Apech

I'll start by confessing my complete lack of qualifications for discussing YinYang but what I do have is an old olive tree in my garden. One side is noticeably straighter, dryer, lighter than the other - which is more rounded, mossy and damp. There aren't two trees but the tree is only possible because of the 'tension' or interaction between the two sides. The first is the South facing and the second is the North. Now you can produce lists of associations like male, active, light and female, passive, dark and such - but I am seeing these as illustrative and not as definitions. You could say Yang is active ... but then you would have to explain what induced the Yang to act! So in a sense the Yin is active ... and so on. To be a real man you have to be quite female

I call it DaoBumming down the topic.

Would you like to define yin/yang which is non-patriarchal? Also on the word 'quick' it is essentially the same word as witch - so hardly patriarchal - or am I missing something?

@Taomeow Just to say the word quick originally meant alive and not just fast. Hence quicksilver for mercury, quickbeam the rowan or mountain ash tree (flexible wood) and so on. Also a link between quick and witch, wicca and so on - in fact the rowan tree is also sometimes called a wtich and there's the word switch for a stick to shoo cattle. And forgive me for quoting wiki: I feel this is a good word 'quickening' for the effect of being in the world - in the sense of learning to dance with its energy without going under ... i.e. becoming dead. I am still assimilating the demon thing - particularly the quite chilling three headed one Marx/Engels/Lenin! A Buddhist lama (tantric ) once told me that the way we see the world ordinarily is as a result of seeing through parasitic entities in our subtle body. They become attached and distort our view - hence delusion/illusion. Also I am reminded of the strong connection between civilisation and disease. Even our current Covid has the effect of isolating people from each other - social distancing - limiting behaviour - is very un-natural indeed.

I would say that 'worldly' means anything that derives from objective reality being real in and of itself. Or from that view, even if it is not the case ultimately. However if it is true that the world is a testing ground - then obviously it must be connected to us - and thus not independently objectively real in and of itself. This suggests that both ourselves as the agent of experience and the objective world derive from a common source (e.g. spirit, Dao, consciousness etc.) Actually the very idea that there is something called 'spiritual' and something called 'worldly' is a (post)-Judeo-Christian idea. Jesus said render unto Caesar that which Caesar's and to God that which is God's - suggesting that money and so on belong to the secular (Roman) state while your spiritual aspirations and so on belong to God. What people forget is that Caesar (especially at that time) was a god himself - or at least a divine being of some kind. There isn't a worldly world and a spiritual world which are separate - this would be a straight dualism - there is only spirit. In pre-civilised cultures this division doesn't exist. But that doesn't mean that we don't experience it that way. In fact most of us have our daily lives, work, relationships, shopping - whatever - and our special times for practice, meditation or whatever we do. We make a division as if it is real. It's very hard not to think like this because of the way that the path is introduced to us. As something special and separate. Having said all that, I think experientially there is a 'people-world' - in fact as I said above the derivation of the word 'world' seems to mean exactly this. I like what you said about being encaged by people, and being willing to be wrong. Making mistakes does oddly seem to be a key to all this. And being willing to be vulnerable - not so covered up that you will never make or admit to mistakes or error. Mistakes and error are worldly I suspect. Just my thoughts.

