The Planes as I Understand Them
Jun. 25th, 2024 10:31 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kimberlysteele
“If each human’s existence is likened to the Everlasting Gobstopper/Jawbreaker, the material plane is the sour candy shell on the outside. One layer in, there is a different flavor called the etheric plane. This plane of energy is what Chinese people call “chi” and Indians call “prana” and is what feng shui, acupuncture, and Ayurveda works with. The etheric is invisible to us humans while we are awake in our stodgy plane, but some sensitive people can see it and most can feel it whether they realize it or not. The next candy layer in is the astral plane, which is most easily understood as the world of dreams you go to when you sleep. The dream world is part your own brain and part collective, meaning, other peoples’ dreams are part of your world/vice a versa and you can interact with them and they with you. Dreams are not what you choose them to be: just like other people’s emotions or the weather, they aren’t controlled by the dreamer. There are rules and limits to them just as there are rules and limits on the physical plane. Of course these rules and limits are different than the ones on the physical plane. The next layer in is the mental plane, which is the plane of learning and mastery that separates humans from other animals. For instance, being able to figure out how fast an object falls to the ground because of scientific laws falls under the mental plane category. Another layer into the Gobstopper is the spiritual plane, which is the primary reason you were incarnated and is the core from which all of the other layers of the Gobstopper emanate and cannot exist without. Take note that all the planes are the same Gobstopper, they are just different layers of a whole candy.”
The second analogy I like to use is the Stick Figure Family analogy:
If you are familiar with the kind of sticker that shows up on SUVs depicting family members and their pets, that is what I am talking about. On the physical plane/Meatworld, the window cling film is made of plastic, which is the long-decomposed parts of plant and animal matter we have processed into a sticky film. The etheric plane is where the sticker gets the static electricity that gives it the ability to stick. Though static electricity is invisible, we recognize it as present and we can feel it if we shuffle across the carpeting in a cold and dry room. The next plane "upwards" or "inwards" is the Astral Plane, the plane of ideas and images. When we see a crude stick drawing and associate it with a family of four with a dog and a cat, it is our Astral Plane development that enables us to perceive the drawing as a depiction of a family. Non-human animals do not have the same ability to translate that sort of visual symbolism, and that is the main thing that separates us humans from them. The Mental Plane is the concept of family and the ancient force that causes humans to band together in the first place. Humans do not understand this level of existence very well, but the few who do are often perceived as masters, gurus, or yogis. The Causal Plane is the divine force that created all of this stuff to begin with, and I won't even pretend to understand the first thing about it except that it is there.I am going to add a third analogy in hopes of breaking through the same wall of obtuseness I faced as an atheist. I will call this one the airplane analogy; this one is very special because it actually has a plane in it... You see what I did there?
Airplanes do not just appear out of thin air. In order for an airplane to exist on the material plane, we have to trace it all the way back to where it came from. The airplane is a construction of metal powered by petroleum. It is actually several inventions in one -- refined crude oil, engine, ailerons, wings, steering, wheels. The energy it is given by the oil and the resistance given to it by wind currents and gravity are etheric plane phenomena. Without the etheric plane's energy, the airplane would not be able to be made, let alone fly. The next subtlest plane the airplane comes from is the astral plane, otherwise known as the plane of images. The airplane began as images in a person's (or a few people's) heads. If there had never been an image of a flying machine, the flying machine would not have been invented or "made real" with metal and fuel. The minds that invented the airplane also did not get the idea from nowhere; on the mental plane we have the mechanics of birds and insect wings that illustrate the concept of flight. Only when the concept of how that happens is understood do we get men capable of making an airplane. The spiritual world is the force we call Divine that seems to have created birds, flying bugs, wind currents, and flight in general.
In The Rosicrucian Christianity Lectures, Max Heindel says:
A little thought will soon make it apparent to any investigator that we live in a world of effect which is the result of invisible causes. MATTER and FORM we see, but the FORCE which molds the form and quickens it is invisible to us. Life cannot be cognized directly by the senses; it is invisible and self-existent independent of the varied forms we see as its manifestations.
