Posts Tagged ‘John’

About Magic and the Memory Palace

Tuesday, June 1st, 2010

In the 5th century AD, Martianus Capella defined the Seven Liberal Arts: Grammar, Dialectic, Rhetoric, Geometry, Arithmetic, Astronomy, and (Musical) Harmony. The System of Capella became the model of the Medieval University.

The term liberal means “appropriate for free men“.  The Liberal Arts represented the kinds of skills and general knowledge needed by the Elite. The Servile Arts represented Specialized Tradesman Skills and knowledge needed by persons who were employed or owned by the Elite.
liberal arts

The Seven Liberal Arts

The Number Seven was not taken by Accident. This number represented the Seven Days of the Week, the Seven Spheres, the  Seven Planets, the Seven Notes and the Seven Colors.

The Seven Planets of the old cosmology included the Sun (Sol) and the Moon (Luna), which we now don’t regard as planets at all.   The other Five were Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, the 7th planet and the Son of the Sun.

seven planets of Ptotelemy

The Seven Planets in the System of Ptolemy

In Ancient Babylonia,  the Seven Spheres were represented by a Building , A Ziggurat, that looked like the Tower of Bable. This Babylonian Step Tower was a Visual Model of the StairWay to Heaven.  The Seven Spheres were divided in three Heavens and three Hells with the Earth in the Middle. The Pyramids in Egypt are based on the same model.

The Seven Heavens

Dante and The Tower of Bable

The Three Heavens contained Three Hierarchies of Angels, Nine in total. At the Top, the Eight Step,  the Creator was situated. Again the Creator consisted of three Entities, The Father, The Son and The Holy Gost (The Trinity).

As You can See the Number Three plays a very important role in the Ancient Models. The main reason could be that this number is the most efficient number when you want to create a Number System.

If you use this number as the Base System the Universe could be explained as Triangels within Triangels. With the help of the Trinity-Fractal Ancient models like the Tree of Life, and the Egyptian Pesedjet are easy to understand. The Trinity-Fractal comes back in modern Physics as the Triangel of Pascal.  In Ancient China the Triangel of Pascal was called the Wei Chi. The Wei Chi was used to play the Game of GO.

The The Three Levels and the Nine Hierarchies of Angels

Earth (the Grave), The Three Heavens and the Nine Hierarchies of Angels

In 1275 Raymond Lull designed a tool to Classify and Generate all the Knowledge of the Universe based on a Set of  Nine (3×3) Concepts.  His invention was described in his book Ars Magna (“The Ultimate General Art”).

Lull’s logic machine consisted of a stack of concentric disks mounted on an axis where they could rotate independently. The disks, made of card stock, wood, or metal, were progressively larger from top to bottom. As many as 16 words or symbols were visible on each disk. By rotating the disks, random statements were generated from the alignment of words. Lull’s most ambitious device held 14 disks.

The disk contained the Nine most important (Christian) Concepts of the Universe:  Bonitas (Goodness), Magnitudo (Greatness), Eternitas (Eternity), Potestas (Power), Sapientia (Wisdom), Voluntas (Will), Virtus (Virtue), Veritas (Truth), and Gloria (Glory).

Lull’s fame as a Mystic spread throughout Europe during the late Middle Ages and Renaissance. Centuries later, the German mathematician Leibniz acknowledged the importance of Lull’s Machine.

The idea for the machine came to Lull in a Mystical Vision that appeared to him after a period of fasting and contemplation. In reality, Lull may owe his Divine Inspiration to the Magi. They used a Device called the Zairja, an Idea Generator that used the 28 letters of the Arabic alphabet to represent the 28 Categories of Thought in Arab Philosophy.

Ramon_Llull_-_Ars_Magna

In 1516 Thomas Moore published his book Utopia, a description of an Ideal State. Much later Tommaso Campanella (The City of the Sun), Francis Bacon (The New Atlantis) and Johannes Valentinus Andreae (Description of the Republic of Christianopolis) wrote comparable books. The books were based on Plato’s Republic. All of the books contained Architectual Designs based on Ancient Geometries.

Utopia Moore

Utopia Thomas Moore

Around 1300 Wealthy and Powerfull Merchants (de Medici) in Italy regained interest in the Ancient Knowledge of the Egyptians, the Arab, the Greek and the Romans. This knowledge was almost completely destroyed by the Church of Rome.

Scientists, Poets and Artists (Petraca, Dante, Boccaccio) visited Byzantium and discovered ancient manuscripts written in Greek and Latin.  Greek scholars were encouraged to come from Byzantium to Italy. Byzantium and Europe was ransacked for copies of the long unused Latin classics and copyists multiplied them.

Libraries were founded, and schools for the study of both Greek and Latin in their classic forms were opened at Rome, Mautua, Verona, and many other towns. After the fall of Constantinople in 1453 the proces gained a further impetus because of a number of Greek humanists who moved from Byzantium to Italy.

In 1462 the Platonic Academy was opened in Florence under the patronage of Florentine Duke Cosimo de’ Medici. Its leader became Marcilio Ficino.

Around 1463 Cosimo de’ Medici commissioned Marsilio Ficino to translate a book called the Pimander with high priority  into Latin from a Greek manuscript brought from Macedonia. This book contained the Corpus Hermeticum that was attributed to Hermes Trismegistus.

