New topic split from 'concise criticism of analytic idealism' thread.

[AshvinP]

I agree, all too often moderns take some isolated phenomena in Nature and call it "evil", precisely because they give priority only to outer appearances. Then everything is evaluated as an atomized unit apart from its holistic influence, especially over broad temporal scales. Atheists, and sometimes modern mystics (BK has brought this up before), often use this as an argument against the existence of a personal and self-conscious God - "if He exists, why would he allow forest fires, earthquakes, volcanoes, etc.?" It's simply a projection of a static, atomized perspective onto Reality and then a judgment of Reality's moral worth based on that projection.

This can happen with cultural appearances too. We have so much identity politics now - racial this, gender that, matriarchy/patriarchy this, cultural appropriation that. It's all people confusing static outer appearances for the full meaningful significance of cultural institutions and developments. It just goes to show how much a lack of living and holistic spiritual knowledge is at the root of so many regressive attitudes today, which only end up ensuring the divisions which they outwardly claim to fight against, so to be seen as "virtuous" by others, again an obsession with outward appearances, remain in place much longer than necessary.

I agree completely with this viewpoint! Practically impossible though, to communicate it in society without creating colossal misunderstandings.
I can imagine that, even here, this has been automatically misunderstood by some.
It would be interesting to hear what Lou has to say about that, from his diversity and inclusion perspective (if this is an acceptable way to qualify it).

Yes, it is an extremely difficult quandary of our times. The forces of darkness found a clever way to oppose the path to spiritual freedom - make people convinced that their desire, ambition, and courage to become spiritually free is a vice, and their desire to be physically 'free', 'equal', etc., and to become those things immediately with little effort, to be given those things by an external power, is a virtue. No power can stop humans from attaining their true freedom, only keep them convinced there is nothing to be attained because they already have it.

Monism, then, in the sphere of true moral action, is a freedom philosophy. Since it is a philosophy of reality, it rejects the metaphysical, unreal restrictions of the free spirit as completely as it accepts the physical and historical (naïvely real) restrictions of the naïve man. Since it does not consider man as a finished product, disclosing his full nature in every moment of his life, it regards the dispute as to whether man as such is free or not, to be of no consequence. It sees in man a developing being, and asks whether, in the course of this development, the stage of the free spirit can be reached.

Monism knows that Nature does not send man forth from her arms ready made as a free spirit, but that she leads him up to a certain stage from which he continues to develop still as an unfree being until he comes to the point where he finds his own self.

[Lou Gold]

I agree, all too often moderns take some isolated phenomena in Nature and call it "evil", precisely because they give priority only to outer appearances. Then everything is evaluated as an atomized unit apart from its holistic influence, especially over broad temporal scales. Atheists, and sometimes modern mystics (BK has brought this up before), often use this as an argument against the existence of a personal and self-conscious God - "if He exists, why would he allow forest fires, earthquakes, volcanoes, etc.?" It's simply a projection of a static, atomized perspective onto Reality and then a judgment of Reality's moral worth based on that projection.

This can happen with cultural appearances too. We have so much identity politics now - racial this, gender that, matriarchy/patriarchy this, cultural appropriation that. It's all people confusing static outer appearances for the full meaningful significance of cultural institutions and developments. It just goes to show how much a lack of living and holistic spiritual knowledge is at the root of so many regressive attitudes today, which only end up ensuring the divisions which they outwardly claim to fight against, so to be seen as "virtuous" by others, again an obsession with outward appearances, remain in place much longer than necessary.

I agree completely with this viewpoint! Practically impossible though, to communicate it in society without creating colossal misunderstandings.
I can imagine that, even here, this has been automatically misunderstood by some.
It would be interesting to hear what Lou has to say about that, from his diversity and inclusion perspective (if this is an acceptable way to qualify it).

Not sure what you are asking me to comment on Federica. I can say that after living for 15 years in Brazil among a range of socio-economic circumstances from very poor to very rich, a reentry to standard American middle-class lifestyle seemed as a binge consumerist affluenza. I was amazed.

About forest fires and catastrophic forces, they are standard presences in natural ecologies of living systems. In general, nature works to promote diversity and against sameness. Indeed, they are the mechanism of diversification following the pioneer phase of monocultural colonization. Later as the system matures one has to conduct a war against "weeds" in order to maintain a lawn or a cornfield as nature inexorably pushes toward diversity. I think the rule in identity politics has to be mutual respect of differences and no imposed one way for all.

I think Goethe nailed it in his Aphorisms on Nature.

[Federica]

Not sure what you are asking me to comment on Federica. I can say that after living for 15 years in Brazil among a range of socio-economic circumstances from very poor to very rich, a reentry to standard American middle-class lifestyle seemed as a binge consumerist affluenza. I was amazed.

About forest fires and catastrophic forces, they are standard presences in natural ecologies of living systems. In general, nature works to promote diversity and against sameness. Indeed, they are the mechanism of diversification following the pioneer phase of monocultural colonization. Later as the system matures one has to conduct a war against "weeds" in order to maintain a lawn or a cornfield as nature inexorably pushes toward diversity. I think the rule in identity politics has to be mutual respect of differences and no imposed one way for all.

I think Goethe nailed it in his Aphorisms on Nature.

