Extended Spiritual Warfare and Faith Journey Dialogue

Date: August 27, 2025 Participants: Gary Sheng, Marina Onopriichuk Duration: Extended conversation Location: Austin (Gary), Library/Train (Marina) Context: Deep spiritual mentorship and mutual encouragement during periods of spiritual warfare and career transition

Opening Context and Daily Rhythms

Marina's Current State and Family Pressures

Marina opened the conversation exhausted from both caffeine crash and "existential exhaustion," describing her current situation helping elderly parents in war-torn Ukraine while navigating personal career uncertainty. As an only child, she carries sole responsibility for their wellbeing:

Marina: "I'm one child and my parents in the war... somehow, miraculously, just like literally, a miracle of God, they some kind of survive. But then, small city. And obviously people have no anymore purchasing power... So that is kind of like, also pressure on my holders. So without God, I don't know, this reality would, like, just crush your soul big time."

Museum Pop-up Concept and Career Exploration

Marina shared her current project developing a "museum popcorn concept" examining "what kind of parts of us as a human start extincting by technology," seeking collaborators and sponsors. She's simultaneously exploring various opportunities including:

• Potential Japan gig with Mike if budget allows
• Seeking founder partnerships as "Chief Energy Officer slash COO"
• Balancing idealism with practical need to support her parents

Core Spiritual Warfare Discussion

Gary's Recognition of Spiritual Attack

Gary opened up about his current struggles, framing them explicitly as spiritual warfare - a significant evolution in his understanding:

Gary: "I think you asked me a question... about how I'm doing. Because I realized the best way to sum it up was I was being attacked... And I'm still getting used to even saying something like that because of previous version of myself would be like, you're crazy. Get some medication."

Evolution of Understanding Evil

Both participants discussed how their worldview has shifted from secular humanistic frameworks to recognizing spiritual warfare reality:

Gary: "Everything about Christian all the main points about Christianity makes sense to me. That we're sinners. It's like, oh, my God. What a great revelation that we're sinners. And okay. Guess what? The world will be. We will contribute to the world feeling like hell. If we continue to be sinners."

Marina's Profound Spiritual Warfare Teaching

Mental Warfare and Information Overload

Marina provided extensive analysis of how spiritual warfare manifests through mental exhaustion and information overload in the modern age:

Marina: "This is literally making us insane. Like, literally. And now was like the speed of information because AI the speed of information moving like 50,000 times more. Even my body. Exhausting after a day of freaking, even thinking or coming up as concepts or thinking about solutions."

Orthodox Teaching on Thoughts and Demons

Marina shared sophisticated Orthodox theology about discerning demonic influence through thoughts:

Marina: "We have a Jesus prayer. We have to repeat Jesus prayer almost kind of as much as we can. And if we see thoughts which comes in and they not relate to anything from Bible, then we can already assume it's like demons. Like putting sauce in our head."

The Battle for Peace

Marina: "That's why I say the kingdom of Heaven is taken by force. Because we actually fight him for our peace. But we fight not alone. The fighting was God, and he is going first."

Sleep Paralysis and Demonic Encounters

Marina's Personal Experiences

Marina shared her lifelong experiences with sleep paralysis involving demonic presence, providing theological context through Orthodox understanding:

Marina: "You kind of fallen asleep, but you really feel all your body. But you can't move anything. You can't speak. You all paralyze. And this thing you feel the present of complete fucking hell. Something which it's not like you feel. Oh, there's some ghost. No, you feel like the demonic presence."

Deliverance Through Prayer

Marina: "Usually I say, like Jesus, right? But in the moment, like I said, mother of God saved me. And I was, like, freaking, like, teleported from, like, one universe to another in, like, a second."

Navy SEAL Conversion Testimony

Marina referenced a Navy SEAL who tried everything for PTSD recovery (including DMT, Ayahuasca) but only found healing through Orthodox Christianity and baptism.

Disassociation Episode and Divine Healing

Psychological Crisis During Pentecost

Marina shared a profound personal crisis involving disassociation syndrome during the week of Pentecost:

Marina: "I even had... disassociation syndrome... You can observe yourself as a third person, like kind of in a movie. You can look at yourself as a character... I had look very intense with that. Last year episode for a few days."

Church as Healing Center

Marina: "And that was the week of Pentecost. And I went to church... after liturgy in the morning, I kind of, like, felt okay. It was like either psychology is so complex... or... what demons does they press the weaknesses."

Faith Development and Perfect Faith Discussion

Understanding Levels of Faith

Gary questioned Marina about the relationship between faith and practical concerns, leading to deep theological exploration:

Gary: "Why do you lack faith? What do you mean by that?"

Marina: "Because if I had a complete perfection face, right? I would be able to not at all think about anything about to take care of my parents... I would be in complete bliss. Joy and peace. 24/7. This is what complete face is. And this phase, this level of faith is saints reaching."