Hermes Trismegistus “Thrice-Wise“was named Thoth or Djehuti in Ancient Egypt. The Djed of Djehuti represents the Power of the Snake (the Kundalini) in the Spinal Column. Thoth was the Scribe of the Gods, the inventor of writing, and was usually depicted in hieroglyphics with the head of an Ibis Bird. This head of the IBIS carried the Moon, the Planet of the Mother God, The Night and of Magic.

Thoth and the Human represented by the Ape. The Ape uses the Eye of Horus (the third Eye) to look at Thoth

Thoth, the Ibis with the Moon on his Head and the Human represented by the Ape. The Ape uses the Eye of Horus (the third Eye) to look at Thoth. The Eye of Horus is the Pineal Gland, the Seat of the Imagination in the Brain.

At that time Scientists believed that the Older the Truth the Bettter. They believed there was once a Golden Age in which the Eternal Truth was known. From that time on History was in a Downfall until the time of the Resurrection.

Marsilio Fucino dated Hermes Trismegistus “long before the sages and philosophers of Greece, but yet after Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph“. His dating of the Corpus “proved” that the writings of Hermes contained the Primal Source of Wisdom.

In 1945 Coptic fragments of the Corpus Hermeticum together with many other Gnostic Writings were found at Nag Hammadi, Egypt.

At this moment we know that the Corpus Hermeticus just like the Emerald Tablet ,another text dedicated to Hermes, was written in Alexandria around 200 BC.

Alexandria, created by Alexander the Great, was the place where the Ancient Knowledge of Heliopolis ,the City of the Sun, was stored in its immense libraries after its destruction. A part of this library was later moved to Byzantium, the Center of the East when the library of Alexandria was destructed.

The most important message of Hermes is that the Physical World is the Manifestation of the Spiritual World. This is summarized in the Hermetic adage “As above, so below.” At this moment we would name the concept of “As Above, So Below” a Self-Reference or a Fractal.  The old Scientists knew that one Concept returned on every Level of Our Inside and Outside Reality.

The Corpus Hermeticus provided a seminal force in the development of Renaissance thought and culture. After the Dark Middle Ages, controlled by the Rule System of the Church of Rome, the Scientists started to do their Own Research and  Thinking.

The Cycle of Culture moved from the Stage of Order to the Stage of Imagination.

Hermes Trismegistus in the Cathedral of Siena

Hermes Trismegistus in the Cathedral of Siena

One of these Scientists was Giordano Bruno. Bruno was born in 1548. At the age of 17, he entered the Dominican Order, was trained in the Liberal Arts of that time  and became an ordained priest in 1572 at age 24. During his time in Naples he became known for his skill with the Art of Memory and on one occasion traveled to Rome to demonstrate his System before Pope Pius V and Cardinal Rebiba.

The Art of Memory belonged to the rhetoric tradition as a technique which enabled the orator to deliver long speeches from memory with unfailing accuracy.

giordano_bruno

Giordano Bruno

At that time people had to Learn a lot of information by Heart. To do this they used a Mnemonic System called a Memory Palace. The memory images were linked with visualized locations that could be found in architecture, books, sculpture and painting, which were seen by practitioners of the Art of Memory as Externalizations of Internal Memory.

Artists used the Images that were part of the Memory Palace as a reference. The Images were linked with Universal Concepts. In the time of Middle Ages and the Renaissance people knew the Meaning of every Image that was used. Geometric Structures, Paintings, Poems and Buildings were carriers of many Levels of Meaning. Some of these levels were only known by the Inner Circle of Ancient Secret Societies.

In the old days the Inside World was seen as the most important place to Explore. The Outside was nothing but a Projection of the Inside.

Examples of Ancient Memory Palaces are Ancient Egypt, the City of Meru (Sri Yantra), the City of Heliopolis, the Babylonian Ziggurat, the Egyptian Pyramid, The Temple of Solomon,  and the most important Memory Palace,  the Zodiac. In the Middle Ages Cathedrals (Chartres), Palaces (Alhambra) and Temples (Taj Mahal) were designed and used as Memory Palaces.

new jerusalem coming down out of heaven
The New Jerusalem

One of the most important Christian Memory Palaces is the New Jerusalem. It is a Vision about the New Earth that will arise after the Seven Seals are Broken and the Seven Trumpets have Sounded.

The Seven Trumpets are a symbol of the Seven Chakra’s. The Apocalyps, the opening of the Seventh Seal, is a symbol of the Jump of the Kundalini to the Kingdom, the New Jerusalem.

A large portion of the final two chapters of the Bible deals with John of Patmos’ Vision of the New Jerusalem. He describes the New Jerusalem as “‘the bride, the wife of the Lamb’“.  After John witnesses the new heaven and a new earth “that no longer has any sea“, an angel takes him “in the Spirit” to a vantage point on “a great and high mountain” to see the New Jerusalem’s descent.

According to John, the New Jerusalem is “pure gold, like clear glass” and its “brilliance [is] like a very costly stone, as a stone of crystal-clear jasper.” The New Jerusalem is a Symbol of  the Renewal of Religion that will take place and which secures the Prosperity of the Human World.

Alhambra
Alhambra

“Some place is chosen of the largest possible extent and characterised by the utmost possible variety, such as a space house divided into a number of rooms. Everything of note therein is carefully committed to the memory…The next step is to distinguish something [to be remembered] by some particular symbol which will serve to jog the memory…. These symbols are then arranged as follows. The first thought is placed, as it were, in the forecourt; the second, let us say, in the living-room; the remainder are placed in due order all round… and entrusted not merely to bedrooms and parlours, but even to the care of statues and the like. This done, as soon as the memory of the facts requires to be revived, all these places are visited in turn and the various deposits are demanded from their custodians, as the sight of each recalls the respective details” (Quintilian Institutio Oratoria, Book XI).