Well! I almost feel like I opened Pandoras box here - and I am almost baffled by my own question. Thank you everyone for answers so far - lots of amazing ideas already. @dwai Sure yes, it is our responsibility to cultivate Te, or svadharma or bhavana - whatever you like to call it (ma'at even?) through ethics, knowledge, action and so forth. I think the question is where does that virtue lead you in terms of the world? I looked up the etymology of 'world' and it seems to mean 'human - age' ... the era of mankind - which is not what I expected at all. You mention climate change - what influence do we have as an individual apart from our 7 millionth contribution? And in any case in terms of TM's gods and demons how do we know that the earth (as a great soul) does not want to warm and grow greener (which I am told is a side effect of increased CO2) ???? Maybe even the earth wishes to end the 'world' To a certain extent I am with Gerard in that we project reality and so we may all be silently willing both climate change and income inequality into being - if so what is our secret intent? @Sketch I wish I understood your point. @Taomeow "Being not worldly is still a reaction to the world" - good one "So I say stay in the reactive mode that works for you right here, right now, and change your reactions as the world changes." Would you say this implies working on your ability to respond to change? Becoming more flexible, open and somehow 'quicker' in the old sense of that word? "I do suspect it's the demons' testing ground, not ours" Can you elaborate a little more? What about co-creation - don't we participate in whatever is happening continuously? Are we participating in the work of demons? A worrying thought. "The pandemic of civilization is real. To perceive it as such is to get a glimpse of reality that is absolutely illusory and yet the only reality we have access to. To perceive some "higher" or "inner" or "ultimate" reality that ignores the reality of the illusion calling all the shots is an illusion. The pandemic of civilization is our ultimate reality for all purposes, and there's no getting anywhere else until/unless we get well." Pondering this - there's a lot in there - maybe more later. Maybe you can expand?

Thank you guys for liking my OP - but I was hoping for some replies and ideas. @Gerard I guess I agree in an absolute sense - but how helpful is it to think like this in a turbulent world going to hell in a handbucket? Not sure.

The Minoan olive tree of Kavousi, Crete, Greece. The oldest olive tree in the world. It is estimated that the tree was planted in the period 1350-1100 BC.

@Nungali Yes - I think that is exactly what they are. Though what is interesting is why pillars like 43 have such a collection of figures. The pillars themselves are beings - gods perhaps - but when you get a pattern of images I think the intention must be to tell a story of some kind - a narrative ... simply because they are obviously pointing to the relationship between the figures and hence 'meaning' of some kind. You could almost say a hieroglyphic text. Whether this is stellar stuff I don't really know but its quite likely - a lot of early religion seems to be star related (based on my limited knowledge) - and is later brought down to the human level later. I was interested to read that the round structures were accompanied by smaller square structures - which show more evidence of things like food preparation (grinding of flour etc.). What I don't quite understand is why they built so many round structures over a long period of time. I was mentally considering what the archeologists describe as the social hub function of GT - and I thought about a Medieval Cathedral - a large stone structure surrounded by smaller structures (used for various purposes like selling food and so on) where people would assemble periodically to worship - but no-one would say that the primary function of building a Cathedral was as a social hub - more that this is a byproduct of its primary function. So to for GT. Also the distinction of sacred and secular is pretty much a modern invention which surely would not apply to ancient peoples.

@Nungali I've looked at some of those papers/articles you linked to. What strikes me is how similar this kind of analysis is to early 20th Egyptology - where everything was reduced to socio-cultural or political symbolism. For instance the great Kurt Sethe was convinced that the Pyramid Texts related to tribal struggles for kingship in the Old Kingdom and so on. No-one as far as I know thinks this way any more - as the Egyptologists in those days even went as far as to say that the Egyptians had no spiritual life and were all practicality and down to earth - even when Classical literature says the complete opposite. So for instance, when looking at the totemic symbols for different tribal groups - or hunter groups - no thought is given to the idea that these are shamanic tutelary spirits. That the coming together of certain spirits (with astral associations) may have special significance. In other words they look at the world as if magic doesn't exists. As DBs we should be sceptical of this, I think. The thing about the zodiac signs is not that precisely the same stars were always selected for each grouping - but that the groupings were used to divide the visible sky into twelve parts (arcs) - which has both symbolic and practical purposes. I don't have any trouble thinking that more or less the same approach has been used by mankind way back into the mesolithic - and so the same/or broadly similar star patterns would be used to plot out the night sky.

They might be - but then you would have to examine why those animals were chosen and what they actually signify.

