In Search of the Miraculous

Having defined this I saw that the problem consisted in directing attention on

oneself without weakening or obliterating the attention directed on something else.

Moreover this "something else" could as well be within me as outside me.

The very first attempts at such a division of attention showed me its possibility. At

the same time I saw two things clearly.

In the first place I saw that self-remembering resulting from this method had nothing

in common with "self-feeling," or "self-analysis." It was a new and very interesting state with a strangely familiar flavor.

And secondly I realized that moments of self-remembering do occur in life, although

rarely. Only the deliberate production of these moments created the sensation of

novelty. Actually I had been familiar with them from early childhood. They came

either in new and unexpected surroundings, in a new place, among new people while

traveling, for instance, when suddenly one looks about one and says: How strange! I

and in this place; or in very emotional moments, in moments of danger, in moments when it is necessary to keep one's head, when one hears one's own voice and sees and

observes oneself from the outside.

I saw quite clearly that my first recollections of life, in my own case very early ones,

were moments of self-remembering. This last realization revealed much else to me.

That is, I saw that I really only remember those moments of the past in which I

remembered myself. Of the others I know only that they took place. I am not able wholly to revive them, to experience them again. But the moments when I had

remembered myself were alive and were in no way different from the present. I was

still afraid to come to conclusions. But I already saw that I stood upon the threshold of a very great discovery. I had always been astonished at the weakness and the

insufficiency of our memory. So many things disappear. For some reason or other the

chief absurdity of life for me consisted in this. Why experience so much in order to

forget it after-'wards? Besides there was something degrading in this. A man feels

something which seems to him very big, he thinks he will never forget it; one or two

years pass by—and nothing remains of it. It now became clear

to me why this was so and why it could not be otherwise. If our memory really keeps

alive only moments of self-remembering, it is clear why our memory is so poor.

All these were the realizations of the first days. Later, when I began to learn to

divide attention, I saw that self-remembering gave wonderful sensations which, in a

natural way, that is, by themselves, come to us only very seldom and in exceptional

conditions. Thus, for instance, at that time I used very much to like to wander through

St. Petersburg at night and to "sense" the houses and the streets. St. Petersburg is full of these strange sensations. Houses, especially old houses, were quite alive, I all but

spoke to them. There was no "imagination" in it. I did not think of anything, I simply walked along while trying to remember myself and looked about; the sensations came

by themselves.

Later on I was to discover many unexpected things in the same way. But I will

speak of this further on.

Sometimes self-remembering was not successful; at other times it was

accompanied by curious observations.

I was once walking along the Liteiny towards the Nevsky, and in spite of all my

efforts I was unable to keep my attention on self-remembering. The noise, movement,

everything distracted me. Every minute I lost the thread of attention, found it again,

and then lost it again. At last I felt a kind of ridiculous irritation with myself and I

turned into the street on the left having firmly decided to keep my attention on the fact that I would remember myself at least for some time, at any rate until I reached the following street. I reached the Nadejdinskaya without losing the thread of attention

except, perhaps, for short moments. Then I again turned towards the Nevsky realizing

that, in quiet streets, it was easier for me not to lose the line of thought and wishing

therefore to test myself in more noisy streets. I reached the Nevsky still remembering

myself, and was already beginning to experience the strange emotional state of inner

peace and confidence which comes after great efforts of this kind. Just round the

corner on the Nevsky was a tobacconist's shop where they made my cigarettes. Still

remembering myself I thought I would call there and order some cigarettes.

Two hours later I woke up in the Tavricheskaya, that is, far away. I was going by izvostchik to the printers. The sensation of awakening was extraordinarily vivid. I can almost say that I came to. I remembered everything at once. How I had been walking along the Nadejdinskaya, how I had been remembering myself, how I had thought