The Temple of Solomon

The Temple of Solomon

The Art of Memory was a very important Art because Manuscripts were very rare and the use of Manuscripts and Symbols was seen as the major cause of the detoriation of society. Books produced “fake” scientists who are not wise but only appear to be wise.

For this invention will produce forgetfulness in the minds of those who learn to use it, because they will not practise their memory. Their trust in writing, produced by external characters which are not part of themselves, will discourage the use of their own memory within them. You have invented an elixir not of memory but of reminding; and you offer your pupils the appearance of wisdom, not true wisdom, for they will read many things without instruction and will therefore seem to know many things, when they are for the most part ignorant and hard to get along with, since they are not wise, but only appear wise” (Plato, Phaedrus).

Chartres

Chartres

Giulio Camillo was one of the most famous men of the 16th century. With a commission of 1200 ducats from the King of France, Francois I, he created a theatre that contained divine powers: whoever entered the theatre would emerge with a complete memory of all the knowledge that had ever existed. The design of his theatre is described in his book L’idea del teatro written in 1554, the last year of his life. The theatre consisted of Seven Levels and contained the complete Knowledge of the Corpus Hermeticum.

Borobudur (Meru Temple) contains the Sri Yantra

Borobudur (Meru Temple)

Following the order of the creation of the world, we shall place on the first levels the more natural things…those we can imagine to have been created before all other things by divine decree. Then we shall arrange from level to level those that followed after, in such a way that in the seventh, that is, the last and highest level shall sit all the arts… not by reason of unworthiness, but by reason of chronology, since these were the last to have been found by men” (Guilio Camillo).

meru

The Design of the City of Meru is based on the Sri Yantra-generator. This Generator generates Quasi-Crystals and Penrose Tilings.

At the time of Gordiano Bruno Copernicus detected that the Sun was the Center of our Planetary System. His discovery was in conflict with the Theories that were educated at the Universities that were controlled by the Church of Rome.

Gordiano Bruno saw that the new theories were in line with the teachings of the Corpus Hermeticum in which the Sun (of Heliopolis) was in the Center. Bruno started to Fuse the Knowlegde of the Corpus Hermeticum with his already highly advanced Memory System.

At that time the power of the Church of Rome was going down rapidly. Europe was divided by religious wars between Catholics and Protestants. The merchants, bankers and artisans of Europe’s largest cities and towns resented the fact that local bishops of the Church controlled all of their commercial and economic activities.

Priests married and then took mistresses, holy offices were bought and sold for the highest price, incompetence among the clergy became the rule, the congregation of more and more people in towns and cities perhaps exposed the amorality and immorality of the clergy.

Taj Mahal (Shiva Temple)

Taj Mahal (Shiva Temple)

Gordiano Bruno believed he had to create a new Religion based on the Ancient foundation of Religion he found in Egypt.

Gordiano was a free-thinker and he never stopped expressing his own believes. When he learned that an indictment was being prepared against him in Naples he fled the convent and started to travel Europe.  He visited the French King Henry III, the English Queen Elizabeth, Wittenburg , the Center of the Protestant Movement, the city of Prague and Emperor Rudolf II.

At every place he came he started to educate the others in his Expanding (forbidden) Vision of the Infinite Universe. At every place his free-thinking brought him into a conflict and he had to move on.

In 1592 he was lured to Venice, arrested by the Inquisition and transported to Rome. In 1600 he was convicted and publicly burned at the Campo de’ Fiori in Rome. In 1889 a Statue was erected at the place of his execution.

The Statue of Giordano Bruno at the Campo Fiero

The Statue of Giordano Bruno at the Campo de' Fiori

At the time of Gordiano Bruno many of the important people where highly interested in Magic, Alchemy and Astrology. One of the people Gordiano visited,  the Emperor Rudolf II,  practised Alchemy in his own private laboratory and spared no expense in bringing Europe’s best alchemists to court, such as John Dee, the personal alchemist of Queen Elizabeth.

There is no evidence that Giordiano Bruno met John Dee when he was in England but he was in contact with the most important people that were part of the “Hermetic Circle” of John Dee. There is a lot of evidence that Bruno was the creator of the Rosicrusians.

Queen Elizabeth and John Dee

Queen Elizabeth and John Dee

Bruno’s books on the Art of Memory were in reality Courses in the Solar Magic taught by Hermes Trismegistus.

Bruno knew that the most important tools of the Magician are the Power of his Imagination and the Connection with the Major Powers in the Hierarchy in the Heavens, the ArchAngels and the Demiurg, the Creator of the Matrix.

The System of Bruno was created to make is possible to generate powerfull images and Magical Rituals to make the Right Connection (Bonding) with the Major Creators of the Universe we live in.

There are three gates through which the hunter of souls (the Magician) ventures to bind: vision,  hearing and mind or imagination. If it happens that someone passes through all three of these gates, he binds most powerfully and ties down most tightly.” “He who enters through the gate of hearing is armed with his voice and with speech, the son of voice. He who enters through the gate of vision is armed with suitable forms, gestures, motions and figures. He who enters through the gate of the imagination, mind and reason is armed with customs and the arts.” (Giordano Bruno, Theses de Magia, Vol. LVI).

