TL;DR ⧝ Eight pillars I aspire to live by. This is an original framing in a long lineage of seeing clearly.
I. Stay On Path
There are no shortcuts. The path presents itself in earnest but we immediately look for a detour. Why do we resist the rhythm of one foot in front of the other, guided by a fixed northern star? Where does this compulsion for alternatives come from? Sirens will call, and nothing good ever comes of it.
II. Disidentify the I/Eye
'I' is a paradoxical multiplicity. We tether our identity to polarizing adjectives of every menial affect. This is cognitive dissonance at its best. Language, though, is not the battleground; it is a tool we must use without becoming slave to it. I choose to see personality, mindset, and body as conditions, not as whole truths. I choose to sit with the question, “Who am I?” as it leads me out of opinion, and towards being.
III. The Law of Three
Everything that is in movement, that is alive, seems to circulate in forces of three—positive, negative, neutral. It is the most stable of sums. Nature lives this principle; historical religions just picked up on it. Nothing can happen or change without an interaction of all three forces. I apply this to achieve real results, and observe it in all real transformations.
IV. Prepare for Spontaneity
There is no such thing as productive—let alone creative—work without respecting and complementing natural law. Knowingness is also not just a mental thing; our bodies have an inherent intelligence that orders us toward life, despite all the ways in which we compromise it. Unfortunately, our “reasoning” minds are young and egoic, and highly susceptible to the delusion of narrow and manipulative framing, i.e. calling acts of remixing or blatant extraction as creative and valuable. Most everything that’s called “creative” today is, in fact, displacement and destruction. “Preparation” here implies that our life’s work is to prepare fertile ground, and tend to any seeds that land. We can be stewards of this higher-order Creativity, but we are not its progenitors.
V. Know Your Patterns
If we looked through the eyes of a recommendation engine, we would see ourselves clumped by compulsions. All it takes is a swivel from mirror to looking glass, which we can only do on an individual level (there are too many disintentives for others to do it for you). Open up YouTube and note all the videos that compel you to click; do the same with IG, TikTok, Facebook. This trigger mesh is a treasure map of all the distortions that hide your true purpose. Hint: no one can tell you what it is, and you can’t build it on false pretense. Purpose is revealed. To know it, know yourself beyond your complexes.
VI. Love Restores Integrity
True love defies any impulse to control or manipulate. Unlike indifference, which separates, Love is the act of making whole again, by holding that all is whole already. It is an accessible-right-now expression of fundamental reality. This grace of freedom unravels all tangles, no matter how long it takes.
VII. Law of Seven
Seven finds expression in the diatonic scale, which—with its unevenly spaced intervals—parallels life's uneven steps. Some lead straight to the next, while others are cleaved by chasms. The strange magnetism of consonant intervals, which is a universal phenomenon (not only cultural and conditioned), also underwrites this Law, signifying that harmony lends a helping hand to “pull” us across the steepest of these chasms. There is help out there, a benevolent life-affirming force, as long as we meet it with our own honest efforts.
VIII. Time for Rest
This may be the most important of all, because it is the most likely to be ignored or forgotten. Rest is essential. Everything in nature rises and falls, and we, spanning various planes—physical, mental, emotional—are no different. While we might be tempted to ride the momentum downward, there's wisdom in choosing when to rest. This pause allows us to catch the next upward wave, propelling us even higher. Life has multiple layers, and it's crucial to explore beyond our current scope.
Notes
This is an original framing of universal insights. I am greatly indebted to the lifelong work of Gurdjieff and Rudolf Steiner for shaping my perception. It all comes down to results, and in my own life the seeds of peace have taken root and sprouted their first leaves. It remains to be seen what else will come of this, which is why I give the disclaimer in What Are We Logging? to always evalute the context of the person espousing a system completely—their background and their results—before adapting it to one’s own practice. Intellectual resonance can very often be misleading! spanning lineages and individual teachings. May this help give context for the transformation I am undergoing, and that my life is committed to. I have learned that constantly refining and renewing my commitments, in the open, is what builds bridges across my own chasms, as well as those between me, you, and others.
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