The Perennial Philosophy and to walk in someone else's shoes

In a recent thread about religion, Silent Thunder bought up the concept of Perennial Philosophy.

Perennial philosophy is the notion of the universal recurrence of philosophical insight independent of epoch or culture, including universal truths on the nature of reality, humanity or consciousness (anthropological universals).souce

It seems that this "classification" is something i have been looking for, for a long time. Perennial Philosophy sums up all that could be and has been, the archetypal blueprint for human thought.

Not the surface thoughts that seem to pervade our sleeping existence in the reality we so often get caught up in, in our day to day lives. But the subterranean thoughts that arrive in the quiet, in the times of doubt, in the dreams and from the gut.

How often do we find ourselves wondering of God, Death and the Universe.

It seems we either do, or we don't. To start this wondering, puts ourselves in a precarious position in our day to day lives. It can separate us from what we believe is important and isolate us from those around us, that aren't wondering at all. It is scary. It can drive you to isolate yourself from the people that love you and if you don't find the answers you can end up severely out of sorts.

Why is it that the answer is so important? What would happen if we found the answer to the Perennial Question? Would that solve anything?

It probably wouldn't.

I remember talking to a man once who told me " anybody that tells you they are an expert are no expert at all". This resonated with me at the time, because i was in a position where i was "supposed" to be the expert and the pressure was enormous. Partly because i wasn't and also because i becoming aware of exactly what he meant.

There are no experts. And if there were, then we are in trouble. If someone claims to be an expert they are either lying, or they are self obsessed with their own importance. If they are obsessed with self importance then they are probably lacking in self worth.

If they are lying they are in denial of truth or protecting their position, whatever that may be.

But then we have a much larger group of people who proclaim they are not experts but will put their trust in the people that say they are. They will relinquish all responsibility of finding the truth to someone else and continue to not ask the questions so they can continue life, without having to confront the Perennial Philosophy.

Religion has taken advantage of this. Politics has taken advantage of this. Hollywood has taken advantage of this. The mass media takes advantage by knowing this.

Day to Day people take advantage of each other by knowing this exists but continuing to ignore it.

An easy way to start asking questions is to feel compassion. To walk in someone else's shoes.It gets ignored because having to walk in someone else's shoes, means we will not only feel compassion, but we will have to look at ourselves from another perspective. That is scary.

It is scary because when we look at ourselves, we become critical. we are supposed be the experts in our own lives and we realize pretty quickly we are not. That is confronting and leads us down a path of depression as we try and find the answers, because we think that is what we need. But when the answers aren't forthcoming or they continue to raise more questions there is a danger of falling into a cycle of lack of self worth.

I am not worthy of myself because i do not have the answers to who i am.

That why i find this Perennial Philosophy so interesting. It doesn't provide an answer but it does show that the question is always essentially the same. It brings a unity to thought. A fast track to compassion because it tells us that we all have and have had the same question. Its comforting to know that you and i and everyone before us feels the same, somewhere.

We all walk in each others shoes.

Know it and then ask, are the shoes even necessary?

Keep the question as sacred, expand on it and let it grow.

this video Just posted simultaneously gives a cosmic look at what i mean

www.abovetopsecret.com...

good timing colloredbrothers!

Then after this ramble
my next question would be-

well anyway, what would i know?



[edit on 11-4-2010 by 2theC]

Cool, thanks for noticing that post and running with the idea. You've put a lot of thought into the above and I hope it gets the attention it deserves.

The concept of the "perennial philosophy" is seen as outdated by some academic nitpickers, but that just means its ready for rebirth in new clothes...as it is every generation or so.

If you stamp a pattern on a piece of dough in permanent ink, fold it in half, and mush it down, you will get a new and less coherent pattern. Fold it again the same way, and you will get another even more messy pattern. However, mathematics says that if you keep doing the same thing over and over, at least in theory, the original patten will eventually re-emerge, after howevermany thousands of repetitions. I kind of see the perennial philosophy that way...its something that comes up again and again, in all times and places. However many books we burn, however much doctrinal encrustation overlays it, the primal awe at the root of the human experience of divinity always manages to shine through.

Originally posted by silent thunder

If you stamp a pattern on a piece of dough in permanent ink, fold it in half, and mush it down, you will get a new and less coherent pattern. Fold it again the same way, and you will get another even more messy pattern. However, mathematics says that if you keep doing the same thing over and over, at least in theory, the original patten will eventually re-emerge, after howevermany thousands of repetitions. I kind of see the perennial philosophy that way...its something that comes up again and again, in all times and places. However many books we burn, however much doctrinal encrustation overlays it, the primal awe at the root of the human experience of divinity always manages to shine through.

When you put it into that context, i think of the Mandelbrot Set...we always come back to that one image no matter how far we go, or how complex the pattern gets. Its always there, its a fundamental truth that can't be escaped.

