Lobsang Rampa

“ The air was filled of the sound of music. I was happy, comfortable after years of hardship. "Ah!" exclaimed the voice of the Lama Mingyar Dondup, "So you have had to come here again?" I opened my eyes to find him smiling down upon me, with the utmost compassion shining from his eyes. "Life upon Earth is hard and bitter, and you have had experiences from which, happily, most people are spared. It is just an interlude, Lobsang, just an unpleasant interlude. ”

“ It all comes down, as I told you before, to yourself, the real self which you are when you leave this, the shadow life, and enter the Greater Reality. While upon Earth we all tend to think that this is the only thing that matters, but Earth, this world—no, this is the World of Illusion, the world of hardship, where we come to learn lessons not so easily learned in the kinder, more generous world to which we return. ”

“ I thought of the woman upstairs, wondering if she was drinking beautiful hot tea, and wishing that she would bring me a cup.
The door at the head of the basement stairs was flung open with a crash, letting in a flood of light. Hastily I jumped up to cover an opened packet of printing paper before the light spoiled it, as a voice bawled, “Hey! You there! Want a cuppa? Business is bad tonight and I just made meself a pot before turning in. Couldn't get you out of my mind. Must have been telepathy.” She laughed at her own joke and clattered down the stairs. ”

“ The guards wore dark glasses. The light beat down in waves. The sensation was as if needles were being pushed into my eyes.
A door softly opened and shut. The scrape of chairs and the rustle of papers. A low-voiced muttered conversation which I did not understand. Then-the blow of a rifle-butt between my shoulders, and the questioning began. Why had I a camera which had no flim in it? Why had I the papers of a Frontier Guard stationed at Vladivostok. How? Why? When? Hour after hour the same stupid questions. ”

“ At last I reached the Land of the Golden Light where my Guide, the Lama Mingyar Dondup waited to receive me.
"Your sufferings have been truly great," he said, "but all that you have endured has been to good purpose. We have studied the people of Earth, and the people of strange, mistaken cults there who have and will persecute you, for they have little understanding. But now we have to discuss your future. Your present body is nearing the end of its useful life, and the plans which we have for this event must come to pass." ”

“ Suddenly the blows and the abuse stopped as if by magic. I turned my anguished head round and gazed up at the giant figure towering above me, heavy cudgel still in his upraised hand.
"Proctor," said a well-loved voice, "that was vicious punishment indeed for a small boy. What has he done to suffer that? Has he desecrated the Temple? Has he shown disrespect to the Golden Figures? Speak, and explain your cruelty."
"Lord Mingyar Dondup," whined the tall Proctor of the Temple, "the boy was here day-dreaming when he should have been at the Litany with his fellows." ”

“ The old lama laughed softly, and said, "How strange to me that the people beyond our land cannot understand astral travelling! How strange that they think all this is imagination. Could it not be put to them that even changing one's body for that of another is merely like a driver changing from one automobile to another? It seems inconceivable that a people with their technical progress should be so blind to the things of the spirit."
I, with much experience of the West, replied, "But Western people, except for a very small minority, have not the capacity for spiritual things. ”

“ As I told you before, you must visualize the route you would take to the sick person's house, and then make that body travel in your imagination to the home of that person you desire to heal. Picture yourself, your Overself, arrived at the house, arrived in the presence of the person you desire to help. Picture yourself putting out your arm, your hand, and touching that person. Imagine a flow of life-giving energy going along your arm, through your fingers, into that other person like a vivid blue light. Imagine that the person is gradually becoming cured. ”

“ So, eventually, from a Communist over-run Lhasa, they had come to their new home. No aircraft carrying war loads would fly this high. No enemy troops could live off this arid land, land devoid of soil, rocky and treacherous with shifting boulders and yawning chasms. Land so high, so poor in oxygen, that only a hardy mountain people could breathe. Here, at last, in the sanctuary of the mountains, was Peace. Peace in which to work to safeguard the future, to preserve the Ancient Knowledge, and to prepare for the time when Tibet should rise again and be free of the aggressor. ”

“ The Chinese Communist soldiers, also on the way to Lhasa, had come upon them and treated the monks with such savage brutality that such things could not be put into print. The monks, mutilated beyond hope of saving, had been turned loose, naked, bleeding, until they died from loss of blood. One woman alone had survived; she had fallen in a ditch and had been hidden by prayer flags which the Chinese had ripped from their posts. At long last, the lama and his attendant acolyte had come upon the gruesome scene and together had heard the full tale from the nun's dying lips. ”