Thanks for the aphorisms. Here's an author who seems unavoidable in so much of what's discussed here!
Sorry, my question on identity politics brings us to a discussion that has probably not much relevance in the context of this thread, my fault.

[AshvinP]

I agree, all too often moderns take some isolated phenomena in Nature and call it "evil", precisely because they give priority only to outer appearances. Then everything is evaluated as an atomized unit apart from its holistic influence, especially over broad temporal scales. Atheists, and sometimes modern mystics (BK has brought this up before), often use this as an argument against the existence of a personal and self-conscious God - "if He exists, why would he allow forest fires, earthquakes, volcanoes, etc.?" It's simply a projection of a static, atomized perspective onto Reality and then a judgment of Reality's moral worth based on that projection.

This can happen with cultural appearances too. We have so much identity politics now - racial this, gender that, matriarchy/patriarchy this, cultural appropriation that. It's all people confusing static outer appearances for the full meaningful significance of cultural institutions and developments. It just goes to show how much a lack of living and holistic spiritual knowledge is at the root of so many regressive attitudes today, which only end up ensuring the divisions which they outwardly claim to fight against, so to be seen as "virtuous" by others, again an obsession with outward appearances, remain in place much longer than necessary.

I agree completely with this viewpoint! Practically impossible though, to communicate it in society without creating colossal misunderstandings.
I can imagine that, even here, this has been automatically misunderstood by some.
It would be interesting to hear what Lou has to say about that, from his diversity and inclusion perspective (if this is an acceptable way to qualify it).

Not sure what you are asking me to comment on Federica. I can say that after living for 15 years in Brazil among a range of socio-economic circumstances from very poor to very rich, a reentry to standard American middle-class lifestyle seemed as a binge consumerist affluenza. I was amazed.

About forest fires and catastrophic forces, they are standard presences in natural ecologies of living systems. In general, nature works to promote diversity and against sameness. Indeed, they are the mechanism of diversification following the pioneer phase of monocultural colonization. Later as the system matures one has to conduct a war against "weeds" in order to maintain a lawn or a cornfield as nature inexorably pushes toward diversity. I think the rule in identity politics has to be mutual respect of differences and no imposed one way for all.

I think Goethe nailed it in his Aphorisms on Nature.

Lou,

I keep mentioning you are ignoring an entire pole of Reality, one-half of the entire evolutionary progression. Actually you are only focusing on the involutionary progression, the diversification of systems and forms. The evolutionary progression is the integration of that diversity back into living Wholeness, where every form and system becomes ever-more conscious of how it is functioning within a unified Cosmic Organism. As I mentioned before, if we have a tendency to give preference only to the past, then we will focus on the diversification of Nature and ignore the integration through Culture. Then we start to feel the latter is something "evil" or "oppressive". Yet we are then once again inverting the actual relationship - what is earlier becomes "evil" when it refuses to adapt and evolve, not the other way around. Goethe's aphorism is pointing precisely to the intuition that evolution redeems what is earlier from its outmoded and 'evil' orientation, by allowing us to experience it again more consciously and thereby integrate the diversity. Remember, Goethe was all about balancing the polarities. It's not about reaching some homogenous "sameness", but about harmonizing the rhythms of all the diverse forms currently working at cross-purposes without obscuring their individuality.

Let's explore this polarity of past-future, involution-evolution, differentiation-integration further. It's simply our default to state to orient towards former pole and obscure the latter in one way or another. Even the materialist who is well-versed in evolutionary theory will tend to focus on the differentiated outer forms and not the inner integration of conscious ideas. Higher ideations - imaginations, inspirations, intuitions - are of the 'future'. They are the supersensible context which archetypally structures our destiny from 'above'. Everything we perceive around us, including our inner concepts, are from the 'past'. They are accomplished ideational works of bygone ages. Secular science informs of this in its own dim way - light travels various distances from objects to reach our eyes. This is what is really meant by "Maya" - a world of past perceptions, including concepts, which are in process of decaying and dying away. The sensory world bears us up, not so we can remain chained to it, but so that we may evolve through it into higher planes of consciousness. "The world is a bridge, make not of it your dwelling place."

Metaphysics, history, anthropology, etc. are theories of Being, theories of the past. Inward phenomenology of cognition and spiritual practice is a way of Becoming, a portal to the future. We extract what is of essence from the former and move on to the latter, and we continue to rhythmically alternate between the poles so that we are spiraling upwards in a harmonious way. The longer we are content to simply dwell with our theories of all sorts, the deeper we mire ourselves in past perceptions which are dying out. There is no Spirit - no life or higher meaning - to be found only in the world of perceptions and mere concepts. It has withdrawn from outer nature so that we may discover the Spirit from within our inner nature in freedom. It is easy to see that conceptual philosophy, materialist and idealist, secular and religious, has simply been revolving around the same questions for hundreds of years now, making absolutely no progress towards greater understanding or practical transformation of our inner lives. That is because it tries to stitch together past perceptions into something new and living, but it can't be done.

