Secret of Shambhala

by James Redfield

  He forced a half-smile. “But our friends will be equally rewarded. Do you understand?”

  At this moment another wave of fear rushed through me, but it was different. It was a fear mixed with a great disdain. I was beginning to loathe the extent of this man’s evil.

  I glanced behind him to the area that seemed lighter, but it was now flat and filled with shadows. The lightness had disappeared, and I felt totally alone.

  “Why are you doing this?” I asked. “The Tibetan people have a right to their own religious beliefs. You’re trying to destroy their culture. How can you do this?” I could feel my anger making me stronger.

  My confrontation seemed only to energize him.

  “Oh, you do have opinions,” he smirked. “Too bad they are so naive. You think what we are doing is unusual. Your own government is developing ways to control you too. Chips that can be inserted into the body of troops and unsuspecting trouble-makers.

  “And that’s not all.” He was almost shouting now. “We know now that when people think, a specific pattern of brain waves radiates outward. Every government is working on machines that can identify these brain waves, especially angry or antigovernment sentiment.”

  His statement chilled me. He was talking about the same misuse of brain wave amplification that Ani had warned me about, the one that had doomed some early civilizations to ruin.

  “Do you know why your so-called democratic governments are doing this?” he went on. “Because they are far more afraid of the people then we are. Our citizens know the role of government is to govern. They know that certain liberties have to be limited. Your people think there can be individual self-direction. Well, if that was true in the past, in a highly technical world where a suitcase weapon can destroy a city, it cannot work any longer. With that kind of freedom, humans will not survive. The direction, the values, of society must be controlled and directed for the greater good. That’s why this Shambhala legend is so dangerous. It is based on absolute self-direction.”

  As he talked, I thought I heard the door open behind me, but I didn’t turn around. I was focused totally on this man’s attitude. Here was the worst of modern tyranny being voiced, and the more he talked the more my loathing increased.

  “What you don’t see,” I said, “is that humans can find an inner motivation to create good in the world.”

  He laughed cynically. “Surely you don’t believe that? Nothing in history would suggest that people are anything other than selfish and greedy.”

  “If you had your own spirituality, you would see the good.” My voice was rising in anger too.

  “No,” he snapped, almost screaming. “Spirituality is the problem. As long as there is religion, there cannot be unity among people. Don’t you understand? Each religious institution is like an inflexible roadblock on the path of progress. Each wars with the other. The Christians spend all their time and money wanting to convert everyone into their doctrine of judgmentalness. The Jews want to remain isolated in a dream of chosenness. The Muslims think it’s about camaraderie and collective power and holy hatred. And we in the East, we are the worst. We disregard the real world for a fanciful inner life no one can understand. With all this chaos of metaphysics no one can focus on progress, on easing the burden of the poor, on seeing that every Tibetan child is educated.

  “But don’t worry,” he went on. “We’re going to see that the problem is resolved. And you have helped us. Ever since Wilson James visited you in America, we’ve monitored your movements and the movements of the Dutch group. I knew you would come, that you would be involved.”

  I must have looked surprised.

  “Oh yes, we have known all about you. We operate more freely in America than you think. Your NSA can monitor the Internet. Do you think we cannot? You and this sect will never elude me. How do you think we could follow you in this weather? It was by power of mind. My mind. It came to me where you would be. Even after we were lost in this wilderness, I knew. I could feel your presence. At first it was your friend Yin whom I could follow. Now it’s been you.

  “And that’s not all. I don’t even need to use my instincts to locate you anymore. I have your brain wave scan.” He nodded toward the door. “In a matter of minutes our technicians will have mounted our new surveillance equipment. Then we’ll be able to locate anyone we have scanned.”

  At first I couldn’t remember what he was referring to, but then I recalled my experience at the Chinese house in Ali after I was gassed. The soldiers had put me under a machine. A new wave of fear raced through me, but it turned immediately into an even deeper anger.

  “You’re mad!” I screamed.

  “That’s right—to you, I’m crazy. But I’m the future.” He was towering over me now, his face red, virtually exploding with anger. “Such stupid innocence. You’re going to tell me everything. You understand! Everything!”

  I knew that he would not have given me all this information if he planned to ever release me, but at the moment I didn’t care. I was talking to a monster, and an overwhelming rage was filling me. I was about to verbalize his damnation again when a voice from the other side of the room called out.

  “Don’t! It weakens you!”

  The colonel turned and stared, and I followed his gaze. There by the door stood another guard, and beside him, slumping against a small table, was Yin. The guard pushed him to the floor.

  I jumped up and raced over to Yin as the colonel said something in Chinese to the guards, then stormed out. Yin had bruises and cuts on his face.

  “Yin, are you all right?” I asked, helping him over to a cot.

  “I’m okay,” he said, pulling me down to sit on the cot beside him. “They came for us right after you left.” His eyes were full of excitement. “Tell me what happened. Did you reach Shambhala?”

