In the essay Stop Being So Human! an idea was put forth concerning the concept of Divinity. In the lives of most humans, finding, knowing and understnading the nature of Divinity is important. In many ways, the content of this web site is an attempt to find, know and understand the nature of Divinity as much as it is a quest to find, know and understand the nature of Being. The theoretical model of existence that is being developed everywhere on this site is about Being, and the qualities of Humanity. But, in the same way that we can't see the Figure without the Ground behind it, we do need to also address the nature of Divinity. As a means to this end, many have put forth philosophies that suggest a need to transcend the dual or binary nature of Humanity in order to find Divinity. In the essay Stop Being So Human, the idea of transcending duality lead to the idea of neutrality of duality, which was then illustrated, in at least one way, with the use of the color gray. With the idea of Divinity being gray, it was suggested that the "light" that most people associate with "enlightenment" should in fact be associated more with an inspired experience concerning Life than with Divinity, and that "The Light of Life" that most people cherish as Divine Light, should in fact be considered as only one half of a binary pair of opposites devoted exclusively to describing Humanity. With these ideas in mind... it could be argued that the term "enlightenment" is not really as accurate a description of finding Divinity as we might expect!
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Engrayment!
Throughout the pages of this site, the word "enlightenment," has been used, mostly because it is a word that many are familiar with. But... if we think about it, such a casual use of that word might in fact be a bit sloppy. To many, "enlightenment" is synonymous with: a divine superconsciously transcendent level of awareness with regard to one's place in the universe and their interconnectedness to everything else. But... as we've just implied, the actual word - enlightenment - carries with it a bias. The bias within the word "enlightenment" is the inclusion of the word "light." To many, enlightenment also includes an understanding of the superior nature of unity over that of duality. But unity is supposed to be a realm without opposites. Clearly, light has an opposite - dark. Thus, to attach the concept of "lightness" to "unity" is to impose a bias upon a concept that is not supposed to have any bias.
For now... the study of consciousness being presented everywhere on this site will continue to use the word "enlightenment" to mean anything similar to "divine superconsciously transcendent level of awareness with regard to one's place in the universe and their interconnectedness to everything else" but... with a hopeful understanding that this divine superconsciously transcendent level of awareness with regard to one's place in the universe and their interconnectedness to everything else has no actual bias of light to it at all. In the study being presented everywhere on this site, a divine superconsciously transcendent level of awareness with regard to one's place in the universe and their interconnectedness to everything else has no light or dark bias. In the study being presented everywhere on this site, the most "ultimate" degree of "enlightenment" possible, is only achieved through a "neutrality of duality" that I think we should call "Engrayment"!
In the opinion of this study of consciousness, enlightenment describes a heightened level of awareness regarding the realization of the Self that governs a conscious entity, like a human. This level of awareness, as hard as it is to realize and understand, is in fact still very human... not Divine. To achieve this level of awareness is to know and become "The Light of the World" or a radiating presence of concsciousness. But as a radiating presence of consciousness and heightened awareness, elevated and separated from the background of ignorance that pervades throughout humanity, we are still human. We shine as the illuminated figure on the dark background... but we are still human. In order to find, know and understand Divinity, we need to move beyond figure and ground... beyond the dark and the light. We need to be gray.
Because the study of tarot and consciousness being presented everywhere on this site uses paradox as a logical "Godforce" to our Universe, there is no escaping duality... even (paradoxically) within the realms of unity! (see The Three Unities elsewhere on this site). Because of the way paradox combines unity and duality into one ineffable concept of ultimate cosmic neutrality... one could easily argue that the idea of "enlightenment" when used to mean Divinity found, should really be more accurately described as "engrayment"!! Enlightenment is still a good word to use when describing the breakthroughs people have on their way toward an understanding of the neutrality of duality, but this study of consciousness would only agree with that usage if "enlightenment" is interpreted to mean: the LIGHT of awareness, cast upon the DARK of ignorance, to reveal the GRAY of God!
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It is difficult to separate our natural bias to view increased awareness with light, but if "Enlightenment" is equated with understanding transcendent unity, then a full embrace of the complete spectrum of all possibilities could only lead to "Engrayment!" Likewise... if the light of the world sits at the right hand of God, what is at the left hand but that logical opposite... which puts God in the middle... making God gray. To see a mandala that embodies this idea of Engrayment, try the Grand Cosmic Eye mandala.
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The Gray of God
At the beginning of The Bhagavad Gita, Krishna (a spiritual entity) instructs Arjuna (a human entity) as to the advantages of acquiring and utilizing detachment from all concerns about outcome, as Arjuna prepares for war on a battlefield where many are soon to die. With the idea that we are not our bodies but only spiritual entities wearing human bodies like clothing, and that permanent souls are reincarnated... abandonment of all value for life is possible. With that, anything is possible. This is considered by some to be an enlightened state (see the essay Stop Being So Human elsewhere on this site). But... absolute detachment from all notions of good and bad, or right and wrong, or true and false, or reality and illusion, means absolute neutrality. Why then do people describe and illustrate notions of "God" with Blinding White Light? Why do people describe "God" as Good and compassionate? Why do some describe "God" as Male? Why do some describe "God" with a human form at all? If we are supposed to find "God" by moving beyond all notions of duality and opposites, shouldn't our notions of "God" be centered around the idea of detached neutrality and indifference to outcomes? Shouldn't "The Light of God" be Gray? Shouldn't God be androgynous? Or better yet, shouldn't God be a neutral gray "it" rather than a Brilliantly White Him, Her or even Him/Her?
