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First, a few wrap up comments on the response to my Round 7 preliminary posting.
Bagua and others have raised the point that yin-yang is one cycle, one whole, so what me worry about having a split soul? And of course everyone wants to support the Oneness is all that matters attitude.
Let’s remember to keep our language precise: Oneness is not the same as Harmony, which implies the continued existence and relationships amongst of the Many.
It seems easy and obvious to argue that the Many is innately in harmony with its source, the One, that it’s a given and does not require real cultivation other than smiling and accepting What Is.
But WHY IS THERE NOT HARMONY AMONST THE MANY, Ii.e. between the different individual s all incarnating from that primoridal oneness? In common language, WHY IS THERE SUFFERING, VIOLENCE, DISEASE, or EVIL?
That is the question, and that is why binary soul theory and Daoist yin-yang theory needs to be understood at a deeper level than the obvious taiji circle. Yes, I agree, on the vast scale of eternal time it is all in balance, and will all work itself as that is inevitable process of the Life Force.
But as Bagua casually mentioned, and failed to elaborate on, there seems to be a little problem of “extreme cases” of imbalance that requires a little extra work. And what does it mean when that extreme case seems to be manifested on an entire planet, in the suffering many of the 6.5 billion humans, and a planet facing self-destruction by war and environmental destruction?
The explantion that is’s all perfect, if you could just shift the angle of perception, rings a little hollow. It doesn’t describe the reality. Its basically a “mind is perfect” or “shen is perfect” theory if you let it be perfect.
It means that if you just sit there are watch the suffering from your safe neutral spot on the meditation pad, you’ve improved your own lot (of at least your mind, if not your jing/bodily health) but may not have speeded up that process for the larger field.
TIME, which is just an illusion created by subjective rate of vibration of space, IS A REAL and SERIOUS PROBLEM WHEN YOU’RE SUFFERING. Ask anyone who has got a disease, or is in pain, or is feeling suicidal. If their suffering is not real, then the notions of kindness, love, compassion are empty and useless if they don’t alleviate anything for those stuck in the “illusion” of their suffering.
———————-Now, on to the key questions.
1. Why is there a binary soul? How does it serve the whole?
It serves the whole by allowing greater mirroring and distinction of Self, that does NOT exist in the primordial or Oneness state. In humans, it steps down and concretizes the relationship between Heaven and Earth.2. If there is conflict and struggle between the two halves of the soul, which is acted out as violence, war, etc. in outer world, its because there is friction between Heaven and Earth, or within Elements of Heaven and Earth, that are showing up in their Child Humanity. This is sometimes called the War in Heaven that is reflected as the war on earth.
3. The cause of suffering then is in the agency that creates the binary soul, i.e. heaven and earth, formless and form. It does NOT originate in any flaw or sin of humans, although we may aggravate it out of fear and ignorance. But since humans have been given the spark of free will that existed in the original will to exist, present in the primordial oneness, then we do have the power to alleviate our own suffering.
4. This means Humanity has been given a pre-existing flaw (or “extreme imbalance”) AND the means (free will) to heal it. It would seem that every human is given a “mandate from heaven”, i.e. a destiny, a patatern of jing imprinted and flowing through our mingmen/Gate of Destiny in each moment.
Question: if we all followed that destiny everything would come up roses and suffering should quickly end. Why is it so difficult for any one human being to follow their destiny, i.e. to know their purpose in life and act on it?5. THIS IS THE WILDCARD: NEITHER HEAVEN NOR EARTH KNOWS FULLY WHAT OUR DESTINY IS! Our destiny is NOT PREDESTINED. They have stepped themselves down into humanf orm as a binary soul pattern in the hopes that the tension between the yin-yang halves of the soul will propel us each to DISCOVER THE MISSING ESSENCE NEEDED TO RESTORE HARMONY between heaven and earth.
6. We need to admit that Heaven & Earth have a little problem: it is called astral pollution, and it occurs at the moment of death. There are consequences to humans NOT exercising their free will and using it to choose integration between yin & yang halves of soul.
