Introduction.  (3.1)

What we come into is a world of energy, presumably in not all its possible forms, but certainly enough for us. This energy is our ‘ground’; we are made of it; it is all around us, and never-ending. If we are the fish, then this is the ‘water’, as in, “the fish doesn’t know the water”. This ‘world’ of Energy presents great contrasts from the tiniest parts of an atom to the hugeness of the Universe ‘out there’. These contrasts help us compare, and as we do that become more aware of who we are.

This energy has a structure and laws, so the more we understand them, the easier it is to navigate life in a manner that satisfies us.

Our body is as a kind of radio, receiving energy (or ‘vibes’) from out there and transmitting our own energy (or ‘vibes’) from in here. Our individuality is expressed by what it is that we choose to tune to receive, as well as what we transmit, with large differences between individuals in range, frequency and sensitivity.

We are here to learn about …

• our own energy,
• Life energy, and
• the intersection between these through our interactions with them.

So, we absolutely need to learn to describe/name/label it properly, to ourselves and to others. Otherwise we cannot use what energy has to tell us, much less work with it. The ‘fish’ is here to learn about the ‘water’.

The Absolute Opposites of Part, Apart, and Partner, introduced in chapter 1 are a very interesting and intriguing property of Energy that I have already described, but there are others…

God and Energy.  (3A)

The horse and the rider.  (3.2)

I have said before that I suspect that God is Mind exploring Energy which has the implication that they are two different things. We kind of assume they are the same thing, but they are not. A useful metaphor here is that of the Horse and its Rider.

As we know, a horse can run with the wind, but humans can’t, but humans can ride horses and then they can ride with the wind. The horse is the energy; it just goes where it pleases in its horsey mind; it can run free anywhere a horse can go. But the human can provide the direction ie, goals or destinations.

The ride is exhilarating; and both seem to enjoy it.

Successful riding involves some things …

• The human serves the horse by looking after it, addressing its needs, and getting to know it. This is a subservience to the horse’s needs for the human’s sake. Hopefully, we don’t expect to treat the horse like a car, because the horse won’t like it.
• The horse serves the human by providing a very large source of energy in one live package.
• The human rider merges with the horse through feel/senses; here both work together ‘as one’; and both need each other for their separate functions as well. Humans do other things, and so do horses.

There is an essence of being-ness in this ride including a love of life; the mastering of the skills required, the physicality of it, and the stimulation of the senses; desire and delight together, and self-esteem in the skills that have been learned.

The human finds out more about himself through his skills/abilities in riding and in using the horse, and directing it. The horse isn’t actually telling us what it thinks about it, but many horses appear to enjoy it too.

Success in riding the horse includes being able to stay on it and direct it. If we are riding the horse incorrectly or don’t know why we’re on it, or where we want to go, (viz, our internal motives are poor), or we lose concentration, we will eventually fall off, which can be a bit disastrous, not to mention painful.

When we watch a skilled horseman, horse and rider look like a single being, and we can ‘see’ where the myths of the centaurs came from. They look like a single entity and we have tales about them, but in the case of God and Energy, they are not a single entity.

This metaphor has its limits, because energy is all pervasive, not just a single entity, but it can be a useful concept.

God uses Energy to explore Herself.  (3.3)

God is the ‘rider’, not the ‘horse’ of Energy. We can use this metaphor to understand that God is using energy to explore Her Self; to find out Her own ‘who is here?’ She has learned how to ride the horse and is thus using Energy correctly, as in, with the correct motives. Notice that since every one of us is part of Her Self, we are helping Her to ‘know Herself’.

In the same manner humans are here to learn to ride the ‘horse of energy’. But it is also easy to become rather frightened of the horse; after all, it is somewhat larger than we are. But our motives for what we want to do, ie, why we want to do whatever, are crucial and I deal with them more specifically in the Goal-Setting chapter (16). On the other hand, the whole of this book is ultimately about our motives.

It is important to understand that the horse and the rider are two separate things, because much of what God is trying to tell us (all those injunctions in the Bible) is about what happens when we use Energy incorrectly. Almost all of these are when God is trying to tell us that something ‘bad’ will happen if we do such-and-such. We insist on thinking that ‘God will punish us’ and this seems a complete anomaly when we want to think of a ‘loving’ God. But God is not Energy; She has worked out how it works and uses it all the time, but every time She tries to warn us humans on earth about what it does, we think it’s God Herself doing the punishing, because we think they are the same thing, and they are not.

In fact, Energy is energy, and is not actually concerned about us at all; it’s just ‘there’ and it does its own thing according to itself; just like a horse in the wild. So, notice that God gets to ‘fit in’ with Energy; it is not the other way around. And so do we get to ‘fit in’. What God is trying to tell us is that when we work out how to ‘fit in’ with Energy, we can use it and have a wonderful time. But it can certainly hurt when we fall off, and it can potentially kill us. And we could also notice here, how much we think that Energy should ‘fit in’ with us! And how much we complain about it when it doesn’t!

Everything on Earth is made of Energy, hence everything on Earth is telling you something about this energy. Whether that thing involves one or a few, or lots of facets, it is still telling you. An example here can be the ‘energy’ or qualities of a dog or a cat or a tree, plant, bird and so on. We would naturally describe them all in different terms. But the terms we use to describe this energy also tell us about who we are. This turns up in lots of ‘pop’ psychology quizzes, eg. ‘Choose what you like best out of dog, pig, cow, sheep and so on’. So, energy does ‘odd’ things.

Also, many of the Nature-based religions (generally regarded as pagan) use these natural energies of whatever is out there in their environment, as indicators for giving direction and feedback which is in fact extremely useful, and a skill that our marvelous technological society simply cannot comprehend at all. This was something that was far more natural in societies not so long ago.

Well, then, how do we learn to ‘fit in’ with Energy? It’s very strange stuff, but we can get a handle on its structure. It has rules and it provides us with tools which we can learn to use, eg, the Absolute Opposites are one of them. But, really, a lot of this is about our own attitude to Life. If we can allow life to tell us about Energy, and stop expecting it to fit in with our wonderful selves, that’s a good start.

Something to remember is that how we use energy always has consequences. If we do ‘a’ we’ll get ‘b’. What we don’t know is, when. We like to think that this does not happen, or it goes the way we want it to. Older people have a lot more experience with that one.

First, we will consider some properties of Energy.

The 4 departments, domains or realms of Energy; Physical, Emotional, Mental and Spiritual (PEMS).  (3B)

Introduction.  (3.4)

Energy has properties and it is useful to have some sort of handle on them, said ‘handle’ being how we observe and name things. The most easily accessible is that Energy seems to have 4 directions or departments.

In the Western world we consider energy as having 4 directions, departments, domains, compartments, realms, facets or quadrants, which we label, Physical, Emotional, Mental and Spiritual (PEMS). (Although these are also sometimes listed as PMES.)

In this discussion I will be using the term ‘department’ most of the time, because ‘directions’ gets confusing.

Notice that the way in which our Psyche/Mind is built has a direct correlation with these 4 departments of Energy. This makes sense to me. The western world has a long history of correlating the 4 departments with the 4 ‘Humours’ of personality, and the 4 elements of earth, water, air and fire.

(Someone else can correlate the Eastern world’s 5 elements system, which works very well in its own right. Thus, using the 4 elements system is really just a particular way to cope with energy, but said ‘coping’ can still be very useful.)

Defining the 4 departments.  (3.5)

The 4 departments of Energy are the….

Physical – this is the sensate, or the specific, what we can sense as we see, touch/feel, taste and hear part of the world, for your own body and for the external world. This is symbolized by Earth. (It corresponds with Jung’s Sensate function.)

Emotional – this is the emotional, for within our own self and externally ie, others’. (The word ’Feelings’ includes both sensate and emotional, so that is why it is not used.) We use Water as the symbol for this department. (This corresponds with Jung’s Emotional function.)

