The Pac replied‘Transaction in progress, automate next transactions?’I pressed the illuminated pad to give consent and it asked me how often I wished to proceed.
I chose one-minute intervals and the Pac duly indicated the progress of the shares I had purchased for the simulation.
The shares of the company were dropping in price - I had seen the name and chosen more or less at random but I had already lost one point five percent. I smiled to myself. It seemed to be just a stupid gambling pastime so I switched off the Pac and replaced it in my bag together with my summary of‘The Big Book of truths that were not truths.’
I passed by Matt and Sonia to say goodbye before leaving.
I went also to Alice, but she only managed to sign‘cheerio’with her hand. She had people in the office and I didn’t want to disturb her.
I noticed that a few graphs had appeared on my Mac and it occurred to me that Alice could have at least asked if she could use it, but I didn’t really care. The woman did a great job and she was nice. I walked towards my‘silver fireball’with a new task in mind - when I got home I would take an hour off to go around the estate. I just wanted to relax and empty my mind before returning to work. I didn’t really know what I wanted to do, just that whatever it turned out to be I would do it to the best of my abilities.
Considering the absurd request to read thousands of books and having succeeded in about a month, then maybe I had some hope since this time it was only two hundred pages.
Serena, who was heading home with my two huge trays, greeted me with a warm
"Hello Kate, I brought a couple of things if you should feel peckish.”She finished the sentence with a dazzling smile.
I knew the‘couple of things’would probably be a meal for four people.
I took a quick shower, got comfortable on the couch with my Pac, book in hand, and began to tuck into Serena’s delicacies.
Where to start? was my first thought but not the last. Okay, so let’s follow Sgrunfio the legendary and friendly dwarf’s advice. I laughed, nibbling at another piece of delicious quiche with asparagus.
I started to run through the various notes I had taken but I felt rather blocked.
I decided to give a title to my work. I didn’t really feel like starting it but I did.
I chose a quote that didn’t not seem to say anything but in fact said everything or vice versa.
I fixed my attention on one sentence:‘You can remember only what you know.’
I didn’t understand what it meant, beyond the fact that I remembered only what I knew. It seemed obvious and almost useless, but it pleased me.
So I used it in the title of my analysis:‘To know signifies remembering what you already know.’
So I proceeded to start my project.
I started scrolling through the pages as I had learned to do earlier, this time trying to simplify the concepts that seemed to be repeated with different words and explained with more extensive examples.
I cancelled nothing from my previous writings, but I began to remove names and transcribe the subjects under one heading.
I started from what seemed to be the most important concept for all religious beliefs. I put in the same column the various names: God, Jehovah, Allah, Vishnu, Krishna, Jesus, Buddha, and added to the list every name that might have something to do with this subject.
I found that the word that best described all of these names was‘The Creator,’so I adopted that word from then on.
I made a copy of my book to be used for corrections in order to maintain the integrity of the original script. I set my Pac to automatically replace all the different words that indicated‘The Creator’and I used this word as the beginning of my new analysis, positioning it prominently at the top and centred on the page.
Below the word : ‘The Creator’
was added : ‘Supreme being’
I then passed to what seemed to be the eternal conflict between two opposites.
Also in this case countless adjectives and nouns to define it were evident, so I chose one myself,‘Principal Dichotomy.’
So I had a title and a beginning:
Title: Knowing signifies remembering; learning does not exist but only remembering what is already known.
This is the third relative truth
Learning means discovering what you already know.
We have innate within us all knowledge; we need to make it emerge from oblivion. A simple visual stimulus is enough, a hint from the teacher, an appropriate indication and knowledge is revealed as if by magic.
Yes, that seemed to be the effect.
At the centre was‘The Creator’and immediately after‘The Supreme Being.’To the left,‘Principal Dichotomy.’
It was not much but it felt like a good start.
Now I had to take all the data and analyse it thoroughly. I had to find the opposites, the dichotomies in fact.
I divided the page into two columns, drawing a line down the center of the page.
I entered everything that seemed to have something to do with this dichotomy, so positive things to the right and negative to the left, light to the right and darkness and so on to the left.
At the side of the two columns I noted the various spiritual aspects that emerged during the analysis.
I was trying to simplify but I only managed to get stuck. I eliminated about ten pages simplifying some names and some adjectives, and now I felt lost. I had no idea how to proceed.
So I decided to quit and seek advice from Sgrunff.
