http://www.cmn.tv/transcripts/transcript-leonid-sharashkin-2/ February 06, 2011

Conscious Media Network » Leonid Sharashkin 2(Transcript)

Leonid Sharashkin: The Art of Soaring

May, 2010

Regina Meredith: There’s a type of deep wisdom that comes from the heart of theRussian spirit, one that knows pain and, in particular, knows laughter. LeonidSharashkin came into contact with a book titled, The Art of Soaring, at a time when heneeded some serious emotional adjustment. He found the work to be profound andchose to bring the book to the English-speaking world, just as he did with, Anastasia,which he also continues to this day.Leonid Sharashkin: I completed the translation of all nine volumes in the Ringing Cedarseries, and now I’m traveling throughout the world giving workshops about how toturn this dream into reality. And I see that, you know, no matter where I go, even toJapan, where the books are not yet available in the Japanese language, people can relateto the essence of the messages and people are crying and laughing, and I presentedeven a talk at [a] dance academy in Japan—professional dancers. Two months later Ireceived an email from them with them dancing on a potato patch, planting their Dicons[radishes] and vegetables.Regina Meredith: (laughing together)Leonid Sharashkin: So, it’s amazing how this simple messages of returning [to] andregaining this joy of living not through some kind of special practices, but through yourevery day life; they are really catching on. And so many people [are] writing to me howit is really changing them on some very deep level.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: And gives meaning to their every day existence.Regina Meredith: It brings a type of beauty and enchantment and, definitely,sovereignty back to the living experience. And, I’m very happy to hear that that’s stillreally going strong globally because it seems to me that this is just the beginning ofwhat our futures will be looking like. This has to be a serious model for the future. And,anyone who hasn’t read it, I highly encourage them to read all nine of the books, as I’veencouraged many, many friends and relatives to read the series, and everyone comesaway with the same feeling. I don’t know any other way to put it, but it’s a verymaterial, real kind of enchanted way of viewing our own lives.Leonid Sharashkin: True, and you know many people use the term remembrance.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: You read it and it’s not that you get these concepts from the books,rather all of a sudden you start feeling aahhh! This is how life should be. This is . . .Regina Meredith: Why didn’t I think of that? It’s so true! Exactly.Leonid Sharashkin: These books are—they help people draw some of the memories,some of the inspiration from the depth of their own being.Regina Meredith: Very, very true. Well, I’m glad that’s still out there and in motion, andyou’re in motion constantly because when you find something has value, you reallycommit yourself passionately to that. And, now, you’re working with yet anotherproject, a couple of projects, both of which I’m totally intrigued with. And this book,which is an interesting little book called, The Art of Soaring, and we’re going to get intowhat that is in just a moment because it really has to do with awakening the adultimagination, and this is an incredibly challenging thing for a lot of people to do!Shockingly so.

Leonid Sharashkin: Absolutely, but you know even when I was editing the Anastasiabooks I realized that we will not be able to make a lasting change if we do not changeour mindset. You know today we’re all really locked up in the negative perception ofreality. I do not have a TV at home, but when I travel I cannot escape the TV screenswith CNN news at the airports, and what I notice; they keep telling you about 10percent unemployment. But, sorry, 10 percent unemployment is 90 percentemployment!Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: So, all our civilization is about conditioning us to see the negativeside of things. So, I feel that unless we switch our minds from this negative perceptionto the positive one, we won’t be able, really, to change anything for the better.Regina Meredith: No, you’re right.Leonid Sharashkin: So, this is the very logical first step.Regina Meredith: You’re absolutely right, and these world views that we each have, weeach possess start in utero. Well, one might say they start prior to that, but certainlyfrom our conception to the point where we are cognizant on an energetic level, we’realready being programmed just like a computer to accept and reject certain—maybecertain practices, certain people, certain tastes, proclivities for all kinds of things—eachthing narrowing down our potential of experience and completely thwarting theimagination. So, let’s talk about what, The Art of Soaring is, so we can understand, soour viewers can understand why the imagination is so key to bringing ourselves backalive, again, in our potential.Leonid Sharashkin: You know after translating the Anastasia books, I thought I wasdone with editing and translating. I thought I would just retire to my family farm back inRussia, and devote the rest of my life to raising my family and planting my vegetables.But, I was faced with some very dramatic controversy and conflict in my professionallife, and I was looking for solutions how to overcome all this feeling of frustration andnegativity. And, I came across the book, The Art of Soaring, that is about changing ourreality through changing our inner world, but through laughter, through humor,playfully. You know the concept that we are really the creators of our reality is verypopular today; it’s almost too commonplace to talk about.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: But what I noticed, for many people it becomes so serious. Theycreate out of resolving problems with their own thought, another problem. They arejust–humph!—all tense, all serious about it.Regina Meredith: I don’t want to make the karma any worse. I have to get on top ofthis; I need the discipline; I have to meditate.Leonid Sharashkin: Yeah, absolutely. (laughing together)Regina Meredith: Too many “have to’s.”Leonid Sharashkin: And it turns out that in Russia there was an ancient tradition and anancient teaching about how to overcome problems, issues, conflicts, violence,negativity through laughter. Because laughter is this amazing energy that just releasesall the tension, and all of a sudden things that you thought were impossible become atyour arms reach.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: So, this is what, The Art of Soaring, is about. This book gives aseries of very simple techniques of how to turn what you think is an impossiblechallenge into a joke.Regina Meredith: Mmmhmm.Leonid Sharashkin: And when it becomes a joke you can no longer be serious about it,and instead of channeling all your inner mental energy into maintaining the image of itas a serious issue, all this energy is freed up and all of a sudden the problemdisappears, or at least you can use all this energy on resolving the problem, rather than

