I was relieved to hear myself being told “please follow me” when I reported to the young woman at the entrance to the campan. I relaxed, breathed in the garden’s perfumed air, and it was with genuine joy that I greeted Master Samtyang when he joined me.
“I was very disappointed not to see you yesterday,” I confessed.
“Have you made progress with your thoughts about your life?”
“Yes.”
“You see? You don’t need me that much,” he said with a smile.
We sat on the floor, on the mat, as usual.
“So, did you find interesting information about placebos?” he asked me.
“Yes, and what I read astounded me,” I admitted.
I told him the results of my research the day before in Amankila. “I thought I would find proof of the effect of placebos on illnesses in which the mind plays an obvious role, like sleep disorders, for example. But I was really surprised to discover their impact on ‘palpable’ illnesses, and even the effects they can have directly on the body. It’s very impressive,” I said.
“Yes, it’s true.”
“I thought it was a shame that more research isn’t done into using the mechanism of beliefs to heal people.”
“Yes, especially as it isn’t new. Two thousand years ago, Jesus was doing it already.”
“I’m sorry?”
“It’s never talked about, but Jesus used people’s beliefs to heal them.”
“You’re joking. Are you planning to write Da Vinci Code 3?”
Without replying, he leaned toward the little camphor-wood chest, and, to my astonishment, brought out a Bible.
“Are you a Christian?”
“No, but that doesn’t stop a person from being interested in the Bible.”
He calmly flicked through the pages and then read me a passage. “Jesus is replying to some blind people who are begging him to heal them—it’s from Matthew 9, verses 28 and 29: ‘Jesus said unto them, “Believe ye that I am able to do this?” They said unto him, “Yea, Lord.” Then touched he their eyes, saying, “According to your faith be it unto you.”’”
“Did he really say that?”
“Read it for yourself,” he said holding out the opened Bible. “You will notice that he doesn’t say, ‘I, all-powerful Jesus, have the ability to heal you.’ No, he asks if they believe he has that power, then he tells them they will obtain what they believe in. It’s very different.”
I couldn’t get over it. I read over and over again the passage from Saint Matthew’s Gospel. It was incredible. How could Jesus know what practically nobody in the 21st century knew? How could he understand to that extent the working of human beings deep down inside themselves? I had to admit I was disturbed by what I had just discovered.
The healer’s voice brought me back to Earth.
“An American researcher recently carried out a survey into the effectiveness of all the various cancer treatments. He examined the results from one group of patients. As the results were quite disparate, this led him to carry his investigation further. In the end he revealed that, in this group, the patients who got better had undergone very different treatments from one another. On the other hand, these patients all had one thing in common.”
“What?”
“All those who got better were absolutely convinced beforehand that their treatment was going to heal them. They had total confidence in their doctors and the choice of treatment. For them, getting better was a given.”
“So, the treatment doesn’t matter—what counts is believing in it?”
“In a way.”
“It’s crazy. Yet cancer isn’t a psychosomatic illness. And its presence in the body can be observed undeniably.”
“All the possible causes of cancer are not yet well known. There is probably a hereditary factor, environmental causes, pollution, diet, et cetera. But perhaps there also exists, in certain cases, a psychological dimension that is still unrecognized.”
“How’s that?”
“A few years ago, something disturbing happened that no one could explain.”
“What?”
“A woman showing all the symptoms of a blood cancer, a leukemia, was admitted to the ER of an American hospital. A blood sample was immediately taken that showed a blood analysis typical of leukemia. The hospital procedures required a second sample be taken to confirm the results of the first. Now, the second blood sample showed a perfectly normal blood analysis. Surprised, the doctors asked for a third sample. That time, the results were identical to those of the first test. So the doctors thought that the second blood test was badly done and its results were wrong. To be sure, they ordered a fourth blood sample. Except that one confirmed the results of … the second one. Amazement and incomprehension. It was only later that they learned that the patient suffered from a split personality. She was capable of changing personality from one moment to the next. And it turned out that this change had taken place between the different blood samples. One of her personalities had cancer, not the other.”
“But it was the same person!”
“Yes.”
“It’s unbelievable!”
“It’s a mystery. No one’s ever been able to explain it.”
I was impressed and again enthusiastic about the idea that, when research was done in this area, the field of what was possible in medicine would be considerably enlarged.
“To bring this chapter on health to an end,” he said, “it is interesting to know that people who believe in God and practice their religion, whatever it is, regularly have a life expectancy twenty-nine percent higher than the others.”
“You know, nothing surprises me anymore!”
“As I was saying to you last time, you can’t judge a belief, but you can take an interest in its effects. In this case, no one can prove the existence of God, but we know that one of the effects of the belief in God is a lengthened lifespan.”
