Tuesday, October 14, 2008

The graduated layers of reality

At the ultimate level, there is nothing happening. It could even be incorrect to say there’s only one being, because that one being would be no being, all of everything is nothing. On the levels at which we are, there seems to be a lot going on. It corresponds with the metaphor of the rock. From the outside, it looks like a pretty constant form, just sitting there, nothing going on. But at a very small level we can see that there is no stillness. Molecules and atoms are constantly shifting about, vibrating, spinning, all that.

What truly exists is unknowable, yet it is all there is to know.

There are multiple layers of existence, different planes populated with entities and we are evolving. All things are evolving, but the wheel itself remains unchanged. At each level the truth appears to be different. We adopt systems when they are useful, but we grow beyond them. Each may contain truth, but none of them can be perfect truth as long as there is a distorted mind attempting understanding. We must not fear to leave behind the systems which no longer serve us, for they are approximations and theories, understandings limited within a certain framework.

Here in the world we are currently in, we may say things like “might is right” or “survival of the fittest.” And these approaches have served us, but our clinging to them hinder us from evolving to a higher stage, in which we make ourselves strong by empowering others, in which we recognize every being as equally deserving as we, rendering the idea of “deserving” anything into an absurdity. To cling to our old ideas is to ignore the rising level of our consciousness, or attempt to bring it down a peg or two.

Yet at another level, there is nothing anyone needs to do, ever. In this sense, we are all free, while others find this idea to be a curse, leaving them afloat in a sea of limited potentials. We do not need to hang on to anything. We can let go of all things and simply be.

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