Harmony is a supreme virtue here. We oscillate violently in the modern era between the poles, constantly overcorrecting from one to the other, as in Cleric's magnetic pendulum. Think how often we indulge ourselves in something, like food or drink or mindless entertainment (past), only to then try and balance it out with temperance and mental endeavors (future) for a while. We drink ourselves to death in the Winter only so that we can 'dry out' during the Summer, rinse and repeat. Most are only dimly conscious of this oscillation and simply take it as a permanent state of being. Indeed, if we tend to focus only on Nature, then these cyclic oscillations seem like the end goal, the highest possible achievements. But instead the goal can be to spiral these into closer unity by becoming conscious of them in a living way. Jung identified the polarity of extroversion (past) and introversion (future). It's very easy for us to overcorrect from a life of sensory indulgence into isolated asceticism. In one case, we lose ourselves into the world of sensory impressions, in the other, we gain ourselves but we lose the world.

The oscillations are so rapid now that many people live in the distant past and future simultaneously. They cling to external authorities to provide for them, to natural gender and racial divisions, to national divisions of the past, yet also crave immediate freedom, equality, inclusion, etc., that which can only be actively and gradually earned from the future. As Federica mentioned, it's difficult to even speak of these things without enraging someone or the other. The extent to which we feel our blood boiling at the very mention of such things is the extent to which they are entirely subconscious for us. Intuitive thinking as a spiritual path is about Centering our lives in the streams of Being and Becoming, rhythmically navigating the oscillations as we spiral upwards into the future. Our inner life should be calm and steady at all times. Of course this is an ideal, it won't happen right away - but if we are always anticipating a period of indulgence after temperance, depression after optimism, etc., then we have already made great progress in balancing them out. Likewise, we can anticipate periods of differentiation following integration, yet remain confident that the latter is in the driver's seat.

It is not about depriving ourselves of anything. Our instincts, impulses, antipathies, sympathies, reasoning and concepts can serve us well IF we become conscious and orient them properly. We do this by directing them towards the higher worlds from which they originated. They are like ingrained circuits which were etched into our being throughout the aeons and which our inner spiritual activity - our imagination - is channeled through. If we want to liberate our activity from these constrained pathways, then we need to put them to a higher use, in service to the future. We can desire, feel, and think about the higher worlds, and then gradually we spiral our activity, which is a gift from those very same higher worlds, and the object of its desire, feeling, and contemplation, the higher worlds themselves, into unity. As Cleric speaks of often, the higher worlds begin thinking, feeling, and willing through us. That is the inversion which is possible for modern man - we can transition from mechanically stitching together concepts about the higher worlds, and begin experiencing how they think our conceptual activity into existence.

Love must be mentioned here. It is our deepest intuition when it is not confused for our dim Maya feelings and concepts of what it is, which is much easier said than done. Love looks to the past with reverence and gratitude for the Wisdom of the sensory creation, the life of instincts, feelings, and concepts which bears us up, the diversification of systems and forms, yet always with a more radical interest in the dormant potential becoming and harmonizing of All-Beings. If we gaze at sunsets and trees and rivers, plants and animals, and the diverse forms of Nature without a sense of how much greater they can become through our own inner development, then we have lost interest in the pole of future becoming. Love is the ultimate bridge between the sensible and the supersensible - it imparts the individuality with a free desire to do for ourselves and our neighbors what the Gods once did for us, and that is how creative evolution unfolds. 

"God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. We love him, because he first loved us." (1 John 4)

[Lou Gold]

I agree completely with this viewpoint! Practically impossible though, to communicate it in society without creating colossal misunderstandings.
I can imagine that, even here, this has been automatically misunderstood by some.
It would be interesting to hear what Lou has to say about that, from his diversity and inclusion perspective (if this is an acceptable way to qualify it).

Not sure what you are asking me to comment on Federica. I can say that after living for 15 years in Brazil among a range of socio-economic circumstances from very poor to very rich, a reentry to standard American middle-class lifestyle seemed as a binge consumerist affluenza. I was amazed.

About forest fires and catastrophic forces, they are standard presences in natural ecologies of living systems. In general, nature works to promote diversity and against sameness. Indeed, they are the mechanism of diversification following the pioneer phase of monocultural colonization. Later as the system matures one has to conduct a war against "weeds" in order to maintain a lawn or a cornfield as nature inexorably pushes toward diversity. I think the rule in identity politics has to be mutual respect of differences and no imposed one way for all.

I think Goethe nailed it in his Aphorisms on Nature.

Lou,

I keep mentioning you are ignoring an entire pole of Reality, one-half of the entire evolutionary progression. Actually you are only focusing on the involutionary progression, the diversification of systems and forms. The evolutionary progression is the integration of that diversity back into living Wholeness, where every form and system becomes ever-more conscious of how it is functioning within a unified Cosmic Organism. As I mentioned before, if we have a tendency to give preference only to the past, then we will focus on the diversification of Nature and ignore the integration through Culture. Then we start to feel the latter is something "evil" or "oppressive". Yet we are then once again inverting the actual relationship - what is earlier becomes "evil" when it refuses to adapt and evolve, not the other way around. Goethe's aphorism is pointing precisely to the intuition that evolution redeems what is earlier from its outmoded and 'evil' orientation, by allowing us to experience it again more consciously and thereby integrate the diversity. Remember, Goethe was all about balancing the polarities. It's not about reaching some homogenous "sameness", but about harmonizing the rhythms of all the diverse forms currently working at cross-purposes without obscuring their individuality.