worrying about it.Regina Meredith: Yes, and I had a friend who was a mentor of mine, and like a secondmother to me, who was from Russia, pre-Bolshevik Revolution, hoof it out on foot withher mother, as a matter of fact. And, she kept telling me—this was before the wallcame down, and this would have been in the 70s and 80s —and she kept saying to me,“People in the West don’t understand the Russian heart and soul is filled with anacceptance and a living in magic and artistry beyond what the outside world reallycomprehends because it’s—it was at that time—very cloistered during the Communistyears.Leonid Sharashkin: I couldn’t agree more, and you know it’s amazing because duringthe 1,000 years of our recent history, Russia was constantly in war or slavery. Andpeople could not attach themselves to their material possessions like here in the West.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: Because those could be taken away from them at any moment.They couldn’t even attach themselves to their families because even wives anddaughters could be taken away to satisfy the inclinations of the landlord at anymoment.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: They couldn’t even attach themselves to their own lives becausetheir lives could be taken away from them at any moment. So, they had to attachthemselves to something else, to their inner essence. And they came up with thisamazing way of transcending all this suffering through laughter, through humor. Bynot even being serious about all these extremely traumatizing experiences that theRussian people had been put through century after century after century.Regina Meredith: Yes, and it does; it makes for a very interesting mind. I always noticewith my Russian friends, there is so much silliness, silliness in the conversation, fun,joyful ways of portraying things that it just doesn’t occur to most minds to even comeup with. And, so, I say that because when you first start reading—when I first startedreading, The Art of Soaring, you know I always thought well, I’m pretty creative. I’mkind of loose in that sense; I can flow with it. But, even so, with being posed with havingto create something to the point of extravagance and absurdity, our minds have beennarrowed by our world view so much it’s hard to access like what would I, if I could usemy mind as a power, how would I create this situation?Leonid Sharashkin: Mmmhmm.Regina Meredith: And, so, can you talk to that for a little bit about what we’re up againstbecause of our world view being so well entrenched, all of us everywhere in the word?Leonid Sharashkin: Yeah, you know we have this mental block. We think that well,silliness and playfulness and imagination, it’s only for children, and we adults, we arereally like serious people!Regina Meredith: Mmmhmm.Leonid Sharashkin: We have our mortgage bills to worry about; we have our jobs, oursocial status, etc. So, you don’t see an adult climbing up in the tree, or like, you know,doing something that children do and enjoy doing, not because we wouldn’t enjoy it—actually, I climbed a tree a week ago; it was so much fun!Regina Meredith: Yes!Leonid Sharashkin: But because we created a mental image of it as not beingappropriate, or so forth, we lock ourselves up and we lock up these abilities and with itwe lock up these abilities of seeing human laughter and lightness even in conflict andadversity. You know what I notice in Nature, Nature never looks back at darkness. Inthe morning after the darkness of the night, after all the dangers of the night and beingeaten up, the birds start singing, instead of sitting there serious and worrying about allthe dangers . . .Regina Meredith: The next night that’s going to come.

