02-17-2011, 09:34 PM
.
Jody wrote: In other words, there cannot be an overlap before transition without an overlap after transition, but it's a psychological trait to hold contradictory beliefs when that makes us feel better, even when they are mutually exclusive. It's just wishful thinking, a newage version of the Christian rapture.
Gary wrote:Definitely true that unconscious psychological factors may motivate the instantaneous ascension camp. For many perhaps that is just the appeal of the instant ascension scenario. What could be more normal for the human lot than to desire escape and relief from the pain of separation delivered via quick fix rather than through serious introspection, sacrifice, and the long-term disciplines of the personality?
But at the same time I am with Scott in believing that conclusions can be drawn independent of latent fear-of-death complexes.
Jody wrote: That's not cynical, just realistic and responsible. If we seek to be examples, it serves others better if we recommend they continue planting and expect and prepare for difficult work ahead, rather than giving out the message that all will be beamed up. That's where I feel very strongly that the ascension message is enormously irresponsible and does great harm. It's an understandable but pathological earth 3d psychological reaction on the part of wanderers who are traumatized by their earth 3d experience and simply want out themselves, so succumb to fantasy and wishful, 'magical' thinking.
Gary wrote:I totally agree that someone promulgating a message of instant ascension which suggests that all of ones troubles will soon be over not by virtue of hard work but by running out the clock is doing a disservice. But I’m still not seeing eye to eye with you on this for two basic reasons.
Firstly, while the scenario of gradual transition coupled with societal breakdown is eminently possible, what I perceive as your conviction moves beyond what any human being can know with certainty. We all have our convictions of course and I’m sure that many of mine depart from what is knowable, operating on faith alone, so I’m not claiming that all of my perceptions are rooted in hard “facts”. Just that this is one area where I don’t feel I can have similar conviction in one direction or another. My conviction is to be without conviction.
Secondly, while it can be interesting to speculate in either direction, I think that both schools of thought are mistaken if they begin to place emphasis upon the unfolding of Scenario A or B as future certainties for which the seeking entity would do best to prepare. This diverts the attention from the only access point, so to speak, wherein one connects to the real and the true, that being the present moment. Our outer identities do of course live within, and are made of, the illusion, so it is wise to plan and make decisions according to the ever changing needs of the horizontal plane (e.g., it will likely rain some day so it would be helpful to invest in a raincoat, you live near a river that floods so best to elevate your house), but these concerns need occupy only a small portion of our consciousness as I see it. The further ones attention strays from the present moment, especially as it gets caught up in sensational events of the future (however plausible and probable those events may be), the more we solidify, and identify with, a separate, time-bound, transient identity.
As I see it, the business of spirituality is eternity and infinity, not to the point of denying, repressing, ignoring, or judging the events and energies within the illusion, but in rendering the movement of illusory energies transparent to the One within -- ever present, ever unchanging, ever permanent. Thusly any entity or group teaching the ways of spirit and the keys to unknowing should not emphasize Scenarios A, B, or C, but Scenario Now --- all other concerns, including preparation for probable/possible upheaval, being of secondary importance.
Jody wrote: yes, the point when yellow-green, more yellow than green, becomes green-yellow, more green than yellow, which still continues for a humanly long time... a 3 year old child does not in real developmental terms suddenly become a 4 year old child on its 4th birthday, even though that is a sudden'discrete' event in its own time scale...
Gary wrote:And that, too, is a beautiful point. As was your clarification of the definition of to abate in reference to the difficulties of the harvest continuing “unabated” for a period of thirty years.
I had done what Scott did and read “unabated” in that excerpt to indicate that there would be an abrupt end to the difficulties, not that there would be a lessening, so I’m grateful for the clarification.
Here is an analogy of evolution unfolding in a combination of gradual and discrete that may be of aid: the moth becoming the butterfly. Gradual metamorphosis within the cocoon followed by a discrete event wherein the creature is entirely different, having irrevocably left its moth-form behind in favor of a new mode of life. While we can’t say what inner characteristics are retained in the butterfly from its previous moth form, I think we can say with certainty that a discrete boundary was crossed with accompanying radical transformation.
