The story with Nadya became my first encounter with what I later called the field of meaning — an invisible matrix of perceptions and projections that exists beyond individual consciousnesses yet exerts influence on the people around them. At that time, I had no suspicion of its existence and no understanding of its mechanisms, but I already distinctly felt its impact: distorted information about me, arising in the minds of others, penetrated into my reality and created tension and dissonance. This was not an abstraction — it felt entirely real, as if other people’s thoughts about me had become part of my inner world. That experience laid the foundation for my later insights, although back then everything remained just a vague, intuitive sense — without a name or clear comprehension.
Nadya seemed to split my inner world in two. This feeling manifested itself most sharply in the autumn of 2011 and in 2012. The universe within me divided into two poles: on the one hand, my own beliefs about myself, on the other, a distorted perception that I associated with her and her circle. This gave rise to unceasing tension, a state of cognitive dissonance in which the inner knowledge of myself did not coincide with the external projection. In this way I first saw how the field operates: another’s perception does not remain a private opinion but invades one’s reality, forcing one to live in a divided consciousness.
One half of my universe was filled with heavy, alien energy — this was the “world of Nadya” projected into my consciousness. In it, I saw myself through her eyes and involuntarily turned into someone I had never been: a street kid, a drug addict, a stranger in my own world. Such distorted representations — introjects, alien thoughts that had settled inside — returned again and again, intensifying the dissonance. In essence, this resembled projective identification: her gaze began to function as my reality. It became clear that this was not a one-time experience but a mechanism — the operation of the field of meaning, when information born in another’s consciousness invisibly intrudes into your life and begins to define it.
On the other side was my own world — work and people who recognized value in what I was doing in programming. There I felt support and respect. Yet the dark half — Nadya’s projection — returned insistently. I experienced it as a narcissistic wound: a distorted version of me, created by someone else, repeatedly struck at my self-esteem and remained unresolved. No matter how my achievements grew, the split did not disappear: one part reached toward clarity and recognition, while the other drowned in imposed meanings and hostile interpretations. The field worked like a barrier, not allowing me simply to “ignore” someone else’s projection.
At that time, not only Nadya’s distorted representations pressed on me, but also tangible circumstances: robbery, betrayal by those I had considered friends, slander launched against me. The absence of parents and the disability of my brother made us vulnerable: threats and attempts at pressure arose precisely because I had the ability to earn money and thereby stood out. A sense of insecurity became the background: each day turned into maneuvering between risks and the necessity of protecting myself and my brother.
The hardest part was not what had happened itself, but how Nadya interpreted it. She passed the events through a ready-made script of “drugs — street fights,” made a direct conclusion about my responsibility, and, as a result, removed any grounds for support and compassion. This assumption became fixed and turned into a permanent frame of her perception of me. Here the action of the field manifested especially clearly: someone else’s version did not remain a mere opinion but pressed as reality — it intensified the internal dissonance and became a factor of my everyday existence.
Every attempt to clarify what had happened for her was read as harassment — as if a “drug addict who cannot let go of the past” was once again disturbing her. In her frame I appeared obsessive, while my goal was different: to restore fairness and show that the constructed image was mistaken. Later I called this the filters of consciousness — stable assumptions and scenarios through which a person selects meanings to interpret events.
Thus a closed circle emerged: any attempt to remove the projection — to approach Nadya or her circle, to clarify facts, to correct the image — was instantly read as an impulsive attempt to “win back the ex.” A double bind arose: in order to correct the distortion, one must address the source, but the very act of addressing immediately confirms the label of “persecutor.” It is like a shell game: wherever the “ball of meaning” might be, the interpretation is always adjusted to fit the previous scheme. The labeling effect and the fundamental attribution error came into play: behavior was read not according to the facts but according to a pre-accepted cause. This is how the filters of consciousness operated: the given frame made interpretations self-reinforcing, and any contact only strengthened the original assumption. This is one of the mechanisms of how the field of meaning works.
And this is not an isolated case. A narrow horizon of vision substitutes observation with expectation: ambiguity is experienced as a threat, and the label assumes the role of protection. This is how the habit of the mind works, filling in gaps with a ready-made script: say “conflict — night — police,” and many will automatically add “drugs.” The map begins to scold the territory, and the script begins to rewrite the facts. Thus grows the inertia of form, which demands that meaning must correspond to the template.
I found myself caught between an unchangeable external perception and unceasing internal pressure: my consciousness could not reconcile two irreconcilable worlds. The field left no space for disputing the frame and forced me to look for another way out.
I drew a practical conclusion: to argue with the frame is meaningless; projections can be weakened only by results. I began to set new goals and consistently achieve what, in Nadya’s optics — where I was a supposed “street addict” — I allegedly could not have done. I immersed myself in travel, teaching, deeper self-education, and launched my own projects in development. These were not only steps for myself — they were verifiable facts that contradicted the imposed label. In this way I influenced the field: each completed step added new information to it and weakened the old projections.
To convey the facts, I chose neither dialogue nor justifications but an asymmetric, calm channel of fixation. I marked my progress to Nadya mostly through small gifts on “VKontakte” accompanied by short messages. It was important to establish rhythm: not random outbursts but steady predictability. Regularity shifted the gesture from the category of “intrusive signal” to “stable background,” and in that format it ceased to provoke resistance from the frame. With each new result, the internal pressure diminished: I distinctly felt how the projection of hatred was losing its grip. When major successes were lacking, I maintained the rhythm with verses from motivational songs and brief clarifications of the truth about myself — this provided a similar release and kept the field tuned to facts rather than rumors.
Gradually a working logic took shape: what matters is not only the information but also the frequency of its appearance. A series of events incompatible with the label and presented in a steady rhythm drains the energy of the frame more reliably than any argument. These practices confirmed my intuition about the field: by introducing new, verifiable information with the right periodicity, I could change its influence on me.
That is why I am writing this book: to record the route through the field — not by arguing with frames but by relying on verifiable facts and clear mechanisms. When the route is laid out, the field no longer pulls you back into the old vortex. This book structures my experience and formulates those mechanisms of the field that at the time were only beginning to emerge.