Mental – the department of reason, logic and data; your own and others’. Air is the symbol. (It corresponds with Jung’s Thinking function.) and

Spiritual – the department of meaning and values; beliefs, intuitions (as in, ‘answers’ or ‘logical leaps’) and motives; your own and others’. It’s the ‘why’ or the ‘about’; the ‘meta’ bit; its concepts are usually abstract. Fire is the symbol for this part of energy. Fire is about inspiration; what ‘fires’ us up. This is the part where we can ‘jump’ to ‘conclusions’, and I suspect that the spirit part of us can ‘jump up’ for these ‘answers’ that seem to be spread about in space.

‘Spiritual’ is a difficult word to define, and generally unsatisfactorily for most people, but it is usually used to refer to what we believe. The word now tends to be used for someone’s personal belief system (internal ‘Spiritual’), while ‘religion’ is used as the word for the external, social department. Religion is about the biggest ‘why’.

Restricting the ‘spiritual’ department to only ‘religion’ narrows it right down, whereas it is actually much larger because it includes the abstract, theoretical, generalizations, intuitions (logical leaps not based on reason), the principles of things, their patterns and connections, as well as metaphor and symbols. If we consider that this department is generally about the ‘why’ of things, or ‘the bigger picture’, then we could consider this department to be ‘Inspiritive’ or inspirational because the ‘why’ inspires us.

I suspect that the ‘Spiritual’ department corresponds with Jung’s ‘Intuitive’ category of personality type. Although ‘Intuitive’ could be a better word for this department in terms of what it actually encompasses, many people are not clear about what Intuitive actually means. See also MBTI chapter 15.

Hence, we still need to use the letter ‘S’ here because PEMS is so universally used to denote all four energy departments.

Internal plus external.  (3.6)

But we have these departments internally as well as externally; we are energy too.

So, with 4 departments each from ‘in here’, internally, plus ‘out there’, externally, we have a total of 8 departments to consider, and society regards and thus treats them in very different ways.

How society treats these departments.

The external departments.  (3.7)

Our Western society can generally understand and measure the physical (P) and mental (M) departments, but has such a hard time measuring the other two (Emotional and Spiritual) that it regards them as ‘weak’, unscientific, and basically best left ignored or repressed, especially if negative. They both also take far too much time to deal with, so they are generally regarded as detrimental; people should just be happy, and that’s that.

We have very strange attitudes to what we measure and how we measure it, and generally insist that it be in the physical with a few exceptions including theoretical physics, although there is still a great deal of mathematical logic applicable here.

But, in general, if we can’t measure it, we simply say it is not there, which is strange. We don’t say to ourselves, well, how could we measure this, or what sort of instrument(s) would be required? We simply ditch the whole thing and it just gets sent to the ‘It’s not there’ basket, hence the conclusion that it’s not ‘scientific’ ie, it’s not ‘real’ and only the deluded would think so. (Just exactly what is it that ostriches are supposed to do?) An obvious and common example here is that if something is in-valuable (so much value), we give it a 0 (nought, zero) value; we’re good with quantity but not that hot with quality.

External Emotions (ExtE) belong to others; we ‘control’ ours, especially we should be able to control our emotions with our minds, or if this fails use these pharmaceuticals, (a physical remedy).

The Inspiritive/Spiritual (S) department is also generally ignored as irrelevant to most; religions teach what they believe, and many do not agree, but offer no alternative, or are not interested in the ‘why?’ in the first place. Most people consider that our religions do not affect us; you might have noticed by now that I do not agree.

The internal departments.  (3.8)

These are different according to the socialization of men and women.

We have the same set of departments available to us internally but, men (and some women) are taught to turn their ‘radio receivers’ off (=no information from the body). We forget we’ve done this because we are still transmitting, and so is everyone else, and we are still actually receiving. We have simply turned off the internal connection between the reception and registering it.

We are taught to ignore our receiver, ie, the vibes we receive through the body; men especially; a major disconnect from Life. This is very much a ‘shooting of the messenger’. We don’t like the bad news, so we stop our ability to receive any news at all! Very useful.

This ‘turning off’ then leaves us without the information from the body which is the feeling part, ie, both the sensing (the ‘gut feelings’ which are the Internal Physical) and the emotional departments, as in, no Internal Physical and no Internal Emotional. Hence the mind ends up with ‘no body’, and nothing will affect us (we think), and nothing will matter to us. This means nothing in life matters to us, and this is a very ‘spirit’ attitude, because for spirit, it doesn’t, and it’s busy teaching ‘detachment’.

As these feelings are cut off, the body becomes treated in a manner similar to a car, ie, as a mechanical device. If anything goes wrong with it, we think we can repress/ignore symptoms, cut or mend or get rid of the offending part if it gets worse, or find a replacement if needed.

This means that the emphasis now falls onto the internal Mental (IntM) only, which is supposed to control everything (mind over matter, etc.) and any failures here leave you very much on your own. (Within ‘normal’ society, the ‘Spiritual’/Inspiritive department does not ‘count’ either internally or externally.) The problem here is that it isn’t ‘all in the mind’, but this strong social ‘truism’ leaves you labeled as ‘out of control’ and ‘weak’ in others’ estimation. It is very difficult not to feel sorry for one’s self if you are unable to ‘control’ your body, but self-pity or even sympathy from others don’t seem to ‘fix’ very much, as far as I can find. Our general psychotherapy (which is the tool we use to ‘help’ those with mental problems) has a large emphasis on re-establishing any sufferer back into ‘the social norm’, so it’s going to be a pity if it’s the ‘norm’ that’s causing the problems in the first place.

The problem with ‘all in the mind’ is a semantic one. Our psyche/mind is receiving data/vibes from inside and outside the body and we use it to think, so there’s a lot in our heads. Thinking is a mental exercise and comparing and contrasting data using logic is regarded as being in the Mental department. But the Spiritual department is also received through our mind; it’s a mental process as well, while the feeling processes of sensations and emotions come through the body, but is ‘registered’ mentally. Society gives great precedence to the Mental department, but there’s an awful lot more than that in our heads. When we tell someone that it’s ‘all in the mind’, it’s generally translated as, all you need to do is be logical about this, and think about it properly and you can sort it. But the answer to this is yes, it is all in the mind, but a) you’re not conscious of much of it, and b) It is not simply some mental exercise to ‘see reason’ or be logical and you’re stupid if you can’t work it out, and c) what is there will also be from the other departments as well, which we think don’t count. Thus, it is not just a mental or even conscious exercise. The mind is a lot more than simply the Mental department.

Women are not quite so pressured to disconnect from their bodies and it’s actually more difficult for them to do so, especially if they wish to relate to others. The hormonal cycles and changes during their life force more focus/attention on the body in the attempt to handle them. The emotional department is also considered to belong to women only, and naturally it makes them weak, crazy, and stupid. Yes, well, you know what I think. Both sexes are ‘allowed’ to have the internal Mental.

The interesting thing is that women can have access to all the internal departments if they are able to name and validate their internal physical and emotional feelings, by finding a useful labelling/naming system (internal Spiritual/Inspiritive). This can happen as they take to the world of the esoteric. Most of the systems available in the esoteric are methods of describing the internal vibes/feelings using names/labels that have been developed over a great many years.

Access to all four departments internally gives great potential for stability.

The social consequences.  (3.9)

Thus, internally and externally we lack many of the energy departments as we try to understand Life. We are restricted in our ability to use all the departments of energy, and therefore we have very few to poor skills at this. Essentially, we are judging some departments as ‘bad’ and others as ‘good’, but this is Energy we are talking about; it’s our ‘ground’ – it’s everything; even God gets to ‘fit in’ with it, so, who do we think we are?

Externally, we exist in the world of the measurable only, which is the Physical sensate (things) and the Mental (logic and data) so that leaves out any inSpiritive (the why) or any Emotional (weak, crazy, stupid, etc.)

Internally, we are left with the world of the mind only which might include the InSpiritive ’intuition’ which belongs to Spirit, and the mental dimension of information, and logic etc. Your mind should be able to control everything about it, and you’re a failure if/when you can’t do that. Thus, internally, we have no body, as in, no sensing or emotions, which leaves us feeling like no-body.

This leaves us about as secure in Life as trying to stand on a table with only two legs, or a plant that puts all its growth into one direction because of lack of light from other directions, and is vulnerable to falling over.