We always know deep down there is a fundamental truth, we can choose to ignore it but its always gonna pop up. In the meantime enjoy the creations in between.

Thanks Silent Thunder, Knowing that there is a Perennial Philosophy has been one of those moments for me. I have spent a lot of time thinking about stuff, trying to grasp the answer, even when knowing the question was more important.

But the question shows up again and shows it is even more important in a grander scale without a label and yet with one, knowing at the same time, it doesn't need one!

Realization often occurs to people in a flash of brilliance.

If i understand the premise of this philosophy, it states that the realizations happen in recurring manners. Man seems to find truth. Is able to discern the pattern in the chaos. Is this correct?

If so, then what occurs to me is that there must be a common source of this logic.

I have always thought of the brain as a modem, with the mind being the uplink. This provides additional context for this daydream i have.

Originally posted by bigfatfurrytexan
Realization often occurs to people in a flash of brilliance.

If i understand the premise of this philosophy, it states that the realizations happen in recurring manners. Man seems to find truth. Is able to discern the pattern in the chaos. Is this correct?

If so, then what occurs to me is that there must be a common source of this logic.

I have always thought of the brain as a modem, with the mind being the uplink. This provides additional context for this daydream i have.

Realizations
Insights
Revelations
Inspirations
Seeing the light
Visions
Ideas
Divination's
Intuitions

these maybe the file codings that are downloaded by your modem. Maybe the Pineal Gland is the modem, the brain is the processor, the information all part of the Perennial Philosophy....

Hard to describe in words, easier in universal symbolism that seems to defy the ages and cultures.

reply to post by 2theC


"Why is it that the answer is so important? What would happen if we found the answer to the Perennial Question? Would that solve anything?"
---------------------------------------------------------------------

As a young child one of my first esoteric thoughts was "is the meaning of life, the meaning of life". Stay with me here...

You imply a "solve" or solution to the "question". This also inherently implies boundaries to the equation or in our case, a start and finish.

So if you solve it and are finished, wouldn't the the meaning of life have been the pursuit of the meaning of life?

Now if we are as the bible says "created in the image of god". Would that not mean that we have been endowed with the "creator" characteristics as well?

So could the solve be us realizing the meaning of life, and through reaching the end we now know the beginning and we can create ourselves again.?

Snake eating his own tail and all that jazz.

ps - i like ur style 2theC


[edit on 12-4-2010 by UnfoldingRoom]

[edit on 12-4-2010 by UnfoldingRoom]

reply to post by 2theC


"Maybe the Pineal Gland is the modem, the brain is the processor, the information all part of the Perennial Philosophy...."
--------------------------------------------------------

This is a crazy co-incidence but my friend and I had a discussion on this very topic last night..

I am trying to figure out a mechanism for imprinting changes in our environment and the adaptations we developed into our genetic code (DNA).

I agree with you 100% about the pineal gland being the modem or interface to the DNA.

We all sleep at night, and when we sleep we release '___' via our pineal gland and experience dreams. Dreaming is the time of the night when we take the notes (events) of our day and weave them into the song (story) of our life.

Now we all have very similar DNA although I am more closely related with my family members than ATS members. I feel that the family unit (DNA match) jack into to eachothers stories while sleeping and not only add to the song of there individual life but also to the song of the family DNA. This I feel trickles down with each closer and closer DNA match so in essence all living things (plant and animal) are relating there environment and how they dealt with it that day into a global family song.

The kicker with this is what people say when they have a NDE (near death experience). We hear things like "my life flashed before my eyes", "I saw a bright tunnel" and "I saw my dead relatives".

The body releases a flood of '___' upon your death and I feel this is the ultimate injection of physical (your life on earth and how you adapted to your environment) uploaded into the spiritual (DNA).

If this mechanism is true then your relatives would be contained within your DNA (which would explain why we look like our parents and they looked like there parents and so on and so on) which helps explain people seeing dead relatives. It also explains the "life flashed before my eyes" due to the complete uploading of ones life or the finished song.

The terrible thing about all this is due to our modern world and the various toxins, chemicals and fear based lifestyles we have increasingly calcified pineal glands. Combine that with SSRI's preventing a natural release of '___', we could soon be entering HELL..

If you cant release your '___' when you die then you dont get to see your family and share you song with them (HEAVEN). Generation Paxil is soon to start having some users dieing of old age and natural causes soon. Will this lead to a stagnation in our song as less and less songs are woven into the DNA??