I fiddled a bit with my Pac, opened the Universal Library page and typed‘Planet H’- after a few moments,‘Planet H, videogames section. Authorized access only to officers. Enter Password’appeared.
‘Damn it, for once I manage to find some information and I can’t read it,’I thought angrily.
I put the Pac to one side, inadvertently touching the illuminated pad and went into the kitchen to get something to drink.
Meanwhile, the Pac displayed:‘Authorized Access, confirm within twenty seconds or start the shutdown process automatically.’
But I was in the kitchen and I couldn’t’see the information.
I went back thirst quenched and I saw the Pac was closed; it had returned to being a normal cell phone.
I decided I’d had enough for that day and slid into bed.
The next day I went to the office for a quick check, Alice had not yet arrived and I saw my Mac still running with a chart in plain view on the monitor.
‘Executed transactions’was flashing on the monitor and I immediately became suspicious. I had a strange premonition so I checked and what I saw made me freeze. The current account of the company until the day before which had up to eighteen million euro had been drained! It seemed that I had been purchasing shares on the NASDAQ automatically all night long!
I was desperate, I needed to so something but I didn’t know what.
I rushed off to find Matt but I was called by Sonia.
I blurted out something incomprehensible and I tried to apologize for the unintentional and reckless action, but she surprised me with hercalm and asked me:
"Were we playing with high finance last night Kate? What were you trying to do? "
I tried to apologize, explaining that I was just trying out a simulation and that everything had happened without my knowledge.
"How can I fix it?" I pleaded with Sonia. "I had just entered a small sum of $100! How did this happen?!"
"If you had checked better you would have noticed that the last three zeros were added automatically by the program."
“A hundred thousand dollars? Did I empty the account by buying shares for eighteen million?"
I was horrified and bewildered. I crashed into a chair, trying not to faint.
Sonia told me that she would take care of it - she would have to wait for the opening of the market before selling the shares.
"Anyway, don’t worry Kate, I checked. Your buying made someone suspicious on Wa
ll Street and the stock closed up four point five percent.”
I stood frozen for a moment reflecting on what I had just heard.
"So with a purchase that I knew nothing about I actually managed to make a profit?"
I was Incredulous and relieved and my heart was recovering its normal rhythm. I headed for Sgrunff’s classroom where he was waiting for me, my heart still prey to a heightened agitation.
I greeted him with myhands still trembling visibly. I said,
"I'm stuck, I don’t know how to continue my analysis.”
"Good morning Kate. You seem slightly agitated, are you okay?"
With that question he took my notes, got up and began to check them.
He arrived at my side and then continued to walk back and forth, touching his moustache and occasionally mumbling strange words.
I had never seen Sgrunff so thoughtful, so I decided to say something.
"For heaven's sake Sgrunfio, I only wrote two lines, what is there to think about?"
He regarded me for a while time with eyes so dark that I wondered if he actually had an iris or just two large, dark, deep pupils. He finally said,
"I can’t understand if you understand.”
I was surprised to see him so serious, but in a moment his face appeared stretched and the usual smiley one returned. He sat on his chair, turned on the screen and on the console my words appeared.
"Well, I think the best way to discovery is to make you think and listen to your comments. Today you will continue your analysis with me.”
He began by wondering what I meant by‘Principal Dichotomy.’
I began explaining to him that all the time when I read the many and various writings I could not help but notice the strange struggle between good and evil, but I could not understand why it was described that way.
"Explain yourself," he said, holding two arms crossed behind his head and two in front of his chest.
I said that words were used many names over to describe one very simple thing.
I told him that such evil was described as the Devil, Satan, The Beast, the one who induced temptation and that various actions were described that were considered bad.
I explained to him how everything was geared to keep people from damaging themselves, even at the cost of serious threats and I took as an example the various warnings that were mentioned in the Bible:
-‘You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.’
-‘You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's.’
- ‘Whomsoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.’
Or from the Koran:
-‘Fornication is shameful because it creates evil, disorder and often violence.’
-‘Previously, as a guide for the people. It has sent down the Criterion. Verily, for those who disbelieve the revelations of Allah, a severe punishment! And Allah is the Mighty Avenge’.
-‘No, not those who disbelieve, their wealth and their children shall not suffice to protect them from Allah. They will be fuel for the Fire.’
It seemed that someone has used the name of a higher authority to force people to be good and obedient.
I explained that often in the literature there were words that were not used for what they were in reality but interpreted in a distorted manner to arrive at a definite purpose.
