Moscow, international airport ‘Domodedovo’.

I checked in for the Moscow-Bombay flight, and proceeded to the passport control zone. I was looking forward to this trip and my imagination was picturing tropical sights, ancient temples of astonishing beauty, and gracious women in bright sari with beautiful eyes, just like in the Indian movies I used to watch in my childhood...

Lost in my imagination, I came up to the desk and offered my passport for inspection. A woman in uniform opened it, looked at me with a long thoughtful gaze and said harshly:

“Young lady, this is not your passport!”

The visions of ancient temples and women dressed in sari disappeared straight away! Trying to stay calm, I made an honest face and started to attempt to convince the woman behind the glass window:

“Look carefully at the photo! It is me, honestly, can’t you see? I just changed a little, lately”.

“Do you have a twin sister?”

“No, just a younger brother.”

I showed her my credit card, my driver license, and finally she softened up believing me and, returning my passport through the window, said:

“Come through! Take my advice, you’d better change your passport”.

A bit upset by the incident, I walked towards the Duty free zone. Indeed, the officer at the passport control zone had been right. Her trained professional eye picked up straight away that the woman standing in front of her and the one who in the passport’s picture - taken three and a half years earlier - were two different women.

I am used to compliments lately; people often tell me that I have changed. My old friends tell me that I look almost as I did in my student years. Yet, all outer changes are not so important, no matter how amazing they are. What really counts are not the changes in the outer looks, but in the inner power that have awakened inside of me, a power that had been asleep for many years.

In one of the duty free boutique full of the scents and fragrances coming from the elegant bottles and boxes, I remembered how I got to become a Goddess. 

It all had begun with the Internet.

A friend had e-mailed me a advertisment about a sight called ‘Ladyworld’ and had insisted that I registered and subscribed to some women’s lessons. She had been already receiving them for a month and, according to the number of exclamation points in her email, she appeared thrilled with them. So curiosity got the best of me, and I looked the sight up.

The title ‘School of Goddesses’ intrigued me, as I’ve always loved unusual things, things able to fuel my imagination, I read all about the school, looked through a few lessons, which were on sight, and subscribed to them without a second though.  Reading the lessons, I experienced a strange velvety, voluptuous feeling in me: each word was intriguing, new and full of a wisdom whose dept came through the light, playful tone in which they were written.

The essence of these lessons was the following: get to know the woman inside of you….she is divine! Learn to love this woman, allow her to express herself and to take the place she deserves in life.  

I gulped down all the lessons they sent me and looked forward to the new ones, whilst trying to do all the exercises and practices given in them. The exercises were so simple that I did not expect any miracles or quick results, yet these came very quickly. At first men’s increasing attention seemed to be just a coincidence, but…it wasn’t. I guess that I began to radiate something new and extraordinary, which man could feel, and which made my eyes shine when I looked at myself in the mirror. With the ‘School of Goddesses’ lessons life became warm and pleasant.

However, a whole year went by before I decided to attend the school.

The photos on the ‘Ladyworld’ sight were very beautiful and women looked like real goddesses. “Well, I would never look anything like this”, I thought. All my life I thought that I had looks and ordinary luck. Yet, the desire to walk this path further was stronger than my fears of being judged and I dialed the number given on the sight. The woman’s voice on the other end of the line sounded pleasant and encouraging, as if saying: “Do not be scared, all is going to be well”.  I took the address and the timetable, and went along.    

We were sitting in soft chairs in a small cozy hall, waiting for the beginning of my first lesson at the ‘School of Goddesses’. Women were chatting along and I was barely looking at them. Some of these women were standing out: they were the once who had come several times. Others, however, were like me: newcomers. After all I was not any worse off than others; all the Goddesses once had been newcomers too. The very moment I came up with this conclusion, the tutor had invited us into the hall.

I was thoroughly examining a ‘real’ Goddess.  She was medium height and pretty. Looking more carefully, I realised that she did not have extraordinary features, although she radiated a feminine charm and grace. She was slightly flirtatious and, at the same time, confident and well mannered: precisely these were the qualities, which lifted her onto a pedestal.

“Now, as always, let‘ s start our lesson with some warming up exercises, remembering that love as well as acceptance of our bodies is the beginning of self-love. Strip, plasticity and eastern dances, are the best exercises for women as they harmonically develop the body and release the energy of the sexual centre”. 

My favourite music, Enigma, started to play and we all followed our tutor imitating   striptease movements, looking at ourselves in the big mirror. At the beginning I did not feel comfortable with looking at myself in the mirror as, in comparison with the gracious cat-like movement of out tutor mine looked stiff and awkward. Slowly, however, I relaxed and started trusting my body. My movements were becoming better and better. The music, the dance and the cheering voice of our tutor made me feel light and full of joy. 

“And now let’s move on to the next stage: the creation of our charming feminine image! Has everybody brought stockings, high heals shoes, cosmetics and all other stuff?”

