Today’s I Ching – 30 – Clinging

Fire above, Fire below.

Clinging follows Double Danger in the order of the Hexagrams.

Spirit explains:

Double danger is moving from danger into greater danger.

Fire over fire suggests the direction we have taken.

Now what? I ask, sensing a personal message.

Open your eyes and your mind, He tells me.

We must look back, now and then, to see

Where we have come from.

Are we moving uphill or down?

Without looking back we can’t measure our progress.

I think I get  the message, approval of

My moments of nostalgia.

Today’s I Ching – 16 – Delight

Thunder above, Earth below

Delight follows Humility in

The order of the Hexagrams.

Spirit explains:

To be aware of how far

We have come, and yet, to know there is still

A long way to go, is to feel humility.

We can, Spirit tells me, take delight in how far

We have come, without losing a sense of

Humility when looking ahead.

The message? I ask.

Look back, He tells me, at What you have left,

But not to focus on what you have left,

But to measure how far you have come

Along The Way, along Our Way.

Each day I randomly draw two Tarot cards to prepare myself

For what to expect re my relationship with Spirit.

Today’s first card was The Nine of Cups expressed by

A very self-satisfied person firmly guarding his treasures.

The second card was The Nine of Swords depicting a tragic figure

Tormented by regret.

Spirit tells me that contentment is the Middle Way, in which

Ego and Self flow into and sustain each other, as do

Yin and Yang, or Force and Form, the outer Pillars

Of The Tree of Life. Consciousness, the central Pillar

Serves to harmonize them

Without denying their uniqueness.

Simple Definition of grace

A simple seeker seemed to be lured by her Spirit teacher to believe that she could possibly learn to understand the deeper meanings of the interconnection between the Kabbalah Tree of Life and Tarot symbols through studying each of these mystery systems separately and then integrating them. She protested that she just didn't seem to have the mental capacity to go much beyond a surface awareness of life, as the mysteries taught. Not past tense, He insisted. There has always been a continuum of teachers in every age, who adapt what has been shared, as a sacred trust, with them, to the culture they live within, and are, at least to some extent, a product of. She drew three Tarot cards to express: 1. Ego, or her personal relationship to herself and her perceived needs and level of satisfaction. 2. Higher Self, or what a higher self might inspire her…

A simple seeker of enlightenment was, or almost believed she was

Unprepared for the lesson that Spirit seemed intent on her learning;

That the pillars of form, consciousness, and force that provided

The basic structure, or the built environment, of The Tree of Life

Did not exist as anything more or less than mental concepts

To express the lived world of continuous experience and response,

That necessarily causes an expansion of consciousness, or awareness,

As a result of this evolutionary process.

But, she protested, consciousness rises.

Everything rises as it expands. Density of matter, or mind, moves up

As it reaches out.

It isn’t fair.

What isn’t fair.

I’ve spent countless hours learning to relate to specific centers

Of energy on the separate pillars of form, consciousness, and force.

And their specific interactions with other energies.

There are no other energies.