An Image to make a connection with the Power of the Sun

An Astrologial Image of Bruno. It contains the Lyre of David (an Ancient Pole Star).

Robert Fludd was born in England in 1574,  thirty years after Giordano Bruno was born. Between 1598 and 1604, Fludd studied the Liberal Arts on the European mainland. Robert Fludd was one of the last Hermetic Scientists of the Renaissance. In his life he tried to describe everything that was known until that day. Robert Fludd was a Rosicrucian.

One of his products is a Musical Memory Palace and a Memory Theatre, the Globe, that was used by Lord Chamberlain’s company to which Shakespeare belonged. In the view of Fludd a theatrical play was a Projection of a part of a Memory Palace.  The Theatre was a tool to educate the Elite (and the Masses) into the Hermetic Whole.

Robert Fludd, The Temple of Music

The work of Bruno and Fludd was taken over by many other Scientists but the relationship between the Art of Memory and Magic slowly faded away.

At the end of the Renaissance Reason, Logic, became much more important than the Seven Liberal Arts.  The Scientists of the Age of Enlightment wanted to get rid of the Delusions of the Imagination. The only thing that counted were Facts observed by the Senses.

Leibniz (1646-1716) was one of the exceptions. He was an Old Fashioned Renaissance Magician and believed in the Harmony of the Spheres. He invented many theories that proved his Point of View and are now proven to be Right.

He believed that scholarship or “perfect knowledge of the principle of all sciences and the art of applying them ” could be divided into three equally important parts : the Art of Reasoning, the Art of Inventing (Combinatorics) and the Art of Memory and the Imagination (Magic). He even wrote an unpublished manuscript about the Art of Memory.

Leibniz got into a big conflict with Newton about the Role of the Imagination and Scientific Discovery in Society. Afther his death Newton and his Protectors, the Medici of Florence, started an effective campaign to prove that Newton was the inventor of the Theories of Leibniz. This is the reason why Newton became the major Scientist of his time.

Rosicrucian_Rose

The Rosicrucian Rose with the Trinity of the Chained Lion of the Sun, the Unicorn of the Moon and the Crossed Triangels of the Center, the Heart Chakra.

After the Renaissance, the Stage of the Imagination, the Cycle of Culture moved to the Stage of the Emotions, the Time of the French Revolution. The Old Social Structures of Europe started their big Transformation.

Around 1740 the Industrial Revolution started in England and the Theories of Newton, Descartes and Kant about the Cold Mechanical Reasoner without Feeling and Imagination took the Lead. The ultimate products of the Industrial Revolution, the Computer and the related Factory-Model are now the Leading Paradigm.

The link between the Machine that Controls and Generates our Universe (the Yantra), the Ideas/Concepts that govern our Universe and the related mostly Astronomical Symbols is now completely lost.

Almost nobody is able to understand and value the Ancient Knowledge of Heliopolis that Scientists like Gordiano Bruno and Robert Fludd were trying to reconstruct during the Renaissance.

The Medici and their Successors, the Big Bankers and Merchants, finally succeeded in the Destruction of the Imagination and the Emotions.

Starting 1950 the Cycle is moving into a new Renaissance.

After the Invention of Quantum Mechanics (inspired by Robert Fludd) it becomes clearer and clearer that The Imagination is the Major Power that Creates and Sustains our Universe.

The Ideas of Bruno, Fludd, Plato, the Corpus Hermeticum and the Ancient Knowledge of Heliopolis are coming Back.

One of the most interesting scientists of the Art of Memory is Alan Turing. He constructed a very simple machine now called a Turing Machine that contained a Memory and a Writing Device that could move backwards and forwards. With the help of this simple Device Turing was able to solve many Mathematical Problems. At the end of his Life just before he committed suicide he started to research Morphology, the Science of the Forms.

What to Do?

The Current University System is highly fragmented. It needs a general principle to Unite all the now diverging Subjects of Investigation. The complexity of our Science is enormous. The link between Science, Art and Religion is gone.  We are in the same state as the World was at the end of the Middle Ages.

Perhaps we could introduce the Memory Palace again. It would certainly help to improve the Memory of the Students who are now Copying and Pasting the Internet.

Behind The Memory Palace lies the theory of the Fractal Universe (“As Above, So Below“) and the Trinity-Pattern. The Same Pattern Repeats itself on every Level of Existence.

The Fractal Universe simplifies Science enormously!

Perhaps the Modern Scientists could start to look for Repeating Structures on many Levels and Exchange these Structures. They could start to listen to the Scientists of Physics and Mathematics who have already found the fractal patterns.

LINKS

An English translation of the Pimander

About the Power of the Imagination

About the Nine Concepts of Egyptian Science

About Alan Turing and the Art of Memory

About the Egyptian Djed

About the 7th Planet, Saturn

Why the Trinity is the Most Efficient Number Base

Why Leibniz was a Magician

About the Triangle of Pascal

About the Power of Reason

About Plato and Harmony

How Robert Fludd influenced Quantum Mechanics

About the War between Newton and Leibniz

How Socrate changed the Cycle of Western Culture

Why the World is one big Memory Palace

About the Renaissance

Why the Industrial Revolution was really a Social Revolution

About Epigenetics and the Power of the Imagination

About the Placebo Effect

Arthur Zajonc: Catching the Light

The POWER of Habit

Wednesday, November 12th, 2008

 

John Dryden famously said, “We first make our habits, and then our habits make us.”

