A Simple Explanation of the 12/21/2012 Prediction

The earth's axis wobbles like a top.

This wobble, or precession, takes

26,000 years to complete.

photo:wikipedia.org; Precession

of equinoxes

 

The earth's "precession of the equinox" completes its 26,000 year cycle this year, 2012, on December 21, the day of the winter solstice.  

photo: wikipedia 
Maya Long Count Calendar
 

On that same day, the 5,125-year-running Mayan long count calendar comes to an end or turns over to begin a new cycle.

Some people have suggested that December 21, 2012 portends the cataclysmic end of civilization as we know it. It turns out that many theorists have arrived more-or-less independently at numerous 2012 Doomsday scenarios. The wikipedia article on the subject is well-researched and comprehensive, with a works cited list 148 entries long. 12/21/2012 is an active meme chord that is becoming more vibrant as the date approaches. The website www.december212012.com has a handy countdown clock and a list of 21 different catastrophic events that may beset us on that day, with articles and videos covering everything from pole reversal and electromagnetic pulse, to precessional wobble and timewave zero. There's even a Greenwich Mean Time conversion chart to show you precisely when the world will end in your time zone.

Some 2012 predictions focus on the frightening collapse and destruction of civilization, while others focus on the cataclysm as the orderly end of one cycle as it ushers in the birth of the next, more enlightened age.

John Cusak outrunning apocalypse in "2012"

(Think the Hollywood disaster movie, "2012", with  hero John Cusak outrunning the fear-based, apocalyptic Flood meme on the one hand versus the "Dawning-of-the-Age-of-Aquarius" hope-based New Age meme on the other.)

The Simplest Explanation for all this chatter is that the 12/21/2012 prophesy is the latest iteration of the archetypal Doomsday meme common to most world mythologies.
Do I think the world is ending on 12/21/12? I truly doubt it. But, whether or not death comes on a planetary scale, many of us will pass away on 12/21 just in the normal course of events. It is always wise to consider and prepare for death, because you never know when it will come. Given that, here's the best advice I can give you: no matter what happens on December 21, stay centered, stay positive and optimistic, and hold onto the "onward and upward" meme.

A Simple Explanation of the Tao Te Ching -- Verse 2

The following translation of Verse 2 of the Tao Te Ching was arrived at by employing Jonathan Star's verbatim translation provided at the end of his "Definitive Edition" of the Tao Te Ching. For more information about Star's book and my translation process, please read the blog article, "Process Note: Interpreting the Tao Te Ching." Please compare my translation to one you may have on hand; I think you will find this meta-translation helpful.

Verse 2, The Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu

Every manifested unit of consciousness within our Universe is attracted to beauty in all its delightful forms. Each attraction co-creates its own polar opposite--the negative meme of "repulsion."

All recognize virtue whenever it arises as "virtue"--this distinction alone gives rise to the "lack of virtue" meme.

In the same way, "existence" and "non-existence" beget each other in reciprocal interdependence.

Difficult and easy perfectly complement one another,

Long is relative only to short,

High is relative only to low.

A musical note relies upon a voice to sing it just as a voice depends upon having a note to sing.

Front and back, before and after, future and past--self-referential, circular definitions.

This is why those living in tune with the Universal UC deal quietly with the affairs of daily living, administering metaversal principles to do what needs to be done through action rather than words. Every decision is executed appropriately, as needed, without attachment to either recognition or outcome, and once the task is completed, it is forgotten.

Because of this attitude, accomplishments are eternal.

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What I take away from this verse is that all of the memes we deal with in daily living are enmeshed with their polar opposites. In other words, this is a universe of relativities and relationships and whenever we push in one direction, we wind up pulling in the other direction. The Buddha among others said that all suffering is due to attachment. Verse 2 says this is because attachment is fused to its dialectical opposite--repulsion. The Golden Mean advises staying to the middle of dialectics so that neither attraction nor repulsion is activated, as a means of avoiding suffering.

Verse 2 goes a step beyond advising staying centered. It gives the example of the Wise Sage (called by the Simple Explanation "those living in tune with the Universal UC") avoiding memes altogether by doing "what needs to be done through action rather than words." When one's Self UC is fully aligned with the Universal UC's notion of the best course of action for any moment and place, then decisions will seem to come automatically and they will be the best possible response to the situation. There will be no relativistic memes invoked because "thinking" will not be involved with the response. Naturally, since one's Ego was not involved with the decision-making, there is no call or desire for recognition or even attachment to outcome. It was the Universe's call; it's the Universe's score. Except that the Universal UC does not keep egoistic scores, which are limiting and relativistic, as Verse 2 points out; therefore, such accomplishments are eternal.

Fractal Yarrow Flower

The yarrow flowers are abundant this year, due to an especially late spring and late, heavy rains. Yesterday, when I was out walking the dogs, I noticed how beautifully fractal the yarrow flowers are. Looking at the largest flowerhead shape here as the first level, you can easily see two fractal levels down from there--the florets within the flower have florets of their own. Here's the picture I took with my cell phone.

Notice how fractal the yarrow flower is

When I look at this outwardly bursting, fractal pattern I am reminded of ananda-joy energy exploding outward into our space-time continuum from the center of here and now.

Ananda-joy energy bursting outward into our space-time continuum manifests at the next fractal level up as the smallest level of material quanta (anu). The Simple Explanation proposes that a unit of consciousness (UC) is associated with every manifested thing, from quanta on up.

When the inward-poking forces wrap around from the outside and slide into the vortex, they wind up poking outward from the center in an explosive pattern. You can read more about toroidal flow here.

