Posts

The wall

I swim three pool lengths, turn around – and realize: I can’t do the fourth. Everything before this was easy. But this – this is my real limit. I won’t make it. The freediving instructor certification...

The thoughts in your head aren't yours

Someone else’s programming. Your parents’ fears. Phrases from childhood. Voices of exes. Parasitic thoughts always move from outside in. Real ones – from inside out. And to tell them apart, you first ...

Meta

Meta – “above.” Metacognition is the ability to observe your own thoughts. The overminds at work. Close your eyes – what’s behind you? A projector from which your life pours out. It emits ready-to-use...

Living on remote control

I spent half my life on autopilot. Studied where my parents wanted. Worked where they’d take me. Tried to start a family because it was time. And then I saw my life in a movie. The film Click. About a...

The reality bubble

The world is changing right under our feet. They keep us in the dark, ban everything global, forbid using AI under the pretext of fighting satanism. Meanwhile they hand themselves SIM cards with no re...

Pelevin's "The hermit and Six-Toes"

The most precise book about awakening was written about chickens. Two chicks live on a poultry farm. One figured out long ago where they are; the other is just starting to catch on. They try to learn ...

King's "The life of Chuck"

Of all the movies from last year, this one hit hardest. It perfectly shows the world we carry inside our heads. I even read the Stephen King original. Careful, spoilers. The end of the world. The inte...

While still alive

Most people die long before their funeral. They stop growing somewhere in their twenties and spend the next forty years defending that decision. “We live a very limited version of what life actually i...

The illusion

Rebirths happen while you’re alive. It’s the endless wheel of the mind – when under the grip of emotions we turn into different people. Or when yet another illusion clouds the mind. Like the illusion ...

The game

People are used to seeing themselves as separate individuals, disconnected from the surrounding universe. This illusion prevents them from recognizing their true nature: we are an inseparable part of ...

The blasted-off

Suffering is not a law of nature, not karma, and not punishment. It’s a habit you can quit. So there we are, holding our breath, and I’m thinking – I need to give this knowledge to others, I want to t...

Spiritual truths

Many spiritual traditions, from ancient to modern, say the same thing in different words. Behind the diversity of books and teachers lie simple yet profound truths about the nature of reality, conscio...

God

The problem isn’t that truth can’t be found. The problem is there’s too much of it on the market. Life is short, and there are too many stalls selling this product… You won’t even have time to visit t...

Fear is made up

Let’s be honest. Nobody’s jumping out with a knife. It’s some made-up bullshit in your head – “what if something goes wrong.” We accepted fear as a way of life Strangely, we’ve accepted fear as our mo...

Suffering

The Buddha summed up Buddhism in four words. Dukkha Samudaya Nirodha Magga. Suffering Cause Cessation Path. In other words: a way to ease suffering. And here it’s not entirely clear what exactly we’re...

Doubt

Buddhism doesn’t call for blind faith – it teaches you to seek truth yourself. Don’t believe because you’re told to – check for yourself. In the Kalama Sutta, an ancient Buddhist text, the Buddha says...

Deep week Thailand 2024

This year seven of us took part in a week of freediving. Two of my friends decided to try what freediving is all about — and weren’t disappointed. I myself, to be honest, had considered freediving jus...

The blast-off crew. "Club of the Geniuses"

Peak Blast-Off Mode: A week after which you won’t want to be your old self. We’re filming a reality show where we supercharge people so intensely that their usual patterns just stop working. You can’t...

Awakening

Social reality is a conveyor belt that distracts from what matters. You’re not in hell – you’re in “distraction mode,” where the spiritual drowns in grocery runs and TV shows. Life is set up so you fo...

Happiness exists

How good is your life? Most often the answer is: “about seven out of ten.” Rarely higher. You can’t have it too good. So something’s slipping away, there’s a catch somewhere. Those remaining three poi...

Life at full throttle

Your potential is exactly what you’ve achieved — no more, no less. — But I could’ve achieved more if I’d pushed harder. No, you couldn’t. Everyone is exactly where they managed to climb. What’s happen...

