Avengers: Endgame (2019)

Ironman: "the existential terror of staring into the void of space"

Editor's prefatory note:

Part I of this writing was meant to be a singularity. However, I’ve come to see that this entire subject is so important that a little more discussion is warranted. Certain elements providing beginning answer to “Surviving the Terror,” while addressed in Part I, were emphasized too much, with some, not enough.

Proportion is important. As well expressed by Dorothy Sayers, "The proportion and relations of things are just as much facts as the things themselves; and if you get those wrong, you falsify the picture really seriously." 

the most important concept on the Word Gems site

At the time of this writing, the Word Gems site conceals 2000 documents; if printed, 10,000 pages might ensue.

I no longer feel the need to add anything to this corpus of information. Especially, with this final chapter of the "small room" book, I ask myself: if required to choose one most important concept from the many gold-nuggets I’ve been privileged to see, what would it be?

It’s is the “mind the gap” principle - introduced in the “Surrender and Acceptance” page, and further discussed in the “Zen” article, along with the “Just Sitting” writing.

“Mind the gap” means that one perceives the great existential separation between “true self” and “false self.” It allows one to say, “I am here, the real me, reveling in a quietude of peace, and over there, across the divide, is the emotional chaos which, for so long, has been masquerading as my essential self but, in fact, is an imposter.”

I feel there is no more important precept that one might possess to prepare one’s spirit for life in the next dimensions. Why is this? It is so because “mind the gap” means that you’ve not only accessed, but have crossed over the threshold into, the domain of the sacred soul.

In that celestial realm of certainty, wherein one is linked to Universal Consciousness, all mysteries will yet bow the neck and bend the knee to one’s investigations. In time, the hidden regularities of the universe will disgorge themselves as you come to understand more and more and more… and not even some of those on the other side for thousands of years, who have not yet perceived the efficacy of “mind the gap,” will be able to stand against you.

Some may ask, shouldn’t love have something to do with a “most important concept”? And I would say, yes, of course, as mystics, poets, and saints instruct of its highest expression of the human spirit. However, unless we access the “true self,” we will never experience authentic love, but only its ersatz counterpart, mere egoic wanting and needing. When we do find ourselves in this way, true love, a perception of oneness, automatically and naturally rises to the surface of consciousness. It was there all the time, in the silent reaches of the soul, inaccessible however, due to “static on the line” from the “false self.”

Editor’s note: Recently, I've come to view all of the above as "second most important." See on the "ultimate reality" page.

Dr. Carl Jung: “Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darkness of other people. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious. The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely. Your visions will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.”

Editor's note: "Opening a channel" allows us to see where we've gone wrong. Jung, in his own words, expresses Jesus' teaching of "first remove the beam in your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck in your brother's eye." Knowing your own darkness is the beginning of authentic spirituality.

 Avengers: Endgame (2019)

Ironman: "the existential terror of staring into the void of space"

I don't have anything, since I don't have you

Since I Don't Have You

READ MORE

What would it be like having an endless perfect summer day, with no day-and-night?

an excerpt from Krishnamurti's lecture, March 12, 1968:

"So thought creates fear of tomorrow, tomorrow being death. Actually if you observe, there is no tomorrow at all; if you really faced that fact psychologically you would no doubt be terribly afraid because tomorrow matters very much - psychologically. Tomorrow is going to give you a great deal of pleasure, you are going to paint a better picture or compose with greater feeling, you'll make it up with your wife or husband. So for you tomorrow is extraordinarily important. And is there tomorrow psychologically or has thought invented it? And if there is no fear, there is no tomorrow; then one lives with that complete sense of wholeness, always in the present."

Editor's note: This is another profound concept by K. What does it mean “there is no tomorrow at all”? Some years ago now, when I first learned of Summerland, I found myself uneasy with the prospect of the endless perfect summer day; there is no day-and-night there (however, you can go to areas to experience what you like, including, not just eventide but, rain, snow, etc.). This concept of unending day and “no tomorrow” still bothers me at times.

But why should this be so? As I examine my subliminal fear associated with this I begin to see. “Tomorrow,” apart from the ready definition of future duration of time, is actually a psychological construct. The ego, ever judging itself to be needy, sees the future as a refuge, a place of salvation, as it wants more time to enhance itself: “I might not have it all together right now, but my ship will come in – tomorrow.”

