After ascension he promised to stay in his physical body to help all humanity and still appears to groups of disciples. Yogananda writes about him in Autobiography of a Yogi. It is said that you only have to say his name with reverence and you directly attract a blessing from him. Jesus was a high priest in the Order of Melchizedek.
All humans belong at some level to this order. He has also been the "planetary logos" for Earth, its prime overseer. Sanat Kumara is the Planetary Logos, apparently the greatest of the Avatars. He is the God of this Universe and He oversees ascension initiations in the inner planes. He has an Ascension seat in Shamballa, over Gobi Desert, where you may ask to go in meditation. Vywamus is the higher self of Sanat Kumara. Vywamus is reported to have had 32 lives in a physical existence in another galaxy, one of which included being a channel. An expert in communication and channeling Vywamus is specifically focusing the energies of joy, laughter and self love to aid Earth and humanity in their evolution to higher consciousness.
A very high frequency energy bringing profound wisdom on a mass level concerning the relationship between humanity and our planet Earth. Assists in the Ascension Process. He is very much concerned with the Ascension of planet Earth. Ascension is achieved by increasing the amount of Light and the amount of Love that your cellular structure can hold. This Light and this Love is flowing from the Source. A beautiful expression of Divine Mother. Mercy means there is more assistance given through love than through merit earned.
Following her ascension Kwan Yin turned back to save others and made this pledge - "Never will I seek, nor receive, private individual salvation, never will I enter into final peace alone, but forever and everywhere will I live and strive for the redemption of every creature throughout the world from the bonds of conditioned existence". Kwan Yin is associated with the earth, fertility, and birth, and healing.
She has also brought forth the energies of Magnified Healing.
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- Visiones de Peralonso Niño, Descubridor de América (NOVELAS nº 17) (Spanish Edition).
Quan Yin is known as the Goddess of Compassion and is often depicted riding on a dragon. She is the eastern counterpart of Mother Mary and she works to balance the feminine energy. She is one of the Lords of Karma representing the sixth ray. Her proper name is Kuanshih Yin and means "She who harkens to the cries of the world". She is honored in Japan and China. A Celestial Bodhisatva and Ascended Master. Beloved for his great devotion, he experimented intensively with other religious paths, including Christianity and Islam.
- OLD ENOUGH!;
- Strategien der Manipulation und der Emotionalisierung in der arabisch politischen Rhetorik am Beispiel ausgewählter Reden Usama bin Ladens (German Edition).
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- Mikie:Family and Friends (The Mikie Books Book 2).
Some believe this planetary master was Krishna, and that he inspired the life of Jesus. Maitreya is a Buddha, working diligently behind the scenes to enlighten humanity and birth the age of light. He is the planetary Christ who overlit Jesus during his lifetime and is the head of the Great White Brotherhood. Lord Maitreya was an incarnation of Krishna. He works to enlighten humanity and bring in the new Golden Age. Lord Maitreya is the being who holds the office of the Christ-Grid frequency for our planet. This is the new grid system of higher evolution.
He is the head of the Spiritual Hierachy and is often called the "Master of Masters". A profound being of light and wisdom, he was strongly connected with Sufism. He did not speak from until he left his body in The Hathors are giving loving assistance and profound ascension teachings to humanity and Earth. On the holy mountain Arunachalam, he taught seekers to meditate upon the question "Who am I? There he founded the Self Realization Fellowship and introduced kriya yoga to the west. He authored Autobiography of a Yogi and other works.
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He has introduced millions to Eastern ways of enlightenment, and done enormous good in the world. He was one of the few gurus who deserve absolute trust. He was the disciple of Lahiri Mahasaya, who was the disciple of the immortal Mahavatar Babaji. He is a Member of the Karmic Board, representing the first ray. He will give assistance to adjust things in legal matters. He taught detachment and the middle way. Ascended years ago, Buddha "gave it all up" to find meaning in life and the reason why some suffered so much.
It was during a meditation under the Bodhi Tree that he received Enlightenment. Buddhism was formed out of his Teachings. She holds the balance of mercy and judgment. She helps those who want to balance heart and head. She will also help those who judge and criticise others from the lower mind to raise their energy to their heart centre and be loving towards themselves and others. You may apply in meditation to the Lords of Karma for release of personal or collective karma.
If you do this, ask if karma may be released on every level - physical, mental emotional and spiritual, in evey dimension and in every reality and universe. Lady Portia is one who frequently offers grace. One can call to Her for assistance in legal action. Her electronic pattern is the Maltese Cross. Born as a cowherd boy, Krishna displayed his perfect divinity with the all attractive features of wealth, power, fame, beauty, wisdom and detachment.