Anxiety vs. Action

Marina: "You don't have in your heart, in your body, in your mind... the anxiety never helps... You experience no anxiety. You experience no fear. You're not afraid to die right now for like a stranger on the street."

Orthodox Sacramental Life and Spiritual Practices

Confession as Mystical Healing

Marina: "Sometimes I feel like so peaceful after compassion when I release my thought. So it's not just, like, conversation... No, it's something really happening there. I can't explain what."

Sign of the Cross as Protection

Marina: "In Orthodox, right, like we do cross on ourselves... We put, like, a cross sign on ourselves to, like, protect as well, because demons afraid of the cross and that Jesus name."

Calling, Simplicity, and Humility

Moving Away from "Saving the World" Mentality

Both participants discussed the spiritual danger of grandiose thinking and the need for humility:

Marina: "God doesn't expect from us big mission and things which we kind of come in with... we have this, like, system thinking. Just like, ever since should scale. Ever since should be big... But I think for people like us to find enjoyment to make it a little things. In simplicity."

Small Business as Ministry Model

Gary referenced a Japanese cafe example of simple ministry, aligning with Marina's advice about humble service.

Financial Faith and Generosity

Gary's Generosity Reflection

Gary shared his internal struggle about past generosity and whether it represented true faith:

Gary: "The thought that came to mind was like. Was I scammed by my friends? What a weird thought."

Marina: "If you did something from your heart, Make it worse on God. That's it. If you help them from your heart. Then what is in the Bible say if you borrow money, don't expect it back."

Faith vs. Worldly Systems

Gary: "You can't be half in the faith. Expect that you can be both of the world. And deeply in flesh. And capitalism, like hyper capitalism... And also good favor with God."

Daily Spiritual Practices and Growth Areas

Gary's Current Routine

Gary shared his daily patterns:

• Writing extensively about Christ
• Consuming YouTube content (acknowledged as potentially problematic)
• Working out
• Seeing one friend daily for community connection

Identified Growth Area

Gary: "But what I don't do enough of is just sit with God... In silence. I don't do it much... I think I just need to do it more... That's one of my biggest growth areas. Is feeling comfortable. Being alone with my thoughts. Being alone with God."

Information Overload Recognition

Gary: "Yeah, I think we're really information overloaded... I want to have faith that these experiences that I've had, that we've had are going to help other people. Because other people are information overloaded."

Orthodox Certainty and Perfect Faith Journey

Marina's Theological Certainty

Marina: "There's no question. That God is real. In christ. Is real. Christ is worth following... I have zero question. Yes, I have little face in a sense of if I would completely trust God."

The Saint-Making Process

Marina: "The Christianity in orthodox sense. It's not just to become a moral nice person. Who doesn't do bad things. The idea is to acquire the Holy Spirit. To become like God. With God. On this reality."

Honest Spiritual Struggle

Marina: "Sometimes I'm just laying down. I'm not even going. Sometimes I'm so bad and feeling bad that I'm like, Christ, I'm just like. I'm just laying down. I can't even walk anymore. Please pick me up. Pick me up and resurrect my dad's spirit and body."

Mutual Spiritual Mentorship and Closing

Recognition of Divine Fellowship

Gary: "Well. I really appreciate this talk. And it was also very informative. Educating. Thank you. And it's beautiful. What people walking the Faith can do for each other."

Marina: "Yeah, it's huge. When we're here, Treasure going through, like, saying kind of suffering and kind of can share this experience is really. It's really helpful and healing."

Practical Spiritual Advice

Marina: "Don't fight in your mind, fight in your heart with the prayer. Focus on the heart and the prayer. Because that's where Demons wants to get you is the thought."

Closing Encouragement

Marina: "Spend some time with God today in silence... But we are on our journey. Crisis trends us step by step. And maybe he wants to fork given this time, to focus on ourselves, to become stronger in relationship with him."

Key Themes and Theological Insights

Spiritual Warfare as Primary Reality

Both participants demonstrated sophisticated understanding of spiritual warfare as the underlying cause of personal struggles, mental health challenges, and cultural decline.

Orthodox Sacramental Healing

Marina provided extensive testimony about the mystical reality of Orthodox practices - confession, communion, prayer, sign of the cross - as practical weapons against demonic attack.

Information Age as Spiritual Battlefield

Revolutionary insight that AI acceleration and information overload represent new forms of spiritual warfare targeting human minds and peace.

Simplicity vs. Grandiosity

Profound wisdom about the spiritual danger of "saving the world" mentality and the need for humble, simple service as antidote to pride.

Faith Development as Process

Honest exploration of different levels of faith, from intellectual certainty to practical trust to saintly perfection, with patience for the journey.

Community as Spiritual Medicine

Both participants demonstrated how spiritually mature friendship provides essential support during spiritual warfare and calling discernment.

This conversation represents one of Gary's most theologically sophisticated discussions, with Marina serving as advanced spiritual mentor helping Gary integrate Orthodox Christian understanding of spiritual warfare with his practical life challenges and calling discernment.