#Spiritual Metaphor

[compassionmattersmost]

Ramayana No. 2: Ayodhya—The Unsubdued Kingdom Within

Rama’s Exile and Our Spiritual Journey: Reclaiming the Pristine Mind As I sit with the first chapter of the Ramayana, I find myself drawn to the idea of Ayodhya—the city that cannot be subdued by war. This simple yet profound description speaks to something deeper, something within each of us that remains untouched by the chaos of the world. Ayodhya, the capital of King Dasharatha’s kingdom, is…

[uncanny-tranny]

All I want is to go to a trans person's funeral after they lived a full, enriching life. I want to see trans people grow old, I want us to live like the stars. We don't deserve to burn out before everybody else. When we die, I want it to be because we grew old, because we had lived.

[nho-jungle]

im not doing all the prompts for freak week/have merged a few of them for one rlly big piece on the final day due to. being disabled. but here is a wiwi for yall.

day 2 prompt: decay

[vaguely-concerned]

it probably says something either sad or deeply unfortunate about me as a person, but I'm darkly amused to see some people react to the reveal of the ultimate permeability of souls in tlt as a triumphant thing -- the "you can't take 'loved' away!!!" side of it all -- when my first reaction was such an immediate wave of 'oh, oh so this is why this series is horror, I truly understand now' distress haha. ngl the final confirmation of the self not being inviolable in the deepest way freaks me the fuck out far more than any moment of body horror in the series has managed. (these two elements are of course the two sides of one thematic coin; it's about the horror of our bodies and minds and selves not being inviolable things, and about the effect of violence on them on so many different levels. violence psychological and interpersonal, physical, subtextually sexual, emotional, medical, political, a whole unlovely smörgåsbord of indignity and violation a person can be exposed to, and on a broader scale the spectrum of violence colonialism wields). The world and other people being capable of leaving indelible marks on us for good or ill through their presence in our lives is of course a pretty self-evident demonstrable truth in the real world, but somehow having it be proven metaphysically just uh. Fucks me up! 

It also drives home to me just how perfectly Muir has captured the dilemma at the heart of human connection and intimacy: the fact that the thing that gives us life and meaning is also capable of harming us so deeply. the same thing that can be so beautiful — even in a bittersweet, violently transformative form like with the creation of Paul — when done mutually and consensually and compassionately, is the same process that means someone like John can touch someone else's soul and 'after he's put his fingers on something, you'll never find anyone else's fingerprints on it; too much noise'. I think the text itself — the whole series, because to me this is what it is ultimately about, this tension between individuation/self vs. love/connection/enmeshment — is far more ambivalent in its treatment of it than saying it’s inherently a good thing or inherently a bad thing. The only thing it says for sure is that it is always a thing, that thinking you’re ever getting away from it is the height of futility, and that through being alive (or even through being dead lol) it is something you have to engage with in some way no matter what. Contact with other people is deeply necessary — without it we sicken and die. it can be the most beautiful and meaningful thing in a human life, and the most unspeakably horrific. All of these people are searching for some way to be whole, whether in total self-contained sufficiency on their own or in melding with someone else as their ‘other half’, and stumbling around in the dark they reach for each other and score deep wounds into the thing they’re trying to touch even when they don’t mean to. Taken to horrific extremes with the form of lyctorhood John guided his disciples to when they were ‘children — playing in the reflections of stars in a pool of water, thinking it was space’, because while people hurt each other all the time with differing levels of intentionality behind it, what John did was deliberate. It weaponizes the misapprehension of what closeness must be and destroys everyone involved in the process… and all because it leaves John the one sun their ruined lives have left to orbit around, because that’s the closest thing his soul will allow to connection. He doesn’t understand that to truly touch something you have to truly let it touch you back, and then wonders why he’s never satisfied.   

‘The horrors of love’ has been memed to death, I know, but… yeah. That is what it is, isn’t it.

[thedansemacabres]

possibly controversial opinion, however, I am extremely wary of how people in witchy & pagan spaces are beginning to spiritualise ‘inner child work’. For those unknowing, inner child is a psychotherapy & IFS concept that seeks to provide therapy via metaphorical ‘parts’—the idea is that all of us have ‘parts’ that operate like a family unit. I won’t go into too much detail because I myself am not a licensed therapist, my biological mother is, but overall I am extremely wary of people trying to recommend courses/spells/rituals for a psychotherapy model especially without the guidance of someone actually trained in this. IFS can do serious damage even with a trained therapist, so why is it becoming a practice people are pushing as necessary in some spiritual spaces?