Here is what the yarrow flower looks like before it unfurls. All the florets are turned inward, facing the inside.

Can you see how the inside of the yarrow resembles the illustration above of toroidal flow? On the outside, you can see only the stems, looking very much like meme strings wrapped around a UC.

I am also reminded of "falling backward" into smaller and smaller fractal calculations until the pattern of the yarrow flower becomes the pattern of the molecules and the atoms and the sub-atomic particles fractally nesting until not even their wave forms remain to disturb the singularity of pure consciousness.

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At the beginning of this article I identified three fractal levels of one repetitive pattern that makes up the yarrow flower. Here are a couple of more pictures that demonstrate two more fractal levels up from the flower. Looking at the entire plant, you can see that each yarrow flower is to the plant as each floret is to the flower. One level up from there, you can see that each yarrow plant is to the field as each flower is to the plant, as each floret is to the flower, as each tiny floret is to the larger floret...

Yarrow flower

Yarrow plant

Yarrow field

A Simple Explanation of "Stay Centered"

We are often advised to "stay centered" in order to better deal with life's challenges. This is timeless advice. Most ancient philosophies, in the West and the East, incorporate some version of "staying centered."

Both the Bible and the Tao Te Ching promote the memes "stay centered," and "walk the straight and narrow path." For example, during the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said,

Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it. (Matthew 7:13)

And Lao Tzu similarly recommended,

The great Way is easy, yet people prefer the side paths. Be aware when things are out of balance. Stay centered within the Tao. (from verse 53, Tao Te Ching, Stephen Mitchell translation)

In the examples above, "staying centered" refers to keeping to a narrow field of possible action, as opposed to broader or more diverse paths.

Another way to "stay centered" is expressed by the Golden Mean, which Aristotle described as keeping to the beneficial middle and avoiding extremes. In Chinese philosophy this is called the Doctrine of the Mean. In Buddhism the same meme is called The Middle Way. Each tradition uses slightly different words and metaphors, but they all articulate the same meme.

Here is the Simple Explanation of "Stay Centered":



Staying Centered Near the Vortex Maintains Alignment with the Metaverse

Staying centered means keeping your conscious focus on the here and now, remaining poised in the present between past and future. Staying centered means allowing your Unit of Consciousness to align with the Universal UC, rather than with your ego. Staying centered acknowledges that the answers lie in the immediate present, not out there in some other place or time.   

According to the Simple Explanation, information from the metaverse flows into our universe through the dynamic patterns of the Universal UC. In our model, the patterns of our space-time continuum emerge fractally from the zero-point field at the center of the Universal UC. These patterns are both ideal and material. Idealistic patterns include, for example, the laws of physics, mathematics, and karma. Material patterns are expressed in the 3-D universe with which we are all familiar.

Spiritually, the best solutions arise from God, also known as the Universal UC, or the metaversal fractal. Answers to problems are not found in the broad pathways of the world; attempting to find answers "out there" will not align you with the metaversal plan. Keeping to the center aligns one with God's will.

When I image nestling backward into the Universal UC, I imagine falling smaller toward the ananda/joy direction, while still feeling the outer skin of the Universal UC holding from the outside and flowing through the middle. Perfection and possibility emerge from the middle as the universe instantiates around me. This would be the truest expression of the meme "stay centered".

The Fractal Roots of Consciousness



As explained in the articles, "My Self, the Governor of Whoville" and "A Simple Fractal Model of the Conscious Universe," my Self's Unit of Consciousness (UC) is sitting atop a veritable fractal galaxy of hierarchically arranged Units of Consciousness, all working together to instantiate my body. While I may believe I am the only conscious soul inhabiting this body of mine, my physical body is actually home to all of these aggregated UCs, each with their own job to perform, each living their own lives and laying down their own karmic record. Within the confines of my skin, countless UCs of varying levels of complexity work together to keep my body alive and fully functional. At each descending level of complexity, from my governing Self UC down through the organ systems, organs, cells, molecules, atoms, and quanta, my body's UCs deal with increasingly simpler tasks even as the matter associated with them becomes smaller and more numerous. The simplest and most numerous level of materially instantiated consciousness is associated with the quantum foam that forms at the finest fractal edge between matter and energy.

As the roots of a plant send out finer and finer tendrils at each level of fractal branching, our hierarchically arranged aggregate UCs nest closer and closer to the Original Source Code--the Universal UC--at their simplest and most numerous levels. Whereas the concerns of the world often obscure my Self UC, the UC of a single sub-atomic particle or wave (anu), having a fairly limited view of creation and few choices regarding activity, is the least distracted by Ego and most attuned with its originating Source. At the deepest physical level of instantiation, the countless quanta that form the building blocks of our bodies are associated with countless undeluded UCs, all tapping their roots directly into the organizational source of our Universe ("Universal UC," "God," "Sat," "Original Source Code").

As I visualize the roots of Whoville, I visualize roots penetrating from my skin inward, finer and finer, to the depths of my material being. Within my body, all of my aggregated UCs drill fractally "backward" toward the zero-point field at our shared core. Whereas my Self UC may appear a long way off from God, especially if I conceive of God outside the Very Large, if I instead turn inward and "fall back," I am as near to God as the center point of Whoville's UCs. This is a new way to interpret the practices of "centering" and "grounding." When ancient teachings speak of God residing in the hearts of man, this Simple Explanation suggests the heart may be interpreted as the shared zero-point field at the shared center of our fractal Units of Consciousness.