What It's Like
This is going to be one of those stream of consciousness posts. So buckle your seatbelt.
Now Playing: Everlast "What It's Like" (lyric video)
Read a short story by an Echelon friend of mind -- @GirlWithWords -- a few minutes ago, and it got me thinking.... *evil grin*
(Said story: http://the-girl-with-words.blogspot.com.au/2013/08/my-heart-is-going-nuts-right-now.html
You don't need to have read the story to follow the rest of the post, but it's a good short. *g* Basically, I'm presenting it as the catalyst to getting me to sit down and write some things that have been swirling around my head for a few weeks. I've been very bad about writing long form lately. It's all short twitter bursts that are ephemeral.)
Anyway ... A week ago (2 weeks?), another Echelon on twitter posted some links to this blog that's pseudo psychology and pseudo spirituality. The first link she posted was to an article on "old souls".
http://personalityspirituality.net/articles/the-michael-teachings/reincarnation-the-35-steps/stage-5-the-old-soul/
Now if you've read this journal long, you know I went through a Richard Dawkins lovefest fairly recently (starting around May 2012) & decided I am, in essence, an atheist.
(My Dawkins tag: http://mlady-rebecca.livejournal.com/tag/author_richard_dawkins
Note to self: Make appropriate entries public.)
Then Mr. Leto went and made an album built on four cornerstones of what matters in this world, of what we need for fulfillment.
Love Lust Faith + Dreams.
But I believe in love.
I believe in dreamers.
I believe in miracles
and I believe in you.
"I Believe in You" - Bette Midler
Thought I'd quote Mars, huh? But that last line. I don't believe in much, but I believe in 30 Seconds to Mars. I believe in Jared Leto. (Those not converted to the church of Mars may want to stop reading. You won't get it.)
What do you get when you slam an atheistic scientific world view into a Leto inspired faith-fest. Well, I'd bet on Leto. *g*
I believe in nothing
Not the not end and not the start
I believe in nothing
Not the earth and not the stars
I believe in nothing
Not the day and not the dark
I believe in nothing
But the beating of our hearts
I believe in nothing
One hundred suns until we part
I believe in nothing
Not in sin and not in god
I believe in nothing
Not in peace and not in war
I believe in nothing
But the truth and who we are
"100 Suns" - 30 Seconds to Mars
"This is War" era's "100 Suns" seems to fall on "lack of faith" side. But Jared loves dichotomies. I'm sure they've always been there, but they seem so much more pronounced this time around. Maybe because for a moment I weighted in on the other side of the line.
Now Playing: "Birth"
Fate...
Stand out on the edge of the earth
Dive into the center of fate
Walk right in the side of the gun
Look into the new future's face
- Echelon (self-titled)
I don't believe in fate
But the bottom line, it's time to pay
You know you've got it coming.
- Escape (This is War)
A thousand times I tempted fate.
A thousand times I played this game.
A thousand times that I have said,
Today, today, today.
- Up in the Air (LLFD)
Bought my fate straight from hell
Second sight, has paid off well
For a mother, a brother, and me.
- City of Angels (LLFD)
Fate is coming, that I know.
Time is running, got to go.
Fate is coming, that I know.
Let it go.
- Do or Die (LLFD)
Okay, I've been dying to do that with a whole bunch of keywords. Future post? This may have unlocked my muse. I have a post-it full of appropriate keywords and I went through and put all of the lyrics for each of the albums into a single file so I could do a search.
See:
Now Playing: "City of Angels"
Where was I? I have no idea. Are we back to the old soul thing yet? *g*
Anyway, the website has a series of 5 articles describing the 5 stages of the soul: infant, baby, young, mature, and old soul. They're going from a perspective of reincarnation, although I find the articles useful just as character archetypes.
Can't say I've ever strongly believed in reincarnation, but it's always been a topic to interest me. Anyone remember the Highlander series? My mixed spirituality metaphor for that series was: those more in their bodies than their minds just die, those more in their minds than their bodies moved onto the next life/world/whatever, & those in balance are reincarnated or live forever. Silly, I know. That was a "right out of college" thing.
Did I mention, queen of the tangent?
*Back in a moment*
O-KAY. Umm, was trying to find the website owner's name for crediting. It appears to be Barry. But I made the mistake of looking at this page. The screaming skeptic is back (Which is one of the 7 attitudes, but we'll get back to that ... maybe.) Did we have to start with Ouija boards? *frowns*
Now Playing: "The Race"
Okay, shoving the skeptic back in her cage. Archetypes. Just archetypes.
