crossroad

Hermes is the great messenger of the gods in Greek mythology and additionally as a guide to the Underworld. An Olympian god, he is also the patron of boundaries and of the travelers who travel across them, of shepherdsand cowherds, of the cunning of thieves and liars, of orators and wit, of literature and poets, of athletics and sports, of weights and measures, of invention, and of commerce in general~Wikipedia

Herm

In ancient Greece the statues functioned as a form of apotropaic and were placed at crossings, country borders and boundaries as protection. Before his role as protector of merchants and travelers, Hermes was a phallic god, associated with fertility, luck, roads and borders. His name comes from the word herma (plural hermai) referring to a square or rectangular pillar of stone, terracotta, or bronze; a bust of Hermes' head, usually with a beard,^[1] sat on the top of the pillar, and male genitals adorned the base. The hermai were used as boundary markers on roads and borders. In Athens, they were placed outside houses as apotropes for good luck. [The male genitals would be rubbed or anointed with olive oil to obtain luck].~Wikipedia

"Robert Johnson, blues musician, who some people claimed he met with Satan at the crossroads and signed over his soul to play the blues and gain mastery of the guitar.^[5]"

Let's talk about integration, shall we?

Often times when I sync-in deep enough, whatever I touch for the rest of the day is exactly what I've been looking for. It provides then next step toward the stargate/rainbow bridge. Yesterday was no exception. I began reading a work that I've wanted to look at for a time (but wasn't ready for), and oh boy, I think I need to quote at length from its introduction because it connects.

So I've been speaking about "the three kingdoms"--Heaven, represented by the branches of the tree; Earth, represented by the trunk of the tree; and Hell, represented by the roots.

We can't have leaves without roots and the two structures mirror one another. The snake and eagle are the same image. What? -sorry this post builds upon three recent posts here at the whole: 432, Greenman, 314 (As for all this writing I've been doing lately, I wish I could say I was grandstanding. This is the song, and it won't stop, so I follow (Fuh-low):

My research lately has been focused upon the Macrocosm, (the universe) & the Microcosm (the individual). It isn't new, and this path is well worn to be sure, but I'm compelled to continue. . .

So yesterday I shared our year in terms of the three kingdoms:

Spring/Fall = Earth; Summer = Heaven; Winter = Hell.

-also don't forget the literal kingdoms of an individual:

Heaven = mind; Earth = body; Hell = soul

Satan (is the Starman who) "falls" to earth and becomes flesh after the heavenly summer.

He descends to Hell in the frozen subconscious winter.

Jesus returns to earth and is reborn in the spring.

He ascends to Heaven again in the summer.

For integration, Jesus needs the Devil. Don't flee your shadow! Hug your devils. Integrate. Sync, don't swim. The King of Love is a Deadman & The King of Death is a fucker!

The three kingdoms also speak to our psyche as defined by Freud: Id, Ego, Superego.

-It's fascinating because there is a link between the Id (instinct) and the Superego (unintegrated red-eye, or one's OS-operating system). See, this is one of my hang ups with God in the Bible. Why is he such a fucker. In Job, God is such a dick, but that is a tangent. . .(God as symbolized by the heavenly mind must by transcended?)

As I related from Zarathustra, Nietzsche believes that the progression of life is from Ape to Man to Superman (Thus 2001 A Space Odyssey). All these things are all the same. The Earth is a place of transformation. It can be painful, it is equal parts light and dark. Love your devil. Bring the dirty "unconscious" up through the roots and grow a new heaven. Create life!

So after spending the time I thought I would be reading in the beautiful spring sun totally engrossed yesterday's sync-in, I went to the park with my kids and started reading Robert A. Johnson's Transformation which illustrates the journey in three famous literary characters. And today, instead of working on my intro to sync essay, here I am quoting at length from it. . .

Tradition indicates that three levels of consciousness are available to us: simple consciousness, not often seen in our modern technological world; complex consciousness, the usual state of educated Western man; and an enlightened state of consciousness, known only to a very few individuals, which is the culmination of human evolution and can be attained only by highly motivated people after much work and training.

Proverbs in many languages point out these three levels of consciousness. One story, for instance, relates that the simple man comes home in the evening wondering what's for dinner, the complex man comes home pondering the imponderables of fate, and the enlightened man come home wondering what's for dinner. Simple man and enlightened man have much in common, including a direct, uncomplicated view of life, and so they react in similar ways. The only true difference between them is that the enlightened man is conscious of his condition, while the simple man is not. Complex man, on the other hand, spends much of his time worrying and often is in a state of anxiety.

A Zen proverb states: "When I was young and free, the mountains were the mountains, the river was the river, the sky was the sky. Then I lost my way, and the mountains were no longer the mountains, the river was no longer the river, the sky was no longer the sky. Then I attained satori (the Zen term for enlightenment), and the mountains were again the mountains, the river was gain the river, and the sky was again the sky."

Our biblical tradition takes us from the simple perfection of the Garden of Eden through every imaginable chaos and leads us finally to the heavenly Jerusalem. Again, three levels of consciousness. [ Nietzsche: Camel = simple; Lion = complex; (star) child = enlightened. Same trip available in the Tarot. -d.b.]

. . .In this book I want to explore the three levels of consciousness--which I have called two-dimensional man, three-dimensional man, and four-dimensional man--as they are portrayed in three works of literature. Cervantes, Shakespeare, and Goethe have given us works of art that portray these levels with great power. Cervantes wrote of Don Quixote, a man who was so enamored of the simple way of two-dimensional man--medieval man--that he took on the finery of knighthood and chivalry and played out a half-comic but inspired imitation of what he had lost in his life. Shakespeare defined complex man with unerring accuracy in Hamlet. And Goethe gave us Faust, which picks up where Hamlet lost the battle and takes us on to that higher consciousness often called redemption.

In these three works we can trace the evolution of consciousness possible in this life (3-12). Robert A Johnson Transformation: understanding the three levels of masculine consciousness

-Do yourself a favor, Read This Book!