Let us quarantine some images that are better off put aside for now. One is the American Buddhist notion of nonexistence, which acknowledges reincarnation and seeks to supplant it with the ultimate turn off/tune out. The Buddhists I have met seem to confuse it with an unsullied afterlife realm of bliss. This innocent land for "good" Buddhists sounds like Christian heaven with the tags removed. The last time I checked, heaven may be a nice place, but it is definitely still existence. Speaking of Christian heaven, there's another farce explored in countless television shows and movies, though not as often as Christian hell. Long story short is all the interesting people go to Christian hell, leaving Christian heaven a fairly boring place. Even ancient Greek concepts of the remote lands of Hades and Mount Olympus should be put aside for the time being, or at least until you can use them to train your mind instead of inform it.
There were a spate of episodes of the cheesy, oversexed vampire TV series True Blood that featured the worst of New Age misconceptions about the realm of fairies. Of course fairies or Faeries were depicted as having their own dimension, and this dimension was a literal forest with chandeliers hanging from trees. White Ren faire gowns were the official dress code of the True Blood Faeries. Just... NO. This sort of Tinkerbellish conception of fairies is exactly what landed me in hot water when I tried to invoke them as a teen and ended up with night terrors. Fairies aren't nice creatures; in fact, they are often brutes. John Michael Greer speculates in his book Monsters that gray aliens and fairies are probably the same thing -- both like torturing and raping humans and occasionally mating with them consensually. From my experience, I believe he is correct.
When I say fairies dwell upon the astral plane, and I believe I have said those words before, what I mean is they are non-embodied beings. They are strongest in the realm of images whereas humans are strong in the physical plane, and we have the oil rigs and strip malls to prove it. Because fairies and other astral creatures are more active in their comfort zone of the astral level of existence, they can manifest on the next plane "down" towards the material known as the etheric, but if you put up a defense, such as a bent piece of iron in the form of a nail and salt amulet, they are easily prevented from taking form. This is useful knowledge if you have a house that is prone to orbs, bad smells, weird noises, stressed out pets, and misplaced objects. The defenses of natural magic are often enough to completely remove mild poltergeist phenomena from a living space.
Humans have become more materialistic as our populations have swelled. I believe the average person in 1924 saw more ghosts, shadow people, saints, and other paranormal oddities than the average person of 2024. The further you go back, the more they saw. In 1624, witches were taken seriously because it did not require hallucinogens to see what they were doing on the etheric plane. This is why so many regular people made witch bottles in 1624. A witch bottle is a device designed to trap and torment the etheric body of a would-be witch assailant. In the year 124, dragons were real because the average peasant could perceive the etheric plane (I believe dragons, ki'rin and ki'lin are etheric plane phenomena) like modern humans perceive the physical plane. Isn't it interesting that fairies ahem I mean aliens tend to haunt rural areas and the more remote, the better. I's almost as if they take shelter where non-human ecosystems are in charge. When there is a human lucky or unlucky enough to encounter them in the wild, they are anything but friendly.
They saw it coming...
The material plane is extremely crowded at the moment. The era in which we dwell was labeled the Kali Yuga by ancient Indians. Nostradamus burned all of his collected knowledge in order to prevent it from falling into our bumbling hands. Ancient Mayans and Incas tried to prevent our era from happening via blood sacrifice and a hell of a lot of it. When white guys showed up in boats, they folded their empire like a paper napkin and let a few hundred Conquistadores take their empire. Why? They knew. They knew this era would be materialistic, crass, ugly, and depressing. They knew we would be utterly blind to things they saw.
When you have a buttload of humans in incarnation, it follows there are lots of former animal souls being flipped into human existence. I myself have distant past life memories of being a goose and later a cat. It's not easy being a cat. One of the reasons I treat my cats so well is because like Pepperidge Farm, I remember. So the next time you, my gifted and intelligent reader, have the urge to throw your hands up (or a particular finger) at one of those dolts known as the Stupid People, please keep in mind that the Stupid Person may have been a squirrel, cow, or a dog all of eighteen years ago. Be patient, for they are doing the best they can!