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God is not Good. God is not Light. God is not Love.
God is Gray!
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Lots of philosophies preach the abandonment of opposites and dualities as a requirement of enlightenment and reaching the realm of "God"-like, Divine Unity (as opposed to the other two forms of unity mentioned in the essay The Three Unities found elsewhere on this site), but... at the same time... these same people will frequently follow that instruction with a promise of eternal goodness, light, love and compassion to follow, once we have united with "God." These are great, comforting thoughts to give to people who are suffering through a difficult life, but... it would seem, to any detached observer, that one conclusion does not sensibly follow from the other! Goodness and light have opposites - badness and darkness. So, in what way are Goodness and Light accurate descriptions of a "God"-like, Divine Unity? Goodness and Light just puts someone to one side of a binary pair that some mortal mind perceives as preferable. That's not "God"-like Unity. Like the tarot card reader - mentioned in the essay Stop Being So Human - who thinks they are being neutral because they are only presenting one perspective of good and lightness, many of these spiritual philosophies do the same thing... they talk about achieving the neutrality of unity through the abandonment of opposites, but at the same time they can't let go of their human desire to view that "ultimate" goal as something good, light and compassionate. So they conflate. They conflate their human desires with divine geometry to create a hybrid that is not entirely true to the form of what they seek. But... because it leads to a conclusion that makes them feel good, they ignore their distortions and hypocrisies and form their manipulative religions. In forming their spiritual philosophies, they have a desire to view this spiritual realm as something that will relieve them of their Earthly burdens and lift them up out of their misery. But that is not what "God"-like Unity implies. "God"-like Unity implies an ultimate, cosmic neutrality, beyond that, even, of human neutrality! Thus there is no "up" out of misery to be found within "God"-like Unity, just as there is no good or bad, or consequences of any kind, within the realm of "God"-like Unity.
In the essay Consider the Source we address this problem of people manipulating spiritual philosophies in order to have their cake and eat it too. This behavior is particularly characteristic of one particular personality type that just happens to represent a majority opinion within most cultures. Thus, because of the malleability of this majority, contradictions like attaching a bias of light to notions of "God" are accepted without any trouble whatsoever. But, to other more detached personality types, who examine things with a more critical eye, these kinds of contradictions spoil the wisdom of a philosophy. People will tend to create, and take, what they want from any philosophy, and some are more forgiving of discrepancies than others. People living in the darkness of misery typically want solace, and will manipulate the logical contingencies of existence to suit that purpose. People neeeeed a God that is Good, Light and Compassionate... and for many, a neutral God of Gray that is an "it" rather than a "Him" simply will not do. So people bend the logic when creating a wisdom system, and people in need of solace readily bend the logic in order to accept such a wisdom system as true. If enough of it makes sense, and it is comforting enough to the psyche of those in need, certain contradictions and discrepancies will be politely overlooked by those looking for something in which to believe.
| Live, die, whatever... I don't care, it doesn't matter. - God |
People who manufacture a Good, Light and Compassionate God, will typically look to that God for guidance. But why should a God that preaches detachment from consequences be sought out, by humans, for advice on what to do in life? Shouldn't God's answer to all inquiries about what a mortal human should do in life be the same every time: Hey dude, I'm neutral... as in beyond opposites... gray... so... live, die whatever... one shouldn't care, because it doesn't matter? Just as Krishna tells Arjuna? Krishna makes it sound like Arjuna should not be concerned about whether he is going to die or not, because of how expendable his transient human form is... at least... that is... from the perspective of "The One" that unites us all by "wearing" us as "clothing" (see The Paradox in the Lotus Mandala in the essay Stop Being So Human, elsewhere on this site). Arjuna is reassured with notions of reincarnation of permanent souls. On the other hand... people who believe in reincarnation are typically instructed to take heed as to what they might be reincarnated to, if they do not lead a "good" life that cultivates a "good" soul. But... wait a minute... "The One" of "God"-like Divine Unity is not supposed to have any good or bad to it at all. In many ways, the concept of a soul is as ephemeral as that of unity and oneness. But... if we declare our permanent souls to be the product of our individually lead lives, they are effectively as separate, unique and different from that of ephemeral unity as our transient physical forms. It is only through ultimate, cosmic neutrality that we are all seen as "One." In darkenss we are the same. In lightness we are unique. In the absolute neutrality of light and dark we are one. Thus, if these permanent souls, preparing to be reincarnated as either a higher or lower - not neutral - beings, are not part of that neutral unity, then we are effectively returning to the notion that there is such a thing as "good" and "bad" after all. Which would mean that Arjuna should be concerned about whether he dies or not, because there are consequences - he might be reincarnated as a "lower" being! So... should a living breathing human with a permanent soul acknowledge the good and bad of consequences or not?
