When you follow your calling, when you listen to what your soul is telling you you are here for, when you follow that “Theseus” thin thread out of the Labyrinth to the T, then the whole universe opens up and comes to your aide, and a magical track opens up that automatically takes you where you need to be, and the things you need to fulfill your destiny come to you automatically. Life becomes effortless simply by making a decision to say ‘yes’ to your calling which is more often than not, not respected by the outside world, and that’s one of the first hurdles.
Tag: mythos
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The Symbolic Meaning of a Water Fountain
One can obviously see the phallic symbology of the water penetrating a yoni from beneath, but in a deeper sense, ironically a higher chakra sense, the form of a fountain represents each person and living being itself manifesting from a world of transcendence. And since each particle is of divine nature, so it your whole being. The water represents the energy, the ambrosia of eternity pouring into the field of time. The endless flowing, the continuous flowing, represents the eternal nature of this mystical dimension and also the infinite nature of its source. Since you can’t see the water’s source, that represents that it’s coming from the ground of being and also that it’s coming from another dimension which is invisible to our senses. On a deeper level there’s the paradox and the archetypal sense of the infinite coming from nothingness, which ironically enough is being postulated as the literal truth in the latest scientific origin stories such as the Big Bang theory.
Most fountains that you see spring from a round bowl-shaped container or vase. The inside of the bowl or pool is sacred space, a “Holy Grail” you might say, which represents the transcendence of duality or on a psychological level, the gap between our thoughts.
Water has long been seen as symbolic of the ambrosia of eternity—and in mythology and psychology as symbolic of the subconscious. A fountain represents a sacred opening, gap or tunnel which is a connection to eternity itself—as well as to the depths of our own being, which for all we know, (and “knowingness” or “chit” in Sanskrit is the metaphysical key to ‘riding this wave’ so to speak), is infinite, equal in its adventure and richness of experience to the “outer” world as is the Ying is to the Yang and gravity is to matter.
In a way, a kind of mini temple, yet completely natural: a religious, mystical experience paradoxically combining both the mystical and the physical, representing a connection created by nature herself.
This is why it evokes an archetypal response of beauty in most people: The aesthetic being, at least on the symbolic level, the manifestation of a mystery.
02/09/16 Update: One element that struck me recently, especially looking at the still photograph, is the Lingam/Yoni symbolism. And there is a strong dichotomy of the Lingam, representing Shiva, coming out of the bowl/vase shaped Yoni, which is representative of the feminine aspect. But if you think about it from a Hindu perspective this makes total sense: The “Void” out of which everything comes and back into which everything goes is the Mother Goddess of the Universe. She is it. Symbolically speaking, the divine feminine represents life itself, and the Lingam, the male divine, represents the snake, who by piercing life, right through the middle, throws off death, just a snake throws off its skin.
The fact that the Lingam and Yoni are seen as together, like the Ying and Yang of Asia, as well as the water and bowl of a fountain, represents that the two are one, that the feminine and masculine are merely two different aspects of the same thing, just like the eternal and the imminent, the mysterious and the manifest, and indeed, life and death: this represents to the soul the transcendent nature of its own being.
Read this quote by Joseph Campbell
“Nevertheless-and here is a great key to the understanding of myth and symbol-the two kingdoms are actually one. The realm of the gods is a forgotten dimension of the world we know. And the exploration of that dimension, either willingly or unwillingly, is the whole sense of the deed of the hero.” – The Hero with a Thousand Faces, page 217, The Crossing of the Return Threshold
Here, the “realm of the gods” is symbolized by the Yoni, the void, the bowl, the feminine. And the “world we know” is represented by the Lingam/Masculine aspect. The masculine is representative of manifestation, but that manifestation has the potentiality to come in contact with the divine, indeed become divine, if it has the energy, drive, and intent to summon itself into one direction, namely that of the spontaneity residing inside the bowl of its own heart.
Another dichotomy: Notice in the fountain and in Hindu temples, the Lingam aspect is coming out of the Yoni, not going in: That’s symbolic of a resurrection. New life (Nova Vita) in this case not coming from sexual intercourse, but from a birth of the heart.
