The Esoteric Western Conceptual Matrix

Introduction to the Conceptual Matrix by Kienda tae BeTrue

To understand death, we must understand life. Why was I born and why am I living, and if there is meaning to life, then why, in heaven's name, must I die?  What is the value of education, medicine, religion, finances, or any other human activity? To understand the answers to these questions, one needs a large overview of human evolution – a context for all the myriad facts of our lives. We need a conceptual matrix in which all human experiences and knowledge find their reasonable places and relationships – from the cosmos and the galaxies to the whirling atoms; from iron and ice to the most delicate human feelings; from unity to every duality of fractal multiplicity. We humans can do this. Our minds have evolved to the point where we can extrapolate concepts from experiences. Pure concepts are the spiritual realities that are the foundation of existence on all levels.
The ancient Vedas say, “All creation is in the mind of God.” Now it is becoming clear even to science that thinking is a part of the function of the heart. The definition of 'mind' is expanding. Head and heart are connecting. If the universe is the heart and mind of God, then all existence is divine and deserves intelligent observation and a conceptual grid or matrix in which to perceive the larger picture of the interrelatedness of all life and death.  The following is the beginning of a chapter in my soon to be published book Lucid Death: Conscious Journeys Beyond the Threshold.
 

THE CONCEPTUAL MATRIX 

Evolution on earth can be described as the progressive materialization of the spiritual/cosmic/super-sensible thoughts of the ground of creation, God. Everything is evolving, increasing in complexity and consciousness or just plain changing. There is a pattern to earthly evolution. The “wheel of Dharma” or the “wheel of life” is a great, huge, cosmic vortex. Everything within it is spiraling upwards and recapitulating the old in new and hopefully better ways. The fundamental tension between unity and separation is infinitely elaborated as creation expands and contracts through rhythmic pulses between the two poles of every duality. There are fleeting moments of eternal cosmic balance midpoint and 180 degree transitions at either extreme. Life fluctuates between evolution and involution.

Just as life is constantly changing, so death is also constantly changing. Neither side of existence, life nor death, is static. The whole cosmos is metamorphosing, evolving or devolving at all times. Just as life is different in each age or time period, each decade, century or millennium, so the experiences of human souls are different in the successive journeys between lives.

As humanity has evolved over eons, charted by the rise and fall of successive civilizations, it has changed. Earlier mankind had other faculties and was more aware of the higher, divine beings. They interacted with their gods. The myths and legends of all peoples hearken back to the time when plants, animals and gods spoke to humans, and we listened and understood. As those faculties were eclipsed by dawning intellectual capabilities and materialistic exploration of the world, conditions changed in the death worlds also.

We have moved into the 21st century and humanity has now developed an intellectual, abstract, conceptual mind which is no longer satisfied with mere belief or tradition. Human beings are asking questions and seeking proof. Is there sufficient information, knowledge, wisdom or true stories available to assuage the growing doubts and answer the piercing questions? And perhaps even more important, is there an experience available from which personal understanding can arise?

There are at least two answers to that last question: one internally generated and the other externally experienced. “Know thyself” has been a dictum of many ancient esoteric orders, and a time-honored pathway to wisdom. Reverence for the profound nature of humankind is a powerful force capable of awakening our spiritual sight. Enlightened self-consciousness is the goal of meditation, initiation, life and death.

The course of evolution has been paralleled by a course of devolution: intellectually we have evolved, spiritually devolved. However, since the time of Golgotha, the turning point of time, we have begun to rise again spiritually. The overarching pattern of the earthly journey is to move out of the spiritual world, our original home, into matter and then; after having understood ourselves in the physical world, to consciously ascend back into the spiritual realms, transforming matter into spirit as we go. The “deed of Christ” occurred at the deepest point of materialization, and is the decisive action that turned earthly evolution again toward conscious unity in the spiritual worlds. Christ came from higher planes than mankind, assumed human incarnation, and then went through physical death, resurrection and ascension into the etheric realms of Earth.

Only three-dimensional human beings exist within limited time and are confined within spatial restrictions, and experience death. Beings of other planes or dimensions such as angels and archangels change and undergo transformation, but they need not die. Christ could only learn the lessons that death teaches and vanquish it, by incarnating as a human on earth where death is the only absolute.