We are at peak population, peak Idiocracy, and peak materialism. The bad news is that you are HERE. The good news is there is no place to go but up.
If there is one habit I can recommend to foster gnosis of what on earth is happening (shout out to Mark Passio) it is discursive meditation. For 5-15 minutes every day, you sit in a chair with your feet on the ground. While you sit, your job is to unpack a single phrase, thought, picture, or symbol like a ZIP file. Mine it for its information, its insights, its tangents, and its flights of fancy. This limited focus becomes your rabbit hole. For instance, you could meditate on deceptively simple statements like this:
- I am a spirit in the material world.
- The planes are separate and all at once.
- Time and space are illusions.
The second thing I recommend is being more openhearted about Divine influence. My formerly atheist self dismissed prayer as God-bothering. I believe this was an instinctive overreaction to mainstream religions where congregants act like annoying, entitled beggars when it comes to their attempts to communicate with God. The first thing I sensed was the etheric. When I began to be grateful for little things like a cup of tea or a safe trip across town, the energy or vibe improved around whatever I was thankful for. Gradually I became more sensitive to other people and I began to be slightly less stupid via the virtue of not opening my mouth whenever I felt the urge to speak. When I went for my solo walks in the forest or prairie, I began to feel my surroundings on a deep level. Over time I began talking to trees, streams, and larger spirits of the land in what we crudely call "their language". I risked becoming a God-botherer, but I like to think my approach to asking for Divine guidance is less annoying because I try to be humble about it and I don't ever feel it is owed to me. I am not, nor will I ever be the smartest or most special of people. It was only when I could admit my lowly position that the Divine began throwing me a bone here and there.
The Divine powers are smarter than us humans in the way humans intellectually outclass hamsters. Why they choose to help or pity us humans at any given moment is a mystery. As occupiers of the spiritual plane, they are all around us, as are ghosts, fairies, demons, astral pyramids, egregores (group spirits), land spirits, and beings too diverse to name or contemplate. We are the ones with severely limited perception living through the least-spiritual phase of human existence. Only through our willingness, humility, openness, and entreaties to smarter beings than us can we help to remedy the situation.
no subject
Date: 2024-06-27 11:10 am (UTC)Have you ever heard of Miyadaiku, or Japanese shrine carpentry? It's a 1400+ year old tradition, where everything is put together with very complex wooden joints, without the aid of nails. The joints are incredible, but they must take a long time to make. (I do some hobby woodworking myself)
Whilst Japan has historically been a fairly iron-poor country, metal nails were still in use elsewhere. For shrines through, to invite in the Kami, they had to be a fully wooden construction. I think I posted about it a while ago, but there's a podcast I enjoy called Uncanny Japan, all about the Japanese mythical creatures and gods. Many (especially the Tengu) sound a lot more like what we in the West used to call faeries. In this light, the lack of metal (especially nails) makes perfect sense. The Kami are very strict about what they do and don't like, and are equally as capricious as faeries with their boons for offerings and punishments for transgressions.
You may have seen my post on JMG's magic Monday this week about my musings on gremlins being a form of sky-fae as well. To further that, I think they were what the Greeks thought of as the personifications of the wind, but our encounters with them were, by nature, fleeting, until we started encroaching on their territory with aircraft. As someone else commented on my post, ships at sea used to commonly have benevolent faeries as well, until they started being an all-metal construction.
I do think there are extraterrestrials who visit the Earth, and always have done, but much like how the Tanuki and Kitsune (both probably types of fae) can camouflage themselves as animals, I think the fae have learned to camouflage themselves as ETs. The whole 'airship men craze' of the late 1800s (before airships were invented) may have been the fae trying to disguise themselves with modern technology. Even today, with radar etc (which I imagine they hate), pilots occasionally report seeing 'phantom aircraft' with no radar signature. Not UFO shaped, but plane shaped, and often from the wrong 'era' (eg. WW2 planes seen in modern times, and vice versa).
