“I” am also the self-aware unit of consciousness generated at conception.This capital-letter “Self” came into this universe as a perfect echo of God’s mind. The job of this Self UC is to oversee the body’s aggregate UCs and to join with other UCs to build things.
“I” am influenced in my decision-making by many forces acting upon me as I approach the here and now. These forces include the karmic records and meme bundles of my Self and my body’s aggregate UCs, and the karma and memes of those around me. Despite these influences acting upon me, it is always within my power to make a free-will decision at any particular moment.
I totally agree.
ReplyDeleteIf "I" am the aggregate of the body's UCs (as well as the self-aware unit of consciousness generated at conception), and my Self UC timeshares a body with other Self UCs, how does that affect who "I" am?
ReplyDeleteI'm assuming here that "I" is different from a Self UC. If that is not the case, then I am really lost.
13
Your model makes sense of some fundamental paradoxes found in Yoga, Buddhism, Hinduism, etc.. For example, the "I" is said to be an illusion. Yet Easern thought believes in reincarnation. What reincarnates if the "I" is not real? I believe that the governing UC that I call "me" generates a succession of selves overtime. I am under the illusion that my self at any one time is my "I" when in fact it is not. "I", as a UC, am real and does reincarnate. My selves are merely memes that do not govern and do not make choices. In hypnotic regression we discover past memes. By working on past memes (selves), I can affect present choices, hopefully for the better. Call that past life therapy. I am particularly interested in your "Simple Explanation" model as a Professor of Philosophy for thirty-eight years with a apecialty in Mind Body theory. I am now a practicing Clinical Hypnotherapist.
ReplyDeleteTo 13: For most people, the answer to "who am I?" is that I am my self-aware sense of "me" encased in this body of mine. This Simple Explanation theory says we are that, but also we are the things we love and hate, plus the record of our actions in this world, overlaid upon our UC. Think of a UC as a perfect echo or wave form "shaped" exactly like God's mind. You might say our universe is populated by exact echoes of God's primordial UC. The UCs are all identical--they're all reflections of the God UC. What makes "me" different from "you" is the pattern of my meme bundles and karma that overlay or filter out my UC.
ReplyDeleteSo, 13's UC, when you scrape away the loves, hates, and karma, is the same as Cyd's UC. What makes us different is the stuff we scrape away -- the filter (of attachments and karma) that obscures our UCs.
The Self UC is a perfect reflection of the God UC. But "I" (the subjective sense of "me") am not that perfect, because of my meme attachments and karma.
Does that make sense?
Dr. Bill,
ReplyDeleteThank you for your insightful comments. Yes, I agree with what you say. I would only try to keep the terms we use uniform, to prevent confusion.
So I guess I would say that we do only have one capital-S Self, and that is the perfect UC that underlies all the transitory "me's" and that never changes. This is what you are calling the "I."
I like what you say about the selves being memes. I'd say the "me's" are memes, or more precisely, the me's are our unique patterns of meme bundles being held at any given time. The meme pattern is like a woven cloak laid over the lantern of your UC. Everyone's cloak or meme pattern casts a unique shadow over their UC. It would be the cloak you are revisiting when clients are hypnotically regressed. Does that make sense to you?
Yes, you've explained it quite well. I understand what you mean when you say that "I" consists of all those things we gain during a particular lifetime, overlaid on our Self UC.
ReplyDeleteI was thinking about something Bill was saying about past life therapy. Since you can revisit past "Is" does that mean that you are somehow linked to all the "Is" you have ever been? Do you carry some meme patterns forward life after life for better or for worse? Can you tap into past "Is" and access past talents or wisdom? Or do you think that happens automatically?
I know that there are a lot of things that I have picked up easily in this life that I have already learned in other lives. For example, calligraphy, shooting, climbing and sign language. However there are other things that I was good at in past lives that I can't do worth a damn now. For example, singing and dancing.
Do you think maybe, when our Self UC is getting ready for another lifetime that it chooses from all the talents that it previously learned in the past, which ones it will bring to it into the current incarnation?