He was a slayer of demonic tyrants and enchanted all with the music of his flute. It is said that he overshadowed Jesus years ago, and Krishna is believed by some to have reappeared as Lord Maitreya in modern times. Krsna, Vishnu , Embodied as: The spiritual mentor who ensures that, ultimately, our evolutionary path and spiritual growth is sustained in accordance with our souls' highest spiritual aims. To do so, his energy is in contact with each of us at all times, guiding us from the higher realms to embrace self loving choices and actions in our daily lives and improve our understanding and practice of Unconditional Love.
This beloved master has showed humanity that death can be overcome and that love, forgiveness and compassion are our true nature. Like all great masters Jesus did not come to be worshipped, he came to teach humanity how to become Christ like. One of major Archangels, as well as Chief Elohim.
He is the twin brother of the angel Sandalphon. He was Enoch in an earthly incarnation. Considered the Creator of the outer worlds, a teacher and guide to Enoch and creator of the Keys. He is also a co-worker with Zoroaster. In the Book of Enoch, Enoch records the revelations of Sanat Kumara on the true nature and deeds of the fallen angels. He was educated in music, history, poetry and sports, and was a gentleman as well as a scholar. After his mothers death, and at the end of his morning period, he became a teacher of the 6 disciplines - poetry, music, history, government, etiquette and divination.
He later received a prestigious post that allowed him to spend the rest of his life compiling his writings, which are now called Confucian Classics. Confucianism arose from his teachings, the essence of them being to strive for perfect virtue in every thought, word and deed. Was an early incarnation of Ascended Master Djwhal Khul. Ganesha, the god of wisdom and good fortune and the patron of learning and letters, is popular because he is gentle and helpful. Ganesha is depicted as an elephant-headed man to express the unity of man, the small being, with the Great Being, God.
The Messenger teaches that the elephant-god Ganesha has the infinite memory of the Mind of God. Hindus believe Ganesha can remove obstacles, including obstacles to devotion. He is traditionally invoked before writing a book or at the beginning of any project. Elephant God of India. He is in charge of removing all obstacles. Connected with occult knowledge and magical practices in the Hellenistic Age. Now the Ascended Master Zarathrustra.
Slain with 80 priests whilst officiating in the temple, by an invading Persian army. Although he told her he did not love her she was the one willing to deal with all of his bs, so she won. I was left broken and it took me years to get over it. Fast forward years later about 3 years ago I entered into another serious relationship, it was over in less than a year, he was a liar, cheater, manipulative etc, etc.
That ended and I was once again left broken. The next 2 relationships or flings after that I chose more wisely and used my discernment as to not make the same mistakes. Those ended but I was not left broken or sad actually kind of glad, I was not in love so I was not sad when the relationship was over. I am a little bit more aware now than before. I thought that since I had forgiven and moved on with not grudges held and personally forgave him that I would be freed from those challenges.
Thank you kindly for the advice! I do plan on asking him out as he is not charging me for his services and it is the least that I could do. I have already shown gratitude for his help by gifting him some crystals he is new to crystals and told me he would love to know more about them and their healing power and I plan to tell him more about them.
Sorry for being so long winded, thanks again for the much needed advice! That makes the whole evolution progress so so slow. You have to get advanced fast in one life and try to start at the highest level of your last life otherwise you may roll back to lower level soul… is this right? Unless you regress badly which is unusual. What you gain you keep. Its like a school in which once you complete a grade you move on. Unless certain lessons are hard then you might spend more than one life on them.
There is no fixed rule. Thus each life is viscerally far more powerful by allowing soul forgetting. Makes it a pain in the butt often but serves the purpose well. If we were to have recall of all of our other lives, we would be so distracted by all of the other scenarios, experiences, sorrows, pains, and personalitites happening simultaneously, we would in no way be able to focus on what this life here now is supposed to be about.
We come here to live this life, not to remember the horrors of the past. After each life, the old personality is left behind as the soul absorbs any actual wisdom it can learn from its experiences. The more we manifest our intuitive knowing, the more we are being true to who we are at the soul level.
Love your answer Barry. I raised my children to be aware of the unusual, but not to let it overtake their normal lives.. So the infant souls are not identical to level I. I myself took a PL regression the other day and as I talked with my Higher Self I got an impression that I am a fairly new soul so I may be level I not such an infant soul as described on this article, though. Newton, for example, does not go into much detail in JOS as to characteristics of the Souls he categorized.