Let's explore this polarity of past-future, involution-evolution, differentiation-integration further. It's simply our default to state to orient towards former pole and obscure the latter in one way or another. Even the materialist who is well-versed in evolutionary theory will tend to focus on the differentiated outer forms and not the inner integration of conscious ideas. Higher ideations - imaginations, inspirations, intuitions - are of the 'future'. They are the supersensible context which archetypally structures our destiny from 'above'. Everything we perceive around us, including our inner concepts, are from the 'past'. They are accomplished ideational works of bygone ages. Secular science informs of this in its own dim way - light travels various distances from objects to reach our eyes. This is what is really meant by "Maya" - a world of past perceptions, including concepts, which are in process of decaying and dying away. The sensory world bears us up, not so we can remain chained to it, but so that we may evolve through it into higher planes of consciousness. "The world is a bridge, make not of it your dwelling place."

Metaphysics, history, anthropology, etc. are theories of Being, theories of the past. Inward phenomenology of cognition and spiritual practice is a way of Becoming, a portal to the future. We extract what is of essence from the former and move on to the latter, and we continue to rhythmically alternate between the poles so that we are spiraling upwards in a harmonious way. The longer we are content to simply dwell with our theories of all sorts, the deeper we mire ourselves in past perceptions which are dying out. There is no Spirit - no life or higher meaning - to be found only in the world of perceptions and mere concepts. It has withdrawn from outer nature so that we may discover the Spirit from within our inner nature in freedom. It is easy to see that conceptual philosophy, materialist and idealist, secular and religious, has simply been revolving around the same questions for hundreds of years now, making absolutely no progress towards greater understanding or practical transformation of our inner lives. That is because it tries to stitch together past perceptions into something new and living, but it can't be done.

Harmony is a supreme virtue here. We oscillate violently in the modern era between the poles, constantly overcorrecting from one to the other, as in Cleric's magnetic pendulum. Think how often we indulge ourselves in something, like food or drink or mindless entertainment (past), only to then try and balance it out with temperance and mental endeavors (future) for a while. We drink ourselves to death in the Winter only so that we can 'dry out' during the Summer, rinse and repeat. Most are only dimly conscious of this oscillation and simply take it as a permanent state of being. Indeed, if we tend to focus only on Nature, then these cyclic oscillations seem like the end goal, the highest possible achievements. But instead the goal can be to spiral these into closer unity by becoming conscious of them in a living way. Jung identified the polarity of extroversion (past) and introversion (future). It's very easy for us to overcorrect from a life of sensory indulgence into isolated asceticism. In one case, we lose ourselves into the world of sensory impressions, in the other, we gain ourselves but we lose the world.

The oscillations are so rapid now that many people live in the distant past and future simultaneously. They cling to external authorities to provide for them, to natural gender and racial divisions, to national divisions of the past, yet also crave immediate freedom, equality, inclusion, etc., that which can only be actively and gradually earned from the future. As Federica mentioned, it's difficult to even speak of these things without enraging someone or the other. The extent to which we feel our blood boiling at the very mention of such things is the extent to which they are entirely subconscious for us. Intuitive thinking as a spiritual path is about Centering our lives in the streams of Being and Becoming, rhythmically navigating the oscillations as we spiral upwards into the future. Our inner life should be calm and steady at all times. Of course this is an ideal, it won't happen right away - but if we are always anticipating a period of indulgence after temperance, depression after optimism, etc., then we have already made great progress in balancing them out. Likewise, we can anticipate periods of differentiation following integration, yet remain confident that the latter is in the driver's seat.

It is not about depriving ourselves of anything. Our instincts, impulses, antipathies, sympathies, reasoning and concepts can serve us well IF we become conscious and orient them properly. We do this by directing them towards the higher worlds from which they originated. They are like ingrained circuits which were etched into our being throughout the aeons and which our inner spiritual activity - our imagination - is channeled through. If we want to liberate our activity from these constrained pathways, then we need to put them to a higher use, in service to the future. We can desire, feel, and think about the higher worlds, and then gradually we spiral our activity, which is a gift from those very same higher worlds, and the object of its desire, feeling, and contemplation, the higher worlds themselves, into unity. As Cleric speaks of often, the higher worlds begin thinking, feeling, and willing through us. That is the inversion which is possible for modern man - we can transition from mechanically stitching together concepts about the higher worlds, and begin experiencing how they think our conceptual activity into existence.

Love must be mentioned here. It is our deepest intuition when it is not confused for our dim Maya feelings and concepts of what it is, which is much easier said than done. Love looks to the past with reverence and gratitude for the Wisdom of the sensory creation, the life of instincts, feelings, and concepts which bears us up, the diversification of systems and forms, yet always with a more radical interest in the dormant potential becoming and harmonizing of All-Beings. If we gaze at sunsets and trees and rivers, plants and animals, and the diverse forms of Nature without a sense of how much greater they can become through our own inner development, then we have lost interest in the pole of future becoming. Love is the ultimate bridge between the sensible and the supersensible - it imparts the individuality with a free desire to do for ourselves and our neighbors what the Gods once did for us, and that is how creative evolution unfolds. 