13
Traditional scriptures all agree that your karma is sticky stuff that clings to your UC after your body dies. These would be the "sins" so many people fear being tallied up and paid for on "Judgment Day." Now, if we imagine this karmic bundle carrying forward, then you'd expect the memes involved in those karmic patterns to also carry forward. If there were some karmic reckoning in your next lives, they'd be along the same meme bundle that influenced your UC in the first place. For example, a simple karmic reckoning could be imagined as overeating in one lifetime being balanced by starvation in a different lifetime; both overeating and starvation are extremes along the same meme bundle. This is why I reason that karma and meme bundles may travel together.
ReplyDeleteBut it may be that perhaps it's only your karma that travels, and it is the karma itself that draws certain memes your way. If this is the case, then the "I" of your ongoing UC is nothing but the pattern of all the choices your UC has made--your karma.
If the "you" that exists between material incarnations is nothing but your karmic record, then this is in a sense proved by the necessary assertion that all UCs are one and the same back at the beginning, that all UCs begin their journey as perfect echoes of God. Then it follows that "I" develop as a result of my choices and the choices of others. The memes are in the ether, in the transpersonal consciousness, in the zero point field, in the akashik record, if you will. They are not in me or riding along with my UC. It is my karmic record that attracts and repels the patterns of memes surrounding my life.
more response to 13's post:
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with you that talents easily learned are UC's reacquiring old meme bundles from previous lives.
Easy explanation for why you can't reproduce all such previous abilities has to do with the aggregate UCs to which you are now attached. IOW, a UC who was once a great pianist may now find herself inhabiting a body with less nimble fingers--or no fingers at all!
Every UC in this material Universe is limited by the abilities of the mud or meat to which it is attached.
Answer to 13's last question:
ReplyDeleteThere is a deep-seated need for justice in the universe. Personally, I can't see how a UC can walk away from their karmic record between instantiations. Doesn't seem fair. So, I wouldn't expect the UC to have total free will in the matter.
As stated a couple of Comments prior to this one, it seems likely that the UC's karmic bundle also determines its future body choices. Maybe between lives as it works in this life, karma constrains the possible choices available from which to choose.
I suppose a UC, as a unit of free will, could choose its new host body based upon the things it loves or hates (your preferred memes--generated by your talents and experiences). So, sure, it seems as though a child prodigy in any talent already knew what they were doing and chose a good body and life situation in which to express it.
Cyd, a wonderful and insightful dialogue between you and "13." I am in agreement with the analyses being made. Your model has great explanatory power. You are a gifted thinker as is "13." Bill
ReplyDeleteHmmm...I don't know that I necessarily view karma in quite the same way. On some level, I guess I do, but I see other things mixed in there, too.
ReplyDeleteWhat if we were keeping our own score card? Might we do things simply for the experience of it? I had the experience of overeating in my last life; this time I want to experience starvation (or vise versa). Is it so crazy to think that I might want to experience what it's like to overcome an addiction? Or that I might want to experience what it's like to be poor, rich, deaf, blind, gay, black, famous, thin, fat, prejudice, lonely, pious (ad infinitum)? What's it like to have ECT? What's it like to be shunned by others just because of the way you look? What's it like? What can I learn from it? And then, what can I teach others about it?
I don't mean to imply that we want to experience everything that we experience in our lives, but I also don't believe that everything negative that we experience in our lives is as a result of some past "sin." Maybe, just maybe, there was something that I wanted to learn from the experience.
13
Oh my gosh, 13! What an excellent, non-judgmental way to view karma. I like it; it's so gentle. Plus, that's really what happens anyway. It's through the exercise of your free-will and determination that you behave the way you behave in this life. Stands to reason you'd behave that way in between lives, too.
ReplyDeleteWhat is your sense of the need for reckoning or balance, ying/yang. Do you think a UC will necessarily choose to starve for the experience of it after having binged? Or do you think that randomly, across the universe, UCs just happen to balance out each others' proclivities? Or do you think that there is no need for karmic justice at all?
