Modern systems: one concept
The space of variants
The space of variants (space of variations) is Vadim Zeland’s claim, in Step I of Reality Transurfing (Russian 2004, English 2008), that every possible version of a life already exists. He says thought moves a person between these versions; no test we know of can tell such a move from chance, and the likeness to many worlds in quantum physics is one of picture, not of physics.
Living is recast as moving toward one of many lines that already exist, rather than causing an outcome.
In Russian. пространство вариантов is the original term; English and Polish editions do not always render it the same way.
Where the idea comes from
The space of variants comes from Step I of Vadim Zeland’s Reality Transurfing, the volume named after it: Пространство вариантов (St Petersburg: Ves, 2004). Zeland sets it out in chapter I, “Модель вариантов” (the model of variants), which the book presents as its theoretical introduction to Transurfing. According to Zeland’s official site, excerpts first went out through an internet mailing list in August 2003, which is why the series is also dated to that year. In English the volume is titled The Space of Variations, so the idea also goes by that name.
| Fact or claim | Status and evidence |
|---|---|
| Which book | Documented. Step I, Пространство вариантов (Ves, St Petersburg, 2004, 206 pages, ISBN 5-9573-0283-X). The Russian State Library lists the model of variants first among the six items in its summary of the volume’s contents. Russian State Library record; contents on LitRes |
| English names | Documented. Reality Transurfing 1: The Space of Variations (O Books, 2008, ISBN 9781846941221). The English e-book Reality Transurfing. Steps I-V calls it “the alternatives space”. Open Library record; e-book on OverDrive (publisher’s sample) |
| What it is | Claimed in the book; a postulate, not a finding. An infinite field of information, which Zeland calls material, holding every possible variant of every event: all that was, is and will be. Sectors of the field with a similar script and scenery line up into life lines. Step I, chapter I, section “Загадка Смотрителя” (publisher’s sample, no page numbers) |
| What moves a person | Claimed, not verified. The energy of thought, which Zeland likens to radio waves, is said to make material the variant it is tuned to; when a person’s attitude changes, their life passes to another line. How thought acts on the field, he concedes, is unclear. Same section |
| The support offered | Documented as the author’s own statements. Everyday experience, such as worst expectations coming true, and experiments in quantum physics, none of them named. What counts, he writes, is the practical result, not the model. Same section |
| Evidence that it exists | Cannot be checked as stated. We found no test that could tell a chosen variant from one that would have come anyway. PubMed, searched for “transurfing” on 3 November 2026: no records. PubMed |
| Many worlds | Documented in the physics literature; a different claim. One interpretation of quantum mechanics among several, still disputed (Everett 1957; DeWitt 1970). The differences are below. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy |
Checked on 3 November 2026, each line at its source. Documented: a record or text anyone can open; claimed, not verified: the book asserts it and nothing independent confirms it; cannot be checked as stated: we found no test that could count for or against it.
How does the space of variants work, according to Zeland?
In Zeland’s account a life runs along one line of variants at a time, and thought decides which. Unroll a reel of film, he says, and all its frames exist at once; only projection makes them follow one another. In his picture the space of variants is a dark forest, the variant being lived is the patch lit by a torch, and the torch is the energy of thought. The script of the line you are on cannot be changed, only exchanged for another: a visitor who dislikes a gallery room cannot rehang it but can walk into the next. Fighting a situation, he writes, only tunes thought to a line with more of the same. A wish, he adds, is not yet a choice, but a choice is always realised.
The older idea
Underneath the variants is a question about agency: how much of a life’s course a person chooses. The Hermetic answer is older and stranger. The Asclepius calls the human being a great miracle and, in the lines that follow, describes it as mortal in body and divine in mind; Pico della Mirandola quoted the great-miracle line near the start of his Oration, right after Abdala the Saracen, picturing a being with no fixed nature, free to sink toward the beast or rise toward the angel. The mechanism Zeland adds, a mental act selecting among ready-made outcomes, is, in our view, New Thought, the current behind the Kybalion of 1908: a parallel in the question, not a source for the answer. The working mechanism, on our reading: treating your options as already there can make people choose among concrete ones and commit sooner, and if anything changes the outcome, it is that, not the field.