Leonid Sharashkin: Yeah, the next night.Regina Meredith: Let’s build a little fortress.Leonid Sharashkin: So, instead of that, they are looking forward to the coming of theSun. So, the Art of Soaring is about reclaiming this ancient wisdom of not looking backat darkness, but moving towards light. And laughter is this like wave that carries youinto this new, really new existence and new mindset where everything is possible.Regina Meredith: And the men that have written this book, [Vladimir] Dolokov and[Vadim] Gurangov—I don’t know if I said that correctly . . .Leonid Sharashkin: You said it.Regina Meredith: OK. These two men are what would be termed in Russia, as magicians.Now, here we might call them like very wise, artful healers. But talk about the differencebetween that and the way that, for example, I love the way that—I’ve forgotten whichone of the two men starts their day, when they were talking about going into the waterand doing a dance, starting to take in intuitively what’s going to be coming up that day.What defines a magician?Leonid Sharashkin: So, magician as defined in The Art of Soaring is not somebody, youknow, all mysterious, who is able to create all kind of tricks. Rather, it is somebody whois soaring, who is light in his inner being, who is playful in life. So, the authors, they arejust ordinary people. They are not gurus; they don’t call themselves teachers. They arejust ordinary people who figured out that there is this Way, and there is this ancientteaching, that the rediscovered, of transcending all controversy in our lives throughhumor. So, their day starts with, just with laughter, with humor. And, I was intrigued bythis book and it helped me a lot to redefine how I saw controversy and darkness andproblems in my life. But, actually, before committing to translating this book and makingif available in the English language, I really wanted also to see whether the approachreally worked. The book contains a theoretical section, the discussion of the principles.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: Why this lighthearted, playful approach really works, and thesecond part of the book is the real life success stories of the people who startedapplying these techniques. So, I wanted to see on my own experience whether it heldany truth to it, and it worked! It did work.Regina Meredith: And, you went through the entire process? How long . . .Leonid Sharashkin: Yeah. Can I give you an example?Regina Meredith: Yes, please do.Leonid Sharashkin: So, one of the techniques presented in the book is if you comeacross a conflict or some darkness, find something positive within the negative andexaggerate it to such an extreme that it will become laughable.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: And when you arrive at this image that made you laugh, instead ofcringing inside, stick to this image in your inside, and the problem will disappear. So, thisis how it worked for me: At that time I was in a rural place in Missouri, and my placewas not accessible by large truck, so whenever I had a delivery or another big piece, Ineeded to go to an intersection of two rural highways, where there was a parking spotwhere the big truck could park. And, I would unload it on my car and take it home. So,this parking space was surrounded by grass, by a lawn and it was private property,already, but it was demarcated. So, you couldn’t tell, really, where the public parkingspace ended and when the private property began. And the owner of the lawn livedacross the road and owned a convenience store. So, because I am a foreigner, or inthe legal sense, an alien, and I have an accent—and you know in rural Missouri, peopleare very conservative; they do not like anybody who is different. So, he was singling meout. So, whenever a truck was coming to deliver something for me, and sometimesgoing with the rear wheel of the truck over his grass, he would jump out of hisconvenience store and start yelling at us across the road, “You guys get off my land!”