Confucius said, “Men’s natures are alike; it is their habits that separate them.”

And Aristotle noticed that, “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit.”

 

It’s pretty clear that the habits you adopt will shape who you are. What are your habits?
Do you eat the same thing for lunch, go through the same exercise routine, and fall into bed at the same time each night?
Or maybe you’ve made a habit out of eating something sweet before bed, avoiding the gym, and staying up as late as possible.

When it comes to your fitness, the two habits that define you are your eating and exercise habits. In fact, everyone that you know who is in great shape has dialed in these two important habits. Check these amarose reviews.

If you aren’t happy with your current state, then simply adjust your eating and exercise habits.

 

Here’s how to adopt a habit:

1) Decide on the ONE habit that you would like to develop. It’s tempting to pick up 3 or 4 healthy habits but choosing just one new habit is realistic and doable. Here are some healthy habit ideas:

• Do not eat after 7pm each night.
• Bring your lunch to work instead of eating fast food.
• Exercise 4 times a week before or after work for 45 minutes each time.
• Only eat fruits and veggies as your afternoon snack (mostly veggies).
• Get up early and exercise for an hour each morning.
• Workout with me 3 times a week.

 

2) Write your new habit down on paper. Also include your 3 main motivators for developing this new habit, the obstacles you’ll face, and your strategies for overcoming these obstacles.

Here’s an example:

• My new habit is to work with a personal trainer 3 times each week. Learn more about protetox.
• My 3 main motivators are 1) to feel confident in my bathing suit this summer, 2) to have more energy, and 3) to fit into my skinny jeans.
• The obstacles I will face are 1) not having the energy to go to my session after work, 2) not having enough money to pay for sessions, and 3) not having my spouse’s support.
• I will overcome these obstacles by 1) doing my workouts before work instead of after work, so I have more energy, 2) cutting down on frivolous spending to ensure that I can afford it, and 3) asking my spouse to join me so we can get in shape together.

 

3) Commit fully to your new habit, in a public way. This could mean posting it on social media, or simply announcing it at the dinner table. Put yourself in a position where you’ll be less likely to give up on your new habit. Visit https://washingtoncitypaper.com/article/561560/six-best-testosterone-booster-for-muscle-growth-to-try-in-2022/.

 

4) Keep track of your progress. You could keep a detailed journal or simply make a check mark on each calendar day that you successfully exercise your new habit. Once your new habit becomes second nature, usually in about 30 days, feel free to add a second habit by going through the same steps. I’d love for my fitness program to become your new healthy habit!

About the Old Egyption Concept of Justice, Ma’at

Friday, July 4th, 2008

maat_goddessofjustice1Ma’at was one of the Egyptian Neteru (a Goddess). She represented the concept of Justice. Just like Lady Justice she carries a scale in her hands. Ma’at was also the keeper of the Afterworld.

The dead person’s heart was placed on a scale, balanced by the Feather of Ma’at. If the deceased had been found not to have followed the concept of Ma’at during his life (if he had lied or cheated or killed) his heart was devoured by a demon and he died the final death and was reincarnated. If the heart weighed the same as Ma’at, the deceased was allowed to go on to the eternal afterlife.

Ma’at was an important Neteru and important Neteru are bisexual. Ma’at was created by Amon (later named Ra, The Sun) and was one of the four bisexual primal forces in the Universe. Ma’at was the Breath of Life. Through Ma’at the Cycle of the Seasons and every other Cycle was moving around. Ma’at represented the Rythm of the Universe.

Later the bisexual Neteru were split into a male and a female part. Ma’at became female and her companion was represented by a Baboon. Later the Baboon changed into Thoth, The Scribe. Thoth (or Set) was the creator of language and writing. He was also a very powerfull Magician.

Behind the many transformations lies a very important story. It is the story of the Creation of Man. Man was a creation of a Neteru and his creation was a big mistake. His creation was not according to the Plan of Amon. The Plan of Amon was to keep Ma’at, Balance, Rythm and Order.

Man was created out of the secret fusion between one of the Neteru (Seth, Thoth, Enlil) and a “Chattering” Baboon. Three times the fusion failed and in the end Enlil decided to destroy his creations by the Great Flood. The Fusions between Ape and God was creating a gigantic cosmic Unbalance.

One of the Talking Baboons (Atrahasis, Noach) and all the (not-talking) Organisms were saved by the intervention of one of the other male Neteru (Enki, The Wise, The Water God). The Words of the Organisms (Seeds, DNA?) were put into a boat (The Ark). To keep the overpopulation of Humans in balance a System of Cycles of Creation and Destruction was created.

On the level of the Soul Man is a bisexual being. The Soul is incarnated in a Male and a Female body until he is able to leave the Cycle. He is able to leave the Cycle when his heart weights the same as the Feather of Ma’at. All he has to do is to live a life of Justice. He has to act out of the Heart.

A Human is capable of Injustice because he carries the “genes” of one of the male Neteru who stood up against Amon. If his heart is Heavy Like a Stone he is taken over by the Demon and has to return to the Material World to try again and again until he has learned his lesson (Reincarnation). The Demon has many tricks to keep the Soul into the material plane. His most important trick is Language.

Ancient Egyptian law dates from 3000 BC. It was based on the concept of Ma’at, rhetorical speech, social equality and impartiality. Around the 2200 BC the first law code based on casuistic statements (“if… then…”) was developed in Persia. Around 1760 BC, King Hammurabi further developed Babylonian law by codifying and inscribing it in stone.

