There is no death

To prevent my muscles from going completely limp, I take a long walk through the monastery complex and its grounds every day. First I wish the pigs a good day and hand them a few melon rinds. Then I visit the cattle in the nearby forest. The rain of the past few days has allowed fresh grass to grow, which the cows and bulls are now feasting on. I wave to the nun sitting leaning against a tree and keeping a watchful eye on the monastery’s valuable possessions. When she spots me, she also raises her hand in greeting and gives me a friendly smile. Lost in thought, I walk down into the valley to the small lakes. The stay here in the monastery, the liturgies, some of which we attended, the many conversations with Father Andrew and Sister Domnina, the reading of the book “The Wave is the Sea” by the well-known spiritual teacher and Zen master Williges Jäger and the many times of thinking have rekindled the question in me about us humans, the why, where from, where to and our tasks.

A few anglers take advantage of the sunny day. They have laid out their rods and are waiting for one of the fish to eat the bait. Not moving, I watch the peaceful scene. Then I discover an old run-down hut that I hadn’t noticed before. As I’ve already been wandering around for two hours, I decide to rest there for a few moments. Tired, I sit down in the shade of an oak tree on a concrete step in front of the run-down accommodation. My gaze falls on the old, completely torn slippers next to me, which the occupant of this dwelling is obviously still using. I lift my head and watch the lake that has nestled in the lovely valley about 50 meters away from me. A few swallows fly low over the water to catch insects. I try to let my thoughts flow and not think about anything specific. I have been practicing meditation for a long time and I still find it difficult to clear my head. A breeze rustles the leaves above me. The angler’s line buzzes as he casts it out again. The barking from the monastery reaches my ears. “Is it Anatoli’s dog?” I ask myself. Then my thoughts wander to the Moldovan-Ukrainian border. Will the customs officers cause us problems there too? My God, I don’t really want to think about anything and yet it’s flitting all over my brain. Thoughts, thoughts, thoughts. What are thoughts? Who controls them? Why is it so difficult to switch them off? Who is actually the master of my body? What is my body? What is it really made of? Certainly mostly water, then meat, bones etc. In other words, matter. At least that’s what they say. What is matter and why are we here on earth? And what is our task? Is traveling really my mission? Where does this inner desire come from? Why is this desire so strong? Is there a reincarnation after all? Life after death. Does my wish come from another life? A stream of energy that was given to me from another life when I was reborn in this body? Who says so? Myself? And what is the ego? The ego? Oh dear, now my control center is slowly going into overdrive without me wanting it to. Well, it doesn’t matter. Then I just don’t meditate. Go after my thoughts. The energy flows that come from somewhere and go somewhere. Which are so difficult to control and influence. And yet it can be done, I read and hear again and again. Well, what are thoughts? Energy flows? They are certainly energy flows. You can also measure them. They chase around in our brain, connect wires, pass through nerve pathways and nerve junctions and are responsible for our actions.

What happens if a mistake is made? Is that what you call crazy? And what is crazy? Surely this is a way of looking at normal people. But who is normal and who is abnormal? Who decides that? If we move within the directives of our society, we are considered normal. But if we move outside these norms, one or the other is already considered abnormal. Am I abnormal because I have a great need to explore the world? Some of the people we spoke to thought Tanja and I were crazy. Crazy because we are usually traveling. Many a friend has said that I should slowly calm down. “You’re getting too old for traveling. What if something happens to you? What will you do then?” they keep asking me. What is too old? And why am I being asked these questions? Do you have to be young to travel? What do I do if something happens? What does the person who lives at home do if something happens to them? It doesn’t really matter where it happens. If you’re unlucky, you also die in Germany. Most Germans die in Germany, whether they want to or not. You don’t need to be traveling to be hit or run over by a car. Like what happened to my good friend Andreas. He was five years younger than me and crashed his car on a business trip a year ago. In the middle of Germany. And my intervertebral disc blew a whistle in Romania. What would have happened if I had been operated on in Germany and not in Romania? Yes, that is the question. The doctors in Romania did it perfectly. So maybe it was even good not to have been in Germany. Who wants to know? What is safe? Life itself is uncertain. Something can always happen. Everywhere. Perhaps there is a purpose after all? And the question remains whether Andreas isn’t doing better on the other side of life? The splash of a fish jumping out of the water pulls me out of my stream of thought. I look at the water and observe the circular ripples that the fish has left on the surface of the lake. The waves get smaller and smaller until I can no longer recognize them. If I had a telescope, I could still see the waves that are no longer visible to my eye. And what if the technology of a telescope no longer manages to make the wave visible? Does it then no longer exist? Nonsense, you would need a larger telescope. And if that’s not enough, an even more powerful one. Until our human technology fails. But the wave is here to stay, I’m sure of it. “Hey, hey, what a thought,” I say quietly and continue to spin it. This would mean that the wave is an energy caused by the jumping fish. Scientifically speaking, energy never goes away. It only changes. Changes into another invisible form of energy. For example, when burning wood. The heat that is generated escapes into the atmosphere. What happens to her then? Where is she fleeing to? How long is it measurable? “Man, what a thought.”

