I have written this text without focusing on quoting books or having a very precise structure or methodology. But it gives a very good “trailer” on what my personal stands are. I apologize for the inconvenience brought about by the lack of structure and repetition of ideas.
The lack of academic knowledge and understanding about esotericism is the effect of many causes:
This type of knowledge, by definition, is hidden. It isn’t accessible by regular means of acquiring experiences. Those other ways may include, but are not limited to, some breathing and meditation techniques as well as the use of psychedelics. As the individual experiences another state of consciousness, the data received is not coming from the probing senses of touch, sight, smell, taste and hearing. Those experiences are then explained through language, but are by themselves sometimes unspeakable, and even if explained, would in certain case be analogous to trying to explain the color red to a blind person.
They wouldn’t actually see it. And, as in the allegory of the cave of Plato, if most of the people, even the wisest of the masses, are believing that the shadows they see are the whole of reality, those who have a glimpse of the light are thought to be blabbering utter nonsense. This has been the case for a long time regarding esoteric knowledge, and this is part of the explanation about why it has been concealed by secret societies and initiates throughout the ages. The esoterists had to protect themselves from the masses, and they had to protect the knowledge from being misused and desecrated by unworthy men whose aims weren’t pure. Thus goes the saying : « pearls shall not be thrown before swine » in the Bible.
Though today, at the so called “Age of information”, we are now in a complete opposite dynamic regarding “secret knowledge”. It seems, poetically, that swines have used pearls to become masters of the world, and turn it into a wasteland of consumerism and entertainment. This is a very good, global mirror, of our inner state as individuals: we are blind to the fact that we dwell in the shadows, we have lost inner sight and are blind to the depth of outer reality. Thus, we realize that we must seek the pearls by ourselves at this point of time. And the pieces of wisdom that once were so concealed, are today available in the blink of an eye to the curious soul who dares to seek on Google what gives rise to the shadows that have been so entertaining to watch.
The states of consciousness are plural and take different tastes and shapes and colors. They are also comprised on a scale, as visible colors go from red to violet depending on the frequency of the light spectrum. The hermetic principles are to be understood in symbolism and analogy. They emphasize on the fact that everything is mental, thus saying that everything is symbolic isn’t far from it. And symbolism is a realm of subjective subtlety that cannot be grasped by science, or explained by logic. How could one explain logically the feelings provided by a poem that touches the inner world of the reader as the words give rise to an interaction between the individual and the content that the words refer to, which are lived internally through imagination and feeling?
It operates on a whole other range than the material realm.
Scientists have not developed the inner tools to understand the different spectrums of consciousness as they have developed those to view a broader range of the spectrum of material light. There is no “mapping” of the mind yet. Psychedelics may be used as those tools, as they are portrayed as such by scientists who studied them.
“LSD is a catalyst or amplifier of mental processes. If properly used it could become something like the microscope or telescope of psychiatry.” (Stanislas Grof, in LSD Psychotherapy, 1980)
With the extraordinary synchronistic discovery of LSD and the rise of the psychedelic era in the last century, there was a breach made between chemistry, biology, the human mind and spirituality. Though we know what happened : the global banishment of psychedelics from the scientific realm was one of the most critical acts of modern-day obscurantism in the 20th century.
History shows in western culture that the dogmatism of the political and religious fields have led a massive campaign of systematic destruction of knowledge and cultures throughout millennia. Whether they were ‘pagans’, kabbalists, alchemists or scientists as Galileo, and the psychedelic-curious nowadays, active repression of these occult activities was the motto of the dominant powers. It has imprinted in our behavior as a culture a hindering disdain and automatic dismissal of the esoteric realms of knowledge.
This is of course well illustrated by the definite secularization of culture and the systematical undermining of religions, as well as profound esoteric and theosophical understandings.
An anecdotal evidence of this is portrayed on the Wikipedia page of the famous metaphysicist and mystic Neville Goddard. His page only exists in Russian language, for everything else has been deleted entirely three years ago due to “insufficient sourcing”. The comments on the Wikipedia edit page point the fingers on “Wikipedia’s atheistic culture”[1]
Viewing religious and mystical matters solely through the prism of atheistic materialism is quite an unproductive and utmost destructive endeavor, for it lacks the necessary openness of mind to grasp and feel what is to be pondered upon, and disdains the very beauty of the truth it cannot understand, for it fears it. Watching the shadows for so long makes one’s eyes very sensitive to light. It may even condemn one to stay in the dark because light would blind the eyes, thus, one would begin to be very dangerous towards those who aren’t blinded by the light, but seeing.
