowledge here that is needed.”

She nodded and looked away, thinking.

“How did you learn such good English?” I asked, feeling weak again.

She smiled. “We speak many languages here.”

“Have you seen a man named Wilson James?”

“No,” she said. “But the gateway can enter the rings at other places. Perhaps he is here somewhere.” She had walked over to
the potted plants and was pulling one of them closer to me. “I think you must rest awhile. Try to absorb some energy from
these plants. Set in your field the intention that their energy is coming in and then go to sleep.”

I closed my eyes, following her instructions, and within moments I drifted off.

Sometime later a swooshing noise aroused me. The woman was standing in front of me again. She sat down on the edge of the
lounger.

“What was that noise?” I asked.

“It came in from outside.”

“Through the glass?”

“It’s not really glass. It’s an energy field that looks just like glass, but you can’t break it. It hasn’t been invented in
the outer cultures yet.”

“How is it created? Is it electronic?”

“Partially, but we have to participate mentally to activate it.”

I looked out at the landscape beyond the house. There were other dwellings spread out over the gently rolling hills and meadows,
all the way down to the flat valley. Some had clear outer walls, like Ani’s house. Others seemed to be made of wood in a uniquely
designed Tibetan style. All were nestled unobtrusively into the landscape.

“What about those houses out there with different architecture?” I asked.

“They’re all created by a force field,” she said. “We don’t use wood or metals any longer. We just create what we want with
the fields.”

I was fascinated. “What about the internal construction, water and electricity?”

“We do have water, but it manifests right out of the water vapor in the air, and the fields power everything else we need.”

I looked outside again, disbelieving. “Tell me about this place. How many people are here?”

“Thousands. Shambhala is a very big place.”

Interested, I swung my legs off the lounger and put my feet on the floor, but experienced severe light-headedness. My vision
blurred.

She got up and reached behind the lounger and handed me more soup.

“Drink this and breathe in the plants again,” she said.

I complied and eventually my energy returned. As I took in more air, everything became even brighter and more beautiful than
before, including Ani. Her face had become more luminous now, glowing from within, exactly the way I had seen Wil look at
times in the past.

“My God,” I said, looking around.

“It’s a lot easier to raise your energy here than in the outer cultures,” she commented, “because everyone is giving energy
to everyone else, and setting a field for a higher cultural level.” She said the phrase “higher cultural level” with emphasis,
as though it had some greater meaning.

I couldn’t take my eyes off the surroundings. Every form, from the potted plants close to me, to the colors of the floor tile,
to the lush green trees outside, seemed to glow from within.

“All this seems unbelievable,” I stammered. “I feel as if I’m in a science fiction movie.”

She looked at me seriously. “Much science fiction is prophetic. What you see is simply progress. We’re human just like you,
and we’re evolving in the same way that you in the outer cultures will eventually evolve, if you don’t sabotage yourselves.”

At that moment a young boy of about fourteen ran into the room, nodding politely to me, and said, “Pema called again.”

She turned to him. “Yes, I heard. Will you get our jackets and one for our guest?”

I couldn’t take my eyes off the boy. His demeanor seemed much older than he looked, and his appearance was familiar. He reminded
me of someone, but I couldn’t remember who.

“Can you come with us?” Ani said, breaking my stare. “This may be important for you to see.”

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“To a neighbor’s house. Just to check things. She thinks she conceived a child a few days ago, and she wants me to check her
out.”

“Are you a doctor?”

“We don’t really have doctors, because we no longer have the illnesses you are familiar with. We have learned how to keep
our energy above that level. I help people monitor themselves and extend their energy and keep it that way.”

“Why do you say it’s important for me to see?”

“Because you happen to be here at this moment.” She looked at me as though I was dense. “Certainly you must understand the
synchronistic process.”

The young boy returned and I was introduced. His name was Tashi. He handed me a bright blue jacket. It looked exactly like
an ordinary parka except for the stitching. In fact, there was no stitching at all. It was as if the pieces of fabric were
simply pressed together. And surprisingly, even though the jacket felt just like cotton, it weighed almost nothing.

“How are these made?” I asked.

“They’re force fields,” Ani said as she and Tashi walked through the wall with a whoosh. I tried to follow and bounced back
from what felt like a solid piece of Plexiglas. The boy outside laughed.

With another swoosh, Ani came back in, also smiling.

“I should have told you what to do,” she said. “I’m sorry. You must visualize the force field opening for you. Just intend
it.”

I gave her a skeptical glance.

“Just see it opening in your mind and then walk through.”

I did as she described and then walked forward. I could actually see the field open up. It looked like a distortion in the
space, something like the heat rays one can see on a highway in the sun. With a swoosh I walked through onto the outside walkway.
Ani followed.

I shook my head. Where was I?

Following Tashi, we traveled along a winding path that moved gradually down the slope of the hill. As I glanced back, I saw
that Ani’s house was almost totally hidden by trees, and then something else grabbed my attention. Near the house was a square,
black, metallic-looking unit the size of a large suitcase.

