I was puzzled. “What was it that I didn’t do?”
“You must learn that all the answers that mysteriously come to us really come from other people. Think about all that you have learned since you have been in Peru. Haven’t all the answers come to you through the actions of other people you mysteriously met?”
I thought about it. He was right. I had met just the right people at just the right time: Charlene, Dobson, Wil, Dale, Marjorie, Phil, Reneau, Father Sanchez and Father Carl, now Pablo.
“Even the Manuscript was written by a person,” Pablo added. “But not all the people you meet will have the energy or the clarity to reveal the message they have for you. You must help them by sending them energy.” He paused. “You told me of learning to project your energy toward a plant by focusing on its beauty, remember?”
“Yes.”
“Well, you do exactly the same thing toward a person. When the energy goes into them, it helps them see their truth. Then they can give this truth to you.
“Father Costous is an example,” he continued. “He had an important message for you which you did not help him reveal. You tried to demand answers from him and that created a competition between you and him for energy. When he felt that, his childhood drama, his intimidator, took over the conversation.”
“What was I supposed to have said?” I asked.
Pablo didn’t answer. Again we heard someone at the cell door.
Father Costous entered.
He nodded at Pablo, a slight smile on his face. Pablo smiled broadly, as if he actually liked the priest. Father Costous shifted his gaze to me, his face becoming stern. Anxiety gripped my stomach.
“Cardinal Sebastian has asked to see you,” he said. “You will be transported to Iquitos this afternoon. I would advise you to answer all his questions.”
“Why does he want me?” I asked.
“Because the truck you were caught with belongs to one of our priests. We are assuming you received your copies of the Manuscript from him. For one of our own priests to disregard the law is very serious.” He looked at me with determination.
I glanced at Pablo, who nodded for me to continue.
“You think that the Manuscript is undermining your religion?” I asked Costous gently.
He looked at me with condescension. “Not just our religion; everyone’s religion. Do you think there is no plan for this world? God is in control. He assigns our destiny. Our job is to obey the laws set forth by God. Evolution is a myth. God creates the future the way he wants it. To say humans can make themselves evolve takes the will of God out of the picture. It allows people to be selfish and separate. They think that their evolution is the important thing, not God’s plan. They will treat each other even worse than they do now.”
I couldn’t think of another question. The priest looked at me for a moment, then said, almost kindly, “I hope you will cooperate with Cardinal Sebastian.”
He turned and looked at Pablo, obviously proud of the way he had handled my questions. Pablo only smiled at him and nodded again. The priest walked out and a soldier locked the door behind him. Pablo leaned forward on his cot and beamed at me, his demeanor still completely transformed, confidence on his face.
I looked at him for a moment, then smiled.
“What do you think happened just now?” he asked.
I struggled for humor. “I found out I’m in more trouble than I thought?”
He laughed. “What else occurred?”
“I’m not sure what you’re getting at.”
“What were your questions when you arrived here?”
“I wanted to find Marjorie and Wil?”
“Well, you found one of them. What was your other question?”
“I had a sense that these priests were against the Manuscript not out of malice but because they misunderstood. I wanted to know what they were thinking. For some reason I had the idea they could be talked out of their opposition.” After saying this I suddenly understood what Pablo was leading to. I had met Costous, here, now, so that I could find out what bothered him about the Manuscript.
“And what was the message you received?” he asked.
“The message?”
“Yes, the message.”
I looked at him. “It’s the idea of participating in evolution that bothers them, isn’t it?
“Yes,” he said.
“That would figure,” I added. “The idea of physical evolution is bad enough. But to extend the idea to everyday life, to the individual decisions we make, to history itself. That’s unacceptable. They think humans will run amuck with this evolution, that relations between people will degenerate. No wonder they want to see the Manuscript suppressed.”
“Could you convince them otherwise?” Pablo asked.
“No…I mean, I don’t know enough myself.”
“What would it take for someone to be able to convince them?”
“One would have to know the truth. One would have to know how humans would be treating each other if everyone was following the insights and evolving.”
Pablo appeared pleased.
“What?” I asked, smiling along with him.
“How humans will act toward each other is in the very next insight, the Eighth. Your question of why the priests were against the Manuscript has been answered, and the answer, in turn, has evolved into another question.”
“Yes,” I said, deep in thought. “I’ve got to find the Eighth. I’ve got to get out of here.”
“Don’t go too fast,” Pablo cautioned. “You must make sure you fully grasp the Seventh before you go further.”
“Do you think I grasp it?” I asked. “Am I staying in the flow of evolution?”
“You will,” he said, “if you remember to keep your questions always in mind. Even people who are still unaware can stumble into answers and see coincidences in retrospect. The Seventh Insight occurs when we can see these answers as they arrive. It heightens everyday experience.
“We must assume every event has significance and contains a message that somehow pertains to our questions. This especially applies to what we used to call bad things. The Seventh Insight says that the challenge is to find the silver lining in every event, no matter how negative. You first thought that being captured had ruined everything. But now you can see that you were supposed to be here. This is where your answers were.”
