19 juni 2011

The house metaphor

Imagine being in a house.
You are surrounded by servants, parents, family and a massive garden.

This is the world. Your parents the butler and everyone here are symbols for various forces.
If you break a vase you might get told off.
When your parents are away maybe the Butler is allowed to punish you by confining you to your room.

The servants the Butler, your parents and the rules you have are simply there to protect you as a child. If you never grow up you will need to follow these rules.
When various steps in your spiritual journey arise you might have various ways of dealing with your situation.

1 You could run away from home. Escape. If you succeed good luck, but if you go back you will be punished. (reincarnation.... )

2 If you fail and you are found out you will be put under closer scrutiny

3 You can make yourself invisible to the staff. This is in a way the mystery of mysticism. You don't bring attention to yourself and can mostly get away with things as long as you don't overstep your boundaries.

4 You could enter various savoury and unsavoury contracts with different members of the staff or possibly bring in staff from the outside that are on your side

4 you can simply, grow up.

as a grown up, you'll realise that the nasty Butler who had the power to punish you will politely nod and bring you tea and cakes when you snap your fingers and the house will be a home you rule as its rightful heir instead of a prison.

I'm sure you can translate the metaphor into spiritual practices for yourself.

(yes, still scheduled posts so comment moderation might be slow)

11 juni 2011

Of Gods and Men

Religion and mysticism do not go hand in hand. There is no such thing.
It is not possible to be religious in any sense of the word at all that most people understand by that term and claim that one is following an esoteric mystic tradition.

If you find yourself following a religion you are not allowing the mystery of mysticism to fully unfold.
If you find yourself being "chosen by a deity" which is so popular within neopaganism, then you are not transcending certain forces.

The most important lesson with mysticism is that the religious symbols are there to point you in the true direction of spiritual truths. Not because the outer forms should be the ones worshipped.(1)

(1)This doesn't mean that there are no spiritual entities.

(Posts still pre-scheduled due to busy times.)