One of the great fallacies of materialism is its profound belief of its own capability of deriving knowledge only from reason and logic. This stems from the scientific method and reductionism, which are absolutely fantastic tools. But which cannot rest upon themselves, for without balance they lead to the greatest fallacies. Indeed, everything human beings will ever be able to produce in the material realm will derive from their own ability to sense their surroundings and understand it. If they lack the organs to see ultraviolet light, they will build machines to sense it.
But scientists have never stopped to ponder about the fact that their thoughts and feelings themselves come from organs of perceptions (namely, brain and heart), and that these could reach spectrums of different scales of consciousness through the development of their inner potential. [Quote rudolf steiner : Nature only leaves man between things, and only Man can finish himself up and become Human]
And even if they did, how will they ever produce a machine that will be able to access the thought realm, since they are themselves this “machine”? As far as we know, thoughts and imagination are subjective realms and yet are shared by all subjectivities. We dwell in the world of thoughts and imagination just as fish dwell in water or we dwell in the air on earth. So we have capabilities that will never be reachable to the lifeless machines we seem to be so desperate to raise as our new gods. And this realm is spaceless and timeless for all we know of what our imagination can do. So who is to say that we are not dwelling in it, and that the whole Universe is dwelling in this imaginative substance ? For all we know, space and time could only be welcomed at the surface of/be born into existence from- a spaceless and timeless substance.
Thus psychonauts, esotericists, psychologists, all explorers of the mind, are at the forefront of the mapmaking of the suprasensible realities, and have been forever. We just don’t quite view it as important today because we are identifying ourselves with our thoughts and being softly mesmerized in the Samsara and Maya (define terms).
Panem et circenses is the motto the entertainment society has built itself upon. We are in the dark age of Kali Yuga, the greatest disconnection from the whole cosmos according to Hindu Cosmogony. We dwell in the illusion of matter, the shadows of the allegory of the cave is what fascinates us so deeply instead understanding the objects that shape the forms of the shadows, which are the ideas, and the light that shines through these, which is consciousness.
We need to become the whole scenery instead of watching the shadows.
We cannot understand the ability to think because when we are engaged in the activity, we are caught in it. Thus, we cannot grasp thought by thinking about it. And science rests on rational thinking and linear causality, which obviously closes off the first doors to grasping esoteric knowledge from within, because the latter involves symbolic imagination and a great flexibility and sensitivity of the mind. Whereas the logical side of the intellect thrives on reductionism, cutting everything to pieces, the intuitive side of the intellect dwells in a holistic, integrative, imaginative and feeling approach.
It is well spread in mainstream scientific vulgarization that there are two sides of the human mind or the two hemispheres of the brain: the creative and logical side. I would like to point out that, through understanding the millennial principle of Gender laid down in the book the Kybalion (1917), we can say that there are both feminine and masculine sides to consciousness.
Laser-focused, reductionist, directed logic and linear thinking dancing with holism, openness to feeling and free association of intuitive symbolism through imagination.
It is quite like a battle between science and art or science and religion.
The analogy for the two hemispheres of the brain reflects the fundamental dualism that our whole world rests upon. Be it feminine and masculine, hot and cold, feeling and thinking, logic and intuition, imagination and reason, conscious and unconscious, right or left hemispheres, the fundamental dualism rests on the unity of the brain, the unity of the cosmos. The unity of consciousness, for it is all that exists, and it rests upon nothing.
Both hemisphere are linked by the “Corpus Calloseum”, and by use of analogy, it is this mediator between the two sides of Man that needs to be taken care of in ourselves in order to bring about a “marrying of the opposites”: the alchemists’ hermaphrodite, the wedding of the sun and the moon, integrating the “shadow” or the “unconscious”, becoming “whole” through the “individuation process” of C.G. Jung. We need to focus on understanding how to become wholly individuated human beings. What is the inner equivalent of the biological Corpus Calloseum, and how to become very pragmatic on going through the individuation process and integrating all aspects of our Self.
I intend, in my studies and in my work, to mediate between the two sides, because they are but two sides of the same thing. Just as matter is not separate from consciousness according to monism and modern quantum physicists, it is also the case that science, religion and art which are not hermetically separated in my opinion. Theology, philosophy, psychology, sociology and all human sciences are all linked together.