[itspileofgoodthings]

had a very nice realization about peace, especially spiritual peace, the other day. (Been brewing for a while.) and it’s just: peace is for the non-peaceful.

[completeoveranalysis]

[2]

OH IS IT EGG TIME?

IS IT EGG DAY?

Something something never skip egg day.

But all plot promises aside I love the thought process Doumeki is showing here. 

He understands an “egg” as “something that new things are born from”, and so he can’t imagine what other use it might have if that option is off the table. 

And there are so many different layers to that concept alone. Doumeki is, after all, a regular person who was presumably born one of the regular ways. For him, Egg -> New Birth is the ordinary and perhaps exclusive way of things, from his point of view. 

But what about eggs that aren’t laid at all, but still exist? What about eggs that are glitched into being - like Watanuki was? If Watanuki is an egg he is technically the same egg as the egg that originally existed, but he wasn’t the one that was actually raised by his parents. Does an egg like that still have some use in this world? (which is a very affirmative yes)

What about eggs that are separated from their world of origin, do they still have some use? Tampopo says yes! Like Watanuki, even if it’s just human connection and making someone else happy, then it existing at all is always a good thing, even if it wasn’t supposed to be here originally. 

And what about eggs that never hatch? Do they have some use in this world? 

Yuuko said it will. Doumeki doesn’t understand how, but he’s still only thinking about it from one angle. 

If he were thinking about it like a chef, for example, then yes there are many, many uses for an egg that will never hatch. As long as it didn't go off.

So clearly he should spend even more time with Watanuki. :) 

[kookiekult]

Guys I'm getting unhealthy I'm actually crying you don't understand

[222cunty]

[eltonjohndenver]

s5 trailer conspiracy

Louisa: River what the fuck

River: Sorry was that not ok

Louisa: girl i asked you hypothetically what you’d do if Spider was here right now what is wrong with you

[lifenconcepts]

Check it out y’all

The divine wolf in body of man

[eyesfuil0fstars]

July

When a creature that used to be wicked and cruel grows,painfully, slowly, inevitably, it falls into the Sun’s lap and asks for forgiveness. Mercy, for all it has ever done,out of spite and selfishness and a need to be more.

The Sun replies“It’s not me you seek forgiveness from” and turns around,and goes.

-

I try to write about the colour of your eyes, or the way you half talk,half sing. I try to write you a poem and I fail to make it rhyme. The stars above my head yawning,waiting for daylight.

 I don’t know what to say to you. I bled blue because of you the entire winter. Run out of metaphors somewhere between March and June.And now here we are,August, trying to think of ways to move forward, in a world that’s only trying to stay the same. 

I don’t know how to say I’m sorry. The Sun won’t accept my apologies on your behalf.

Instead I’ll write about the pieces of you my memory has managed to capture like lightning in a bottle and hope they’ll satisfy. Fail to do anything else until you reach out and try to touch me. July comes and goes. My pages stay blank.

[metanarrates]

watched a majora's mask analysis earlier today with my fiancee. my verdict is that I actually really enjoyed the op's interpretations, but that I wished that they talked more about mm's literal level and what one can get from it, rather than talking about those events as if they are strictly metaphor. yes, of course the metaphorical layer of the game is rich to dig into, but it's also such an open-ended and surreal game that it's difficult to nail down every single distinct metaphor that can be derived from its events. which is why I consider it necessary to discuss the way the literal layer presents itself and what sort of motifs and ideas exist there as a baseline before you begin looking at it as metaphor

[unmeritedunearnedundeserved]

The Butterfly Law Of Attraction Analogy

When a caterpillar enters into a Chrysalis, many don't know that the caterpillar completely dissolves into a gooey liquid. None of the previous form is left or used. And then out of the goo begins to emerge the new form, the Butterfly. And the Butterfly 🦋 is capable of doing things that the caterpillar cannot. The Butterfly has wings and can travel great spans and distances that the caterpillar couldn't even imagine.

Likewise, in your learning of the Law of Attraction, there is a radical psychological transformation that one undergoes. A spiritual metamorphosis.

In order for one to evolve into the metaphorical "Butterfly" which can manifest all of their hearts desires and be capable of tremendous things, they must completely dissolve the previous concept of themselves.

Their old self-image must in effect be dissolved into a formless substance, similar to the goo that the caterpillar melts into.

None of your previous state of consciousness, your previous "form", can enter into the state of consciousness which would manifest your desire.

You must completely renounce your old identidy and identification in which you've seen and understood yourself to be an external being with an individualized personality.

You're "John Smith", "Sarah Jane", "Marlon Chavez" identidy must dissolve in order for you to evolve into the state which would effortlessly manifest your desires.