Why aren't you happy?

Why aren’t you happy? You’d think intelligence — the ability to solve problems, learn from mistakes, make plans — should make life happier. People get smarter but don’t get happier. Why? Simple — it’s...

Meetup in Moscow

Who’s in Moscow? Let’s meet up in City. Come by, let’s chat.

Instage World

Astrakhan flew by like a single day. I haven’t seen that many beautiful, engaged people in a long time. The incredible Anton Bogdanov, whose “Genius Club” I landed in after “The Unhinged.” Waves of wa...

Astrakhan

Speaking at https://instage.world/astconf right on the banks of the Volga. Talking about a system for liberating consciousness through mental techniques and freediving. Anyone here from Astrakhan? Com...

The movement of life

Leaving Thailand, let me sum up this chapter. Having let more life into myself, I ended up in some kind of magical space. Passed Molchanovs Wave 3, now an assistant instructor. Participating in The Un...

Nikolay X live

Wishing everyone well.

A moment of classics

Matt Darey “Ibiza Euphoria” 1999 A straight-up time capsule. Temptation, Liberation, ‘Till I Come. All tracks enhanced with remixes — might be a bit intense in places. CD1 Lost Witness — Happiness Hap...

Molchanovs assistant instructor

In May I met Alexey Molchanov. He said: “Become an instructor.” The universe acts through other people — and now I’m an assistant freediving instructor. I hold static for 5:30, dive almost 40 meters. ...

Be grateful to life and it will be grateful to you

It’s simple. And it always has been.

The unhinged. "The Genius Club"

Peak unhingedness: a week after which you won’t want to be your old self anymore. We’re shooting a reality show where we level people up so hard their usual patterns just stop working. Special season ...

Boost the channel

Why don’t I have stories in the channel? Let’s boost it. https://t.me/boost/thinkforwardru

Doubt

Buddhism, instead of faith, teaches you to seek truth yourself. Don’t believe because someone said so — check for yourself. In the Kalama Sutta, an ancient Buddhist text, the Buddha says: Do not belie...

Awakening

Many people feel depressed without realizing how much they could change — physically, mentally, spiritually. If people understood this, they’d gladly invest in themselves every day. Life gets better w...

Soul surfers — Astropilot and Syduaya

From the self-titled album by Astropilot & Friends, which for some reason isn’t on streaming platforms. A rare track, one of my favorite electronic ones, almost nowhere to be found. Nearly eight and a...

Psychedelic freediving

So, I moved on to Wave 3 — that’s 34-40 meter depths, next up is assistant instructor. Throughout this time I’ve introduced about 20 people to freediving, and I accompanied all of them in parallel, wa...

Become an instructor

Alexey Molchanov: become an instructor! Become freedivers. Try it. It’s a gym for the mind. A training ground for relaxation and equanimity. You polish your bubble of reality. And you can fly.

Kindness

Broke free from Moscow and the energy came back. Recently had a truly fateful dive trip to Dubai and the universe’s printer sealed it again. This past week we’ve been hanging with friends, went to Phi...

A moment of classics

Working afternoon.

Wake up. It's time

Who am I writing this for? Myself. For someone who, like in The Matrix, feels something is off with the world. Why? My plan is an instruction manual for the next incarnation, for those who are ready t...

Suffering

The Buddha packed the essence of Buddhism into four words: Dukkha Samudaya Nirodha Magga — Suffering, Origin, Cessation, Path. A way to ease suffering. And here’s where it gets unclear — what kind of ...

Your second life

A person has two lives, and the second one begins when they realize life is only one. This Confucius quote is where my upward journey began. Don’t postpone your dreams. Live consciously, act boldly, a...

Test

Made a test for identifying hidden motives. No time to explain, easier to just try it. The more answers — the more accurate the result. Want to make a bot, haven’t gotten around to it yet. Send your a...

Complexity

We’re so used to everything falling apart over time that we don’t notice how everything in the Universe is becoming more complex. The complexity of objects increases over time, similar to the increase...