"God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. We love him, because he first loved us." (1 John 4)

Without doubt, it's all about love.

[Lou Gold]

Lou,

I keep mentioning you are ignoring an entire pole of Reality, one-half of the entire evolutionary progression. Actually you are only focusing on the involutionary progression, the diversification of systems and forms. The evolutionary progression is the integration of that diversity back into living Wholeness, where every form and system becomes ever-more conscious of how it is functioning within a unified Cosmic Organism. As I mentioned before, if we have a tendency to give preference only to the past, then we will focus on the diversification of Nature and ignore the integration through Culture. Then we start to feel the latter is something "evil" or "oppressive". Yet we are then once again inverting the actual relationship - what is earlier becomes "evil" when it refuses to adapt and evolve, not the other way around. Goethe's aphorism is pointing precisely to the intuition that evolution redeems what is earlier from its outmoded and 'evil' orientation, by allowing us to experience it again more consciously and thereby integrate the diversity. Remember, Goethe was all about balancing the polarities. It's not about reaching some homogenous "sameness", but about harmonizing the rhythms of all the diverse forms currently working at cross-purposes without obscuring their individuality.

etc.

Ashvin,

In the spirit of speaking directly, I do wonder why you always think I'm ignoring something? Of course, there's another pole, an absolutely essential one. My own ongoing spiritual practice is based on communing with it. Yes, Geothe is about balancing polarities. Yes, the highest virtue is harmony. Yes, Nature expresses the glories of God. Can you imagine that I am reporting from my process and not ignoring a pole?

[AshvinP]

Lou,

I keep mentioning you are ignoring an entire pole of Reality, one-half of the entire evolutionary progression. Actually you are only focusing on the involutionary progression, the diversification of systems and forms. The evolutionary progression is the integration of that diversity back into living Wholeness, where every form and system becomes ever-more conscious of how it is functioning within a unified Cosmic Organism. As I mentioned before, if we have a tendency to give preference only to the past, then we will focus on the diversification of Nature and ignore the integration through Culture. Then we start to feel the latter is something "evil" or "oppressive". Yet we are then once again inverting the actual relationship - what is earlier becomes "evil" when it refuses to adapt and evolve, not the other way around. Goethe's aphorism is pointing precisely to the intuition that evolution redeems what is earlier from its outmoded and 'evil' orientation, by allowing us to experience it again more consciously and thereby integrate the diversity. Remember, Goethe was all about balancing the polarities. It's not about reaching some homogenous "sameness", but about harmonizing the rhythms of all the diverse forms currently working at cross-purposes without obscuring their individuality.

etc.

Ashvin,

In the spirit of speaking directly, I do wonder why you always think I'm ignoring something? Of course, there's another pole, an absolutely essential one. My own ongoing spiritual practice is based on communing with it. Yes, Geothe is about balancing polarities. Yes, the highest virtue is harmony. Yes, Nature expresses the glories of God. Can you imagine that I am reporting from my process and not ignoring a pole?

Lou,

Yes, speaking directly, it's evident you are missing a pole. The pole remains entirely abstract and therefore inert, which then leads you to certain conclusions about the arrangement of humanity and its role in Nature, which are quite the opposite of the conclusions I and many others, including Goethe, and especially all esoteric Christian thinkers (Goethe was such a thinker), have reached. It makes all the difference whether these things are viewed as generalized abstractions, concepts to toy around with for amusement, or living, evolving, practical realities across the individual, natural, cultural, and cosmic scales. I veered into pretty generalized abstract territory in the last post, so I can take some blame for this impression. But my message certainly was not intended to amount to, "it's all about love".

Let's take your concrete forest fire and weeds example. It may seem at first blush that people are interfering with Nature's process of death and renewal, of endless diversification, by fighting forest fires and creating lawns and gardens in which weeds must be pulled out. Indeed there are certainly times when humans do interfere with such processes in an unhealthy way. But we cannot simply generalize that to all human cultural practices. Implicit in such a generalization is that these practices are not also an integral aspect of Nature. That humans didn't evolve from Nature (of course not mindless matter) and that their individual and collective ordering (thinking) activity is not also playing a vital role in evolving Nature, i.e. bringing about Nature's purposes which arc towards Harmony between the diversity of forms.

We can discern this most easily if we simply imagine what would happen or not happen in the absence of these cultural institutions and practices. What does a thriving home garden mean? It means humans are learning to cultivate and maintain various plants, to aim their spiritual activity at other organisms and develop virtues of patience, discipline, stewardship, harmony, perhaps even love. Again, this isn't the case for all humans and all gardens, but the cultural practice of gardening itself and many similar ones. The same could apply to forest fires - true, the natural rhythm of this 'catastrophe' is thrown off at first, but that is necessary to create a new rhythm of virtue development. Humanity cannot stand back and pretend as if they aren't integral to Nature, because it's simply not true. Without us, the natural rhythms would continue as they grow further and further apart and eventually burn themselves out. We are not meant to simply stand in amazement of Fire, but also to tame it and put it to good work. We must use it to burn up our lower animalistic and tribalistic tendencies, releasing them onto a higher plane.