@Nungali I'm not here to defend Sweatman's position - he has a youtube channel with a lot of videos and book to do that. I posted his video because I found it interesting - that doesn't mean I agree with everything he says. That's it. You could email him direct if you want to question his theories. https://www.eng.ed.ac.uk/about/people/dr-martin-sweatman/

From your link: 1. There still is quite a significant probability that the older circular enclosures of Göbekli Tepe’s Layer III actually were subterranean buildings – possibly even covered by roof constructions. This then somehow would limit their usability as actual observatories a bit. As I said above he is not saying they are observatories - but this argument could be made about the Denderah ceiling or cave paintings - or indeed anything like a planetarium - all indoors and not with visible sky - so I call this argument amateurish. 2. Even if we assume that the night sky 12,000 years ago looked exactly like today’s, the question at hand would be whether a prehistoric hunter really would have put together the very same asterisms and constellations we recognise today (most of them going back to ancient Egyptian, Babylonian, and Greek scholars and descriptions)? He's not assuming it looked identical he uses star map software which shows the night sky as it was on selected date e.g. 10,000 BC or whatever - another amateurish argument. The constellations are almost self selecting especially if used for solstice/equinox mapping - names and animal symbols will change and in fact Sweatman does this - but the basic star patterns remain substantially the same. 3. Contrary to the article’s premise the unearthed features at Göbekli Tepe are not shrouded in mystery. Published over the last years and decades, there is ample scientific literature available which unfortunately did not find its way into the study. The specific animals depicted in each enclosure’s iconography for instance seems to follow a certain intention, emphasizing different species in different enclosures. A purely substitutional interpretation ignores these more subtle but significant details. This also can be demonstrated for instance with the headless man on the shaft of Pillar 43, interpreted as symbol of death and mass extinction in the paper – however silently omitting the emphasised phallus in the same depiction which somehow contradicts the lifeless notion and implies a much more complex narrative behind these reliefs. There are even more reliefs on both narrow sides of P43 which went conpletely uncommented here. I agree with this comment - the headless man with erect phallus seems to echo cave paintings and I am almost certain if it is an asterism it is Orion - not as Sweatman gives it. I agree he should have considered and addressed the research of others but he has jumped in with his own hypothesis - which must be rather annoying. However that's no reason to reject everything he says - this would repeat his own mistake. 4. It also seems a bit arbitrary to base this interpretation (and all its consequences as described in the paper) on what seems to be some randomly selected pillars and their iconography (the interpretation thus not covering “much of the symbolism of Göbekli Tepe” as stated in the paper, but merely the tip of that iceberg). In the meantime more than 60 monumental T-pillars could have been unearthed in the older Layer III – many of these showing similar reliefs of animals and abstract symbols, a few even as complex as Pillar 43 (like Pillar 56 or Pillar 66 in enclosure H, for example). And it does not end there: the same iconography is prominently known also from other find groups like stone vessels, shaft straighteners, and plaquettes – not only from Göbekli Tepe, but a variety of contemporary sites in the wider vicinity. I'm not sure this is reasonable - the symbolism on Pillar 43 is what it is - regardless of what else is there. They are doing to Sweatman what they do to others - that is more of a discounting exercise than a refutation. If they are the experts they could provide the counter interpretation.

I am not a particular adherent of Sweatman and I do think he makes some mistakes. But I like his analytic and statistical approach and that he is at least a 'proper' scientist. He has done a very long series reviewing every published paper on the Younger Dryas impact theory which although very dry are worth watching. Most of the criticisms you linked to are very amateurish - for instance saying the GT monuments were probably roofed so no good as an observatory - he doesn't claim they were observatories. If you take his basic claim that much of neolithic art is related to the stars I think that has some merit - or at least consideration.

You need to watch his other vids to get his whole theory - this vid is really just an addendum.

Who doesn't love a bit of Gobekli Tepe:

Now let's follow the science (as the current phrase goes):

Suddenly it all clicks into place.