My brain is running at full speed. I have completely forgotten my outside world. I’m fascinated by where my brain waves take me. There is undoubtedly a connection between the wave that the fish has just left here and the burning of wood. Where is the connection to me? To the people? Everything is connected, I learned in the Australian desert. Mother Earth taught me that. But this statement alone is unsatisfactory. If the wave and the burning wood have a connection by changing their energy form, and this becomes so small that we as humans can no longer see or feel it, what happens when the human dies? What happens when he breathes his last breath and his body cools down? Is there a connection to the wave in the lake that the fish left behind and the burning wood? “Man, what kind of thought?” I whisper excitedly once again. Where does the body’s energy go? Its warmth? And what about the soul of the body? With the spirit? Where does it all go? The fact is that the body first disintegrates and becomes smaller and smaller until it connects with the earth. So he becomes a part of Mother Earth. Looks the same, smells the same. The earth also disintegrates into other components, into dust, until it is no longer visible. And then what? What happens to the ever-shrinking matter? And where has the human soul fled to? The energy that kept the body going? The fish, the fire, the human being. Without a doubt, everything that we are and everything that exists on earth goes into the universe, into the cosmos. It unites with “all that is”. And, “All that is” is a designation for God, Allah or Brahman etc. This in turn means that we are connected to “All that is”. Also with Mother Earth. During his lifetime and afterwards too. Now my brain is running hot, so hot that I think one or other node is overloading.

I am thinking of the book by Willigis Jäger. He writes: Quantum mechanics has arrived at the groundbreaking insight that there is no matter. The further the search for the foundation stones of matter progresses, the more we realize that matter is nothing other than energy, about whose origin we can say nothing more. As early as 1944, Max Planck stated in his lecture on “The Nature of Matter”: “As a physicist, I tell you this after my research into the atom: There is no matter in itself! All matter arises and exists only through its own force, which causes the atomic particles to vibrate and holds them together to form the tiniest solar system of the atom”. And he added: “We must assume a conscious, intelligent spirit behind this force. This spirit is the source of all matter! It is not the visible but perishable matter that is the real, true reality, but the invisible, immortal spirit that is the real thing! However, since spirit cannot exist on its own, but every spirit belongs to a being, we must necessarily assume spirit beings.”

“Man, what a statement!” And this from such a famous scientist. If this is the case, our body disintegrates into its individual parts after death and then reduces in size until it eventually dissolves into energy. “And what does that tell me?” I whisper, a little confused. I think and think. Think about death and what happens to us afterwards. My brain is suddenly empty. It seems to focus on a single thought. I sit motionless and stare at the lake. “What happens after death? Are we even dead then? Is there actually a death?” Suddenly, a glistening beam flashes through me. One of my brain coils has apparently found a new connection. It only flashes briefly and I feel an enormous sense of relief. A powerful and yet so simple realization. So simple that I could laugh about it. I feel hot and cold at the same time. My happiness hormones seem to be in overdrive. They dance and unite to form a massive round dance. I would love to jump up and run screaming to the lake and then jump in. Not to drown myself, but to give vent to this feeling. But my body won’t budge. He doesn’t receive any commands from my control center. Outwardly, I continue to sit there frozen and have difficulty processing this realization. But it is obvious. It is perfectly clear to me. Crystal clear. Nevertheless, I find it difficult to put this realization into simple words. It’s just a tremendous feeling. A feeling that revolutionizes my entire way of thinking over the last few decades and turns it on its head. Without a doubt, at least for me. ” THERE IS NO DEATH!!!”