And one time he even called 911, saying that, “There are some aliens who aretrespassing on his property,” so sheriffs came.Regina Meredith: (laughing)Leonid Sharashkin: So, now, because of this outburst of anger against me, I startedfeeling very tense every time I had a delivery of a few boxes, or something coming myway. And, it’s one thing to have a personal relationship issue; it’s another not to sleepwell when you’re expecting a delivery, right.Regina Meredith: Right. (laughing)Leonid Sharashkin: Or, even driving by this convenience store, I would always feelahgggh! So, I needed to do something about it, and I noticed that he enjoyed greatlyhis social status. He had a massive golden ring with a precious stone, and hisconvenience store was sort of a community center. All the “real men” from thecommunity would come in the evening to play Dominos there. And, he would staybehind the counter and put his hand, with this massive golden ring, on top of thecounter and watch the game. So, I started playing out in my imagination this absurdscenario: So, there is this game of Dominos happening one evening, and at a verydeciduous moment he comes forward and takes out of his pocket a “six/six” dominostone, and it starts expanding in his hand until it’s the size of this room, like this hugepanel. And then he puts it crashing down on the table; the table collapses and he winsthe game, and all the players around the table look up at him in amazement and awe.And from this point onwards this legend starts circulating and the rumor that he is thebest domino player in the world. So, people from all over America start coming to hisconvenience store to learn domino-playing from the man. And then people from all overthe world start coming and they build an international airport close to this ruralintersection in Missouri, and direct flights from New York, Tokyo, Moscow, from theentire world landing like . . .Regina Meredith: This is the lavish absurd part; I love it!Leonid Sharashkin: You know and he builds a big domino-playing academy of the world;a marble white building, a skyscraper, with a six/six domino on top of it. So, when Iarrived at this absurd image, I laughed; I could no longer be serious, and all of a suddenI felt all this tension falling away. You know what happened? Not a single time, eversince, has he even walked out of his convenience store when my trucks were coming?They continued coming regularly, but the problem just dissolved. For some time I waseven concerned whether he was alive, or not, because he just wasn’t there.Regina Meredith: He wasn’t threatening you. (Laughing together)Leonid Sharashkin: He disappeared, pretty much. But one time I saw him riding amower, mowing his lawn, so I know he is alright; he is well. But his attitude, his anger,all this conflict all of a sudden disappeared just because through laughter, throughhumor, through applying this technique from The Art of Soaring, I dissolved the conflictfrom within myself and saw it dissolving in my real life.Regina Meredith: I find it just beautiful—a beautiful way to do it! So much better thanthinking oh, well, we have to have a talk and, you know, that kind of way that usuallydoes not work because it hasn’t resolved anything in your field; it hasn’t resolvedanything in their field. But what’s so cool about it is that at the same time, you werefeeding him the thing that he most desires.Leonid Sharashkin: Absolutely.Regina Meredith: He wants to be honored; he wants to feel in control of his own life,and you created this quantum field of absolute honoring and abundance for him, andthis is that “gifting” thing, right?Leonid Sharashkin: True. (laughing together)Regina Meredith: Even to the point where it’s and absurd cartoon, but, nonetheless,that’s a lot of supportive incoming energy, even though you’re doing it to release yourown tension, right?

Leonid Sharashkin: Absolutely, and it works for anybody. I started sharing thesetechniques with people here in America, and of course, that many people already read,The Art of Soaring. So, now I receive a flow of funny stories like that, when somethingmagical happened just because people changed their attitude within. In the book it iscalled renaming.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: We lock ourselves up in a particular view of who we are. I’m anurse, or I’m a husband, or I’m this, or I’m that, or I am the one who can never earnenough money. Or, I am the one who has this relationship issue. Or, I am the one who .. .etc., etc. So, we create an image: I am this. I am that. So, the authors playfullysuggest that one of the techniques is, instead of saying I am the woman whosegirlfriend is cheating on me, you rename yourself I am a crocodile made out of sweetpeas, with two yellow dandelions instead of my eyes.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: Whatever your wildest imagination can show you. And, all of asudden, you notice that the problem disappears. Just yesterday, I shared thistechnique, here, with one of the attendees of my workshop, and she came the nextday and told me, “You know what, we had our house on the market for six months; nota single showing. Last night I came, after talking with you, and conveyed this techniqueto my husband and we laughed, and then went to this vision that eventually the housewill be purchased by aliens, extraterrestrials, and they will turn the subdivision lot, herein Los Angeles, into a portal for communicating with other galaxies.Regina Meredith: (laughing together)Leonid Sharashkin: Some of it was so absurd that they all laughed, and all this tensionof not being able to sell the house disappeared. The next morning they got a phone callfrom their real estate agent that somebody wanted to look at the property.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: Stories like that keep piling up, and they are always funny; they arealways about how all of a sudden these concepts of changing your reality throughchanging your inner world becomes accessible to everybody because laughter andhumor and imagination is something that everybody can relate to.Regina Meredith: It’s very true, and when you think about it, it’s often been said that ifyou want something or you want to draw something to yourself, you have to let it go,right? And, so, in a sense, although that’s very kind of dower, almost, in the way it’spresented, there is—again, it has the same common theme that’s you’re releasing thispainful kind of attachment, this painful kind of expectation that human beings tend tohold onto in order to achieve and outcome. I’ve just got to grind away at it! Meaning Ihave to work hard to get what I want. That’s another world view, though.Leonid Sharashkin: True, and this is the term that they use a lot in The Art of Soaring;world view. You know we think that the way we see the world is the world. But, no; it’slike we can be changing our operating system and changing our glasses and seeing theworld in all the different lights and colors, etc. So, it’s really a matter of our choice. Thisis the amazing part of the book. They make you laugh and realize that there is nounsolvable problems, that there are no “missions impossible,” that we are in charge ofour own destiny, and we are always making the choice of what we want to manifest.So, if you say oh, I cannot do it. The circumstances are so dire that I will be miserablefor the rest of my life, well, it’s your choice. You are choosing to see yourself this wayand this is the reality that you choose for yourself. These books, The Art of Soaring, thesequels that I am now working on, they are all about giving this understanding, that weall are the creators of our destiny and we all have the choices.Regina Meredith: But it’s done in a so much more powerful and beautiful way then whatwe traditionally experience, looking especially at those who have come through thescientific model of creating your own reality. You know it’s getting into holographic

