Metaphors

[DFS]

first, i use a screen reader, so no photos or icons. text is what screen readers do best. <smile>

second, all truths become personal truths. the following is based on my personal experiences, studies, assumptions, prejudices, etc. i'm an eclectic, meaning i borrow indiscriminately and often forget my sources or how i arrived at my present opinions and personal truths. in other words, there's nothing special or sacred about the following musings. <wry grin>

can't recall why i started musing about metaphors, wondering why metaphor and its siblings -- simile, analogy, idiom, and symbols, including dream symbols -- are so prevalent a part of third-density experience.

okay, it's about communication -- dream symbols for our subconscious and all the other siblings for verbal exchanges, which means we either enjoy peppering our communications with colorful images or there's a more basic reason for employing metaphor and its siblings.

why use a metaphor when a single word would suffice? easy. it's because most single words or groups of words have multiple levels of meaning. we resort to metaphors, analogies, etcetera in an attempt to more effectively communicate complex concepts or experiences.

it's an attempt to create pictures with words because as the old cliche affirms, "a picture i sworth a thousand words." <grinning>

(sometimes my musings do a lateral shift)
so then, if i were a full telepath, would i use metaphorical images to thought-project concepts and experiences? would true telepathy be all images and no words? maybe, but there would likely also be emotions. one might deliberately edit the images, but the emotions would expose the true intent. interesting speculation, but can't know until i become a full telepath. <bemused grin>

why metaphors? cause they make third-density life work better by improving communications. and, might life, itself, be some sort of metaphor?

doubtful, but there are life metaphors:
life as a battle or struggle -- a rat race, a jungle, a dog-eat-dog struggle
life as a stage or play -- tragedies or sitcoms
life as a journey or quest
life as a game or competition
just to name a few.

my own life metaphor is "life as a classroom." as far back as i can remember, i always loved to learn and share what i learned. formal schooling simply reinforced this metaphor, and when i settled into my metaphysical seeking, "life as a classroom" became an overarching metaphor for the seeking, itself. i was doing this "life" in order to learn and share what i learned. what's more, this overarching metaphor reshaped my life perspective.

those challenging catalysts become opportunities to learn chosen life lessons. those annoying persons and stressful situations become, after sufficient musings and meditation, teachers and hidden opportunities.

it's really how i now see life. but dare i generalize? do other selves have life metaphors? i have always been an odd duck out of step with popular culture, and with maturity, i've become a true eccentric. maybe i'm the only persona in this third-density illusion who has chosen an overarching life metaphor. maybe everyone else just uses the generic life metaphors whenever applicable -- sort of like only wearing sunscreen if one is going to the beach.

do you have a life metaphor or metaphors? comments, quips and reactions would be most appreciated. <hopeful smile>

dfs

[Rhonda]

fun trend, thanks for the post, dfs, i have a oldie, but goodie,

different things for different folks

metaphors, i suspect you can view this statement as different truth for each of us, different views, different taste etc...., but we all are experiencing our lifes as we have choose to. its a statement of acceptance and just being.

welcome, dfs......

[TheCusp]

it seems that metaphors can sometimes be more accurate than real descriptions can be. i think that's because they better describe the reality of things on an archetypal level, which is the true nature of reality.

my life metaphor is that "life is a dream".

and i use a duality metaphor to describe what dreams are. "dreams are an expression of wave/particle duality". our dream world is the wave form counterpart to waking solid particle reality.

a metaphor for a probability wave form is an archetype. focusing attention on a wave form causes it to collapse. focusing attention on an archetype in a dream causes it to "collapse" down one of it's many possible associations (probabilities).

[Anders Lindman]

my own life metaphor is "life as a classroom."

i agree that there are always things to learn. another metaphor is "life is intelligence unfolding."

one interesting idea is that consciousness is the foundation and the physical universe is created by consciousness. this is not a new idea. many of the ancient spiritual traditions have this idea. and even scientists have started to talk about this idea, such as amit goswami.

david wilcock gave a metaphor of a rotating prism struck by a single light source. and each person is like one of the rainbows that are projected from the prism. david also said that we are not only the body. we are also the earth. and also the milky way galaxy, and ultimately we are the whole universe.

here is a short video clip that illustrates this idea:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wq_yogkrew

then we also have progress. mainstream science has the theory of evolution. and that is a part of it but not the whole explanation. in most if not all religions we have the idea of creation and progress. so there is evolution and creation. and creation is not a single one-time event as i see it, but an ongoing process of intelligence unfolding.

as for the idea of life being a classroom, here is a short clip with j. krishnamurti talking about "learning all the time":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0cjooiwi9u

[DFS]

thecusp

my life metaphor is that "life is a dream".
and i use a duality metaphor to describe what dreams are. "dreams are an expression
of wave/particle duality". our dream world is the wave form counterpart to waking
solid particle reality.

