When I left Christianity all those years ago I fell from ‘Heaven’ to ‘Earth’, figuratively speaking. Despite my convictions in leaving the religion I was still subconsciously in contempt, feeling guilty, and alone; however, this was the price I paid to start again, re-discover myself, to get one-step closer to my true authentic self. Not to say that I regret my journey to this point – it was necessary for me to get to this point in my life, this understanding of myself, my ultimate reverse-UNO, my repentance, and my magnus-opus so to speak. This may sound strange but our greatest fall, or our greatest change, and our healing is truly our work of art. Maybe not observed but definitely experienced from the inside-out.
Going from the so-called ‘elect’ to a fallen state was what I represented, knowing that I had been sleeping and awakened to my truth. It was an interesting paradox at the time, the foundations of my ‘self’ was firmly built on many truths and wisdom of the book, and yet at the same time destroyed. The stems of which were cultivated from the esoteric teachings, and wisdom I had gained from the Bible-and yet it didn’t satisfy me, I knew there was more, and I knew that not all that I read was from Source.
Starting from the bottom, whilst frightening was exciting, and inviting. It represented freedom to be and explore beyond the bounds of religion; from Universalism, to New Age, to Starseeds, to the mysteries, the philosophies of Theosophy, and channeling of the beings, and so on. I found myself in ‘Heaven’ again – from the roots to the branches, and then the tops of the trees, and yet something was missing. I was treading the same ground as before in my Christian walk, sacrificing ‘Earth’ for ‘Heaven’ in the spirit of the most fundamentalist zealots and Gnostics.
I held a deep reverence for all above, but none for what was below. The flesh became a weakness, the material became unimportant and irrelevant, I became judgemental, my motives were questioned, and I struggled to fully understand and reconcile my dual existence. Over time I came back down to ‘Earth’ again and learnt to plant both my roots in the ground, whilst touching the sky, but I found this greatly challenging.
In seeking to only acknowledge the ‘above’ it caused me great tension and conflict ‘below’, being either overbearing, arrogant or powerless. Sometimes I found everyday life and interactions trying, and only considered those things of a spiritual nature. It became a form of escapism, a form of ‘spiritual’ bypassing, ironically enough. It was only through integration of ‘Heaven’ and ‘Earth’ was I able to accept myself as a physical and spiritual being-learning to love the fullness of life, and the necessity of human experience and connection-both of body and spirit as one. I fully understood the phase ‘As Above, so Below’ without its dogmatic context.
When I refer to ‘Heaven’ and ‘Earth’, the ‘roots’ and the ‘top of the tree’, I am speaking about our human connection to the material world and the spiritual world, or the tangible and intangible world. When we seek purpose beyond the mundane or the ‘Earth’ we climb our own Jacob’s Ladder to ‘Heaven, analogous to when we realise that our material lives and mental constructs are only parts of ourselves that we have created, rather than see them as our true and authentic selves; however, we also risk disassociating ourselves with our everyday lives and losing our humanity.
As human beings one of our biggest challenges is integrating our ‘Heavenly’ self with our ‘Earthly’ selves, our flesh with our spirit as it were. After all, a tree cannot live without roots, cannot speak with the forest floor, cannot share knowledge and nourish life, or provide shelter for the birds.
When I think about this I consider the Tree of Life (or other parallels like the tree of Yggdrasil in Norse mythology or the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Bible), which may constitute the various qualities, energy centres, ‘rays’, planets, or aspects of virtues or qualities we intrinsically hold and must develop to become our divine selves. Two examples are shown below (first image courtesy of @samdeacon.art).
Our essence constantly moves back and forth between our roots (Earth) and the sky (Heaven, or our Divine self), unconsciously and consciously (when we awaken to our truth). When we come into some gems of truth our purpose and pleasure is to go back to our roots and spread our truth to others-inside and outside of any religion, philosophy, or spiritual path. This is an iterative process, where we are constantly rebuilding up from our roots to the sky, refining the form and the shape of our branches, to better receive and transmit what we know as truth – knowing that our beliefs and opinions change in the pursuit of authenticity – ad infinitum.
In our current state of being it is necessary for us as a species to develop these qualities and discover ourselves during our physical life, in order to support others in their own journeys – whatever path they may take towards divinity. This is similar to staring in the face of Nirvana and going back to earth to tell those what you had seen or learned. Better yet this may be paralleled with the narrative of Plato’s Cave, or the story of Saul from the Book of Acts. Just when we think we know something, something brings us right back down to Earth and enables us to work on the qualities we had lacked, to remove the parts of us that no longer serve us, that continue to obstruct our view of ‘Heaven’. Seeing through a glass darkly; but then seeing face-to-face (1 Cor. 13:12).
Attaining such revelation or realisation does us no benefit if we do not use it to do ‘the work’ that is required for ourselves and for the expansion of others. Reviewing and drafting a chapter of life where the best of you is yet to come.
The Philosopher's Poet 