From your "caterpillar" (external / second cause) identidy, you can do nothing. For you are in the race belief of thinking you are a second cause, subject to the external world and somehow divorced and separate from the divine.

From your "Butterfly" (First Cause) identification, all things are possible to you because all things have already effortlessly been done for you, without any requirements of works or merits.

The caterpillar you, still believes in deservability and feels itself to be in need of external things or people to become whole and complete.

The Butterfly you, which is your true self, is whole and complete in and of itself, and is a law unto itself. None can stay it's hand or say unto it "what doest thou?"

The caterpillar you sees itself as subject to conditions.

The Butterfly you sees itself as author of conditions and full in possession of its desires, right now.

Enter fully into this Butterfly identification, for in doing so all of your desires effortlessly manifest into the external.

And in receiving greater revelation of the Law of Attraction, you will find yourself being effortlessly released from your old self concept which imprisoned you in your previous conditions and had you "crawling around" on your hands and knees in this world.

First Cause Consciousness has "wings" that second cause consciousness does not. And in order to experience the fullness of these wings, you must completely die to the previous indentification.

Let go of yourself as a caterpillar completely surrenders to the process of the chrysalis which melts it down and transforms it. For your chrysalis is a greater revelation of First Cause Consciousness, which leaves you changed, such that you will NEVER be the same.

[inqueerist]

Take me to a place

I have never been before

Where the way my name leaves your lips

Never hits my ear

In that way

Because I am nameless

Because I am god damn

Nothing

And it is beautiful

[wallbeatjournal]

if you had to base a new riverdale season off three movies, which would you choose and why? they could be tonal choices or you can pluck entire elements of the movies and work them in.

ok i broke the rules bc i didn't stick to movies, i went novels and pop culture with it too. and i also kind of embroidered a few references together around each main riff in a way that i think COULD be riverdalian, but these are my 3 selections:

jt leroy (2018). trashy iffy-hot-take kristen stewart/laura dern movie about a very 2000s literary scandal/internet drama run Too Far into irl drama that i think riverdale would know better what to do with. two ideas (this is a jughead plot btw):

put jughead in the dissociated trauma-projecting controlling persona-having laura albert/jt leroy role and rope veronica and reggie and their monetary-business motivations into the scam angle. monica posh savannah knoop stuff and rattling veronica and jughead around in a jar together intensely in a campy way

or step lightly outside the bounds of this script into the real livejournal and myspace based drama of it all and jughead's sometimes-characterization as a guy who needs help unpacking metaphor even though he's swimming in it. make him into one of the many emo band boys (ryan ross?? ryan ross????) who related so so so so sosososo much to the writing of jeremiah terminator and then had a whole crisis when j.t. was unmasked as a middle-aged woman with a metaphorical literary persona.

permissible bonus web-weaves: james frey a million little pieces and oprah, augusten burroughs and running with scissors. we're doing the 2000s obsession with author authenticity is-this-really-autobiographical-if-it's-not-literally-true-or-are-you-shaming-your-family-for-NOTHING questions and scandals. but we're especially doing the emo community freaking the fuck out about blorbo from their novels doing a catfish online to extend the persona just that much further.

the avril lavigne replacement conspiracy theory (linking the wiki even though what i'm REALLY thinking of here is this moving pandemic essay alexander chee my beloved posted that i can't locate now, riffing on themes of feeling like a ghost inhabiting your own life after a major trauma). they can work in some other famous body double / replacement and assassination conspiracies (paul is dead, jfk) too but avril is the main reference and this is a betty plot.

pull in some actual alexander chee images and motifs too maybe, his novels about csa grooming trauma and having complicated feelings about your intimate abusers via like grandiose opera/paris siege metaphors (the queen of the night) and fox demons (edinburgh) betty would eat, i fear, even if they're a step off her normal serial killer media mix. dark betty has the range <3

stephen king's the long walk / suzanne collins' the hunger games / battle royale / state-sponsored brutal murderous game show authority abuse dystopia media homage in general!! especially when it's homoerotic and full of ptsd and institutional abuse, because clearly this is a plot primarily for archie and the lads. imo the long walk ("how bad do you have to hate yourself to join the military" but it's game show horror) and the hunger games ("child stardom is traumatic institutional abuse especially in the era of social media and society simply pretends not to see it" but make it a ya game show adventure) should be the main references, but we could work the academic/art-competition angle of battle royale for kevin. as a treat. ok yeah and maybe work in that arnold schwarzenneger movie the running man too while we're here picking up interwoven motifs at the store. why not!