ON PRAGMYTHIC BELIEFCRAFT
The premise of pragmythic beliefcraft is that it makes all the difference what you choose to believe about what you can’t know to be so.
There are many “things” we don’t know to be so and will never know about for sure because they lie beyond the scope of knowing per se. They lie beyond science and the natural world, and fall into the category of the supernatural or the metaphysical. Perhaps they are not “things” in any literal way, and yet they are ideas with very real effects on our thinking and our lives.
Somehow our human kind of intelligence opens us to thinking and speculating and imagining beyond the factuality of the immediate material world we apprehend by our senses. We are constituted to wonder about what is unseen or otherwise unapprehended, and then to suppose various answers to our wonderings, and so it is we make our myths to explain the invisible superstructure of what we call Ultimate Reality, beyond the physical scrim of our senses.
But some of the myths we conceive or are taught by others to believe serve us better than others. While science works to describe the material world and thereby makes it more useful to us as we learn better to manipulate all things physical, likewise our beliefs about Ultimate Reality can prove more or less practical in our lives, depending on their efficacy—on their power to guide us to live well and wisely. Bad beliefs will steer us to self-destruction and the harm of others; whereas good, efficacious beliefs will bring us better being and make us and others happier.
Are such metaphysical myths true or false? No—only better or worse pragmythically, as they prove in practice to affect the quality of our lives and the lives of others we influence.
Therefore, our belief in God or gods or spirits or devils makes a difference in the material world, as does belief or disbelief in reincarnation, past lives, karma, heaven, hell, purgatory, angels, spirit guides, akashic records, astrology, palmistry, telepathy, synchronicity, out-of-body travel, and the law of attraction.
True and false do not apply to such undetectable, immeasurable paraphenomena; only effectual and ineffectual apply: Does it work well for you? Does it make life better for you and yours and all whom you influence? Is it positvely pragmythic? If so, then it is a belief well crafted for your belief system.
∞∞∞∞∞
THE FRONTIERS OF SPIRITUALITY
Many religions, with all their conflicts, within themselves and against others, are doing themselves in. War over religion seems so insane that many people can no longer see the appeal of dogmatic belief systems leading to such atrocity. Consequently, they are leaving the sheepfolds of churches and temples and pastors to seek solace and wisdom elsewhere, mainly from within, not dogmatically but mystically, not second hand, but directly from the source: the God within.
Direct access to inner spiritual wisdom is the promise of contemporary Gnostics who seek knowledge of things divine by looking inward via meditation and other contemplative practices intended to tune out ego and attune to one’s Higher Self, the “voice” of God resident in one’s own soul, an inner comforter and guide to righteous living.
Pragmythically speaking, I find this attitude promising, providing we can tune in sharply to the divine frequency, rather than to various delusive frequencies emanating from our egos and our ids (in Freudian terms) or from our shadows (as Jung would say), transmitting spiritual endarkenment rather than enlightenment.
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