God

The problem is not that truth can’t be found. The problem is that there’s too much of it on the market. Life is short, and there are too many stalls selling this product… You won’t even have time to v...

The game

People are used to thinking of themselves as separate individuals, disconnected from the surrounding universe. This illusion prevents them from recognizing their true nature: we are an inseparable par...

Principles of life

Do what you feel, feel until the end The principles of life are burnt in your mind Do what you want, do it until you find Do what you want. Anything goes.

Freediving in Moscow

At Deep Week 2025 I became a freediver. Since that happened, we looked for places to freedive in Moscow. First we tried https://molchanova.school in an open-air pool. Warm water in sub-zero air temper...

Unified consciousness

Anya and I experienced unified consciousness. And at some point I lost her, and then I saw her, and the world just lit up around me. Yin and Yang. We are two snails with one eye that sees. I am kissin...

Deep week Thailand 2024

This year seven of us took part in a freediving week. Two of my friends decided to try what freediving is about, and they weren’t disappointed. I myself, to be honest, had considered freediving just a...

Breathing

Less than a week until Deep Week Thailand — meeting up in Phuket. There’ll be a Junior Group for Eva. The past few weeks I’ve been training breath holds on dry land. You can actually learn to breathe....

Levels of consciousness

The idea of raising consciousness permeates all religions and philosophies. A kind of maturation of the personality, spiritual growth. It’s the movement from “Everything — for me” to “Everything — for...

Where does everything come from

From yourself. And I’ll prove it very simply. What is all of this? What you see, hear, feel, and think in this very moment, and nothing more. Only you could have created this, and no one else, for it ...

Around the sun

Waiting to board in Casablanca, finishing this post. It’s been a year since I realized that everything is a game, and I’m watching it, like the “dweller of the field” from the Bhagavad Gita. I managed...

Dark Matter and reality code

Just yesterday I discovered the Dark Matter series on Apple TV. A guy invented a way to travel to parallel universes using psychedelics. And now, the folks at codeofreality.com found a way to see the ...

Your mind is it

Understand, friend, that the supreme being doesn’t sit in the imperial box. It looks at the world straight from your mind. Your mind — that’s what it is.

One rule

Live as you live. One rule — don’t cause others suffering and don’t participate in evil. Don’t argue with God and don’t interfere with his leisure. Want to know what interests God — do what you feel l...

The search for happiness

The search for happiness is suffering. There is no happiness outside, beyond you. Live in harmony with what actually is, not with what you imagine. We project ourselves into a world of our imagination...

Getting into enlightenment — how?

Remembering Morpheus — You know something and can’t explain it, but you feel something’s wrong with the world. The truth is one. If the direction is right — the path you take doesn’t matter. The Buddh...

The spacesuit

Meanwhile, flew to Phuket. Vipassana without leaving the office. Continuing to dig into the nature of consciousness. Think about how much what’s happening depends on what just happened. Obviously ever...

The greatest happiness

I was experiencing the simplest and greatest happiness in the world — I was alive. Ray Bradbury

Iyengar yoga

Crushed it at the Iyengar Yoga seminar with Natalia Luzhanskaya in Turkey. Iyengar is one of the greatest yoga masters in the world, who taught it for over 70 years, systematizing the knowledge for th...

True desires

To shape reality, you need to think more about what you want, and less about what is. When you do what you truly want, the universe starts helping in return. Sounds simple, though figuring out what yo...

Dharma

The Buddha, and the Hindus before him, described various psychedelic states and techniques for managing consciousness with remarkable precision. Good to know the path is right — they need constant tra...

Love life

The first truth of Buddhism: Suffering exists. When speaking of suffering, the Buddha didn’t mean some abstract “life is pain,” but a specific list of mental afflictions. Afflictions are contagious — ...

The nature of love

The world we create day after day out of inertia is full of evil. But we can’t break the vicious circle because we don’t know how to create anything else. Love has a completely different nature, and t...

Albania was magic

Albania flew by magically. I learned long ago to expect nothing and keep my heart open, ready to accept anything that might come. It can hold anything — don’t limit yourself. We partied all week, from...