The consequence is separation of the souls and leaving each in an incomplete state. There is a huge pileuip of dead po souls, or earth bound souls that neither feeling complete in fulfilling their mission on earth and incomplete in merging with their heaven/formless halfl.
This large and incomplete pool of yin/earthbound souls exerts negative influence on the global psyche of humanity, perpetuating negative thought forms which trigger negative actions, which require incarnating more souls to take on those patterns in the hopes of resolving them.
The mass wars and epidemic of human violence and killng has created a huge pool of incompletion that IS A SERIOUS PROBLEM FOR THE COLLECTIVE WHOLE. It becomes a vicious repeating cycle – unless the feeling of soul incompletion is completed somehow. This is why SOUL COMPLETION is the DRIVING FORCE BEHIND EVOLUTION.
Yes, everything always remains in its proper and inevitable yin-yang relationship of Heaven-earth, man-woman, hun-po – but that relationship will produce intense suffering in this physical plane if any imbalance is allowed to continue for a period of time.
Denial of this problem just pushes the suffering into a deeper level of unconscious, from which it will emerge at death once the conscious suppression is stopped,a nd the two halves split in immediate relief that a bad relationship is over. But soul divorce doesn’t solve the core suffering – it just shifts it from the failed individual effort back into the collective burden.
6. The alchemical methods are designed to speed up the natural process of soul completion. And at higher levells, allow the individual to consciously radiate the vibration of the integrated /sage / third pole of consciousness out into the broader field of human consciousness. They permit the individual to speed up their own process of soul completion and begin working on the colletive isues beyond their own soul pattern.
This alchemical process is different than the enlgihtenment process (in my definition of the words).
The yin/earth soul dominant types are either Self-Improvers or World Improvers. Their enlightenment is to serve the world.The yang/heaven soul dominant types are Self-Transcenders or World Transcenders. Their enlightenment is seek otherworldly states that free the self from the limitations of form.
Many pursue the completion of their yin or yang half while SUPPRESSING the other half. This gets played out at death, although the individual doesn’t know it, because once you’ve split youlack the capacity for self-awareness. The collective has already taken on your problem.
Immortality is not an end state, in my definition it is just a way to describe the ongoing evolution of the individual ability to relate to the Many after death. The Immortal can REMEMBER CONSCIOUSLY WHAT ESSENCE WAS DISCOVERED THAT COMPLETED THE WHOLE and evolved it beyond what it was.
this is the unique process of Tao – it never repeats itself, each mment is unique and open to uniqiue realization by humans. The constancy of the primordial ground of oneness does not interfere with or prevent the continuing flow of the Tao’s uniqueness, it serves it and stabilizes it.
But the key point about the WILDCARD is that your free will, exercised n each moment, is exploring thorugh desire = and intention to complete each desire – those essences necessary to restore the harmonoius flow within the physical plane, without violence or suffering. As I have mentioned in my essay on sexuality posted on the Healing Love product page – I believe the first level of essence to be recoverd with our freewill is the yuan chi that was “lost” to consciouness during the splitting of the male and female sexes.
enough for now.
michael‘Michael:The consequence is separation of the souls and leaving each in an incomplete state. There is a huge pileuip of dead po souls, or earth bound souls that neither feeling complete in fulfilling their mission on earth and incomplete in merging with their heaven/formless halfl.’
At this very moment it is the funeral of a friend who shot himself through the head. I decided not to go, my partner is. Connecting with him yesterday night, I saw him walking in the mist along with many many other ‘ghost’ people, most of them young. And I was struck by the number, all walking but without direction, without goal, and not knowing where they came from. Ultimate horror. So very sad, I never felt so sad with the death of a person, that is why I decided not to go, I felt I couldn’t deal with so much sadness.
To Wendy and Michael:
Michael, thank you so much for clearing up some questions that had arisen within me during the past week. Your lucid explanations in the round 8 essay hit the spot.
