Two analogies & a metaphor, walk into a bar…

One of them said to the others “Tag, You’re It.”

‘Who is?’ I said.

“We are, remember?”

Lol, kidding.

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1. The Game.

It is whatever you say it is… If it wasn’t, then why would you say it is?

Perspective is everything.

And we’re all talking about the same thing, from different points of perspective on the spectrum of being human…

Looking at this experience, we’re having… trying to explain it.

Some of us are damn sure we have “chosen wisely,” while others of us are certain of it and have “proof,”… and some of us throw our hands up in the air saying, “Who knows?”

We, humans, have come up with some wild concoctions as to what is, what it is, why we’re here, and what this is all about…

Some of the more plausible explanations are even wilder than what we appear to be capable of dreaming up: simulation theory, the alien hybridization theories, the notion that we’ve risen and fallen dozens of times over hundreds of thousands of years only to be knocked back by asteroid impacts or high technology that fell into the wrong hands…

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What if all of those are plausible?

What if they’re all actually true and accurate?

What if the truth is even larger or deeper than any one of those theories on their own?

Meaning… what if it’s really all of those, at the same time?

The truth of it?…

We may never actually know or understand…

Some say the truth of the matter is actually incomprehensible at our given level of intellect…

Some say that’s built into the game itself, the fabric this whole thing plays out on, and therefore we “can’t” know it… like we can’t know the name of God, can’t…

We’re a level below the thing itself, and therefore we “can’t” know.

Maybe it is something we “can’t” know…

We don’t think so 1.

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The notion that we can’t know doesn’t work if you consider that we are able to maneuver it, control it, and bend it to our will. And do so consciously when we see how it works…

And there we find an opening.

An opening to pen it any way we choose.

And when we begin to craft the story even as it unfolds right before us, not unlike the way a video game renders what the player is observing.

Yes, there are holes in those theories as well, the simulation and hologram theories specifically… eventually we find that all of our theories have holes in them… because we categorize, classify, and try to separate them all into individual theories.

Part of the game seems to allow for the proving and disproving of almost everything within it. Depending on your perspective. We even have language to describe this, preference… confirmation bias… and so on… a rabbit hole for later, I suppose.

One thing we do know for sure is that at this level of consciousness, 3D or whatever term you’ve ascribed to it (our current general level of human consciousness), we seem to be unable to tolerate it being perfect. Supposedly, though, we can ascend to higher dimensions where “It” is perfect or more perfect than we have it here, now.

We’ll see.

And so will you.

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In the meantime, here on Earth… at our current “level of consciousness,”…

It’s a Game, Dude. (Relax. This isn’t “THE WAY” being professed here, nor is that being prescribed… this is simply a perspective, a “way to see it” – a way to describe it, for the sake of being able to “do it” – it being “creating our experience more to our liking…”).

Anywho… where was I?

Oh, right… This thing we call life… is an ultra-realistic Role Playing Game (meaning, it’s so real we don’t realize it isn’t. Cool, huh?).

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Let’s pretend for a moment…

Imagine yourself sitting on the couch, in the living room, playing a video game, feet up on the coffee table if you do that sort of thing, controller in your hand, the sliding glass door open, a drink on the table…

The version of you sitting on the couch knows the character you’re playing in the game on the TV screen isn’t “real,” even though you’ve played that character for ages, you’ve developed that particular character, built it up, and found its strengths and weaknesses…

You’ve really learned how to play this character well… it’s got a name, and you’ve dressed it up in all the gear and garb you prefer… but it’s just a character in a video game.

And you’re aware that you aren’t that character. You just play that role in that game or that series of games.

Now imagine that that game has become so immersive that you literally think you are the character on the TV screen…

Like I said, let’s pretend for a moment… like Sims, imagine for a second that that’s real, and these characters we create in video games think they’re actually real… and you’re one of them…

Don’t forget, at the same time, even though the character version of you in the game thinks they’re real.

