1.12. Pleached Green Alley in the Botanical Garden-Part 1
Firstly, I became understanding of myself. This was an incredible change. How did I do this? I learnt to project imagery of the future me. Why did I do it? I intuitively felt that I needed to navigate
1. The journey home
I was driving on August 22, 2021. The afternoon sun was pouring golden rays onto my left arm, penetrating my thoughts. As the saturated, vivid world passed before my eyes, radiant energy flowed into my dormant thought patterns, and I was highly focused. Three hours passed, and I had concisely summarized the events unfolding over the past two weeks.
For what? To ask who he was.
I approached the Erzgebirge, the German name for the Ore Mountains as if it were calling me home. I needed a long meditation on my favourite hill. Only there would I find the answer to my question. The possibility was drumming in my mind, urging me to seek clarity in that sacred place. Clarity would come with a simple, to-the-point question. That was why I was fiercely concentrating.
”Sachi, I will try to make this chapter into bullet points. There was too much going on. I will stick to facts, then meditate and ask. On that hill, to my tower, Antahkarana.” I said it in my car.
Yesterday, I received his long-awaited email, in which he told me about the “Mind Computer” and how it would answer everything. I was itching to try his new instructions and had some questions which I was sure only my “Mind Computer” could answer. As always, his email came at the perfect time.
The navigation showed that it would take 55 minutes to reach my “Glastonbury Tor in Czechia.” Meanwhile, let me give you a short explanation of how it all happened.
2. The Solo Trip
Two weeks ago, I made the snap decision to go on an adventure to a new city with only my dog, Inca. Yes, it was a solo travel. My last solo trip was in 2004, when I met Satchidanand, swam in the Mediterranean, and meditated for two weeks. Then, I went to Faro, Portugal, and participated in an 8-day fasting program. It was a mental and physical detox-cleansing adventure. Thinking back, it was probably the starting point of everything happening around me now. Or, highly likely, it might have started before that. Until now, I had been at the crossroads of destiny countless times, and every time, I fought back. Making excessive use of my few special skills and intuition, I lived and struggled honestly, like a little girl reaching for the stars. I decided to move forward.
I looked at Google Maps and chose Munich as my destination. Three factors gave me a supportive push: First, it was within a five-hour drive—my limit for driving alone. Second, it had to be a city I'd never visited—otherwise, it would not be an adventure. Third, it had a large English Garden. Why an English Garden? Strangely enough, I recently had a lucid dream.
3. The Second Lucid Dream in White
It was the same as the first lucid dream in white, which I wrote about in the Kiosk; somebody woke me up. I was in a world of dazzling, ethereal whiteness in my lucid dream. As I stood there, disoriented, I became aware of another presence with me, though I could not distinguish their distinct features in the bright, all-encompassing light.
Compelled to move forward, I began walking alongside this mysterious figure, my senses heightened. Beneath my feet, the ground transitioned from the stark white expanse to the harder of flat stones, and the scenery surrounding me transitioned to verdant hues of green. The lush greenery came into focus, the details of leaves and blades of grass emerging from the luminous fog.
How beautiful! I was moved in the lucid dream.
As I strolled through this serene, pastoral landscape, I realized the significance of my surroundings. The winding paths, the ornamental plantings, the overall sense of natural harmony – I realised this was an English garden. The transition from the blinding whiteness to this tranquil, verdant realm felt almost like a metaphorical awakening, a shift from the abstract to the tangible.
The tangibility brought me to the details of the garden, where art and nature came together harmoniously. It was like the embodiment of the poem, an excerpt from Edmund Spenser's "The Faerie Queene."
I saw an arbour or bower constructed by art using the lush, flowering ivy plant. The sweet-smelling eglantine (sweetbrier) plant also intertwines through the arbour, its thorny branches entangled with red roses. The roses emit delicate, pleasant fragrances around the arbour.
The entire space within the arbour is decorated with various flowers, and the gentle west wind blows through them, releasing their abundant scents and displaying their vibrant colours.
And then, just as I were fully immersed in this dreamscape, the vision began to fade. The green tones receded, and the whiteness again enveloped me, signalling my return to wakefulness. But the impression of that walk through the English garden lingered, a vivid memory seared into my mind, fueling my desire to make now that dream a reality.