Suddenly some frogs start croaking loudly in the lake. I look at the surface of the water in amazement. The croaking gets louder and louder. It spreads like wildfire on the opposite bank, until it builds up to an almost monstrous concert. Does that have anything to do with my realization about death? Nonsense. That must be a coincidence. The frogs probably start their deafening concert every day at this time. But does chance even exist? No matter. Inwardly shaken by my incredible realization, I repeat what has just gone through my mind. ” THERE IS NO DEATH!” Shocked by this outrageous statement and its clarity, I now jump to my feet. I look around to see if anyone sees me. No one there. Suddenly the croaking stops. As if someone had given a command, the frogs fell silent. Strange. I have never experienced anything like it. Will they start adding their two cents to my thoughts again? A little confused, I sit down again and let my eyes drift to the other bank. I fall into a brief stupor again. ” THERE IS NO DEATH!” I repeat to myself out loud. If there is no matter, there can be no death. There is the connection with the wave that the fish has left behind and with the wood that burns. Everything is clearly connected and ultimately we and all our actions merge into one comprehensive energy. Yes, we are the energy. An important part of it. For me, this also clearly means that we humans are made up of this energy, which is connected to everything, even during our lifetime. With the animals, the trees, the lake, the water, the fish, even the stones, the dust of the earth. All one. Basically, everything is one and belongs together. When we do something to someone, we do it to ourselves. Clearly. Energy cannot be separated from anything. “My God, what a realization.”

Willigis Jäger with his book, Father Andrew with his talks, the nuns with their comprehensive love, the many thoughts and the peace of this divine place have helped me to have this experience. What a moment. I would love to kiss his feet. So everything makes sense in life. Above all, I understand that our task is to live life. That life is a gift. An invaluable gift. A gift that must not be thrown away under any circumstances. Who knows what the energy in my human form will do after I die? Will it manifest itself in a new form? And what does that depend on again? “What about the incarnation?” I think aloud.

I stand up again and shake my head. The frogs are still silent. As if they didn’t even exist. Strange. Overwhelmed by my realization, but at the same time completely relieved, I walk through the oak forest, leaving the small monastery chapel on my right. A glance tells me that a group of believers are bathing in the blessed and holy water. I raise my hand in a fleeting greeting and walk on, lost in thought. What about time? Does time even exist? Is it just a man-made concept? Just a word to give our lives an order, a structure? Probably. Because if there is no death, there is no time. I see an absolute connection there. Everything is infinite. The cosmos is constantly expanding. Grows from day to day, from hour to hour. According to our limited scientific knowledge, it is about sixteen billion years old. An immense, expanding energy of which we humans and our tiny little planet are a part. A barely measurable, but in the sum of “all that is” important part. Because if the individual particles did not exist, there would be no “all that is”. And “all that is” is the expanding cosmos. You could also say God, Creator, Brahma or Allah to give a name to this energy that spreads at the speed of light. There are said to be 250 billion Milky Ways so far. Our earth is like an atom compared to this enormous number. An atom, which in turn is a component of the whole. And however small this atom may be, it is still important for the cosmos (“all that is”) and for us humans, because this tiny little solar system gives the human energy form the space to live and die.

Whether small or large, because these statements are relative, our tiny planet is at risk. Through our constantly evolving life form and our brain, we are a system within the system of the cosmos. If humanity does not achieve the leap in development and understanding and understand from within that we are connected to “all that is”, we will continue to marginalize ourselves. From my current perspective, this would mean that we have it in our own hands whether the human energy form will still exist in the future or whether the form will fundamentally dissolve and merge forever and ever into the whole, into “all that is”, the cosmic energy. I think it would be a shame, because humans are an exciting, highly interesting and unique life form with unimagined development potential. We have it in our own hands to develop our form further or to end it. We have it in our own hands whether we continue to trample our life platform, Mother Earth, underfoot and urinate daily on our own plate from which we eat our food.

We influence our evolution through our mind. Are the forge of man’s energy form on this beautiful little planet. Tanja and I will continue to work on explaining to people and ourselves that we are connected to “all that is”. That a change in basic life orientation makes sense. A change away from the one-sided fixation on power, money, success, prestige and performance. Towards a holistic lifestyle. Towards emotionality and love. Towards an understanding of connectedness, towards a fundamentally honest life. To a life of lightness, of joy, without us humans making it difficult for each other. Without us taking advantage of, exploiting and ripping each other off.

At this time in particular, it is incredibly important to protect our life platform “Mother Earth” like our own skin. Because the whole of humanity is obviously at a crossroads. We humans are connected to each other, whether we like it or not. We have now realized this more than ever. A fantastic insight that opens the door to another world. A path into the “cosmos”. A path to what Christianity calls “God”, to which the mystic says “First Reality”. Zen, on the other hand, speaks of “emptiness” and Hinduism refers to that which is incomprehensible to us humans as “Brahman”. For me, the term “all that is” is understandable.

