My feeling of disappointment worsened, taking me down to a new personal crisis. Some would ask: “What else do you need?! You’ve got a stable business, a nice family, a wife and a child… Everything seems to be great!” That was what my life seemed to be like from an observer’s point of view, but there was emptiness inside.

Needless to say, my disappointment affected all and each sphere in my life, demolishing them. The first line to be hit were my relationships with my closest ones, as I brought that annoyance and disappointment home. Though, my family which I wished could become my new support, didn’t save me from my inner pain.

In all honesty, one day I just stopped feeling what was going on in my own home. I started fighting with my wife more often. Once I had a huge fight with Marina right after coming back home from a yacht trip with my friends. So huge, that we decided to break up.

We lived apart for about a week. I had enough time to think about what my life had turned into. Those days the thought I could lose my family came to my mind for the first time. Meanwhile, it was absolutely clear that Marina didn’t want that and she was dreaming about our happy family life together. It was me and no one else, as if I were trapped in a dark labyrinth, trying to escape from it without knowing where the exit was.

MY WILL TO DO THINGS HAD ALL BUT LEFT. I HAD NEITHER POWER, NOR WISH TO DO ANYTHING AT ALL. THAT WAS THE DEAD END.

I COULDN’T LIVE THAT WAY ANYMORE. THERE WAS A NEED TO CHANGE MY LIFE, TO LIVE SOME DIFFERENT WAY… BUT WHAT DID THAT “DIFFERENT” MEAN?

That’s when there was a huge change in my mind. Maybe, the most important one. I started getting that if you want to escape from a dead end, you need to totally change your life.

I started going to church, reading spiritual literature, visiting shrines, doing pilgrimages to holy places. I needed, I thought, to try that as well. Maybe, that was a way of escaping the reality and passions I used to live in. Anyways, I started acquiring a deeper interest in such activities. I started reading the Bible, prayers, stories about the saints, and about people who had a pure spirit. In those holy places, the places of power, I felt calm.

My main discovery that time was understanding that “yes, the way I live is wrong”. It occurred that there are some major rules of the world, which I was breaking by ignorance… And with my usual passion and self-commitment, I commonly put to sports and business, I dived into self-development. Just like a stranger who’s just got back from a desert, I was consuming that new knowledge thirstily and couldn’t quite quench my thirst.

I studied the rules of healthy family relationships and the rules of eating healthy. I was interested in each and every sphere of life, and I tried to check everything on my own.

I’d say that was the first time ever when I believed that despite the well-known material world, there is another, spiritual one, which is higher and purer. And that world is just as real as the matter surrounding me.

Even though I studied diverse holy texts, I couldn’t understand: how were these ancient truths be connected to my own life? I found no answers in conversations with priests.

Once my wife suggested I try yoga. I didn’t know much about that, but I agreed: anyways, that was something new and interesting! I visited a class and was impressed. For the first time in several years, I finally felt better: relaxed, calm, easy.

Later on, thanks to yoga, body and breath exercises, my physical and mental states started changing for the better. I began studying that practice deeper. And even though I didn’t understand the full depth of it, I continued.