Author: Vladimir Pyatsky
Translation: Natasha Tsimbler
One night in 1992, I had a nightmare. I saw an old man, sitting in a wheelchair. His scraggly gray beard, streaked with reddish patches, had bits of food tangled in it, and his blue eyes were frozen in an expression of terror and madness. The dream left such a strong impression on me that I couldn’t fall back asleep for over an hour. Instead, I prayed and focused on dissolving the image of the old man in formless light. Finally, my anxiety subsided.
At the time, I was searching for a job. The morning after I had the dream, I received an unexpected phone call offering me a position of caring for the elderly. I accepted. A nurse, who was familiarizing me with my new job responsibilities, took me from house to house to meet the patients I was to assist. My duties included helping them bathe, dress, and eat, along with providing other essential care. The following day, I began working on my own.
Two weeks later, I was assigned to a new address. An elderly woman opened the door and invited me in. She explained that her paralyzed husband required care. As we entered the room where the patient was, I froze in astonishment. Sitting before me was the very same old man I had seen in my dream. He was sitting in the same position, with clumps of food in his gray and reddish beard, and the same overwhelming terror and madness frozen in his blue eyes that had woken me in a cold sweat two weeks earlier.
The old man’s mind was trapped in the Hells of Screaming – a realm where sufferers cry out not to seek help, but to drown out their own despair and emotional emptiness. Although the man could neither move nor speak, his inner world was torn apart by cries inaudible to those around him. It was those cries that had reached me in my nightmare.
The Hells of Screaming arise in the consciousness of beings as a result of accumulating harsh, rude, and hostile speech – both internal and external. We may not even notice our own harsh speech, but its presence can easily be identified by the disgust we feel toward others and the world as a whole. Over time, this disgust gradually turns into the Hells of Screaming.
The terror and madness radiating from the old man were immense. However, the prayers and contemplation I had practiced after having my dream helped me see the emptiness and impermanence of those states when I encountered them in the physical realm. This allowed me to avoid feeling revulsion toward my patient.
Author
Author: Vladimir Pyatsky
Translation: Natasha Tsimbler
One night in 1992, I had a nightmare. I saw an old man, sitting in a wheelchair. His scraggly gray beard, streaked with reddish patches, had bits of food tangled in it, and his blue eyes were frozen in an expression of terror and madness. The dream left such a strong impression on me that I couldn’t fall back asleep for over an hour. Instead, I prayed and focused on dissolving the image of the old man in formless light. Finally, my anxiety subsided.
At the time, I was searching for a job. The morning after I had the dream, I received an unexpected phone call offering me a position of caring for the elderly. I accepted. A nurse, who was familiarizing me with my new job responsibilities, took me from house to house to meet the patients I was to assist. My duties included helping them bathe, dress, and eat, along with providing other essential care. The following day, I began working on my own.
Two weeks later, I was assigned to a new address. An elderly woman opened the door and invited me in. She explained that her paralyzed husband required care. As we entered the room where the patient was, I froze in astonishment. Sitting before me was the very same old man I had seen in my dream. He was sitting in the same position, with clumps of food in his gray and reddish beard, and the same overwhelming terror and madness frozen in his blue eyes that had woken me in a cold sweat two weeks earlier.
The old man’s mind was trapped in the Hells of Screaming – a realm where sufferers cry out not to seek help, but to drown out their own despair and emotional emptiness. Although the man could neither move nor speak, his inner world was torn apart by cries inaudible to those around him. It was those cries that had reached me in my nightmare.
The Hells of Screaming arise in the consciousness of beings as a result of accumulating harsh, rude, and hostile speech – both internal and external. We may not even notice our own harsh speech, but its presence can easily be identified by the disgust we feel toward others and the world as a whole. Over time, this disgust gradually turns into the Hells of Screaming.
The terror and madness radiating from the old man were immense. However, the prayers and contemplation I had practiced after having my dream helped me see the emptiness and impermanence of those states when I encountered them in the physical realm. This allowed me to avoid feeling revulsion toward my patient.
