Андрей Алексеев
The Way to myself
Why?
The huge effort put into the business, brought nothing but exhaustion. Everything I did lost its liveliness, leaving pure mechanics.
Year by year, my life looked wealthier, and I had more opportunities to enjoy it. However, I felt worse and worse emotionally. Meeting friends and experiencing some lighter emotions, which can be bought for money, helped me avoid depression.
However, the tiredness was accumulated, while joy and love gradually went away. One day I understood that I’d lost the easygoing spirit which was natural to me. The deal I had didn’t cheer me up. The weariness of life reached the peak, and I wanted nothing: no business, no money, no love, no new ideas or projects…
Nothing I possessed encouraged me to feel the passion and the taste for life. I had to always seek for – and come up with some new sources of joy, inspiration, and reasons to live.
I STARTED ASKING MYSELF: WHO AM I AT ALL? WHY DOES THE WORLD NEED ME? DOES IT ACTUALLY NEED ME, AND DO I NEED IT? WHY WAS I BORN AND WHAT SHOULD I DO? I DIDN’T HAVE ANY ANSWERS, BUT I HAD A FEELING THAT I COULDN’T LIVE THE WAY I DID ANYMORE.
So, I found a way to change everything. “I guess, I should get married! I’ll get married and everything will improve. A family will fill my life with new meaning, and change its quality. I will settle down, calm down, and I will feel better”.
By the way, I noticed that as soon as I set an inner goal for myself, everything seems to happen without much effort. For example, that’s the way important people come into my life: we meet and get to know each other by chance, I don’t go out of my way to make this happen. And the opposite is true: usually, nothing goes well with the people I look for.
And in the same way, by chance, I met my future wife Marina. We became friends, and we had a wonderful relationship which developed easily and naturally. I liked giving my attention to her, flirting, taking care of her. So, I was absolutely sure that: first, I must get married; second, it must be with Marina.
After half a year since our meeting, I made a proposal. And three months later we got married. I got a new role: I became a husband. We found some new activities to do together, some mutual rights and duties. Our leisure time became totally different.
Once I was travelling by bus, when my phone rang. Marina told me we were going to have a baby. My first child! It’s really difficult to describe my feelings at that time: joy, surprise, perplexity, responsibility, tenderness… Something new was about to come into my life.
By the way, that was the moment when I decided to quit smoking. And I’ve never smoked since then. Because I was going to have a baby. What would she think of her father? What example would I be giving her?
As soon as Marina appeared in my life, we built a family and gave birth to our baby, a new period in my life had started. A new kind of energy came into it. Many things changed in my mind as well: I started living not only concerned with myself, but others as well. I became responsible for my family. Gradually, my interests changed too.
Many things were changing. But not my habit of having a free, independent life style, or taste for bachelor parties with friends and entertainment. I couldn’t leave that behind, neither did I want to do so.
That way a year passed and another one did… I was an adult married man. I worked on my family and my business, which was growing rapidly and required a lot of my attention. I thought of my business as my child, which I fed and helped grow for many years. And everything that happened to it affected me a lot.
More frequently the same dreadful thoughts came to my mind. “I devoted myself to my business till the very end. I established lots of successful projects. And where is my joy, calmness, satisfaction for everything I’ve done? When will this rat race finish? Why don’t I control my business, instead of it controlling me?”
There were no answers so far. I still didn’t understand, who I was and what I was here for. I felt as if I was driving staring at the gauges, without seeing the road, moving almost as a blind man.
Meanwhile the number of restaurants increased. One moment, I felt bored with replicating my restaurants, and working in public catering business altogether. And the competition became too tough, because I prefer working on the underserved markets, creating my own new niches.
That way, step by step, I was coming closer to the next important twist in my life. I was done working in the business I had built up from nothing. The business I put so much effort, attention, and energy into.
Together with my partner, we reached an agreement about the conditions for me leaving the company pretty fast. I thanked him for the cooperation and, as soon as we accomplished our mutual commitments, we parted.