  I looked at him and held my fingers to my lips. “They probably put us together to see what we would say,” I whispered. “You can bet they have this place bugged. We shouldn’t talk.”

  “We’ll have to risk it,” Yin said. “Come over by the heater. It’s noisy. Tell me what happened.”

  For the next half hour I told him all about the world I had found in Shambhala, then, in the barest whisper, I mentioned the temples.

  His eyes grew wider. “So you haven’t found all of the Fourth Extension?”

  I mouthed, “It’s at the temples.”

  I went on to tell him about Tashi and Wil and what Ani had said about learning what those in the temples were doing.

  “And what else did she say?” Yin asked.

  “She said we must have no enemies,” I replied.

  Yin grimaced in pain for a moment and then said, “But you are doing exactly that with the colonel. You were using your anger and disdain to feel strong. Those are the mistakes I made. You’re lucky he did not kill you immediately.”

  I slumped back, knowing my emotions were out of control.

  “Don’t you remember when your negative expectation drove away the Dutch couple in the van, and you missed an important synchronicity? In that case you were having a fear expectation that they were perhaps going to do you harm. They felt that expectation on your part and probably began to feel that if they stopped they would be doing something wrong, so they left.”

  “Yes, I remember.”

  “Every negative assumption or expectation,” Yin continued, “that we make about another human being is a prayer that goes out and acts to create that reality in that person. Remember our minds connect—our thoughts and expectations go out and influence others to think the same way that we do. That’s what you have been doing with the colonel. You have been expecting him to be evil.”

  “Wait a minute. I was just seeing him the way he is.”

  “Really? What part of him? His ego or his higher, soul self?”

  Yin was right. All this was something I thought I’d learned with the Tenth Insight, but I wasn’t acting on it.

  “When I was running from him,” I said, “h
e was able to follow me. He said he could do it with his mind and intuition.”

  “Were you thinking of him?” Yin asked. “Expecting him to follow you?”

  “I must have been.”

  “Don’t you remember? That’s what was happening with me earlier. And now you are doing the same thing. That expectation was creating the thoughts in Chang’s mind of where you were. It was an ego thought, but it came to him because you were expecting—praying, in effect—for him to find you.

  “Don’t you see?” Yin continued. “We’ve talked about this so many times. Our prayer-field is working constantly in the world, sending out our expectations, and in the case of another person, the effect is almost instantaneous. Luckily, as I said before, such a negative prayer is not as strong as a positive prayer, because you immediately cut yourself off from your higher-self energies, but it still has an effect. This is the hidden process behind your Golden Rule.”

  I looked at him for a moment, not understanding. I took a minute to remember what he was referring to: the Bible injunction to do unto others as you would have them do unto you. I couldn’t exactly see the connection and asked him to explain.

  “The rule sounds,” Yin went on, “as though it should be kept because it creates a good society. Right? As an ethical stance. But the fact is there is a real spiritual, energetic, karmic reason that goes beyond the notion that this is a good idea. It is important to keep this rule because you are affected personally.”

  He paused dramatically, then added, “The more complete expression of this rule should be: Do unto others the way you would have them do unto you because how you treat them or think about them is exactly how they are going to treat you. The prayer that you send out with your feeling or action tends to bring out in them exactly what you expect.”

  I nodded. This idea was starting to sink in.

  “In the case of the colonel, when you conclude he is evil, your prayer-energy goes out and enters his energy and adds to his tendencies. And so he begins to act the way you expect him to act, in an angry, ruthless manner. Because he isn’t connected with a deeper divine energy, his ego energy is weak and malleable. He takes on the role you expect of him. Think back to how things generally operate in human culture. This effect is everywhere. Remember that we humans share attitudes and moods. It’s all very contagious. When we look out at others and make judgments, thinking that they are fat or thin or underachieved or ugly or poorly dressed, we actually send our energy out at these people and they often begin to think bad thoughts about themselves. We are engaging in what can only be called the energy of evil. It is the contagion of negative prayer.”

  “But what are we supposed to do?” I protested. “Don’t we have to see things as they are?”

  “Of course we have to see things the way they are, but after that we must immediately shift our expectations from what is to what could be. In the case of the colonel, you should have realized that even though he was acting evilly, cut off from anything spiritual, his higher self was capable of seeing the light in an instant. That’s the expectation you want to hold, because then you are really sending your prayer-field out to lift his energy and awareness in that direction. You must return to that mental posture, always, no matter what you see.”

  He paused dramatically, smiling, which I thought was strange, given our situation and his bruised and cut face.

  “They beat you?” I asked.

  “It’s nothing I haven’t wished on them,” he said, making his point one more time.

  “Do you see how important all this is?” Yin asked. “You cannot go further with the extensions until you understand this. Anger will always be a temptation. It feels good. It makes our egos think we are becoming stronger. You have to be smarter than that. You cannot reach the strongest levels of creative energy until you can avoid negative prayer of all kinds. There is enough evil out there without adding to it unconsciously. This is the great truth behind the Tibetan code of compassion.”

