Hardly one thought in her head is the same as compared to four years ago. That is how Lena Svanborg experiences the change since she started the new movement in her life that eventually brought her to Borntorpet.
Lena, the 11½ months younger sister of the Borntorpet founder Johan, was always of a restless nature. Driven by impulse she would give anything that came her way, and felt attractive enough, a chance. She would spontaneously speak out her thoughts about this or that, not caring too much about the consequences. Regarding the yoga lifestyle of her elder brother, however, Lena stayed indifferent. Until a certain point in time, that is...
Lena used to make a living from a variety of service jobs. As a young woman she went to Spain. Formally she went as an au pair, but for Lena that title tells very
little of what her journey was about. She started a relationship with a man who
played in a rock band. Life soon started to revolve around the concerts and tours of
the band, rather than the floor mopping and grocery shopping in her host family.
Following the trip to Spain, Lena had a period of eight years when she travelled,
worked and lived in different places in Europe. Especially she spent a lot of time
in Greece.
Life brought Lena back to Sweden in 2001. What do to now? She was aware of an
inner state of confusion. Restlessness didn’t work as a driving force anymore. It didn’t
satisfy. She felt a pressing need to become more of the main character in her own life. Life, it seemed, was about becoming
someone, and she felt that she was still waiting to become what she was meant to be. What would be her career? What was
she to become?
“Become the one you are!” This was the slogan of HumaNova, an institute of psychosynthesis in Stockholm –
an answer as fitting as any to her questions. Lena decided to do the first year of their training, compulsory for
every student and geared towards one’s own personal development. Such a focus fitted her perfectly. She didn’t
necessarily want to become a therapist. She just wanted to get rid of her confusion, and find out what her place
in life was.
The year at HumaNova did change a lot. Looking back, Lena identifies this as the point in time where her story
changes directions, starting to move towards the life she is presently discovering at Borntorpet/Shambala. It took
time for the change to become outwardly visible though. During, and after the HumaNova year, Lena worked
as a ground hostess at Arlanda airport, a job similar to many other she had had. But in her free time, she now
started to devour books on spirituality. There was a call sounding inside her, and it came from... Truth. (Even
though Lena, being no friend of big sounding words, would perhaps make an attempt to somewhat soften that
way of saying it...)
Lena left her job at Arlanda when another opportunity turned up. Three Greek restaurant owners whom she knew
offered her to run their new café in the Stockholm district of Söder. Being a social networker at heart, Lena loved it.
She spent a year at “her” café, doing what comes most naturally for her: fixing, managing, networking, and
applying her sweetness and warmth to have the customers turn into beloved regulars. She worked hard, but she
was also better paid than ever. Well enough to be able to buy her own apartment, something she had been
dreaming about.
All was well, but was this all? Lena came to a point where it seemed that she had no life outside of the café
business. A conflict with one of the owners of the place put it to an end. It all died in a day, emotionally. On
that day, Lena called Johan. “Stay where you are, I’ll be there in ten minutes”, he said. Sitting down to talk with
Johan, Lena realized how her brother had long been aware of her working too hard. He confirmed and reinforced
her feeling of being in need of a break.
Lena bought a ticket to Thailand. She felt a deep need of letting go of anything excessive and superfluous in her
life, keeping only the essential. That left her with a packing of only 7 kg. No fancy clothes and jewellery, no makeup,
just the plain necessities. She spent three months in Thailand. She spoiled herself to at least one massage or other
treatment a day, and she started doing yoga. On the whole, during these months she adopted a lifestyle in many
ways similar to the one she now enjoys at Shambala.
Back in Sweden, Lena moved in to a 12-people community on a boat in Hammarbyhamnen in Stockholm.
One of the people living there was Anneli, the TV journalist who was later to become Lena’s workmate at
Shambala. Lena was offered to start up cafés in southern Sweden, this time as an entrepreneur rather than an
employee. Later the chance came to work in a free school for children with problems of the Aspberger and
ADHD type. She felt at ease with the kids at the school, but not with the adults. Staff-room conversations were
typically about things like “the Friday beer”. It didn’t match with Lena at all.
In June 2008, right after having quit the school job, Lena went to Borntorpet together with Anneli and another
two girlfriends. It was good to be there – as usual. And then, after a couple of days, it was time to leave –
as usual... Or was it? She had been visiting Borntorpet a few times, but she had always been off, back to the city,
in a couple of days. So now that the midsummer celebrations were over, it was time to get going again –
wasn’t it? Johan asked her: “Lena where are you going?” Yes, where was she actually going? What was there
really to go back to in Stockholm? She mentioned this and that that she needed to attend to. But Johan didn’t
look too impressed. “Stay here”, he said.
Stay at Shambala? Lena allowed the idea to really sink into her. And she stayed. It felt very natural, after all,
she just hadn’t dare to seriously consider the possibility. And here she is. To this day. It is from here that she can
say that hardly one thought in her head is the same as four years ago, in 2006, when she embarked on that trip
to Thailand.
Lena’s first time with Shambala as her base was intense. She participated in a Thai massage course. The open
and relaxed atmosphere challenged her shyness when it comes to exchanging physical touch and truly putting
herself out. A 10-day silent meditation retreat followed, and then immediately after that, a one-month Thai massage
training in Greece. Then, when the year of 2008 cooled off in Sweden, Lena travelled together with Johan to Bali.
There she was introduced to the wisdom of the Vedanta teachings and met many healers and other people of a
kind new to her. It all offered many new pieces to the puzzle...
The next summer Lena returned to Borntorpet. Together with Johan, Otto and Mirja, she now belonged to the
quartet at charge. Melissa, Johan’s Spanish girlfriend, had also come into the picture, and there were as usual
other people around the core group who contributed on a voluntary basis. But something happened that almost
made the entire enterprise of Shambala come to an end: Otto and Mirja with their baby boy decided to move on, and not return to Borntorpet for the season of 2010.
Johan was on the verge of dropping it all. And who knows, perhaps that would actually have happened, hadn’t
it been for Lena pushing her brother. Shambala had until then attracted many people who enjoyed it as a place
to hang out but didn’t feel called to contribute to the management and outreach to the general public. It had
been to 70 percent about community life. Lena’s idea was to make it 70 percent about courses and retreats.
She suggested to Johan that the two of them together would give Shambala a new start. Together with Johan
she started to play around with the idea of bringing in all their favourite teachers and cram the summer of 2010
with high quality courses. Yet, Johan, tired after an intensive season, hesitated. But eventually, he said yes. Lena
was happy. This felt so totally right.
During the following winter Johan’s and Melissa’s relationship grew more stable, which made it clear that they
were now three people at the steering wheel of the ship facing the summer season of 2010. In addition there
was Lena’s friend Anneli, now being more or less in the same position as Lena had been a year earlier: Inspired
to work for Shambala, just waiting for the right moment to step fully onboard...
It is clear that Lena and Shambala is a great match. Daring to stay on past the two three days of her first few
visits, she made a great discovery. Shambala is a place with an entirely different set of playing rules than society
at large. The “density of heart” here is big enough to support Lena in nourishing that which is essential in her self
while disregarding the artificial and superfluous. The inner change that was kick started by her year at HumaNova
continues at Shambala, and – most importantly – here it is also outwardly manifested in her day to day life and
work. Truth is catching up on her.