About 5000 years later many people believe the Ancient people were barbaric. Objective Law and its Institutions are one of the beautifull inventions of Western Culture. Western Culture was a product of the old Greek Civilizations. The Romans perfected the System of Law.

Almost nobody knows that the old Creek Scientists copied all their knowlegde out of Egypt. The Greeks named the concept of Ma’at, Logos. The early Christians adopted this concept as you can see in the first line of the Gospel of John (“In the beginning was the Logos ,and the Logos was with God”). In the Gnostic Tradition of Christianity Ma’at was called Sophia (Wisdom).

The effect of the Gene of the deficient Neter later called the Devil has increased in Time. The split of the Male and the Female part resulted in a Male Dominance in every area part of Society. The Afterworld changed into an Underworld. The Power of the Heart has diminished.

The concept of Ma’at has lost his place. Ma’at has been blinded and her Feather has changed into a Sword. The amount of Rules has increased tremendously. The Chattering Baboon has produced many Words of Justice. The Talking Baboon has taken over the Power. His Words have finally killed Amon. Ma’at is not needed anymore. The Baboons are able to Stear the Stars themselves.

Nobody knows that we are still silently governed by Ma’at. We have to move to the Dark Cycle to restore the Golden Age of the Gods. In the Golden Age the Light of Amon (The Sun) will Shine Again.

Truth, Integrity, Honesty, Goodness and Balance brings one closer to the spiritual essence that is all pervasive in the Universe. There was nothing more sacred or important to the practitioner of the Ancient Egyptian Religion. The cosmic order that is Ma’at connects everything in the ageless dance of beauty and motion giving meaning to existence on all levels.

About Paths of Change by Will McWhinney

Monday, August 27th, 2007
Will McWhinney

Will McWhinney

The Navajo Pollen Path inspired Will McWhinney to write his book Paths of Change

The Navajo Pollen Path

Oh, beauty before me, beauty behind me, beauty to the right of me, beauty to the left of me, beauty above me, beauty below me, I’m on the pollen path.”

About ten years ago I met Will McWhinney.

Will became the most influential person in my whole life. He died this year.

Will wrote just one book called Paths of Change.

Paths of Change is based on the ancient Navajo Pollen Path.

Will was an expert in the myths and culture of the Ancient Tribes that lived in the Four Corners-area of New Mexico.  Every year he organized a seminar in the Ghost Range for his ex-PHD-students. I visited many of his seminars and fell in love with New Mexico and the ancient cultures (Hopi!) that live in this area.

Will tried to write a second book called Grammars of Engagement. The book is about Coupling or Entrainment.  For about ten years we discussed many of his ideas.

Unfortunately his book was never finished. The reason it was never finished can be found in Paths of Change. Will was not able to apply his own theory. Strangely enough this proves his theory.

Let me try to explain the theory of Will. The theory of Will is based on his reflection about the Practice of Change.

He did not write the book alone. He discussed his intuition with all his colleagues of UCLA (University of Los Angeles).

What they wanted to resolve was a very strange pattern behind the failures of Personal and Organizational Change.

Will and his colleagues found out that the explanation was simple. Human beings don’t think the same. They are unaware of this. Almost everybody is convinced that all humans think the same. This is the main reason why many people don’t believe the theory of Will. This again proves the theory.

Will discovered four basic ways to think. He named them Mythic, Social, Unity and Sensory. The four ways are completely independent.

The consequence of Path of Change is that You reader when you are not of my world will read this article and think you understand what I am trying to say but in reality you understand something else.

The Chinese Pollen Path

The Chinese Pollen Path

When I meet you you will prove this when I ask you to explain what you think I am trying to say. The only way to explain the theory is to detect your worldview and use your language to tell the same thing.

When I do that you will think I am explaining a different theory. Probably you will ask me why I have changed my point of view (= world-view) and I have to explain you in your language that I did not do that. This will cause the same problem. You will think I am inconsistent.

When you are living in a world with only one world view you are according to all the Best Practises in Mental Ilness (Interpersonal Theory) highly disturbed.

Many people are able to think in two world views. They are able to switch from one world view to the other.

The amount of different combinations of Two of the Four Worldviews is Twelve (4×4 = 16 but 4 are the same x the same = the same -> 16-4 = 12). Will named the 12 Duals Games but you can also call them Apostles (with Jezus at the Center 12+1 = 13), Knights (of the Round Table with Arhur at the Center) or Constellations (of the Zodiac with the Sun at the Center).

Some people are able to switch to all of the world views. When you are able to switch to the worldview of the other you are able to explain the same thing differently. You are able to look at the world with a shared view.

The four worldviews in the book of kells

The Four Worldviews in the Book of Kells

When both our worldviews are the same we will agree on everything but both of us will not see the others. This is the main reason why people with shared worldviews join in all kinds of cooperation’s. They join because they need a secure place that shields them from the strange outside world.

It is also the reason why people with different world-views leave a cooperation in due time. They feel the others don’t understand them. Clusters of shared world-views become highly inflexible when the outside world changes.

When you are a Sensory you will say “what I read until now is highly theoretical. I want to see facts and prove. Is the theory of Will tested?”.

Although Path of Change is Best Practice you will not accept what he is writing. You want to experience the theory yourself and perhaps 20 years later you will write a book telling the same thing. You will write a book full of examples because you love examples. You will be convinced it is telling something very different Will was telling. Happily Will has also written a book that uses examples and cases to help You.