No, I don’t think that a UC will necessarily choose to starve after having binged. I think that for a couple of reasons. First, it assumes that binging is a sin for which starving is a kind of punishment meant to set things right. In my thinking, binging (whether it’s just overeating or to the extreme of morbid obesity) is simply an experience that we can have here on this 3D planet. Remember, binging is no more pleasurable than starving. There is a lot that a UC can learn from the experience of binging, living with the consequences, and then overcoming it. Just as there is a lot that a UC can learn from the experience of starving, living with the consequences of that, and then overcoming it. Each experience will have its unique lessons to be learned, however, I don’t think that my UC will necessarily learn the exact same lessons from binging as another UC will learn from the same experience. Which brings me to my second reason.
ReplyDeleteThe second reason I don’t think that a UC will necessarily choose to starve after having binged is because, if a UC is seeking balance from an experience of excess, there are many other ways to experience a lack other than starving. As I mentioned above, a UC’s experience of binging and the lessons learned will be unique. Therefore, what balances that experience will also be unique.
13
Yes, I like your thinking about learning opportunities and lessons learned. Yet, the idea of balance, which some call righting a karmic debt, is still implied in your comment, whether or not the reciprocal experience is along the same meme. Would you agree?
ReplyDeleteYes, I would agree. However, I think that “righting a karmic debt” is not necessarily about having a reciprocal experience (whether along the same meme or not).
ReplyDeleteI think I need to be very careful when talking about things such as karmic debt and karmic justice because I don’t now enough about it. I don’t know which sorts of things are settling karmic debts are which sorts of things are accruing it.
What I do know is, that for me, while I’m on this 3D planet, it’s best for me to forgive others that I feel have done me an injustice in this life. There are many reasons why I think I should. It could have been a misunderstanding. Maybe they didn’t mean it or were having a bad day. Maybe they are sick. Maybe I deserved it. But even if they were being maniacal, it’s best for me to try and let it go because, (1) I don’t like what it feels like to feel bad, (2) I don’t want to stay or enter into a karmic bond with them, and (3) it’s not my place to decide (karmically speaking) whether their actions were justified or not.
You asked me before about my thoughts on the need for karmic justice. I don’t know about the need for karmic justice, but the problem I have with many theories of karmic justice is that they are too simplistic. For example, if we do good things in this life we will be rewarded in the next. Or the reverse: if we do bad things in this life we will be punished in the next. I understand that these statements (or beliefs) are meant to motivate good behavior from people. But if a UC is doing good things in this life out of fear of being punished, what has that UC learned? I’d hazard a guess that one of things they’ve learned is how to live in fear. What are they learning of love?
In my thinking, there is no over-reaching UC entity ready to punish me for all my misdeeds and reward me for my successes. If there is anyone holding my scales and asking for them to be balanced, it’s my UC.
13
13, I totally agree with everything you say in the comment above.
ReplyDeleteYour final paragraph brings up an intriguing implication. If we UCs are all perfect replicas of the original UC (which I, being theistically-minded like to call God), then there is in reality no superior UC sitting over you, but one exactly as your Self UC.
That is not to say that there is no karma. Every action incurs a ripple--that ripple is the karma generated by that action. If you chop off your arm, your karma is to have one arm thenceforth in this lifetime. That's judgment. It's easy to see the "punishment" for chopping off your arm.
Perhaps you will say, "It's not punishment, it's a learning opportunity." And I would agree with you. Maybe that's all that "judgment" is: learning whatever your UC hoped to learn from the learning experience of whatever you did. In this case, being a one-armed person.
Yes, I would call that a learning opportunity. As C.S. Lewis would say: “Experience: that most brutal of teachers. But you learn, my God do you learn.”
ReplyDeleteHi there. Testing the waters to see if Anonymous 13 is still subscribing to the blog comments. Like to hear from you again if so.