Anjunadeep 15

Just dropped for the festival. Just a year ago you didn’t need a visa for Albania, now it’s a full-on circus. Reminds me of the game Papers, Please. The document package is like applying for citizensh...

Base reality

Well said. Base reality is not all there is. When people talk about the “unreality” of the world (implying we live in a simulation, the Matrix, or Bostrom’s trilemma), it’s more accurate to speak of “...

Negativity

When you notice that nothing bad is happening and negativity disappears from your life, it’s not just the present that improves. The past gets rewritten. All sorts of troubles and grudges vanish from ...

Vedanta and happiness

Everyone wants to be happy — it’s the main goal of life that needs no explanation. Happiness for happiness’ sake. Everything we do is just a way to achieve it. Yet from childhood we’re fed the deferre...

My path to awakening

My conscious path began the moment I realized I didn’t really know much about myself. Besides the biographical data, of course. I needed some kind of foothold, and I decided to simply stop lying, espe...

Animal consciousness

Scientists propose a new paradigm for animal consciousness, claiming that even insects may be sentient. Animals live according to their dharma, don’t fear death, aren’t burdened by material worries an...

Expert center for book compliance

Russia has created an expert center for checking books for compliance with laws. Before they pull it from the shelves, I recommend the Bhagavad Gita, the “Song of God,” translated by “foreign agent” B...

Lessons from the Bhagavad Gita

At first I couldn’t understand — why are they so calmly discussing war against an army where many were close to Arjuna? The Gita is a myth, a description of an inner journey and the obstacles every hu...

Sati App interview

Gave an interview to the creators of https://sati.app. They have really good meditations, each preceded by a short lecture on the path. We talked about meditation, psychedelics, the road to enlightenm...

Anjunadeep Albania

Next rave is in June in Albania. Anjunadeep here we go. Had to wait half a year for tickets, and it looks like they’re underbooking. Albania is Russian-friendly, so there shouldn’t be any problems. Se...

Real love is when you love

Love is not when someone loves you. You can’t feel another person’s love directly, because we don’t have a sense organ capable of that kind of perception. You’ll simply receive a bunch of gifts from t...

Happiness requires restraint

Either you’re happy with very little, not burdening yourself excessively, because happiness is inside you, or you’ll get nowhere. This is not a justification of poverty. It’s a justification of restra...

What is emptiness

Emptiness is the solid knowledge that darkness separate from the consciousness perceiving it does not exist and never has. I kept thinking — when the ego dissolves and you find yourself in a little un...

Morning routine

Yoga 15 min https://youtu.be/zB6ATkPbP9U Breathwork 15 min https://youtu.be/tybOi4hjZFQ Meditation 30 min https://youtu.be/FIpcyy056zw Love

What game theory teaches

“Hate is baggage. Life’s too short to be pissed off all the time. It’s just not worth it.” — American History X

A mushroom grew on a frog

Meditation is mental culture

The word ‘meditation’ is a very poor substitute for the original term ‘bhavana,’ which means ‘culture’ or ‘development’ — that is, mental culture or mental development. Buddhist bhavana, properly spea...

Think, wait, fast

You see, Kamala: when you throw a stone into the water, it hurries to the bottom by the shortest path. That’s how it is when Siddhartha has a goal, when he makes a decision. Siddhartha does nothing — ...

The method works

Following the Recluse’s advice, I’m summarizing the experience as I leave yet another world. The gathering went brilliantly. Meditation, yoga, and freediving are parts of a whole, supporting and devel...

Words shape your brain

Choose the words you use. The language we speak shapes the brain. The parts of the brain that control language also participate in regulating heartbeat, hormones, the immune system, and breathing. Thi...

Think forward

You can’t focus on what you want and what you don’t want at the same time. The first step to controlling your thoughts is to free your mind from fear and its derivatives: doubt, disbelief, greed, envy...

The danger of lying

Tell the truth — or, at least, don’t lie. One of the things I’ve been trying to think through is why you should tell the truth. Lies are very powerful. You can manipulate the world with your tongue. Y...