4. Of Gardens
Munich has a large park called “English Garden”, covering an area of over 3.7 square kilometres, more extensive than Hyde Park in London and Central Park in New York. The garden was the creation of Sir Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford, a remarkable man who, in 1789, had been commissioned by the Elector of Bavaria to transform this land into a sprawling oasis of natural beauty. Thompson's vision was inspired by the style of English landscape gardens, which emphasized a more organic, informal layout in contrast to the rigid formality of French gardens.
“Bingo! How lucky am I? Munich would offer exactly what I need.”
I have visited various gardens throughout my life. Particularly memorable are the dry landscape Zen gardens of Ginkakuji Temple in Kyoto, Japan; Kenrokuen Garden in Kanazawa, Japan; Canglang Pavilion in Suzhou, China; Prior Park Landscape Garden in Bath, England; the gardens of the Alhambra Palace in Granada, Spain, and the gardens of the Palace of Versailles in France. Each expresses its own unique harmony. It would be presumptuous of me to rank them.
What is the first garden for human beings?
Francis Lord Bacon wrote below in his essay:
GOD almighty first planted a garden: and indeed it is the purest of
human pleasures. It is the greatest refreshment of the spirits of man.
What was the first garden for me, then? I asked myself.
I jogged my memory. I passed through the flat where I grew up on the timeline of my memory. There was no garden. I found myself struggling with severe seasonal allergies that kept me from engaging with nature. Then, where was my first garden? I carefully jogged the timeline again. I found myself reading a book at night. A single book unlocked a world of imaginative wonder for me. In this book, the author provided several vivid descriptions of gardens, particularly highlighting their design and layout in various regions, including the oasis cities of Central Asia and China. My imagination grew freely in these exotic gardens within me.
I realized that gardens have held a profound and enduring significance for me. This book, The Travels of Marco Polo, was my garden in the oasis scattered across the Silk Road deserts. The vivid descriptions of these lush, verdant respites amidst the harsh, arid landscape captivated my young mind. In those pages, I found a place where my imagination could roam freely, unencumbered. And thanks to this second white lucid dream, I remembered something forgotten deep within my mind: I yearned to be like the legendary explorer, venturing to discover these hidden sanctuaries.
5. First Change in my internal world
Since I built my spiritual tower, “Antahkarana”, on my sacred hill, I have visited the hill with my dog, Inca, almost every day and followed the same procedure I did that day. I have started using this spiritual imaginary tower without a manual and have experienced changes—first within myself and later in my external world. I want to introduce my attempt, but I believe there are thousands of ways to use this tower as the inner instrument that facilitates the process of self-realisation and spiritual growth. In Indian philosophy and yoga, "Antahkarana" refers to the internal organ, the location or inner origin of thought and feeling,
Firstly, I became understanding of myself. This was an incredible change. How did I do this? I learnt to project imagery of the future me. Why did I do it? I intuitively felt that I needed to navigate oppositions, balance myself, and be more neutral because I was so stuck in the past. I should have made the marriage work, nurtured the family, and fulfilled the dutiful, loving wife and mother role—even if it went against my natural inclinations. I struggled with this opposition. After three days of struggling, intuition came first with transparency, and I imbued it with trust. Then, it started forming and told me.
"Envision a future version of myself: reliable, warm-hearted, and trusting."
At first, I roused imagery of the future me through my third eye, which connects to the brain as pseudo-matter, a vessel. But something unusual happened—the future myself was projected in my heart, perhaps my chart chakra. It felt strange yet natural. I nurtured this vessel, gradually making it larger until it became the same size as me.
At that time, I sensed intuition again. So, I imbued it with trust, and it started forming. It was too abstract to understand. What should I do? I touched and kneaded it in my hands for a while, like when I was making bread. It was so soothing that it made me focused. And I started understanding the message through my hands.
“Everything has a correspondence. Our physical body is a small universe that corresponds to the larger universe. Do you understand it?"
"Yes, it is like what I am doing now. Your message I am kneading is our physical body, and I am the large universe. My palms are the corresponding tools." I replied.