Externally there is no height, and internally there is no body = nobody = ghost.

This ‘world view’ of ours leads to a very flat earth indeed, and very ‘cardboard’ people; we have neither depth nor height in most of the departments and it absolutely hamstrings us in terms of sorting out our problems or much less, trying to grow to become a whole person.

Wholeness in energy terms requires using all the departments.

Our assumption here is that if we don’t count it, as in, ignore it, it won’t and doesn’t affect us!! (Once again, can ostriches teach us anything?) How much can we ignore and for how long? And how limited and daft can we get?

When we ignore some of the energy departments, they don’t go away – they’re still there. We simply remain ‘immature’ and cannot grow or develop, and cannot work out how to do so. We cannot ask the right questions to get us out of this mess. If the questions are incorrect, the answers cannot be correct. This leaves us very insecure in our world and dependent upon appearing to ‘succeed’, which is often only in the short-term.

We need to use all the energy departments to give us information about ourselves within our own ‘energy ground’. This is the only way we can grow properly.

Our failure to understand the Energy departments leaves us with the consequences of….

• Unable to consider that a problem presenting in the physical may be originating from one or more other department(s).
• When we don’t know how to solve our own problems, we remain dependent on others’ answers, ie, society’s ideas about what we should be wanting rather than giving people tools and validation for looking for themself. These social ideas tend to be focused on what we worship in life as desirable, and these are actually pretty limited.
• We have no rudders to help us look for what we really want, because we don’t/won’t let ourselves experience disappointment. We’re ‘controlling’ our emotions. Firstly, we’ve ‘shot the messenger’ because we are afraid of Life, and Secondly, we won’t look at and can’t use the information in ‘disappointment’ to tell us what we might have been wanting. (It’s just ‘put it behind you’.)
• Increasing boredom and dissatisfaction as we stymy or stunt ourselves, and cannot grow.

Notice also that to say ‘I think, therefore I am’, (Descartes) is actually the cry of the someone who does not know if they exist. It could just as easily be, ‘I feel, therefore I am’, or ‘sense’ or ‘intuit’. But all scientists who pride themselves on being ‘scientific’ use this maxim as the be-all and end-all of any life enquiry; just about to everybody’s detriment by giving such precedence to the mental department only. Remember, the crux here is that we are aware of our thinking or sensing or intuiting, as in, there is something in us which is doing this ‘awareness’ that is ‘above’ these things.

The body does not really differentiate between the Energy departments, in that physical, mental or emotional abuse are all equally painful for the receiver, with the mental or emotional aspects more difficult to spot, and much harder to measure or calibrate. (This also begs the question of why do we think we need to calibrate these things in an ‘objective’ manner?)

This is also a warning not to take any department entirely literally. Many things that may appear to us as being from the external physical only can have an equivalent in the emotional or other department. See more in the discussion on metaphor below, and under Mirrors.

The PEMS pyramids and the Growth Diamond.  (3.10)

So, here we are at the centre of our own little piece of Energy with its four departments. Can this be shown in a diagram?

When something has four ‘legs’ (tables, animals) it has a stability to it. If it is a 4-sided pyramid, it is very stable. Stability implies security.

A diagram for the growth of our own sense of self within the world of energy around and in us, can be shown as a pyramid. The four sides of the pyramid are the four departments of energy, and we are at the centre of this pyramid; the line up the middle becoming higher as the pyramid increases in height. This central line of self could be named a shoot (as of a plant).

When we have an upright pyramid over an inverted one, we get a diamond, which we consider a very valuable thing; very bright, hard and ever-lasting. I will refer to this diagram as the ‘Growth Diamond’ to emphasize the value of seeing ourselves within the Energy departments in this way. This diamond shows us the external departments that we want to grow out or up into, and the internal departments that we need to grow down into (’know thyself’). The inward-looking line of self could be named the root.

This concept of the shoot growing upward and the root growing downward leads us to the Plant Metaphor.

Diagram 3B.1  (3.11)

The plant metaphor.  (3.12)

A plant consists of a root and a shoot. The shoot absorbs sunlight from the sky, and the roots provide security and absorb nutrients from the earth. As a plant successfully develops its roots as it explores and penetrates the soil, it finds nutrients that can support the shoot which can grow up into the light.

The plant needs to grow straight to be able to reach up properly, and be fed by light from all directions.

When we can’t use the internal departments of Energy, we can’t put our roots down to any extent; they go in some directions and not others and hence can’t find stability. We cannot feed ourselves from all directions within, so cannot develop all our roots to obtain the widest variety of nutrients.  The root system ends up stunted and lopsided, and any gardener knows that this limits the plant.

The shoot tries to grow, but the root system is limited. The upper pyramid of energy is also missing some departments, so any increase in height will jeopardize the stability of the shoot. If it grows too far or too fast in only 1 direction, it will fall over.

Using all four departments internally brings us internal stability and ‘nutrients’, while using all four departments externally helps us to grow in a stable manner. The plant is able to grow up and ‘flower’ ie, reach its potential, not to mention being better able to endure ‘the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune’.

Therefore and thus, humans grow best when both inner and outer realms of energy with all its departments are available to them, and have great problems when they are not. (And all these departments are of equal importance.) We need our roots and our nutrients from the dark and the unseen within to support our growth out there in the light.

Thus, if we apply this plant metaphor of the PEMS Energy Departments to how women and men are socialized within our society,

• Men generally have access to the Internal Mental for their root development, and the External Physical and Mental for their shoot development. This is a bit like a tall tree being planted in a corner between 2 walls (which go a long way down) which will lead to only 1/4 of the root space for exploration, support and ‘feeding’ as well as having to get away from these walls to get up to the light, as in, unable to grow straight, and the bigger it gets the more likely it is to fall over. While,
• Women are not quite so planted in a corner (nor are they allowed to get too big) so they have the potential for a better root structure, (which men sense and envy) but they tend to have their ‘shoots’ ‘out there’ lopped off or cut back unless those shoots are to ‘saint’ or ‘mother’. This can be a tad frustrating for them, leaving them with some difficulty reaching their potential. If they turn to the ‘esoteric’ worlds which are basically the internal ‘spiritual’ and the sensing departments, they can in fact find a much greater internal stability, enough to start sending up another set of shoots if they wish, and better able to defend/protect these new shoots from being ‘clopped’. I develop these themes in Chapter 11 on Women in Part III.

But, to return to PEMS energy departments, how do we actually get from one department to the other? Well, we use metaphors.

Metaphor.  (3.13)

Metaphors are the bridges that allow us to jump across the energy departments from one to the other. Interestingly, metaphors and symbols belong in the Spiritual/’inSpiritive/intuitive’ department, because they can have more than one meaning at a time. It is metaphor and symbols that give us the ‘entree’ (entrance/doorway) into another energy department, which feels similar to going from 2-D to 3-D; richer, fuller and far more informative, and far more able to see Life as a whole; ‘in the round’ so to speak.

Some examples.  (3.14)

1. A metaphor for someone who drinks a lot or who needs to drink is that this person could be looking for ‘spirit’ in a bottle as the only way they can identify anything or remedy ‘out there’ to dull their emotional and/or mental pain (and alcohol is fairly easy, cheap and socially acceptable). If this metaphor is relevant, it can tell us that the problem lies in having no reason or meaning in their life (the ‘spirit’ual department). However, the emotional gets mixed in as well, because nothing in life ‘fills them up’. They may also be ‘drowning their sorrows’ which has the implication that their sorrows are ‘drowning’ them. The ‘emotional’ department being symbolized by water, fluid or liquid.

The message then is, attend to the spiritual dimension and probably the emotional as well; neither the physical, as in, pharmaceuticals, nor the mental, as in, learn to control yourself using logic, is really going to address the problem. Hence the value of the 12-step programs which do acknowledge a ‘higher’ power, as well as giving emotional support to the ‘lost/empty/drowning’.

2. Someone who smokes may be unable to ‘catch fire’, as in, unable to find what sets them alight or gives them the drive or the desire from the heart; they just smoulder along. The problem here can be emotional and/or spiritual and may well be both. But the metaphor is a reminder that other dimensions exist and need to be addressed.