1. Infant souls: think tribal natives & pagan earth religions ... as well as the bottom of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. (Click for bigger w/ the diagram.)
Infant souls are learning to adapt to the human form and to the world around them. There is an emphasis on very basic life-skills, both individually (food, shelter and so on) and as a family or small tribe (protection and reproduction). The major lessons for the soul are to do with experiencing oneself as a separate physical being with one’s own needs and limitations, interacting with a physical environment and with other physical beings, both caring and threatening.
*clip*
The Infant soul’s perceptions derive primarily from the raw sensations of physical embodiment and encounters with a physical environment. The sense of self, others and life is at its most basic. Life is perceived in terms of “ME” versus “NOT-ME” - the body and its environment.
There is much fear and little comprehension, other than that they are in a strange and often hostile environment.
At the same time, however, the infant soul is still close to the original state of oneness with all-that-is. Having little experience of physical separation as yet, the infant soul retains an inward sense of cosmic connectedness.
Because of their remnant closeness to Home, individuals at this stage also tend to have animistic perceptions. That is, they will readily attribute spirit (consciousness, mind, will) to anything and everything in the physical world - animals, plants, rocks, clouds, flames, etc. The environment is perceived as consisting of many different agencies who can be either helpful or dangerous - tree spirits and so on.
This sense of immersion in living consciousness is often expressed in tribal art and ritual.
Now Playing: "End of All Days"
Now Playing: "Pyres of Varanasi"
(yes, 2, it takes a while to process those big copy & paste jobs)
(to be honest, it's multiple times on each song)
2. Baby souls: think religiously rigid, ultra-conservative in choose-your-own "one true God" religion.
The pictures (in the original article) are very illustrative here. The famous farmer & wife portrait. Amish. Orthodox Jews. Polygamist Mormon compound. Christian Ultra-religious Right. Muslim Taliban. Cultures varying from the benign to outright cancerous.
In other words, the religious set I'm most anti. The us vs them, sacrifice the individual for the group, narrow-minded mind set. They are officially babies. *evil grin*
Order! Order!
In the second level of soul development, the focus of human life is no longer on day-to-day physical survival but on participating in a social structure that provides order, security and a sense of belonging.
The major lessons revolve around reconciling one’s immediate personal will with the greater collective will - often making sacrifices so as to create a more stable and organized way of living than that at the more primitive infant stage.
This stage emphasizes self-control, restraint and compliance, taming one’s personal, short-term impulses for the benefit of long-term stability and security. There is a sense of playing a meaningful role, doing something of value, and belonging to something that is greater than oneself. Life in society is a system of give and take, and here the emphasis is on learning to give, thereby supporting the greater good.
In Freudian terms, it’s about having a superego to tame the id. The ego is not yet in focus.
Perceptions
It is natural for us to seek order in life’s apparent chaos. And at this level of consciousness, we impose order. An order that is simple and absolute.
A baby soul adopts fixed, permanent structures such as strict rules, enforced law and order, and rigidly defined roles, including gender roles. All things perceived must be consistent with this rigid framework. If the facts appear to challenge one’s beliefs, the facts must be wrong since the belief system is always “right”. If the Bible says the world was created in seven days, that is The Truth and any evidence to the contrary must be the work of Satan.
All actions, too, must be consistent with a clearly defined set of rules. As a result, baby souls tend think of behavior in terms of simple dualisms: good vs. bad, right vs. wrong, us vs. them. For example, if being clean is better than being dirty, then cleanliness is absolutely good while dirtiness is absolutely wicked. There are no sliding scales or grey areas.
*** And those of you who follow me because of Anita Blake know my feelings on shades of grey. ***
Us versus them
At the previous stage (as an infant soul), the environment was perceived in terms of beings that either help or hinder one’s survival. For the baby soul, however, the world is divided into the uncivilized physical environment versus civilized society. And society consists of good or bad “actors” - human beings who deliberately act in either a good way or a bad way.
And so the world at large now consists of two kinds of people: “us” versus “them”, we who do it right versus those who don’t. We, the decent law-abiding people, versus “the rest”.
In psychological terms, the baby soul’s sense of self is culturally embedded - ”I am one of us” - where “us” means others who think and act like me.
The sense of personal identity is also predefined by one’s role in society (e.g., “I am the farmer’s wife”).
Similarly, beliefs are predefined by the culture, and actions are predefined by the laws and rules of society. Baby souls do not, as yet, focus on setting their own perspectives, motives or agenda. (That all comes at stage 3.)