As an entrepreneur, I find some pleasure in imagining and creating something that has never been thought of before. After finishing one project, I started thinking about a new one immediately. I started trying to find a fresh idea, a new sphere where I can establish something original.
In those days there was nothing like a shopping mall, gathering many manufacturers and sellers of a narrow niche together in Novosibirsk, – and in Siberia at all. For example, if you decided to do some home repairs, you would have to wander around the city. You’d buy some wallpaper in one place, electrics – in another one, furniture and interior decor – in the third, and plumbing – somewhere else… That was extremely inconvenient for both: buyers and manufacturers. I understood: there it was – a wonderful brand-new field for business!
WHILE OTHERS THINK ABOUT SEPARATION, I WILL MERGE.
That occurred to be the key point to achieving the future success of “Bolshaya Medveditsa” trade and exhibition center: give your customers an opportunity to choose, compare and buy all the things they need for their construction or repair work in one and the same place.
I was also inspired by the idea of building “Bolshaya Medveditsa” center, I was creating not only a certain kind of service or products, but also the space itself. A kind of environment for other people and companies to establish and develop. Stores, cafes, restaurants, service companies created a natural synergy effect all together. A huge number of goods, services, and other offers, attracted a significant number of people – potential buyers. On the other hand, a high quantity of buyers stimulated sellers to provide more services, goods and products.
My goal was, in other words, to build a suitable space for the manufacturers and to assist them. The idea proved to be effective: “Bolshaya Medveditsa” lives, develops and prospers to this day.
For about two or three years, I worked on the new business with my natural passion and inspiration. The project pleased me with new opportunities and unexpected solutions. I was able to create and imagine. I had total freedom to design something brand-new. However, later on, the situation repeated again. I ran into the same wall again. I got that feeling of being disappointed and following it – a sense of the emptiness and meaninglessness of everything I had been doing.
Business and daily rush seized me so much that there was no escape from my depression. I exchanged my expensive cars with the ones which cost a fortune, spent more money on clothes, chose absolutely unbelievable (regarding the price as well) destinations for my trips… Nothing I could imagine made my life more cheerful or better.
More often I started feeling I was a character of a famous joke about an owner of a luxurious yacht, who felt happy twice in his life only: when he bought it first, and when he managed to finally sell it.
That was the way I used to live those days: I felt a short flash of a desire to possess something new. I got it and, almost immediately, that feeling of inner emptiness came. To feel more alive, I always had to find some new reasons to get an emotional rush. More and more, I felt that I was not living, but just riding the same carousel in a circle.
Those days, I travelled all over the world looking for something (I didn’t actually know, what). That was a situation we call: go there – I don’t know where, get that – I don’t know what. There was hardly anything I hadn’t tried! I attended different workshops, studied everything that could catch my attention or give me a hint of a hope to find the answers to the most important questions. I tried everything I had met in my way. Everything the consumer’s world could offer – expensive or cheap, extreme or safe, classic or exotic…
All those things were done for one and only one reason: to feel happy, to find a new source of joy and inspiration. Nevertheless, days went by, – and the feeling of boredom came. Everything I’d used to love – skiing, yachts, parties – sooner or later stopped grasping any of my interest.
WHERE HAS MY HAPPINESS GONE? WHERE IS THE LOVE AND JOY WHICH USED TO BE WITH ME SINCE CHILDHOOD? WHO AM I? WHAT WAS I BORN FOR? WHAT SHOULD I DO IN THIS WORLD?
These questions didn’t let go of me. I was struggling, but I couldn’t find any answers yet. Also, I understood that I’d lost my freedom. Me, a person who values his freedom more than anything else, gave it up to his own business and entertainment. I lost myself in the lifestyle I used to live those days.
My feeling of disappointment worsened, taking me down to a new personal crisis. Some would ask: “What else do you need?! You’ve got a stable business, a nice family, a wife and a child… Everything seems to be great!” That was what my life seemed to be like from an observer’s point of view, but there was emptiness inside.