"A mirror was the first tool humans acquired to peer into other universes. The image in the mirror is not real, but it can be seen as an incomplete representation of the self—an echo of a deeper truth which is thought of as a correspondence of your current true self." The message continued.
A mirror? Immediately, I think of the Yata mirror. It appears before me. I looked for the person behind the mirror; neither the fingers at the bottom nor the person behind the mirror were there, but there was me in the mirror. While she is not "real," she is a correspondence of all my true self. What does it mean by this?
I calmly observed the correspondence of my true self while kneading the message in my hands. There were so many types of myself: public self, private self, hidden self. All were influenced by how they believed others perceived me. Which one is my identity? It seemed clear that I had to do something. I was so calm that I let my Antahkarana do it.
It felt less like searching for answers and more like allowing clarity to arise. The clarity told me that my future self neutralised inner conflicts that my past self held. I brought the "looking-glass self" from Yata’s mirror and put her before me. She was filled with regret, loneliness, and anger. She seemed my inner rebel who wanted to break free from these rigid expectations. I asked her to sit by the imagined future self I projected. This projection of my future self was reliable, kind, and nonjudgmental. Then, her positivity started to melt, and the negativity of the "looking-glass self" started to melt, as if water was flowing from high to low. Finally, her positivity melted me.
”I am you, and you are me, " she whispered softly, filling me with her security and trust. This offered me immense release, almost like purification.
In summary, I became aware of my present self by synchronising my past self with my future self, like adding positive and negative to get zero. By repeating this process, I gradually purified my psychological functions, including my emotions.
That was when a significant transformation began. I naturally stopped endlessly questioning myself and instead found a natural sense of understanding. I realized I had kept looking everywhere but within for our solutions and peace. I had assumed that everything I was looking for was outside of myself.
6. Why Avalon?
The second change was more visual and symbolic. I could see my transformation as a change underwater at the bottom of my Antahkarana.
Do you remember the swamp where I dove to use the Yata no Kagami (the Mirror of Yata)? There, I found my inner child. In the magical realm of the wisteria-filled waterfront, I shared my feelings with her and received a long message. I intuitively thought that the power of Avalon helped me interpret it because I am not an evangelist, guru, rabbi, priest, or spirit guide channeler. While I wrote that in my previous chapter, I wondered why I thought that was Avalon's help.
The myth of Avalon is a rich and complex part of the Arthurian legends, representing a mysterious, otherworldly realm with profound spiritual and symbolic significance. The Arthurian legends, while rooted in Celtic and British folklore, have long since transcended their geographic and cultural origins to become archetypes of the human experience that resonate across cultures and time periods. The themes of heroism, the quest for meaning, the struggle between light and dark, and the sacred feminine vs. masculine dynamics inherent in these tales seem universal. Satchi probably knows much better than I do. Do you, Satchi?
I could have thought of two reasons. One, this is the function of the Antahkarana. It is the culmination of all that is almost invisible and bridging the Seen and Unseen: Just as Avalon exists as a threshold between the physical and the ethereal, my Antahkarana is the bridge between my conscious, rational mind and my higher, intuitive faculties of the soul. For what purpose? To heal me. That message answered the question I had asked of everyone else but myself before. And it gave me the peace I had been looking for everywhere but within myself. I was healed.
The second reason is the power Glastonbury obtains. It perhaps is connected to the idea of energy flow in the landscape, profoundly connecting places' spiritual and physical aspects. This is the reason I had a mystic experience when I was there; it remains within me and triggered me to find a similar hill, which might be on the same geomantic energy line,
In China, the concept of geomantic energy lines is closely related to Feng Shui, which translates to "風：wind" (feng) and "水：water" (shui). Specifically, it encompasses the idea of "Dragon Lines”, which are thought to represent the pathways of energy that flow through the earth, much like blood vessels. They embody the planet's life force and are considered auspicious locations for building homes or temples, perhaps Antahkarana. These lines are believed to be "Chi (Qi)"pathways. The flow of Chi along these geomantic lines is believed to affect the prosperity, health, and overall energy of a place. Where Chi flows smoothly, harmony and balance are said to be present, while blockages or disruptions are thought to lead to negative outcomes.