Lifestyles
Whereas the infant soul flourishes in some sort of “Garden of Eden” environment, the baby soul likes to be very civilized, finding its feet in a perfectly ordered, rule-bound society. Think of anything from the American Deep South to the Taliban.
The various lives undertaken at this stage will generally focus on law and order, morality, organized religion, ethnic tradition, and being in a close-knit community.
Childhood will typically include indoctrination into a set of well-defined rules, beliefs and values. Education will tend to be marked by dogmatism, discipline, and a sense of propriety.
That said, the soul learns by experiencing both sides of any issue, so there are likely to be incarnations at this stage as criminals and outlaws as well as law abiding citizens, particularly in the early levels.
Baby soul behavior is heavily colored by a sense of what is correct or acceptable. There is only one right way to do anything, so let’s do it right or not at all.
As individuals, they are primarily interested in doing what is deemed right come what may. Their sense of rightness is largely dictated by their background and upbringing, and may be extremely conservative, hardline and xenophobic. A baby soul could, for example, work as a professional torturer and do so with a great sense of righteousness.
Because of their rigid beliefs and values, baby souls risk feeling unbearable lifelong shame should they ever do something which they believe to be wrong, such as blaspheming or dishonoring the family name.
For some, this absolute rigidity and inflexibility creates considerable inner tension and conflict (potentially leading to mental illness). Baby souls can be prone to rage at and excessively punish others who transgress the law, just as a way to take the heat off their own conflicts.
Generally, baby souls prefer to stick to their own ethnic kind within small, quiet towns. They can get by in the modern world, though much of it is not to their liking. They are not so comfortable in the big city with all its complexities, ambiguous rules and sinful temptations.
Ideally, baby souls would probably like to live together in a sort of "Pleasantville" town where life is completely safe and orderly and where there are no troublesome outsiders or free-spirited types breaking the rules.
In some ways, baby souls represent the pinnacle of civilization. Indeed, the rules and laws that underpin modern society stem from the baby soul impulse to organize community life. But with their fixation on rules, hygiene, and upright moral behavior, they can come across to older souls as distinctly old-fashioned, “uncool”, and “anal”.
*** Getting Jonathan Haidt vibes here. http://mlady-rebecca.livejournal.com/tag/author_jonathan_haidt ****
As a mark of their civilized nature, baby souls like to keep their homes and themselves especially clean and germ-free, to a degree which others might regard as obsessive or paranoid.
They also tend to dress the same as their fellow community members, as tradition dictates, rather than display any individualism. The whole point is to fit in, not stand out.
Because their own ethnic beliefs and traditions are assumed without question to be the only true and right way, baby souls tend to distrust other cultures. In the USA, for example, they make up much of the Christian Right and the “Moral Majority”.
How do baby souls get on with souls at other levels? Not very comfortably.
Infant souls represent the “uncivilized” aspect of human nature which baby souls are trying to get away from.
Young souls are difficult because of their insistence on progress and change, which challenges the baby soul’s desire for stability, permanence and continuity. In addition, young souls are often fixated on ego gratification and personal advancement, which baby souls tend to regard as distasteful and unGodly.
And to baby souls, mature and old souls with their complex and liberal ways are simply incomprehensible - the Devil’s spawn.
Religion
With their need for a sense of cosmic order, baby souls are often highly religious. They are usually God-fearing in the most literal sense, both absolutist and fundamentalist. They tend to personify God as the ultimate authority figure who doles out punishments to sinners.
Baby souls will tend to regard their religious leaders as infallible and their scriptures as the literal word of God. The religion into which they are born is assumed without question to be the one true religion (even though in each lifetime they might be born into a completely different religion).
Because of their overriding sense of order, baby souls like to do everything right and by-the-book - literally, in the sense of the Bible, the Koran and so on. But, rather like toddlers, they are also prone to enraged tantrums when their rigidly defined expectations are not met, such as when their concept of morality is violated or their religious beliefs are attacked.
*sigh* I think we need a pause after that one.
Now Playing: "Bright Lights" & "Do Or Die"
3. Young Soul: think capitalism & secularism ... hmmmm. For some reason I want to reference "American Psycho".
We Can Be Heroes
Young souls are learning to be independent actors in the world, exercising their free will. Hence, there is a major emphasis on heroic self-assertion and progress, freeing oneself from limiting structures, finding one’s own strengths and talents, discovering “what I’m made of”.
The main lesson for souls in the third stage of their evolvement is to do with exploring and expressing individuality, discovering the power of independence in thought, will and action. There is a strong desire to make a personal impact on the outer world, so the focus is very much outwards and with a lot of energy.