Jody wrote: In other words, there cannot be an overlap before transition without an overlap after transition, but it's a psychological trait to hold contradictory beliefs when that makes us feel better, even when they are mutually exclusive. It's just wishful thinking, a newage version of the Christian rapture.
Gary wrote:Definitely true that unconscious psychological factors may motivate the instantaneous ascension camp. For many perhaps that is just the appeal of the instant ascension scenario. What could be more normal for the human lot than to desire escape and relief from the pain of separation delivered via quick fix rather than through serious introspection, sacrifice, and the long-term disciplines of the personality?
But at the same time I am with Scott in believing that conclusions can be drawn independent of latent fear-of-death complexes.
Jody wrote: That's not cynical, just realistic and responsible. If we seek to be examples, it serves others better if we recommend they continue planting and expect and prepare for difficult work ahead, rather than giving out the message that all will be beamed up. That's where I feel very strongly that the ascension message is enormously irresponsible and does great harm. It's an understandable but pathological earth 3d psychological reaction on the part of wanderers who are traumatized by their earth 3d experience and simply want out themselves, so succumb to fantasy and wishful, 'magical' thinking.
Gary wrote:I totally agree that someone promulgating a message of instant ascension which suggests that all of ones troubles will soon be over not by virtue of hard work but by running out the clock is doing a disservice. But I’m still not seeing eye to eye with you on this for two basic reasons.
Firstly, while the scenario of gradual transition coupled with societal breakdown is eminently possible, what I perceive as your conviction moves beyond what any human being can know with certainty. We all have our convictions of course and I’m sure that many of mine depart from what is knowable, operating on faith alone, so I’m not claiming that all of my perceptions are rooted in hard “facts”. Just that this is one area where I don’t feel I can have similar conviction in one direction or another. My conviction is to be without conviction.
Secondly, while it can be interesting to speculate in either direction, I think that both schools of thought are mistaken if they begin to place emphasis upon the unfolding of Scenario A or B as future certainties for which the seeking entity would do best to prepare. This diverts the attention from the only access point, so to speak, wherein one connects to the real and the true, that being the present moment. Our outer identities do of course live within, and are made of, the illusion, so it is wise to plan and make decisions according to the ever changing needs of the horizontal plane (e.g., it will likely rain some day so it would be helpful to invest in a raincoat, you live near a river that floods so best to elevate your house), but these concerns need occupy only a small portion of our consciousness as I see it. The further ones attention strays from the present moment, especially as it gets caught up in sensational events of the future (however plausible and probable those events may be), the more we solidify, and identify with, a separate, time-bound, transient identity.
As I see it, the business of spirituality is eternity and infinity, not to the point of denying, repressing, ignoring, or judging the events and energies within the illusion, but in rendering the movement of illusory energies transparent to the One within -- ever present, ever unchanging, ever permanent. Thusly any entity or group teaching the ways of spirit and the keys to unknowing should not emphasize Scenarios A, B, or C, but Scenario Now --- all other concerns, including preparation for probable/possible upheaval, being of secondary importance.
Jody wrote: yes, the point when yellow-green, more yellow than green, becomes green-yellow, more green than yellow, which still continues for a humanly long time... a 3 year old child does not in real developmental terms suddenly become a 4 year old child on its 4th birthday, even though that is a sudden'discrete' event in its own time scale...
Gary wrote:And that, too, is a beautiful point. As was your clarification of the definition of to abate in reference to the difficulties of the harvest continuing “unabated” for a period of thirty years.
I had done what Scott did and read “unabated” in that excerpt to indicate that there would be an abrupt end to the difficulties, not that there would be a lessening, so I’m grateful for the clarification.
Here is an analogy of evolution unfolding in a combination of gradual and discrete that may be of aid: the moth becoming the butterfly. Gradual metamorphosis within the cocoon followed by a discrete event wherein the creature is entirely different, having irrevocably left its moth-form behind in favor of a new mode of life. While we can’t say what inner characteristics are retained in the butterfly from its previous moth form, I think we can say with certainty that a discrete boundary was crossed with accompanying radical transformation.
Explanation by the tongue makes most things clear, but love unexplained is clearer. - Rumi
![[+]](https://www.bring4th.org/forums/images/collapse_collapsed.png)