Geomantic energy lines are often associated with natural geographic features like mountains, rivers, and valleys. The layout of these natural formations can influence the flow of Chi and determine the strength of the energy in a space. In particular, mountains often symbolize stability and protection and are considered strong energy sources.
Maybe this geomantic energy of Glastonbury flows smoothly into my Antahkarana and collects in the water at the bottom of the tower. Well, maybe it's just my imagination, but it's working. I was healed, like a dying hero. In the story of Avalon, the Lady of the Lake represents a powerful female archetype that guides and protects the hero who is wounded during his journey. Maybe the water at the bottom of my Antahkarana is filled with feminine-centered energy. It is nurturing and mysterious, like floating in the womb of the earth. Why? Because that’s what I need now.
7. Under Water
The second change happened in this water filled with feminine-centered energy. A few days after I used Yata's mirror to find and heal my inner child, I realised the change. The transparency of this water has gradually increased. Now, there are colourful flowers, some in their first budding stage and others recently full-blown. Other plants live there. Some flowers look like soft corals, and some plants look like kelp and algae. It was no longer a swamp but the ocean, which became so gay and life-giving.
I raised my head and looked around, and the seven-coloured light of the sun shone in. Although it must be the light of my tower, it looked like the sun. I was happy to see the tower I built and named shining beautifully. “Ah, meditation is an art”, I thought, and I was floating on my back as if I was soaking in a hot spring. The energy of the light was powerful and took me to a sea of memories. I felt like I had travelled back in time when I was sitting in the middle of the gallery at my solo photo exhibition in Shanghai. I was enveloped in the me of that time. At that time, I was trying to use photography to structurally express the depth of emotion. As the significance of the seven-coloured light gradually penetrated me, an intuition that meditation might be an art that can express your own perspective and individuality tickled me.
At that moment, the light expressed to me that there is a correspondence between all things. It glowed in seven colours while blending into the ocean, and its frequency range produced beautiful flowers and coral. Ah, this is the garden of my heart. I am in it. I realized that I am very small. My body is just a vessel for a small universe; my mind is the ocean corresponding to that universe. My small self projected this ocean.
I saw myself as a second-grader in an elementary school classroom. During class, I was sitting by the window and reading my textbook. It seemed that I time-leaped. I was reading a book in the textbook as if I couldn't hear the teacher. Sunlight was shining in through the classroom window. It was rainbow-coloured light. I looked into the book, and an illustration of the ocean caught my eye. The title of the book was "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea."
Ah, I remembered it. In this book, the oceans of the world were expressed in words. Their beauty was reproduced in my tiny brain and projected onto the water at the bottom of my Antahkarana. Now, I could see flowers and plants—some resembling soft and hard corals with vibrant colours. There were seaweeds, kelp, and agar-like plants. Light streams through the water like a prism, breaking into the seven colours of the sun. What was once a stagnant pond has transformed into an ocean—vast and mysterious. I haven’t reached its depths yet, but I felt its immensity.
This ocean reminded me of the first time I went scuba diving when I was a freshman at university. How had I forgotten about it until now? The moment I jumped backwards from the boat, I was floating in another world, under the world of "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea.” In the ocean, I realized that I was only a part of something much bigger.
I intuitively felt that this was something very important. Because I remembered a similar experience twice during the meditation. Now, the ocean I was floating in was an art collaboration between the projections in the book that I imagined as an elementary school student and the projections in the real ocean that I experienced as a college student. In other words, I was floating in a structured mental world transcending time and the physical body. And it was incredibly deep, mysterious, unique and beautiful. Maybe this is the divine feminine with its deep emotional intelligence and spiritual nature.
This realization allowed me to see my body as a vessel, a microcosm, and my mind as a small ocean corresponding to the macrocosm. Furthermore, my mind was always overflowing from the vessel and connecting with something much larger, like the ocean. Maybe this is one of the many functions of the Antahkarana.
Interestingly, the Antahkarana is often described as a "rainbow bridge," a spiritual bridge or conduit that connects the human personality to the realms of higher wisdom, intuition and spiritual evolution of the self. Furthermore, it is said that all impressions, memories and experiences are stored there. Compared to everything I have, the fear, loneliness, and anxiety I've experienced recently are incredibly small, maybe as small as a piece of coral in this ocean. When I think about it like that, I feel I don't need to be scared and can coexist.
