Mid-year 2018
I was working at my desk, my colleagues around me, when a lady walked up to me and placed a chocolate bar with a sticker on it in front of me.
She smiled coolly at me and walked away,
My colleagues saw, they all cheered, saying things like “Still got it, hey!”
I turned to look at her, catwalking away, but she never looked back.
Her name was Jaya. She worked on the legal team, and she was the best and worst thing ever to happen to me.
Before this, I’d never really noticed her before; she had a wedding ring on, and she was distant and seemed bitchy. So I had zero interest in talking to her.
Besides the fact that I myself was a ball of depression, insecurity, and anxiety.
Soon after, I bought a similar chocolate bar, removed the sticker, placed it on the new chocolate bar, walked up to her, and set it on her desk.
The beginning of the end.
With my nose still deep in spiritual books, I often came across the thing everyone wants:
Love.
A story stuck with me about how the Japanese believe the gods tie an invisible red string around the little fingers of two people who are destined to meet and be together, regardless of time, place, or circumstance.
Yeah, love sounded great. But I wasnt looking, I was searching for meaning instead. I was far more concerned with spiritual matters. I hadn’t had sex in possibly a year or two at that time, but with my new awakening, that didn’t really matter.
I remember running into her in the kitchen soon after. I asked her why she had a wedding ring on, and she told me she was married….
I was staggered, “Then why are you giving random men chocolate bars in such a fashion!?” I internally screamed at her.
Later on, I discovered she was apparently going through a divorce.
The Michael today would have given her finger and walked the fuck away, but the Michael of yesterday was a broken boy, completely flattered by a walking red flag giving him scraps of offhand attention.
I initially ignored her, but I would find out that she loved that.
Then, something unexpected happened; her energy became attached to me.
At night, when I was high, meditating, doing yoga, or drawing, I could FEEL her. She became like a cloud wrapped around me. An ever-present energy that would shift in different directions that I would feel in real time.
A seed of infatuation took root.
She was flirty but distant. Every time she was physically around me, it seemed like a performance. Whether it was her hovering around my area, asking strange questions to the people next to me, clearing her throat when strutting by, throwing glances at me, whipping her hair around, or just talking loudly within earshot,
It was pretty clear she was interested in me, or at the very least, trying to get some attention. We did speak sometimes, but always very briefly and superficially.
And then, a letter from HR. She told them that I was harassing her.
What??? The lady who started off by giving me a chocolate bar and was now seemingly parading herself around me said I was harassing her??
I was taken aback. I immediately distanced myself. Shocked and hurt, I immediately began ignoring her.
Much to my complete utter amazement and complete lack of understanding about women, she seemed to love this and even amplified her efforts to get my attention. Quickly noticing this, I, being a little bitch, soon buckled and spoke to her about something or other; we laughed a little. Then just as before, she retreated.
My mind struggled to comprehend.
At night, when I was alone, high, and lost in meditation, the same thing began to happen: I began to feel her energy even MORE. She may as well have been in the room with me. I could connect with her easily and deeply. I really could just tap into her.
My empathic abilities were never great, but with her, it was like an open book, and I didn’t even need to be near her. By feeling her feelings, I began to realise things about her.
I felt deep, deep pain in her. Wounds from a lost marriage. A lost father. A cheating spouse. An utter sense of insecurity.
I began crying, but not for me, but processing her pain.
I knew this was possible from my Ayahuasca experience, where someone did the same for me.
I could do it for her, but no Ayahuasca needed. This happened a few times over the next few months.
I was deeply connected to this woman, whether I liked it or not. There was something there…Past lives? Karma ties? A twin flame? Something?
Then a shift began to happen: whenever I was angry with her and had decided we wouldn’t speak again. She would grow interested in me, I would ignore her. Yet, at home, as soon as I got high, it felt like my heart would pry open and send a rush of love to her, which she seemingly deeply hated.
With a freshly opened heart gushing love, I would try to speak to her the following week, which she then couldn’t stand and would immediately push back; this would close my heart, so I began ingoring her again, which caused a lack of attention to her, which she hated, then she would attempt to flirt with me, which I would ignore, until I smoked weed again, and my heart pryed open again.
A painful cycle began.
Months and months ensued of her breaking open and shutting down my heart.
And inevitably, reality hit. Another message from HR. Jaya says you are harassing her again.
Harassing her??? I was barely able to speak to her??? She’s flirting up and down with me??? Our energy is off the charts! FUCK!
My mind didn’t know which way was up anymore.
I think around November, I drew a line, sent her a message on Facebook and told her to leave me the fuck alone.
Then, on Monday, she arrived on crutches. I crumbled immediately and briefly asked if she was okay.
She smiled and told me some made-up story.
Afterwards, she took them off and walked normally. I was played like a book.
A light switch being flipped off and on.
I knew enough spiritual knowledge to know that I wasn’t crazy. I could feel this energy, the same way I could feel the field around me. She even began appearing at random places I went to.
Fate seemed to be screaming at me to figure this mystery out.
Until,
Fate squeezed the trigger.
I was called into a meeting and told I was to be suspended.
Jaya had made a case with a friend of hers (who I barely even knew was alive) that I was harassing BOTH of them. HR took the matter forward, we had a meeting, and well, long story short, I lost my fancy financial job working at the Waterfront in beautiful Cape Town on 21 December 2018 – the Summer Solstice.
And that was it. Over before it was even started.
Pretty pathetic, right?
Yeah, completely avoidable if I just didn’t smoke weed, and I guess had a better backbone.
But strangely, those weeks leading up to my firing, I was so calm. Like, really calm. I even stopped smoking 5 days before I was fired. Eerily calm.
On the day, I simply took the news on the chin and went home. I had an overwhelming conviction that Jaya would come clean.
In an attempt to escape reality, I got home and ingested 5 grams of psilocybin mushrooms.
But strangely, this time the usual sense of overwhelming love was absent. I felt alone, cold, and as if I were being watched on all sides. I felt eyes all around me, then I felt a darkness approaching me.
Michael's musings 