Needless to say, my disappointment affected all and each sphere in my life, demolishing them. The first line to be hit were my relationships with my closest ones, as I brought that annoyance and disappointment home. Though, my family which I wished could become my new support, didn’t save me from my inner pain.
In all honesty, one day I just stopped feeling what was going on in my own home. I started fighting with my wife more often. Once I had a huge fight with Marina right after coming back home from a yacht trip with my friends. So huge, that we decided to break up.
We lived apart for about a week. I had enough time to think about what my life had turned into. Those days the thought I could lose my family came to my mind for the first time. Meanwhile, it was absolutely clear that Marina didn’t want that and she was dreaming about our happy family life together. It was me and no one else, as if I were trapped in a dark labyrinth, trying to escape from it without knowing where the exit was.
MY WILL TO DO THINGS HAD ALL BUT LEFT. I HAD NEITHER POWER, NOR WISH TO DO ANYTHING AT ALL. THAT WAS THE DEAD END.
I COULDN’T LIVE THAT WAY ANYMORE. THERE WAS A NEED TO CHANGE MY LIFE, TO LIVE SOME DIFFERENT WAY… BUT WHAT DID THAT “DIFFERENT” MEAN?
That’s when there was a huge change in my mind. Maybe, the most important one. I started getting that if you want to escape from a dead end, you need to totally change your life.
A twist of fate
I started going to church, reading spiritual literature, visiting shrines, doing pilgrimages to holy places. I needed, I thought, to try that as well. Maybe, that was a way of escaping the reality and passions I used to live in. Anyways, I started acquiring a deeper interest in such activities. I started reading the Bible, prayers, stories about the saints, and about people who had a pure spirit. In those holy places, the places of power, I felt calm.
My main discovery that time was understanding that “yes, the way I live is wrong”. It occurred that there are some major rules of the world, which I was breaking by ignorance… And with my usual passion and self-commitment, I commonly put to sports and business, I dived into self-development. Just like a stranger who’s just got back from a desert, I was consuming that new knowledge thirstily and couldn’t quite quench my thirst.
I studied the rules of healthy family relationships and the rules of eating healthy. I was interested in each and every sphere of life, and I tried to check everything on my own.
I’d say that was the first time ever when I believed that despite the well-known material world, there is another, spiritual one, which is higher and purer. And that world is just as real as the matter surrounding me.
Even though I studied diverse holy texts, I couldn’t understand: how were these ancient truths be connected to my own life? I found no answers in conversations with priests.
Once my wife suggested I try yoga. I didn’t know much about that, but I agreed: anyways, that was something new and interesting! I visited a class and was impressed. For the first time in several years, I finally felt better: relaxed, calm, easy.
Later on, thanks to yoga, body and breath exercises, my physical and mental states started changing for the better. I began studying that practice deeper. And even though I didn’t understand the full depth of it, I continued.
When my friends invited me to visit the Himalayas, I agreed. By that moment it seemed I had already visited everywhere: America, many countries in Europe and Asia, but I hadn’t been to India yet.
The country looked strange to me. Everywhere was poor and dirty, but the eyes of the citizens were somehow happy. “How come?” – I thought. “How can you be happy living in such conditions?”
So, we got to Rishikesh. Got some rest and went to the mountains. We reached the height of 3,500 meters to a holy place there. And, all of a sudden, I got an awkward feeling that I was in a jelly – that the space around me was dense and tough. That’s the way a crystal purity shows itself. And that actual purity was squeezing me out of myself. I’d even say it kicked me out – that’s how hard it was to stay in that place.
UNEXPECTEDLY, I UNDERSTOOD HOW MUCH DIRT AND SLAG THERE WAS IN MY BODY. I SAW THAT MY MIND IS, ACTUALLY, AN OVERWHELMED COMPUTER, WHICH HADN’T HAD ANY FREE SPACE FOR ANYTHING NEW FOR A LONG TIME.
I felt so bad, that I couldn’t walk forward anymore, fell behind, and finally went back to the place where we started.