"Antakarana is amazing. Sachi"
9. Change in my external world
The third change happened in the external world, in my relationship with my 12-year-old daughter. She came to visit my flat for lunch. I made sushi, and we spent time together—something that hadn’t happened since I started living separately from my husband. I asked her to live with me, but she said “No”. She ignored my messages and acted distantly when I saw her after school, as though she was punishing me for leaving. Instead, my husband sent me pictures of him getting along with our daughter and asked me to send money.
I consulted my lawyer, who instructed me to send money until my husband found a job. I was annoyed at him for having everything I wanted without doing anything. To add insult to injury, he said, "Our daughter chose me because I'm right." I knew that he was childishly judgemental, but it tormented me like a curse. This was the reason why I was tied to the past and was tormented by regret, guilt, alienation, and loneliness. It was as if I was forever tied to the mistakes and missteps of my former self, unable to break free and embrace the future that beckoned.
By meditating on integrating my past and future many times on the hill, I was able to calmly analyze my inner self from multiple angles. And within me, I found a conflict that lay at the heart of my struggle. On the one hand, there burned a fierce desire for freedom, innovation and individuality - a restless spirit that yearned to break free of any constraints. Yet, alongside this drive, there was an equally powerful yearning for completeness, a sense of belonging and healing. This duality, this constant tug-of-war within my very being, was the source of my inner turmoil.
I found that even after integrating my past and future, some residue of this conflict remained. In my current state of separation, where fear had been eliminated, and I had found a sense of freedom, innovation, and individuality, the longing for completeness and belonging persisted.
At first, I was not sure what to do with this residue, this lingering dissonance within. In such cases, it is best to purify at the centre of the Earth using the 7-step process recommended by Sachidanand. From steps 1 to 7, I slowly transmuted the remnants of this inner conflict, watching them transform into a golden light. I infused this radiant energy into my healing, allowing it to permeate every structure, such as the vein and cell of my being, Antahkarana.
Visualization was a powerful tool, don't you think so, Satchi?
I repeated this meditation for a week. As I floated effortlessly in the vast, mysterious ocean of my consciousness, I experienced a profound realization: the fear, loneliness, and anxiety that had once weighed heavily on me seemed like a mere speck, completely insignificant in this infinite and mysterious ocean.
Thanks to my Antahkarana, after I experienced some changes in my internal world, there was a natural ease between my daughter and me. This natural ease seemed to flow in a new direction. In this flow, we had lunch on August 7, 2021.
Although I was over the moon, I followed the “Art of Silence” and avoided filling the space with unnecessary words. Yes, I had digested the purple message translated by the power of Avalon well. I was determined to go with this flow in a new direction. I appreciated my daughter's presence, felt her independence, and trusted in our bond. I felt the warmth of my future self alongside me, her reliability and compassion reassuring me.
We didn't speak much. Instead, I was practising deep emotional intelligence with the guidance of my future self, who had already acquired an innate energy sensitivity. This helped me focus on the subtleties of the world around my daughter. The subtle part of the world was beyond duality. As I began to connect with it, I no longer defined myself with the duality that had once tormented me. In this moment of transcendence, I knew where the harmony and integration I had been seeking all along was. But it was still far away.
I had a joyful time with my beautiful daughter. After saying goodbye to her, I set off on my journey to the English park. I packed my bag, brought my dog into the car, and set the navigation. It showed a five-hour drive, with an estimated arrival time of 18:00 —enough time for dinner and rest.
10. Heavy Rain and Telephone Call
As we stepped into our destination, the English Garden in Munich, I felt a sense of fatigue and disappointment wash over me. It was 20:14, and it was just after heavy rain had poured. It was wet everywhere—the winding paths, the serene artificial streams, the lush meadows. I watched my black greyhound running circles in the damp, verdant lawn, full of joy. My leather shoes, now soaked through, squelched with every step, and I still hadn't even found the hotel. I breathed fresh air and walked to an oasis in the web of strange, unpredictable events, going round and round, hopelessly lost for what felt like an eternity. Yes, I couldn’t find the hotel that must have been located near this green oasis.