realities, and really you’re talking about scientific parlance, which is very valuable. It’swonderful that these mysteries, this magic has essentially been unlocked and explainedon certain levels, how we can create this reality scientifically. But that doesn’t unblockour emotional charges that we walk around with.Leonid Sharashkin: It does not and, actually, you know today’s scientists, I think theyforgot that even Einstein was saying that imagination is more important thanknowledge.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: He felt that—and, we all know that the greatest scientificdiscoveries, they come not through intellectualizing, but in a flash, in a flash ofinspiration, in a flash of awareness or insight. So, imagination has such an importantrole to play even in science, itself.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: I have a doctoral degree; I have a PhD, but it doesn’t prevent mefrom seeing that, you know, science is a tool. It is just one of the tools to do certainthings in our reality, but it’s not the whole of reality. It’s not the whole range of thetools that we can use. Art and imagination, it’s all accessible to everybody. You knowthe irony of it is that we all have imagination within ourselves, but today we havepersuaded ourselves that only special people have imagination. The artists, they haveimagination, or those who make movies. So, these are the people who can create allthis imagery and we are just the consumers of their imaginations. No. Read The Art ofSoaring, try just one of the techniques and you will see that you can create a morefascinating movie within your own mind than anything you’ve ever seen on screen.Regina Meredith: It’s very true. I kept practicing it as I was reading. I thought gee, thisis really fun just to give yourself the permission, even, to become zany and insane inthe way you’re creating this world, this abundant world of whatever it is, whether it’speace, joy, happiness, health, whatnot.Leonid Sharashkin: True and you know these techniques can be used to resolve anykind of issues, even health issues.Regina Meredith: I was just going to ask you; tell us about that.Leonid Sharashkin: Yes. So, what is the health issue? Today we have an approach thatthe health issue, or depression— so, some kind of disease of the flesh or of our spirit,it’s our enemy; we need to fight against it. So, surgery, or pain killers orantidepressants, this is the solution. So, we are fighting with the consequence, not withthe real cause. But in the ancient world view, from which The Art of Soaring emerged,they were seeing a depression, the feeling that well, something is wrong, not as adisease, but as a signal that something is wrong with your lifestyle, with your worldoutlook, with your relationship to others, with your diet, with something. So, it was seenas signal, as an invitation to transcend this depression or bodily condition.Regina Meredith: Mmmhmm.Leonid Sharashkin: And to move forward to the health existence. So, instead of takingpain killers or antidepressants, The Art of Soaring shows some very efficient techniquesof actually thanking this disease, or thanking this feeling of depression for coming toyou and reminding you . . .Regina Meredith: Maybe you’ve gone out of balance.Leonid Sharashkin: Exactly.Regina Meredith: Yeah, uh-huh.Leonid Sharashkin: And, so, this very simple technique is to thank and to give yourdepression a gift. So, dear Mr. Depression: Thank you very much for spending so muchof your valuable time with me. So, I thank you profusely and I give you this gift, andimagine something that would make you laugh inside.Regina Meredith: (laughing delightedly)Leonid Sharashkin: And, people come up with all kinds of imagery. One lady, she was

