Been doing a lot of reading recently, trying to utilise my newly reclaimed sense of connection to further some of my workings. One of the things I have been thinking about is the three levels of existence.

The concept that everything exists on three levels, the physical, mental and spiritual. This wont be a new concept to many of you Im sure, but whilst I have been studying it struck me that on first glance the concept is deceptively simple.

But when considered it throws up some questions, for instance whilst I have no problem with comprehending that all living things function on all three, I do have trouble with say rocks working on a mental level. Thats only one example but hopefully it will give you guys an idea of where Im having difficulty.

When trying to look at the world with this concept in mind there seem to be many things to which its not so easy to apply it. Is this something that any of you have thought about? If so any suggestions of ways I may be able to examine the concept further?

This is not laziness on my part by the way, I just need some way of more actively taking part rather than only going at it from the mental aspect, I often find that real interaction makes things easier for me to comprehend.

Ah, that's the problem with 'rules' - the exceptions

IMO, this dividing things into such categories is a very humano-centric way of looking at things. It's like the news article I posted. There was a time when everything a non-human animal did was considered to be driven by the vague 'instinct'. We know better now.

Once we stop comparing those things around us with US and trying to shoe-horn unknowable concepts into our understood categories, perhaps we may get a glimmer of some other truth.

Marto

Deceptively simple I suspect. I also suspect that the divisions between the three catagories are more than likely grey areas rather than sharp divisions. Emotions for instance are known to be a physical response to stimuli. I have my own ideas about the soul, the spiritual, but they are a bit long-winded to go into here



It depends on how you catagorise "living" and what you include and exlude from that catagory - again it's not so clear cut. Personally no one will ever convince me that rocks think. They exist as energy (as does everything) but that's it as far as I'm concerned - they are not sentient (anymore than the planet is).



Can't help you there I'm afraid. Since I don't believe rocks or whatever else are sentient I see no reason to try and get in touch with them. However, that said, it may be that they can store up "memories" if you like - the old stone-tape theory - which may not be so strange (WARNING - "Q" WORD COMING ) as it sounds - I'm thinking of recent theories proposed in the field of Quantum Bioholography amongst others.

Perhaps I am coming at it from too black an white an angle. It was just something that proved tricky to totally get my head around, I wont even start on the whole concept of time thing I was reading! lol

Time! Well there is a complicated issue - something I have been reading about of recent and trying to get my head around some of the concepts involved.

Eth says:

But when considered it throws up some questions, for instance whilst I have no problem with comprehending that all living things function on all three, I do have trouble with say rocks working on a mental level. Thats only one example but hopefully it will give you guys an idea of where Im having difficulty.

Yes, the distinctions do get a bit blurry when applying these categories to 'real life' examples. On the issue of rocks (and trees for that matter) sometimes I do sense a type of livingness and a sort of consciousness, thats more like a 'feeling', but then is a feeling a thought?

some would argue that I am merely projecting my own feelings on to the environment (eg the rock, tree or what ever) but then why does the 'feeling' go away when I go away from the source of this feeling?

it is one issue that I ponder...

fizz

Don't reject it all too soon Ethereal. it is an old question, (or 'answer' if you know it), in traditional witchcraft. You are trying to apply modern logic and thinking and missing simething basic. For example, have you experienced 'faerie'? have you considered alechemy? These are two examples of how the broad question you ask is understood and dealt with.
Rocks do not think, the whole idea is skew. But there is consciousness of 'Land', and of 'earth element' that can apply here. Those are labels only, do not let them mislead you, use your own understanding. It is actually basic witchcraft and because few are truly witch, not often traveled. Do some more thinking on this, then perhaps head towards meditation instead, use whatever tools you use to enter the 'realms' and see where your consciousness follows. It is not that the rocks and minerals have conscious thought, it is more that the adept can enter that realm of being and perceive the connections, flows and yup, spirit, of that level. The language does not convey the experience.

Thank you Jape, I knew I had to be approaching this in the wrong way. Too coldly clinical in my thinking. The immersion into 'Faerie' is a good suggestion, all too apparant now that it has been said. I will find some time to approach this from the 'other' direction and see where the path takes me.

I look forward to hearing of your journey. Suggestion, if you ever travel 'astral', even as 'lucid dream' or some other horrible term, try sinking into earth instead of flying.

Eth, put aside rational thought and the need to classify experiences, and reach out to what's there in a place.

Obviously, you need to preserve enough wariness to guard yourself if you encounter something unpleasant. But, if you are able to be open and to distinguish between what comes from yourself and what does not, you will receive impressions relating to places which are true to those places, and not generated from your own mind.

As to the source of those impressions - that is not always so easy to tie down. For want of a better description, I have been spoken to in Avebury and Stonehenge by rocks. That does not mean I go around seeking to speak to rocks wherever I go - far from it. My rational mind tells me it is impossible. Fine - so maybe it was the wights of the land. You think that distinction would matter to non-pagans? And the distinction does not change the experience, and neither is knowing the precise nature of the source, on those two occasions, needful. If I were to go down the route of trying to classify the whole experience then there is the danger that the only thing I will accomplish is to lose it.

The important distinction - to me, at any rate, YMMV - is between what is truly from outside myself and what is not. Beyond that, one can slice and dice and categorise to one's heart's content, and in whatever way one wishes.

Can't argue with that ...except, lol ... 'what is truly from outside and what is not' ....!
Following the 'connections' as Eth is, perhaps those are the very boundaries that need to be lost, anything else is translation by the self into meaningful experience at the time and place or point of view one feels the need to hold onto in order to hold onto self! That should make sense I hope but grammar can be difficult in metaphysics.

Further to that and following what I think Moonhunter is saying, my experience is that there is little need to hold to self or boundary. Threats, if perceived, will just bring you back to mundane self, but conversely, 'allowing' or accepting threats (differences, fears, complexes, other) means they become formless as often as not. And a good belief to start such enterprises with is that the ultimate self is not able to be harmed. Surely, it is experiencing that self that is the whole point of the exercise? The paradox is thus resolved and experienced and momentarily, kenshu or even satori - which is a good trick to have in place for when you die, gives you choices when arguing with the witchmother/angelic self etc. about coming back again in service. Trad witch point of view of course.

Indeed it can!

Hmm...I'd like to explore this in order to find out whether we're saying the same thing, or two different things.

The distinction I was making between that which comes from within and without is the need to eliminate self deception, as far as possible. I don't know whether self deception is possible in a complete trance state, but there are other states of altered consciousness which are lighter, but in which one is capable of communicating with other beings - gods, wights etc. What I am talking about is knowing the difference between, if you like, wishful thinking and that sort of communication.

Now, it may be that none of us can ever be sure it isn't wishful thinking, which is why I try - as far as possible - to check my experiences with those of others I trust. Not every experience, every time, but enough, and frequently enough, to assure myself I'm not completely off the rails, or self delusional. Enough for me. But I've been doing that now for ... uh... twenty years? Discounting the Zen training. And my initial training twenty years ago was by experts in their own school. Though that was very different to pagan practice, there are enough similarities in most of these disciplines to produce tranferrable skills.



here, we will have to differ. My own self protection is good, but I have met something, on at least one occasion, which was not about to become formless. The attack is psychic, though I have come across people who claimed occurrences which became physical. And the human mind is complex itself to produce such effects.



This makes me wonder if we are talking about different things - you seem to have a slightly different discipline in mind, whose purpose is to eliminate the defences of the ego in order to join with the 'other'. That, for me, is part of complete trance, where communication becomes more a state of being.




Not my theology. But I find the skills themselves, as I say, are not dependent upon or fixed to one theology.