Time doesn't seem to work quite the same on the etheric plane, so it's understandable they might get slightly scrambled with their timing and camouflage as anachronistic vehicles.
Electricity and magnetism are also on the borderline between the etheric and physical plane, in my opinion, but in a way that we can observe, measure and use.
I've been recently reading a book where people have (anecdotally) been cured of things like fibromyalgia using magnets. Human bodies demonstrably have their own biomagnetic field, and I imagine being saturated in artificial EMFs all day disrupts it pretty badly, with young women seemingly being most affected.
And remember all the weirdness about people sticking spoons to their arms over their injection sites? Definitely some etheric effect going on there, even beyond any nanotech.
Did you know that electricity used to be thought of as a fluid? High-frequency electricity in particular seems to behave extremely similarly to the etheric field, as well as like a liquid. Superconducting materials, with almost zero resistance to electrical current, have some very strange properties and effects. You can make a frog levitate with ultra-high magnetic fields from superconducting magnets (and the frogs apparently don't mind). Radionics machines are typically un-powered, but can be boosted significantly with high-frequency electric power. Nicola Tesla created a 'healing bath', where he ran very, very high frequency electric current through a bathtub. Even at extremely high voltage, the human body is unharmed (I think there's a photo somewhere of him sitting in it), whilst pathogens and unhealthy cells (presumably with a different electrical frequency to the rest of the body) are destroyed.
Before some clunsy maths (which Einstein himself did not agree with) 'disproved' it, the universe was thought to be filled with what was known as "luminiferous aether". Sound waves require a medium to travel through (like air), so the logic was that seemingly empty space must also be permeated with a similar medium for light waves to travel through. Since then, dark matter and dark energy have been invented as terms to describe more or less the same thing...
I came across a theory known as the 'electric universe', to explain how astrology could have a scientific basis, as the planets all have their own electrical charges and therefore could set up charge differentials between each other as they move, resulting in effects on those planets. There are also clouds of charged dust we periodically travel through. It was very clever, but if you add in aether as the conducting medium, it makes an awful lot more sense.
In engineering, a fluid can actually refer to a liquid or gas - the only difference is the viscosity and density. (And aether would be very, very low density!)
Mr. Crow
no subject
Date: 2024-06-28 03:14 am (UTC)Yes, I have heard of that kind of carpentry! It's like tongue and groove joinery but for houses. I do think you are on to something as far as the connection of no iron/no metal and kami.
"Electricity and magnetism are also on the borderline between the etheric and physical plane, in my opinion, but in a way that we can observe, measure and use." I have a mild disagreement with you here -- the etheric plane IS the energy plane. It IS magnetism. We can measure some electrical phenomena but most of it is beyond the reach of our equipment. The day the vibe of a room can be measured or the size and shape of a land spirit can be represented on a graph is the day we will be able to measure etheric phenomena.
The empty universe theory always seemed fatuous to me, much like an "I give up". Most of the people studying these phenomena -- physicists -- are far too deep into the Dunning-Kruger effect to address their own ignorance. The electric universe makes a great deal of sense, and so does the idea of the planets carrying charges.
no subject
Date: 2024-06-28 05:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-06-29 02:09 am (UTC)My own opinion is that we will emerge from the dark age of spiritual leprosy when the internet goes down for good and when there is no more cheap petroleum to be had any which way. No more planes in the sky (or chem trails) and no more cheap shipping. A mobile phone will be a useless piece of plastic and will be more useful melted down.
People who migrated to other countries to live and raise families will completely lose touch with their relatives overseas as there will be no more reliable post offices. Their children will take on the land spirits of wherever they are with no ability to go back except by wooden ship. At that point, the only distraction from philosophy and spirituality will be hard manual labor, and those conditions usually give rise to a more spiritual brand of human. Considering hard manual labor is in itself a fairly direct path to spirituality, once it comes back (obviously it won't be chosen) it will bring the gods and awareness of the gods with it.
no subject
Date: 2024-06-28 06:39 am (UTC)Christopher Kinyon
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Date: 2024-06-29 02:15 am (UTC)