You’re also the one sitting on the couch… with the controller… having no real idea that the version of you on the TV screen ACTUALLY thinks they’re the one that’s real…

Stay close… one more level of weird (read: complexity)…

Now, in order to imagine yourself sitting on the couch in the living room, you had to observe that version of yourself from yet another point of view…

If you think about it, you were likely standing just outside of the living room in a hallway, leaning up against the wall, or maybe against the breakfast bar between the kitchen and the living room.

I’m curious: in order to see yourself sitting on the couch, playing a video game… from what perspective were you observing yourself?

Strange?

Most of us, when walking through this imagination, tend to “see” it that way. Some of us end up viewing this scene from the perspective of the one sitting on the couch… which itself is like being “stuck” in the perspective of the character in the game.

Now, in order to see that version of you, you’re using yet another point of view (perspective)… who is that???

All of these perspectives are valid, all are viable, and all are “usable” in a sense for “playing” this game.

There’s a lot here that we dig into a bit later. For now, simply recognize that you have access to all of these perspectives, the first three being the most beneficial for what we will do with them.

Let’s see if you can correlate them…

One of you is the Observer…

Another one is the navigator…

And the third is the participant.

Who’s who, or which one is which?

Each of these is a character playing another character (And some of these characters have built into their script that they “have problems” or “issues” or even “trauma” – and, to cover our asses… much of that is TRUE. Don’t shoot the messenger… yet, we’ll do that later, I’ll help…).

Moving on.

It’s subtle. It’s nuanced. It’s how you operate yourself… you’re simply not aware of it or how exactly it works.

Cool? We’ll circle back soon. Hopefully, you’ll be with us for that.

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2. The Program.

You’re like a computer.

Remote programmable and all… like, you’re wireless… don’t even need to be plugged in…

You’ve got Hardware and Software… built with and tied together by a Legacy Code… created to function on top of or within a Source Code…

It’s like this… and for our purposes here, works in this order:

1. Your In-Game Avatar:
   • Your physical body – hardware (wetware)
2. Your Operating System:
   • Source Code (Ah ha! Whatever it is… or where it comes from… or how you “got it.”)
   • Legacy Code & Programs (Genetic & Familial conditioning)
   • System Programs (Self-chosen, consciously or otherwise)
   • Applications (Context-specific behaviors)
3. Your Senses & Emotions:
   • The electrochemical system that allows your OS to operate your wetware.
4. That “something else:”
   • Whether you call it life force, a spark, consciousness, soul, spirit, or simply the emergence of awareness, or whatever you personally call it.
   • We’ll use the term consciousness, and we’ll sort out any associated baggage with that term later.

Park this somewhere safe. We’ll come back for it before too long…

You are a SYSTEM of Systems operating within a system.

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Your early days (from birth to between five & sevenish years old) saw a factory-installed operating system and a host of programs fashion you into a playable character with base settings set one way or another.

This then set you up to develop your own personal identity (the role and roles you’ve learned to play). A.k.a. Your Character. This phase begins around seven/eight years old… 2

It was during this phase, or stage that you were “taught” how to act… and how people like you (and your family) acted.

What was and what wasn’t acceptable.

This included your extended family, neighborhood people, friends and all those who “fit” into your circle – your tribe… layered into a culture and a class.

From this base OS, you spent roughly the next seven years crafting the “who” you think you are based on the “who” you think you’re supposed to be…

This brings us right up to about fourteen years of age, give or take… some of us were early, others a bit late (*authors note… the shit I got into from about twelve on… Jesus.).

By the time you were seventeen/eighteen years old, you were basically who you would become, spending the next couple of years setting that character in stone… arriving you into your very early twenties…

Since then, on the whole, you’ve honed that version of yourself… sure, you’ve made some changes, some tweaks here and there… probably a couple big fuck ups, big life lessons…

Likely a couple of the regrets you carry around… sorry, not sorry. It’s honest, and there’s nothing wrong with it… it happened. Period.