Also, if you are communicating with your Higher Self, in no manner imo are you a younger soul in any system. Hello Arma, I found in th book Messages from Michael it states that when we experience agony or extreme stress that we can accelerate through soul level but it also state that if your depressed, it can stop your growth. Depression is more like wearing a tons of weight on your body, emotions and spirit..
You can lose all faith in the future, and other people. There is also medication for depression that works in many cases, but sometimes not. But they are always worth a try. Now, if you believe that every experience in your life is a spiritual or life lesson, then you can learn from great pain and fear, and also depression.
There are a huge amount of lessons — courage, physical and emotional strength, patience, faith, hope, allowing others to help you — particularly if you are used to be extremely independent and not rely on others, empathy, sympathy, compassion, adaptability, generosity, kindness.. So you can use the experiences to leap frog your own growth, but you can also just curl up into a ball of misery and stay that way, and sometimes that might be the easier choice, at least for a while.
Depression can make you want to curl up into that ball and just disappear, so you end up with two choices, remain hidden and get help. The asking for help can sometimes feel like be a tremendous problem, but its just another of those challenges we learn from. Perhaps the giving in to extreme isolation in depression is their reference point. That would make sense. Again, I would need to see the comment and context. Agony and stress are characterised by intense emotion to the point of being unbearable.
Depression is an absence of emotion and motivation — the opposite. I live at the moment in Mexico which is mainly a baby soul country. The way men look at women is like they have never seen a women in their whole lives, The evil eyes they throw, its all too emotional and strange for me. Of course, nothing ever gets done. Thank goodness I can move to Young soul countries, where things work out. We must find the strenght needed. Your work is amazing and I started and I will try to support it when I can.
After reading and studying so intensely on Michealreadings site and a lot of introspection and test I could conclude that I am a Mature Soul, Priest dominating 2nd Warrior 3. Now like a curios person that I am I still have a lot of question going thru my mind that I want t discuss with you and find out your opinion or insight about it, if your kind to do it.
This are some of my questions that I did not find an answer on the site or comment section: Is it possible for our soul to go down on one of the 35 steps for example from a young soul 6th to a young soul 5th, or 4th according to what we do on Earth when we use our free will? What I mean is is there any responsability that we have regarding what we do on earth towards other people? People having near death experiences tell us about the idea that are no emotions when we leave the body and all is bliss and serenity.
What is your input on suffering and is it necessarily to end suffering until we accomplish all the 35 steps? What is your take on attachements on material things that some teaching describe as being the cause of suffering in the world and cannot evolve if we still have these kind of emotions.
Are there any other entities in the universe that dont have human shape aliens that are a part of what we call God? We all reply here. Short answer to some from my experience. Suicide for example leads to a redo, not regression. But I knew a woman when I was young who said she had been a cat in a previous life because of misusing spiritual power, which opens up another can of worms. In Yogic tradition movement between human and other forms is somewhat common.
Eastern psycho regression techniques reveal knowledge of animal lives. However, Pain is one thing, suffering is another. A very advanced soul can feel great pain but not suffer due to it. For all is seen as it really is, One, Connected,Love, and everything is here to support growth-no exceptions. This Earth journey is material. It is meant to be enjoyed. Clinging to outer form in any form a spiritual way? The wisdom and perspective that is gained from lived experience cannot be lost; it becomes part of your very being. That said, in each life we begin from scratch as conscious individuals.
At age 10, a mature soul will act more like a baby soul; at age 20, more like a young soul. So for example, someone who is actually 4th level mature might get fixated on something in their late teens and then continue to manifest as, say, 6th level young. One of the issues that causes arrested development is not realising that we have free will.
We are not responsible for how others react or respond, however. Karma is a teaching device that spans across lives. It teaches us that we are free to use our free will however we wish, but there are consequences when we violate the free will of others. This is because we are all interconnected as parts of a whole. If I murder you in this life, for example, there will be a disparity between us which we can both feel and which demands resolution.
So then we will plan to re-balance ourselves in a future life, either by you murdering me or by me saving your life from another murder. Purgatory, hell — no, not unless one fully expects to see exactly that after death, in which case you unconsciously create it. This is our familiar home between lives. Human bodies well, most of them experience the full gamut of emotions both positive and negative, from pain and misery to joy and love. When we are no longer in human bodies, there is no mechanism by which we can experience negative emotions. Our home is entirely blissful, peaceful, loving and joyful.
The soul, however, is still attracted to human existence precisely because the negative emotions are so powerful as learning devices. When we begin the steps, we are mostly focused on exploring our own free will — being selfish rogues. In doing so, we tend to create suffering for others. As we progress, we will begin to create suffering for ourselves e. Eventually there comes a point, or various points, where we want to stop creating suffering altogether. Some Warriors might become pacifists, for example.
