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[Alexandr Korol]

And my attitude toward money became like this too: I do not want to count how much money I have, so that I will not think, so that I will not begin doubting or limiting myself like people do. It is as if I do not want to know how much money I have. Right now, during this wandering, this journey — whatever there is, that is what there is. When it runs out, then I will see that it is gone. It feels as though I do not want to count it, can you imagine? And I also noticed that when I am in this magical world, and when people began to ask me about work — while I still keep some connection with everyone, trying to find this golden middle — when they began asking me questions about work, I would respond without delving in, purely at the level of feelings: “this is yes, this is no, and this — well, what do you think?” Like that. But it was as if I did not even understand what they were asking me about, can you imagine? Before, I would answer with logic and precise calculation, when I was in the world of people. But now it is as though I do not even know, it does not matter to me what they are asking — about bolts, shoelaces, colors, prices. I simply respond: he described first, second, third — but the second gives some warmth in the chest, so I say: “the second option,” and that’s all. But I don’t even know what that second option is. I cannot even think it through, I cannot seem to delve in. Can you imagine? And everything is simply like this, by sensations. And also in this world I can easily sit and endlessly read my own book — any of the “Alternative History” volumes or “Paradox”. But “Paradox” is what I most want to read, of course. That multi-volume set, the three volumes of “Paradox”. I leaf through it, read it, and it feels very pleasant, it resonates deeply — because that is exactly the state being described there.

And to add by contrast — I’ve described this before, but I’ll say it again — that when you are in this magical world, the feeling is real: you are like a child, as if you don’t know anything yet. You know how a child isn’t embarrassed when, for example, he’s in a restaurant with his parents and starts running around the place? He doesn’t know that adults are watching him, that they are judging how he’s dressed. He doesn’t understand that. He doesn’t seem to understand anything, as if the outside world of people doesn’t concern him, as if he’s not part of it, as if he’s not