At the same time, there is a strong tendency to compare oneself to others, evaluating self-worth in terms of “my” achievements relative to “their” achievements. This outward-bound, achievement-focused sense of self can lead to a determination to be a “winner” - and to be seen to win. The danger is that the appearance of success can become more important than anything else, including even happiness.
Young Soul Perceptions
Recall that for the baby soul (at stage 2), the world is perceived in terms of us versus them. For the young soul, however, the world consists of distinct individuals, each with a mind of their own, each with their own agenda. The young soul’s sense of self is as an individual who stands in contrast to other individuals - I am not you, you are not me. Life is often therefore perceived as a contest between competing individuals: me versus you and you and you ... Or between competing agendas: my way versus your way.
And whereas baby souls automatically adopt the beliefs and values of their native tradition, young souls are busy developing their own perspective and agenda, finding their own talents and their own way of seeing things and doing things. By asserting their own perspective, they can change what the world believes to be true. By pushing their own agenda, they can determine what happens in the world. They are self-determined agents of change.
Because young souls’ opinions are of their own making - based on their own knowledge and reasoning - they will naturally feel that their own opinions are inherently right and correct. As a result, anyone with a different opinion is presumably wrong.
But because others’ opinions too, right or wrong, can determine what happens in the world, there is a constant sense of competition, and hence a feeling that those who disagree ought to be put right, or put down, or at least proven wrong.
So, for the young soul, “My way is the right way. I know it is because I can see it for myself. So let’s all do it my way.”
What young souls do not quite recognize as yet is that all perspectives are equally valid. They are identified with their own perspective, feeling confident that is the best way to see things.
Young Soul Lifestyle
Young souls are drawn to live in highly competitive environments in which they can push themselves, assert themselves, and prove themselves. Frantic, materialistic cities like Hong Kong and Los Angeles are young soul hotbeds.
Because young souls can often experience life as a contest between themselves and many other ambitious individuals, an ideal outcome would be to succeed very loudly and visibly so that everyone knows who "the winner" is. Hence, young souls are often attracted to the more obvious signs of success - fame, wealth, power, glory.
Other Young Soul Characteristics
At this level, love between individuals can be experienced as a reciprocal offering of goodwill: I make you feel good, you make me feel good, let’s keep making each other feel good.
It is also a feeling that can be extended to others who are not directly known to oneself, or to abstractions. For example, one can feel great patriotic love (reciprocal goodwill) for one’s country.
As artists and performers, young souls are attracted more to fame and fortune than to seeking meaningful insights into the human condition.
*** Cough - everyone celebrated on the MTV VMAs - Cough ***
There is nothing wrong with any of this, by the way. It is a natural and necessary stage of soul evolution for all of us. The audacious ambition and competitiveness of young souls may be distasteful to both baby and mature souls (for different reasons), but it serves to bring out the best in us as powerful individuals - inventiveness, confidence, enterprise, heroism. Many of the world’s most remarkable achievements, from ancient empires to the Moon landings, have been young soul projects.
I should mention the articles include examples. Thought this one was especially relevant:
One of the most famous figures of antiquity, Alexander the Great was a Young King soul (as well as a young king in life!) who created one of the ancient world’s largest empires.
Any bets as to whether I write too much for a single post?
Now Playing: "Convergence" & "Northern Lights"
4. The Mature Soul: Think trying to be politically correct & walk in someone else's shoes -- this is where I see myself.
Knowing Me, Knowing You
The lives of mature souls focus on exploring the true nature of self, life and especially others. Reaching beyond the forthright independence of the third stage, the major challenge at this fourth stage is to discover how to live inter-dependently with others, and other-ness in general.
So ...
* Whereas the young soul focuses on being assertive, competitive and successful, the mature soul focuses on being sensitive, cooperative and authentic.
* Whereas a young soul insists that its own perspective is right, the mature soul recognizes that other perspectives are equally valid.
* Whereas for the young soul self-interest is all-important, the mature soul is more concerned with the self-other relationship.
Mature Soul Perceptions
The mature soul develops an ever-deepening sense of both self and others. Life is no longer simply a matter of what happens out there in the world, but also what is going on “in here”, where we are coming from, what it all means.
Through understanding more and more of its own psychology, the mature soul also learns about what makes others tick. They come to recognize that all others are their equals, at least on the inside. In fact, their own perspective is nothing but one among many equally valid perspectives.
*clip*
Empathy
At this level there is also the development of empathy - appreciating others’ experiences from their perspective.
I can appreciate how you experience life. I can perceive life as you perceive it. I know how you feel, and I understand why. Though our perceptions are not the same, we are all the same on the inside.