I brought the example of the keywords that I had transcribed -‘evil’,‘the demon’ ‘intestines,’all these elements had‘the smell of sulphur.’
"If I were to analyze these words for what they are, without external interpretations, I'm thinking that evil has the smell of poop and it lines the gut. All this doesn’t make much sense.”
He looked at me, interested, and asked me to tell him more about dichotomies and explain what else I noticed.
I resumed my notes and I told him that I had found many writings focused on one thing; someone said, "Get rid of the pairs of opposites," another had done a lot of work on what seemed to be two conflicting minds, one was the‘Animal Mind’and the other was the‘higher Mind’and according to this procedures were developed relating to that subject using as the main dichotomy Create / Destroy.
This is the fourth relative truth:
All we know is created and controlled by the opposing and the interdependence of opposites (good and evil, love-hate, war-peace, truth-lie, hunger-satiety, hot-cold, etc.).
They fight each other, but at the same time cannot do without each other, and one would not exist without its opposite.
It seems that everything has to do with positive and negative.
The Animal Mind seems to be positioned so that it occupies the central part of the intestine, in the area of the solar plexus, and all negative, evil stimuli start from there.
The Higher mind seems to be positioned behind the centre of the forehead and from here all positive, good emotions begin.
The interaction between these two minds creates the emotions.
Sgrunff said nothing. He brought me to his desk, took out two small magnets from a container and explained to me that in a certain way these are attracted and then repelled by turning one of them. I said,
"I know Sgrunfio, I studied it in school. I may be a poor little girl from the third world, but I’m not stupid," I said smiling.
Unperturbed, he took a small container containing metal powder and re-made before my eyes the experiment to show the magnetic fields created by the two magnets.
He looked at me and launched his question.
"With the data analysis in your possession, could you say that one of the two magnets represents a‘higher mind’and the other magnet represents a‘lower‘one? And that the interaction of the two minds creates a magnetic field that can be defined as‘emotions.’
I looked at the lines drawn by the metal powder, considered the positive and negative poles of the two magnets, and answered:
"Yes, it’s very rudimentary but the concept seems to me correct.”
“Well, then you're beginning to understand," said Sgrunff, very satisfied. "Something is not yet in the correct place but the beginning is very promising."
He told me to place the notes on the big screen using his console and add the conclusions I had drawn.
While I was sorting this out he was fiddling with his Pac.
A few minutes later Valdes arrived.
He approached and greeted me gently. He began to observe the screen and asked Sgrunff if he could intervene because he wanted to ask me something.
Sgrunff nodded and listened curiously.
Valdes asked me,
"Who is the Creator?”
Unsurprisingly, I didn’t know what to reply so in a conspiratorial tone I whispered, "I have not the faintest idea, my darling."
I was rather surprised to hear myself using the term‘darling’to Valdes but he seemed to like it.
He looked at me and with a beautiful smile asked,
"And what makes you think that there is a creator?”
I thought for a moment and then by way of explanation I said,
"It seems there is a whole universe of created things, so this assumes that someone or something madethem. It seems only natural for me to give him the name of the Creator.”
"Tell me more," said Valdes.
I did not know what to say, so I began to reason out loud.
"So, first of all I do not know if it's a person or persons. In the various writings that I have seen it seems to have no human characteristics. It might be a superior form, an individual who does not need a human form like ours. They could, however, also be different individuals, imagine a team at work, perhaps composed of about twenty of these beings who have one that directs the works and others who perform them. A great architect at work with a
lot of team leaders and labourers, all intent on completing the project.”
“Not a bad imagination," said Valdes.
His face relaxed into a gentle smile where I lost myself.
"Maybe someone might not agree, but really not bad."
I smiled in delight, not so much by the compliment, but because he was there next to me.
I had the urge to hug him, but I refrained.
Valdes left. In the hallway Sammy was waiting for him. His big head all shaved and black, was peeping over the door threshold. He greeted us with,
"Hello Kate, Sgrunff hello," and he left with Valdes.
I faintly heard Valdes’words confirming to Sammy something about an operation that would be performed the next day, and then the voices went away and became indistinct.
Who knows what those two are cooking up, I thought.
I discussed various things that were on my mind with Sgrunff, some of which could be considered quite controversial.
He advised me to continue on the path that I had taken and that I should be cold and logical in my opinions.
"Think simple, you're on the right track."
I asked for some other books because I wanted to research some things that now seemed more interesting.
Planet-H: The End of the Beginning Page 14