Evolution is a slow long-term process and we certainly cannot jump from say step 25 to step 35 in a single lifetime by giving up material attachments. For some people, giving up material attachments is exactly the right thing for them to do in order to take the next step. For other people, it would be completely irrelevant and even unhelpful.
Life Is a Dream
The search for material success is precisely where their evolution is right now. All entities and non-entities are a part of what we call God. It has been a few years since I accidentally came across your website, which led me to The Michael Teachings. I was initially surprised at the result!
I always thought I was a Mature 6th or 7th Artisan. Turns out I am actually a 3rd stage Old Soul Scholar! The overleaves I guessed correctly. What I dont understand is that I have lived 10 previous cycles. I thought it was just one — from baby to old? I am still very grateful and indebted to you Barry, for shining a light in the darkness.
It has all been so illuminating. I am always on the quest for knowledge and enlightenment, not surprising, as I am a Scholar after all! That is who and what you are stripped of everything, including Role and Soul Age. To undergo a cycle of evolution, that innermost spark has taken on a particular Role Scholar?
But a spark-essence can do that more than once, evolving through all the levels again but using different Roles. Each of these grand cycles is known as … a Grand Cycle. So you are in the 4th entity of your cadre. That will add a subtle scholarly energy to your way of being. Likewise, your cadre is 4th in its own grouping…. This whole thing as far as Michael is concerned is about self-validation through self-awareness and self-examination.
Take it as an opportunity to investigate and evaluate what feels truly valid to you. If your next life focuses on different lesson altogether, there is no reason to expect any similar depression. Another possibility is that something has drastically changed in your life, leaving you in a situation of not knowing what to do or even not knowing what you want out of life. Hi, this message is principally to Barry, Ama Nazara, or kenstories1 — certainly I welcome other input.
It is fairly accepted that the soul exits through the crown chakra, and I believe does so by the quantum physics principle of Pair Annihilation. Positron s and electron s collide and a Photon s is are created. Hence our true state is pure photon energy again and we boogie back to our spirit state and level we came from. We initially settle in the Pineal Gland. BUT when we enter the human somewhere between 4th month and 8th month I doubt chakras exist yet. Chakras are an energy network as is our soul principally aligned along the spine and also controls our external energy field and human aura.
Does our soul create and assist the chakra energy field which then of course communicates with The ALL Source? I cannot meditate sufficiently into a deep Alpha state and certainly not into a Theta state. If I could I would ask my Guides myself. It is really hard for me to tell in which stage of reincarnation I am right now. I feel like a Mature soul at stage one.
What Do Dreams About Stairs Mean and How to Interpret Them?
Acting mostly like a young but also a mature soul. But it seems that detach phase ahould happen to an old soul? I in general am experiencing things from all three stages. The young very strong the mature medium and the old soul very strong too. How is that possible? I think it is not as hard as it sounds. Mature souls tend to carry more of their karmic burden, think more in terms of others and their relationship to the collective as a basis of life.
Old souls are connected to spiritual truths and are in communion with the bigger picture beyond the physical.. This site is primarily an late stage mature-early stage old site. So feel where your core values and interests are. If you care for things like the environment, corruption, and the plight of others, you are more mature. If you resonate easily with more advanced spiritual ideas and have developed strong intuition, then you have some old soul traits.
More on old souls here http: This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed. Messages from Michael a d v e r t i s e m e n t The 35 Steps We are here to know ourselves and be all we can be, step by step. But why 35 steps? Why not 36 steps? They are named after the stages of human development: The OLD Soul Each of these five corresponds to a specific level of development in capability and self-awareness within the individual soul. Stage 1 — Infant Souls Infant souls focus on immediate survival needs.
Stage 5 — Old Souls Old souls tend to exude some degree of depth, gravitas or wisdom that is quite obvious. The lessons of each stage Here are the five stages of soul evolution through human reincarnation, together with the typical learning experiences associated with each stage: Michael, via Victoria Marina To look at each stage in more detail see: The Infant Soul Stage 2. The Baby Soul Stage 3.
The Young Soul Stage 4. The Mature Soul Stage 5. The Old Soul Soul levels in the human population The six or seven billion people on the planet span the whole range of stages, but the average is said to be somewhere just past the mid-point of stage 3 see chart below. The seven steps within each stage Within each stage there are seven discrete steps to go through. The first step or level of any stage is like putting a toe in the water; the final step is like teaching others how to swim: We come to recognise that there is a whole new way of being ahead of us, and we respond to the call, even though as yet it is beyond our comprehension.