ReplyDeleteHi Cyd,
ReplyDeleteI found the above discussion thread very interesting and hope you don’t mind me adding a few thoughts.
Many years ago, I came across a little book called “What God Wants”. The first half of the book talked about all the things that we believe, or are told/taught, that “God Wants” – from the major religious viewpoints to the totally secular (as an interesting exercise, try Google “What God Wants” and see the sheer volume on the topic). Then right in the middle of the book, the author sums it all up by asking the question again “So What Does God Want?”. Very cleverly, the author left about 10 blank pages and then prints the following word in bold: “NOTHING”. That thought took me utterly by surprise because it was so contrary to everything we are generally being taught and thus generally think and believe. The rest of the book then goes on to explore the consequences of “What If God Wants NOTHING”. That has changed my thinking and has stayed with me for the rest of my life.
I tend to agree with Anonymous 13’s direction of thinking in context of your Simple Explanation model. One could see the constructs and concepts of “right”, “wrong”, “good’, “bad”, “judgement”, “punishment”, “debt”, “justice”, “reckoning”, “balance” etc. as mere memes in themselves. As such, all life experiences are merely that: experiences. Some experiences may relate to others and some may not. Some experiences might be consequences/opposites of others and some may not. Why should there be a need to classify them, other than again just creating the “stickiness” of karma for carrying them along?
I do however think that ALL experiences are born out of will/choice/thought and they all have consequences. The purpose of experiences and consequences could be thought of as “learning” or “knowing”. One could thus see this world as a laboratory environment (simulation/matrix/dream) that plays out all the possible consequences of will/choice/thought for the benefit of learning or knowing – from the micro to the macro level, from the smallest totally independent to the largest fully interdependent levels, within one lifetime or carried across multiple lifetimes. In such a view, there would be no need for an overarching superior UC controlling or designing or wanting anything. There would only be a need for the laboratory environment and the mechanisms of generating the knowing - which could be referred to as “God” or “The Mind of God” if you are so inclined.
I find your Simple Explanation model has many interesting concepts, which can further illuminate what I have described in very short above. Does that resonate with you as well? I’d be interested in your further thoughts.
Ruan
What does God want of us? God wants us to live and love and help one another. God seems to want us to work together with our neighbors on projects none of us could do alone. God wants us to remember that we come from above and will return to above. That's my answer.
DeleteHi Cyd,
ReplyDeleteThe well-known philosophical thought experiment: “If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?" can also be seen in the above context. This statement implies many constructs: a tree, a forest, sound, hearing, which in turn implies subjective observation/experience/learning/knowing, or the absence thereof. Digging deeper, it questions the constructs and concepts themselves and their ultimate purpose: Why is there a tree or forest to begin with? Where did it come from? Who put it there? For what purpose? Who are the observer(s) of the tree/forest? Why are they observing/experiencing the tree or forest? What is the purpose of such observation or experience? What is the fundamental impulse or motivation for “wanting” such an observation or experience?
Ruan
Possibly the omniscient omnipresent consciousness wanted to experience singular, limited point of view. Those would be the units of consciousness experiencing monadic existence, at all various levels and stations. A data gathering exercise, if you will.
ReplyDeleteHi Cyd,
ReplyDeleteThat does seem logical and rational – in-line with the logical and rational structure of the universe we observe and as explained by your Simple Explanation. We may never consciously know or understand the original impulse, however it does imply a certain sense of curiosity and exploration. It also implies a certain sense of risk. All for the purpose of “Knowing Thyself”? Interesting that all of these characteristics also reflect in our human experience. Would that original impulse be the “Fall” that you refer to in your Gnostic Cosmology? I am interested as to why the word “Fall” as it generally has negative connotations, i.e. a “bad” thing? Does it imply it should not have happened?
Ruan
Interesting questions, Ruan. The Simple Explanation tries to be logical and rational. Thus the originating consciousness simply has a thought that is our universal blueprint. And then a toroidal boundary enveloped the thought bubble and thus was born the universal unit of consciousness that produces fractal interations I call units of consciousness that become the material, forces, and laws of our space time continuum.
