Yuriy Gorbunov
Chapter 3. San-Diego
Over the past year, I would often reflect on why, since childhood, I was forever being attracted towards esotericism and philosophy. Probably, it took the living through of more than one life, before the wild wanderer-seeker emerged as an esoterecist in the later years of my life.
I recall, that our family came to live on the outskirts of the town Kanko in Northern Korea in 1945-46 in a quarter inhabited by Soviet officers with their families just after the War II. Japanese officers had previously occupied the outskirts part of the town, where we were living,with their families, each in a separate house. The town was surrounded by hills, green, fine, friendly – an open space for boys. On the highest hill, about a kilometer from our suburb, stood a Buddhist temple. We loved to play around that temple.
Probably, it was there that my preparation began for the jump in development of my consciousness, which made me choose, after a long and agonising searching within myself, the path firstly as a military translator, then historian and philosopher, and finally to Oriental knowledge and esotericism. It was this path that has led me to San Diego.
Chance fortune led me to David Keane in distant Australia. He had found my address in the yearly Forum for Units of Service published through World Goodwill, well known throughout the world as an esoteric organization, formed by Alice Bailey in the 1920;s in America and highly popular today in the West. In its aims and activities, it is close to the Roerich Society. In a similar way in which Helena Roerich wrote, together with Master Morya, the volumes for "Agni Yoga", so also did Alice Bailey with Master Djwhal Khul writing 24 volumes on esoteric philosophy. Both teachings are given to us through Shamballa, legendary land in Himalayan Mountains. Both appeared to continue the work of “The Secret Doctrine” by H.P. Blavatsky.
We began to correspond, and David suggested to me that I translate a discipleship course in meditation through correspondence training, following the teachings of the Tibetan Master. I agreed. When I was preparing to visit my daughter, he wrote to his acquaintances in America about my arrival, recommending me to them and asking them to render to me help and support. I wrote to him, that I had founded a School of the Mysteries in Simferopol, and that I wanted to find in America a suitable contemporary program of esoteric training for my school. Following my request, I received a response from Michael Robbins, co-founder and director of the Seven Ray Institute and the University of Seven Rays.
In March of 1998, Michael phoned and invited me to attend the eleventh yearly conference at his university at San Diego. I agreed. They paid for my ticket and I came.
That;s how I turned out to be in San Diego. The hotel, specially arranged for those attending the conference, stood directly over the shore of the Pacific Ocean.
‘
Could I possibly have imagined in my distant childhood years, that in my later years, after surviving all the ideological twists of the "Cold War", I would find myself on the opposite shore? But that is just the way it has happened. So things are arranged by a higher force, which we all are subject to without exception, independently of whether we believe in it or not. This was what I was thinking about in the early morning on the day after arriving by air, while I was admiring the ocean from an embankment with palm trees and city skyscrapers in the background. While local joggers running or walking past welcomed me with a "Hi" or bowed their heads. And with pleasure I returned their greetings.
Afterwards, my acquaintances showed me a few of the local sights, the most kimportant being the famous Zoo Park, one of the best in the world. When it was first suggested that I be shown it, I hesitated and even felt a little offended, that I should be as a child who had not seen animals. But as it turned out, I had never before seen such a fine zoo park on hills, and I was thankful to be provided with such a splendid gift.
But the most generous gift, ever given to me, a esoterecist and orientalist, during the past quarter century, began at that very conference. It showed me as a fact, those people who constitute the New Age movement. In meeting with many of these people I became convinced of their unconventionality, their goodness, their high moral qualities, their preparedness to serve humanity through faith and truth. I in practice became convinced to a new degree, of the theosophical world-view, the living ethics and the beneficial influence of the Masters on humanity.