3. If someone is having problems with any part of the body, the emotional issues for that part also need to be addressed; in fact, all physical problems have some of their roots in the other dimensions. It is terribly simplistic to consider otherwise, and the costs of supporting the walking wounded are becoming increasingly unsustainable.

It is metaphor that tells us in which department to look. There are quite a few books about such things. They are listed in the addendum 1, Tools for the Journey.

Our dreams use symbol and metaphor to reach us emotionally and physically, and they can feel very real and very forceful to the recipient, and many of us can accept that, although the general consensus is that dreams are essentially non-sense. (Another useless general consensus. We have a few of these.)

Many athletes are able to use careful imagination to train themselves in the correct mindset as well as physical training to achieve their goals, as in, they are using the abstract department to affect the physical.

The use of metaphor is particularly derided as ‘woo-woo’ and ‘New Age’ but we need to understand that this is a problem with our current social beliefs or ‘world view’, not with using metaphor. I consider these social beliefs to be based on spirit’s ideas about Life on Earth. Spirit wants so much to be off-earth and out of all this ‘entrapment’, that its ideas are not useful to us, and actually leave us fairly powerless in facing life. Time for a change.

After all, the part of us that sends us our dreams, to try to tell us what we are doing to ourselves, uses symbols and metaphor and even makes puns at times, which I find amazing.

The real test is that of the words themselves. If they ‘work’ or apply across the departments, then language itself is telling you that you’re on the right track. You may feel uncomfortable about such truth and wish to reject it, but that does not make it incorrect.

In some respects, using metaphor to awaken us to other possibilities in other departments sort of makes it harder to learn how to address our problems, but that’s probably because we have so very little social learning or skills in these areas. We tend to want things simple and easy, but we are built to handle these four departments, and we could if we understood them.

However, without understanding this concept of the four departments of energy and how to use them, we have a terrible time. This has been the case for quite some time, although we have since developed much psychological understanding, even if we do ignore/waste it.

This UUS uses metaphor constantly as we continue on this discussion; it really is the only way to understand what we do to ourselves.

Now we go on to further properties and some rules. The more we understand them, the more we can use them to our advantage.

More Properties and Rules of Energy that we can use.

Magnets.  (3C)

Magnets with their magnetic properties are another property of Energy that is all pervasive. Much of our machinery uses these properties and the Earth itself is a huge magnet with the North and South poles and the flow of energy between them. Even small magnets have these two poles with the strange characteristic that the opposite poles attract each other and the same poles repel each other. Thus, North and South poles have a magnetic attraction and ‘pull’ each other together, while two South or two North poles will push away from each other.

The whole of Earth is a magnet because of its iron core, and magnetic forces are harnessed by humans in ways we take entirely for granted, including much of our modern-day technology. Hence, there is a great deal of power here which is reliant on having both ends/poles as a unity, as in, both ends are as important as the other, but different, and it is the fact that they are united within the thing called ‘magnet’ that generates the power of it. Hence, if a pole is missing, there can be no power.

Magnets are an example in the physical domain of the absolute opposites of a continuum discussed in Chapter 1D and labelled as the AO1; the poles are the AO1s and the Magnet itself is the AO2; the poles define the magnet.

Now we look at contrasts and opposites.

Contrasts and opposites.  (3D)

Life on Earth provides us with Contrasts and Opposites which come from the dualities of Life, as well as Mirrors; all to enable us to See our internal selves. It is terribly difficult to get any sort of handle on anything without having some sort of comparison or contrast. In the absence of knowing anything about yourself, where would you start without having any contrasts or opposites? Imagine if our day were all daylight. How would we define light or night?

This world of ours is composed of energy in an amazing gamut of contrasts, opposites, polarities and dualities in so many ways. It is the ‘relative’ world as opposed to its opposite of the (said to be) ‘absolute’ world of God (or ‘heaven’). Thus, these contrasts and opposites are properties of Energy. They provide tension (or intensity) within energy itself, and thus within us to varying degrees. Jung refers to this tension as ‘libido’ as a way to describe the internal energy of humans.

‘Consciousness loves contrast’ and in fact cannot do without it, and the structure of Life on Earth provides these in spades. From heaven to hell; nice to nasty; good to bad; and so on.

I used contrasts and opposites when outlining the basic ‘coat-hanger’ which is discussed above in Chapter 2.

The ‘coat-hanger’ is the shape of the AO1s with the AO2. There are two AO1s which are contrasts/opposites and the AO2 is itself the opposite of these two opposites, but with the unique quality that the AO2 unifies, but also ‘holds’ or ‘locks in’ the contrasts of the AO1. The AO2 is ‘resolving’ this continuum between the AO1 ‘ends’. So, this is a strange thing. It’s a property of energy where it becomes clear that all three ‘corners’ are necessary, and this provides a kind of stability. It also becomes a kind of ‘dance’ as we move through these three corners; thesis, antithesis and synthesis, all the time, as we find new things. All three ‘corners’ of the coat-hanger are valuable and necessary for life. The unity is necessary for the creation of new life and the duality is necessary for its support.

The contrasts of opposites are throughout our lives. They are so much a part of our life that we may not realize how useful they can be to clarify for ourselves how/what we are thinking about a concept. When we look at these contrasts, we do two things.

Firstly, we consider that each contrast is at the end of a linear continuum eg, daylight to twilight to moonlight to starlight to night, as in, we assume that this continuum is a straight line with light at one end and dark at the other. But that continuum’s contrast/opposite is singular, and yet it encompasses both ends of the straight line. This is hardly obvious, so it’s a pretty interesting property.

Secondly, what we insist on doing is judge the ends all the time. We want one end and not the other. One is ‘bad’ and the other is ‘good’.

Good and bad.  (3.15)

It is a fact of Energy that it encompasses all, from the heaviest, lumpiest, grimmest, darkest, saddest, meanest, cruelest, hardest, ugliest and lowest, to the lightest, finest, most joyous, brightest, happiest, nicest, kindest, softest, most beautiful and highest, and we get to choose what we want out of all this.

God/Life presents us with the great gamut of possibilities that we call ‘Life’, but it is difficult to understand that within each end of an opposite is the kernel of the other end. The yin/yang symbol is a much better depiction of this contrast because the Chinese are better at understanding this than we are in the West. Each end contains its opposite, and Jung was always trying to get this through. Sometimes too much ‘good’ leads to something bad, eg, taking things for granted or failing to develop resources for changes in life circumstances, and sometimes the really ‘bad’ can lead to something really good, eg, when someone survives a concentration camp to give others hope in dreadful situations, etc. There is also a time dimension here. Bad things can force people to develop aspects of themselves that they would not otherwise have considered.

We prefer to just label whether things are good and bad at this immediate time without considering the potential for change over time in response to these situations. All the more reason to be careful about judging, which see below, under Blame.

However, we can use the ‘linearity’ of the opposites to help us look more clearly at these contrasts. This is spelled out further below.

But the best way for us to See something directly about ourselves is to look in the Mirror.

“Oh would some power the gift give us, To see ourselves as others see us.” Burns

Mirrors and Mirror Laws (ML).  (3E)

I have discussed our wish to harness ‘the horse’ of energy for our own purposes, as well as the four departments of energy. But the most important property of all is that Energy simply mirrors/reflects us, although what is being mirrored to us is our InSelf/unconscious, not our outself. (The argument in this UUS is that you can use this property for your own advantage, and in fact, that is why you are alive.)

To repeat, all life ‘out there’ which is Energy, is Mirroring your ‘in here’, your unknown InSelf, always, forever and for everybody, all the time. This is what it does; it is a property of Energy which is very important and really rather amazing. So, in a way, ‘you are alone in a hall of mirrors’ and so is everybody else. (Although, you do also need to remember that you are two people internally, and therefore not technically alone; it just looks/feels that way to you.)

We have been given life because it is so difficult for us to ‘see ourselves as others see us’. It is as if we exist in an absolute world of ourselves, and need the mirrors from others to get feedback for the energy we put out. [God worked out how to do it Herself, but it may have taken a while.] Remember, it’s actually easy to see others; it is only you that is unable to see yourself. It’s as if the real you occupies a point on your back between your shoulder-blades that you have no way of seeing for yourself without a mirror.