Wading in and out. Comparing and contrasting the old and new consciousness. We determinedly commit ourselves to actively embrace and explore the new consciousness. We fully incorporate and consolidate the new consciousness into our own being. Giving value and benefit to others.
We also burn off any outstanding karma incurred in the earlier steps of this stage. We have complete understanding and control of our awareness at this level. We know exactly what we are doing. We may feel like a role model. Questions and Answers Coming back again and again sounds dreadful. How does it do that? More frequently asked questions What happens to our souls after our last reincarnation? How can I know my soul age level, etc? Great blessings to you, Wes. Great answer Wes, and thank you for the compliments.
Hello again Alex D, I would be interested to know your experience of your spiritual awakening. Thanks for the amazing insight you guys. Greetings again Alex, In answer to your question I wanted to offer you some things that work for me. This is pure bullshit! You cannot choose to stay or go on. Anyway, sorry about the tangent. It will come to pass in the blink of a geologic eye. Use this if it helps. Hi Regina, Ken has give you a good answer. Greetings Ama… I emailed you last night, when you have time please check and respond.
I would have to see the passage and the context. I hope that helps. Is there such a thing as a purgatory, hell, heaven and the soul can remain trapped inside it? Heims is a writer and teacher living in Paris. When Rosaura appears during the first moments of Life Is a Dream , descending from the craggy mountains where her wild flying horse has left her, the audience is confronted by ambiguity and uncertainty. The unreliability of sense perception, one of the problems around which the entire play revolves, is presented in this scene. Rosaura appears to be a man; yet, when that man begins to talk, despite appearances, the man is a woman: The spectators are forced to reevaluate and reconfigure their first impressions and to doubt appearances.
What they saw, or rather, what they thought they saw, is not what is. Reality, as it is constructed in Life Is a Dream , is not fixed. Things are ambiguous—and so is human possibility. The ambiguity of things that seem definite is the principal theme of Life Is a Dream , the idea that unifies its elements, and the condition that gives meaning to the play's other central concern—the conflict between free will and determinism.
Segismundo, the wild beast of a man Rosaura finds amid the mountains, imprisoned in a tower and clothed in animal skins, speaks nevertheless with the grace, facility, and learning of a Renaissance courtier and laments his condition with a poet's eloquence and passion. Wretched like her, he may also be something other than what he seems.
Indeed, Basilio, the king of Poland, confirms that fact in the ensuing scene. Segismundo is a prince, his own son. Basilio imprisoned him in the tower at his birth, because in his study of the stars, it appeared to Basilio that Segismundo would grow up to be a rebellious son and a tyrannical ruler, humiliating his father and oppressing the nation. But Basilio is troubled by the sense that he may have acted tyrannically against the threat of tyranny.
To make sure that his action, even if driven by his mathematical wisdom and motivated by concern for the good, was not tyranny but a justified act of preventive punishment, Basilio has decided to release Segismundo from his prison and let him rule Poland for a day. Should he prove benevolent, Basilio will yield authority to him, happy that Segismundo can exercise a freedom of will that is stronger than cosmic predestination.
Should Segismundo's behavior confirm the destiny Basilio saw written in the stars, however, Basilio will know that he was justified in imprisoning his son. Segismundo will be returned to prison, and, to prevent him from falling into despair, he will be told that he was dreaming. After Segismundo uses his power badly and is returned to prison and told that he only dreamed he was a prince, he never again is able to be sure when he is awake and when he is dreaming.
He cannot tell whether he is definitely a prisoner or definitely a prince. How can he be both? Yet he perceives that he is. Thus, taught by ambiguity and uncertainty that experience is not a proof of actuality, Segismundo realizes that he is neither prisoner nor prince in reality, for there may not be any reality.
Becoming One With The Wave — The Ascension
He is not defined by what he perceives but by himself no matter what he perceives—that is, by how he chooses to act. If everything is illusion and life is a dream, it is not important what Seigismundo perceives or thinks is real. The only thing that matters and that he can be sure of is how he behaves.
Basilio, too, is deceived in his strategy. Contrary to his belief, when Segismundo acts like a brute on his day of trial, it does not serve as a definite proof that determinism is stronger than free will, as Basilio had feared. Segismundo himself, in the last scene of the play, makes the sound argument that it was not his star-determined destiny that was the cause of his brutality but the brutal way he was raised.
It is the course his father chose, not the configuration of the stars, that has made him uncivilized. Basilio's will, influenced by his understanding of the stars, is just as likely the power that determined Segismundo's nature as the stars themselves. Segismundo is just as likely to have been taught by his experience to be brutal as his brutality was formed by destiny. His impulsive inability to exercise freedom of choice may just as likely derive from a lack of education of his will as from his inherent nature.