A difficult farewell to the place of love

Once again, Father Andrew invites us to breakfast. Once again we are sitting in his room and once again the table is generously laid. Some nuns also gather in the room. We have a lively conversation. Many questions are still being asked. Father Andrew has to leave the room from time to time. Believers keep asking about him. He takes each individual very seriously and gives people a lot of his time, usually well into the night. Due to the many interruptions, it gets later and later. Some nuns joke about whether it will start raining again soon and we will be held up again. Even now, after a month’s stay here in the monastery, none of our dear hosts want to let us go. We explain that we must not set off too late, as we need the day to be able to take a break in between. Father Andrew understands immediately. He calls a friend who owns a construction company on the way to the border. “Anatoli, my friend will take you in. You can spend the night on his company premises,” smiles father Andrew graciously after the phone call. We are delighted. We are taken care of again.

Tanja and I fetch the bikes from Baumeister Anatoli’s shed and push them outside the dining room. Some nuns bring us wine, pickled sheep’s cheese, a large jar of home-made honey, eggplants, peppers, olives, tomato sauce and garlic vegetables. A large bag of grapes, a bag of tomatoes and cucumbers. Even a loaded car driver would have difficulty fitting all the goodies in. Domnina has already done away with a lot and yet we still have to reduce the well-intentioned gifts by another three quarters. “Do you think there’s enough room in your trailer for the six liters of monastery wine?” asks Tanja. “Sure, we won’t leave the wine behind under any circumstances,” I reply with a laugh. Then the nun of Christ comes and wants to put more grapes in our pockets. Sister Dorothea presents Tanja with her prayer angel. There is no way she can refuse such a valuable personal gift.

Suddenly, a hundred hands reach out and take all our belongings to the parking lot in front of the dining room. There it is immediately loaded into Father Andrew’s van. One of his parting gifts is that he will take us over the next mountain. It is supposed to be the last mountain before the Ukrainian border. He actually wanted to drive us to the border, but we were able to decline this variant of the offer. He understood that we wanted to make the journey from Germany to Burma under our own steam. But we cannot and will not refuse to conquer the mountain in this way. On the contrary, we are delighted to accept this offer.

Shortly before our final departure, Father Andrew gives a speech. “We would like to thank you. Thank you for spending your valuable time with us. For showing respect for our religion and showing interest in our faith. Thank you for seeing us more often at services and liturgies, sometimes even late at night. Every moment with you was a gift for us. You have grown close to our hearts. You became part of the monastery. You were not strangers to us right from the start. We have something in common. You are like sister and brother to us. We will never forget you and hope that you won’t forget us either. We would like to thank Denis for his many stories, which gave us a glimpse into another world that was foreign to us, and to you Tanja for your great help in the kitchen and Marta in the greenhouse. We wish you God’s protection and blessing. We will always pray for you. And please forgive us if we have made one or two mistakes out of ignorance.”

Tanja and I struggle with our composure. Tears start to roll again. Nurses dry their eyes with the back of their hands. Then I too would like to thank all those present for the boundless love we have experienced here and promise that we will carry all the sisters and brothers of the monastery in our hearts for the rest of our lives. Now the dam has finally broken and the tears are flowing. Tears of sadness at saying goodbye and tears of joy at a happy future. The sisters and nuns come to Tanja one by one to hug and embrace her. I stand next to it and struggle to keep my composure. Where have I experienced something like this before? When every single nun and sister comes up to me and touches me with a handshake for the first time during my entire stay, I can’t take it anymore and have to cry bitterly. Like at a state reception, I shake at least 50 hands and thank all my new sisters and brothers for one of the most beautiful and instructive months of my life.

Anatoli the builder and father Andrew’s brother hugs me tightly. He didn’t miss any of the many stories I told in the evenings, and always sought us out with some of the nuns in our room or in the dining room. Ion, his helper, also gives me a hug. Father Andrew stands there crying and laughing at the same time. When I see him like that, my heart clenches. Is it really possible that I may never meet this person who represents true love again in my life? My God, how painful goodbyes can be. But where parting is associated with pain, there are reasons. If this stay had not been characterized by the greatest hospitality, by unlimited, never-breaking love and care, we would not shed a tear now. As we get into Father Andrew’s car and drive off, almost all the residents of the Marta si Maria monastery wave after us. We wave back and as the car turns around the large church under construction, the residents have disappeared. Domnina sits in the back seat. She accompanies us to the mountain to translate for Father Andrew and us. Suddenly she hugs Tanja and is shaken by a bitter crying fit. She is not a person who initiates contact with people quickly and prefers to live in seclusion. Through the translation work of the last four weeks, however, we have become a part of their lives. And now, all of a sudden, the line has been drawn.