Update 9/12/21 — These graduates seem to be popping out of the water just like the fountainhead itself—as if the fountainhead were a person too, or as if the two guys were, and their being and consciousness, types of fountainheads. The fountainhead represents a being, a connection between the two worlds, not as refinedly formed as his two ‘brothers’ are in this photo, but more in touch with the primitive, indigenous, fundamental energy and ground of being which is it source. Even beyond that a water fountain is a symbol, like a church, of a connection to the eternal world (which paradoxically is both natural and metaphysical) you’ve got a symbol of the two ‘more evolved’ creatures re-communing with the more primitive yet ultimate source of their life. It’s thus symbolic that education in this sense is as much as an inward exploration and pulling out your innate wisdom as it is absorbing, learning from, and incorporating outward stimuli (the fountain of life is in you as much as it is outside you). The ultimate symbol is that the lines of communication between the two worlds must not only remain open but continue to get richer (‘the falcon cannot hear the falconer’) in order for experience and ultimate fulfillment to keep expanding.
What is it in us that responds spontaneously to the elemental forces? Especially in the younger folk who have a much more alive connection? Fire is the “water” of the underworld, the “water” of night, the “water” of the depths of our subconscious that illuminates revelations that come from within. Most things you divide them, they become smaller. Just like the Gods, the more you divide fire, the bigger it becomes, the more it becomes…
“If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.”
The Gospel of Thomas #70 -
If Everything is Made of Atoms Who or What is Doing the Seeing?
If everything is made of atoms, who is it that is doing the seeing, the feeling. Atoms don’t have eyes, so who or what is it that is doing the seeing? It’s striking how much that galaxy looks like an atom. Infinite Worlds above, Infinite Worlds below, and your wave function exists in all of them simultaneously, forever.
Richard Feynman said that the greatest discovery in history is that everything is made of atoms. That made me think of this. My entire body and everything around me is made of atoms, or more precisely three primary constituents, protons, neutrons, and electrons. So that’s what drives me to ask the question “Who or what in me is doing the seeing?” If you say the neurons, which is a collection of atoms arranged in a specific way, it makes me think of an instrument like a camera. But does the camera have consciousness? It collects photons through a lens and arranges them in a pattern. But until we look at the photo, does anything happen? And even when we do, again who is doing the seeing? Because we are made up of exactly the same three ingredients as the camera, only arranged in a different way.
Update: 10/13/12: As I was stirring my coffee today, the white powdered sugar at the top, as it was swirling around looked just like a galaxy. As I stirred harder the middle of the white froth started to sink in the middle reminding me how space curves inward from gravity. It reminded me that gravity is simply energy. In this case my “Mini” galaxy was spinning from the energy of my hand being transferred to the coffee. So the coffee was like the fabric of space itself. But what I was curious about was although I knew the energy was there and causing the sugar to swirl, I still wondered why the swirling energy made the coffee suck downward in the middle. The coffee wasn’t being sucked downward due to gravity. It was being sucked downward by the swirling energy. Was it only being sucked down because the energy of my straw was pushing the coffee outward towards the sides of the cup? So is gravity not really a force in and of itself but merely the after effect of energy pushing space outward? In that case then somehow this energy pushing space outward must cause a vacuum within Hyperspace (some Physicists refer to this as “The Bulk”) that sucks the the fabric of space inward towards the bulk itself. Interesting. So Hyperspace itself must be causing the attractive force of gravity. Really, when you think about it the “sucking” of gravity is caused by energy moving a portion of space towards the “wall” of Hyperspace (aka the wall of the cup) and so the middle of that portion of space loses its volume and moves away from Hyperspace (In this case the Hyperspace is like the surface of the cup of coffee.)
Related Posts:
Qualia Principles: The Foundation For A Science Of Consciousness – DeepakChopra.comAnd if you have a Facebook, it was this photo/post from Deepak that sparked this thought of mine.
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Deepak Chopra Quotes
“…the Scientific discoveries show that the laws of physics themselves preclude us from intellectually getting in touch with the source.”
“The more we understand the nature of the Universe, through ‘Science,’ the more we understand there is the ‘Unknown’ and there’s the “Unknowable.’ The ‘Unknowable’ because the Scientific discoveries show that the laws of physics themselves preclude us from intellectually getting in touch with the source. You have to go beyond the intellect. You have to listen to the heart. The heart has reasons, that reason doesn’t know. The great prophets, Jesus, etc., they transcended to a level where they were in touch with the mystery.” – Deepak Chopra on “The O’Reilly Factor” Nov. 2, 2011. – Youtube Video Link
“When we transcend our own thoughts, we get in touch with the womb of the Universe.”