MW >> 6. The alchemical methods are designed to speed up the natural process of soul completion. And at higher levells, allow the individual to consciously radiate the vibration of the integrated /sage / third pole of consciousness out into the broader field of human consciousness. They permit the individual to speed up their own process of soul completion and begin working on the colletive isues beyond their own soul pattern.<> The consequence is separation of the souls and leaving each in an incomplete state. There is a huge pileuip of dead po souls, or earth bound souls that neither feeling complete in fulfilling their mission on earth and incomplete in merging with their heaven/formless halfl.<>This large and incomplete pool of yin/earthbound souls exerts negative influence on the global psyche of humanity, perpetuating negative thought forms which trigger negative actions, which require incarnating more souls to take on those patterns in the hopes of resolving them.<<
Again, I've seen this 'influence' manifest. (particularlly in that part of Australia, though not denying it exists elsewhere).
It manifests as: fighting, various forms of violence, alchohol and drug addiction and abuse, apathy, anger toward life, fear suspicion and on and on ……But a most tragic, and increasing manifestation is youth suicide.
Wendy, reading your post brought tears to my eyes. Less than 6 months ago, while I was in north western australia, a relative hung minself. He was 11 years old.
Last weekend, 2 more people suicided. The frequency is increasing.
There appears to be a cycle of unconcious self destruction.Michael, please continue to reveal the way of harmonisation and integration.
That's also why I wanted you to come here (aust)mat
Michael,
Excellent peice. I’ll share some insights before I depart for the weekend.
My alien visitations on the dream plane was to a 4,600 year old (in our linear time) Reptilian, of which I was one in a past life. The androgynous being told me about the astral pollution you talk about, I humbly agree with you.
The war in heaven as referred to in the Bible is particularly between humans and the Draconian/Reptilians and has been going on for quite some time now, it is not known how long. I won’t go further in detail with this, as it is not important right now.
But, my purpose to explain this is to say that aliens are highly advanced beyond our wildest imagination of technology. Our solar system was aligned with our collective souls in our bodies. We have planets in our solar system that were literally created specifically to relate to our souls. That’s correct, they have that kind of technology to materialize entire planets.
I was told that aliens also have technology that can transfer souls after death and insert them into bodies. After being born, they remember all their past lives, the children are just as smart as the parents if not smarter, they acquire all their knowledge. The alien told me that technology is not needed because we have our intent which is the greatest form of technology and we are able to do what technology can do.
This is because many millions of years ago, our human space ancestors were created by another race that and we inherited their soul patterns of allowing for us to for individual evolution through free will. The other important thing here is that humans have seriously de-evolved partly because of the nuclear war on Atlantis. Our DNA has also been manipulated by other races who choose to manipulate from the sidelines.
Humans have lost their true nature and must continue to seek evolving. Evolution allows us to be free, it did originally. I do’t think that the tension of the earth and heaven souls is the ultimate evolution though, there is more to it. But that certainly resolves birth-death-rebirth. Very good points, Michael.
Above all, the highest evolution is the one that allows complete responsible freedom. Seeking to cultivate our neutral or emoty space does not relate to the cosmos. The planets were created and specifically aligned to help evolution and relate to our souls. There is a reason alien races choose to become adept in science and learn about the cosmos.
Regads,
Fajin“Secret of Everlasting Life/Zhou Yi Can Tong Qi and the author is Richard Bertschinger, published by Element Book of England. An extract here might interest you
“The idea of everlasting life has nothing to do with hankering after life. The truth is that actually there is no death.
How can there be no death? Because actually there is only one single energy, one all-encompassing motivating force, which lies at the root of our life’s activity, not two. The Great Void, which is the common ground of all life, is there already, with life continuously being born within it. So what need is there for life and death?
It is because our desire for things assumes undue importance that we go astray and begin the separation of life and death. If we view them from this space of quiet and tranquility we can see there has never been any life or any death. Evidently there is only one single energy flowing and circulating about”.
Your interpretation of this quote is true in a larger sense, but does not acknowledge the existence of polarity or suffering that needs resolution now. This might happen in the case where the One single energy that is flowing about might encounter a blockage to impede its free flow.
Do you believe in the existence of suffering?
We could all choose to end our physical lives right now, but would we feel ready, or happy to do so?
It is not my interpretation, it is the author’s.