struggling with depression and she wrote me, she wrote a small poem, a song. And thesong was; “I am a pregnant Barbie doll.” So, she gave her depression this gift—a CDproduced song, “I am a pregnant Barbie Doll, flying on a hairy balloon.” So, whatever itis, but this released her depression and she saw that where antidepressants could donothing, all of a sudden in a flash, in five minutes she resolved the whole issue on itsown within herself.Regina Meredith: It’s just beautiful! Now, one of the things he’s talking about in thebook is they are still in the theoretical stage setting it up as—they use the analogy of agamer, a video gamer. I thought that was quite interesting because he was talkingabout that really rarified strata of video gamers who are called divers. Remember thatpart?Leonid Sharashkin: Mmmhmm, absolutely—who can be totally immersed in the game,yet, remember somewhere in their subconscious that it is still a game.Regina Meredith: Yeah, and he’s talking about that it’s still a game, and this is really a lotof the lovely Eastern philosophies talk about of being the one who observes, beingaware, being the awareness at the same time you’re involved in the dance, so to speak.Leonid Sharashkin: Mmmhmm.Regina Meredith: And, they talk about this is an important element to have almost this—it’s not a dual type of awareness—but in this expanded awareness while you’re playingthe game and that helps in not taking thing so seriously, as well.Leonid Sharashkin: True and you know I feel that today, with our computer technology,we start seeing all kinds of like parallels between how computers work . . .Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: And how our minds operate.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: Look, computers have viruses and they can become sick and theycan have hard drive failure, all these things that we can suffer from, too. And thisparallel with the computer world starts helping to remind people that we can becomeour own programmers. Instead of buying an operating system from some softwaremanufacturing company . . .Regina Meredith: Preprogrammed.Leonid Sharashkin: Yeah! Preprogrammed and then having to download securitypatches and everything on a daily basis, we can become creators of our own operatingsystem; we can rise above the program, the social conditioning that we went through inour lives. We can become the creators of our reality. And, I have a friend who has aPh.D. in Biology, and he has been studying the cognitive abilities of mammals, and oneday he asked me, “Leo, do you know what’s the difference between a rat and a humanbeing?” I said, “You know I never really thought about it, but now that you ask, I’m notreally sure.” And he said, “I’ll tell you; here is the difference.” He was making a largercardboard maze and he would put a rat inside maze, and he would hide a piece ofcheese in one corner. And he would see how much time it would take the rat to findthis cheese. So, on the first day it takes 15 seconds; on the second day—and, he put itin the same corner—it takes 10 seconds; on the third day it takes just 5 secondsbecause the rat starts to remember this is the path to the cheese, and just tracks itthere. On the fourth day, he would place the piece of cheese in a different corner of themaze. So, the rat would rush to the corner where the cheese was the previous night.[He] cannot find the cheese. Oh, dumbfounded! But then, five seconds later, becomesactive and searching, looking for the cheese and eventually finds this piece of cheeseand eats it. So, he told me, “Here is the difference between a rat and a human being:When the rat doesn’t find the cheese where it used to be, where it was the previousnight, it becomes active, it does something about it, and humans seem to be the onlycreatures on this planet who, after not finding the piece of cheese where it used to be,they will be just sitting there and complaining and inventing entire religious theories

about how they transgressed in a previous lives, and this is why the cheese was takenaway from them.Regina Meredith: (laughing)Leonid Sharashkin: So, this was his insight that he got from observing the behavior ofmice and rats. They do not have this kind of programming; they are open-minded. Nocheese; not a big deal; I’ll find it elsewhere. And, we are overlaying the reality, whatreally is in the world in our experience, we’re adding so much of our own ideas to it,that it becomes really a jungle. We cannot find our way.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: So, The Art of Soaring is this amazing technique of rising of thejungle and saying ah-hah! There— this is where I was going; this is what reality is reallyall about.Regina Meredith: Yes and they even talk about that, what you were just saying oh, Ihave to rise above . . . They even talk about the subject of karma in this book.Leonid Sharashkin: True.Regina Meredith: But it’s not the way we would think of it, as something you have topay a penance for or grind through or something in much of the parlance that existsright now. They are talking about it in much more lighthearted way. Can you talk abouttheir view of karma and dealing with it?Leonid Sharashkin: Absolutely, mmmhmm, you know and the amazing part is that whatthey are talking about is not new. They are referring to some ancient parables, etc.,that show that even our ancestors knew that there are ways of overcoming karma,overcoming all kinds of problems light-heartedly. For example, they give an example ofan ancient story when a man was—a peasant was making love to a neighbor’s wife,and so, the Shiva God, passing by, and [he] asked, “Oh, Shiva, tell me how many moreincarnations to I have in this flash?” And she said, “Well, you have 10 incarnations left.”And, he was overjoyed that it was just ten incarnations left of suffering . . .Regina Meredith: (laughing together)Leonid Sharashkin: That he became enlightened in the same moment. Here is an ancientstory; yet, it conveys this understanding that we’re not locked up in our karma. So,they have the same approach; if you seriously believe in karma, you keep maintainingyour karma with the energy of your thought.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: You are creating your karma; you are giving it existence by believingthat yeah, I need to work with it. I need to be good. I have like that many more lifetimesto go. So, you are all locked up, but you are your own prisoner. And, they present allthese beautiful lighthearted approaches of how to realize that, yes, karma is just oneoperating system; it’s one world view; it’s one image, but I’m the one who is in chargeof all the movies played in this theater. So, why don’t I play another movie where I canjust resolve all my karmic circumstances in five minutes? There it is.Regina Meredith: There you go; it’s a choice! Yeah. It’s beautiful. I like that so muchbetter. What about the notion of becoming a healer, because they talk to the personthat is reading this that really wants to be a part of the journey of others in goingthrough this healing process. And, yet, we judge ourselves for that. Oh, I don’t knowthat it was really me that had that effect, and so forth. How did you perceive that?Leonid Sharashkin: Yeah. Talking about healers, you know what I like also about The Artof Soaring book is that the authors are not serious about anything, includingthemselves.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: They do not present themselves as someone special, someone whoknew the way and now is enlightening us, the ignorant people. No. They are verylighthearted, they are playful and where the healing—they practice healing, themselves;they are healers. They help people overcome bodily disease and all kinds of life