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Dueling Contexts
In the essay Stop Being So Human, we observed how the Unity of "no differentiation" and the Duality of "binary differentiation"... create a loop of reincarnation that resembles a Mobius band, where good and bad are both "fused as one" and "split as two" or both meaningless and meaningful at the same time. The paradox that allows the concepts of good and bad to be both meaningful and meaningless at the same time, creates a dilemma between dueling contexts. Thus, the real lesson to be learned here is that no single context is any more correct than any other. So... pick a context! If we are "The One" of "God"-like Divine Unity, we should not concern ourselves with the good and bad of any individual, completely expendable, soul or body. On the other hand... if we are that individual soul or body, we should concern ourselves with the good and bad of all the consequences in life and death - as many lives and deaths as we have before achieving the ultimate, cosmic neutrality that gets us off the wheel of reincarnations. Thus, in the world of life and death, things matter. While within the realm of the ultimate, cosmic neutrality of "God"-like Divine Unity, things don't matter. One context will instruct us to live one way, the other context will instruct us to live another way. This unresolvable conflict is the endless torment of every human who bothers to be as aware as possible. This is also how people come to acknowledge one context, while at the same time - through reckless acts of conflating - pollute one context with notions from the other context - making both less pure to what they really are. It is also how people come to pit one context against the other in a futile contest of alleged superiority.
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Are Humanity (dualism of black and white) and Divinity (unity of gray) separate incompatible realms? Or do Humanity and Divinity intermingle? Can a human be completely "Gray" in every way shape and form, with every action and reaction they express, for the entire duration of their existence? Or do we have to stop being human (i.e. don't live or die) to achieve a state of "Gray" that would make us Divine? |
The most perplexing aspect of paradox is how it taunts the mind into thinking that something impossible is in fact possible. Is it really possible for a manifest entity or permanent soul, being reincarnated into higher or lower states, to be absolutely neutral for its entire duration of existence... in order to transcend to unity? Could it be that, in spite of our gift of enlightened awareness, one context is not meant for humans, while the other context is meant for humans? Could it also be that these dueling contexts are not meant to be experienced in tandem by inhabitants of either side?
Many argue that a state of absolute neutrality is not sustainable by living, breathing, mortal humans (see Good and Bad, Right and Wrong, Smile and Frown elsewhere on this site). It is a context we mortal humans are not meant to inhabit, but can only imagine, or logically believe to exist, and... temporarily approximate through things like meditation. Meaning... for living, breathing, mortal humans, the consequences of good and bad and life and death will not be denied. Except... maybe... by those among us who are capable of emotional neutrality; the people who emotional people label as "dead inside" (see the essay Stop Being So Human elsewhere on this site) But for the rest of us, who occasionally crack a smile or reveal a frown, it would appear that dualities are undeniable. Thus, in a cruel twist of paradoxical irony... when we have the capacity to understand - i.e. an evolving, reincarnating permanent soul - we can't. And when we loose the capacity to understand - i.e. get off the wheel of reincarnation with a soul that is completely neutral gray - we do. Paradox rules! In the spiritual philosophy being put forth on this site, the locationless location that is off the cycle of reincarnation is a neutral gray "it" and not a Brilliant White "He." The "Light of God" is Gray. And all questions about what to do in life are answered with unresolveable paradox - a degree of neutrality that goes beyond mortal neutrality and into a realm of Absentia.
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Detachment
Many spiritual philosophies talk about a fall from grace, where "Spirit" becomes "imprisoned" within "Matter." As mentioned above, these philosophies then examine the hardships of life amid duality and quickly surmise that life amid unity must be preferable to the misery of our current existence. They then proceed to vilify our manifest form as a prison of spiritually unworthy filth to be shed as quickly and completely as possible on a path toward enlightenment and spiritual transcendence to the unmanifest realms of Divinity (see An Alchemistic Recipe elsewhere on this site). They likewise proceed to vilify all the dualities of life as the source of all misery, and Unity as a Utopia of paradise devoid of all conflicts.
In some cases, the spiritual philosophies that vilify our human form and conscious minds acknowledge that transcendence to Divinity includes the death of the physical form and the conscious mind. Others however seem to imply that through repeated purifications of the Self, a mortal human can be transformed into a God-on-Earth - a living being of Divinity. Like an alchemist turning lead into gold - a mortal human can be transformed into the Philosopher's Stone incarnate. But while some might characterize a claim of human transformation into something Divine as "a God complex," the idea itself can be used to help clarify the nature of the paradoxical dilemma we have before us concerning the nature of good and bad vs no good or bad, and why it is that good and bad, right and wrong, true and false or illusion and reality are so obvious to each individual, and yet impossible to define in ways that are satisfactory to all individuals?
Some cultures are monotheistic - they only believe in one God. Others cultures are polytheistic - they believe in many Gods. In both cultures Gods are typically detached from the activities of mortals - like a puppetmaster to a puppet. With the contradiction of unity being described by a diversity of Gods aside (!)... things like good and bad, or right and wrong, or true and false, or illusion and reality do not concern Gods... because they don't have to be affected by the consequences of their own actions upon the mortal world - Gods are typically immortal, eternal, unchanging and detached. Thus... in being so detached, we find that they have transcended the most important obstacle to understanding the universe - that of the human tendency to have concern for the consequences of life and death.