For the most part, you’re who you crafted between seven and seventeen, just with a bit more experience.

The base operating system, the main programs you picked up, and the coping mechanisms you developed that got you here were all but set in stone in those three phases – 0-7, 7-14, and 14-21.

Just like getting a new computer all set up…

To recap, if you will, you’ve got:

Your hardware/wetware – the physical suit you inhabit here… which is electro-chemically operated.

Legacy Code (Your Nature plus the Nurturing you received, even if that means the lack of nurturing – you learned how to be from people and circumstances. – This is essentially the blueprint you were installed with).

System Programs (Your coping mechanisms).

Applications (situational and context dependant behaviors).

All are built on top of and playing out in/on the Source Code (The Matrix, The Field, God, Universal Consciousness, Whatever you need/want to call it.).

Again, not “THE TRUTH,” but rather, a way to see it.

An analogy that will allow us a languaging and a framework by which to recode or reprogram the automations you installed or had instilled in you that doesn’t serve you and what you’re after… getting what you want and stopping the getting of what you don’t want.

Make sense?

Onward buttercup…

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3. Soul Mountaineering.

The most universal metaphor we use to describe life…

“It’s like climbing a mountain.”

When we’re faced with difficulties, we often describe it as facing a mountain or having to conquer one.

The whole of human existence seems to be trekking up one mountain or down the next. We’ve even turned it into a sport, several sports actually, some of which are sought after by the rich and famous, where the more dangerous, the bigger the prize.

Like it’s stained on our genetic fabric… the need to ascend the mountain.

Life isn’t like climbing “A” mountain. Though that’s how we use this metaphor…

It’s learning how to mountain climb, scaling one mountain after the next…

Our lives are lived alongside a great Mountain Range—pushed right up against the ocean—each of us with our own unique landscape to traverse.

The point isn’t to find the path of least resistance or the path of comfort… avoiding the mountains…

Nor is it meant to be in a constant struggle, up the steepest of cliff faces with nary but a finger’s grasp of the wall, hanging on for dear life at every turn…

…however, there is something to be said for having had those experiences, the tough ones, the ones that challenge our ability even to survive…

And those tough moments aren’t just reserved for the steepest cliffs and rock faces.

The rivers, lakes, caves, and even the meadows hide peril, misery, and calamity. You just gotta know where to look… and boy, do some of us go looking for it…

The valleys can be just as dangerous as the last leg up the north face during a blizzard just before the summit.

We haven’t even mentioned the other travelers yet…

Or the weird little mountain towns…

Nor the rapidly changing weather that turns a wonderful Sunday afternoon picnic into a tragedy. – Stay the fuck out of the canyons during the rainy season… what, are you new?!?!?

The point is to learn how to navigate the landscape, to thrive in the wild… to become capable of dealing with whatever the terrain and the journey present us.

The whole of it, being our own path… life is the way, YOU are the path.

You’ve got Mountains to climb, rivers to cross, caves to explore, etc. All of these other “features” seem to revolve around the Mountains both metaphorically and in real life… Your Mountains frame the rest of your life’s landscape.

Knowing this, it only makes sense to become adept at navigating all the different types of terrain you might find yourself in and become your own Guide.

Lest you leave your survival up to others...

And we all know what that leads to, following someone else’s path...

…course, maybe that is your path... or part of it.

Life is lived alongside a great mountain range, shoved right up against the ocean. There are many different paths one might take, and the point isn’t to merely go on a journey.

The point is to become a Guide for yourself and others.

The whole thing is Psycho-Spiritual Mountaineering.

Soul Mountaineering. A better metaphor.

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“Two analogies and a metaphor walked into a bar…”

Dude, it’s a Game.

You and the game are programmable.

The whole thing is played out in and through a wild landscape.

Your life is the path. You are the way.

Making your own way, well, that’s soul mountaineering.

The point?

To become your own Guide and demonstrate to the rest of us how to navigate life gracefully.