He was right, but if I was receiving answers here and evolving to a higher level, then Pablo must certainly be doing the same thing.
Suddenly we heard someone coming down the hall. Pablo looked directly at me, a serious look on his face.
“Listen,” he said. “Remember what I told you. The Eighth Insight is next for you. It is about an Interpersonal Ethic, a way of treating other people so more messages are shared. But remember not to go too fast. Stay centered in your situation. What are your questions?”
“I want to find out where Wil is,” I said. “And I want to find the Eighth Insight. And I want to find Marjorie.”
“And what was your guiding intuition concerning Marjorie?”
I thought for a moment. “That I would escape…that we would escape.”
We could hear someone right outside the door.
“Did I bring you a message?” I asked Pablo hurriedly.
“Of course,” he said. “When you arrived I didn’t know why I was here. I knew it had something to do with communicating the Seventh Insight, but I doubted my ability. I didn’t think that I knew enough. Because of you,” he continued, “I now know that I can. That was one of the messages that you brought to me.”
“Was there another?”
“Yes, your intuition that the priests can be convinced to accept the Manuscript is a message for me also. It makes me think I’m here to convince Father Costous.”
As he finished speaking, a soldier opened the door and motioned for me.
I looked at Pablo.
“I want to tell you one of the concepts the next insight talks about
,” he said.
The soldier glared at him and took my arm, ushering me out the door and closing it. As I was led away, Pablo stared through the bars.
“The Eighth Insight warns against something,” he called out. “It warns against your growth being stopped. … It happens when you become addicted to another person.”
THE
INTERPERSONAL
ETHIC
I followed the soldier up the steps and out into the bright sunshine. Pablo’s warning was echoing in my head. Addiction to another person? What did he mean by that? What kind of addiction?
The soldier led me down the path toward the parking area where two other soldiers stood beside a military jeep. They watched us intensely as we walked their way. When I was close enough to see inside the jeep, I noticed that a passenger was already sitting in the back. Marjorie! She looked pale and anxious. Before I could catch her eye, the soldier behind me grabbed my arm and directed me into the seat beside her. Two other soldiers climbed into the front seats. The one sitting on the driver’s side glanced back at us briefly, then he started the vehicle and headed north.
“Do you speak English?” I asked the soldiers.
The soldier in the passenger seat, a beefy man, looked at me blankly and said something in Spanish that I couldn’t understand, then turned curtly away.
I turned my attention to Marjorie. “Are you all right?” I asked, in a whisper.
“I… uh…” Her voice faded, and I noticed tears were flowing down her face.
“It’s going to be okay,” I said, putting my arm around her. She looked up at me, forcing a smile, then rested her head on my shoulder. A ripple of passion filled my body.
For an hour we bounced along the unpaved road. Outside, the landscape grew continuously more lush and jungle-like. Then, around one bend, the dense vegetation opened up into what appeared to be a small town. Wood frame buildings lined both sides of the road.
A hundred yards ahead, a large truck blocked the way. Several soldiers motioned for us to stop. Beyond them were other vehicles, some with flashing yellow lights. I became more alert. As we pulled to a stop, one of the soldiers outside walked up and said something I couldn’t understand. The only word I recognized was “gasoline.” Our escorts left the jeep and stood outside talking with the other soldiers. They glanced at us occasionally, weapons at their side.
I noticed a small street which angled to the left. As I looked at the shops and doorways, something changed in my perception. The shapes and colors of the buildings suddenly stood out and became more distinct.
I whispered Marjorie’s name and felt her look up, but before she could say anything, an enormous explosion rocked the jeep. A blast of fire and light shot up from the area in front of us, and the soldiers were blown to the ground. Immediately, our vision was obscured by smoke and falling ash.
“Come on!” I yelled, pulling Marjorie from the vehicle. Amid the confusion, we ran down the street in the direction I had been looking. Behind us I could hear distant shouts and moans. Still engulfed with smoke, we ran perhaps fifty yards. Suddenly, I noticed a doorway to the left.
“In here!” I shouted. The door was open and we both ran inside. I fell against the door, closing it securely. When I turned around, I saw a middle-aged woman staring at us. We had dashed into someone’s home.
As I looked at her, attempting a smile, I noticed that the woman’s expression was not one of horror, nor anger, at having had two strangers rush into her house after an explosion. Instead, what she displayed was an amused half smile that looked more like resignation, as though she half expected us and now had to do something. On a chair nearby was a small child about four years old.
“Hurry!” she said in English. “They will be looking for you!” She ushered us to the back of the sparsely furnished living room, through a hall, and down some wooden steps to a long cellar. The child walked at her side. We moved quickly through the cellar and up some other steps to an outside door leading to an alley.
The woman unlocked a small compact car which was parked there and hurried us inside. She directed us to lie down in the back seat, threw a blanket over us, and pulled away in what seemed to be a northerly direction. Through it all, I remained speechless, carried along by the woman’s initiative. A rush of energy filled my body as I fully realized what had happened. My intuition of escape had occurred.