The cause is uncertain. Destiny itself is not solely determinant: The problem that Segismundo and the play itself must confront is whether either sort of determinism—the fate written in the stars or the fate imposed by the force of human actions—can be overcome by free will. The answer in the play is that it can, through the human ability to choose.
That is the power, when he exercises it, which liberates Segismundo from his fate. Segismundo becomes free when he chooses, and he is able to choose because there are alternatives. Only after he is confronted with uncertainty does Segismundo realize that he can choose to act tyrannically or not. In his first encounter with power, at court, his actions explode impulsively from him. He is a force of raging desire, and what he wants seems to be palpably in front of him to take, if he would.
In his second encounter with power, after the mob frees him from prison and he defeats Astolfo and Basilio, his sense of his own power has been tempered by his experience of uncertainty. Consequently, each of his actions becomes a matter for deliberation. In an apparently illusory world, Segismundo has realized that the only thing that is not illusory is the way he acts in relation to what surrounds him. By his actions, he can shape illusion. In the midst of instability, he can be the stable element. When he frees himself from his apparent destiny, Segismundo becomes the one who shapes destiny.
Ambiguity's defining characteristic is that it is all-encompassing.
It contains alternatives and takes in mutually exclusive and opposing phenomena. Ambiguity suggests that there are fixed and yet distinct categories and, simultaneously, that something may not be what it seems. For a woman to be mistaken for a man, as Rosaura is, those two categories—male and female—must exist independently of each other. For a man to be in doubt as to whether he is a prisoner or a prince, a beast or a man, those categories must exist independently of each other. Still, it must be possible for them to be confused with each other and, consequently, to be determined by behavior.
Whether Segismundo is a prince or a beast may be unclear, but no matter which he is, he can choose to be either princely or beastly in either the prince or the beast role. The very ambiguity inherent in perception forces him to reject the power of perception and to rely on the authority of his own action. In themselves, the characters in Life Is a Dream contain all possibilities, by virtue of their humanity, which is itself defined by ambiguity. Rosaura embodies the masculine in the first act, the feminine in the second, and both when she appears dressed like a woman but armed like a man in the third.
Being at the center of ambiguity gives Segismundo the power to determine himself, to deliberate. This is a common Renaissance idea. It is expressed most unambiguously by Giovanni Pico della Mirandola — , a scholar who combined Neoplatonic Renaissance humanism and medieval Roman Catholic theology in his Oration on the Dignity of Man ca. We have given you, O Adam, no visage proper to yourself, nor endowment properly your own, in order that whatever place, whatever form, whatever gifts you may, with premeditation, select, these same you may have and possess through your own judgement and decision.
The nature of all other creatures is defined and restricted within laws which We have laid down; you, by contrast, impeded by no such restrictions, may, by your own free will, to whose custody We have assigned you, trace for yourself the lineaments of your own nature. I have placed you at the very center of the world, so that from that vantage point you may with greater ease glance round about you on all that the world contains. We have made you a creature neither of heaven nor of earth, neither mortal nor immortal, in order that you may, as the free and proud shaper of your own being, fashion yourself in the form you may prefer.
It will be in your power to descend to the lower, brutish forms of life; you will be able, through your own decision, to rise again to the superior orders whose life is divine. In Life Is a Dream , the problem is this: In a world shaped by ambiguity and instability and governed by perception, what can determine how to act, if action, rather than perception or desire, is the only possible stabilizing force?
How can humankind recognize what Pico della Mirandola shows as the divine stability and, by action, achieve something enduring rather than temporary? For Segismundo, it is by an act that achieves victory over himself. He has been "a man among wild beasts, and a beast among men. Her power to bestow this gift on him is inherent in her situation and in what she represents. She is the abused maiden who seeks justice. As she seeks justice, so, too, does she represent Justice.
The very name she takes in her conversation with Astolfo is Astrea, the heavenly Roman goddess of Justice, and through her person she brings the awareness of justice to Segismundo. Segismundo realizes that the nature of his relationship to Rosaura is a matter of his choice and that it is not his perception of her that matters but his behavior toward her. In his first encounter with her, he responds to some overwhelming quality in her by a kind of animal tropism. He does not know why, but the sound of her voice fascinates him. His first impulse, to kill her because she had overheard him grieving, is overtaken by the stronger and mystifying impulse of attraction.
His second encounter with her at the royal court, when he is a prince, shows him as bestial and rapacious, blinded by lust. But in their third encounter, he becomes self-defining and deliberating—a man, not a beast—when he triumphs over himself and, choosing to champion her honor rather than gratify his own lust, turns his head away from her so that he cannot look at her. By this action, he shows that he will not be guided by perception but by will.
