Preserving the Status Quo
May. 31st, 2021 06:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
youngelephantOne of Violet’s posts lately (https://violetcabra.dreamwidth.org/136381.html?thread=560573#cmt563645) gave rise to a question in my mind: What makes people unwilling to make the leap from conformity to non-conformity? I dedicated a walking meditation session to this today and I have some thoughts.
Jordan Peterson’s lobsters in a bucket metaphor popped in my mind first. Peterson often talks about how when lobsters in the bottom of a bucket will pull down the lobsters that make it to the top of the bucket and almost escape. Though much maligned by the mainstream left, I see a lot of truth in this metaphor.
As JMG has said, most people reside on the astral level of consciousness. Emotions rule this level of consciousness, and the stasis or equilibrium of emotions in a group of people at this level of consciousness reinforce each other. In other words, every person who conforms to some group makes the others feel good and stable. When some individual begins the process of differentiating themselves from the group, the other members of the group not participating in this process feel bad about themselves. They subconsciously react to the individuating soul to try to bring them down to the level of the group, eg. lobsters pulling each other down before they can escape from the bucket.
Why don’t the puller downs individuate themselves? They reside in the astral level of consciousness and don’t want to miss out on the reassuring, comforting incoming astral matter of their fellow conformers. In other words, fear keeps them in the bucket.
This association to fear led me to make a comparison with the Dweller on Threshold. For those of us who start off as completely undifferentiated herd dwellers, we quite literally reside in our lower selves. It’s only when we start making moves to differentiate/individuate ourselves from the herd do we start to identify with aspects of our higher self. At that point, our lower self takes life as the Dweller. Therefore, those of us who start off as herd dwellers (as I certainly did) have a sort of collective Dweller on the Threshold in the herd consciousness of society. Overcoming this collective Dweller seems like what the Jesus Christ mythos represents, at least to me.
Society has a lot of demons to offer to those on the spiritual path: drugs, pornography, casual sex, gluttony, consumerism, partying, and the emotional feel-goodiness of herd consciousness. I feel quite certain I’ve only touched on a few of these demons.
I think this makes a good first start in answering the topical question. If I had to write a TLDR I would simply say “fear”.
Jordan Peterson’s lobsters in a bucket metaphor popped in my mind first. Peterson often talks about how when lobsters in the bottom of a bucket will pull down the lobsters that make it to the top of the bucket and almost escape. Though much maligned by the mainstream left, I see a lot of truth in this metaphor.
As JMG has said, most people reside on the astral level of consciousness. Emotions rule this level of consciousness, and the stasis or equilibrium of emotions in a group of people at this level of consciousness reinforce each other. In other words, every person who conforms to some group makes the others feel good and stable. When some individual begins the process of differentiating themselves from the group, the other members of the group not participating in this process feel bad about themselves. They subconsciously react to the individuating soul to try to bring them down to the level of the group, eg. lobsters pulling each other down before they can escape from the bucket.
Why don’t the puller downs individuate themselves? They reside in the astral level of consciousness and don’t want to miss out on the reassuring, comforting incoming astral matter of their fellow conformers. In other words, fear keeps them in the bucket.
This association to fear led me to make a comparison with the Dweller on Threshold. For those of us who start off as completely undifferentiated herd dwellers, we quite literally reside in our lower selves. It’s only when we start making moves to differentiate/individuate ourselves from the herd do we start to identify with aspects of our higher self. At that point, our lower self takes life as the Dweller. Therefore, those of us who start off as herd dwellers (as I certainly did) have a sort of collective Dweller on the Threshold in the herd consciousness of society. Overcoming this collective Dweller seems like what the Jesus Christ mythos represents, at least to me.
Society has a lot of demons to offer to those on the spiritual path: drugs, pornography, casual sex, gluttony, consumerism, partying, and the emotional feel-goodiness of herd consciousness. I feel quite certain I’ve only touched on a few of these demons.
I think this makes a good first start in answering the topical question. If I had to write a TLDR I would simply say “fear”.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-31 10:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-06-01 01:14 am (UTC)