What you can actually check
The space of variants itself cannot be checked: no observation separates a life you chose from one that would have arrived anyway. Your own choosing can be. The book draws a line between a wish and a choice, and you can test that line on yourself: before a decision that matters, write down the options you see, the one you take and why, and months later read the note against what happened. Choosing for reasons you can state and owning the result is also the core of human agency in the AI age: keeping your own judgement when a model does the work.
Is the space of variants the many-worlds interpretation?
No: the two share a picture, many versions of reality at once, but not what produces the versions or who decides between them. For Hugh Everett III (1930-1982), writing in 1957, the versions are branches that follow from the wave equation of quantum mechanics once the collapse of the wave function is dropped, and all are equally actual. Bryce DeWitt (1923-2004) presented it in 1970 as a universe in which every possible outcome of an experiment actually occurs, the picture of splitting worlds that became the usual reading of Everett. Nobody chooses a branch there. Zeland’s variants rest on a postulate with no equation, only one at a time becomes material for a person, and the person chooses it. Zeland’s chapter I mentions wave-particle duality and Bohr’s model of the atom, and it speaks of infinitely many parallel worlds beside ours, illustrated by a flat world whose inhabitants know nothing of a third dimension; it does not mention Everett. What Transurfing takes from physics and what it leaves out: is Reality Transurfing based on quantum physics?
Sources cited on this page. Step I, chapter I, read in the publisher’s sample on LitRes (IG Ves e-book, ISBN 978-5-9573-0645-0, no page numbers) and in the publisher’s sample of the English e-book Reality Transurfing. Steps I-V (ISBN 9780463286654, on OverDrive since 5 August 2019); Zeland’s official site, “События и факты”. All read 3 November 2026.
H. Everett III, “‘Relative State’ Formulation of Quantum Mechanics”, Reviews of Modern Physics 29 (3), 1957, 454-462, doi:10.1103/
What it does not settle
Zeland promises methods that let readers check everything for themselves, but none of them can tell a variant that was selected from one that would have happened anyway, and the whole claim rests on that distinction.
Nearby
The current of variants · Soul and mind
The full set, side by side: the ten concepts. Dating and pedigree: the main entry. What to do with any of it: in practice.
Fair questions
What is the space of variations in Reality Transurfing?
It is Vadim Zeland’s space of variants (Russian 2004) under the English title of Step I, The Space of Variations (O Books, 2008): a field of information that, he writes, holds every possible variant of every event, all that was, is and will be. A life runs along one line of variants, and the energy of thought is said to move it to another. Zeland offers this as a postulate; no test we know of can confirm or refute it.
What is the book The Space of Variations about?
It is Step I of Reality Transurfing and bears the name of the idea it opens with: Пространство вариантов (Ves, 2004), in English Reality Transurfing 1: The Space of Variations (O Books, 2008). Its six chapters cover the model of variants, pendulums, the wave of fortune, balance, induced transition and the current of variants. Chapter I, presented in the book as the theoretical introduction, calls the model of variants the conceptual basis of Transurfing.
How do you move to another variant, according to Zeland?
By the energy of thought, in his account: thoughts tuned to a variant are said to make it material, and a change of attitude takes a life onto another line. Fighting what you do not want, he writes, only tunes you to more of it, and a wish is not yet a choice; the book promises to teach the conditions a real choice must meet. No study we found tests any of this. What you can check is your own choosing: note the options, the decision and your reasons, then read the note against what happened.
Is the space of variants based on quantum physics?
No. Chapter I of Step I mentions wave-particle duality, Bohr’s model of the atom, unnamed experiments in quantum physics and infinitely many parallel worlds, but it gives no equation, measurement or study, and it does not mention Hugh Everett. Its picture of many versions at once resembles the many-worlds interpretation (Everett 1957; DeWitt 1970), in which every outcome of a measurement happens and nobody chooses; in the space of variants a person chooses.
What would prove the space of variants exists?
Nothing the book specifies. Zeland promises methods that let readers check everything for themselves, but no observation he names would come out differently if the field did not exist, so a variant that was chosen cannot be told from one that would have come anyway. A PubMed search for “transurfing” on 3 November 2026 found no records.
Sources & further reading
- The description is ours. We do not reproduce text, instructions or exercises from Vadim Zeland's books, which are in copyright.
- Dating, pedigree and the unnamed-source question: Reality Transurfing, read with care.
- How the system sits beside the law of attraction, Stoicism and a therapy with trials: compared.
- This page makes no therapeutic claim and is not advice for treating anxiety or any other condition.