“ The Eminent Man broke in again, "you have your choice, my Lobsang. You can with a clear conscience relinquish your body now and remain here. But if you return to Earth, the time of the changing of bodies is not yet. Before you decide, I will tell you that if you return, you will return to hardship, misunderstanding, disbelief, and actual hatred, for there is a force of evil which tries to prevent all that is good in connection with human evolution. You will have evil forces with which to contend." ”

“ As they came closer I saw that they were yellow-robed monks bearing aloft glaring torches, precious torches from the temple above with rare resin woods and incense sticks bound together giving a fragrant scent to drive away the odors of death and of decay, bright lights to dim and make invisible the evil glow of the rank vegetation.
Slowly the priests entered the underground chamber. Two moved to each of the walls near the entrance and fumbled on the rocky ledges. Then one after the other flickering butter lamps sprang into life. ”

“ Again I say to you, Lobsang, you cannot judge a man's evolution by his present status on Earth, nor can you condemn him as evil because he seems to be in difficulties. Nor should you condemn, for until you have all the facts, which you cannot have in this life, you have no sound judgment. ”

“ Bring my son back to life.” The Buddha rose and gently touched the poor woman, saying, “Go down into the city. Go from house to house and bring to me a mustard seed from a house in which no one has ever died.” The young woman shouted with exultation as she rose to her feet and hastened down the mountain side. She hurried to the first house and said, “The Buddha bids me bring a mustard seed from a house which has never known death.”
“In this house,” she was told, “many have died.” At the next house she was told, “It is impossible to tell how many have died here, for this is an old house.” ”

“ The guard beckoned, and a man hurried out of the Frontier offices. Bowing to me, he got into the car and sat beside me. By his aura I saw that he was an official and was suspicious. Apparently he was wondering why I should be driving alone, with no woman friends.
He was a great talker, but he left time enough to ply me with questions. Questions which I could answer. "No women, Sir?" he said, "but how unusual. Perhaps you have other interests?"
I laughed and said, "You people think only of sex, you think that a man travelling alone is a freak, someone of whom you must be suspicious. ”

“ But Western man scoffs at things he does not understand, yells “faker” to those who have abilities which he himself does not possess, and works himself into a frenzy of vituperation against those who dare to be in any way “different”.
Happily I put aside my typewriter and settled down to entertain the Lady Ku'ei and blind Mrs. Fifi Greywhiskers who both had waited so patiently.
That night, telepathically, came the Message again. “Lobsang! You have not yet finished your book!” My heart sank, I hated writing, knowing that so few people had the capacity to perceive Truth. ”

“ But the Kundalini can be partly awakened, and can vivify certain centres by love between a married couple. With the true ecstasy of intimacy, the molecules of the body become so arranged that many of them face in one direction, and so these people become people of great dynamic power.
"When all the false modesty and all the false teachings about sex are removed, then once again will Man arise as a great being, once again will Man be able to take his place as a traveller to the stars." ”

“ The man was mad saying that he wanted my body! So did I, it was my body. I wasn't having anyone take off my property like that. I had been shaken out of the physical vehicle against my wish, and I was going back. But the Tibetan obviously got my thoughts again. He said, 'What have you to look forward to? Unemployment, illness, unhappiness, a mediocre life in mediocre surroundings, and then in the not too distant future death and the start all over again. Have you achieved anything in life? Have you done anything to be proud of? ”

“ Because I had stronger than usual powers of clairvoyance I was very frequently called upon by the Inmost One, the Great Thirteenth Incarnation of the Dalai Lama, to look at the aura of those who visited Him “in friendship”. My beloved Guide, the Lama Mingyar Dondup, a very capable clairvoyant, trained me well. He also taught me the greatest secrets of astral traveling, which now to me is easier than walking. Almost anyone, no matter what they call their religion, believes in the existence of a “soul” or “other body”. ”

“ I say to you that if you use the power of prayer properly, without thought of self-gain, without thought of self-aggrandizement, then you have tapped one of the greatest powers on Earth, a force so great that if just a few genuine people got together and prayed for peace, then there would be peace, and wars and thoughts of wars would be no more. ”

“ For century after century the tunnels and caves had remained bare of life, desolate and lonely, known only to astral-traveling lamas who could visit anywhere and see all. Astral travelers had scoured the country looking for such a refuge. Now, with Terror stalking the land of Tibet, the corridors of old were peopled by the elite of a spiritual people, a people destined to rise again in the fullness of time. ”

“ The truth is that each gazed upon the aura of the other, seeing the other's naked astral form, the form unclothed by the human body, and so could see all the other's thoughts, all his desires, all his knowledge, and that should not be at the stage of evolution of Adam and Eve. ”