What a great insight by K! If we learn to become present to the “inner riches” and therefore live in the present moment, a sense of “tomorrow” disappears. In order to properly deal with the “terror of living forever,” we must learn to “live as the gods.” Simply importing one’s old mortal mindset into Summerland is not going to cut it for us. 

'the disease of immortality' 

Star Trek: Voyager, season 2, episode “Death Wish” (1996)

A member of the Q Continuum seeks asylum on Captain Janeway’s Voyager. The cause of action? We are well familiar with refugees from totalitarian states oppressing its citizens with violence and threats of death. However, we’ve not often encountered a regime which imposes immortality as violation of human rights.

This episode of Star Trek: Voyager offers profound discussion on a topic not often addressed: What would it be like to be required to live forever for one who had not learned how to access purpose from existence?

The Q member in question had been a philosopher among his people, had written a regularly published blog:

And for those who believe that altruistic service is the center of life’s meaning, we discover that this individual had spent hundreds of years offering important help to humanity. But, in the end, this, by itself, was not enough to make him want to remain alive. We’ve discussed the inefficacy of good works as ultimate purpose of living.

These issues are vitally important, and a day will come when Life itself will demand answers of us; such will present themselves by knowing who we are and why we were created.

one more attempt at explaining the ineffable

I had finished this “Part II” article - once again, thought I was finished. However, I found myself bothered by a sense that I had not yet expressed the essential concept. Granted, the answer here, that which allows us to “survive eternal life,” is the mind and viewpoint of God. And how does one capture that marvel in mere words on a page?

Nevertheless, allow me to try, one more time.

In the Christian tradition, popularized by Dante, there is a precept, a view of the reward of the blessed, the “Beatific Vision.”

Suffice to say, the general idea asserted that the highest station to which mortals could attain would be to spend eternity gazing upon the glorious splendiferous face of The Most High God. For endless eons to come, so the teaching suggested, we would be mesmerized, held in thrall, by the radiant visage of The Eternal God.

The scientific evidence for the afterlife informs us that there is no “Great White Throne” on the other side, no “Sky God,” no grandfather figure with a long white beard. People over there do not see any visible indications of God; at least, none of popular religious conception. We have discussed this many times before. However, even though the “Beatific Vision” as portrayed by orthodoxy does not exist, I have come to see that this teaching contains a very beautiful underlying truth.

In my studies of classical mythology, I’ve learned that, not infrequently, a mythical hero or god, stories of which have been passed down through the centuries, just might bear a kernel of historical truth or wisdom-principle; for example, the legend of Theseus and the Minotaur. While no actual fantastic monster, half-bull and half-man, ever existed, archeological excavations of Knossos on Crete reveal some sort of ritualistic involvement of early Minoan civilization with elements of the Theseus-Minotaur legend.  

So, too, in my view, the “Beatific Vision” offers a core truth, brings to us a glimpse of the infinite empyreal. There were those in ancient times, as in all times, who had psychic abilities and would receive images of the wonders of the next life. And some of these percipients, over the years, would have discerned the beautiful truth that the happiness of eternal life has something to do with basking in the “Beatific Vision” of God, an expression of Ultimate Beauty, that warms, comforts, and uplifts the soul.

One does not need to be a fully-developed psychic to “see” or to “know” some of these things. I say this because I sense that these portals to highest reality are available to all of us, if we “open a channel.”

When an “open channel” of perception begins to uncloud the eyes, the eyes of the soul, we begin to see things, understand things. It will be a mystical revelation; but perhaps I should not use the term “mystical” because it sounds too abstract or religious, and that would give the wrong impression. The “open channel,” available to us all, produces a sense of joy, unparalleled in one’s life. And in receipt of this kind of “Beatific” joy, all fear and “terror of surviving eternity” melts away.

How can we encourage or facilitate this accessing of Ultimate Beauty? There is no sure formula to this "pathless land." The ancient Spirit Guides indicate that it will happen for each of us, in this world or the next, at the right time, the right time for one’s soul to awaken. But how will this occur? Are we to literally see the face of God? I think not, and a million or a billion years from now we shall still affirm this statement. Then how?

I think there’s a reason why ancient prophecies insist that the “image of God” is revealed to us in the form of female and male. I feel that the truth of this doctrine extends far beyond biological attraction. As the great spiritual teachers have preached, this ultimate sense of affinity will not work for just any two fish in the sea; instead, it means, one particular woman made for one particular man. Each, as is said, becomes a “messiah,” a “savior,” to the other; each to the other reveals the visage of the unknowable God; each, via the agency of “made in the image,” transmits a sense of the “Beatific Vision” of the utterly transcendent and glorious God.