Some cultures portray the gods as having conflicts of morality similar to that of humans, but ultimately a God is a God - immortal, beyond consequences and detached (see the essay Behold the Absentia! elsewhere on this site). It is this absolutely DETACHED state, beyond all consequences, that would transform a mortal into a God - if in fact one were to believe that to be at all possible. But whether absolute, or relative, it would be this detached state that would allow judgments of what is good and bad, right and wrong, true and false and illusion and reality to be so obvious to each detached individual. In a state of absolute detachment - whether imagined or actual - we are effectively Gods unto our own self-centric universe. Consequently, it is only the point at which we attempt to share with others our self-centric beliefs, and moral judgments about good and bad, right and wrong, true and false and illusion and reality, that our unsustainable state of detachment is broken... and we return to a state of human mortality... shocked and amazed that our beliefs don't necessarily match that of other mortal humans.
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There's no way to understand where you are, while being where you are.
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With this idea of "broken detachment" in mind... we understand the concept put forth in the essay Stop Being So Human, which states unequivocally that: to truly "know" what life is about, stop being so human! Remain detached. Which... is an unsettling paradox to be sure. But, as mentioned above, this is all a matter of dueling contexts. As a participant we will be forever guessing. As a detached God, we will know all. And while the level of neutrality required for total, cosmically neutral "Engrayment" is much greater than any human concept of neutrality, our human concept of neutrality definitely gets us much closer to understanding the nature of the ultimate, absolute, neutral "God"-like Divinity than our human concepts of lightness... or their opposite, darkness. Thus, it becomes the declaration of this particular study of consciousness that "Engrayment" - not enlightenment - becomes our most ambitious spiritual goal ! That is... when such spiritual goals become important, as they so often do.
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The Great Regress
It is only the detached Gods and Goddesses who "know" what life is about, for they are the detached puppetmasters. This is why I have written essays that are devoted both to the guesswork of mortals, as well as the "knowing" of Gods... who, by the way, live in Absentia. By examining both these realms, we can compassionately acknowledge that; for one mortal human to suggest to another mortal human that they abandon all notions of life and death, in order to abandon all judgments of good and bad, right and wrong, true and false, or illusion and reality is in effect hypocrisy... if the person making such a suggestion has not themself abandoned the same. As mortals, we can imagine the abandonment of life and death, and the embrace of Unity and Divinity... but as long as we both have tongues in a head, or fingers on a keyboard, capable of expressing that thought, and eyes capable of seeing each other across time and space, neither one of us is in any position to criticize the other for being unenlightened... or... unengrayed! Only when someone relinquishes all notions of life...death... and reincarnation of permanent souls, and stops being so human, can we truly call them enlightened... or... Engrayed! The rest of us are just going 'round and 'round, guessing.
In the essay on Reincarnation I suggest that the most Divine form of reincarnation is the one that leads away from ideas of permanent souls going 'round and 'round and leads instead to the paradox of The Absentia. In the essay The Three Unities I suggest that there is in fact more than one brand of unity for us to experience. All forms of unity require an abandonment of duality. In that regard they all require a certain degree of detachment from our notions of what it is to be human. In the essay The Three Unities, three forms of unity were used to suggest a sequence of creation from that of ineffable Absentia, to incomprehensible Infinity, to manifest Identity. The mechanical nature of this sequence utilized a concept known as symmetry vs. broken symmetry, where the stagnant nature of symmetry is involuntarily broken to produce something removed from the previous state. That theory was used to suggest a path of creation. The cool thing is... how that same conceptual path can now be used to explain the mechanics behind a path of enlightenment... or Engrayment! By achieving successive levels of detachment from duality, we produce successive levels of restored symmetry, instead of broken symmetry, as we regress to unity.
The idea that we regress to unity might offend some who prefer to view enlightenment as progress rather than regress. But at the same time, the idea of moving back to a more primal state lends credence to the idea put forth by many spiritual philosophies that our current mode of existence is in fact a corrupted form of a previously utopian state. I don't particularly buy that notion. I think that if we are to consider our human state as corrupt, then we should conclude that humans have been corrupt throughout all cultures and ages. But the idea makes some sense, if we view it as metaphorical to the idea of regressing to unity. Thus, with this notion of "successive levels of regressive detachment from that of humanity" in mind, we can see how the concept of Oneness only reveals to us the idea of "Self" discovered or known. By detaching from humanity enough to abandon duality, we discover the Self. In discovering the Self, we identify ourself as the center of our own universe. Nothing matters but the reality we build in our own minds. Knowing that we are the center of our own universe allows us to view ourselves as our own Light of Life. This, to me, is enlightenment. If desired, one could extend this notion of light to claim that they are in fact Thee Light of Thee Universe, sent to Earth by "God" "Himself." But even if we don't go that far, the first unity on our path of detachment, is a unity of the integrity of the Self as a Universe unto itself.