***

one advantage of my classroom metaphor is that it easily includes other metaphors without conflicts. your dream metaphor is acceptable to me as well, though i tend to refer to it as an illusion rather than a dream. your duality metaphor is a novel concept and i like it. i've always thought of wave/particle duality as a demonstration of consciousness present in everything, but had not thought to extend it to dreams. thanks for sharing that. i will muse about it and try to remember where i encountered the concept. <smile>

there''s plenty of room for individual interpretations of space/time concepts. as rhonda noted in her reply:

rhonda
different things for different folks
metaphors, i suspect you can view this statement as different truth for each of us,
different views, different taste etc...., but we all are experiencing our lifes as
we have choose to. its a statement of acceptance and just being.
***

i like this approach cause i see all "truth" as personal truth, and no individual persona has a corner on truth. and acceptance is a necessary attitude or bias for anyone seeking to serve others while preserving free will.

i appreciate the feedback. <big smile>

dfs

[DFS]

anders lindman wrote:
i agree that there are always things to learn. another metaphor is "life is intelligence
unfolding."
****

i like the image of unfolding

****
one interesting idea is that consciousness is the foundation and the physical universe
is created by consciousness. this is not a new idea. many of the ancient spiritual
traditions have this idea. and even scientists have started to talk about this idea,
such as amit goswami.
****

i have listened to amit goswami's interviews and find his presentations interesting and persuasive. my own take is that consciousness is all that there is. everything is both consciousness and conscious.

****

david
also said that we are not only the body. we are also the earth. and also the milky
way galaxy, and ultimately we are the whole universe.
****

i agree. in session 1, question 5 on the law of one web-site, ra states:
""you are not speaking of similar or somewhat like entities or things. you are every thing, every being, every emotion, every event, every situation. you are unity. you are infinity. you are love/light, light/love. you are. this is the law of one."

we are the one, and the one is all that is. thus, we are all that is.

i appreciate the input and suggested links. i study, muse and meditate, incorporating those concepts that resonate with me. my guidance has forced me to accept that i am my own best resource, that answers and understanding are ultimately to be found within. in other words, i cannot expect others to choose for me. i'm responsible for everything in my life experience, including my limiting beliefs.
<wry smile>

thanks for the thoughtful response.

dfs

[Anders Lindman]

i agree. in session 1, question 5 on the law of one web-site, ra states:
""you are not speaking of similar or somewhat like entities or things. you are every thing, every being, every emotion, every event, every situation. you are unity. you are infinity. you are love/light, light/love. you are. this is the law of one."

we are the one, and the one is all that is. thus, we are all that is.


the difficult thing for me is to grasp how all can be one. yet no doubt, everything is one reality. i found david wilcock's metaphor of a rotating prism struck by a single source of light useful. i am one of the rainbows that is being projected from the prism and i am also the one light source that makes the rainbow appear.

i think of the single light as the one consciousness shining the physical universe, including my body, into being moment by moment. amit goswami said an interesting thing about how consciousness is the ground of being and that the physical universe is in consciousness instead of the other way around which is often how mainstream science today describes reality.

and there is a continuous progress/evolution created by each new moment being more complex than previous movements. and it's an accelerating progress! this has even been confirmed by mainstream researchers.

it can feel stressful that reality is becoming more and more complex at an accelerating pace, but ian lungold had a very good metaphor for this acceleration up to 2012. he said that our current state of consciousness is based on power and that we are moving into a state of consciousness based on ethics. as things are speeding up, the old state based on power will find it more and more difficult to deal with it all, while the new state of ethics is like a gyro which becomes steadier and steadier the faster it spins!

[katalys]

ian lungold ... said that our current state of consciousness is based on power and that we are moving into a state of consciousness based on ethics. as things are speeding up, the old state based on power will find it more and more difficult to deal with it all, while the new state of ethics is like a gyro which becomes steadier and steadier the faster it spins!

i am a student of dr. david hawkins. he found that the time of the harmonic convergence (16./17. august 1987) coincided with the biggest leap of mankind's consciousness as a whole. it was the moment when the global energies shifted from
* a force driven paradigm to
* an integrity based paradigm.
hawkins uses the terms - force (as for ego-driven power) and integrity instead of ethics.
i found it very intriguing to see that hawkins and lungold arrived at a similar conclusion.
according to lungold the changeover into the realm of ethics was dated 5 january 1999.

http://de.spiritualwiki.org/wiki/2012#swiki.2012_3

gloria, katalys

[DFS]

anders lindman wrote:
the difficult thing for me is to grasp how all can be one. yet no doubt, everything is one reality. i found david wilcock's metaphor of a rotating prism struck by a single source of light useful. i am one of the rainbows that is being projected from the prism and i am also the one light source that makes the rainbow appear.
****

it is difficult to truly grasp the unity that binds everything. i can get an intellectual sense of the concept, but to truly know it on all levels, is another matter. the metaphor of the prism comes close, but i've yet to find a metaphor that truly captures "unity" in the sense that is intended by ra.