Luke the Evangelist, the Social

Luke the Evangelist with the Sheep, the Symbol of the Social

When you are a Social you want to know the opinions of important social scientists and others you feel are of importance. You believe important people are telling important things and you have never heard of McWhinney so his theory is not important to know.

When you are a Unity you want to know the Rules. You want to be told what to do and most of the time you do what the Rules tell you to do. The book Will has written is without Rules it contains concepts and ideas. You think concepts and ideas are not concrete. You even don’t like some of his concepts because they are not according to the concepts you think are true. They are violating your System of Thought. You believe in absolute truth.

When you are a Mythic you believe everything is possible. Life is full of opportunities. You generate ideas and concepts all the time. A Mythic creates his own unique theory and his theory is really a theory about himself. A Mythic is unaware of this. To become aware of this he has to face the facts. He needs to switch to a Sensory world view or accept the view of an other who is able to see the world this way. This is very difficult for a Mythic because a Mythic is very Will-full.

john the evangelist the mythic

John the Evangelist with the Eagle, the Symbol of the Mythic

A Mythic is convinced he is the only person who understands the World and some day the World will understand what a genius he is. This will never happen when he is alive. Mythics become a Myth when they are dead.

A Mythic is also an artist. He produces paintings, poems and even theory but his theory is mostly incomprehensible for others just like poetry.

Only Mythics understand Mythics. They feel the Field of Meaning. A Mythic does not understand that the others don’t understand him because his poetry is `the way it is`. It tells everything there is to say.

Will’s basic patterns were Mythic and Social. He was also able to switch to Unity. His blind spot was Sensory. Although many people were very enthusiastic about his book he did not see the facts about his success.

As a Social he focused on the recognition of important social scientists. At the end of his life he was very sad about this. As a Mythic he was convinced his theory was simple and easy to understand. This created even more sadness. Sadness and depressions are the mental illnesses when a Social becomes too Social.

Why was Will unable to finish his book? A Mythic is a highly creative person. He was constantly generating new ideas and concepts. The book was changing and changing and changing because Will wanted to create the perfect book about Engagement. Every version of the book he created was a jewel of poetry and insight. Will wanted to create the perfect book and striving to perfection is again an act of a Mythic. Will was falling in the trap of his own world-view.

What Will also did not realize that he was really writing to understand himself. Path of Change and Grammars of Engagement were a personal quest to understand the real Will McWhinney.

Mark the Evangelist, Unity

Mark the Evangelist with Lion, the Symbol of Unity

In the last year of his life somebody asked him to write his life-story. He tried to do this. He became aware of the fact that his whole life was centered around one personal quest. He wanted to find harmony. He never found harmony because a Mythic is on a Quest and the Quest never stops because every time when he has found the Grale he will start to look for a new Grale.

In Grammars of Engagement he started to write about Harmony.

A few citations out of his unpublished manuscript:

All communication arises through coupling. All communications are dances that coordinate the rhythmic processes shared among the engaging systems

Communication is not a transmission of information, but rather a coordination of behavior among living organisms through mutual structural coupling. Coupling, the instrument of coordination, is established by the physics of exchange and by traditions that associate both human relations and communications with music: harmony, rhythm, tone and tune”.

Just right’ communication work because it allows systems to exchange energy, thus information, through entrainment. They dance to a just right message. The communication follows from exchanges that take place as the systems draw each other toward a common resonant mode. Systems communicate in the process of being more similar, approaching a harmonious state at least in the domain of the communication. Entrainment stops short of perfect harmony. With perfect harmony there is no exchange. ‘Just right’ is becoming close to harmonizing”.

What Will is describing is a dialogue. Will was always playing with his own thoughts. He was busy with an internal dialogue called Reflexion. Intense reflexion is a Mythic Process. When you only talk with Your Self there will be no difference. You are similar with yourself and the internal dialogue stops. You are in harmony.

matthew bull

Matthew with the Bull, the Symbol of Sensory

To make a difference you have to introduce others like your wife or your mother. People talk internally and externally with many voices. Most of them do this without noticing. They are not aware of the many personalities they are. They are not similar to themselves and therefore “out of balance”.

To become balanced they need to talk. A huge amount of conversations (gossip) are aimed at creating an internal balance. To find internal balance people look for people that are similar. Again they need a secure place that shields them from the strange outside world.

When people are constantly moving in similar environments they will never find their Kernel, The Self. It will be watching unable to interfere in the many dialogues that are taking place.

When the Self is unknown, people will not accept the theory of Will. They will be switching from one theory to the other without finding rest.

When they find themselves they will not need the theory of Will because they will be able to play with all the world-views. This is a paradox. It also proves the theory of Will because Will tried to explain that Life is a Paradox.

Another citation: `The process of coming close to harmonizing is visible in an old example. Automobiles and farm machinery once had clutches. These clutches consisted of two plates, one attached to the driver motor, the other attached to the wheels, thrasher, or rotary saw. When the operator ‘let in the clutch’ the two plates moved flat up against each other. As the clutch ‘comes in,’ the driver plate begins to transfer energy to the follower plate getting thus it to turn. At first, the clutch slips and most of the power goes to grabbing, which produces heat. Increasingly the driving plate turns the follower. With full ‘letting in,’ the two turn together. There is no more heating; they form a unit with no further visible communications. The coupling established at the molecular level joins the material of the driver and follower plates in transmitting power to the wheels and cutting blades. This clutching sequence is a model of entrainment. We can recognize similar entrainment sequences in many other situations: a spoon stirring batter in a bowl, cellular protein molecules latching onto antibodies, two persons entering into conversation, and 100,000 people being captured by Marion Anderson singing God Bless America at the Lincoln Memorial

Will was unable to operate his own clutch. This was really visible when he was driving his car.