But the mature soul’s sense of self can become confusing because of this empathy with others:
I am very aware of how you perceive me, how you feel about me. I can also identify with you, yet I am not you. So who am I?
The mature soul keeps being reminded that all perspectives are valid but not necessarily correct, and that there are perspectives on perspectives on perspectives... So begins the search for a deeper truth that will ultimately lead back to oneness.
Other Mature Soul Characteristics
In contrast to the outward-bound adventures of the young soul, there is at this level an inward focus on perceptions, meanings, issues, relationships and the meaning of life.
Mature souls seek understanding, authenticity and integrity, especially in relationships, but also in other aspects of life including art and spirituality. They come to appreciate both the diversity and complexity of life, but there can be a lot of ‘naval gazing’ as they struggle to get to the bottom of it all.
Because of their willingness to accept and include others, and their empathy for others’ experiences, mature souls can be overly self-critical at times. While young souls tend to blame anyone but themselves for their own problems, mature souls will readily look for their own faults.
And whereas young souls like to have their own opinions and assert them forcibly, mature souls are more ambivalent when it comes to taking sides on any issue.
At the beginning of the stage, they will tend to reject and criticize the competitive, materialistic thrust of young soul culture. (Ironically, many mature soul writers, artists and performers have achieved fame and fortune this way.)
But by the end of the stage - sensitive to life’s complexities - the very fact of holding a strong black-and-white opinion for or against anything (even against young soul culture!) comes to seem dubious and even absurd.
Mature Soul Relationships
More than any at other soul stage, mature souls are likely to bond for life in a positive, loving, intimate partnership. It is a time for soul mates to get together and help each other work through their issues to create a mature, healthy relationship.
At this level, love is generally experienced and expressed as appreciation, a genuine acceptance of the otherness of another.
Irrespective of whether you make me feel good or not, and irrespective of how you feel about me, I love you for who you are.
The mature soul is attracted to opportunities to express this appreciation of otherness, or diversity, the more unfamiliar and ‘alien’ the better. For example, one may develop a love of exotic wildlife or of foreign cultures.
Mature Soul Lifestyles
Mature souls can have sophisticated, avant-garde or post-modern sensibilities, but in private they may struggle with basic emotional issues. Because life is now all about optimizing one’s relationships with anything and everything, mature souls can find life to be intensely complex and stressful, filled with emotional turmoil, sometimes overwhelmingly so. Inner conflict is very common.
Hence there is often a need to find time and space for introspection, or psychotherapy, or perhaps an artistic outlet, to confront the confusion and negativity within oneself.
Hence also a desire to keep well away from both the enforced limitations of baby soul cultures and the me-first competitiveness of young soul cultures. Do it any place but here is the mature soul motto, and this often shows in their facial expression.
There also emerges at this level a desire to explore the deeper and quieter forms of spirituality, such as Zen Buddhism. Mature souls tend to gravitate to liberal, multicultural places like London and San Francisco, though they prefer the relative tranquility of the suburbs to the push and shove of the city center.
[All that was the background, this is the meat of the post. The new insights.]
Okay, that was half the extracted endgame when it comes to me personally. The other half being the goal of retardation, which probably will be in a different post. Still have one more soul type to go. Then there are the types of souls. Too much information....
Now Playing: "Witness": I've got secrets and lies that would blow your mind....
But yeah, the original song, the story I read, walk in someone else's shoes. And Toni Bernhard's "How to be Sick". ( review) The idea of retardation - that some souls may choose to come back in less than perfect bodies to be able to focus on the world in a different way. Toni talking about the empathy you get from being chronically ill.
Maybe my "failures" of gluttony & sloth, my INFJ personality - introversion and NF in particular, getting fired twice - all the little mistakes that led to that, all the little habits that allowed me to become obese, my disability status ... do they all add up to the desire to understand at mature soul level? Did I choose this in some twisted way? Maybe I'm not failing by not accomplishing anything materialistic or having a family of my own or creating something. Maybe this. This learning is enough. This stuckinarut (http://mlady-rebecca.livejournal.com/tag/stuckinarut) thing that gives me flow. Can that be an ending all its own? Can the journey to finding oneself be the end all and be all of a life?
Now playing: Gotye "Somebody I Used to Know" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UVNT4wvIGY
You can get addicted to a certain kind of sadness
Like resignation to the end, always the end
And, yes, I'll think I'll pre-date a post with the video and lyrics. Coming momentarily....
Weird place to break, but break I'm going to do. Will not un-private this until I finish the matching post(s).
09/08/2013 - making it public. The rest will come when it comes.