|
|
|
|
|
|
|
The drop of water and the ocean are one. Macrocosm and microcosm. The drop never really left, but because of water's nature it was able to experience life as if it had become separated and it may even have believed that it was for a time. The drop is itself, individuated, unique, not quite exactly like any other drop yet in its center, one with all the drops and one with the ocean.
|
|
|
|
|
|
So come on in, the water's fine!
|
|
|
*does the backstroke* ahhhhhhhhh.......thanks! but I feel as though I've always been "in" ;) *giggles*
|
|
Karen
- Saturday, June 7 2008
|
Cdxy, what a thoughtful and beautiful analogy--droplet~human, ocean`mankind/God. Are you the author?
|
|
cdXy
- Saturday, June 7 2008
|
No, not at all. I'm surprised you haven't heard or read this metaphor before which has been used and abused to the point of becoming a cliche. For this reason I wanted to stop a minute and have us reflect on what exactly it implies. I suppose the idea originated in Buddhism but I cannot tell for sure (anyone knows?) I tend to think along the same lines as Michael but I am not so sure that was the original intent as I think the drop of water is not supposed to retain any measure of individuality when it merges in the ocean. If I was writing the metaphor I would thus speak of molecules of water instead of drops. I believe that changes the perspective somewhat.
|
|
Karen
- Sunday, June 8 2008
|
Cdxy, you wouldn't be surprised if you knew that for over 30 years I was on hiatus with seeking. In the late 1960s in college I had a traumatic and tumultuous (including a suicide attempt)period of seeking. When I thankufully calmed down, I labeled myself an active agnostic--I didn't know but was actively seeking. Then, came my 30 some year hiatus where I simply accepted that I don't know and never will know so just be honest and never puposely hurt another person. Now that I am retired, I have begun the search again. I guess I could now label myself a born again seeker. :-) It is just in the past 3 years that I have even read Eastern spiritual thought. My childhood spiritual background was that of being raised in a very dogmatic religion. Until recently, I did not have a lot of the spiritual knowlege/ideas/growth that many of you in this and like forums share.
|
|
pampe
- Sunday, June 8 2008
|
Seems like this is really old (Buddhist or Vedic??) and that would be why "drop" is thew smallest item.
Hmm..but then there wouldn't be a microscope.....maybe a mixed metaphor?
I have no trouble getting this one .....
|
|
|
"No, not at all. I'm surprised you haven't heard or read this metaphor before which has been used and abused to the point of becoming a cliche. For this reason I wanted to stop a minute and have us reflect on what exactly it implies. I suppose the idea originated in Buddhism but I cannot tell for sure (anyone knows?) I tend to think along the same lines as Michael but I am not so sure that was the original intent as I think the drop of water is not supposed to retain any measure of individuality when it merges in the ocean. If I was writing the metaphor I would thus speak of molecules of water instead of drops. I believe that changes the perspective somewhat."
I am guilty of having "used and abused" this idea to the point of . . .but that is because it makes so much ordinary sense (to me at least).
"I would thus speak of molecules of water instead of drops.
A molecule is just a smaller drop. No real difference cdxy!
Water is everywhere and in everything. It is not so cliche as is it true.
"Isn't the drop [molecule] of water also an ocean?" Yes.
|
|
cdXy
- Wednesday, June 18 2008
|
NighEve, I am confident the original intent of this metaphor was to convey the idea of an absolute loss of identity and individuality as the "drop" return to it source. Indeed if an observer sees a drop of rain falling in the sea, it seems conceivable that it (the drop, not the observer) will be completely diluted and it's "drop-ness" never again to be recovered. For my western mind that is a concept I cannot quite grasp, nor do I think it is true. So I am proposing the modern update of the molecule of water which, albeit with some patience, could actually still be discernible and traceable as itself in the vastness of the ocean, never having lost its "molecule-ness." It is the totality of the molecules, similar and yet different, that form the ocean.
|
|
|
"NighEve, I am confident the original intent of this metaphor was to convey the idea of an absolute loss of identity and individuality as the "drop" return to it source."
Then that part must have gone way over my head, because I understand that I can maintain my ID as a drop or molecule while at the same time I am the ocean (God). At least that is the way I have understood and abuse the cliche. (I guess this means I agree with you and Michael?)
"Isn't the drop [molecule] of water also an ocean?" Yes.
|
|
|
I think I will get off the computer right now and go to the beach....My droplets are beggin' and whinning to go to the ocean - and I'll take them there by car. so there's how - if not why.
|
|
|
Looking at the gray sky in Seattle I think some droplets are headed my way and they do not inspire a trip to the ocean at the moment. :)
|
|
|
ok, i get it, we are all one and the one is all of us, but i still wonder, if you pee in the ocean, does it become an ocean full of pee....?
|
|
|
There you are earning the nickname U.P.
May I take you back to the primordial soup?
Your bit of being can add salt, heat, sweet or bitter to the soup - your effectiveness is diluted by all the other beings - because it is all just huge.
|
|
|
What do you mean, "if"?
|
|
|
bella, you havent seen me lately, i am pretty huge, too:) well, maybe not compared to the ocean and the universe....
i think as close as i will get to thsat today is sweating in the yard, about to go cut my wilderness that is now my front lawn:)
|
|
|
My molecules are on vacation and the molecules that resonate with salt water - feel so relaxed and at peace as I spend time in the ocean even breathing the ocean air - I start to feel one with the outside.
I lose that during the year. It is the leaving who we are as me strive to be part of a group or will ourselves to another's purpose (our jobs) and then regaining those parts that get left as we re-member ourselves. I got to read and have quiet time for a whole afternoon and I came bach to myself. We have awareness and so can feed the bits that we want to encourage, maybe we starve the parts that we don't encourage - not just us as earthlings lose our relationship with the seasons being inside, but us losing our consciousness and self purpose to the larger consciousness. What does the macrocosm of consciousness do to our droplets (molecules)?
|
|
She
- Monday, June 9 2008
|
Have you ever noticed how drops of water are attracted to other drops of water? And when they join, they seek more and more? I've noticed it with other things too, like seeking like. Recently while at the Museum of Sci in Boston I noticed the same thing even with children. They streamed single file, congregated, bunched up together, dropped behind just to be sucked back into the group again and again. Watching other critters under the scope - their behavior is similar...just wondering...
|
|
|
Wilhelm Reich tried to put together a theory that would explain this phenomenon. He called it "orgone" energy. It does'nt look like his theory quite hit the mark but he certainly noticed the same things you have.
|
|
She
- Saturday, June 21 2008
|
Wasn't his theory also based on captured --- energy, and what could then be done with that - energy? We've vistited is home and library in Rangeley, ME.
|