****
i think of the single light as the one consciousness shining the physical universe, including my body, into being moment by moment.
*****

i might identify the light source as the focused intent of the one infinite creator to know self. it is this intent to know self that drives all creation. it is what ra refers to as the spiraling energy forever seeking upward.

*****
amit goswami said an interesting thing about how consciousness is the ground of being and that the physical universe is in consciousness instead of the other way around which is often how mainstream science today describes reality.
*****

main-stream or establishment science has a lot of assumptions backasswards. <cheeky smile>
it also has its share of sacred cows or sacred myths. the attempt to separate the practice of science from consciousness and link it entirely to the material is a prime example of this reverse thinking. i can accept that goswami's concept makes more sense.

*****
it can feel stressful that reality is becoming more and more complex at an accelerating pace, but ian lungold had a very good metaphor for this acceleration up to 2012. he said that our current state of consciousness is based on power and that we are moving into a state of consciousness based on ethics. as things are speeding up, the old state based on power will find it more and more difficult to deal with it all, while the new state of ethics is like a gyro which becomes steadier and steadier the faster it spins!
*****

interesting metaphor. i hope it is accurate in forecasting a new state of social beingness based on ethics. i think that would be a marked improvement. <smile>

dfs

[Anders Lindman]

i am a student of dr. david hawkins. he found that the time of the harmonic convergence (16./17. august 1987) coincided with the biggest leap of mankind's consciousness as a whole. it was the moment when the global energies shifted from
* a force driven paradigm to
* an integrity based paradigm.
hawkins uses the terms - force (as for ego-driven power) and integrity instead of ethics.
i found it very intriguing to see that hawkins and lungold arrived at a similar conclusion.
according to lungold the changeover into the realm of ethics was dated 5 january 1999.

http://de.spiritualwiki.org/wiki/2012#swiki.2012_3

gloria, katalys

ah! you're right. i didn't think of that. i have read his book [pm for title] (and another one which i don't remember the title of right now). he presented a very interesting logarithmic scale of different states of being.

[Anders Lindman]

it is difficult to truly grasp the unity that binds everything. i can get an intellectual sense of the concept, but to truly know it on all levels, is another matter. the metaphor of the prism comes close, but i've yet to find a metaphor that truly captures "unity" in the sense that is intended by ra.


exactly. i find it fairly easy to grasp intellectually that all is one, but to really grok it is more difficult (at least it seems more difficult from my current view).

i have heard many metaphors about the one reality. the metaphor wilcock used is one of the best i have heard. it's tricky because our minds operate by thinking of separate things.

the unity aspect you mentioned is important. otherwise there is still a split between the 'me' and the 'one'. on the other hand, all written metaphors will have this split, because words are themselves separate entities.

i will try to come up with a new metaphor... i have one: imagine the one consciousness as a crystal ball. the crystal ball is all there is. the physical universe appears as a projection within the crystal ball. this means that physical matter is consciousness. and each individual soul is simply a unique point on the surface of the crystal ball from which our personal experiences are created by looking into it and we co-choose (if that's a word) and co-create our life experiences as the one consciousness experiencing itself from different points on the surface of the crystal ball.

[transiten]

hi!

i think oneess is a feeling beyond words. one can try to describe what it is not but that will also escape what it really is...no-thing-ness...

transiten

[DFS]

anders lindman wrote:
the unity aspect you mentioned is important. otherwise there is still a split between the 'me' and the 'one'. on the other hand, all written metaphors will have this split, because words are themselves separate entities.
****

yes, all attempts to categorize or label are at best only approximations or as ra notes, distortions. what we 3d humans engage in as communication is more a matter of intuition than objective knowing.

****
i will try to come up with a new metaphor... i have one: imagine the one consciousness as a crystal ball. the crystal ball is all there is. the physical universe appears as a projection within the crystal ball. this means that physical matter is consciousness. and each individual soul is simply a unique point on the surface of the crystal ball from which our personal experiences are created by looking into it and we co-choose (if that's a word) and co-create our life experiences as the one consciousness experiencing itself from different points on the surface of the crystal ball.
****

it covers the key elements and can be imaged or visualized. more complete than the rainbow metaphor, and considering the limitations already noted, probably as good as one is likely to find. <thumbs up>

the unified creator has been referred to as a consciousness field, and in considering the unity in a conceptual manner, i like the use of holarchies, which originated with arthur koestler. ken wilber has attempted to take this concept as a basis for a "theory of everything."

the ultimate holarchy, which may be designated as the one infinite creator, contains all that is. the individuated parts or holans within the creator may, themselves, be holarchies, as may the holans within those holarchies. this is like conceptualizing from the macro to the micro without the necessity of employing hierarchies. and it reflects the fractal or holographic patterning of our universe.

holarchies enable us to see the unity without resorting to the traditional arrangement into a power structure or pecking order. it emphasizes the interconnected nature of our material reality/illusion. everything is linked to everything else, sometimes in multiple ways, which is more reflective of new approaches, such as chaos theory and complexity.

thanks for the new metaphor. <smile>

dfs