Everyone got busy, and the magic of transformation begun. A coward voice inside me, resisting the changes, wailed: “Why do you need it all? Why do you need to become a goddess? Your life is quite normal, like anybody else’s”.  My negative woman’s experience was desperately screaming: “God! It is so scary!” In spite of this, the passionate desire of liberating myself from that experience as well as the anticipation of something new and extraordinary took the upper hand.  After all, I had nothing to lose! So, I obediently tried to follow all the instructions of our tutor. 

She helped me to put the eye shadows and eyeliner on. Other women, generously, shared with me their cosmetics as of late, my beauty-bag contained only mascara, ‘neutral’ eye shadows and two lipsticks, one pale pink and the other light brown.  Funny that during my university years, I remembered, all girls from my group used to come to me to be helped with putting their make up on!

All those joyful creatures were flying about, helping me wrapping myself up into some glittery and transparent fabrics, flowers and feathers. At the beginning, as I could not do it properly, I ‘stole ideas’ from other women and tried to copy them.  

The generous ‘goddesses’ were sharing their skills. It felt so nice: no jealousy and competition, as it often happens amongst women! Slowly all tension disappeared without leaving a trace. Our preparations were coming to an end, and the atmosphere in the hall filled up with a special feminine scent, with beauty, creativity and harmony. Those were unusually thin vibrations, but I could feel them with all my body, all my being.  It was just like some memories from my childhood: I was surrounded not by women, but by incredible creatures from fairy tales, light colorful ladybugs, flocks of heavenly birds or a bunch of exotic flowers from a tropical garden. My heart started pounding with joy; I understood that I was one of them: Cinderella, from her world of poverty and hard labor, had arrived at the royal palace.  

Suddenly I heard an unhappy voice: “I don’t understand why we should need all this? ! The most important thing in people is their soul’s beauty. All this cosmetics, all those colorful rugs, it is do artificial! I believe in natural beauty, much better than this!”  This voice belonged to a middle-aged woman with a short haircut, wearing heavy glasses; she was one of the newcomers. To me she looked like a nerd or a schoolteacher. She obviously could not overcome the fear of putting some make up on her face.   

Our teacher invited us to sit in a circle and started explaining:

“You are definitely right, there is no make up that can cover negative emotions and stupid thoughts, beauty begins from within. But let us have a look at our believe system, that to wear cosmetics and to dress up are a bad thing to do. Where is this coming from? Let’s remember the soviet movies. We could often see that beautiful, bright, sexy woman, who knew how to attract man, would always turn out to be a negative character in the movie: selfish, greedy and bitter. She, in addition, would always end up unhappy, because men would, always, leave her for a plain, but honest and nice woman.  We have all ‘swallowed’ these lies, even though it was obvious that in reality things are quite different. Why did soviet ideologist need this? What was wrong with beautiful women? As they were outstanding may be they were a distraction from hard work in the factories. As they were a source of sexuality, hence announced freedom, a freedom, which was, however, persecuted in soviet times! Indeed  we had grown up in this atmosphere.

We had heard similar stories coming from the western world, even though their cultural roots were different from ours.

Recently I had spoken to some Dutch women. Unfortunately, their culture stops them also from looking after themselves and, on the contrary, fosters the thought that it is quite acceptable to ware baggy unisex clothes, runners and plain hair. Who would believe that they are hoping to attract a partner and to have happy relationships! I want you to understand my dears, that a very small percentage of men on Earth have their third eye open, man do not have the super ability to see your beautiful souls and good thoughts, especially at first glance. Ask any man, what attracts him to a strange woman and he would say: the way she walks, her hair, her attractive eyes, hips, waist… All men have different taste, but all of them are talking about the looks. No one mentions the soul. As we want to be happy and loved by a worthy man, we need to learn how to attract their attention”.

The tutor patiently kept on explaining to us and answering our questions.

“Let’s now come to the mirror and continue our dance getting deeper and deeper into this new state, creating our new and permanent image inside of us!”

We continued dancing. I looked in the mirror at this gorgeous mysterious creature, and I was beginning to like it more and more. I was becoming the woman who, without admitting it to myself, I always wanted to be. 

The dancing was becoming more passionate and free. The tutor was showing us new and more complex movements, which my body was repeating as if it had always known them. It felt as though a heat wave was filling my body up, bringing with it an amazing feeling of freedom. The music kept changing and together with the music, the images were changing too: Witch, Goddess, Tiger, Courtesan, Angel and Demon at the same time.  Like Margaret in the famous romantic novel, something inside of me was screaming: “I am free! I am free!”

I was picturing my future life, imagining how it would change from that day onwards. My relationships with men, which so far had only brought pain and disappointment, now were becoming a divine game.

I promised myself that I should certainly become happy!

Those were my first steps on the never-ending path of perfection.

Later, came new lessons and new sacred impressions: trips to Altai and unforgettable meetings. The last three years of my life had been very fulfilling and bright.

I looked at the clouds beneath the airplane. At that altitude, filled with believe in my bright future, I thanked God for my life full of miracles and for all those people helping me to open up the doors to all these miracles.