ReplyDeleteThe Gnostic Gospel Illuminated bases its cosmology on an ancient religious text--the Tripartite Tractate of the Nag Hammadi codices. The language is more personified than the Simple Explanation. The thought of which we spoke becomes the Son, and then the Son produces the aeons of the Fullness. And that was all fine with the originating consciousness, AKA the Father. Things went awry when the top aeon acted unilaterally and overreached his role and station, whereupon he Fell out of union with the Fullness and crashed down below. At that point the Father "threw up a boundary to contain the elements of the Fall." I would equate that with the Simple Explantion's toroidal membrane. However, in this version, the fractals of the Fall are sterile and unable to level up to life forms.
There is actually a line in the Tripartite Tractate that says something like, Don't be mad at the aeon who fell, for it was a necessary step for producing a new economy, probably referring to our material universe or possibly our heavenly afterlife as truly living figures.
But I digress--our human experiences of Falls, and we all have them, are narrative fractals. There are very few stories, told over and over, with different actors and props, but they all are simply fractals at the psychological level.
Is this what you were thinking?
Hi Cyd,
ReplyDeleteYes, that is what my questions related to, thank you. It may not necessarily be exactly what I am thinking . My thoughts do very much align with yours and the rational logic of your Simple Explanation do appeal/resonate with me a lot. There may however be different “words” that I would use to express my thoughts and understanding, especially of your Gnostic Gospel. I put “words” here in inverted commas for a particular reason. I have come to see words as “vibrations” expressing with particular “frequencies”. This is not just so at a physical level when spoken or heard, but also when written or interpreted. For me, this especially extends also to conveying via other non-verbal or non-written means, like body language, math, symbols and pictures (the picture of the toroid conveys a thousand words…), and relates maybe even further to beliefs, feelings and emotions and ultimately to learning, memory, understanding and knowing. In fact, I think the concepts of vibration and frequency can be elegantly integrated with your fractal toroidal model to bring deeper understanding and knowing across numerous practical, psychological and philosophical disciplines and fields of study. Let me digress a little to explain, and then get back to the topic we discussed above. I will then also later on apply this in our other discussion thread on “What God Wants”.
The characteristics of waves/signals (vibrations of, or within, a conveying medium), their related frequencies, and how they are generated, received, measured and manipulated – especially to convey or store information – is very much one of the cornerstones of modern Science and Engineering. The (infinite?) breadth of the electromagnetic spectrum, and its related scientific discoveries and practical application just over the last 100 years, is actually quite astounding. Vibration and frequency is so pervasive in the mechanics and physics of our observable universe, from the macro to the micro level, that I cannot help but think that the same characteristics and principles must also extend beyond the physical. Here are a few examples of these characteristics and principles:
ReplyDelete- Medium (e.g. air/ether): certain mediums are required to carry signals
- Generation (e.g. transmitters): certain energy configurations are required to generate and sustain signals
- Reception (e.g. antennas): certain structural/geometric configurations and alignment are required to receive signals
- Frequency bands: in principle, an infinite number of frequencies, but different energy characteristics within different bands
- Power/Propagation: the amplitude, distance and mechanisms by which a signal is conveyed
- Amplification/Attenuation: the ways in which energy is added/removed from signals
- Modulation/Filtering/Attuning: the ways in which signals are combined/merged together or separated/extracted/isolated from each other
- Interference: the constructive/destructive ways in which signals interact
- Balance/Harmony/Resonance/Imbalance/Dissonance/Noise: the ways in which signals complement/supplement or clash/cancel each other
Relating the concepts of vibration and frequency to your fractal toroidal model, I would also imagine a toroid as being dynamic/moving and in at least three possible ways or “dimensions” if you like. One being the flow in the vertical (y-axis, up-down) plane; as you explain in your Simple Explanation from-the-zero-point-out-the-bottom-round-the-envelope-back-in-at-the-top-to-the-zero-point. A second being the flow in the horizontal (x-axis, left-right) plane; i.e. creating a kind of circular swirl around and through the zero-point, like water in a basin swirling circularly down a drain. A third being the flow in the depth (z-axis, in-out) plane; expanding/contracting the envelope, a kind of pulsing or pumping of the toroid, like a heart beating. All these dynamics are cyclic and could therefore imply “vibration/frequency” of toroids throughout all fractal levels. Applying the above listed characteristics and principles of signals to vibrational frequencies of toroids, may possibly offer even deeper insight into the physical and metaphysical fractal nature of our universe and our construct of time. And by extension maybe also to our experiences of feelings, emotions and our language and cultures and our mechanisms of memory (memes/karma?), learning and understanding. In fact, toroidal vibration and frequency may be the very core organizational mechanism by which our fractal universe achieves its physical and metaphysical structure. We can certainly explore some more on this later, but for now back to “words”.