But why the need for a “savior”? – well, this is what we've been talking about here; but not orthodoxy's contrived "savior" - we need a savior, a rescuing from the terrors of existential aloneness; stated differently, we were made to require the presence of a particular one.

Plotinus had it exactly right (as we discussed in the "Meaning Of Beauty, Part II" writing). He articulated, so very well, this lofty view of the nature of Beauty: it is "the translucence," a shining through, "of the eternal splendor of the One" and of the Truth; only her true mate will perceive her loveliness as portal to an inner knowing of the Divine; a sacred mesmerization, an enrapturing "beatific vision," as she reveals, as no other pedagogue in the world - this one or the next - the hidden face of God.

We need this direct access to God, without which we shall not survive the "existential terror" of negotiating infinity, the unsettling sense of drifting aimlessly in the void, lost in space. In order to survive eternal life, we need to "live life as the gods," and therefore we need a direct accessing of the beauty of God's face, "the eternal splendor of the One," which will rescue us from unending meaninglessness, from the zombie-camp of "the dead ones."

Only the "image of God," translated via the agency of the Sacred Beloved - one particular woman made for one particular man - shall answer, as "The Wedding Song" has it, his existential "cry of the heart."

Only the "beauty of God's face" will help us survive the terrors of eternity, and there's but one, one particular person who can do this for you.

Elizabeth explains this principle in her own words: 

Elizabeth’s love letter to Robert, May 20, 1846: "... while the heart beats, which beats for you… my life, it is yours, as this year has been yours. But how can it make me happy, such a thing as my life? There, I wonder still. It never made me happy, without you.”

I am living for you now

Her fervent assertions, an outpouring of innermost being, "how can it make me happy, such a thing as my life, it never made me happy without you," strike at the depths of our humanity, "what we stay alive for"; or, as Elizabeth, the once "drooping untrained honeysuckle," announced to Robert, "I am living for you now." Is there another reason?

I don't have anything, since I don't have you

Since I Don't Have You

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'nothing was of any value without him'

Anne Of Green Gables, Lucy Maud Montgomery (1985)

“Oh, the black years of emptiness stretching before her!”

"their own eternal life," part two

The following was reported in "Letters From the Spirit World,” channeled information via the mediumship of Carlyle Petersilea who accessed testimony from his father on the other side:

“… within the waters here, glide beautiful fishes — the spirits of those that have died on earth, and it is the same with our animals… nothing is crowded here and there are vast areas of space… When wild animals die on the earth, their spirits rise into great spiritual forests which… human spirits seldom or never visit ... when great sea monsters die, or smaller fish, their spirits ascend and find homes within boundless spiritual oceans. Your globe of earth, that seems so vast to you, is but a small speck, or like a grain of sand, compared to eternity and its eternal heavens… Forms come up through the material, not that they may perish, but that they may be conserved to fill eternity with beauty and intelligence — not only the intelligence of mankind, but the lesser intelligence of beasts, birds, reptiles and fishes — these forms to nature are just as beautiful as is that of man.”

Editor’s note: It strikes me just now that certain ones of us, particularly drawn to the animal kingdom, might choose, while a rare opting, to live among our feathered, furry, and finned brethren on a somewhat permanent basis. No one would stop you.

Editor's last word:

I’ve come to see that the “terror of living forever” is not a separate terror but part of a seamless terror of what the ego experiences every day, all the days of its distorted-vision life. The ego has many fears, but, fundamentally, only one underlying fear, which is the fear of annihilation. What we experience as ordinary garden-variety terror on a daily basis is the common perception of “I don’t have enough” because “I am not enough.” However, as we peel back the layers of trepidation, it all funnels down to the primary subsuming fear of annihilation, as the “terror of living forever” is just the grand expression of this pervasive disease.

We have discussed that the beauty of one’s Sacred Beloved will “save” us. In her role of “made in the image,” the agent of palpable sense of God’s presence in our minds and hearts, she offers a vivifying and strengthening effect, able to overcome the ego’s fear of annihilation.

But what does this mean? It is not the bodily beauty – be it mortal body or astral body, formidable as this beauty will likely be - which shall save us. We have learned that nothing external to our own Selves can rescue or help us become more spiritual; and not even one’s Twin Soul, as external being, can help us.