We need mirrors (and contrasts) if we are going to know ourselves, which is what we ultimately need/want to do. So, how does this fact of energy being a mirror, work?

As a culture we are vaguely aware of…

..’do as you would be done by’..

..’as ye sow, so shall ye reap’..

..’what goes around, comes around’.

And less aware of…

..’you are alone in a hall of mirrors’..

..Jung’s ‘Shadow’ and the mechanism of Projection, and

..Byron Katie’s ‘Turn it Around’ aka ‘The Work’, from the book ‘Loving What Is’ (2002).

But it’s kind of worse than these, because Reincarnation comes into it, so your decisions from past lives are included in your unconscious.

What I am talking about are what I label the Mirror Laws (ML). There are two Mirror Laws working all the time behind the scenes, although basically, they are the same concept. They are far more precise than the above and they are tough indeed. I have called them the Mirror Laws because they come from looking in the Mirror. I also find them easier as a concept than Jung’s Shadow and Projection, simply because they are easier for me to keep my head around.

The laws.  (3.16)

The Mirror Laws (MLs) are….

1. What we do to others IS what we do to ourselves in some manner. And….

2. What others do to us IS what we do or have done to others AND what we do or have done to ourselves, in some manner, in this life or previous lives.

Mirror Laws are saying that what someone has done to you is what you do or have done to yourself in some form or manner, as well as what you do or have done in some manner to others in this life or in a previous life.

‘In some form or manner‘ refers to the fact that what is being done can be literal OR figurative/metaphorical. Metaphor is very important here; you can ‘kill’ or ‘disappear/remove’ someone from your life physically, but it is also possible to do the same mentally, with the same effect being that that person is no longer in your life (with a bit of a difference for them, of course, but these laws are talking about your enquiry for you).

Hence, we need to remember not to take things absolutely literally. An example here would be that if you perceived that someone else tried to attack or negate you somehow, that is apparent in the physical world ‘out there’, but that may be ‘mirroring’ your own tendency to attack or negate the other in the mental or emotional department, but not the physical. However, you are still doing it, and you are still being shown something about how you do it, but you may need to use the metaphors to move to the other energy departments, as in, using the figurative or metaphorical.

Mirror Laws are telling us how we can tell what we are actually doing to our InSelf = the internal ‘other’.

The first thing they tell us is …

1. That we have an InSelf, and
2. That this is what we are actually doing to it, not what we think is happening, or our ‘stories’ about life. Your Life ‘out there’ is always Mirroring your InSelf’s actual energy or vibration ‘in here’.

Notice here that the Mirror laws are about the whole spectrum of Energy and our relationship to it. Don’t forget that God has had to fit in with (submit to) these laws as well. They are basically, Love (TISP) leads to Life (which feels like ’heaven’ or ‘the garden’), while un-Love leads to un-Life (which feels like ’hell’ or ‘shite’).

The Law of Attraction is a variation of these MLs, although many try to use it without understanding it correctly. The world ‘out there’ is matching or mirroring the energy of your InSelf, not your outself. Many people think that just bashing the InSelf with sufficient ‘wishes’, wants or ‘orders’ should do the trick, but it doesn’t. (’If wishes were horses, beggars would ride’.) Your InSelf holds the Truth of You and wants your love and affection for it as it is, not your conscious domination of it or what you consider a good idea. (More in Goal-Setting.)

How impossible is this?  (3.17)

But we find these Laws just impossible! It is much, much easier to dismiss them out of hand. Well, why are they so impossible?

We are not taught them per se. They are not really part of our awareness, although they are the basis of the ‘do as you would be done by’ instruction that appears to be fading from social awareness in the infotainment age. Jung’s Shadow and the mechanism of Projection are describing their action.

They really are quite severe, and we don’t like that, but we keep on expecting life to be as we think it ‘should be’, and it may be for some, but they probably take it for granted. While I suspect many people put on a ‘successful’ face (’we’re all having fun here’), I am not sure how many people are particularly happy about the way their life and/or the world is going. Life in the wild looks to be a fairly ‘life and death’ matter for the animals concerned, and it looks pretty fierce to me (’Nature raw in tooth and claw’).

One of Jesus’ most difficult instructions was ‘turn the other cheek’, if someone had struck you for basically no reason apparent to you. This instruction is so far away from ‘normal’ behaviour that it is simply consigned to the ‘too hard’ if not impossible basket. How relevant is this instruction to our lives, particularly under the teaching that we only have one go at Life?

We would blame them, attack back if possible, physically or verbally, be a victim if we couldn’t, and so on. Our whole social focus is so oriented on blame and fear that we have a very hard time accepting that we ourselves may have had something to do with what has happened to us from out there, but in a previous life. And, once again, our ‘doings’ then were not necessarily literally the same either – they could have been figuratively the same.

Mirror laws are the basis for ‘turn the other cheek’. There is plenty of evidence that Jesus was part of a society that believed in reincarnation. However, we no longer need to physically ‘turn the other cheek’ because we now have psychological processes for learning the lessons without having to experience being ‘bopped’ more than once if we don’t want to.

The Mirror laws as I have outlined them also imply that past lives can be accessed. Although we are taught that this is neither necessary because we don’t have them, nor possible because we don’t remember them in this life, this teaching is not correct. Past lives are quite easily accessed through techniques of talking to the unconscious if one knows how, and many people do. More about that later.

We need these Laws to enable us to understand/comprehend/realize our own energy that is internal to us. We cannot know otherwise. To rephrase this somewhat, we cannot know our own effect on others unless and until we can know their effect on us. It is only in this manner that we can begin to learn that what we do affects our self as well as others.

So much of our social understanding implies that what we do to others has no consequences, especially if we get away with it in the short term, and in many instances disrespectful treatment of others is rewarded (see Part III).

So, what about when people do horrible things to us, and they can be horrible? These things have a tremendous effect on us, but it can still be a call to understand your own power to affect others and yourself, ie, be powerful for you.

Something horrible such as rape or any other form of major violence will be devastating to that person, but, and it is a big but, if that person can find her internal ‘violence/intensity/anger’ toward others (or herself), it actually transforms that internal energy into something very powerful indeed, and that insight can help the ‘violated’ to mobilize her energy in an effective manner. Further down the track this person could choose to become a very useful therapist for others who have had such things happen to them. Anybody who has looked for a therapist knows what it means to have a therapist who ‘knows’ and has ‘been there, done that’ and come out the other end in one piece, and by that I mean able to go on to build a satisfying life for herself and not needing to look over her shoulder all her life.

Not all the ‘whacks’ that come our way are a direct result of our own actions in the past. (Hence, beware of judging.) Sometimes we need them to make us sit up and think and hopefully change course. Maybe only some form of abuse within your family could make you consider that your ‘family’ is not really very good for you, and maybe it’s time to leave. In the same vein, abuse from a religious representative may make you wonder about that religion and the difference between what it says and what it does, or even to watch how it covers it all up and how society colludes with this.

I am giving this sort of example because it is really important to remember that the Mirror Laws are not about deserving or blame; sometimes we just need a big ‘whack’ before we will take any notice of something (and it’s part of what we have chosen at a much higher level, and it’s part of our lives as to how we handle same).

However, it is very difficult not to get stuck in the blame game here. It all looks and is rotten for the person concerned, and as for choice – well, how impossible is that? But our society has no mechanisms or answers to truly support this person in their troubles and ultimately to avoid the victim trap of suffering and being disempowered and consequently living a very fearful and difficult life. Our religions aren’t that useful; our therapists are as scared as we are (that’s why they’re therapists), and the basic ‘compensation’ is possibly blame (but what if the perpetrator is not caught or is insufficiently punished?) and maybe lots of pity from someone, and still the person will suffer. But it’s simply not useful for our own growth and understanding. All we know is judgement and blame, and they just make us suffer. Not to mention, we just stay afraid.

The Mirror Laws are also ‘saying’ that as we judge and blame others we are judging and blaming ourselves; trouble again.

