Monday 20 October 2008

The death of an Avatar.....and a good friend....Manuel Schoch R.I.P

I received an email on Saturday evening to say that Manuel Schoch had died. He was not ill. On 9 October he felt unwell, went into a coma and died peacefully on 10 October. It has had a devastating effect on me. Manuel was a swiss psychiatrist, neuroscientist and a mystic who could read auras ((is an electronic field around each of us that has a record of every event that has ever happened and our response to it). I first met him when I was working as a volunteer for Alternatives in central London when he came to give a talk. I knew when I heard him speak that if there was anyone who could explain what had happened on that meditation retreat in Devon in 1998 that it would be him.

I had myself convinced that the lack of sight in my right eye meant that my brain was in some way compensating which was the reason for the experience. When everyone had finished speaking with him I went up and explained briefly about what had happened and asked him whether the lack of sight in my right eye was the reason for the experience. All the time I was speaking he was looking at me intently. When I finished he said very slowly 'what happened to you has nothing to do with your eyes, I see it, it has nothing to do with your eyes'. I was so lost for words that all I said was 'no' and he said 'no and then he continued 'if you keep looking for explanations you will lose what you have'. Still bewildered I thanked him and left but was resolute that this man was going to be my teacher. Since that talk I have been unconsciously his student. My deepest regret is that I didn't sign up for his year long consciousness raising training course. I reasoned it by saying that I was in the middle of another course and I would do it when it came around again - now it's never going to come around and I have lost that golden opportunity.

I have often written about my distrust of so called Gurus but after that first talk I knew that he was my teacher or Guru. His combination of scientific rigour and only speaking about what he had direct experience of inspired me to live that way also. Not making claims for anything other than my own observation and experiences. Manuel was a gentle, humble and authentic man. His ability to ease people's pain and suffering by reading their auras and taking them back to pivotal points in their lives where something had happened that contributed to their current suffering was to be in the presence of a Master at work. The ease and gentleness with which he would restore them to their own power was so humbling and inspiring to see.

I remember on one training day a lady stood up and explained that she had been suffering with ME for almost 10 years. Manuel looked at her aura and asked her when she had been travelling around India. She said that it was almost 10 years ago. He said 'how was your health when you were in India' She said that she had been sick. He was able to see that some of the virus she had had when she was in India was still in her system and this is why she had been suffering from ME. He gave her the name of a friend of his who was a virologist. I was inspired by that. In the days and weeks that followed I often thought of that lady and wondered whether or not she had been freed from the ME. A year later I was at another of the training days run by Manuel and I began to speak to a woman. I shared with her this experience and said that I wondered how that woman was today. She started to laugh and said 'that was me'. I couldn't believe it. This animated woman was nothing like the woman who had stood up the last time. This woman was full of the joys of life, was lively and happy.

Manuel was based in Zurich in Switzerland but had a centre in central London. Following that first talk at Alternatives I always went to his talks when he came to London. After each one I came away inspired feeling that my consciousness had expanded and with an excitement for what is possible for human being. I did a couple of his weekends of consciousness raising and it was so powerful. I had complete trust in this man and his motives that I surrendered myself fully to what he was teaching. However, what I wasn't aware of when I was doing this training was that that I was still fearing losing control so I wouldn't let myself go so deep in the meditations, so unsurprisingly, achieving the profound depths of consciousness expansion was limited for me at this time but I trust that this is the way it was meant to be. I could listen to Manuel speak for ever and never get tired or bored. His background as a neuroscientist and psychiatrist as well as being a mystic meant that for me he was the ideal grounded teacher.


A year ago I wrote to him. I explained that I didn't want a Guru but a teacher or guide to study under, that he inspired me like nobody I had ever met before and asked if he would accept me as a student. I never received a response to the email but the next time he came to London and I went to his talk I felt he knew that it was me who had written him the email. At his talks he never asked for people's names, he said everything can be read in the aura.I remember at one talk he said 'the only thing that stops us seeing other realms (people who have died) is the anger and aggression we have towards ourselves'. This statement irritated me because I didn't think that I had any anger or aggression towards myself! I said 'I don't have any anger and yet I don't see other worlds'. He looked at me, smiled and said 'you don't have any anger against yourself' and I said 'no'. He then said 'you have so much anger towards yourself that it is making me do this' and he staggered backwards and sat on his chair'. He then started to ask me about certain events that had happened in my life where I had decided that 'I wasn't good, I was bad' and out of that decision made from something that happened when I was 5 came all of the anger and aggression I had towards myself'. He said 'if you could let that go, you have no idea what you could achieve'. That conversation shifted and expanded my consciousness and that is only 1 of many conversations I have had with him.


His death is a huge loss not only for me but for the world. He was a young man who was married with two children. His role of expanding consciousness to enable the shift that is coming will be unparalleled. Since his death I feel his presence keenly. All day Sunday I could see his smiling face. I want to finish this blog entry with a sentence that embodied who and what Manuel stood for. He was firmly convinced that '“The question is not how much love you get;
it is how much love you give.”

MANUEL SCHOCH.....REST IN PEACE...MY DEAR FRIEND AND TEACHER

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I have been to two of his talks. What a truely alive, inspiring & insightful man.
He showed me events in my life, how I dealt with them & how I should deal with them.

Thank you Manuel.

RIP.

Joachim Skibenes

shane said...

Yes, very difficult to find. I've only known about him in the last hour,

Nancy said...

Hello, I had the honor of meeting Manuel a couple yrs ago during his speaking visit in Florida. I was amazed, impressed, touched, influenced and in wonder. He selected 3 people in the room for aura readings; I was one. Among other accurate messages, he wagged his finger emphatically at me and forcefully said: "You are an excellent, talented therapist/teacher, why are you not acting on it?" I replied that I was concerned I'd give too much of my energy away and be depleted, as I had been before. He boldly said to stop associating with that connection and do this. I slowly read his book, eating up every word and teaching. As I work on my next book related to spirituality, I reached out to the Internet to contact him and thank him. Then I read your blog, and was shocked and saddened that I did not tell him earlier. But he knows. As a matter of fact, I had dreams of someone who looked like him, but did not associate this with him, until now. I thank you for your beautifully written memory and eulogy to a humble, loving, peaceful, and blunt warrier. Nancy

Margaret Dempsey said...

Thank you so much for this comment. It is timely because I have been thinking about Manuel a lot since the presence of swine flu and what he might make of it.

One key message that Manuel always spoke about was the importance of surrender. It was his childhood of being chained to a bed when he was a young boy in a Swiss orphanage that taught him the importance and power of surrender. As he said "I was a young boy, I couldn't escape, what was there to do but surrender." From that surrender consciousness came his mystical states and insights.

At this time the willingness to surrender control is going to be important in being powerful in the face of how the swine flu virus is going to develop. To surrender to what is happening not in wanting it be like this, but not to have any resistance which only strengthens whatever it is that is being resisted against.

I feel sure that Manuel would speak about surrender. At home I have a little book of sayings that one of his students compiled. I am selecting one to end this comment. He signed this book for me and it is my dearest possession.

"The process of surrender is to forget yourself, surrendering to your own consciousness"

Manuel...gone but never forgotten...

Anonymous said...

Manuel has changed my life forever.
I have just learned about his death. I have a mix of feelings as I know now he is nearer than ever!

Thank you Manuel!

RIP

Stefano De Gaspari

ranand said...

Manuel was a true Saint of this generating..try get your hands to..The Ancient Wisdom of ASHTAVAKRA..amazing work even Saint Ashtavakra would be proud of him.


Anf Manuel is and always will be present..he is pure consciousness