If It Doesn't Ring True
Is it really for you?
Throughout my adult life I’ve spent a great deal of time studying, and practicing Western Esotericism. What can I say? It’s my jam. I’m a Freemason and a Rosicrucian, indeed I stand at the very pinnacle of the structure of Masonry.
I even get to wear the funny outfits!
And without a doubt, Freemasonry is a part of the Western Esoteric Tradition. Anyone who might claim otherwise, and some do, is either uninformed or untruthful.
All of this is a bit of a lead up for me to say that I read something today, within that context, that I think has much broader implications and illustrated a universal truth.
The essay’s author was arguing that when he wrote his esoteric books he discarded what many consider a vital pillar of the tradition. He removed those particular teachings from his practice as well.
It caught my eye, because it is a part of the tradition that I have completely ignored as well. When people discuss it with me, I fear that my eyes must glaze over. I don’t understand it, not because I can’t understand it, but because I just find it far too dull to study. I don’t read about it, because I find books about it to be as dry as dirt.
I’ve gleefully ignored it, for decades.
As has, apparently, this fairly well known esoteric author.
But I have friends who love it. Who love reading about it, studying it, and discussing it. For them, it is an explanation of truth, and a pathway to wisdom.
And that’s a really great thing, for them. For me, it’s rubbish.
I think that there’s a really powerful lesson in that. A lesson that expands well beyond the esoteric.
If something doesn’t ring true for us, as individuals, well then, it just isn’t true.
For us.
And it doesn’t matter how many others find truth within it.
We are all unique, and here for our own unique purposes. What is true for me, in my existence, isn’t necessarily true for anyone else. And we’ll never fulfill our purpose, never have a successful journey here on earth, if we do nothing but follow the herd. We must clear our own pathway, follow our own course.
Sorry for switching traditions here, but I do enjoy the terminology: Enlightenment is not found through a Guru. Not through a curricula designed by others.
Enlightenment is found within. Probably the very first thing we need to do on our journey towards it is discard everything we encounter that doesn’t ring true for us.
Interested in some more? Everything I wrote last week is collected here.
One of the things I found fascinating Gnosis/Gnosticism is that the only individual capable of experiencing it directly is the one having the experience. Anyone else participating in the tradition is operating under the principle of faith that this individual is not directly capable of claiming that experience themselves. Magnetic beings finding what resonates like a tuning fork/divining rod pairs is a really great visual.
The only way out is through! Keep up the Great Work Brother!