Words express thoughts and understanding, which in turn are heavily influenced by conscious/subjective and subconscious/cultural context. For me, words and thoughts are in themselves “vibrations” expressing with particular “frequencies” and as such, their inception, intention, conveyance, interpretation and understanding are influenced by the same characteristics and principles of signals described above. For example, the words “love” or “hate” evoke very specific emotions like peace or fear, calmness or anxiety, and I would ascribe that to the difference in their vibrational frequencies. This may further relate to perceptions of “attraction” or “repulsion” which may be a result of the constructive interference / harmonic resonance or destructive interference / dissonance created by the interaction of related vibrational frequencies. Interestingly, these same notions may also point towards the underlying mechanics of physical forces like gravity or magnetism.
ReplyDeleteAlso, Cyd may use particular words with the intent to describe or convey a particular understanding, but Ruan may interpret them as meaning something utterly different. If Cyd and Ruan’s signal hardware and software are not attuned to each other, then the vibrational frequencies of the words and their understanding will not be received correctly or interfere and create dissonance or noise and will not be conveyed clearly. The phrase “lost in translation” or the classic children’s game of Chinese telephone (an original message consecutively whispered by a row of kids often emerging crooked at the end) are simple everyday examples hereof. On the other hand, if they are attuned, then the vibrational frequencies of the words and their understanding will be received correctly, conveyed clearly and resonate in harmony. Think of the strings on a guitar or piano. If the guitar or piano is properly tuned, then plucking one string causes other strings to spontaneously resonate in melodious harmony; if the guitar or piano is however not tuned properly, then there is no resonance but only a cacophony of noise. Interestingly again, these same notions may point towards the underlying mechanics and physical manifestations of disease/health within living organisms or even manifestations of harmony/dissonance within and between organisations, communities and societies. We can again explore some more on this later, but for now back to your Gnostic Gospel.
In wanting to convey understanding via written/spoken language, the use of words is unavoidable. The origin and evolution of languages and cultures are other interesting topics for another day, but for the purposes of this discussion, the choice and use of words to convey concepts and understanding are always contextual to the time and culture of the writer as well as the intended audience. The broader each of these, the more generic the choice of words and the more challenging to convey understanding, and equally, the narrower each of these, the more specific the choice of words (“would a Rose called by any other name still be a Rose?”). The use of contextual/cultural analogies, metaphors, allegory or parables can be seen as ways to attune such conveyance and create resonance of understanding. This becomes especially true in attempting to convey understanding and attain knowing of the (seemingly?) “unknowable”…
ReplyDeleteAs you mention, the ancient religious text - the Tripartite Tractate of the Nag Hammadi codices - uses specific personified language (metaphor/allegory/parable) to convey its message. Whomever wrote it, and whatever the source of their inspiration, it would certainly have been influenced by the conscious/subjective and subconscious/cultural context of their time. The same could equally be said of any other religious, theistic (e.g. Bible, Koran), atheistic (e.g. Buddhism, Hinduism) or other esoteric or secular inspirations, writings and teachings. My keen interest in ALL of such writings and teachings has not just been to try to understand their core messages and inspirations, but also to try to understand why they often seem so entirely different or conflicting. Which is Right and which is Wrong? What is Truth and what is Untruth? Is it Black or is it White? For me, there are no such literal distinctions or judgements. Intriguingly, I find across mostly all of them underlying elements of “resonance” – especially if the “dissonance/noise” created by subjective/cultural “words” are contextually “filtered” out by “attuning” (the inverted commas here referring back to my vibrations/frequencies explanations above).
