I find it oddly symbolic that my graduation year is also one of the key numerological conecpts in one of the many metaphysical systems I’ve looked into over the years.
For me, the number represented an amazing change in being. A freeing from many of the things that held me back from knowing–let alone being–who I could be. It was a year that led me to realize just how interconnected all things are. A year when I learned what real Friendship was all about (and how I had been thinking of it wrong in the past).
In a way, it all falls in nicely with the meaning held in high regard by those who walk the path of Thelema. It serves as the numerical representation for both of their key concepts: Love and Will.
Right now, the more relevant of those concepts is Love.
Agape, the Greek work for the particular kind of love spoken of in most religions (or, at least, the Greek word for Love that was appropriated by early Christians and serves quite well to differentiate). It is a pure and complete Love–the basis for everything that is.
Over the years, I’ve found it quite useful to begin from that point and, based on individual experience, dial back that “free and clear” love. Part of me remains vigilant, aware and waiting for the betrayal of trust, but another part always remains open to that free flowing positive influence of unconditional Love.
By no means does that make me some sort of bunny and marshmallow squishy New Age stereotype. On the contrary, it makes me all the more aware of how nasty and separated from one another we humans have let ourselves become.
Suspicion, duplicity as the norm, self-centered thinking to the detriment of all–things like that run rampant when we don’t realize that we’re all in this life together (and none of us are making it out any more alive than anyone else). There are near infinite examples of a lack of Love that we’re exposed to day in and day out. Even in our own lives, we’re more often than not left doubting whether anyone really cares about us.
Starting from the negative, it’s almost impossible to work our way to the positive side of acceptance.
But if you accept, even for a moment, that there may be an equal possibility of some unconditional positive force, filling the gaps among the dark bits we see all the time, there is hope for us all.
And if you start from that high point–that Agape position of genuinely Loving yourself and the world you exist in–a whole new dimension of interaction opens to you.
It doesn’t matter if anyone else cares. You care. And you express that to others. You let them know that they are not alone in the Dark.
In the fall and winter of 93, I learned that first hand. It’s something that’s kept me going ever since.
Leave a Reply