The Cosmic Slinky (Outline/Notes)
1. Possible explanation for this reality, figuring in the existence of omnipotent, omnipresent, eternal, homogenous God Mass, is the manifestation of said "being", for whatever unfathomable reason (perhaps cosmic boredom), into the myriad forms which taken altogether represent the opposite qualities of its original nature (i.e. finite, stupid, temporary beings such as humans).
2. Discuss duality. Relate teachings from Buddhism, Tao, etc. Illustrate this principle in everyday life. Also, explore the "Major Division":
Feminine Masculine
Emotional Logical
Right Brain Left Brain
Whole Parts
Rational Empirical
Religion Science
3. Discuss the Buddhist "Illusion" concept. Point out the paradox involved in this concept, that being that it is a very real illusion.
4. Explore spiritual interpretations of the following: Addiction, sexual aberrations, phobias, innate talents, relationships.
5. Consider recurring cosmic patterns such as the spiral, the sine wave and the circle, show how they are all different perspectives of the same pattern (spiral) and apply to DNA, music theory, reincarnation, etc.
6. Discuss the mystical experience, giving historical background and relating personal experience of same.
7. Possible introduction: "Philosophy Most Important Pursuit of Man". Show how each individual's personal philosophy underlies his or her every action. Illustrate with drowning man example.
8. Cause and Effect: The Dynamo of the Universe. Relate it to physics (Newton) as well as the law of Karma. Also point out that every cause is an effect and vice versa, meaning therefore that there is no cause and effect (paradox).
9. Mention that while I have no degrees, hell, many of our greatest minds never had degrees, diplomas, or even a grade school education such as Dickens, Einstein, etc.
10. The Meaning of Life is Work. (This realization is one of the perils of philosophical exploration.) Discuss Buddhist, Christian, Hindu backups for this statement.
11. Discuss possible after-death experiences. Point out that whatever does happen, we all come back.
12. All the world's a stage: We're all cosmic actors and actresses, writing, directing, producing, and starring in our own roles moment to moment. Also, shedding bodies like costumes, etc.
13. Point out to reader at the outset that I am either saving him the trouble of reading all those books, or giving him a starting point. Include full bibliography and reading list.
14. Another paradox: If you can hear the message, you've already heard it, and if you can't, I'm wasting my breath. (This would be good in introduction--I can set tone of book as illustrative rather than preachy because I realize this fact.)
15. The Pragmatic Approach: Introduce William James and pragmatism. Recommend this approach to the reader when considering the various items discussed in the book.
16. Distinguish between Western Philosophy and Eastern Philosophy.
17. Discuss the various Hindu trinities such as Brahma-Vishnu-Shiva and Bhakti-Karma-Raja/Jnana.
18. Discuss the advantages of thought analysis.
19. Get Bacon Quote into the introduction.
20. Mention Aleister Crowley and the Great Work, the realization of the True Will. Point out that everyone has one and that the first step is to discover it (some never do), and the second step is to pursue it.
21. Empiricism doesn't work (explain with Hume), leads to skeptic outlook (explain with skeptics), leads to contradiction (RAA). Leaves us with rationalism.
22. Contrast "New Age" from "Ancient Age" philosophy. Mention the spiritualist movement of the late 19th century and state that HPB's criticisms hold up as well today against so-called trance channelers as they did against their contemporaries of that era.
23. Compare Ocilating Universe Theory with Day & Night of Brahma.
24. Spectrums:
a) The Artistic Personality Spectrum
(Self-destruction to Creativity)
b) The Political Spectrum
(Right to Left/Freedom to Security)
Errata
"These words are no words, written on a not page. The meaning is meaningless."
The mind has a bad tendency to pass over basic truths, taking their "obviousness" for granted without really digesting them. One thing I have learned is that the simplest things can often be the most difficult things to grasp.
"There is no religion higher than truth."
Socrates on death: "Death is one of two things. Either it is an annihilation, and the dead have no consciousness of anything, or, as we are told, it is really a change--a migration of the soul from this place to another. Now if there is no consciousness but only a dreamless sleep, death must be a marvelous gain...If death is like this, then I call it a gain, because the whole of time, if you look at it in this way, can be regarded as no more than one single night.
If on the other hand death is a removal from here to some other place, and if what we are told is true, that all the dead are there, what greater blessing could there be than this, gentlemen? Put it this way: How much would one of you give to meet Orpheus and Musaeus, Hessiod and Homer?"
Once, when I was in Kathmandu, I wrote,
"Here I sit, in the midst of the Cosmic Mind, a manifestation of the Divine Idea. I am the microcosm within the macrocosm and as I create these thoughts I utilize the tiniest particle of that Universal Creative Principle which brought into being the myriad formations of matter and force.
"This material universe and the life force which animates it, as well as the consciousness which is its reflection, all this is of the same primordial root-substance which continually modulates between a manifest state of being and an unmanifest state of not-being. These two states are known in ancient Hindu phraseology as the day and night of Brahma, each lasting billions of years.
"The dawn of this current Day of Brahma in which we find ourselves was marked by what science has so quaintly termed `The Big Bang' and it is safe to assume from the continual expansion of the universe that we have not yet reached `Cosmic Noon'.
"But when we do reach that universal mid-day, the inevitable reversal will occur and we will find ourselves inhabiting a contracting universe i.e. `The Big Crunch'. Hopefully by that time we will have evolved out of these cumbersome, dense vehicles of material flesh and into refined, etheric bodies less susceptible to the compacting force of the above mentioned condensation."
I moved on, I searched. The more I looked into things, the more apparent it became to me that I'd been here before, and I began to seriously adopt the idea of reicarnation as a real cosmic fact. And again with the spirals: The Wheel of Birth and Death is actually a spiral, contiuing ever onwards and upwards. This spiral pattern seemed to be the basis of everything, of human growth and development, of man's spiritual unfoldment throught the myriad phases and planes of knowledge and space and time.
In short, the spiral is the blueprint for Cosmic Evolution.
That's what the "Cosmic Slinky" is all about.
You keep using the term "evolution". How can you be talking about God and evolution at the same time?
There's a line from a Devo song that goes, "God made man, but he used the monkey to do it".