I like it

Good question. Well it was the OP of the thread so in a way I am just trying to keep on topic. But obviously there's more to it than that. My father is a scientist/mathematician and I was brought up with a strong emphasis on being rational - in fact I am fairly sure he would not even admit to emotions being a real concern. Which used to piss me off but now I find amusing. His hard rationality probably pushed me, when I was a teenager, to seeking a mystical/meditation path which I saw then very much as a path of seeing. What I mean is I was convinced there was more than ordinary objective reality and wanted a find a way to open up a world behind the everyday world. This was probably due mostly to experiences I had as a child with changes in states of consciousness. After some time practicing and through experiences I realised that what was key was energy - mostly energy in the body of the K type - and experienced some kind of awakening. This changed my view of things but it was quite unbalanced and lead to a number of problems I had to work through. Quite a number of years later I realised that my inability to make progress was because I was still clinging to the path of seeing and the path of body energy (if you can call it that). I realised after some examination that every position that people take up, even my fathers extreme rationalism, are emotionally based. That 'seeing' and 'energy' although valid are incomplete and that the path can be best expressed as emotion. By this I don't mean we have to be emotional - in fact this can be a big pit fall of self indulgence - I mean that we have to perceive that the 'terrain' we travel through is an emotional one. Systems for practice as formal presentations of the way can seem to squeeze the emotion out of the path - or demote emotion to disturbances or 'poisons' for example - but this in itself is an emotional position towards emotions itself, if you see what I mean. Without wishing to desiccate the word if we take emotion to mean a motion in life-force (if I am allowed that New Agey expression) it is something real, dynamic, present and alive, which is why tantra pictures it as female, attractive, threatening, amazing, inspiring and terrifying. This is not all I could say but perhaps explains my interest in the subject.

@Yueya thank you for that, it was quite beautiful, even though I'm not sure I understand it all - due to my limited grasp of some things. @Bindi, @dwai, @freeform - and anyone else - I think we lack a common agreed set of terms for some of the 'things' we are dealing with here. I have tried to stick to normal English and not go off into Buddhist tantra or Egyptian mysticism or other systems because sometimes technical language can help and sometimes it can obscure. I am not saying this to discourage you from posting as you will because I am enjoying reading it all and hope you will all continue but perhaps we need to accept among us as a group that there will be problems when mixing say, yoga terms with Daoist alchemy. If we accept first that we are all speaking from our own experience and expressing something valid in our own sense then we can look more for common ground and affirmation - and move forward that way. I have been thinking, in terms of emotion as the path, how Buddhism and some other systems characterise emotions as poisons or delusion or confusion etc. It is as if they are saying we need to get rid of them - and then we will get to some pure state. This to me is very dualistic. It is valid to a certain extent for a person who is in regular emotional turmoil to think about purging anger and passion and so on - because they feel sick with it all. And beyond that someone might look at their emotions and say I will transform them into something higher. But I think 'emotions are the path' is saying something even more profound than that and something more real and human too. What it is saying I can't at the moment access in words that make a whole lot of sense. So I'm going to leave it there for now and wait for a more inspired moment.

The two goals do appear contradictory - but I think they are actually complementary - or even sometimes sequential. Without wishing to be boring about Ancient Egypt they had two goals - one of witnessing (the sunrise) and the other of becoming an 'effective being' = an immortal spirit. Generally speaking they are presented as being sequential - i.e. first witness and then become. But in actuality the path is always some becoming and some seeing, followed by some seeing and some becoming if you see what I mean. Or you could say you can't become without some degree of insight and can't have true insight without some transformation. In terms of blockages I think you could say there are two main types. One is a restriction or opposition to flow and the other is clouds of confusion. Blocks of energy and blocks of insight. I would, in terms of Dan Tiens and wotnot place them either in the Dan Tien or at the intersections. So for instance the energy blocks (restrictions) are at base of spine, solar plexus, and throat/neck. While the clouds (or even storms) are located in the centre of the Dan Tiens i.e. belly, heart, head ... and if you add another cloud above the head you get your seven obstacles. Each of the blocks requires a different strategy/approach to over come - and one big mistake everyone makes is to try to apply the same remedies to all. For instance dealing with the base of spine is quite different to easing the neck. This is more or less how I experience it from energy work meditation but I am no expert in the intricacies of the Nei Dan process. I think that looking at this technically is important - but often what is overlooked is that it is all emotional energy.

That time in the Middle Ages when you realised that dragons are real and your wife is unfaithful ...

I don''t get your point.