Colin, Contributing Writer
Waking Times

Ever felt like the world was all backwards? Well its not, we are! Well maybe this ‘we’ doesn’t include you but for the most part we live in a society that teaches us a backwards way of relating to ourselves and the world. This is the heart of the materialistic paradigm or worldview. The outer physical world is considered to be utterly real, fact. The inner world especially imagination is considered far less important and not given the designation of reality, its imagination and so not taken very seriously. In this way of looking at life we take things as blessings and curses, good and bad luck and happening by chance. We can only effect life by our actions and those are subject mostly to forces beyond our control. We’re helpless and we often become victims of some person or circumstance which we love to tell anyone that will listen all about. We don’t take all that much responsibility for what happens to us beyond a certain point and we rarely see ourselves as co-creating our reality.

I don’t mean to be self righteous but the problem with this world view is quite simply, its wrong. On some level most people know its wrong and yet they continue to live by it due to the depth of its conditioning. Living from this backward perspective creates all sorts of problems the manifestations of which we can see all around us in the world today. But looking out there is not the source of the problem, its in our own minds. The worst thing about the prevailing perspective is that it creates a split within you, you are cut off from who and what you truly are, you are cut off from your creative power. You become powerless and in that state of disempowerment you can be preyed upon and manipulated. You go to priests and gurus to help you connect with spirituality, doctors to take care of your body, therapists to take care of your mind, pop pills to mask the symptoms of living a life devoid of meaning and depth. You’ve given away your power to ‘experts’ and material substances and you are at their mercy for your health and happiness. This is a sad way to live if it can really even be called living.

When we begin to see the insanity of this way of living it can be incredibly depressing because the conditioning is so powerful and difficult to get free from. However it can be done, the image at the beginning of this post is Key 12 from the Tarot, the Hanged Man. The inner meaning of the Tarot key symbolizes a reversal of the materialistic perspective to one that sees the truth and reality as it is. Another way of describing this Tarot key is the suspended mind. The English word ‘man’ comes from the Sanskrit word ‘manas’ meaning mind. It symbolizes the quieting of the surface mind or personality and all its stories and beliefs so the true self can emerge. When this happens we can see deeper than the surface of things and into their true nature, we can connect with the heart and follow our true life’s purpose – our bliss, we can live freely in the moment connected with our power and we can become actual co-creators of our world. Once we learn to quiet the mind we can begin to hear all that this constant mental noise drowns out. What we hear is the inner voice of our heart, our innate wisdom – the voice of the universe itself. This is our true guidance and if we live by it life transforms into a magical ride into the unknown.

This is possible because we no longer have a backwards perspective. We see, as ageless wisdom has taught in all cultures since the beginning, that we create our experience and our version of the world which is mixed with everyone else’s. We create it first and foremost by the mental images we pay the most attention to in our minds, by the thoughts and feelings we spend the most time with and then secondarily by our actions which are guided by whats in our mind. We realize that to truly effect a change to our outer circumstances we cannot focus on fighting or opposing whats wrong ‘out there’. We first have to change or correct our minds. Typically if things don’t go our way we look externally and react to whats wrong, we take whats wrong externally as a statement about who and what we are. The empowered perspective shows us that we need to look at external conditions as a reflection of whats going on internally and so not react to them but use them to find the cause within and change that first. The occult principle, “as above so below” can also be stated “as within so without”.

Reversing the outward focused perspective means taking full complete responsibility for EVERYTHING in our experience. Gone is the victim mentality in any form because we acknowledge that we create our reality. Taking responsibility means we become empowered to change anything we don’t like about our experience. Responsibility = Power. If we know how to work with our minds, use mental imagery intentionally and have the courage to challenge and let go of all beliefs and thought patterns that obstruct our power we can become fulfilled human beings. True co-creators with the universe, unique expressions of the Life Power as we are meant to be. Life is then about joy and creative expression rather than surviving and trying to stay safe and secure which no one really ever achieves. The possibilities are then limitless and we are free to embrace all sorts of experiences limited only by our imagination which we see as the powerful magical tool it truly is!

Colin walks the warrior path outside of the matrix.  Having heavily studied psychology, Tarot, Qaballah, and Western occultism, he works towards inspiring others with his revelations about the valuable nature of our humanity.  Please visit his inspiring blog, AwakenInTheNow.