That night I wrote to Robert, the disciple who had gotten shot, "...the past 4-5 years have been a bad trip, a bad format. i was getting sicker, weaker. it is necessary for my well being that i live off my own power. i have no need to convince you of this. this my body knows. my body has been telling me for years to leave Rama. Finally, he stopped convincing me to stay. Then i couldn't make it on my own. So i left & came back. Now i'm stronger; off my own steam...unlike past times when i left Rama's Attention field, i'm not going to waste thoughts & power on the past. The past, people's thoughts about me, my thoughts about me-- are all like Nately's Whore, in Catch-22; only she misses, and i jump..." About a week later, Dana called me with a "Warrior's task." Rama, she explained, wanted me to get former disciple Tom to call him. I told her that I was not looking for a Warrior's task-- or any task for that matter. "You know I have left the Centre," I said. "Don't you think you might be following your gut feelings?" she asked. "You bet!" I also followed my gut feelings during the group acid trip earlier that month when Rama asked the disciples to remain inside. I had walked outside and watched the small birds fly. "The bottom line is that he's wrong about me," I thought, my self-confidence germinating the way pine seeds flourish when their cones are scorched by fire. "I'm not possessed by demons, mentally ill, or bent on destruction. I'm okay." 20. The Last Supper In August, 1985, I began spending time with old friends and with people from work. I felt awkward. I did not know what to talk about. They used words like concerts, bar hop, chaser, dive, dude, hot babe, married, pregnant, job security, tax break, investment, global economy, third world, cold war, Reagan, Saturday Night Live, and Letterman. Their language felt alien to me. They used "party" as a verb, not as a noun. They used "to see" as a way to describe what they did with their eyes and with their mind, not what they did with their inner being. I learned to navigate within their world, but felt like I did not belong. The initial reentry into society was difficult in other ways. I found myself constantly reverting back to Rama's world of fear, isolation, and self-doubt. When I had eye contact with someone, for instance, I had to remind myself that my reservoir of mystical power was not being drained. When I saw a flicker of light, I had to remind myself that the reflection was not Negative Forces. When a non-disciple told me of his or her hopes and dreams, I had to remind myself that theirs was not simply a world of illusion. And when I thought of my own hopes and dreams, I had to remind myself that I was not a mentally ill zombie unable to deal with the real world.