The power of transformation

Transformation does something amazing: when you free yourself from the chains of these emotions that anchor you to the past, and you move forward, riding the wave from the continent of energy, and you...

What is awakening?

Easiest way to describe it is a sudden recovery from an illness you didn’t even know you had. Or like waking up from a sleep so long you’d forgotten who you really are. And the illness and the sleep —...

Retreat starts next week

Retreat starts next week. Monday is the warm-up. We’ll talk about the structure of reality, what’s happening, why it matters. First few days, at your own pace, we get familiar with the capabilities of...

Walmart vs Ozempic

Walmart complains people are buying less food. They let it slip. Turns out they’d been fattening up a breed of humans who emptied shelves and medicated their diabetes and acquired conditions with pill...

Psy-hack. Easy entry into meditation

For those who wanted to try meditating but didn’t know where to start. Start with the Wim Hof breathing technique. It’s like jumping off a diving platform — you land straight in the world of sensation...

Pelevin's Empire V

Picked up Pelevin’s ‘Empire V’ and loved it. Best thing I’ve read lately — about money and enlightenment. How the illusion of reality works, using money as an example. I tried the movie, didn’t click,...

Satan was Morpheus

Satan gave Adam and Eve the choice of knowledge. Just like Morpheus in The Matrix. For the Matrix, Morpheus is the enemy — he represents the risk of awakening. That’s exactly what Satan did. God wante...

Overcoming Maya

Still thinking over the experience of overcoming Maya — the ignorance of the true nature of things. Non-duality in Buddhism is the realization that the separation of self and world (duality) is an ill...

You project your reality

The world is continuously created by your beliefs, like a projector’s image. You yourself are the creator of everything around you — problems, situations, and events. They are reproduced from within y...

Naval Ravikant

Inspired by Naval Ravikant. navalmanack.com Health: — Lift — Fast — Meditate — Stretch — Run Wealth: — Create — Sell — Write — Invest — Own Wisdom: — Read — Reflect — Love — Seek truth — Ignore societ...

The structure of reality

How reality works and why only what you believe in actually happens. Each of us has our own soap bubble of reality blown for us. Our own hallucination. We all imagine something similar, but differentl...

Consciousness as universal property

What if consciousness is a property of the universe, like a magnetic field? Science discovers the philosophy of Advaita Vedanta. — A-dvaita → not-two → non-duality, indivisibility. — Vedas → to know →...

There are two versions of the future:

— a future predetermined by our negative past; — a future predetermined by our goals, desires, fantasies, and aspirations. Here’s the thing: to end up in the first future, you don’t have to do anythin...

Bitcoin read

Good Bitcoin read — concise, to the point, and with pictures. Think Long-Term. Live Smarter. Live Happier. Live Free.

Multiverse expedition

Went on a multiverse expedition. The sky answered with a double rainbow. It was magical — every time it gets more epic. The Universe gave a sign that everything is on track. Started at dawn — parks, m...

The party

The recent party was supposed to advertise this: The Russian government authorized production of an analogue of the weight-loss drug Ozempic without the patent holder’s consent. You might have missed ...

The yellow arrow

Question: The ending is puzzling. If the train encompasses our entire life, then what lies beyond it? Who are the residents of the city the hero sees out the window before his jump? Pelevin: Well, tha...

Setting intentions

Before psychedelic therapy, for maximum impact, you need to prepare not only the environment — the Setting — but also the state within — the Set. This means the mindset, the state of consciousness. By...

Phuket freedive retreat plan

I want to organize a brain-bending freedive-psychedelic gathering in Phuket in early February for friends. A stress-free space where time doesn’t dictate the rhythm. New skills, bonding, and transform...

Starry night cosmic disco

Starry night. We’re at a cosmic disco. Lying on the grass, in the fields outside Pattaya. The starry sky above us. I’ve got earplugs and I’m dancing right up against the speaker — when you can no long...