Following the taoist way of life decreases much of human made suffering.
bagua
‘where do you go to recharge?
the graveyard
try for yourselfseak a up to three day old open grave’
some people have moments of generosity
the creative uses of graveyard i came across
still wonderingHello Michael:
Thanks for the profundly insighful post.
There are many things you mentioned, I just picked one to focus on.
MW
“The cause of suffering then is in the agency that creates the binary soul, i.e. heaven and earth, formless and form. It does NOT originate in any flaw or sin of humans, although we may aggravate it out of fear and ignorance. But since humans have been given the spark of free will that existed in the original will to exist, present in the primordial oneness, then we do have the power to alleviate our own suffering. ”“This means Humanity has been given a pre-existing flaw (or “extreme imbalance”) AND the means (free will) to heal it. It would seem that every human is given a “mandate from heaven”, i.e. a destiny, a patatern of jing imprinted and flowing through our mingmen/Gate of Destiny in each moment.
Question: if we all followed that destiny everything would come up roses and suffering should quickly end. Why is it so difficult for any one human being to follow their destiny, i.e. to know their purpose in life and act on it? ”
***************************
bagua
Wu Ji created Heaven and Earth, under your assumption, it created the potential for this polarity, and of course not to polarize to the degree to cause the “human problem”, which you are stating it did create.The classics state for humans to “follow the way of heaven and earth”, why would they if they are the cause of our “preexisting flaw” and one can assume they are still generating that energy, did they get this all wrong?
Why would we connect to the these flawed and polarized forces, Earth and Heaven, in our alchemy?
TO say Wu Ji created Heaven and Earth and then has no part in it is separating creator from creation, what taoist often critiscize other religions of doing.
If I understand you, Wu Ji is seperate from Heaven and Earth, and thefore humanity, Im feeling very lonely.
bagua
Ba,
I have been readng your post, and would like to answer it until michael gets around to it, but again, your language is very unclear, and you take things out of context:
>>”Wu Ji created Heaven and Earth, under your assumption, it created the potential for this polarity, and of course not to polarize to the degree to cause the “human problem”, which you are stating it did create.”
(this is grammatically very unclear and hard to understand)I think what you are saying in general is why would the Dao create this extreme unresolved polarity, and then not create an answer to it (like you say: “Why would we connect to the these flawed and polarized forces, Earth and Heaven, in our alchemy?”)?
My interpretation of Michael’s post is that humanity was created by the dao as an experiment, the stepped down result of the mystery of yin and yang, of formless and form: the answer to your question was in his next paragraph, which said that the wildcard is that Heaven and Earth do not know our destiny completely, IT’S UP TO US TO FIGURE IT OUT. It is a mystery, the beauty of free will. Can we resolve this extreme polarity?
We are at the receiving end of this polarized mystery, meaning that there is no predestined answer laid out for us by heaven and earth. I think what you are really saying is, “why can’t we connect to this perfect state of heaven (or earth, or the dao) to resolve all our problems?”, Why isn’t it already answered, perfected and done for us?
The answer is that we have to do the work to find the resolution through our lives, cultivation and free will, we microcosmically create the answer that heaven and earth is seeking.Heaven and Earth is perfect if we make it that way. “Following the way of heaven and earth” might be interpreted like “following the desire (or will) of heaven and earth to be in harmony and balance”.
I feel that Singing Ocean has basically responded to Bagua as I would.
But Bagua’s question about following the way of Heaven and Earth is very profound, and deserves a fuller answer. I often quote the same passage from the Cantong Qi (Triplex Unity), which is one of the oldest Taoist alchemical texts (2nd century AD).
First, let’s just note that the Oneness (or Primordial) has always been around, it never leaves even in this focused plane of polarity/physicality with its limitations of linear time flow. As the Triplex Unity notes, there is no real difference between Life and Death as far as the Original Breath/yuan qi/Oneness is concerned.
The Oneness was around when Genghis Khan slaughtered millions of innocent people on his imperial whim. It was around when Hitler executed five million jews in gas chambers because of their religion. We can surmise that our Original Being observes neutrally when each murder is committed, when every anguished person suffering from disease is screaming to be relieved of pain.
