Are we living in a Shadow Reality
What is reality and what is perception?
In a recent Alchemy call with a group of ladies who study with me, I shared a quote I’d come across that made me stop and take a breath. Usually, when I have that response, time stands still and I know there is profound wisdom right around the corner if I can stay with it and just wait…
Wait for what?
For the right moment, when I can be quiet enough and open enough for the wisdom to drop in. You know that space betwixt and between where magic resides? That sweet moment when your Soul reaches out for the profound wisdom being offered and your body naturally inhales deeply. Those are mystical moments to me and I’ve grown to savor them when they come.
The quote was from Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave”
“And now, I said, let me show in a figure how far our nature is enlightened or unenlightened:-Behold! human beings living in an underground den, which has a mouth open towards the light and reaching all along the den; here they have been from their childhood, and have their legs and necks chained so that they cannot move, and can only see before them, being prevented by the chains from turning round their heads. Above and behind them a fire is blazing at a distance, and between the fire and the prisoners there is a raised way; and you will see, if you look, a low wall built along the way, like the screen which marionette players have in front of them, over which they show the puppets. I see. And do you see, I said, men passing along the wall carrying all sorts of vessels, and statues and figures of animals made of wood and stone and various materials, which appear over the wall? Some of them are talking, others silent. You have shown me a strange image, and they are strange prisoners. Like ourselves, I replied; and they see only their own shadows, or the shadows of one another, which the fire throws on the opposite wall of the cave?”
You’re looking at the opening lines of what is probably Plato’s most well-known thought experiment. He’s beginning to describe a scene in which people only see the shadows of things and have no idea what the things themselves actually look like. These shadows are reflected by the fire and the sun onto the wall of the cave, and the prisoners (who have been in the cave from birth and have no other experience) think these shadows are the primary things of the world. So when people pass by, they think “people” are the dark shapes and that the wall on which they are projected is the entirety of the “world.”
It begs the student of life to ponder, are we the people in the cave? Is everything we see with our eyes just a projection of the real essence? Are our brains creating a mental picture of something that exists in the physical world, but what we see is the mental image and not the actual object itself?
Are we living a shadow reality?
How often do we find ourselves getting overly caught up in entanglements that consume our energy but bring us no closer to our desires?
Recently I found myself tangled up in the awareness that within three days of publishing my new website makeover, my language and concept had been “lifted” and posted as other people’s work. I have to admit I have a really hard time with that when it happens, because, you know, it takes years of personal work to create a clear message and mission.
And…yeah… I really like my mission.
Sam (if you don’t know who Sam is, will explain more) reminded me as I was all tangled up, about the Allegory of the Cave and asked me if I was currently acting like one of the prisoners inside the cave or one of the shadow projections outside of the cave, that was actually a free and real essence.
Hmm….
Where is true freedom from the shadow stories? How often are we the authors of the story?
Sam never likes when I get tangled up in things he thinks are small. His question to me made me dive deeply within and consider that all we think is real is just a projection of what our minds organize like a computer drive, based on our beliefs.
Suddenly, the entanglement dropped away and the wisdom came. How can we feel anything other than empathy for the prisoners seeing only shadow projections and the cave as the whole world?
For us to truly know that the cave people are seeing only a projection of the real essence, we must be tapped into the Soul’s wisdom, the observer, witnessing the cave prisoner and also the free human carrying the objects outside of the cave, that casts the shadow. The fact that you can observe both means you can reside outside of your own projected bondage called “your reality.”
No one can steal your real essence or convince you that they are the essence and you the shadow projection. Furthermore, a shadow projection of you is never filled with your essence, only a prisoners mind convinced of what it is projecting. There is no entanglement with shadow if you already see that you are free and not chained inside the cave.
What we see in the world is but one shadow reality and we are capable of seeing many, many other reality essences.
There are as many realties as there are imaginative humans.
Fear and constraint is but one shadow reality that has become a collective projection.
Love, empathy and freedom is another.
I’m choosing empathy (with healthy boundaries Sam, but empathy) because, well, look around, the world already has more than enough shadow projections…
Where in your life are you the author of a shadow reality that keeps you prisoner inside your own cave? What is your true desire around it? How will you begin to tap into your Soul’s wisdom about it?
Always and forever love, (while I learn to have more empathy…)
If you want to study with me personally, be sure to check out my private session work available and my new course End Your Limitation Loop
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Originally published at https://megadamson.net on July 16, 2019.