If the foot were to say: Because I am not the hand therefore I do not belong to the body, it would nonetheless belong to it. And if the ear were to say: Because I am not the eye I do not belong to the body, nonetheless does it belong to the body. If the whole body were only an eye, where would be the hearing? If the whole body were a sense of hearing, where would be the power of smell?...If there were only one member, where would the body be? But now there are truly many members, but there is only one body. The eye may not say to the hand: I do not require thee! nor the head to the feet — I have no need of you; rather those which appear to be the feeble members of the body are necessary, and those which we consider mean prove themselves to be specially important. God has put the body together and has recognised the importance of the unimportant members that there should be no division in the body, but that all the members should work harmoniously together and should care for one another. And if one member suffer, all the members suffer with it, and it one member prosper, all the members rejoice with it.

Humanity as a whole is the head, the brain, the spirit of Nature. If the past is of primary importance, and there is no discernable Cosmic arc bending towards reconciliation and Harmony, then human cultivation of the head, its practices and virtues, matters very little. But if there is such an arc, then they are of utmost importance. We need a macroscopic perspective here which views the Cosmos as a holistic organism in process of becoming. Nature will not find the fulfillment of her purposes in any other way but through the individual human with wisdom and conscience, born through Culture and reborn in Spirit. Her kingdoms will not transcend their birth-death oscillations and exist on a higher plane, becoming anything more than what they already are, unless we do as well and orient ourselves towards the universal and harmonious intentions and goals, towards the Idea, the Spirit, of what is True, Beautiful, and Good.

Now there are diversities of gracious gifts, but there is one Spirit. There are diversities in the guidance of mankind, but there is one Lord. There are differences in the force which individual men possess; but there is one God Who works in all these forces. But to every man is given the manifestation of the Spirit, as much as he can profit by it. So to one is given the word of prophecy, to another the word of knowledge; others are spirits who live in faith; again others have the gift of healing, others the gift of prophecy, others have the gift of seeing into men's characters, others that of speaking different tongues, and to others again is given the interpretation of tongues; but in all these worketh one and the same Spirit, apportioning to each one what is due to him. For as the body is one and hath many members, yet all the members together form one body, so also is it with Christ. For through the Spirit we are all baptised into one body, whether Jew or Greek, bond or free, and have all been imbued with one spirit.

And, speaking directly some more, before you say "well I'm not a philosopher, etc.", I really don't buy that. I see you are motivated to think logically through various issues and report your findings here. One cannot discern a theory about the harmful effects of the "pioneer phase of monocultural colonization" without doing so. I just don't think you are yet motivated enough to think logically through those issues which pertain to the indeterminate yet archetypally unfolding and integrating future of Nature's becoming through the human Spirit. It's not an easy pole to think through, precisely because it largely hasn't happened yet from our current perspective, but we can certainly discern the seeds which have already been planted and anticipate the blossoms and fruits. The worst outcome is if we as individuals and collectives become convinced we have already made this effort and done this work when we have, in fact, not done so.

[Lou Gold]

Lou,

I keep mentioning you are ignoring an entire pole of Reality, one-half of the entire evolutionary progression. Actually you are only focusing on the involutionary progression, the diversification of systems and forms. The evolutionary progression is the integration of that diversity back into living Wholeness, where every form and system becomes ever-more conscious of how it is functioning within a unified Cosmic Organism. As I mentioned before, if we have a tendency to give preference only to the past, then we will focus on the diversification of Nature and ignore the integration through Culture. Then we start to feel the latter is something "evil" or "oppressive". Yet we are then once again inverting the actual relationship - what is earlier becomes "evil" when it refuses to adapt and evolve, not the other way around. Goethe's aphorism is pointing precisely to the intuition that evolution redeems what is earlier from its outmoded and 'evil' orientation, by allowing us to experience it again more consciously and thereby integrate the diversity. Remember, Goethe was all about balancing the polarities. It's not about reaching some homogenous "sameness", but about harmonizing the rhythms of all the diverse forms currently working at cross-purposes without obscuring their individuality.

etc.

Ashvin,

In the spirit of speaking directly, I do wonder why you always think I'm ignoring something? Of course, there's another pole, an absolutely essential one. My own ongoing spiritual practice is based on communing with it. Yes, Geothe is about balancing polarities. Yes, the highest virtue is harmony. Yes, Nature expresses the glories of God. Can you imagine that I am reporting from my process and not ignoring a pole?

Lou,

Yes, speaking directly, it's evident you are missing a pole. The pole remains entirely abstract and therefore inert, which then leads you to certain conclusions about the arrangement of humanity and its role in Nature, which are quite the opposite of the conclusions I and many others, including Goethe, and especially all esoteric Christian thinkers (Goethe was such a thinker), have reached. It makes all the difference whether these things are viewed as generalized abstractions, concepts to toy around with for amusement, or living, evolving, practical realities across the individual, natural, cultural, and cosmic scales. I veered into pretty generalized abstract territory in the last post, so I can take some blame for this impression. But my message certainly was not intended to amount to, "it's all about love".