“Well, perhaps I’ll go back to church on Sunday!”
“I’m not sure that would do any good. It’s the belief that counts, not the behavior, even if—and ecclesiastics know this for a fact—rituals keep belief alive. By the way, what is that medallion you are wearing?”
“This?” I said, pointing to the little cross hung round my neck.
“Yes.”
“My father gave it to me while he was still alive, ‘to bring me happiness,’ he said. I’m very attached to it because it comes from him.”
“Many people believe so strongly in their lucky charm that they wouldn’t go out without it. What’s more, I wouldn’t advise them to …”
I was going to get sticky food yet again. It was with a forced smile, and thinking about how to avoid it without annoying anyone, that I saw the young woman’s tray arrive.
“That’s very kind of you, but I don’t want to abuse your hospitality.”
“It’s a pleasure for us to offer it to you,” she said, to my discomfort.
I felt obliged to accept.
“Oh, then I’ll just have a tiny bit, because I’ve already had a lot to eat this morning.”
She held out a plate to me, served Master Samtyang, and disappeared. He had seen my embarrassment and was displaying a broad smile. He was having great fun.
“Why did you lie again?”
I wasn’t going to deny it and get tied up in more lies. In any case, there would have been no point: this man could read my thoughts.
“So as not to annoy you by saying that I don’t like your food and hate eating in the Balinese manner, getting my hands sticky—”
“If I can’t understand that and get annoyed, it’s my problem, not yours.”
“Sorry?”
“It’s not the message that annoys, but the means of transmitting it, of expressing it. If you’re tactful, for example, if you thank the other person for their positive intention, you don’t annoy them. Or else, they are particularly sensitive and then, in a way, it’s their problem, not yours.”
�
��You know, I think I also acted like that because it was easier than explaining the truth.”
“Now you’re mildly deceiving yourself. When you don’t tell people the truth, you tempt them to get around your arguments, which leads you to lie again. That’s what happened, incidentally. In the end, you find yourself forced to do something against your will, like eating food you don’t like. So you’re doubly punished.”
“Doubly?”
“Yes, because, first and foremost, lying is bad for you. It’s a little bit as though it generates negative energy that builds up in you. Try the truth. You’ll see that it’s liberating, and you feel a lot lighter all at once.”
Light was a convincing word, a desirable promise when you were choking on bland, gluey food.
“Speaking of truth, I didn’t follow your instruction yesterday: I didn’t go up Mount Skouwo.”
“I’m not surprised.”
“I didn’t feel like it, so I didn’t.”
“And what effect does simply telling the truth have on you?”
“I admit it’s pleasant. It’s a sweet sensation.”
“Good. Did you carry out the other tasks I gave you?”
“Yes, I wrote down my vision of an ideal life, then I wrote down everything that was preventing me from carrying it out.”
I got my notes out and read to him the description of the life that I dreamed of. He listened in silence, and it was a pleasant feeling, having someone pay attention to my desires without commenting on them, without breaking in to dissuade me or suggesting something better in his opinion. I had heard so many saboteurs of dreams, those people who say, “If I were you, I’d … ,” or, even worse, those who predict negative consequences for your ideas: “If you do that, you’ll …”
When I’d finished, he just asked me, after a silence, “How do you know that life would make you happy?”
“I feel it. I’ve imagined it several times, and each time I have the same feeling, the same satisfaction. Especially, when I imagine myself living that, I have no other desires.”
“And when you see yourself living this life, is there anything you might lose in relation to your present situation?”
“Nothing, absolutely nothing.”
“Perfect. Before going into details, I’d just like to know your feeling about the reason why the life you describe isn’t yours at present. What might have brought about the fact that your path is, overall, different from the one you would have liked to follow?”
“For starters, I think I don’t have much luck in general. To make a success of your life, you must have luck, and I’m not very lucky—”
“You were saying just now that you weren’t religious,” he said with a laugh, “but you are superstitious! I don’t believe in luck. I believe that everyone meets a great number of all sorts of opportunities in his life, and some people know how to recognize them and grab hold of them—others not.”
“Perhaps.”
“A very amusing experiment was carried out recently, in Europe, if my memory serves me well. It put volunteers, some of whom said they were lucky and others not, through a test. Each one was given a newspaper and a few minutes to count the precise number of photos printed inside. After a few pages, a fairly large insert appeared in the middle of the paper, saying in very large letters, ‘There’s no point in carrying on counting: there are 46 photos in the paper.’
“The people who thought they were lucky all stopped when they read this message. They closed the paper and said to the researcher, ‘There are 46 photos.’ In your opinion, what did the people who said they were unlucky do?”
“I don’t know. I would say they thought there must be a trap somewhere, and they continued counting to the end to be sure, before giving the number?”