challenges through the techniques described in The Art of Soaring, but they explainthat, you know, we in this world, we tend to rely on somebody else for everything.Somebody else is raising our children and giving them education. Somebody is growingour food. Somebody is building our home. Somebody—even in the spiritual realm, wehave somebody who is enlightening us, somebody who is healing us, somebody who issaving us. And, they [the authors] remind us that we can all become our own healers.And, actually, the reason why we can be healed so easily if we come to a healer whohas this power is because we have the faith in the healer, we have the faith that thisparticular person can finally help us, where everybody else failed. And your faith in thisperson is what heals you most and foremost.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: So, instead of relying on somebody else for your fulfillment, theysay well, if you have as much faith in yourself, in your abilities, in your imagination asyou have in somebody else’s, this will be your healing, instantaneously.Regina Meredith: Absolutely, and in the Western medical model oh, no. Double blindstudy; that was just the placebo effect.Leonid Sharashkin: Yeah.Regina Meredith: Yipee! Isn’t that great news, you know. (laughing together) We allhave that capability on our own. You don’t need the drug. You don’t need the doctor.You don’t need the intervention in most cases, in many cases, certainly. So, they reallyapproach it from the ground level of your own internal belief systems. That’s what thehealing is about.Leonid Sharashkin: Mmmhmm. And, again, we are not talking just about the bodilyhealing; we are talking about healing our relationships, and money problems. You knowone of the ladies tried this technique. She was struggling with her mortgage bills andthen she played out this negative scenario; it’s another technique described in The Artof Soaring. Instead of struggling with an issue, release it and play out in your mind themost negative scenario you can think of until it becomes absurd. So, she imagined thatshe will become bankrupt and will be thrown out of her home and with no possessions,or anything. So, she will spend the rest of her life living under a bridge in Chicago.Regina Meredith: Under a bridge. (laughing delightedly)Leonid Sharashkin: And policing the sidewalks, looking for a banana skin to chew on.And, she created this amazing vision where she would collect all [the] banana skins inthe world to subsist on, and then even extraterrestrials will be sending their spaceshipsin the form of bananas filled with banana skins for her to chew on. So, when shearrived at this vision; this absurd, comical, exaggerated parable she could no longer beserious about the bills that come in the mail. And, she explained that like the problemdisappeared. All of a sudden her monetary situation improved just because instead ofsitting there and worrying and seeing herself as a victim who will be struggling with herbills for the rest of her life, all of a sudden she changed her perception of herself. As itsays in the book, she renamed herself. Instead of saying I am the one who hasmortgage payment problems, she told, I am the one who is receiving food aid ofbanana skins from aliens!Regina Meredith: (laughing delightedly)Leonid Sharashkin: And you know, because the one who is receiving the food aid ofbanana skins from aliens certainly cannot have any mortgage bill problems, right?Regina Meredith: Right!Leonid Sharashkin: So, the problem disappeared on its own.Regina Meredith: I love it, and the book is filled with that. Really, the second half isnothing but—well, two- thirds of it—is nothing but this kind of story. I mean not thatone, but a lot of stories like this.Leonid Sharashkin: Yes.Regina Meredith: So, you can see, it gives you a nice portrait of someone who comes in