But and this is a big but, however much we may not like it, they are acting all the time because, not only is Energy a mirror, but,

This is the way in which we are all one. The external ‘other’ IS the internal ‘other’, or ‘they’ is ‘us’. And,

They are the single most important reason for ethical behaviour on your part at all times for your own sake. (This should really be in capitals, at the risk of appearing to shriek.)

In our ‘greed is good’ society, we are losing sight of the absolute need for ethical behaviour; many people think that we should be this way because religions say so, but really, it’s because of the way that Energy works. Sooner or later, you will ‘wear’ whatever you do to the other, hence, what do you want to ‘wear’?

When you judge, blame, damn or despise another, you are doing that to yourself (your InSelf) as well. Whenever you treat someone badly, you are doing that to yourself as well. If you steal from someone or exploit or attack someone in any manner, you are doing that to yourself as well, and on it goes. This isn’t just other people either; it’s all life. The laws are a primary reason why ‘vengeance is mine, says the Lord’. It is not, ‘an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth’. Any vengeance on your part is acting on your InSelf as well; you are doing it to your InSelf. So, don’t. As someone ‘attacks’ you, they are ‘attacking’ themself; they get to work this out, too.

The best way to short-circuit blame is to consider that there may be something to See that might be of value to you in these circumstances.

Of course, it is also true that when you treat another with kindness and respect, you are doing that to yourself as well. This is the basis for the church teachings of ‘being good to others as the way to learn to be good to yourself (’Love thy neighbour as thyself’). However, there is a problem in the middle of this maxim that is called ‘motive’, which is why I focus on being good to one’s InSelf and loving this internal ‘other’ first, (the ‘as thyself’ bit) which is difficult enough as it is for most people.

The worst part is considering that we ourselves have done ‘bad’ things in the past. But we have, and there’s no way around it. It may have been inadvertent, but we have still done it. It is part of our exploring and it is part of God’s allowing, but we still need to understand/comprehend our own internal energy, and Mirror Laws are part of how we get to do that. I also wish to reiterate that we are not here because we’ve been ‘bad’ or ‘sinners’; we are here because we want to learn to ‘ride the horse’, and God knows that that takes quite a while to work out. All of us have ‘sinned’; this is called ‘falling off the horse’. No-one learns to ride because they are frightened of what happens if they don’t learn. They learn because they want to learn to ride and experience the exhilaration of being able to do so; the ‘falling off’ is part of learning how to ride. ‘Falling off’ is how we find out about Energy and its effects. Notice also that learning to ride cannot be done in theory; you have to get on and do it if you want to learn.

(‘Sinning’ has so many horrible connotations. We worry that it stops us getting back to Heaven, and it leaves us stuck on Earth which we don’t like. I deal with this more in Part II.)

An aside: what is ‘the biblical fall’ about?  (3.18)

There really is an awful lot of ‘hoo-hah’ about ‘the Fall’, but what is actually being referred to here?

Sinning.

This ‘Fall’ bit mostly seems to be about how we have all ‘fallen into badness’ from being ‘good’, and are now sinners and stuck on Earth as punishment. The Devil is also supposed to be a good angel who has fallen also.

But, to repeat, ‘Falling’ down to be on Earth is part of our exploring of Energy so that we can use it for ourselves. (It is impossible to be truly kind if we have not experienced unkindness from others and also realized the value of the right/appropriate word or action. Similarly, real courage is in the face of real fear.)

To reiterate, we are not on earth because we have ‘sinned’. God simply does not consider us as ‘sinners’, and is not the vaguest bit interested in ‘punishing’ us. It is energy itself that is doing the reflecting back to us (ML) of who is there inside us, as well as being much bigger than our miniscule selves anyway, and this can feel pretty unpleasant or unkind to us. We are here to learn to Explore and Express for God’s sake and our own.

‘Falling’ in Space.

However, it is also true that Spirit as ‘unlimited in Space’ is free to flick around as it pleases. But, if it doesn’t ‘flick off’ it is at risk of falling, and that falling feels like it goes on and on forever, which is not a good feeling at all. The fear of falling seems to be very ‘built in’ to us in terms of instinctive, hence particularly unconscious (and unavailable to our conscious, and probably sitting in the ‘old’/primitive brain); even very small children recognize a ‘drop’ when they see one. It’s as if we scrabble to find something to hang onto and can’t. I consider this fear to be a) about physically looking after ourselves even when very small, and b) about what matters to us, and is part of our need to ‘ground’ ourselves, as in, be connected to Earth.

Applying/using the Mirror Laws.  (3.19)

The main way to use or apply the Mirror Laws is as in Byron Katie’s (2002) ‘The Work’ where we ‘turn it around’. It also turns up in the ‘spiritual’ exercise of ‘How am I that, which I am judging?’.

So, for example, if I am cross because I feel that someone is not caring about me, I can turn that around and ask ‘Am I being shown something about how I am not caring about me?’ (as well as how I may not be caring about others), and you may find that indeed you do not, and it is also true that when you do care about your InSelf (your internal ‘other’), others may do that also, but it will not matter to you if they don’t.

The extent to which I feel rejected by others is the extent to which I am rejecting my InSelf, and/or the other, and so it goes.

A larger example would be that I could hate someone for the way that I perceived them as having treated me in this life, only to find that I myself have treated others in just such a fashion (if not worse!) in a previous life. I could also find that my behaviour at that past time was inadvertent because I had no idea at all of how to treat other people well, or even take them into consideration in the first place. I can now consider that maybe I needed to be on the receiving end for once so that I could understand that others may not like what I did then. True understanding only comes from experience, and if I choose to consider that I might have chosen this situation simply to understand why it is not a good idea to mistreat others, I can choose again to behave differently in future.

This process of asking myself these questions about my behaviour and my motives is called ‘reflecting’ (mirrors reflect, as in, looking in the mirror), and when I See what I have been doing and why, I can choose to try something different next time. In this I am ‘repenting’ in terms of re-thinking (which is what repent means) how I wish to behave in the future, knowing what I know now about what I have done in the past. The upshot is I am learning to behave in a new way that I may happen to like, and so may others by default.

The Treasure Tool in Part IV includes a method for doing this.

And I think that’s what it is all about. You are looking for ways to ‘love what is’ in whatever way you can for your own ultimate benefit.

The only person you have to forgive in this is yourself. The ‘strange’ thing being that as you forgive yourself you begin to realize that others are doing their normal bumbling and faffing around as all humans do. Not to mention learning to be particularly careful about your own motives for whatever you intend to do in the future. Nor do you ‘have to’ do anything either. In the end it’s just so much more enjoyable to find these insights and grow into love for your own self, all of you.

The Mirror Laws are universal laws and are in action regardless of whether you like it or not.

They will make more sense for you under these attitudes…

• Realizing that there are things we need to See or understand; basically referred to as ‘lessons’. Remember that we are trying to find out what is inside us by using what is outside us.
• We have multiple lives – Reincarnation. These laws are in action whatever you believe.
• Complete choice in this life and every life, and that choice is in how you respond to whatever.

You are using and are meant to be using Life to learn how to be apart.

To be apart properly means healing the split/gap within your own psyche and differentiating yourself out from being a part. You are trying to find your own uniqueness, which is what you and God actually want.

Life (=God) provides …

• Multiple lives
• Contrasts and opposites and
• Mirrors,

all for you to experience. And asks you to choose whatever you want because God knows in the end you will choose God because you are God, which is the nicest way to be anyway.

Conclusion.  (3.20)

The Mirror Laws are there all the time, because Energy is reflecting your InSelf back to your conscious, so you can See who/what your InSelf/unconscious is. It is also true that whatever you do to others, consciously or unconsciously, you’ll ‘wear’ it, ie, it will be done to you whether literally or figuratively, in some manner, at some time. This is for you to See and Know for yourself what it’s like being on the receiving end. Hence, be aware.

Life brings you what you need to know, not what you think you want. The most useful attitude for you to adopt for your own sake is to work out how you can use that information or even look for what the advantages of your current situation might be. This is what ‘taking responsibility’ for your own reactions to life is for and about. Use the Mirror. You can always trust that bit.

It’s as if Life presents us with a pack of questions that we have to answer for ourselves.

