Eugene and Stas both rolled with laughter.

“What’s the matter? What are you laughing about?” asked Sensei, while smoking a cigarette. “And where are the other guys? Have you met them?”

Drowning in laughter, Eugene waved towards us, “They are still in a stupor over there and can’t come out.”

“What kind of stupor?” asked Sensei, not understanding and looking into the dark. “What nonsense have you told them?”

But Eugene couldn’t stop laughing, hopelessly waving his hand.

“What a clown!”

“Sensei, don’t you know Eugene?” replied Stas, dying laughing.

Looking at all that turmoil, Andrew was first to understand what was going on. Shamefully pulling his hand away from the button, he sighed with relief.

“Well, guys,” said Andrew, coming out from the darkness to them. “That was great. The joke was good, but who’s going to wash my pants now?!”

This comment provoked an even bigger storm of laughter. Sensei said with a smile, “What did this clown make up this time?”

Andrew started to tell in detail how this “guide” led us through the village, changed according to his stories into the Brocken mountain. We also joined him, enriching the story with our impressions. At the very end, our entire big company, together with Sensei, roared with uninterrupted laughter, recalling our recent feelings.

“I just came earlier today,” explained Sensei, laughing through tears. “The light in our village was cut off. Probably the cable was damaged somewhere.”

“What a story,” Tatyana uttered with her clear voice. “I don’t want to mention what we suffered from Eugene, but there was also this cat!”

Meanwhile, the small ball of our big fear sat peacefully, frightened by human laughter.

“It’s Samurai,” Stas waved his hand and explained. “Sensei’s cat. He always follows him.”

“Stas, you should have clued us in to what was going on,” Andrew said with a smile.

“How?” he shrugged his shoulders. “You dashed aside from every shadow, and if I were to start making faces, we would have had to search for you all over the village.”

The guys laughed, having imagined this picture.

“I say,” Eugene justified, “it was an ordinary joke. Like Ostap Bender said, ‘The most important is to bring confusion into the enemy’s camp… Because people most of all are afraid of the unknown.’”

“That’s right,” said Sensei. “Fear begotten by imagination sees danger even where there is no danger at all. There is one ancient eastern legend about fear. A wise man met the Plague on his way and asked, ‘Where are you going?’ It answered, ‘To a big city. I have to kill five thousand people there.’ In a few days the same wise man again met the Plague. ‘You said that you’d kill five thousand people but you’ve killed fifty thousand,’ he accused. ‘No,’ objected the Plague. ’I‘ve killed five thousand; the others died from fear.’”

Having discussed all the funny details of this journey and having dispersed the myth of our unjustified fears by humor and laughter, we switched to more serious topics. Our group was joined by three other guys: Ruslan, Yura, and Victor (senior sempai). A little later came Nikolai Andreevich (“Dumpling”), who turned out to be a psychotherapist. Meanwhile we were talking about Qigong.

“What does the word ‘Qigong’ mean?” Slava asked Sensei.

“Well, translating this word literally from Chinese, Qigong refers to work with the energy of the air, because ‘Qi’ means ‘wind, gas, breath,’ and the syllable ‘gong’ means ‘work, action, or deed.’”

“And this system was invented by the Chinese?” asked Andrew.

“Not really,” answered the Teacher. “It is the Hindu system of self-regulation, which migrated to China at the beginning of a new era.”

“I’ve read that there exist different types of Qigong.” As always, Kostya put in his remark. “I think there are two different schools.”

“There are a lot more of them,” said Igor Mikhailovich. “In the modern world there are plenty of different schools of Qigong. For example, Confucian, Buddhist, medical, military…”

“Medical?” I shuddered. “What does it heal?”

“Many diseases.”

“So, we need only to breathe the right way?” Andrew interrupted my next question.

“Not only. You also need to think the right way. There is a saying that ‘a thought guides Qi, and Qi guides the blood.’ Blood is like the ambulance of the body; it includes all necessary medical supplies. In the very ancient medical treatise Huangdi Neijin, it is said that ‘when a thought rests in stillness it is free.’ It means that you can master Qi. The human who thinks the right way has good health.”

“To put it short, a sound mind can only exist in a healthy body,” Kostya made a conclusion for himself.

“Not really. I would say, with healthy thoughts there will be a sound mind, and with a sound mind will be a healthy body.”

“Could you please explain to me, you always emphasize the importance to think the right way, both during physical trainings and now,” remarked Andrew. “But for some reason, before I thought that all we need is just to act the right way. Because thoughts can be different during the choice of action: both good and bad.”

“That’s where you waste priceless time on the struggle with your own self. You shouldn’t have to choose between a good and a bad thought because you shouldn’t have any negative thoughts in your mind at all. The goal of the Highest Art, the Art of Lotus, is to learn the proper way of thinking; in other words, ‘to kill a Dragon inside,’ or ‘to conquer a Dragon.’ Have you heard of such an expression?”

“Yes.”

“That is the purpose. The greatest victory is the victory over yourself. What does that mean? It means to win your own negative thoughts, to control them, and to control your emotions. I repeat once again, there shouldn’t be anything ne-ga-tive in your mind. Only positive thoughts! Then you won’t need to spend time fighting with yourself, and your doings will always be positive. Peace should be first of all inside of you. Peace and harmony.”

“So, it means that human thought is reflected in any action?” asked Andrew, thinking about something known only to him.

“It is not only reflected, it guides all action. Because the thought is material.”

“Material?” It was Nikolai Andreevich’s turn to be surprised.

“Of course. It’s a much finer substance, not studied enough yet. But it does exist, it is real, its movements are traced. There have been many effective experiments on psychics and psychic phenomena. There were experiments with our own psychics; for example, Nina Kulagina, Julia Vorobieva, and many others. I don’t even mention the rich world practice. This research is conducted all over the world, although it is known by different names. For example, in England it is known as mental investigation. In France it is ‘metapsychics’, in countries of Eastern Europe ‘psychotronics’, in the U.S. ‘parapsychology’, in China ‘investigations into extraordinary functions of the human body’, and so on.

“And if you look deeply into the history of mankind, you will find there is much evidence that it was known from the earliest of times. In all mythical, magical, and religious views and teachings of people, a firm belief exists that it is possible to influence anyone and anything through thoughts, regardless of the distance, time, and space. In other words, generally speaking, this knowledge has always existed.”

Nikolai Andreevich joined again in the polemics, “Well, now you have given us examples of local psychics who became known to us just recently. Why weren’t there such people earlier in the Soviet Union? I’ve been practicing psychotherapy for many years. But studying the mind of different people, my colleagues and I have never come across such phenomena. It’s true that recently there were people talking nonsense and considering themselves to be sensitives. And they even tried to prove it. But in reality, it was just their sick imagination, while real psychics didn’t exist in the Soviet Union.”