“No. It’s true they continued counting to the end of the paper, but, when they were asked why they hadn’t taken account of the insert, they all said, ‘An insert? What insert?’ None of them had seen it!”
“Interesting, indeed.”
“Yes, I’m convinced that you have as much luck as everybody else, but perhaps you don’t pay attention to the opportunities that present themselves to you.”
“It’s possible.”
Again I wondered what opportunities I had let slip past in my life and what would have been its course if I had seen them and grabbed hold of them.
“Right, now, let’s go over the different elements of your dream.”
“The central element is to work for myself by setting up my own wedding-photo studio.”
“Good. So tell me, what is preventing you?”
“Actually, I’m afraid of not being able to, even though this plan attracts me enormously.”
“How do you know you wouldn’t be able to?”
“I can feel it: it’s so different from my present job, from what I’m used to doing. Perhaps it’s too big a change and I won’t manage.”
“If you just rely on a feeling, you don’t have any way of knowing if it’s reality or just a limiting belief.”
“Perhaps.”
“Do you know how you begin to believe you’re not capable of something?”
“No.”
“When there exists a question somewhere, often not consciously expressed, to which you don’t have the answer.”
“I’m not following you.”
“An example: if you don’t know the answer to the question ‘How can I concretely carry out this plan?’ then you risk thinking, I’m not capable of carrying it out, which is a limiting belief. So, I’m asking you how you intend to set about making this plan see the light of day.”
“I don’t know.”
“You see? As long as you haven’t answered that question, you will have the feeling of not being capable of realizing your dream.”
“I understand.”
“To answer it, you will have to get down more to the details, because, as long as you keep a global image of your plan, you will see it as an abstract thing, therefore unachievable.”
“It’s true; I have emotions, but no precise action plan. Positive emotions when I dream of the result, negative when I think of going into action.”
“There you are. You will demystify the plan by making a precise list of everything you will have to do to achieve it, then noting for each task what you can do and what you can’t yet do. Then all you have to do is find out how to get the skills you lack.”
“There are quite a lot of things I will have to learn that are completely foreign to me today—for example, how to manage what is, after all, to a certain extent a small business. I’ll need commercial skills, since I will have to make myself known and sell my services. The problem is that I have neither the time nor the money to get training.”
“Right, you can also call on your creativity: it’s not always necessary to have lessons to learn to do something! For example, who are the people around you who might have the skills you don’t have and might pass them on to you?”
My principal has some of them, but of course it’s out of the question to talk to him about it.”
“Who else, then?”
“My old principal, in the school where I taught before.”
“Perfect. You’ll be able to ask him to help you.”
“No …”
“What’s stopping you?”
“It doesn’t feel right.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. I don’t want to trouble him with my problems.”
“How do you know it would trouble him?” he asked me, astonished, as if I had just told him I was a mind reader, able to know in advance what people were going to think.
“He probably won’t want to waste time helping someone he isn’t close to or who isn’t a member of his family.”
“If it were you, wouldn’t you help someone who came to ask you for advice about a job?”
“Yes, yes, of course I would.”
He looked right at me.
“What are you afraid of, then?
” he asked me with infinite gentleness.
Once again, I had the impression that he was putting his finger exactly in the right place, so that he didn’t need to press hard to produce an effect. The word fear caused a particular echo in me. For a few moments, it rang like a gong in my rib cage, and the vibrations went down deep into the recesses of my mind. What came back up to the surface appeared self-evident.
“I’m afraid of being told to get lost, so I prefer not to risk it.”
Just thinking about it, I could feel the shame I would experience if my ex-boss told me where I could get off.
“Your fear comes from confusing the rejection of a request and the rejection of a person. It’s not because your request is refused that you are not liked or someone doesn’t have regard for you.”
“Perhaps.”
“Plus, you absolutely don’t know if his reaction would be negative. You can’t answer for people. It’s only by asking the question that you’ll know for sure.”
“I’m probably not enough of a masochist.”
“Most of our fears are created by our minds. You probably don’t understand, but knowing how to turn to others to ask them something is fundamental. All the people who make a success of their lives have that ability.”
“Perhaps I have others that make up for the one I haven’t got—”
“You absolutely must acquire it. You can’t go far in life without being able to ask others for support, backing, help, advice, contacts. Before we say goodbye today, I will give you a task to help you progress in this area.”
I accepted, praying that it wouldn’t involve climbing another mountain or swimming across a bay, weaving in and out of sharks.
“With regard to what I must learn to get my plan off the ground, there is something that may pose a problem.”
“What?”
“It’s impossible to run a studio on your own, particularly because, when you are out on a job, there’s nobody to look after customers or answer the phone. So I would have to take on one or two people. That’s where things get awkward.”
The Man Who Wanted to Be Happy Page 6