We just cannot be told – we can’t ‘hear’ what others have to say.

Hence, we have to work it out for ourselves, and we seem to have to own our own behaviour in all lives and all the consequences thereof; this being how we learn.

But we will be extremely pleased with ourselves when we have found our own answers to our own questions. It’s called ‘consciousness’, which = ‘Know ThySelf’.

But, all of these things take lifetimes to learn.

So, then, how many lives do we get to practice with?

Reincarnation.  (3F)

The decisions that we have made throughout our previous lives remain with us is part of our own energy, and ML reflect that back to us to help us see what we have inside. Thus, how many lives do we have?

Believing.  (3.21)

The teachings and beliefs about our reasons for life (ie, what life is for) are absorbed when we are little and they sit in the unconscious and affect our attitudes to life and hence all we do; ie, they are ‘making’ your life, so you might as well find out what they are. This is regardless of whether or not we actually believe these teachings. The point here is that we were too young at the time to consider or think about whether or not they make any sense to us. I have also noted that our questioning when young is likely to have been repressed with a ‘believe it or else’ type reply, chiefly because the adults didn’t know the answers or the ‘why’s.

These ‘teachings/beliefs’ may appear to come from your parents or your environment, but they can also come from past lives; (although some ‘funny/odd’ things do seem to come down the DNA). Even the concept that there is no reason for life is still a belief, in that we do not actually know.

But really, these ‘believe-ins’ are just that; a belief. We don’t know and have to be told what to believe by ‘those who know’, as a child has to be taught by an adult. However, the trouble with believing anything that you don’t actually know, is that dis-belief has to be repressed or buried, by definition. And, when it’s buried, you don’t know it’s there; it’s unconscious. But, the big problem with the unconscious is that you will be afraid of these dis-beliefs and will be very upset by others being dis-believing. Hence, strongly religious people can get very cross when queried.

We get an awful lot of ‘If you believe in God and Love others/all hard enough or sufficiently, everything will be alright for you’. Hence, if bad things happen, you haven’t believed enough or loved ‘enough’. Hence, lots of people try very hard ‘to believe’ as a way to hopefully avoid ‘bad’ things happening, but this is patently fear-driven, and fear is not love.

So, the choice in teachings about ‘why life?’ is, believe in one life only or lots (reincarnation). (It’s not as if you have just 2 or 3.) Half the world believes in one life and the other half believes in lots of lives.

One life only or multiple lives.  (3.22)

A single life makes no sense at all to me (as you may have guessed). It becomes a lottery and fate, the results of which you must endure (because suffering is ‘good’, [yeah, yeah,] and eventually you can escape – for good, hopefully) and God loves you and don’t ask any questions. Yes, well. You are also expected to believe because there will be awful repercussions (hell and no heaven) if you don’t. This is a fear-based teaching. All of this is an external authority/expert (99% male to boot) maintaining your dependence upon their power (of whatever religion) to tell you what to do and decide how you have done. You get to stay as a child here; you are not going to know for your own self or find self-power or self-direction here, and will remain powerless and/or try to compensate by becoming an authority yourself. (See Part II)

But, if there is fear, as in, being frightened to force you to conform, there is no love here.

Love gives free will and choice to the other at every level. It has to; by definition.

Multiple lives allow for Explore, which is a primary drive (Expression is close behind). They also allow choice and free will. It can also take many more than just one life to learn or understand important issues or develop abilities to skills. Teachings of a single life can allow no concept of such things. We need the time and the Explore because we have enormous internal potential we ‘wot not of’.

We are given time to explore and develop.  (3.23)

We have a very large mostly unknown potential inside us, which is a very small sub-set of God, so to speak, viz, we all have a little world inside us (that seems pretty big to us) within the very much bigger world out there.

It’s also true that the world out there is indeed larger than we are, but we are also much larger internally and externally than we suppose. We are meant to use the world ‘out there’ to learn about the world that we carry inside us.

That world out there includes such an enormous number of ways of being that it boggles the mind really (‘7 billion and still counting’, and that’s just people). We are exploring being; male and female; rich and poor; powerful and powerless; loving and unloving; build and destroy; different cultures and different religions and ideas; and on and on. All of it being ways of finding out who we are, what’s important to us and what we want.

[A change of gender can take at least 2-3 lives to get used to ‘the hang of it’ if most of the previous lives have been the other. We do change gender, although there appears to be a preponderance of one over the other. How/Who would you be if you were the other gender?]

I find a useful metaphor for ourselves in this process of exploring, to be that of a diamond in the rough. Apart from the fact that diamonds are simply carbon formed under great pressure with the potential to become something spectacular, it takes skill for a jeweller to make any particular diamond. It needs to be recognized in the rough for what it is; it takes skill to cut and it takes skill to polish each of the 52 surfaces of a single brilliant cut diamond. If each of our lives is spent polishing just a few of the surfaces or views of our diamond as we address the issues in our lives, it is going to take quite a few lives to get that diamond to perfection, and then we may find that there is another one to discover and work from the rough, and so on. There are an awful lot of ways of being out there and an awful lot of issues belonging to these different ways of being. All of us are working on polishing our diamonds. [A ‘diamond’ metaphor, again.]

But then we make decisions about life through the experiences we’ve had, and we bring them along with us; otherwise what’s the point?

We have assumptions and expectations from previous lives.  (3.24)

We carry our decisions about life, useful and useless, with us, from life to life as we build on our experiences, and, of course, they impact on this life. However, useless decisions can be very painful and frustrating.

We can have circumstances in a past life where we could have formed a decision that was not useful for us in this current life, such as, ‘nobody loves me’, or ‘I am unlovable’, and so on, but it is perfectly possible to change these useless decisions (hooray!). The unconscious is able to go back to the root cause and re-visit the decision with the greater understanding of the bigger picture, including later experiences and their consequences as well as greater maturity. Many of our useless decisions sit in past lives, and the results of clearing them feel very good – hence this writing.

Life designs and contracts.  (3.25)

Various New Age writings teach that we design the general outline of our current lives while off earth, in between lives. The design is formulated with a higher awareness of the need to address various issues for our own higher ‘good’/awareness/understanding.

Thus, when we are off-earth we choose our life circumstances and the general lessons we wish to learn.

Even the word ‘lessons’ is fraught. It’s not like school, as in, being told this is what you have to learn. We want to know ourselves. It is delightful. It is called Insight. These things we learn out of our experiences can be hard, but it is all worthwhile and we treasure these insights about ourselves and we can carry them with us into the next lifetime and the next, as we try out all sorts of things and explore and express.

Neither do we ‘come in’ by ourselves. We form ‘contracts’ with significant others in our lives; eg. ‘you can do this and then I’ll do that’, and so on. The design seems to be a broad outline of structure and events with choices at various stages and alternatives based on those choices. This is the basis of various teachings that we are the writer, producer and director of our own plays, as well as choosing all the actors and telling them what we want them to do. The most interesting bit is that somehow it is ultimately all for everybody’s good which boggles the mind somewhat!

We design and then forget.  (3.26)

So, having designed all this, we then forget. Well, why? What’s the point of forgetting it all?

The point is the difference between theory and practice. Do all of us have people in our lives who know all the answers and will tell you what to do, but their own lives are a mess or they are really unhappy or unpleasant and so is everyone around them? The question is what answers do they really know? What questions were they asking in the first place? We all have issues; that’s why we are here.

Past lives and/or genetic memories are basically one hypnotic script away if that is what you would like to know about, but the point is that your unconscious knows even if you don’t. (PS. Hypnotic scripts are simply a method of talking to your unconscious.)

How many previous lives?  (3.27)

Some say hundreds without any details given. Mann (2002) implies eleven plus this current one as working on a particular set of themes. These themes tend to be the big ones of sex, power, and money, status/authority and religion/death. My own experience fits in with Mann’s observations. All our lives are enthralling and absorbing, (you can’t say you’re not involved!) and there’s always more.

Coming back as an animal.  (3.28)

Since we are made in the image of God, it makes no sense to me to come back as an animal, however much you think your cat has an easy time of it. We are being challenged to find what we truly want and given the most interesting and enthralling circumstances in which to do so. Eternity is a very long time.