  I looked away, knowing that all Yin was saying was true. I had slipped into this pattern of anger again. Why did I keep doing this over and over?

  Yin caught my eye.

  “Here is the cap to this idea. In correcting a counterproductive pattern in oneself—in our case, anger and condemnation—it is imperative not to put out a negative prayer about our own possibilities. Do you see what I mean? If we make self-defeating comments such as ‘I can’t overcome this problem,’ or ‘I’ll always be this way,’ then we are in fact praying to stay the way we are. We have to hold a vision that we will find a higher energy and overcome our patterns. We have to uplift ourselves with our own prayer-energy.”

  He leaned back on the cot. “This is the lesson I myself had to learn. I could never understand the attitude of compassion that Lama Ridgen held toward the Chinese government. They were destroying our country and I wanted them vanquished. I had never been close enough to any of the soldiers to look in their eyes, to see them as people caught up in a tyrannical system.

  “But once I saw past their egos, their socialization, I could finally learn not to add to the energy of evil with my negative assumptions. I could finally hold a higher vision for them and myself. Perhaps because I have learned this, I can also hold a higher vision that you will learn it also.”

  I awoke with the first noise in the camp. Someone was clanking barrels or large cans together. I jumped up, dressed, and glanced toward the door. The guards had been replaced by two other soldiers. They stared at me sleepily. I walked over and looked out the window. The day was dark and overcast and the wind howled. There was movement at one of the other tents; one of the doors was opening. It was the colonel and he was walking toward our tent.

  I moved back to Yin’s cot and he turned over, struggling to wake up. His face was swollen and he squinted to see me.

  “The colonel is coming back,” I said.

  “I will help as much as I can,” he said. “But you will have to hold a different prayer-field for him. It is your only chance.”

  The flap door tore open and the soldiers jumped to attention. The colonel came in and gestured for them to wait outside. He glanced at Yin once before walking over to me.

  I was taking deep breaths and attempting to extend my field as much as possible. I visualized the energy overflowing out from me, and I focused on seeing him not as a torturer, but only as a soul in fear.

  “I want to know where these temples are,” he said in a low, ominous voice, taking off his coat.

  “The only way you can see them is if your energy is high enough,” I replied, voicing the first thing that came to my mind.

  He seemed to be taken off guard. “What are you talking about?”

  “You told me you believe in powers of the mind. What if one of those powers is to raise your energy level?”

  “What energy?”

  “You said that brain waves were real and could be manipulated by a machine. What if they could be manipulated internally by our intention and made stronger, raising your energy level?”

  “How is that possible?” he said. “Nothing like that has ever been shown by science.”

  I couldn’t believe it, he seemed to be opening his mind. I focused on the expression on his face that seemed to be honestly considering what I was saying.

  “But it’s really possible,” I went on. “Brain waves, or perhaps a different set of waves that go farther, can be increased to a point where we can influence what happens.”

  He perked up. “Are you telling me you know how to use brain waves to make certain things happen?”

  As he talked, I again saw a glow behind him against the wall of the tent.

  “Yes,” I continued. “But only those things that take our lives in the direction they are supposed to go. Otherwise the energy eventually collapses.”

  “Supposed to go?” he asked, squinting.

  The area of the tent behind him continued to appear lighter and I couldn’t help glancing at it. He turned around and looked i
n that direction himself.

  “What are you looking at?” he asked. “Tell me what you mean about ‘supposed to go.’ I consider myself free. I can take my life anywhere I want.”

  “Yes, of course, that’s true. But there is a direction that feels best, is more inspired, and gives you more satisfaction than all others, isn’t there?” I couldn’t believe how light the area behind him was becoming, but I dared not look at it directly.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.

  He looked confused, but I remained focused on the part of his expression that was listening.

  “We are free,” I said. “But we also belong to a design that comes from a greater part of ourselves that we can connect with. Our true self is much larger than we thought.”

  He just stared. Somewhere deep in his consciousness, he seemed to be understanding.

  We were interrupted when the guards outside banged on the entrance flap. As they did, I realized that the wind had erupted into a gale. We could hear things being blown and turned over all through the compound.

  A guard had opened the flap and was shouting loudly in Chinese. The colonel ran toward him. As he did, we could see tents blowing over everywhere. He turned and looked at Yin and me, and in that moment a tremendous gust of wind blew the left side of our tent up from its foundation and ripped it apart, covering the colonel and guards with canvas, knocking them to the ground.

  Yin and I were hit with the wind and snow blowing in through the gaping hole.

  “Yin,” I shouted. “The dakini.”

  Yin struggled to his feet. “This is your chance!” he said. “Run.”

  “Come on,” I said, grabbing his arm. “We can go together.”

  He pushed me away. “I can’t. I’ll just slow you down.”

  “We can make it,” I pleaded.

  He shouted against the howling wind. “I’ve done what I was here to do. Now you must do the same. We still don’t know the rest of the Fourth Extension.”