After about 20 kilometers, we reach the highest point of the last Moldavian earth rondel. Father Andrew offers us another ride to the border. Although the temptation is great, we decline again. Then we unload the bikes and equipment. “Just take care of yourselves. This is the main road to the border. There are a lot of trucks,” warns Domnina. “We’ll do it,” promises Tanja. When we hug Father Andrew for the last time, his composure is also gone. For the first time, he is at a loss for words. He waves speechlessly with wet cheeks. We climb onto our trestles. “Good luck! Thank you very much! And may God protect you!” we shout and start pedaling. The two dear people behind us quickly become smaller. We raise our hands a few more times in greeting until they too disappear around a bend.

Tanja and I are now each thinking our own thoughts. On the one hand, we are happy that our journey is now actually continuing, but on the other hand, we would have loved to stay in the monastery forever. But if we want to explore the world, if we want to get to know countries and their inhabitants in order to build bridges of understanding between different cultures, we have to go further. Then we must not hide away in a monastery, no matter how much we like it. We have a job. One task. And we see this task as very important. Perhaps we are some kind of traveling ambassadors? Even if we can only convince a small proportion of our readers that there are also lovely people on the other side of the border, that they are part of us despite their different views, religions and ways of looking at life, then we have already achieved a great deal. If we can then convince one of the other readers that we humans are not only connected to the living beings of this Mother Earth, but are also a part of her, then our task is complete.

Thanks to the straight route, we make very good progress and reach the small town of Olanesti after 63 kilometers. “That’s where the building company is!” I shout to Tanja as we cycle past a courtyard surrounded by a wall. We get off our riese und müller bikes and push them through a gate into the yard. There is a lot of activity. Shunting trucks. Customers load concrete bags, bricks and other materials into their vehicles. We stop in front of a narrow house painted lime green. A man approaches us. We explain that Father Andrew has sent us and that we want to speak to Anatoli, the director. The man, who is obviously the manager of Anatoli’s company, immediately springs into action. The equipment for our bikes is carried by some workers to the second floor of this shack-like building and our bikes are locked in a shed. “Make yourselves at home in the room. When you’re ready, please come to the restaurant to eat,” we understand. It is warm in the room of the lime green house. It smells slightly of sweat. The floor urgently needs mopping. Everything else also needs a thorough clean. After our stay in the monastery, we first have to get used to the presence of dirt again. The room, which is around three meters wide and five meters long, is surrounded by windows on all sides. It’s like being in a tower and we can see the company premises and the hustle and bustle from every window. We spread a plastic sheet on the floor and lay our sleeping mats on it. We prefer to avoid the bed with its dirty bed linen. A worker enters the room. He greets us in a friendly manner and picks up a few of his belongings. He fumbles a few banknotes out of a slot under the TV. He doesn’t know whether he can trust us either. Since everyone in the country will soon be stealing from everyone else, it’s better to play it safe. Before we go down the narrow steel staircase, another worker comes and repairs the door lock with a drill and hammer. Then he hands us the key. “Do you think we can leave our cameras and computers there?” asks Tanja. “I think so,” I reply, lock the room and we go to the nearby street restaurant. We sit down at a round plastic table right next to the main road and watch the traffic. A boy of about eleven gets behind the wheel of a car full of adults. When the little one turns the key and starts the engine, we take notice. “He’s not going to drive away now, is he?” I say jokingly. As soon as I close my mouth, the engine roars loudly and the young man takes off at breakneck speed. With screeching tires, it speeds away. “I hope we don’t come across one of these brats when we’re out and about on our bikes,” says Tanja.

After a month of isolation, we see the hustle and bustle with different eyes again. We are invited for a salad and a microwaved chicken roll. A real shock compared to the excellent monastery food. Then we have a few beers at our host’s expense and review some of our past experiences. When it is dark, we go to the accommodation at the building yard. Dogs greet us barking loudly. The manager Valerie welcomes us. As soon as we arrive, he says goodbye to us and closes the gate to the company premises. The hospitality here is also exceptional. “Where is the toilet here?” Tanja wants to know. “I have no idea. They forgot to explain that to us,” I reply. We brush our teeth and spit the water out of the window onto the dusty courtyard. Then we lie down, sweaty and tired, on our sleeping mats and wait for sleep. As soon as we close our eyes, the phone rings in the room. The persistent caller lets it ring for ages until he finally gives up. “Thank God,” I whisper. We close our eyes again as the phone rings again. It is already 22:00. The phone is now ringing for the sixth time. I get up, pull the dingy comforter off the bed and put it over the annoying device. Although I have now almost strangled the thing, it is still humming annoyingly to itself. It takes a long time before we are allowed to escape into our well-deserved sleep due to the incessant disturbance.

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