By knowing the Self, we know something - something very important. By knowing the Self, we blend dualities into one - we master dualities. But to know everything, we will need to abandon the blended dualities of the Self and get to know nothingness. The Self breaches the continuum of infinity as whirlpools of nothingness or twisted points on the fabric of spacetime. The black empty reaches of space connect all things with a uniformity of unity that encompasses all of humanity with a chaos that defies all sense of duality. Through the stillness of meditation, we attempt to relinquish our manifest form and the conscious mind of the Self, and "know" the black empty reaches of nothingness. In my opinion, we should be calling this practice of closed-eyed meditation "endarkenment." In the dark, we are all the same. Without an ego of Self, we are all the same. At the formless level of nothingness, we are able to know our minds to be one mind. But meditation is an unsustainable state for any manifest being to maintain 24/7/365, for a complete lifetime. Thus... to really "know" nothingness, and how it unites all things in sameness, we would need to detach from life itself and become nothing. We need to die. Only when we are literally dead, can we ever "know" the unity of nothingness. But.. at the same time... "knowing" something implies the presence of an intact mind capable of holding information. Thus, as some theorize intact minds, or permanent souls, to eventually be reincarnated into manifest beings, we can see how there is in fact one more step for us to go.
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1 = White Enlightenment of Conscious Me: Unity through the Fusion of opposites (coagula)
0 = Black Endarkenment of Unconscious We: Unity through the Dissolution of opposites (solve)
A = Gray Engrayment of Superconscious Me & We:
Unity through the infinite, perpetual and impossibly simultaneous
(not alternating)
Fusion and Dissolution of opposites (paradox)
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To "know" the last, and most ultimate, and absolute form of unity, we need to abandon both life and death. To "know" the paradox of The Absentia, we need to get off The Wheel of Reincarnations! To The Absentia, Life and Death are themselves a duality that must be abandoned to achieve the unity of cosmic, universal singularity. If we define life and death as two sides of humanity on a wheel of reincarnation, the message is: stop being so human! The Absentia is the ultimate in between. Through paradox, The Absentia is not only an in between, it effectively unites, divides, blends and separates opposites in ways that go way beyond any human notion of neutrality. At the same time, neutral it is. Thus we could call this ultimate form of infinitely neutral knowledge "Engrayment."
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We can know Oneness by abandoning Duality (1). We can know Unity by abandoning Life (0). But we can only know the ultimate cosmic neutrality of a "God"-like Divinity by abandoning both Oneness and Unity (A)! In other words... stop being so human! Oneness = enlightenment it is white. Unity = endarkenment, it is black. The ultimate cosmic neutrality of a "God"-like Divinity labeled by this analysis as The Absentia = engrayment, it is gray. Get off the wheel. Abandon it all... don't reincarnate... give it all away - give it ALL away. With nothing to follow. Give it all up - give it ALL up, every last bit... including family, friends and ALL traces of a permanent soul or the ego of the self... and rest in Absentia. If you can...! Can you?
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But wait... there is a twist! The diagram above is a combination of The Cosmic Wheel Mandala seen in the essay Verse 82, and the idea of three unities seen in the essay The Three Unities. Those essays go to great lengths to illustrate the unobtainable nature of The Absentia. And so, in a similar manner, it has also been the point of everything in this essay to illustrate how unobtainable the ultimate cosmic neutrality of a "God"-like Divinity (labeled by this analysis as The Absentia) is... to any mortal human with eyes in a head, sending signals to a mind, capable of reading these words! Thus, by theorizing The Absentia to be completely unobtainable, we learn how we are in fact not able to be anything other than human! If we have no choice but to be human, in a state of either life or death, duality is in fact inescapable. This becomes painfully apparent when we realize that the two unities of Identity (1) and Infinity (0) are themselves a duality! The inescapability of duality is additionally apparent when we realize that the Wheel of Reincarnation and The Absentia are also a duality! And because the cosmic singularity of The Absentia is paradoxically split into two locations by our descriptions of how manifestation comes into being (see the book All Things Are Numbers elsewhere one this site), it too is a duality... unto itself! It is a singularity... that is dual in nature. In this way, we come to see how we are in fact on an allegorical/metaphorical Mobius strip! Duality leads to unity... that is dual!
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We can aspire to unity, but we live with duality.
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So... pick a context! Is the allegorical Mobius one sided or two sided? Clearly it is both, depending on how one chooses to look at it. So... for those who think they can stop being human, that context would dictate that indeed nothing in life matters, there is no good or bad, there are no consequences to consider. However... for those who acknowledge that we can only be human (whether one time through or as eternal souls being reincarnated over and over again into higher or lower states), things in life do matter, and there are consequences to consider. For those who acknowledge we can only be human, a Self-centered approach to life might help to temporarily dispel all notions of consequence through the unity of Identity (1). For those who meditate, and do all they can to abandon all notions of physical form and conscious thought, indeed all notions of consequence will temporarily vanish through the unity of Infinity (0). But... for those who acknowledge we can only be human, and that we are awake and living in a reality that includes others, bumping into each other in life preserving and life detracting ways, things will matter, there will be consequences to consider. In being a mortal human who acknowledges other humans, we look for, and find, methods of communicating our beliefs to each other. So it is that everything on this site is my best guess, to share with other mortal humans who are also guessing at what is good and bad, what is right and wrong, what is true and false, what is illusion and reality. Enjoy! :-)
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The Be Gray Every Day Mandala
Here is a mandala we can use to meditate on the idea of Being Gray Every Day. Is it possible to be gray EVERY day? I mean COMPLETELY gray, in EVERY way, EVERY day, in EVERY thing we say, and how we work and play? If not... it might be a good idea to examine the many ways in which this study of tarot and numerology deals with the conflicts and harmonies of duality within our inescapably binary universe.