with a lot of complex issues; this one man in here, in particular, how one of the authorsworked with him a little bit at time to just allow the tension to be released in one littlearea with one little remembrance, and then renaming, and then this thanksgivingprocess, and so forth, until they wound down to the very base of what had reallyhappened in his life, and this rediscovery and reframing of it, and essentially everythingelse healed.Leonid Sharashkin: Mmmhmm.Regina Meredith: The whole thing, the whole mechanism, his whole being healed.Leonid Sharashkin: Yeah, absolutely, and you know what I also noticed just byobserving even my children; I noticed that they know this art of soaring without readingthis book.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: They all have this playful attitude. (Gives an example in relationshipwith his little girl) And, she finds me doing that and asks, “Daddy, what are you doing?”I said, “Well, I saw your doll broke and so, I am trying to see how I can fix it.” And, shesaid, “Yeah, my little sister broke it, but you don’t have to fix it,” she says. I say,“Why?” And, she showed me this. She said, “Daddy, because it’s not a Barbie doll.”She did like, “It’s a giraffe!” (Demonstrates how his child switched the head of the dollto the leg, becoming the giraffe’s neck and head).Regina Meredith: (laughing together)Leonid Sharashkin: And not only that, she told me, “Daddy, it was always a giraffe, andnot a Barbie doll, only the head was attached to the wrong place.” So, you know it’sthis art of seeing a giraffe where everybody else would see a broken Barbie doll.Regina Meredith: I love it!Leonid Sharashkin: And our children have that. It’s just in-built in our being the momentwe are born. So, the art of soaring is not about discovering a new system, a newphilosophy; it’s about reclaiming this pristine purity of perception that we are all bornwith.Regina Meredith: Reclaiming our own fairy tale.Leonid Sharashkin: That’s beautiful.Regina Meredith: Well, on that note, I think it’s best if everybody that’s interested justpick up a copy of the book. Where can they get this?Leonid Sharashkin: They can get it on www.deepsnowpress.com.Regina Meredith: www.deepsnowpress.com, OK.Leonid Sharashkin: On the publisher’s website.Regina Meredith: OK. How long has this been available to the English-speakingaudience?Leonid Sharashkin: Two months.Regina Meredith: Two months. Brand new, whoa! Yes, I’m one of the first. I love it.Leonid Sharashkin: Yes.Regina Meredith: OK, well Leonid, it’s so wonderful to talk about this with you, and also,another thing that you’re getting ready to involve yourself with, which I’ve beenfascinated with very much since we first me, is a school in Russia, which is really—Imean I’m so enthralled with the notion where the children create the curriculum, thechildren build the facilities and supply all of the artwork for the place, and work withgardens and learn movement that we have long lost in our own beings. And [it’s in] thisbeautiful environment. Can you say it, again—Tekos? The Tekos School?Leonid Sharashkin: Tekos. The Tekos School, in Southern Russia, yeah.Regina Meredith: And when you go back to Russia, you’re going to be involved in this.And, I shouldn’t make promises I might not be able to keep, but our intention right nowis in a few months, when we go there, you and I and Scott are going to hook uptogether, and we’re going to go to this school. And, we are going to talk with theheadmaster and some of the students.

Leonid Sharashkin: And, I very much look forward to that day because I visited theschool, myself, with my daughter a few months ago, and it’s literally like entering theFourth Dimension.Regina Meredith: Yes.Leonid Sharashkin: Because it’s not even just about the children there; it’s about whatthey manifest as their abilities. They remind us all that we have all these infinite abilities.The children have designed, built and decorated their own campus. They do it freehand,all these amazing murals you’ll see there in the school.Regina Meredith: Beautiful.Leonid Sharashkin: They were not even traced with a pencil on the wall because it’s anunderstanding of the principle that if you tell the child oh, you need first to practice, itconveys that your skepticism. You believe that oh, the child does not capable of doing iffreehand. So, instead, the principle is giving them the brush and saying, “Do it.” Like,“Create it.”Regina Meredith: Beautiful.Leonid Sharashkin: And because he has this faith in education being not stuffingchildren’s heads with information, but rather creating an environment in which they canblossom and draw out all this creativity and powers and abilities that we are all bornwith. So, they were able to create this very magic space. And, I believe it will redefinethe way we see education and the way we raise our children the world over.Regina Meredith: Mmmm. I felt that way just watching the DVD of it, even beingremoved by and connected, let’s say, by technology, you can feel the essence of thatcoming through. We are going to set our intention to do everything we can to be therewith you.Leonid Sharashkin: Yeah. Thank you, Regina; thank you, Scott. And, yeah, I would liketo wish everybody who is watching this broadcast, “Happy Soaring!”Regina Meredith: Yeah. Happy Soaring!Regina Meredith: For those of you who would like to purchase a copy of, The Art ofSoaring, you can go to www.deepsnowpress.com, and imagine your way to a muchmore satisfying life experience. Meanwhile, you might also be interested in our firstinterview with Leonid, regarding the story of, Anastasia, another beautiful and profoundview of the potential of the human being. Until next time, thanks for watching CMN.