Psy sessions at Wonderfruit

Held nighttime psy-sessions at the Wonderfruit.co festival in Pattaya. Day one — recon. How to get there, how to leave, where everything is. Got acquainted. And the next evening, we took off. The prot...

How requests to the universe work

Requests to the Universe: how they actually work — Kinzhal https://kinzhal.media/universe-works/

Freediving is meditation

Trying freediving. Turns out it’s not swimming — it’s training your ability to stay calm. Couldn’t relax, started panicking — you run out of air and start sinking. Once I got that, held my breath for ...

Happiness isn't too good for the economy

The world is intentionally depressive. Happiness isn’t too good for the economy. If we’re happy with what we have, why would we need more? How do you sell anti-aging cream? Make them worry about getti...

The normality disorder

Disorder “Normality”: constantly lies, can’t express thoughts clearly, judgmental, narrow-minded, no interests, lack of sensitivity.

Nothing to do but have fun

When you realize there’s actually nothing to do, all that’s left is to have fun. The simplest thing, of course, is to eat. Or eat somewhere fancier. Or buy something. But since nothing is needed, ther...

Infinity Pool (2023)

A couple on vacation, together with new acquaintances, hit and kill a local. The punishment for murder is execution. But for money, you can have a clone made of yourself to be executed instead. And th...

Crawling out of a crisis

Had some kind of existential crisis, only had enough energy for work. Started thinking that’s it, I can’t anymore. Lay there, reflected, and figured out what was going on. Intentional living — that’s ...

Preached to everyone who'd listen:

— My mental health has felt so grounded since yesterday. Had an amazing reunion with my wife. Thank you my friend — Thanks again for the chat today on the boat! I’m really looking forward to reading y...

Leaving Mexico

Time to sum up the experience. I flew in with an open heart, expecting nothing, so reality exceeded everything. After trial runs outside the gated community, we went to explore Mexico for real. Touris...

Action over reaction

Tsendrovsky compiled everything you need in his books. For those who haven’t checked them out yet, the universe is sending a discount on paper editions. Action instead of reaction — that’s the essence...

Antifragility before Taleb:

“No one is more dangerously insane than one who is sane all the time. He is like a steel bridge without flexibility, and the order of his life is rigid and brittle.” — Alan Watts “No one is more dange...

Neuroprogramming runs deep

A perfect illustration of neuroprogramming. A child absorbs and repeats the beliefs and behavioral patterns passed down by adults over generations. Who in turn repeat what they heard from their own pa...

The observer effect

If you don’t study magic, then everything in the world is physics. More on the observer effect.

Reading David Deutsch's The Fabric of Reality

Moving to ThinkForward

Long story short. Can’t keep up with enlightening, working, and building a site. Days are too short. The concept has shaped up better, what life back, none of that exists. Moving to thinkforward.acade...

Needles under the skin

And then suddenly “salvation” may arrive. A person hears a clear and sharp answer, something like: it’s all the capitalists’ fault. Or: it’s all the communists’ fault, it’s all the Jews’ fault, it’s a...

Why Buddhism is true

Why Buddhism Is True is available in Russian. Disguised by the translation of the title so that as few people as possible would read it, to prevent the collapse of the familiar world order.

The yellow arrow

Rediscovering Buddhism

Having lived half my adult life in a Buddhist country, I never paid attention to that fact. Buddha was something like a souvenir brand. Having untangled myself from what only existed in my head, havin...

Buddhism as mind training

Buddhism is a mind training system. I’m writing this because it worked. But the last mile you have to walk yourself: “What was the final revelation for the most penetrating Western philosophers from H...

Stress is a scam

Stress is a scam. A “problem” is something we refuse to solve so we can keep experiencing the familiar state of our nervous system. A self-fulfilling prophecy. If something can’t be changed — that’s r...

Until the mid-17th century, there was no word for consciousness

It’s hard to wrap your head around, but the concept of “consciousness” first appeared in René Descartes’ “Meditations on First Philosophy,” published in 1641. There, Descartes used the Latin word cons...