Let's take your concrete forest fire and weeds example. It may seem at first blush that people are interfering with Nature's process of death and renewal, of endless diversification, by fighting forest fires and creating lawns and gardens in which weeds must be pulled out. Indeed there are certainly times when humans do interfere with such processes in an unhealthy way. But we cannot simply generalize that to all human cultural practices. Implicit in such a generalization is that these practices are not also an integral aspect of Nature. That humans didn't evolve from Nature (of course not mindless matter) and that their individual and collective ordering (thinking) activity is not also playing a vital role in evolving Nature, i.e. bringing about Nature's purposes which arc towards Harmony between the diversity of forms.

We can discern this most easily if we simply imagine what would happen or not happen in the absence of these cultural institutions and practices. What does a thriving home garden mean? It means humans are learning to cultivate and maintain various plants, to aim their spiritual activity at other organisms and develop virtues of patience, discipline, stewardship, harmony, perhaps even love. Again, this isn't the case for all humans and all gardens, but the cultural practice of gardening itself and many similar ones. The same could apply to forest fires - true, the natural rhythm of this 'catastrophe' is thrown off at first, but that is necessary to create a new rhythm of virtue development. Humanity cannot stand back and pretend as if they are integral to Nature, because it's simply not true. We are not meant to simply stand in amazement of Fire, but also to tame it and put it to good work. We must use it to burn up our lower animalistic and tribalistic tendencies, releasing them onto a higher plane.

If the foot were to say: Because I am not the hand therefore I do not belong to the body, it would nonetheless belong to it. And if the ear were to say: Because I am not the eye I do not belong to the body, nonetheless does it belong to the body. If the whole body were only an eye, where would be the hearing? If the whole body were a sense of hearing, where would be the power of smell?...If there were only one member, where would the body be? But now there are truly many members, but there is only one body. The eye may not say to the hand: I do not require thee! nor the head to the feet — I have no need of you; rather those which appear to be the feeble members of the body are necessary, and those which we consider mean prove themselves to be specially important. God has put the body together and has recognised the importance of the unimportant members that there should be no division in the body, but that all the members should work harmoniously together and should care for one another. And if one member suffer, all the members suffer with it, and it one member prosper, all the members rejoice with it.

Humanity as a whole is the head, the brain, the spirit of Nature. If the past is of primary importance, and there is no discernable Cosmic arc bending towards reconciliation and Harmony, then human cultivation of the head, its practices and virtues, matters very little. But if there is such an arc, then they are of utmost importance. We need a macroscopic perspective here which views the Cosmos as a holistic organism in process of becoming. Nature will not find the fulfillment of her purposes in any other way but through the individual human with wisdom and conscience, born through Culture and reborn in Spirit. Her kingdoms will not transcend their birth-death oscillations and exist on a higher plane, becoming anything more than what they already are, unless we do as well and orient ourselves towards the universal and harmonious intentions and goals, towards the Idea, the Spirit, of what is True, Beautiful, and Good.

Now there are diversities of gracious gifts, but there is one Spirit. There are diversities in the guidance of mankind, but there is one Lord. There are differences in the force which individual men possess; but there is one God Who works in all these forces. But to every man is given the manifestation of the Spirit, as much as he can profit by it. So to one is given the word of prophecy, to another the word of knowledge; others are spirits who live in faith; again others have the gift of healing, others the gift of prophecy, others have the gift of seeing into men's characters, others that of speaking different tongues, and to others again is given the interpretation of tongues; but in all these worketh one and the same Spirit, apportioning to each one what is due to him. For as the body is one and hath many members, yet all the members together form one body, so also is it with Christ. For through the Spirit we are all baptised into one body, whether Jew or Greek, bond or free, and have all been imbued with one spirit.

And, speaking directly some more, before you say "well I'm not a philosopher, etc.", I really don't buy that. I see you are motivated to think logically through various issues and report your findings here. One cannot discern a theory about the harmful effects of the "pioneer phase of monocultural colonization" without doing so. I just don't think you are yet motivated enough to think logically through those issues which pertain to the indeterminate yet archetypally unfolding and integrating future of Nature's becoming through the human Spirit. It's not an easy pole to think through, precisely because it largely hasn't happened yet from our current perspective, but we can certainly discern the seeds which have already been planted and anticipate the blossoms and fruits. The worst outcome is if we as individuals and collectives become convinced we have already made this effort and done this work when we have, in fact, not done so.

OK. I accept that you can't imagine that I'm not ignoring a pole. Perhaps, we can just agree that it takes a lot of ongoing work to become worthy of the promise and we must approach that task with a great humility.

[Federica]

OK. I accept that you can't imagine that I'm not ignoring a pole. Perhaps, we can just agree that it takes a lot of ongoing work to become worthy of the promise and we must approach that task with a great humility.

Lou,

I am reading your dialogue with Ashvin, coming to separate closures on different pages. And now you have affixed your characteristic 'perhaps-we-can-agree-that' final seal to it. Is it still possible to lift the seal and open the book again, but at a completely different chapter? Not trying to catch you into realizations about polarities here (even if I wanted, I wouldn't be able). I just would like to share with you the thoughts that this conversation evokes, and completely abandon the question whether you are or aren’t ignoring anything. Instead, can we make it about our previous topic of attachment to identity that needs to be shed?