For they all stem from consciousness and ponder upon consciousness.
I think that there is a profound urge to reestablish a paradigm in the epistemology of the acquisition of knowledge, which must be linked to the recent discoveries on consciousness, quantum physics, as well as age old philosophies, esoteric knowledge, and the Jungian psychology.
Our modern science stems from a culture whose philosophical maxims and assumptions come from the Enlightenment era in France. There would be another science and culture if we were to adopt different philosophical foundations, and much more advanced ones, with a broader understanding of our place in existence, and our purpose as a collective species. Another world view, which would give proper place to the greatest understandings of all cultures in a syncretism structured by reason and logic, but permeated by the heart and the profound devotion in science (every field actually) to truth and knowledge above human fallacies. This would link back science to religion in my opinion. (and art/spirituality)
This can be done through paradigm shifts in all fields of knowledge. We need to pave the way for a new understanding of the human nature as well as the universe’s essence and whereabouts. We’re still clinging to a materialistic nihilistic secularizing and dehumanizing global system, whilst battles are fought in every front to shine light on the totality of the human being and on an alternative way to rule our own lives than the top-bottom poison of the neo-liberalist oligarchy.
Will we individually and collectively understand the necessity to bring about a paradigm shift in our own consciousness?
Trouble is coming for the system as a whole, because it rests on a mathematical fallacy. Money is created out of thin air, and profit is the new god. In regards to the earth as a whole, this is analog to a cancerous disease in the human body. The mutated cells rebel against the natural homeostasis of the system, closing off from others and reproducing themselves until they kill the organism they inhabit. This suicidal tendency in the body of man is reflected in his mind and as a whole in the society we inhabit. When the ego doesn’t recognize its part in the totality of the human mind-body-soul system, when it discards the shadow dwelling in the unconscious, when society as a whole forgets the Nachtseite of nature, cancer arises. The communication between parts of the whole is broken.
The paradigm shift will then have to rise from a scientific, logical, but Gaian-like mindset. A radical ecology of the mind, soul and body, of each individual and of the earth itself, as we are but parts of a greater body of consciousness. The cancerous disease that mankind is infecting the whole biosphere with stems from the disconnection from the whole, within each human being. The persona and ego become the tyrants of the body, mind and soul, because it becomes so dense and filled with information, social and mental constructs, that it doesn’t recognize truth from falsehood anymore, it just feels so alone and disconnected, and is feeling so threatened to die that it kills off everything on sight in order to be the only one left standing.
They have become the shadow that they’ve been so fascinated by, and act with intention to fight off the light.
This pathology is both stemming from psychological, spiritual and cultural lack of homeostasis, and it has chaotic effects on the body, the mind and soul of individuals and cultures. This vicious circle is precisely what we aim to step out from as educated citizens of the worlds. Thus, paving the way for a virtuous circle to replace the dying old paradigm, and pushing forward its death and the rise of a new culture, is the most important endeavor today in my opinion.
When power, money and science become blind to harmony and beauty, they become so entrenched in their self-sufficiency that they produce nightmarish monsters of devastation. “Now I am become Death, destroyer of worlds.” (Openheimer looking at nuclear explosion quoting the Bhagavad Gita).
For humans and nature are but makers and users in the eyes of technology, and thus this unbalanced equation makes it so that technology uses us for its own ends whilst disguising as serving us. Very strong minded, faithful and passionate individuals are urgently needed in order to be able to redirect the power of the technological progress through desirable ends for the whole biosphere.
We will only be able to enter into the next paradigm without letting any bit of grossness lurking behind some corner within ourselves. All must come to light and be transparent. The tremendous power of the human being ought to serve the harmony of the whole, and not separate itself in a cancerous fashion leading to unbalance of a world wide range.
And this voluntary servitude must come from true free will and grasp the divine from within, as an act of surrendering of the Ego to the Self. Becoming the masterful servant of the Whole instead of an independent outcast.
We must defeat the hypnotic trance of culture and mass media that has created the perfect structure for humans to be caught in a self-fulfilling cycle of surrendering our own power and mind to consumerism, entertainment, in general, and falsehood. Shifting away from the Ego-gratification paradigm, we may enter a more holistic approach and finally rise above our present-day and age-old misunderstandings of our place on Earth.
[1] https://www.quora.com/Why-was-Neville-Goddard%E2%80%99s-Wikipedia-page-taken-down#HrLqg
Qilin Egostasie 