But, as I discuss further on, animals serve us in many ways, and that service must not be taken for granted.

Karma, punishment and reward?  (3.29)

The problem with the word ‘karma’ is that it is used as a form of judgement and also blame, as in, this is being done to you for your own good, without your consent, basically. If you are having a ‘good’ life, it must be from good karma, as a reward, and a ‘bad’ life, then ‘bad’ karma as a punishment. But this is all judging, and consequently a way of thinking that is no use to you, because it leaves us powerless in terms of being ‘pushed around’ by God/whomever etc.

Many of the usual reincarnation concepts or ideas in our Western society are not really much use to us if there is still blame and judgement.

Spiritual systems that teach us to put up with what we’ve got are not that useful in terms of the importance of finding ways to change ‘bad’ things or proposing better ways to be. It’s just ‘endure until you can escape’.

This UUS argues that you have chosen the general outline of this life as a means to learn about who you are, and this includes learning about the consequences of your own treatment of others. The faster you learn, the less you have to bother with any consequences (so-called ‘Karma’), and can go on to the next realization. “Nothing is good or bad, but thinking makes it so” is as true as it ever was. Shakespeare worked it out long ago.

We get rid of karma by identifying decisions that we made about ourselves or others or our life during previous lives and deciding again in this life. See the Treasure Tool in Part IV.

Consider an example.  (3.30)

A wealthy young man brought up in great privilege has learned to treat others less fortunate than he with disdain and disrespect. This is basically inadvertent in that this man has no idea that he is doing this because that is how he has been brought up in a family that has had money and status for generations. He loses the woman he loves in this particular life because she doesn’t like the arrogant aspects of his personality. Eventually (at a higher level) he may decide that he needs to experience some of what he has dished out, because he has no idea what she was talking about.

So, he does in the next life and it’s a ripper; really terrible, and he dies rebelling against the poverty and degradation. The next one he’s so angry, he lasts a very short time. The next one he joins a gang of thieves and becomes a leader and organizes them quite well. He manages to rob and kill quite a few of the wealthy before he is caught and punished. Then follow other lives with similar and different themes.

So, in this current life of now; he experiences another dose of difficulty and manipulation by the powerful, but he is now intrinsically much more aware of what he is up against, and becomes a union man using his brains to help others fight for better conditions. Not to mention his wife is the love he lost in that wealthy life. He makes sure his children have all the education he can muster for them.

One of the children is given a trumpet and lessons and his dad thinks this is wonderful and starts to learn from his son and is quite good at it……and so on. Write your own plot here.

Where is the ‘punishment’? I see exploration of self with more to come. I am also of course, saying that we bring our memories with us in terms of intrinsic underlying decisions, understandings and drives.

Thus, if you can accept that at some level you yourself have chosen this life and that there is a beneficial point to all of this for you, then that can change your attitude to it all. Hence, instead of feeling as though you were being ‘dragged through a hedge backwards’ you can face forwards (with help if you wish) and Look at your life with a different attitude.

God knows we are children.  (3.31)

We explore first and think later, until we learn otherwise. This is natural! We kind of think that it’s supposed to be the other way around, but it isn’t; we are wise after the event, and sometimes a long time after at that. But we are equipped to work it out ourselves and can’t be told anyway.

In our exploring we can do terrible things to others without realizing our effect on them. (In fact, the only way we can understand this is to experience having things done to us; see Mirror Laws.)

Our current society can only conceive of God as a ‘father’ who lays down laws and a set of rules to live whereby we learn which bits of ourselves to cut off so that we can fit in to what He wants. (This is our great ‘loving’ Christian religion; neither was this what Jesus attempted to teach.) We have very little concept of a father who understands we are ‘as children’ and allows for that. We can’t understand in a fit that God ultimately wants to serve us as the parent serves the child and provides for its welfare. Remember, ‘Spirit’ does not understand parenting anything, much less Serve.

We are all children learning how to walk. We fall and get up again, and we grow and try running and we fall and get up again, and so on.

From child to adult.  (3.32)

So, if we are all children wanting to grow up and actually get to be an adult, what would that be like or involve?

Children need support; adults can support others.

A definition of a fully adult person could be someone who can support themselves fully in all four Energy departments; physically, mentally, and emotionally as well as ‘spiritually’. If they can support themselves fully, they will be able to support others. They are requiring no energy from anyone else because they can supply their own.

‘Children’ are defined as in need of support from others in some manner in one or more of the departments PEMS. They need energy from others because they are unable to supply their own.

The primary difference then between the child and the adult is that the child needs external support while the Adult can provide its own internal support. I am using Adult with a capital ‘A’ to differentiate between the attainment of internal support in all domains for an Adult, and the attainment of age for the adult human.

Getting from child to Adult is what we find difficult, and may not succeed in any single life, so this definition is a big ask.

Really, it’s back to this ‘part/apart’ business again. The child wants to stay a part, and the Adult is able to embrace being apart. There is a part of us that wants to stay a child and be looked after by ‘those who know’; ie, they have power and control (P&C) and are authority or parent. We look to them for approval as doing the right thing, as in, we are looking externally and thus cannot provide our own authority internally. Looking externally is a ‘wanting’ of energy from ‘the other’ and in so doing we are unable to provide our own. Where there is dependence there is control, and control can and will manipulate for its own purposes and attempt to keep you powerless. Staying as a child and powerless means you cannot grow.

The child…  (3.33)

• Is looked after by adults or others, who can guess what the child wants/needs (and the child can have a tizzy when they get it wrong).
• Can play, explore, absorb, distract and generally muck around as it pleases.
• Can just take other people’s answers to it all.
• Doesn’t have to think, be challenged, grow up, till and keep, take responsibility for finding out about self, and doesn’t need or take the time to do so.
• Has no self-direction, autonomy, competence, power for self, or true self-esteem.
• Has problems with unaddressed fears and anger.
• Has difficulty maintaining or developing meaningful relationships.

While the fully Adult human being…  (3.34)

• Is self-sufficient; able to TISP InSelf, and thus can support self PEMS and give it to others (=Serve) because there’s always more; ie, the Adult is able to fill themself.
• Has no gremlins jumping around in their head in the ‘small hours’ and can get proper peace and rest.
• Is able to play her own part in life and specify what she wants/needs.
• Has self-acceptance and good relationships with others and life ‘out there’.
• Is powerful for herself, and able to follow her own path; ie, she is free to follow her own destiny/destination
• Does not need or want power over others.
• Is in partnership with GLS; ie, able to consciously create in a manner that gives life to ‘the other’ which leads to true self-esteem (TSE). (More on TSE in Chapter 8. Desires – Flowering.)

This child part of us that wants to stay a child and have others look after us is a factor in all of us. There is nothing wrong with this part per se; it’s the bit about wanting someone else to do it that’s the problem.

What’s actually required here is for you to embrace this ‘child’ part of you which means….

• turning around and enquiring = spending Time and being Interested in –
• what this part of you actually wants and then –
• learning how to provide your own nurturing/sustaining and safety/protection; all of which = TISP to yourself,

for yourself; your InSelf.

This InSelf part does feel like a child, and embracing it and loving it will help you be kind to yourself and ‘the child’ within others. Not every adult human being is an Adult on these terms.

Being fully Adult doesn’t mean we can’t cooperate or work in mutual endeavour; far from it. It does tend to make us a maverick because we can’t be controlled or manipulated by others and are thus free to follow our own destiny and play our own part in life, whatever that may be.

God knows it’s not easy to get from part to apart as the child grows to Adult and life will actually push us to grow if we begin to stagnate.

Conclusion to Chapter 3.  (3.35)

This chapter has looked at some of the properties of Energy, and the repercussions of these for us humans. We do not really understand them and actually judge them as good or bad, when in fact they are just Energy and are there for our use.

But we cannot use them properly because we don’t understand them, not to mention, we won’t look, and that leaves us hamstrung, as in, unable to move.

We don’t like this ‘stuckness’, and have no concept whatsoever that the problem could lie within our own outlook on life so we look for someone to Blame, which is the next topic.