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Can you be gray EVERY day? I mean COMPLETELY gray, in EVERY way, EVERY day, in EVERY thing you do and say, and in every way you work and play? More importantly... why would you want to? Why not be human, and deal with duality? Because humans are a mistake? a fall from grace? filth to be washed away as a means of obtaining something better?
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Can you be gray 100% of your life? I've got news for you... you can't be gray in every way, every day, in every thing you say and how you work and play. Even if you are dead and reading this from beyond... if you are on your way to reincarnation... out of darkness into light, you are not gray, you are dark becoming light. If you live the quiet life of a secluded monk, interacting largely with other quiet, secluded monks, spending your days in quiet meditation, you might come closer to being gray every day in every way than that of people who live each day in the everyday world of everyday things interacting with other everyday things in imperfect, life affirming and life detracting ways... but, without abandoning all value for life itself, persistent, life-long, 24/7/365 imperturbability is unlikely - especially for 100% of all human beings on Earth, from now to the end of time. But... it's something to shoot for! Why not? Or... go ahead and be human, and use The Numerical Tarot and Quintagrams to help navigate the binary bundles of choice we encounter with every moment of life.
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This diagram shows the entire Minor Suits, upright and reversed. By mixing one fourfold quaternary model with another as a crossed grid, conflicts concerning syncretism are reduced. This diagram shows elements describing an entity, and seasons describing the binary aspects of that entity. For more on these various subdivisions of binary influence, consult the essay Evolution of a Deck Design: The Matrix. For another version of this diagram consult the Interpretation Pages. |
And... to keep all this relevant to the subject of tarot... here is another mandala of sorts that also addresses this question of being gray every day, in every way, in everything we do and say. It is a black and white version of the Crazy Quilt, seen in the essay on Colors, found elsewhere on this site. As a metaphorical quilt, this "square mandala" represents all of the cards of the Minor suits, and their reverses. In theory... these 81, or 72, or 64 fragments of reality, or "windows of perception" upon reality, represent all the ways that a binary entity - like you - can "be"... when not being gray every day in every way. Each square represents a point of binary influence that a normal human might express at any given moment in time (see explanation of Quintagrams and moments in time here). Thus... only by occupying the absolute center of the center square can a person be considered entirely gray in every way. Occupying that center square would be what this site calls Engrayment. While, stepping anywhere outside of that one square would lead to some kind of binary influence - i.e. more of this... less of that... or this is good... that is bad etc.
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Moderation... in moderation
So... given the considerations mentioned so far, of acknowledging consequences... or not, and avoiding the dualities of life by being absolutely gray in every way... or not... we can see how, in order to be gray in every way, every day, we would have to abandon all value for life itself, and shut down our whole "fight or flight" syndrome that helps keep us alive. Otherwise, if our life is ever threatened, we run the risk of responding in a way that reveals a preference to live, which would carry with it the assumption that something life threatening has consequences to be avoided - thereby establishing a dislike, and causing us to step off that tiny square of neutrality, seen in the Crazy Quilt mandala above, and immediately re-enter the realm of duality. It's a clear choice: stay in the absolute center and be Divine, or step away from absolute center and be Human.
The choice is ours. And in confronting that choice, we can see how the logical contingency that is found within the idea of absolute neutrality, and how any teeny tiny step away from dead center, through any expression of preference of ANY kind - including the preference to preserve life when threatened - makes this so-called "enlightenment" as much of a prison as the life of duality we are attempting to escape. Absolute neutrality of duality is a very tiny realm in which to live (if we can really call it living), especially when compared to the full spectrum of life, death, Humanity and Divinity all together. But to many, a singleminded pursuit of Divinity is preferred. To many, a singlemined pursuit of Divinity is our purpose for living. To those who suffer from obsessions and addictions that result from expressed preferences of likes and dislikes that have gone too far, the neutrality of "enlightenment" or as suggested in this essay "Engrayment," and the level of detachment required to achieve that state, might feel like a sanctuary of calm amid the torments of life. But, for many, to pursue this level of neutrality to an absolute degree makes it as much of an obsession as the obsessions and addictions they leave behind, and for which they now live in denial. And the limitations they put upon themselves to never step away from dead center can make this realm as much of a mental prison as any other path of life one might choose. Thus, it would be my advice to acknowledge the unobtainable nature of the absolute, and open up to the full spectrum of light, dark and gray. In other words... practice moderation... in moderation. Be light when appropriate. Be dark when appropriate. Be gray when appropriate. Do not vilify either one. Do not live in denial of either one. Do not glom onto any one in desperation, only to establish an addiction to it, and a fear or hatred of the others. Acknowledge where obsession and addiction to any one outcome puts us, and don't go there.
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All that is required to neutralize the suffering of life is:
moderation... in moderation.