Yet the Primordial Oneness does nothing to relieve our suffering. Or, at least nothing that we can readily perceive. I agree with Bagua, that cultivating an identity of Oneness does relieve personal suffering on some levels. But won’t necessarily stop the progression of a disease or give you long life, or even stop your soul karma from being played out. You may have a more relaxed, less reactive space to experience your pleasures and your pains in life.
But just because you perceive the underlying unity of all things doesn’t mean that you will choose to change the pattern of your soul’s unfoldment, in life, or at death when the souls split. That requires Will, or choice, and that must be communicated to the Life Force. All religions profess belief in God and Unity, and most have been involved in huge atrocities. Even the compassion-loving Buddhists of Tibet engaged in the wholesale extermination of competing Shamans form the Bon tradition. Talk is cheap when it comes to religious values.
The question that is raised here, is (how) can we do more than become a neutral witness to our lives? Can we actually change the pattern of unfoldment? How far can we push the limited free will that we seem to have in our physical choices?
The issue that is raised is not too different from the biblical story of Job: Why do you allow me to suffer, God? (Unlike Fajin, I do not equate God with Tao; I equate all Creator Gods with emanations of Original Spirit, but that is another discussion).
And it speaks to the issue of the impersonality of Heaven and Earth raised in the Tao Te Ching, in which the Sage who has presumably merged with Heaven and Earth “treats humans as if they were straw dogs”, i.e. with indifference. Straw figures were burned in rituals in ancient China to appease the Gods.
The Life Force is not exactly indifferent, in my view. It is simply neutral. and has to be, in order to unconditionally accept all that is created and to honor the desires of all that lives.
The Taoist cosmology in the Tao Te Ching is that the Tao created Heaven and Earth, and that Heaven and Earth created Humanity. The question is, why did Heaven and Earth create Humanity? If we don’t know that, then we cannot know our own purpose for existing, we cannot understand why our souls has been bifurcated into two warring halves, and we cannot know our soul mission in life.
It echoes into the question, on another level, of why the original androgynous bi-sexed, integrated yin-yang soul was divded into physical male and female. Was that part of the War between Heaven and Earth, to be played out by Humanity?
These are the deepest mysteries in life, and no one can claim to definitively answer them. In my opinion, we can only explore the continuum of personal self to collective self, and use our tiny window of microcosmic perception to look at the possible macrocosmic relationship that Humanity has to Heaven (the formless planes of consicousness) and Earth (the form planes of consciousness). We know that as humans we seem to be both, animals (form) with quasi-fomrless minds that mediate totally invisible souls.
My position in the chan-taoist debate has been to support the cultivation practices of both, but to point out that differences in intention will be mirroed by the Life Force differently. That “clearing the mind” of negative ego perceptions, while very beneficial and essential, is not the same as resolving deeper soul divisions.
That enlightenment and immortality are different in my languaging of human evolution – they involve overlapping but ultimately different processes. Different intentions will create different choices, which will produce different experiences.
Essentially, my belief is that you cannot skip the conscious transformations of jing-chi-shen and go straight to wu without bypassing important soul choices that are forced upon us by our physical embodiment. That the “wu” you will achieve may not be the ultimate “wu”, and will thus leave behind soul incompletions that will have to be resolved by Humanity.
The most important choice we can make is to drop our judgments against embodiment and the suffering it may possibly cause. This is macrocosmically the same as dropping our judgement of Earth. Yet most religions – including Buddhism in its root form and most of its Asian non-new age western forms – are making that judgement, and saying that Heaven and the formless is better than earth because it doesn’t have suffering. Hence their hope to get off the wheel of incarnation.
But Heaven ALONE doesn’t have free will, because it lacks the mirroring of Earth, the body/jing/individual shape necessary to express free will. It needs Earth to create, just as men and women need each other to pro-create.