What is an insight

Insight — a moment of spontaneous illumination, when it suddenly hits you and everything becomes absolutely clear and easy. The puzzle clicks into place. You get it. Can you trust your own insights? R...

The body stores everything

The body is not a bag of bones. Our entire life is stored in it. Good thing I went to CrossFit today. Barely worked out in Moscow. You feel alive. A few simple fitness tests to gauge where you’re at: ...

Thoughts reshape the brain

Thoughts organically change the brain. Neurons decrease with age — the garden bed shrinks — but we weave it differently. Neurons constantly grow new synapses. And if you think about something specific...

The t-shirt

Hadn’t even finished thinking ‘gotta print a t-shirt’ — and it manifested.

Let go of the reins

When I realized there’s essentially nothing to do here except figure out how to entertain yourself, reality changed. Days pass in astonishing ways. The secret of life — let go of the reins and stop ge...

Born into slavery

We are born into slavery. The education system is built so you never escape poverty. Be grateful for at least two days off per week — there were different calendar options. But you never have time to ...

What psychedelic means

Psychedelic — means manifesting the psyche, the mind, the soul. They work differently, but the result is the same. You see yourself. The world you actually live in. The world inside your own head. The...

Tsendrovsky said it best

If I hadn’t already started posting, I could’ve just not started. Everything that needs to be said has been written by Tsendrovsky in his book. The best thing out there on the subject of living inside...

The universe gives

I was going to save this for the next gathering, but I can’t hold it in anymore. I never thought I’d even consider that the Universe gives. My whole life it seemed like a strange concept for crazy peo...

Invent or be invented

You have to keep inventing what else can be done. Otherwise you’ll be doing what others invented.

— What is the purpose of your trip?

— For fun. — What? There is only the path.

Destroy all traces

— Before leaving any world, you must summarize the experience of your stay in it, and then destroy all your traces. It’s a tradition. — And who came up with it? — What difference does it make. Well, m...

The suffering myth

Suffering builds character. This mantra passes from generation to generation. It is, in essence, a curse. They’re telling you — you are an armor-piercing bullet, get ready. Tune your radar to the path...

No way back

Once you step onto the path of enlightenment — there’s no way back. It’s remarkable that the fence around the government services center in the former kindergarten got torn down. It instantly went fro...

The point of here and now

What’s the point of here and now? Anyone who’s run the ‘here and now’ experiment — in plain terms, left the house early — might have noticed the bubble of emptiness forming around them. Your own time ...

Feel it, don't explain it

Many abstract philosophical topics have entered everyday speech without much meaning attached. For example — live in the here and now? What’s that even about? I didn’t get it for a long time. And even...

The body is a spacesuit

If the body is a spacesuit — a bulldozer gnawing into the bedrock of reality, grinding food into energy — then the brain, the mind, is a psychological computer. It analyzes the video feed plus all the...

Noise declared sacred

Noise is declared a sacred and immutable part of the human being. From childhood we are taught to consider our neuroses and cognitive errors as health, and to build a protective fence around them. Ole...

Invent your own country

There was no need to run anywhere, no need to search for the promised land. It was right here, beside us. You just had to invent it. I could already see it in the dark. Over there, where the bathroom ...

Templated reactions

Perfectly said. Almost all our reactions are templated, repeating what’s already been: “Every day I see dead people. I walk through rooms of the dead, streets of the dead, cities of the dead — people ...

Happiness is a path, not a destination. Everyone can be happier right now

Writing a book on living

I’m writing a book about how to live. There’s nobody left to pull out of the matrix — it’s time to bring the knowledge to the world. Knowledge is alive as long as there are people who help it along. I...

Talk about yourself

You have to talk about yourself. When you do, you discover what’s happening to you.

Jim Carrey's commencement speech

Jim Carrey knows what he’s talking about. I couldn’t stop thinking about his words — about the choices we make out of fear. By the end of the day, new insights clicked into place. .embed-container { p...

Finalized the thought

A student at the Kapitsa Physics Lyceum stopped communicating with the world for two months. Late to class, wrong classrooms, zero reaction to anyone. The school panicked, called in psychologists. The...