Much of the explanations in your previous discussion threads resonate with my understanding. Some words and concepts describing your Gnostic Gospel do however not necessarily resonate with my understanding; like “and that was all fine with the originating consciousness” vs. “things went awry”, “top aeon acted unilaterally and overreached his role and station, whereupon he Fell”, “crashed down below” and "the Father threw up a boundary to contain the elements of the Fall". For me, such words imply harsh (human?) concepts like “it should not have happened”, “sin”, “contempt”, “judgement”, “retribution”, “punishment” and “rank”, “class”, “hierarchy”, “separateness”, “oppression”, “big bearded angry man in the sky” and “external projection and locus of control”. These concepts in turn evokes dissonant (human?) emotions and actions like “guilt”, “undeserving”, “unworthiness”, “inadequacy”, “imperfection”, “rebelliousness”, “anger”, “intolerance”, “ungratefulness”, “blame” and “defiance”. This in my view has been the cause of much misinterpretation, misunderstanding, anxiety, stress, depression, unhappiness, pain, dissonance and war in this world.
For me, filtering/interpreting the narrative slightly differently, whilst still reflecting the possible original intent and message of the original words and writings, may point to a more subtle/kind/gentle nature of our being, which enhances resonance and inspires harmony in understanding. That is where I could see your Simple Explanation’s fractal toroidal model, integrated with the concepts of vibration and frequency, as quite a unique and universal attuning filter in creating resonant understanding across many religious, theistic, atheistic, esoteric and secular inspirations, writings and teachings.
If I may, here is how I would integrate my understanding of the core messages of the codices, borrowing many of your thoughts and concepts, which for me also resonates across many other writings and teachings:
ReplyDeleteThe Original, Omnipotent, Omnipresent, Ubiquitous, Boundless, I Am, Consciousness (the Father) conceived within His Benevolent, Loving, Fullness, Calmness, Peacefulness, Stillness and Wisdom (the Spirit) an original thought, an impulse (vibration/wave/big bang), of singular, restricted, monadic existence (the Son).
It is extremely difficult for our limited minds to explain or comprehend the above infiniteness, so allow me to borrow another (though still limited) image. Think of a perfectly still body of water, limited only on its surface by a boundary, but infinitely deep. The original impulse is like a very small stone dropping into the water, creating toroidal shaped waves of frequency rippling outwards across the surface, creating further/fractal toroidal interference patterns upon reflecting back from the surface boundary, but never disturbing the infinite stillness of the infinite depth.
The Father, the Spirit and the Son(s) are therefore not in any hierarchical way outside, above, below or separate from One Another – They are All One and Within the Same – and neither can they in any true way or form ever be separated from One Another.
The Father and Spirit (God?) do not “need” or “want” anything from the Son(s) in any similar sense as humans would interpret, as their infinitely deep Omnipotence, Omnipresence, Boundlessness, Infiniteness, Benevolence, Lovingness, Fullness, Calmness, Peacefulness and Stillness can never be disturbed by such notions.
The Son(s) has never and can never “overreach role and station”, “fall out of union” or “crash down below”, or do anything else “wrong” in any true sense, as the original impulse originated from the Father within the Spirit as a mere a thought. Nor would the Father or Spirit ever get “disappointed” or “angry” at the Son(s) or require any “retribution”, “punishment” or “boundary of protection” from the Son(s), as these self-containing and self-reflective toroidal thought(s) are mere ripples on the surface of an infinite depth of Benevolence, Lovingness, Fullness, Calmness, Peacefulness and Stillness.