The sky was clear when I set off. The journey was smooth, and an on-time arrival was in sight. Just before entering Munich city on the highway, a torrential rain opened up, and my navigation system froze when I drove in the middle of roadwork. I couldn't stop the car, so I just drove along, forcing me to rely on instinct and signposts alone. I went back and forth and was hopelessly lost for over an hour.
When my GPS finally rebooted, I drove almost to the other edge of Munich city. I carefully followed Google Maps and drove almost one hour again. Finally, I was relieved to see that I had only ten minutes left to reach my destination. I had trouble taking the right road by roadwork again. How could that be? It was as if the city itself was conspiring to lead me away from my destination, and I couldn't reach the sanctuary of the hotel, which was before my nose.
To dispel my disorientation, my sense of being caught in an unexpected trap, and the hint of even more mysterious events to come, I parked the car in the English Garden, which was a huge green area on the map and took my dog for a much-needed reprieve. Watching my carefree canine bound through the damp grass, I had envied its simple joy, wishing I could shed the weight of my troubles as easily. I had her dog food in the car but no food for myself - just hollow hunger and exhaustion in the shroud of the getting dark, rainy night. I realized there were no open shops nearby. It was Saturday night in Germany, and everything was closed.
Just then, my mobile phone rang, shattering the stillness like a bolt of lightning. It was an unknown number, and I answered the call with a sense of unease coiling in the pit of my stomach.
"Yuko, where are you?" The voices were soft and gentle, yet they rang with a foreign yet achingly familiar frequency.
To be continued to 1.12. Pleached Green Alley in the Botanical Garden-Part 1
Dearest Subscribers and Readers,
Thank you so much for taking the time to read Chapter 1.12, Part 1 of my novel. In this chapter, I shared a pivotal moment in my journey—a realisation that I could move forward after tapping into the power of my spiritual tower on the hill. Through meditation, combining my techniques with the Energy Enhancement 7-step process, I found immense peace during a time of deep regret, guilt, alienation, and loneliness. It was a transformative experience that gave me the strength to embark on a solo trip with my dog—a journey I’m excited to share with you in greater detail in Part 2.
Looking back on the earlier parts of my novel, I introduced some key pieces of my philosophy. I reflected on two books that profoundly impacted me during my childhood—one about the beauty of a garden and the other about the wonders of the underwater world. These books shaped my imagination and planted the seeds for my lifelong love of travel and my decision to live in many different countries. Both books hold deep personal meaning, connecting my feelings about exploring the unknown and finding harmony in nature.
Additionally, I introduced the Avalon myth, which plays a subtle yet significant role in the narrative. For those unfamiliar with it, Avalon is a legendary island steeped in magic and mystery—a theme that resonates with my spiritual journey. These elements will weave together the threads of my story, creating a foundation for the journey ahead.
Part two will delve into the trip itself, filled with moments of synchronicity and encounters with fascinating individuals who shaped my path. Reflecting on these experiences, I feel deeply grateful to have you all as part of my storytelling journey.
With the holiday season upon us, I’ve decided to stay home to focus on writing and spending precious time with my daughter and my beloved dog, who will be facing her last Christmas due to Osteosarcoma. This holiday season is bittersweet, but it’s also a reminder of the love and meaning we can find in the quiet moments.
I have a big plan for you. I plan to publish the rest of the first part of my novel to Substack this year. Next year, I’ll begin introducing the second part, which will continue my spiritual journey but be more active and aggressive, delving deeper into my origin. I’m excited to share what’s ahead, and I hope I can entertain you and that my work resonates with you.
I wish you all a wonderful Christmas filled with love, warmth, and inspiration. Thank you for sharing this journey with me; I look forward to sharing Part 2 with you as soon as it’s ready.
Take care and see you soon!
With love and gratitude,
Yuko
Yuku. My Beautiful and Amazing soul sister, My now trusted friend. You are a truly inspiring person who has enriched my life more than you'll ever know. Your stories fill me with so much inspiration and hope of what I once thought a dreary future. Thank you. Love always, N.