sovereign of oneself

the intention of the book “sovereign of oneself” was to serve as an extension of my short film and unfold through fragments of exchanges with mother theodora, the abbess of the monastery. the impulse for pursuing my project “sovereign of oneself” emerged from witnessing “andrei rublev” (1966) by andrei tarkovsky, a film that resonated with me profoundly.  the final scene, where the monochromatic shot dissolves into the unfolding cinematic condensation of abstract chromatic excerpts of the frescos of andrei rublev, accompanied by the symphonic music, reduced me to tears. the sequence created a transcendental cinematic experience where the viewer is imposed to self-reflect.

i was overcome by the sensation that my eyes seemed to have truly opened for the first time. i experienced an inner clearing, as though an obstruction had been lifted. the film conveys religion from a multitude of perspectives that until then had not been revealed to me. i came to the realisation that, after years of rejecting religion, i had become receptive. the experience appeared to reveal what within me had been locked away.

mother theodora was aware that i was not religious, yet she never sought to persuade me. through our conversations, she imparted her wisdom and unveiled her past with silent sincerity. i came to sense how enlightened the nuns were, how intuitively in resonance with pure introspection. my preconceptions of religion and the church dissolved as religion revealed itself not as an institution of belief, but as a path toward spiritual enlightenment. i remain not religious, yet i have come to believe that within the rituals of religion one can awaken spirituality, approaching the threshold of transcendence and revealing the sacred within.