Recognizing her and his obligation to her, Segismundo also recognizes the force of Justice and, in doing so, brings into an unstable and uncertain world an absolute principle that cannot be undermined by the alterations that attend being alive. It is steady in the face of them, because of the free ability people have to will the good, which is eternal, by their actions. Life can be seen as an enterprise of line drawing. Everything we do relies upon drawing lines between the spheres within which we act. Indeed, an action which does not rely upon separating objects and phenomena into spheres which inform the action is not conceivable.
What is less obvious is that the lines, once drawn, have a tendency toward petrification. They become, in our minds, axiomatic rather than dependent upon the purposes for which they were drawn in the first place. While there can be no social or personal life without drawing lines, the location of particular lines is inherently controversial. All radical challenges to social order can be seen as postulates about the change of demarcation lines, even though the rhetoric employed often suggests that what is demanded is the outright abolition of the lines.
Challenging conventionally accepted lines forces us to rethink the bases of lines drawn, not merely their position. Michael Walzer has suggested that we could "think of liberalism as a certain way of drawing the map of a social and political world. One benefit of looking at the way lines are drawn is that the inherent instability of this phenomenon lines are drawn by reference to reasons, which themselves rely upon some other lines, etc.
This function of challenging lines can be illustrated by Life's a Dream La vida es sueno , a play by Pedro Calderon de la Barca written around and first published in Madrid in The main protagonist is Segismundo, a royal heir who is kept from a very early age in a tower in the mountains because his father, Basilio, King of Poland, was foretold of a violent son who would wage a war against him. Once Segismundo is grown up, however, Basilio in a moment of doubt about the wisdom of his earlier decision asks Clotaldo, the keeper of his son, to drug Segismundo and have him wake in the palace and waited on as a prince.
The strategy is to drug him again and take him back to the tower—in order to avoid risks should the astrological reading prove true—and then tell him that his palace experience was only a dream. When this plan is carried out, Basilio's worst fears are confirmed by the outrageous behavior of Segismundo during his one day in the palace. When Segismundo finds himself in prison again, he is convinced by Clotaldo that he only dreamt about being a prince. At the same time a parallel plot develops: Rosaura who, it is later revealed, is Clotaldo's illegitimate daughter meets Segismundo in his tower, and is soon recognized by Clotaldo who takes her to the court.
The truth about Segismundo's identity spreads throughout the country, and a rebellion against the king breaks out: Rosaura offers to join Segismundo's army if he will assist her in her attempt to regain Astolfo who, along with Clotaldo, sides with the king. Segismundo defeats his father in battle but decides generously not to take vengeance.
In the last scene Basilio crowns his son who in turn makes Astolfo marry Rosaura, despite his own passionate love for her.
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What is Calderon's "point" in Life's a Dream? The tragedy of uncertainty, contingency and interchangeability of human existence? The continuous and yet never successful pursuit of one's own real identity, a destiny which is hidden from us? The ultimate solitude of every individual for whom other people, and the world, are as illusory as a dream?
The burden and also the exhilaration of the "self" which is its own author, which writes its own story, which constructs itself through its free choice in the world in which human stories are as unpredictable as they are pre-determined? The conflict of two great moral codes, honor and commitment, in a world which makes us choose one and sacrifice the other? The absurdity of life not imbued with objective values and necessarily ending with death? The mortal risks which accompany the manipulation of destiny? Certainly, Calderon's play addresses all these themes, but my specific concern is with the work as a treatise on line drawing.
The title of the play in itself draws attention to a basic conventional distinction—that between life and dream. An illusion, a shadow, a fiction, and the greatest good is very little because all life is a dream and dreams are only dreams" says Segismundo. This latter distinction is, however, in turn undermined because the "dream" is no less real than "real life": From Segismundo's perspective the whole day he spends in the Palace is as real as his life in the Tower.
Yet having been persuaded by Clotaldo that the Palace episode was only a dream, he is forced to place a dream and real life on par. Indeed, his "dream" in the Palace seems to him, if anything, more "real" than his real life in the Tower; having woken up, in his jail again, he confides to Clotaldo: His response to her recollection is to ask: This would be unintelligible, however, because the only basis for doing so is Rosaura's testimony given on the battlefield—that is, in the context that he would be relegating to a dream.