For the next several days I felt literally ill, physically feeling worse, I’d say, than ever before: sickness, vomiting, all the body was just turning inside out… The only thing that was clear was: that it wasn’t a normal illness, but a physical cleansing. I realized – it was high time to change my life starting with food.
After I came back from the trip, I quit alcohol and meat, and started paying more attention to my health. The first months, of course, it was tough – I had to change too much in myself. Though, I got reassured that after making a decision, a man can break almost any unhealthy habit. Right, it will be hard for some time, but if you don’t surrender, after just a couple of months you will feel much better. And after a year, you’ll forget that there was a time when you were addicted to alcohol, slept late, loved fatty foods, and didn’t move much…
The main aim I had after coming back from India was cleansing – first, my physical body, then my mind, and finally – all the spheres of my life. I remember the first 3 days without food. Later, I fasted periodically, drank some herbal essences and curative tonics. I expanded both the intensity and length of my yoga exercises.
Though, all in all, I didn’t quite understand which direction I should take for my development and what I should actually do. What is that path which suits me? Thousands of sources were speaking about something that seemed to be the same, but the puzzle pieces didn’t fit in my mind. “It’d be great to find a person, who would become my teacher, a guide to the spiritual world,” – I thought those days.
One day, while discussing our monthly plan with a marketer I asked her a common question: “How are you?” As an answer, she shared her feelings about visiting a yoga-seminar, which took place on the lake Teletskoye. In her story, I felt (even more than heard), – there was something really important for me. That was an interesting feeling: listening to another person, telling a story, I literally saw the images, emotions and energy given by a process I had never taken a part in. When my colleague started describing a master, leading the seminar, I felt an immediate response inside: “that’s what I need!”
I asked the employee to organize the same workshop for us. We gathered a group – and went with Maksim (the trainer) to Sri-Lanka.
That’s how we dived into the amazing nature of the island. We did breath and physical practices, relaxed and listened to Maksim throughout the days. I liked everything I saw and heard more and more.
One of unexpected results of those activities was a skill to see the thin world as well as the dense one. That was an amazing, breathtaking discovery: it occurred that everything around us is impregnated by different energies, everything is alive… I soaked up those unusual feelings of the fulfilled life, peacefulness, harmony, beauty and silence.
“How do you know that? Who taught you?” – I asked Maksim. “I’m a student of Pilot Babagi, a guru famous in India and all over the world. I’ll go to him as soon as we finish the seminar. If you want – you can join me…”
I had a feeling that everything was going too fast. I was concerned, if it was worth it to change my plans so suddenly. The date of our arrival back to Novosibirsk was arranged. Everybody was waiting for us at home… Regardless, I decided to go and we flew to Kathmandu with Maksim right from Sri-Lanka.
At night, we made it to ashram, situated in the mountains, and got settled in a room without much in terms of accomodations. Inside that place, there were many people from Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, India, and other countries all over the world. Everyone was wearing Indian national clothes, looked and acted absolutely not like European people do. Dense smell of incense, unclear rituals, mantras spoken in an unknown language… Frankly, I felt a bit afraid of everything that happened around me. I didn’t understand where I was, who all of those people were, and what was happening.
We came to Babagi, said hello, and went away. But the feeling that there was something too strange and, I’d say, too extreme for me, stayed with me.
When the next morning came I got to the same place with the teacher and all of those people, surrounding him, all of a sudden, I felt an amazing feeling…
ENDLESS, UNIVERSAL PEACE, AND SO MUCH LOVE AT THE SAME TIME!
IT WAS A STATE OF BEING I HAD NEVER KNOW, WHEN YOU WANT NOTHING, EVERYTHING IS ALREADY GOOD, THE WORLD IS GREAT! THE STATE OF BEING ABSOLUTELY HAPPY RIGHT NOW WITH WHATEVER YOU HAVE AT THE MOMENT.
That day there was a Shivaratri holiday in ashram, and many different events happened. And we were about to spend the night next to the fire surrounded by nature.