The Magician, The Mythic

The Magician, The Mythic

He was a staccato person. He loved to work with steel and stone. He was a sculptor. His art was concrete. He loved to practice what he preached but he always practiced his theory in the outside world. He loved to help others but never wanted to be helped. This is the sad consequence of a Mythic/Social-combination.

Will showed that all the combinations are games and the Mythic/Social-game is the game of creating new games. A Mythic Social is an innovator. He is always on the front-line.

He does not see that his inventions wil be taken over by other World-View combinations that are highly practical like the Unity/Sensory-combination, The Expert.

Expert always think they have invented things themselves and never give the Mythic/Social the credits. This is a fact of life but Mythics don’t accept the facts of Life.

His books are wonderful pieces of English words I never heard of. He was a child of a highly educated family in Boston. His mother and father did not love him. They wanted him to become somebody. At the end of his life he was convinced he had failed to satisfy the ambitions of his parents. He told everybody this was the fatal trap in life.

Will was not only a Mythic but also a Social. Socials are highly influenced by Others. Of course parents play the most important role because a young child is incapable of resisting their influence. The Self of the young child is watching.

The Fifth World Views, The Center, Consciousness

The End of the Pollen Path, The Dove, The Fifth Worldview, Consciousness

In the internal dialogue of Will his mother plaid a very important role. In his external dialogue he looked for a similar person and his wife plaid that role. He was unaware of this. He was constantly fighting the mother in his wife without noticing she was a different person. His wife plaid the same game. Will was her father and she did not notice Will was really looking for love and harmony.

Will promoted ”Just right” because ”With perfect harmony there is no exchange”.

Another citation:”Too Large—Overloads. Highly energetic perturbations overload a system, tearing apart the autocatalytic loops that hold its definition. Too much energy bifurcates the stable basins of a system’s memory and ultimately violates its autopoietic identity. The overly energetic perturbations leave open non-reflecting fragments of nodes: neurons, bits of stories, and social customs. These fragmented networks are no longer able to hold meanings or link to memory traces. Short of total destruction, strong perturbation will wipe out the fine structure of a receiving system, leaving it only able to operate in those sequences enforced by the invasive perturbation. To protect the networks of connections, electrical and mechanical systems have features to handle ‘over-modulation.’ With appropriate design, they digitize signals to compress the spectrum, thereby allows the message to be accepted. Human systems have a variety of means to block or censor invasive signals that violate our senses and psyches. Some at the physiological level block the energy that carries the messages; others receive, understand and reject the overwhelming impact. Blocking and the use of censorship disconnects us from the environment and preempts the discrimination they would our systems had more capacity”.

The Paths of Change of the Hopi

The Path of Change of the Hopi

Wills communication was Too Large.

He was a genius and his wife a normal person. He did not realize this.

His knowledge and experience was so enormous that he overwhelmed everybody.

He was looking for a dialogue but in every dialogue and project he became the leader.

He was a guru but he did not want to be a guru.

He was a child longing for his mother but he never wanted to be touched.

He cared for everybody but not for himself.

He was fighting but he wanted peace.

He wanted to create a better world but the outside world was moving into the wrong direction. He did not accept the Cycle.

He always wanted to cure himself. He wanted to find the eternal youth and searched the whole world for new treatments and medicines. He did not believe in the medical system but at the end of his life he needed the system desperately. He never listened to the experts so they left him alone.

He preached meditation but he could not calm himself.

Will was the prove of his own theory.

He was a living paradox.

What Happened?

The personality and the vision of Will McWhinney attracted many Mythic people. All of them started to play with the theory of Will in their own way. Soon it became very clear that Will had re-discovered a very ancient theory of Life.

A pastor found a relationship between the World Views of Will and the Four Apostles (see pictures in this blog). He  discovered that the Four Books of the Evangelists where written to adress one particular World View of the believers.

We discovered a relationship with the very powerfull psychological theory called Interpersonal Theory, Game Theory, Conflict Theory, the Cycles in History, the Tarot, the Four Humors, the Zodiac, the Four Forces of Nature, the Archtetypes of Jung, the Myers Briggs test, the Big Five, the metaphors of George Lakoff and many many other ancient and modern theories.

Paths of Change has proved to be the perfect meta-theory to map and understand all kinds of different physical and social sciences. It shows without any doubt that a theory of everything is possible.

The most interesting find was the self-referencial nature of the theory. It is possible to map the theory on itself.

This website contains many examples of the remarkable power of Paths of Change to understand what is happening in the World.  Use the tag Will McWhinney to find them all.

LINKS

A list of comparable models

About Entrainment

About Meta-Perspectives

About a Model that Explains PsychoPathology

About Engagement, A Chapter out of the never published book of Will McWhinney

About the Infinite Game

About the Game of Politics

About the Analytic Game

About the Game of the Market

About the Game of Invention

A PPT Presentation about the Paths of Change of Will McWhinney

A PPT Presentation about the World View of Will McWhinney

Paths of Change in PDF-format

About the Pollen Path