“What is that?” I asked Ani.

“That’s our power unit,” she replied. “It helps us heat and cool the house and set the force fields.”

I was totally confused. “What do you mean, helps you?”

She was walking in front of me as we continued down the slope. She slowed down and let me walk up beside her.

“The power unit by the house doesn’t create anything by itself. All it does is amplify the prayer-field you know about to
a higher level, so that we can then manifest what we need directly.”

I looked at her askance.

“Why does this sound so fantastic?” Ani asked, smiling. “I told you: it is merely progress.”

“I don’t know,” I said. “During all this time of trying to reach Shambhala, I guess I never gave much thought to what it would
be like here. I guess I thought it was going to be just a group of high lamas in meditation somewhere. This is a culture with
technology. It’s fantastic…”

“It’s not the technology that matters. It’s how we have used the technology to help build our mental powers that is important.”

“What do you mean?”

“All this is not as outlandish as you think. We merely discovered the lessons of history. If you look closely at the human
story, you can see that technology has always been just a precursor for what could eventually be done with the human mind
alone.

“Think about it. Throughout history people created technology to enhance their ability to act and to be comfortable in the
world. In the beginning it was only pots to hold our food and tools to dig with, then more sophisticated houses and buildings.
To create these items, we dug up ores and minerals and fashioned them into what we envisioned in our minds. We wanted to travel
more effectively, so we invented the wheel and then vehicles of various sorts. We wanted to fly, so we made airplanes that
helped us do it.

“We wanted to communicate more rapidly, over great distances, anytime we wished, and so we invented wires and telegraphs,
telephones, wireless radios, and television—to let us see what was happening in another location.”

She looked at me questioningly. “See the pattern? Humans invented technology because we wanted to reach out to various places
and connect with more people, and we knew in our hearts that it was possible for us to do that. Technology has always been
just a stepping-stone to what we can do ourselves, what we knew was our birthright. The true role of technology has been to
help us build the faith that we can do all these things ourselves, with our inner power.

“So in the early history of Shambhala, we began to evolve technology to consciously serve the development of the human mind.
We realized the true potential of our prayer fields and began to recraft our technology to merely amplify our fields. Here
in the rings, we still use the amplification devices, but we are right on the brink of being able to turn them off and just
use our prayer-fields to manifest everything we need or want to do. Those in the temples can already do this.”

I wanted to ask her more questions, but as we rounded a bend, I saw a wide creek running down the hill to our right. The sound
of rushing water echoed ahead.

“What’s that sound?” I asked.

“There’s a waterfall up there,” she said. “Do you feel you need to see it?”

I didn’t quite know what she meant.

“Do you mean intuitively?” I asked.

“Of course I mean intuitively,” she replied, smiling. “We live by intuition.”

Tashi had stopped and was looking back.

Ani turned to him. “Why don’t you go tell Pema we’re coming.”

He smiled and ran on ahead.

We climbed up the rocky slope to our right, moving closer to the stream, and pushed through some thicker, smaller trees until
we came to the edge of the water. The stream was twenty-five feet wide and flowing briskly. Through the limbs to our left
I could see the water going over a ledge. Ani motioned for me to follow. We walked along the stream and down several tiers
of rock until we were just below the falls. From here we could see the fifty-foot drop into a large pool below.

A movement caught my eye, and I moved out to the edge of the rock to look down. To my surprise, through the mist and spray
at the end of the pool I could see two people walking toward each other, both surrounded by a soft, pinkish white light. Even
though the light wasn’t very bright, it was remarkably dense, especially around their shoulders and hips. I strained to make
out the full outlines of the two people, and when I did I realized that they were naked.

“So this is what you brought me up here to see?” Ani asked, amused.

I couldn’t take my eyes off what was happening. I knew that I was watching the energy fields of a man and a woman. As they
approached each other, their fields merged until they were embracing. Finally, ever so slowly I saw another light forming
in the midsection of the woman. After a few minutes they separated and the woman felt her stomach. The tiny light grew brighter,
and the two embraced again and seemed to be talking, but I could hear nothing but the waterfall. Without warning both people
simply disappeared.

I realized that they had been making love and I became embarrassed.

“Who were those people?” I asked.

“I didn’t recognize them,” Ani replied. “But they’re from the region somewhere.”

“It looked as though they conceived a child,” I said. “Do you think they intended to?”

She burst into a chuckle. “This isn’t the outer cultures. Of course they intended to conceive. At these levels of energy and
intuition, bringing a soul onto the Earth is a very deliberate process.”

“How did they disappear like that?”

“They traveled there by projecting themselves mentally through a travel field. The amplification device allows us to do that.
We found that the same electromagnetic field that sends television pictures can be used to actually link the space of a remote
location to the space where we are. When we do that, we can simply look at a scene wherever we want, or actually walk through
to the other site, using our amplified prayer-field. The wormhole theorists in the outer cultures are already working on such
theories now, only they aren’t fully conscious of what it will lead to.”