What is going on is that the Old Boy, paternalistic religions – in which I include Buddhism, HInduism, Islam, and Christianity – are expressing the dissatisfaction of certain streams of Heaven with the way things are going on Earth. That humanity was created as a way to mediate those differences between heaven and earth, and test the possibilities of free will, but that humanity hasn’t proven itself and that the experiment in free will is best ended, the sooner the better. This involves dissolving everyone back into a formless state, where there will be no suffering. Or at the very least, create a clear hierarchy, where Heaven dominates Earth and things are ordered according to a domination/hierarchical order led by those streams of heaven who are horrified by the mess that humanity has become.
But Earth doesn’t hold this position, nor do certain streams of Heaven consciousness that favor free will and believe the experiment will ultimately prove itself important in the evolution of heaven-earth. The problem is that all the players – the diverse streams of Heaven, Earth, and Humanity and their shifting alliances via religion and science – because of the underlying unity of all process, has to stick with it, there is no option to break away and go live in another dimension.
So the Big Picture puts our tiny human choices as leverage points in the cosmic process and the at times absurd virtual reality we call planet earth.
But no need to feel lonely just because there is no Top Dog/ God guaranteeing your salvation and holding your hand like an overweening parent. You have to become both your own parent and treat your binary soul struggle with the kind of love and compassion that only a parent has for their confused offspring.
Every thickening of the human plot is followed by an ultimate resolution. Question is, how soon will you complete your piece/peace in this Way-making process?
Smiling to the Cosmic Jokester,
michaelHi SO:
I will try to be clearer.
According to MW:
Wu Ji created heaven and earth and gave them free will, they did not harmonize themselves and created “extreme polarity”, they then created humanity to find harmony and soul completion? Is this correct, I will assume yes.
Why would all the classics advise us to follow the way of “heaven and earth” if they are so polarized and the cause of our problem?
Why would we seek to connect to and gather the energies of Heaven and Earth in our alcehemy if they are so polarized?
thanks singing ocean, the birds are singing too as I type this.
bagua
Ba,
I have been readng your post, and would like to answer it until michael gets around to it, but again, your language is very unclear, and you take things out of context:
>>”Wu Ji created Heaven and Earth, under your assumption, it created the potential for this polarity, and of course not to polarize to the degree to cause the “human problem”, which you are stating it did create.”
(this is grammatically very unclear and hard to understand)I think what you are saying in general is why would the Dao create this extreme unresolved polarity, and then not create an answer to it (like you say: “Why would we connect to the these flawed and polarized forces, Earth and Heaven, in our alchemy?”)?
My interpretation of Michael’s post is that humanity was created by the dao as an experiment, the stepped down result of the mystery of yin and yang, of formless and form: the answer to your question was in his next paragraph, which said that the wildcard is that Heaven and Earth do not know our destiny completely, IT’S UP TO US TO FIGURE IT OUT. It is a mystery, the beauty of free will. Can we resolve this extreme polarity?
We are at the receiving end of this polarized mystery, meaning that there is no predestined answer laid out for us by heaven and earth. I think what you are really saying is, “why can’t we connect to this perfect state of heaven (or earth, or the dao) to resolve all our problems?”, Why isn’t it already answered, perfected and done for us?
The answer is that we have to do the work to find the resolution through our lives, cultivation and free will, we microcosmically create the answer that heaven and earth is seeking.Bagua’s question:
“Why would all the classics advise us to follow the way of “heaven and earth” if they are so polarized and the cause of our problem?
Why would we seek to connect to and gather the energies of Heaven and Earth in our alcehemy if they are so polarized?”
The original levels of those polarities are pure and not resistant to each other. The higher levels are less “polarized-in-animosity” than our levels “down here”, thus, they are harmonious. I do not think they “are the cause of our problem.” I think, as Michael has explained, the unforseen happened and things got too separated out and yuan chi became too thinned for harmony to remain pure.
Original Heaven and Earth are where we came from and their sequential emanations outward are the path (backward) home. We have no choice but to assimilate them in our reversal of separation back to the source we came from. We are simply taking our minute parts (our personal shen), putting them together, gathering their larger level partners (sun, moon, planets), and adding these up as we move into greater wholenesses. Thus, “They are like a ladder,” as Michael has put it, that completes us by our willingness to “climb” them and unite.
Apparently, it HAS been done! We have to keep going.Blessings, Alexander
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