Marjorie lay beside me, her eyes tightly closed.
“Are you all right?” I whispered.
She looked up at me with tearful eyes and nodded.
After about fifteen minutes, the woman said, “I think you can sit up now.”
I pushed away the blanket and looked around. We seemed to be on the same road as before the explosion, only farther north.
“Who are you?” I asked.
She turned and looked at me with her half smile. She was a shapely woman of about forty with shoulder length dark hair.
“I’m Karla Deez,” she said. “This is my daughter, Mareta.”
The child was smiling and looking over the passenger seat at us with large, inquisitive eyes. Her hair was jet black and also long.
I told them who we were, then asked, “How did you know to help us?”
Karla’s smile grew wider. “You are running from the soldiers because of the Manuscript, aren’t you?”
“Yes, but how did you know?”
“I know the Manuscript, too.”
“Where are you taking us?” I asked.
“I don’t know that,” she said. “You will have to help me.”
I glanced at Marjorie. She was watching me closely as I spoke. “Right now I don’t know where to go,” I said. “Before I was captured, I was trying to get to Iquitos.”
“Why did you want to go there?” she asked.
“I’m trying to find a friend. He’s looking for the Ninth Insight.”
“That is a dangerous thing.”
“I know.”
“We will take you there, won’t we, Mareta?”
The little girl giggled and said with a sophistication beyond her years, “Of course.”
“What kind of explosion was that back there?” I asked.
“I think it was a gas truck,” she answered. “Earlier, an accident had occurred, a leak.”
I was still amazed at how quickly Karla had decided to help us so I decided to press the question. “How did you know we were running from the soldiers?”
She took a deep breath. “Yesterday, many military trucks were passing through the village going north. This is unusual and it made me think of the time two months ago when my friends were taken away. My friends and I studied the Manuscript together. We were the only ones in this village who had all eight insights. Then the soldiers came and took my friends. I have not heard from them.
“As I watched the trucks yesterday,” she continued, “I knew the soldiers were continuing to hunt copies of the Manuscript and that others, like my friends, would need help. I envisioned myself helping those people if I could. Of course, I suspected that it was meaningful that I was having that particular thought at that particular time. So, when you came into my house, I was not surprised.”
She paused, then asked, “Have you ever experienced this?”
“Yes,” I said.
Karla slowed the car. Ahead was a crossroads.
“I think we should turn to the right here,” she said. “It will take longer but it will be safer.”
As Karla turned the car to the right, Mareta slid to the left and had to hold onto the seat to keep from falling over. She giggled. Marjorie was staring appreciatively at the little girl.
“How old is Mareta?” Marjorie asked Karla.
Karla looked disturbed, then said gently, “Please don’t talk about her as if she wasn’t here. If she was an adult you would have addressed the question to her.”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Marjorie said.
“I’m five,” Mareta said proudly.
“Have you studied the Eight
h Insight?” Karla asked.
“No,” Marjorie said, “I have only seen the Third Insight.”
“I’m at the Eighth,” I said. “Do you have any copies?”
“No,” Karla said. “All the copies were taken away by the soldiers.”
“Does the Eighth talk about how to relate to children?”
“Yes, it is about how humans will eventually learn to relate to each other, and talks of many things, such as how to project energy to others and how to avoid addictions to people.”
There was that warning again. I was about to ask Karla what it meant when Marjorie spoke.
“Tell us about the Eighth Insight,” she said.
“The Eighth Insight,” Karla explained, “is about using energy in a new way when relating to people in general, but it begins at the beginning, with children.”
“How should we view children?” I asked.
“We should view them as they really are, as end points in evolution that lead us forward. But in order to learn to evolve they need our energy on a constant basis, unconditionally. The worst thing that can be done to children is to drain their energy while correcting them. This is what creates control dramas in them, as you already know. But these learned manipulations on the child’s part can be avoided if the adults give them all the energy they need no matter what the situation. That is why they should always be included in conversations, especially conversations about them. And you should never take responsibility for more children than you can give attention to.”
“The Manuscript says all this?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said, “and the point about the number of children is highly stressed.”
I felt confused. “Why is the number of children one has important?”
She glanced at me for an instant as she drove. “Because any one adult can only focus on and give attention to one child at a time. If there are too many children for the number of adults, then the adults become over-whelmed and unable to give enough energy. The children begin to compete with each other for the adult’s time.”
“Sibling rivalry,” I said.
“Yes, but the Manuscript says that this problem is more important than people think. Adults often glamorize the idea of large families and children growing up together. But children should learn the world from adults, not from other children. In too many cultures, children are running in gangs. The Manuscript says humans will slowly understand that they should not bring children into the world unless there is at least one adult committed to focus full attention, all of the time, on each child.” “But wait a minute,” I said. “In many situations both parents must work to survive. This denies them the right to have children.”