My Own Private Cosmology

 Hi, 

Welcome to the Shores of Night, or welcome back if you're new. I'm Grim, and I write about far too many subjects for one blog... I think I'm used to it now. 

I wanted to talk about my own personal cosmology in terms of spiritual beliefs. My main belief is in Mother Earth, Gaia, the Anima Mundi - whatever you want to call her- with occasional dips into acknowledging a sea god and believing in Bast, the Egyptian cat goddess. They form an eclectic mix, and I'm not applying much logic to them. I believe in Gaia because without a planet, we wouldn't exist, and because if we don't protect the Earth, we'll suffer a dramatic change in lifestyle, at the very least. My faith in a sea god is because I live by the coast and there are times when the sea can be awe-inspiring, both in its beauty and its violence. 

I believe in Bast because I still maintain the closest thing I've seen to divinity is looking into a cat's eyes. I associate cats with beauty and companionship, as well as with love. It probably sounds a bit daft, but I feel like the best friend I ever had was my old cat, Hobbes, who died just over 8 years ago. The feelings I had for him contribute to my feelings about cats, and Bast. 

I'm sure other gods exist; I just haven't communicated with them yet. Admittedly, I won't be seeking to do that in many cases, simply because many gods simply don't appeal to me, or seem to be outside my general sense of the world. 

In general, I believe in the primacy of the Earth and that humans have a duty to care for it, if only so we have somewhere to live. In terms of an afterlife, I think we reincarnate. While it seems unfair, I don't think there's any cosmic judgement, nor any scale of reincarnation where if you live a good life you're reborn as a higher life form - because the idea of higher life forms is a delusion. We may look at a dog as higher than a worm, but both do necessary jobs. Without worms, the soil isn't going to be life-bearing, after all. 

Another aspect of my lack of belief in judgement is that it seems to me that a human life is almost impossible to assess simply. It feels like it's an idea that's been born from the idea that the gods are like monarchs who measure us against a set of absolutes. While that's appealing in some respects, I'm not sure it's a helpful idea because so much of our lives are contextual. Very few things are as simple as "performing this action equals good". Life and morality are complicated, and I'm not always convinced that blind obedience is the best road to any sort of spiritual awakening. To the contrary, if we look at the various scoundrels and paragons who litter the history of spirituality, it seems like the opposite is actually true. If we can say anything about yogis, magi and other spiritual teachers, most of them are troublemakers and breaking the rules appears to be an ordinary part of the process. 

I'm not sure that I would recommend anyone follow a teacher, by the way. The problem with them being rogues and scoundrels (yes, even your favourite), is that you get as many figures who are only after money, women (and other things) in the same space.

The issue isn't to never accept spiritual teaching, but be conscious that there are predators here. Just because they appear to be spiritually awakened doesn't mean that they are. Easy answers may (may) be traps, so I'd say to walk carefully because that road all too often leads to cults and mind control, not liberation. 

For me, there's no Heaven or Hell, and I don't believe in angels and demons. More than that, I would say that, like the idea that humans being the pinnacle of creation, they are built around human importance and ego. Essentially, they come from "we are special and chosen by gods, these things seek to undermine us because of our specialness". 

I don't think we are special, though. I don't think we were chosen. As you may have gathered, I think that humans are the pinnacle of some weird pyramid is entirely fallacious. I think we evolved from apes, prospered and grew and our brains became capable of stronger memories and the adoption of symbols as important - leading eventually to writing and numbers, as well as ideas around symbolism in nature. During that process, we found deities in the land - be that through vision questing, hallucinations or other means. Almost all traditions have some sort of practice or trial that leads to interacting with the world through a different lens or on an alternate level. Altered states, which can be achieved through something as innocent as singing, are a core part of how humans experience the world, after all.

That's not to say I don't think the spirits are real, but that shamans interacted with what was already there, and it was a process of discovery. This is why so many gods exist in the world, even if most of them have been forgotten. 

Humans not being special doesn't mean we aren't important, though. We only need to look at the world we have built to see that we potentially punch above our weight. As far as we know, we are the only meaning makers and have the biggest, most varied imaginations. We build... cosmologies (for example), and find significance in the rising and setting of the sun, the phases of the moon, and the designs upon sets of cards. We are capable of multiple perspectives of reality at the same time, physical, mental, and symbolic, even if that's often subconscious. 

At present, we don't know whether other forms of life can do these things, given their problem-solving skills. If corvids and other apes could work out a systemised way to pass knowledge down the generations, I honestly believe they could be our rivals in the intellect stakes. But while we know that cats and dogs can imagine to some extent, we don't know whether they are capable of more. We also don't know if they are capable of encountering a sort of divine consciousness - though I'm willing to bet that if they can, they think it looks like them. 

At present, we think our ability to do these things is unique, but it still doesn't make us special. 

Circling back to the idea of angels and demons, in my model, they're rendered moot - just a manifestation of human ego and an attempt to explain away the parts of our psychology. If there's no judge, there's no need to tempt us into sin - which is really just normal human behaviour. Added to this, the absence of the God from what Alan Watts called the Ceramic Model - which posits there was a figure who made the world as if he was casting a pot - means that there's nothing for us to escape to. 

Earth is our home, our mother, and we are part of her. We aren't aliens in a world we never made, but people meant to be here, and that means embracing love and care for the planet, as well as for each other. Being here, and being present, feel more important to me than fixing on something that in the future. In the same way, as long as we don't hurt anyone, living life for ourselves, feels much better to me than constricting ourselves - but that "as long as we're not hurting anyone" is the key point.

Thanks for joining me on this brief piece. I know these beliefs aren't for everyone, but I hold them dearly.