Know thyself
In Ancient Greece, you would’ve been greeted by the aphorism “γνῶθι σεαυτόν” inscribed above the entrance of the chamber where Oracular knowledge was imparted by the Pythia. Transliterated as “gnōthi seauton“, it translates as “Know thyself”. Whatever wisdom the Oracle was pulling from the ether, ultimately, would bring you to know your most intimate Self.
This has always been a challenge for us humans. What and who, exactly, are you? Are you your body? The collection of your experiences? The particular pattern of neuron firings going on inside your skull? Or are you more than that? And if you’re more, then what is its substance? We could go along this line of questioning forever.
The way I see it, your Soul is your true, highest Self. It is what says “I am”, regardless of what changes have happened in your body or what experiences you’ve gone through, it remains intact, whole, and perfect. Each one of us is a fractal offshoot of the Divine Universal Consciousness that decided to know itself more through the experience of humanity.
We are caught between worlds. The Divine Creative spark, boundless in time and space, wanted to know what it was to be heavy. To have material substance. To be bounded, fettered.
Why would the Divine decide to bind itself thus?
I like to imagine that it wanted a challenge. Can we become truly aware of our place in time and space, as we are, and reconcile it with the fact that even though we may appear bounded for this brief droplet in the vast ocean of time, what we truly are isn’t defined by our body, our history, our family, or our circumstances? Though these things house us and shape us, our Truest, Highest Self was there before all that, and will continue to be after all that has been.
Can we learn to fully embody our Divine Self, our Christ Consciousness, starting from the gross matter of physical existence? Can we truly reconcile these seemingly opposite realities?
As a story-teller, I’m also tempted to say that it’s all for Love, for the love of story. Endlessly curious and creative, The Divine Spark wanted to see what would happen.
And so it practiced at Life, starting with blue-green algae in the primordial soup, and kept evolving and figuring it out and becoming more complex until we got here, to where we are, allegedly the highest form of consciousnes on this planet. And I believe that this is exactly why the Bible says that we were made in God’s image. We truly are, but it’s our consciousness that is made in God’s image, Limitless, Whole and Holy, not our bodies which are so diverse and distinct from each other, beautiful in their own right, but so corruptible and perishable.
The Divine Spark within us always seeks Divinity, and so as soon as we evolved enough brain power to realize our individuality, our identity as contained, solid beings, we also recognized, in awe and wonder, the divine magic of Life-Creating Energy, or Spirit, or God, or Allah, or The Everything that Is, or whatever you choose to call It. Jesus said that God is Love, and I believe him.
Because the Divine is boundless, and we see ourselves so limited by the four dimensions of space and time, we may not recognize that we really ARE a sprout derived from the Divine Spark of Love. We get so caught up in the sound and fury and solidity of physical survival that we forget our True Selves, and what we came here for. Our perception becomes overwhelmed by the barrage of evidence presented by our empirical senses and the needs and demands of our physical bodies, drowning out the more subtle, spiritual knowledge we can all access when we are attuned to it. Our senses fool us into thinking the material world, with its concrete immediacy, is all there really is. In reality, this physical plane just happens to be the easiest one for us to perceive, embodied and earthbound as we are.
But deep within us and high above us, the Divine always seeks itself. There have always been humans whose sensitivity to the spiritual world is heightened, and they tell us what they’ve learned, as best they can see it through cultural and linguistic frame of reference they’ve been conditioned to, and if we follow their guidance, our own “antenna” gets tuned to the right frequency, and little by little our own perception starts to change, we see more. The Divine Essence within us longs to be recognized, because this recognition strengthens our connection to the Greater Cosmic Divinity. When we connect with the essence of loving creativity that is our Soul, we can hear the call of our purpose more clearly.
And so this is our quest. To become so familiar with our Nature that we are able to feel and hear the call of our Soul, and to fearlessly follow through with it. Knowing that, in the end, when we flow with our last breath out of these meat suits which temporarily house us, boundlessness will be attained again. We realize that there’s truly nothing to fear, not even Death, because we know in our core that it’s not The End. Not by a long shot.
How wonderful, then, that so many folks before us have toiled, and built upon the old existing knowledge, to devise such excellent tools to discern our Soul’s messages! Astrology, pendulums, I-ching, tea leaf readings, tarot… all of these means of divination are merely tools to connect with Universal Divine Knowledge. The truest, highest, unchanging Truth of who we really are. Whatever the external manifestation of our being might be, in essence, we are Divine Love made solid. If we remember and truly know ourselves to the point where we feel this in our bones, it becomes easier to live accordingly.
May you know yourself deeply, and shine forth from there. Namasté!
This entry is part of a mini blog-hop done in collaboration with the exceedingly magical Paige Zaferiou. Check out her entry here!
If you’d like to consult the oracle yourself, click here to book a reading with me!
