In search of the Tantra of Shambala III

Once when I was 6 years old, my mother took us on a summer holiday trip, to spend some days in the countryside. It was mid-august and the temperature was hot. Fresh air flowing through my open window cooled me and at the same time allowed me to see through the beautiful landscape surrounding us. High and green hills, gorgeous trees, stunning clouds with such original forms, the sun tenderly caressing me with it’s warm luminous rays, etc. Such an overwhelming spectacle left marvelled me throughout the whole trip.

The more we travelled inside the mountain, the better I felt. Even though I was very little then, now a day I can still recall with great detail that marvellous environment and the sensations it made me felt. Leaving behind the chaos of the city I felt very harmonious away from the noise, the cars, the pollution and all those noises present in every large city. In nature I could feel joy, freshness and lightness, I could breath deeply and fill my whole body with vitality and happiness. I can even remember the smell of fresh herb that filled the air and how good that made me felt.

After almost two hours in the car we arrived to the town where one of my aunts lived. She lived there with her daughter, who had almost forty years old but had never gone out of her mother’s place. She dedicated her life to take care of my aunt who was ill and kept her from doing anything by herself. She was a taylor and sew other people’s clothes, that’s how she earned her money. She didn’t had a boyfriend, not then, and never before. At her age, like most of the women in my family, hadn’t married and neither had plans to do it. She wasn’t happy with her life but resigned to her situation and did nothing to change it.

The house had a big garden and an orchard. My cousin used to cultivate her own vegetables and some plants and also there was a nice wood near the house with trees. I remember a big garage with tables and chairs made of wood decorated with different kind of flowers. It was an antique house made of stone where my aunt had done a big effort to fix every detail and so it was perfect.

When we first arrived to the house, my welcomed us and kindly helped us with our luggage, I must say now that she didn’t look very happy but still it was not very unusual this kind of behaviour in my family since most of my relatives seemed to be sad all the time, so smiling was not very usual among them and she shouldn’t be the exception. How glad would I’ve been seeing them happy, smiling and enjoying! My family was the opposite where being sad and always complaining was the common state.

She showed us the house and then invited us to lunch after taking a rest. Rest? I wanted to run, to play in nature! When we arrived I saw a kid that according to me, he was more less my age and had a dog living in the house next door.  I love dogs and never had one so you can imagine how excited I was to play with his pet.

“Mom, can I play with the boy? Can I? Can I?” I asked my mother.

She said “No, we’ve come to see our relatives, so we are going to spend as much time as possible with your aunt and cousin.” I didn’t like her plans at all. I came with the idea of having a good time, playing and enjoying my vacations, not to be with bitter, sad and complaining ladies.

I spent the first hours of my summer holidays sitting on a chair, drawing and writing tales, things I use to do back in the city and I liked to do it but my desire to go out and play in nature with all the kids in town, to enjoy the magic place and imagining all the adventure I could find out there... It was like a fairy tale!

The night fell down and I was sent to bed. I was no tired at all neither I felt sleepy but my only choice was to accept whether I liked it or not. My bedroom was in the upper floor of the house so the sight I had was splendid. I could see the sky covered with sparkling stars! The moon, so big and so shiny! It looked so nice, so beautiful, so magnetic! It took my entire attention and I couldn’t stop staring at it. I slept looking at this magnificent spectacle with this magical images in my head.

All of a sudden, in the middle of the night I woke up. Perhaps it was four or five in the morning but I felt so awake that went out the bed and went outside. I didn’t want to bother anybody in the house so quietly I stepped outside very silent. As soon as I was outside the house, a slight cool wind caressed my tiny face so gentle… I heard magic sounds coming from the woods, there were birds singing. Such celestial sounds brought me a delightful state I had never felt before. I was urged to follow this sound by instinct and so I did.

The more I walked into the woods, the higher and more intense the birds sang. I couldn’t see then but I could hear them so loud and so perfect! All of a sudden I stopped and closed my eyes letting those sounds take me deeper into myself. It was such an intense and deep experience! Even now, whenever I recall this experience, it comes back with such clearness and sensitivity… I was just a child but my soul won’t forget it.

I was delighted in my experience when suddenly my mother came where I was and violently grabbed me by the arm and yelled at me: “Are you crazy!? What are you doing here? Something might happen to you! You’ve took a big scare out of me!” I tried then to explain my experience to her but she didn’t seem to understand me. She recommended me to stop dreaming and imagining things and to start living in the reality. She clearly warned me to be the last time I did those kind of things.

I felt so bad. I felt misunderstood, alone and guilty. Who could I tell my story? Whom to share with my experience if not even my mother was to understand me? I was afraid to share it and I felt guilty of my behaviour. What was I to know? I was just 6 years old!

That was the last time I lived something like this. After this incredible experience, my sensibility was blocked.

I was educated like most of the children in the world; attending school, studies, playing in the park with other kids, watching television and all common things that most children do. Then I turned into an adolescent. When I was fifteen I had too many complexes, overweight and acne on my face. I had no experience with boy’s themes. 