The perceptions and experiences of the Son(s) do however continue to replicate and perpetuate as intricate fractal vibrational toroidal frequency interference patterns (UC’s/memes/karma) on the surface of the Stillness. Sometimes creating chaotic storms, sometimes harmonious waveforms, but only for as long as the Son(s) persist in them by not noticing, self-reflecting and learning from the interference patterns continuously reflecting back at them (memes/karma), and by forgetting the deep connection to the Source and Origin.
As and when the lessons are learnt (memes/karma are released), and once the deep connection to the Source and Origin is remembered, then the storms will die down, the ripples and interference patterns will dissipate and all will return to Infinite Lovingness Fullness Calmness Peacefulness and Stillness of the Original, Omnipotent, Omnipresent, Ubiquitous, Boundless, I Am, Consciousness.
I of course realise that in all of my above ramblings, I am caught within the same confines of the words and language that I used :-). I hope that some if it made sense and I would value your further thoughts on this.
ReplyDeleteGosh, Ruan. What terrific comments. I pretty much catch and concur with your various ideas on wave forms, communication, etc. The only difference is what happens at "the end." In your still water model, the perturbations on the surface still themselves and all returns to the original stillness of the first consciousness. However, according to the religious versions in the Nag Hammadi codices, we "sons" do not disappear at the end of this universe and rejoin the great stillness. We retain our personalities and personal consciousness points of view in a "new economy" that is neither this physical universe nor the original pleroma, paradise, or Son. We become the living figures in a lovely Paradise that has rid itself of the negative perturbations of the water.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, "the water" is a repeating metaphor for what came just prior to this universe in which we find ourselves. The breath of God or Sophia or whomever "moving across the face of the waters" creating our universe as a reflection of the movement on the waters. I often wonder what "the waters" refers to exactly. Your metaphor kind of works that way.
Thank you for your comments Cyd. Yes, water metaphors certainly appear and repeat and work (I would say resonate) across many writings and teachings. I also find it interesting that human beings generally feel so drawn to bodies of water, and not just for obvious survival needs, but to experience/tap into its perceived calmness and peacefulness… Also interesting that water is seemingly the most crucial and fundamental chemical/biological component in the make-up and survival of all life on earth… Maybe, water is THE physical manifestation of the underlying nature of the Spirit pointing towards the Source and Origin of our 3D universe…?
ReplyDeleteI have also personally had (and maybe still have) a struggle with the concept of possibly losing my personality/individuality in an end scenario where all just returns to One Stillness. With all respect, it just feels so … boring? I know it is near impossible within our limited human minds to conceive of Infinite Stillness, but I can’t help but wonder (with respect again) if it was so great, why have the original curious/risky impulse/thought in the first place …? Of course, these are very limited human thoughts again, but still, aren’t we supposed to be a “chip of the old block”...?
Maybe another way of imagining the end in relation to the vibration/wave/frequency concepts described previously, and a bit more in resonance with the Nag Hammadi end time messages, is as follows:
The perceptions and experiences of the Son(s) do however continue to replicate and perpetuate as intricate fractal vibrational toroidal frequency interference patterns (UC’s/memes/karma) on the surface of the Stillness, but only on the surface, and never disturbing the Infinite depth of Stillness. For as long as the Son(s) persist in these perceptions and experiences and not noticing, self-reflecting and learning from the interference patterns continuously reflecting back at them (memes/karma), and by forgetting the deep connection to the Source and Origin, these interference patterns of perceptions and experiences will continue to be dissonant, chaotic and stormy.
As and when the lessons are learnt (memes/karma are released), and once the deep connection to the Source and Origin is remembered, then the chaotic storms will dissipate and the ripples and interference patterns will harmoniously resonate as standing waveforms on the surface of the Infinite Lovingness Fullness Calmness Peacefulness and Stillness of the Original, Omnipotent, Omnipresent, Ubiquitous, Boundless, I Am, Consciousness.