Assembly of NeoWayland
This is a page from the third version of Technopagan Yearnings. There are some formatting differences. Originally published at www.neowayland.com/C550866538/E20060917192343
Another wandering meditation, this time on the crowd that lives inside of you
I actually started writing this early on the 14th, but it has taken longer than I thought.
Which illustrates my point.
You see, one of the "convenient useful fictions" I've adopted over the years is that each person is really a whole crowd of people, only one or two of which are facing the world at any one point. The others mill around in the background, giving comments and the occasional shove.
So while Corporate Me is out facing down the lawyers with his shirt and tie, Wildman Me is naked on a hilltop howling at the full moon. Meanwhile Talespinner Me is taking a long drink looking deep into a bonfire, and Paranoid Me is hiding in the shadows, ready to bite anyone who comes too close.
Okay, you caught me in one little thing. Corporate Me doesn't wear designer ties anymore, these days it is a polo shirt. And not even designer.
Psychology will tell you that it is a matter of behavioral maps that we adopt according to the situation, and that some behaviors don't appear on some maps. That's why we don't take other people's food, or grab the nearest attractive person for sex every ten minutes. But for me, it really helps to think of it as different people with different needs.
The idea is not original with me. It's a mishmash of ideas borrowed from Carl Jung, Joseph Campbell, Napoleon Hill, and Colin Wilson.
Jung contributed mythic archetypes and exploring yourself. Campbell contributed the journey. The other two take some explaining.
Napoleon Hill is one of those people who you have heard of even if you don't recognize the name. His writings and ideas were "borrowed" and in some cases bastardized by nearly every self-help author out there. He has a surprisingly effective description of magick and magickal practices, although he doesn't call it that. Among other things, Hill's system included creating and naming various helpers that would watch out for everything from his physical health and his fiscal situation. There was even a general purpose helper to do everything the others were too busy to do.
Colin Wilson contributed the idea of the "ladder of consciousness." He was using it to explain possession. One of the things that surprised Wilson was that while the "lower order" entities seldom knew as much as their hosts, sometimes the "higher order" entities knew much more, including things that hadn't happened yet. So for Wilson, the "lower order" entities occupied a lower "rung" on the consciousness while "higher order" entities occupied the same "rung" or a higher "rung" as the "normal" self.
You can see the obvious ties to the chakra practices. and the implied ties to some forms of Tarot progressive meditation. Which in turn invokes Jung all over again.
There was another factor that Wilson mentioned almost in passing, as if he wasn't quite sure where it fit. Some of the entities drained energy, making the host more tired. Others added energy, making the host renewed and recharged.
Over the years, I've found that this bears a close relationship with what Cambell called "following your bliss."
The ones of Me who have been out facing the world lately haven't been the ones who replenish my energy. It's made me tired and snappish. I tend to be insomniac anyway, and stress makes the problem worse. If there were a goal I could measure progress towards, it would be one thing. But mainly things are up in the air.
So the creative parts of me and the magickal parts of me have been starving for attention. Even the routine parts of me have been snappish, probably because they have to deal with the others.
I finally have some time to be creative.
Posted: Sun - September 17, 2006 at 07:23 PM