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When a fully detached monk, living in isolation, away from the madding crowd (i.e. a 1/9 sort), looks at someone living in the thick of things, dealing with the give and take of life, and the conflicts of personalities expressing obsessive and addictive likes and dislikes (i.e. the 4/6 sort), he will naturally advise detachment, as a way of calming the mind of the addicted. When we live the life of a monk, cloistered away in isolation (1/9), fewer life threatening things cross our path. When we live the life of a human, in the thick of things, part of the madding crowd (4/6), more life threatening things cross our path. Thus, one might argue that techniques of detachment are somewhat impractical on a worldwide scale. We can't all live in isolation. Some of us have to interact with each other - lest the human race die out completely. And when we do interact, we inevitably bump into each other in life affirming and life detracting ways... causing our "fight or flight" instincts to rear their ugly head again and again, leading to eventual likes and dislikes, which - in some, BUT NOT ALL cases - leads to addictions and aversions.
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"To infinity, and beyond!" - Buzz Lightyear
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There is no "magic bullet" answer. Enlightenment, endarkenment and engrayment is a spectrum of possibilities. Everyone should acknowledge, experience and utilize as much of, or as little of that spectrum as is appropriate for each changing situation - moderation... in moderation. Enlightenment, or even engrayment, does not mean the pathological denial of opposites, it means the mastery of opposites. Mastery is difficult. For some, mastery is nearly impossible, leading to a life of intemperate extremes. This essay argues that extreme neutrality is as intemperate as anything. Thus mastery should not take on the character of yet another extreme by becoming some futile pursuit of an unobtainable absolute, but should remain a relative state of moderation and temperance that embraces the full spectrum of possibilities, from light, to dark, to gray... and beyond! Extreme amounts of moderation = mediocrity. Moderate amounts of moderation = equanimity. Thus... in the end, the message of this essay is: don't be gray EVERY day! Go ahead and be human! And use The Numerical Tarot and its associated quilt of Quintagrams to navigate through life. Try using The Binary Influence Calculator or The Dream Analysis Calculator to calculate binary influence and help determine life's path.
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The White Light of Life is the Right hand of God. The Black Dark of Death is the Left hand of God. So to really look an anthropomorphized "God" right in the Bindu/i, we need to be absolutely grayer than the greyest gray, and then...
one step beyond!
"To infinity, and beyond!" - Buzz Lightyear |
Because of the necessities of survival, a lot of us spend a lot of time perceiving the world with our analytical, rational mind. When people attempt to find a spiritual path, their minds shift. Like an artist shifting into their right brain in order to utilize a more wholistic, visual-spacial mind of shape recognition and subtle aesthetics, the spiritual seeking mind shifts to a more subtle state. In the deck layout being presented by The Numerical Tarot, we see this shift in perception illustrated two different ways, through a series of images that represent a spiritual path of discovery. One path is positive and is illustrated with the suit of Multiplication/Heart/Cup. The other is negative and is illustrated with the suit of Division/Spade/Sword. In the essay The Pentacle Person the advantages of both of these paths are examined in detail. In the essay A Significant Signature of Nature, the positive path is further illustrated and examined for how it influences human lives.
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DON'T Be Gray Every Day
A great number of people spend their days with their analytical, rational mind. Because of this, it is being suggested in this essay that people who reach the conclusion that "God" is Good, Light and Love are in fact only traversing the "subtle" path of Multiplication/Heart/Cup with a shifted mind that... unfortunately, is still human! The mind traversing is still human, and the theory being put forth here is that the path itself is still human. In other words... it is being suggested here that what these people are connecting to that causes their grand epiphany is the Good, Light and Love of LIFE in a more pure and profound form than their previous analytical, rational mind was capable of perceiving. When such a profound connection to LIFE is made, it is natural to have thoughts of touching "God" (for lack of a better term). But, the Sacred Geometry at hand suggests that it is not "God" that is being touched, but LIFE. "God," we are suggesting, is either BOTH life AND death, or NEITHER life or death - meaning... detached from the life and death cycles of humans. This study of consciousness puts forth the idea that the forces of creation and maintenance of ongoing spin (what most people tend to call "God") are in fact detached from life and death in the same manner as a string leaving a top after putting it into motion (see The Planetary Model in the book All Things Are Numbers elsewhere on this site.
Some say that "God" (for lack of a better term) is a circle whose center is everywhere and circumference is nowhere. In other words, no defined center, and no limiting circumference; in other words, unfindable; in other words, unknowable; in other words, beyond, or detached from human perception. With a description like that we can observe how absolutely unknowable, and therefore detached and out of reach concepts of "God" can be. But... for those who don't like the completely detached notions just given, another analogy that allows for at least some ongoing connection to "God" would be a comparison to a hand slapping a bicycle wheel to make it spin; it only has to make contact occasionally to keep the spin going, and in fact has to stop touching the wheel and be detached in order for the wheel to continue spinning. We could also attempt an analogy of a grist mill water wheel, where the passing water would be analogous to a "God" of continuous contact. But even in such an analogy that contact is not continuous to all portions of the wheel at all times, so there remains an element of detachment, whether with occasional contact or not (for a visual of this idea consult the Wheel of Reincarnations diagram above, or the Cosmic Wheel mandala in the essay Verse 82 elsewhere on this site). One more analogy would be to look for "God" at the hub of a wheel where the spokes would be in constant contact with the center. But the absolute center is an infinitely small realm beyond all definition and thereby still somewhat detached (for a visual of this idea consult the Paradox in the Lotus mandala in the essay Stop Being So Human elsewhere on this site). What all these ideas suggests is the idea that our "water wheel" of life and death and ups and downs is in fact a cycle of opposites, and what moves it is not one of the opposites (like Love) but is in fact something detached and neutral... OR.... something that embraces life and death, love and hate, good and bad or light and dark with equal measure.