As you earlier said, when you cling to some self-identity, you often find yourself compelled to let go of it. For instance, sacrificing feelings of self righteousness, or superiority, is a continuous shedding process. And how does it feel to shed self righteousness? Good, right? And rightly so. Self righteousness is not compassionate, it doesn’t show love. So when we see it, we take action, we have the honesty and the respect for others that is required in order to shed it, we are doing what’s right. It feels good. I use ‘we’ not to soften the message, but because I include myself, and others in general, in this common type of drifts we often play to ourselves, that’s so easy to get caught in.

Now I want to submit another question to you. What if our thirst for humbleness, that we quench by shedding self righteousness, by sticking to the role of the humble and respectful learner, the thankful witness of the sacred diversity of this world and its inhabitants, is nothing but a second layer of skin that also has to be shed, in a 'continuous shedding process', as you described it?

What if we need to see through the uplifting feeling that we get from shedding self-righteousness and instead tackle the more advanced sheddings, the ones where we could, with effort, roughly anticipate what they are hiding, but not how it will make us feel once their hidden function is brought into aware consideration? The function of shedding self righteousness is to satisfy a thirst for humbleness. But what is the function insured by clinging to the humble learner and thankful witness' role that is maybe uncomfortable to uncover and shed, Lou? And what new perspective on ourselves could we gain from that sacrifice?

.

[Lou Gold]

OK. I accept that you can't imagine that I'm not ignoring a pole. Perhaps, we can just agree that it takes a lot of ongoing work to become worthy of the promise and we must approach that task with a great humility.

Lou,

I am reading your dialogue with Ashvin, coming to separate closures on different pages. And now you have affixed your characteristic 'perhaps-we-can-agree-that' final seal to it. Is it still possible to lift the seal and open the book again, but at a completely different chapter? Not trying to catch you into realizations about polarities here (even if I wanted, I wouldn't be able). I just would like to share with you the thoughts that this conversation evokes, and completely abandon the question whether you are or aren’t ignoring anything. Instead, can we make it about our previous topic of attachment to identity that needs to be shed?

Sure, Federica. I'll give it a try.

As you earlier said, when you cling to some self-identity, you often find yourself compelled to let go of it. For instance, sacrificing feelings of self righteousness, or superiority, is a continuous shedding process. And how does it feel to shed self righteousness? Good, right? And rightly so. Self righteousness is not compassionate, it doesn’t show love. So when we see it, we take action, we have the honesty and the respect for others that is required in order to shed it, we are doing what’s right. It feels good. I use ‘we’ not to soften the message, but because I include myself, and others in general, in this common type of drifts we often play to ourselves, that’s so easy to get caught in.

Actually, it does not often or generally feel good. Humility does not naturally come to me. It was not my early training in achievement culture. I can't really recall striving toward humility but I assure you I've been humbled, busted so to speak on a variety of occasions. No, it was not necessarily fun or uplifting, more like a wake-up call.

Now I want to submit another question to you. What if our thirst for humbleness, that we quench by shedding self righteousness, by sticking to the role of the humble and respectful learner, the thankful witness of the sacred diversity of this world and its inhabitants, is nothing but a second layer of skin that also has to be shed, in a 'continuous shedding process', as you described it?

Again, I can't say that I "thirst for humbleness." Yes, I like the root word of humble, the Greek humus, meaning close to the soil. I would like to be grounded, to be simply real in the now. But this (for me) is not a "role of the humble and respectful learner, the thankful witness of the sacred diversity of this world and its inhabitants" or other exalted descriptions of a so-called "striving". If I did see it this way, I would surely have to shed it. What I do find more and more now, as an old guy in the late stage of my present end zone, is more and more like a life review whereby each shedding opens to a larger more generous or compassionate process. I become more interested in understanding others than judging them.

What if we need to see through the uplifting feeling that we get from shedding self-righteousness and instead tackle the more advanced sheddings, the ones where we could, with effort, roughly anticipate what they are hiding, but not how it will make us feel once their hidden function is brought into aware consideration? The function of shedding self righteousness is to satisfy a thirst for humbleness. But what is the function insured by clinging to the humble learner and thankful witness' role that is maybe uncomfortable to uncover and shed, Lou? And what new perspective on ourselves could we gain from that sacrifice?

Yes, attachment (cliging) to reward ("uplifting feeling" or whatever) becomes a trap, a snare. Each step yields a new horizon. It's a process. I'm reminded of a Tibetan saying I read long ago about the spiritual path" "If begun, better to finish" or, don't stop on any step. But this, for me at least, is not a one size fits every person in every moment precept. As Jesus says, "The sign of the Father in you is movement and repose." We do need to rest. Each person has his/her karma and time to release.

Perhaps, I can add another perspective on sacrifice: it's not necessarily an achievement trip or striving. In my life-changing dream 40 years ago I was faced with a situation that evoked very strong negative judgements that I pushed aside in favor of a childlike curiosity that simply wanted to know more about what I was witnessing. That kid, that magical inner being, was not striving to be a better or uplifted person. He simply wanted to know more about something incredibly beautiful. The judgements were sacrificed in the moment of that choice. I'm eternally that they were.

I don't know if I've responded well to your questions but I enjoyed giving it a try. Thank you. In the spirit of lightning up perhaps you'll enjoy a cartoon I stumbled upon this afternoon.