If the testimony is only a dream, it cannot be relied upon as a basis for un-dreaming the Palace episode. Calderon's own answer seems to be an agnostic one: The conundrum here is: If the dream-ness attribute applies to everything, then it must also apply to the subject who does the dreaming. Yet in whose dreams does the dreamer appear? And is the one who does the dreaming about the dreamer, also a character in someone else's dreams? Where does this regress end? One answer could be God, but Calderon's own agnosticism as to the human capacity of drawing the line between reality and dream sits uneasily with this hypothesis.
Even if Segismundo can imagine that everything he sees in the Tower, in the Palace, on the battlefield, is but a dream, he cannot think that he is but a dream. For if he were to be an object of his own dreams, he would have to exist as the dreamer , while if he were to be the object of someone else's dreams, it would be tantamount to saying that he was deceived by that other person as to the fact of his existence the deception stemming from the fact that he falsely thinks he exists.
Yet to be deceived, he must exist in the first place. This merely paraphrases the proof given by Descartes in his Second Meditation: The second distinction Calderon draws is that between those attributes of human beings which are of an essential nature and those which are merely contingent. Up to a point, this is simple: The rich man dreams of his wealth…. The poor man dreams that he suffers misery and poverty. Yet there is an irony here: What can be more "human" more of the essence of one's identity, which makes him or her a separate human being than these things which we can affect through our own intentional and deliberate action?
The King can modify the way he exercises his power, or even surrender it—thus showing that royal power is a thoroughly human attitude, that it belongs to those properties which make the King what he is, rather than an open and neutral repository of contingent and fortuitous features. Calderon, however, undermines the line between the essence and contingencies of humaneness by relegating features such as power and wealth to the dream category.
Or, as Mircea Eliade would say, by showing the "false identification of Reality with what each one of us appears to be or to possess. By characterizing those attributes which make us distinct, separate and unique as purely fortuitous or illusory , Calderon may well be saying that there is no objective basis for drawing a line between the fortuitous and the essential, and that while we often believe that only the essential is important, the better way is to say that something is essential because antecedently it is important.
Conversely, our characterization of something as fortuitous is a consequence, not a premise, of denying any moral worth to it. Wilson says that the soliloquy by Segismundo in which the worldly attributes of power, wealth, etc. In my opinion, Calderon does not assert the Stoic line between the things that are in our control and those that are not: And he does so in two ways: Annoyed by Segismundo's story about his violent behavior in the Palace episode, Clotaldo gives him this piece of advice: This sentence does not appear in the original but it grasps well a central concern of the play: As the male-disguised Rosaura evolves from apparent manhood to womanhood, Segismundo evolves from a beast in the Tower to the prince in the Palace.
And just as Rosaura's evolution by the end of Act 2 is not complete it is not until Act 3 that she will achieve a synthesis of manhood and womanhood , neither is Segismundo's: As William Whitby has noted, Rosaura is "the key to Segismundo's conversion"; indeed, her conversions are catalysts in Segismundo's development. Their interconnected transformations inform the structure of the play because, as Frederick de Armas observes, Segismundo's final conversion in Act 3, brought about by the third appearance of Rosaura, "alters the process of destruction that had been set in motion and leads to a peaceful and harmonious denouement.
At first glance, the parallel journeys to identity undertaken by Rosaura and Segismundo would seem to call for an "essentialist" reading, whereby one would discern in both these characters' evolutions a move toward the discovery of their real selves. Rosaura is not truly "herself" when she appears in the beginning of the play disguised as a boy and is forced to play a male role; neither is Segismundo truly "himself " in the Tower, when as a human being he is kept as a wild beast.
They will both have a tortuous journey to make. Rosaura will not simply shed her disguise and appear as her "true" self note that her quest for identity does not end in Act 2 when she finally appears as a woman , nor will Segismundo easily convert from a creature of nature into a man of civilization.
They have no choice but to go through this process because, as Ruth El Saffar suggests, they "struggle … for definition—to recover for themselves, out of the ever-impending threat of erasure, a solid sense of place and meaning. Wojciech Sadurski, "Calderon's Conundrums, Or: The appeal of Life Is a Dream can never be wholly accounted for. From one point of view it seems incomplete, even fragmentary, like Marlowe's Doctor Faustus. From another, the play powerfully condenses in its enacted metaphor of living-and-dreaming an overwhelming perception about life's worth together with man's failure to make much if it.
The play is many-faceted: It has the appeal of a mystery, but one in which the living energy that makes up the mystery is withheld, and while being withheld gets transformed into something different from the rigid terms and structure meant to contain it…. In this play honor is seen in its broadest possible sense as related to the whole of life, interwoven with the very substance and meaning of life. The title implies the question, Is life worth living? By a further implication, if honor is an illusion, so is life, and if this is true, how does one cope with such a vast and fearful discovery?