But, not everyone will like the idea of a detached "God" spinning a wheel of Love and Hate - either as a detached entity or as a representation of Love and Hate in equal measure. What people WANT is an anthropomorphized "God" "Who" is a source of "Good." And if there is one thing that is sure, it's that people will get what they want... one way or another... even if they have to bend and distort what really is, in order to get it! Thus... because of the purity of the connection people make while on the spiritual path, and profundity of the revelation, people who are not inclined to gravitate to either of the options just given, tend to report back to us about a "God" "Who" represents "a Love with no opposite." In this way these people acknowledge the Sacred Geometry of neutrality, while at the same time coloring it with a bias of Love. It is being suggested in this philosophy of consciousness that this is a kluge; an attempt to have one's cake and eat it too in order for people to get what they WANT rather than live with what actually is. When a venturing mind wanders into the lawless realm of spirituality, temptations to conflate are not policed. Things that satisfy our human needs are thus conflated with things that would otherwise lack such satisfaction, in order to make them more palatable to the human "taste buds" of perception. This is being human, not Divine.
Celebrate LIFE and LOVE with Enlightenment. Celebrate "GOD" with Engrayment.
Don't conflate the two. |
When people traverse the positive path of Enlightenment illustrated by the Multiplication/Heart/Cup suit of The Numerical Tarot, they experience Awareness, Inspiration, Love, Power, Control and euphoric, orgasmic Energy! Because the feelings of Love that people have are not polluted by their normally possessive, grasping mind of analytical quantifications, but are instead a boundless kind of Love that is not possessed but only felt, the boundless nature of this path naturally generates notions of being "God"-sent - inasmuch as so many view "God" as infinite and boundless. From this state of mind people generate the idea of "a Love with no opposite" because the Love that is felt is a boundless everpresent Love that is not directed at anyone in particular by a finite mind. But this again is a mistaken interpretation of the Sacred Geometry at hand. Geometrically, it is the Universe created by "God" that is both boundless and finite, or... clumps of finite amid a sea of infinite. "God" we theorize, is not just infinite, but indeed BEYOND our human concepts of the infinite... and the finite. Only by being beyond the finite and infinite can "God" be considered beyond all human perception. And only when "God" is beyond all human perception can "God" be considered all powerful to the universe that was created (see The Absentia elsewhere on this site). Thus... the balance of every binary pair in our universe is not governed by one of the pair (like Love), but by a neutral detached middle, which... we would likely come to label as "God" in most circles of conversation. For a spiritual mind to put itself in the same place as this so-called "God" of neutrality, one would have to be truly neutral, or... gray... in every way.
But... on the other hand... if an experience of orgasmic, euphoric, forever boundless and everpresent Love is desired, the study of consciousness being presented everywhere on this site would advise that we: DON'T be gray every day in every way... be human! If an experience of boundless Universal Love is desired, the advice of this study of consciousness would be to follow the path of Enlightenment illustrated by the positive row of Major Trumps and the suit of Multiplication/Heart/Cup... and even the suit of Addition/Diamond/Coin, which... even though it represents the less universal more analytical mind, still has concepts to offer a mind seeking awareness of the Sacred Geometry that governs a spiritual path in pursuit of Universal Love (see The Pentacle Person elsewhere on this site).
So... in conclusion... it is being suggested in this essay that we celebrate LIFE and LOVE with Enlightenment and celebrate "GOD" with Engrayment, and not conflate the two because of how doing so confuses things in ways that make our awareness of the Sacred Geometry involved harder to discern. True... such a notion might be a hard pill for some to swallow, inasmuch as it makes Universal Love a human thing, rather than a "God"-ly spiritual thing. But... with sufficient adjustment, it will be found that there is in fact no loss of Love being presented... simply an altering of where that Universal Love comes from. There is plenty of Love to be found in the philosophy of The Numerical Tarot, if one follows the appropriate path, or suit of cards.
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White, Black, Gray Mandala
Here is another mandala we can use to meditate on the idea of giving equal emphasis to all parts of the White, Black and Gray spectrum of possibilities, and the idea of NOT making any one of them a mental prison of absoluteness that lives in denial or fear of the others. This mandala is basically a reproduction of the diagram seen directly above, minus the guru. Within the triangle of white, black and gray is a tetractys, which, when viewed in the manner in which this study views a tetractys, repeats the idea of three unities appearing at the corners of the tetractys triangle (see A Tetradic Twist and The Three Unities elsewhere on this site).
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| Extreme amounts of moderation = mediocrity. Moderate amounts of moderation = equanimity. So don't be gray EVERY day! |
STORE! SHOP! BUY! For a talismanic amulet, medallion or pendant based on the ideas presented on this page go HERE! |