My sexuality woke up and I had too much interest in boys. I was eager to experience but no one had ever told me nor guided me even in simple things like how to communicate with them not to say how should I act with them. I was very shy and didn’t know how to approach them or start a conversation.

I remember specially of a boy that lived in my same building. His name was Julio. I liked him so much that I even knew perfectly his schedule and when was probable to meet him in the front door, so I did everything to cross over him, in the stairs or everywhere else. I dreamed and had fantasies with him. I spent hours in my bedroom dreaming of the time when he asked me to be his girlfriend. But that moment never came. Sometimes, I stood outside my door and wait for him to step outside of his with my heart pumping frenetically. When I stood face to face with him, I couldn’t even look at him, my mouth couldn’t speak. He was always very kind with me and I acted like a little dumb girl that didn’t even dare to say hello.

Experiences like this happened to me all the time and made me feel blocked and stuck. I didn’t know what to talk with them so I was dumb! How could I act naturally and free among them? No one was to answer my questions and that made me feel so frustrated and blocked.

Years go by until one day, I started a relation with a boy. My first relation if you could label it like that. I was fill with fears, lacked of self esteem, with many complexes, had problems and difficulties to express myself through spoken language, etc. His name was Marco. He was very kind and tender; he always brought me flowers, gifts, candies and books. He made me feel like a princess and that made me felt secure with him but still I was afraid to show him what I felt and thought.

The only moment I could express freely was when we were alone, when words were not necessary. When all I needed to do for express my emotions and feelings was a tender caress, a gentle touch. A subtle kind of communication that reflected all I couldn’t say with words. But unfortunately it seemed that we didn’t speak the same language because he didn’t feel all I wanted to transmit to him.

He was the first man in my life. My first sexual relation was with him. I was very romantic and I always dreamed of how it could be my first time. Maybe romantic words, poems, candles, a simple “I love you” perhaps, but the reality was far from my fantasies. On my first time, we both drank too much, something Marcos did frequently. We were making out in the backseat of his car and everything was spinning around. He was not being gentle and moreover he was being abrupt and coarse. I felt like an unanimated object being used by a drunk guy who was far from being gentle. This was my first time: I felt used! It was so quick and so bad! I felt nothing but nausea and pain. A complete disaster!

After this terrible experience, I kept contact with Marcos for a couple months more but he kept on behaving stranger and stranger. All he thought about was in sex. He always told me that I never speak with him and that he never knew what went on my mind because I couldn’t explain to him in words. With all, that was truth, I couldn’t sustain a fluid dialogue with him, seemed to be blocked for me. We had sex but it was never good, he used me to receive pleasure but never gave it to me. He was very insensible.

After Marcos I had many other relationships and many more sexual experiences, but once and again, I felt empty and unsatisfied. I realized then that not just me knew anything of boys, not even they and neither did the people in general, they knew nothing.

It was with the first classes of Shambala Tantra that I was able to understand and see this situation much more clearly. I was living in some kind of illusion until that moment; I was trying to fill that empty space inside of me with a man. That was impossible, I was the only one who could fill it.

In Greece I took one of my first seminars of tantra. It was held in nature. During a certain practice we had to connect with nature and open a new perception toward it. What a magic moment! The place was marvellous and the colours were so astonishing; it was a fairly tale. The sound of the sea awakened in me such harmonic emotions. In the middle of the practice I felt the impulse to walk to big, strong tree. Standing in front of him, I listened a very familiar sound. It was the same sound I heard back then when I was a little girl. There were birds singing just like angels! In that same moment, my sensibility opened and took me on higher and deep levels of conscience.

When the exercise finished, some practice mates came to me and asked about my experience. They referred to my face since it was totally different and my face sparkled like stars on a dark heaven. For the first time since I was a 6 year old girl I was able to listen these birds singing. This re-opened something magical inside of me, I don’t have words to explain it.

When I asked the teacher about my experience, he explained to me that the songs I heard in the woods were really inside of me and they were just a reflect of my inner beauty. I was able to connect with my individuality. That was the reason I could see it on the outside because it was living inside of me already. This was really a marvellous inner experience!

Teacher then gave me a personal practice for connecting with my individuality. I had to see myself on the mirror everyday at night for twenty-one days. And so I did it.

After the first week I was able to notice the difference. In my thirty years of life, I had a lot of wrinkles on my face but with this practice my skin was becoming softer and even some wrinkles disappeared. I took some photographs of my face and on the last day of this exercise, I compared pictures, the first and the last and I stood cold. I was astonished with the difference. I looked as if I’ve done myself an aesthetic operation! I looked younger and attractive!

Now, I like myself, I recognize enjoy myself. I feel comfortable and secure. I’m no longer insecure or ashamed in front of men. I know I have individuality and it is opening to my self-development. The more I discover my own talents, the more I like myself.

Thanks for wake me up of the dream I lived on. Thanks for giving me the tools needed to enjoy my beauty and youth. Thanks for helping me understand I have individuality, unique and very special. Thanks for helping me find my confidence and the path to the complete development of my soul. Thanks for returning the love to my own person. Thanks forever and ever!