Then what? The answer is - she is more than external being. She is not given the title “Twin Soul” for sport. In some undefined sense, on a deeper level, her very essence merges with, is part of, shares elemental root with, her Beloved. And it is this unseen nexus, which becomes a kind of proxy for one’s own Self, that begins to dismantle the ego's perceptions of terrifying aloneness.

It is not her bodily beauty that saves. But when the radiant visage of the goddess smiles, seemingly affirming and sanctifying one’s very existence, then that warming radiance, as the radiance of God’s own beauty, will calm and soothe the fractured and stressed recipient. Yes, in her smile, the smile of God's agent, we find existential validation and sense of worth. No terror of eternal life can survive within the sacred domain of this enlivening and exhilarating energy.

All this issues as the fulfillment of the ancient “beatific vision” prophecy.

Elenchus. The issue of each Twin revealing the face of God to the other is really something. And it’s helping me to clarify a thought.

Kairissi. Please share – I’m always happy for you to “tell me more about my eyes.”

E. That reference to the old cartoon is funny. And, of course, your allure, to me, makes you “the most beautiful girl in the world” – I’ve told you that many times. But that’s not what’s really happening with this “revealing the face of God” concept. It’s much more than saying you’d win any beauty contest.

K. Feel free to indulge the fantasy, though, as you like.

E. Well, I could easily do that, but your beauty is more to me than “most beautiful girl.”

K. Which raises the question – how could it be more than that?

E. I’ll try to explain. I’ve seen you, or your photograph, tens of thousands of times. It wasn’t always this way, but, at this stage of my life, when I see your photo, I could almost say that I feel a kind of electric shock. That’s overstating it a little, but when I see you I feel a kind of surge of energy. And even though this has happened thousands of times, I’m always a little taken aback by this abrupt reaction.

K. Now some would say, that doesn’t sound right. When John chooses Mary, the fireworks can last a while but not really so much after the honeymoon. People accept this falling off of feelings as normal and “the way it is.”

E. Then they start to talk about “entering a time of more mature married love.”

K. A rationalization which means, the fizz is gone from the soda pop. Well, we can hardly wait.

E. But I want to point out that this isn’t the way it works if two are connected at the soul level. The fizz doesn’t really leave. It’s always there to draw upon when you want to access it.

K. Like when you look at a certain someone’s photo. So, tell everyone a little more about this “surge of energy.”

E. It’s not biologically based. If a couple’s names were “John” and “Mary”, quite a bit of the fever-pitch would be gone pretty soon. But I’ve been monitoring myself with this “energy surge” for many years now, and even though I know it’s coming, when I see your photo I experience a sense of “jarring surprise” to see your beauty. It happens every time!

K. (sighing)

E. And it’s happened every time for thousands of times in row, and so part me wants to ask, how is this even possible? – surely, one would think, the novelty would begin to wear thin after a while.

K. Wear thin after the honeymoon phase. It’s interesting, John and Mary are surprised at how quickly the “pangs of love” leave them, but Twins are surprised at the enduring nature of what they feel for each other.

E. This is unknown in the animal kingdom. Why should it persist? Once Mother Nature has what she wants, with biology served, she’s all done and packs her bags. But the “energy surge” known by Twins is not a gift of Mother Nature, but – as we’ve said – issues as a function of Madam Destiny.

K. Yes – destiny. There’s a force in play here that is designed to unite Twins for the eternal marriage.

E. And for eternal life, in general. I have come to see, as I’ve looked at this for so many years now, that what I’m feeling is an energy surge of the soul. It’s not part of “Animal Planet.”

K. This is a phenomenon that no one can believe in – until it’s experienced. It’s so amazing. The face of one’s Twin may indeed be attractive, but what can account for thousands of “energy surges”? How is it possible to be “surprised” tens of thousands of times when the same face is studied? And the answer is, it’s more than your mate’s attractive face that is captivating you.

E. Again,this will sound unlikely to John and Mary – because it didn’t work this way for them, but – the sense of surprise to see the Sacred Beloved’s face for the fifty-thousandth time, in reality, is to begin to access the awe, wonder, and mystery of the splendor of the “beauty of God.”

K. And this is what will allow Twins to survive “the terror of living forever.”

K. Elenchus, we should offer a footnote to our discussions – you and I call it “the Father Bruno principle.”

E. That’s important.

K. Why don’t you explain it to everyone.

E. Giordano Bruno was a RCC priest scientist-philosopher burned at the stake in 1600 for heretical views. These included his support for Copernicus’ sun-centered universe; a plethora of worlds in the cosmos containing intelligent life; the destructiveness of religion as means to control uneducated people; that Christ was an evolved man and not God; and other non-orthodox positions.