Does this mean we will stop evolving through the natural means that we developed over the billions of years on earth... ie naturally occuring '___' uploading generational environmental data..
????????

reply to post by UnfoldingRoom

Snake eating his own tail and all that jazz.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/f8ceeba211c5.jpg[/atsimg]

The Ouroboros often represents self-reflexivity or cyclicality, especially in the sense of something constantly re-creating itself, the eternal return, and other things perceived as cycles that begin anew as soon as they end (compare Phoenix). It can also represent the idea of primordial unity related to something existing in or persisting from the beginning with such force or qualities it cannot be extinguished. The ouroboros has been important in religious and mythological symbolism, but has also been frequently used in alchemical illustrations, where it symbolizes the circular nature of the alchemist's opus. It is also often associated with Gnosticism, and Hermeticism. Carl Jung interpreted the Ouroboros as having an archetypal significance to the human psyche.[citation needed] The Jungian psychologist Erich Neumann writes of it as a representation of the pre-ego "dawn state", depicting the undifferentiated infancy experience of both mankind and the individual child

en.wikipedia.org...

Is it the visual representation of Perennial Philosophy?

Food for thought? The chasing of the end, is food for thought?

I will chew on it for a while...

[edit on 12-4-2010 by 2theC]

This video was just sent to me today,
Scared Relationships - The foundation of wholeness
kind of sums up the OP...
enjoy the words and music

reply to post by 2theC


I think i understand your viewpoint. I have heard it expressed thusly:

A universal consciousness that is like the most brilliant of diamonds. Multifaceted and sparkling in bold and luxurious splendor. Each facet being both an individual and a part of the whole.

We are like the facets, whereas universal consciousness is the diamond.

reply to post by bigfatfurrytexan


Your post in turn reminds me of the concept of Indra's net:

"Far away in the heavenly abode of the great god Indra, there is a wonderful net which has been hung by some cunning artificer in such a manner that it stretches out infinitely in all directions. In accordance with the extravagant tastes of deities, the artificer has hung a single glittering jewel in each "eye" of the net, and since the net itself is infinite in dimension, the jewels are infinite in number. There hang the jewels, glittering like stars in the first magnitude, a wonderful sight to behold. If we now arbitrarily select one of these jewels for inspection and look closely at it, we will discover that in its polished surface there are reflected all the other jewels in the net, infinite in number. Not only that, but each of the jewels reflected in this one jewel is also reflecting all the other jewels, so that there is an infinite reflecting process occurring.[7]"

reply to post by bigfatfurrytexan


The Diamond as a Symbol of the Self:
"...The Self is symbolized with special frequency in the form of a stone.... The nuclear center, the Self, also appears as a crystal.... The crystal often symbolically stands for the union of extreme opposites - of matter and spirit."
- M.-L. von Franz, "The Process of Individuation," in Man and his Symbols, ed. C. G. Jung

and so would that mean this diamond of which we are a facet that makes up the whole, is in fact our goal, to be the diamond, to be within ourselves and and without.

we strive for realisation, but once we reach the diamond state we then realise we maybe just a facet in the larger diamond that is indeed connected to other diamonds in a whole net of diamonds which maybe a part of larger one...

Nobody knows where you are
How near or how far
Shine on you crazy diamond
Pile on many more years
And I'll be joining you there
Shine on you crazy diamond
And we'll bask in the shadow
Of yesterday's triumph
Sail on the steel breeze
Come on you boy child
You winner and loser
Come on you miner for truth and delusion
And shine

Pinkfloyd

reply to post by silent thunder


Yes

That is so apt.

You see it everywhere, even if you just look up at night ( i am lucky being in the bush with plenty of stars).

I heard that "pressure makes diamonds"

without pressure, no diamonds.

so with out confronting Perennial Philosophy, and in turn confronting yourself, you escape the pressure. You may feel "comfortable" but you wont sparkle !

If you sparkle, in turn each jewel in the net reflects your sparkle and so the net becomes even more brilliant.

and the more brilliant it gets the more we shine as a whole and as individuals within.

thanks guys!

Originally posted by 2theC
reply to post by bigfatfurrytexan

 

Nobody knows where you are
How near or how far
Shine on you crazy diamond
Pile on many more years
And I'll be joining you there
Shine on you crazy diamond
And we'll bask in the shadow
Of yesterday's triumph
Sail on the steel breeze
Come on you boy child
You winner and loser
Come on you miner for truth and delusion
And shine

Pinkfloyd

here the first part of the lyrics...
sometimes these guys scare me!!

Pink Floyd
Shine on you crazy diamond

Remember when you were young, you shone like the sun.
Shine on you crazy diamond.
Now there's a look in your eyes, like black holes in the sky.
Shine on you crazy diamond.
You were caught on the crossfire of childhood and stardom,
blown on the steel breeze.
Come on you target for faraway laughter,
come on you stranger, you legend, you martyr, and shine!
You reached for the secret too soon, you cried for the moon.
Shine on you crazy diamond.
Threatened by shadows at night, and exposed in the light.
Shine on you crazy diamond.
Well you wore out your welcome with random precision,
rode on the steel breeze.
Come on you raver, you seer of visions,
come on you painter, you piper, you prisoner, and shine!


i think i better go and do some work...