K. This is really something. He was killed during the time of Galileo, not long before the coming of Newton. Here we have the world climbing out of its superstitious abyss with the beginnings of modern science and the RCC is killing those leading the advances.

E. It’s breath-taking to perceive his grasp of reality, essentially, the intellectual precepts that many enlightened people come to see as they progress.

K. Explain what we mean by “the Father Bruno principle.”

E. Historian Will Durant in his monumental “Story Of Civilization” reports that the testimonies and writings of Father Bruno reveal his confessions of a raging sexual desire. Durant comments: "there is some subtle connection between sexual and intellectual awakening."

K. This is really interesting. You and I have observed this phenomenon, as well. As one grows as a person, becomes more enlightened, as the soul opens and blossoms to truth, one’s sexual desire also burgeons and presents itself more intensely.

E. It’s curious and, we would assert, not something generally known.

K. What would you say this means, Elenchus?

E. There’s probably a whole book to be written on this subject, but, in the main, I think it means that the soul is the true center of one’s sexuality – not the material body. Sexual desire is part of our “made in the image” capacities and comes alive, more and more, as the soul awakens and matures.

K. It’s strange, isn’t it, Elenchus. If one enters enlightenment later in life, it’s quite possible to find oneself more enflamed with sexual desire at age 71 than at 17.

E. This upends traditional views. The world generally thinks of the latter teens and early adulthood as the time of fiery sexual passions, but it is imagined that one “dries up” with an accumulation of years.

K. And I would say that this general view plays out just this way in many John and Mary relationships. In the beginning, they can’t keep their hands off each other, but before too long, many of them sleep in separate beds or even separate rooms.

E. But the reality, the true life of the inner person – if it authentically awakens to itself – is just the opposite.

K. I think of you at 17. You were interested in girls, but you were not sexually active and, I would say, not consumed to express yourself physically.

E. This “71 versus 17” item is another example of how the world’s perceptions of love, marriage, and sex are upside down and backwards.

K. Materialist-fundamentalists project their errant views to how they imagine life to be like in heaven. And this is why they believe that there’s no interest in sex over there -- because, in their Earth-marriages, they put sex aside a long time ago.

E. Can we sum up “the Father Bruno principle” for our readers? What would you say, Kriss?

K. Sexual desire is not really a teenage thing. It doesn’t reach full flower with “Veronica and Archie.” Sexual impulse, in its truest sense, reflects our “made in the image” godlike potentialities. As such, it’s something that grows and grows with the awakening of the soul to higher expressions of life and reality.

E. As we learned from Greek scholar Dr. Barclay, the “eternal” in “eternal life” essentially means “living life on the level of the gods.”

K. That’s such an important concept.

E. It means that we need a higher level of consciousness to properly fit ourselves for the endless duration of time to come. Simply carrying one’s materialistic thinking into Summerland isn’t going to work well for us.

K. Elenchus, I’m reminded of that other Greek word, “arrabon,” the “earnest” of the spirit, which the apostle Paul used. I’d like to encourage our readers to review that article. The precept introduced there helps us to understand how we shall endure eternal life.

E. Explain it to us, Kriss.

K. “Arrabon” is used in I Cor. 5 where it says that “God has prepared us” for eternal life. I take comfort in that. God doesn’t just plop us into a new situation of endless duration of time without “preparing” us. And the “preparing” comes to us in the form of a higher state of consciousness.

E. We might normally think of asking God for "things," but there's no reason that God cannot influence and form our spirits to gravitate toward new perceptions.

K. And that’s what the “earnest of the spirit,” I think, does for us. It molds and shapes our minds so as to make us ready to inhabit eternity. This means that, if we are open to God’s instruction, we will be led, small step by small step, to enjoy a “preparing” to “live as the gods.”

E. I like that. And it means that we don’t have to worry overmuch concerning the “terror of living forever.” God knows that this is something we require to feel comfortable living with endless duration, “living as the gods,” and so we can be confident that we will be given what we need at the right time.

K. This is making me smile, Elenchus. After all of our rather extended and sometimes complicated explanations concerning how we will survive eternal life, the simple and best answer is that "God will provide."

E. (smiling) That's our best high-tech answer.