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kingtycoonI told you before all about feelings, and then I told you about doing - now it's time to talk about thinking.
Before the totemic symbol for thinking was the sword - it was a symbol for more than thinking but thinking is the elemental essence of what the swords are about. Here's some of what it's all about (and I'm going to get into it, and into some elaborate thinking-type thoughts here as well so get accustomed to it for the next 10 entries) The swords are about division - an in the antique sense they indicate the division between moments - where decisions happen, where thinking occurs. They also have the power of division between sense and nonsense and significantly between things that are and things that are not. Duality is essential in the suit of the swords because they divide the real and the unreal - by thought.
There's a practical element to this as well - the swords divide the physical from the spiritual - in a very pragmatic, murderous way. Everyone's soul is eventually excised, they're made from whole being to a soul and a corpse - the sword is violence as well. Danger and - significantly, professionalism.
That's a weird relationship that's lost now - we live in the world of guns and I've seen Tarot where the sword was substituted with a gun - but the gun... the gun undermines and is plainly in opposition to the principles behind the sword. A sword - you don't just have one and then have the ability to go around killing guys - that's the gun. The sword needs skill, training and a big investment by the society that arms you and then trains you in the first place. The sword requires skill and it requires training - it signifies membership in a professional caste of killers - people for whom killing is part of their professional capacity. It's not done lightly. Well, it wasn't.
Now we have the pens. There still is a professional class, they still have matters of life and death in their oeuvre, they still have to make decisions and they still are symbolized by something that divides the real and the unreal - in this case The Pen.
See, a pen divides the purely mental from the physical - it's the transcendental bridge between what is thought and what actually is. Because you can write down your thoughts - you can make physically manifest your ideas, your thoughts, your grocery list. Things are recorded, memory becomes irrefutable fact - we live and die by things written by professional men who are tasked with making decisions and signing. Sign your name - something ephemeral, meaningful sure, but spoken and heard on the wind, a sound unlike any other - and you sign, your mark, unlike any other. You turn something from being theoretical to actual. A bill becomes a law, a pad of paper becomes a prescription, a semester of work becomes another grade, a strategy becomes an order.
You get the idea - from a martial ruling class to a technocrat ruling class the transition is from the sword to the pen.
But, briefly, back to duality. Maybe the soul is an archaic idea, maybe it doesn't have a place here - maybe. It doesn't mean that there's not a difference between the substantial, experiential world and the dreamworld of pure consciousness, of reason and dreams. The Pen has the effect of dividing these as well - and combining them. In some respects The Pen is a kind of psychopomp - through physical exertion it generates non-physical ideas. In antiquity it was argued that God must by necessity exist because it was theorized to be perfect, and being perfect it must have the qualities that imperfect things have as well as whatever qualities make it perfect. So since imperfect things exist, the theoretical perfect thing must by needs exist! Since existence is a quality possessed by imperfect things, a perfect thing must have that quality as well. Without getting into too many confusing logical arguments we can extrapolate backward and look at just one confusing logical argument:
So if we consider that we exist and are receptacles for things that do not exist - memories, fantasies, dreams - then it means that the physical by needs contains all perfect iterations of itself. And really - if we conceive of fantasies and dreams as having physical characteristics - and these characteristics are superior to our own then they tell the truth on us - that the physical is the sublime and the imagined is the mundane. Superman. Superman is the manifestation of human wishes and greatness, it is an idea - that became real through the exercise of that noblest of human creations - The Pen.
Anyhow- these sharpies are my favorite pens ever so they will probably figure prominently in the suit.
Before the totemic symbol for thinking was the sword - it was a symbol for more than thinking but thinking is the elemental essence of what the swords are about. Here's some of what it's all about (and I'm going to get into it, and into some elaborate thinking-type thoughts here as well so get accustomed to it for the next 10 entries) The swords are about division - an in the antique sense they indicate the division between moments - where decisions happen, where thinking occurs. They also have the power of division between sense and nonsense and significantly between things that are and things that are not. Duality is essential in the suit of the swords because they divide the real and the unreal - by thought.
There's a practical element to this as well - the swords divide the physical from the spiritual - in a very pragmatic, murderous way. Everyone's soul is eventually excised, they're made from whole being to a soul and a corpse - the sword is violence as well. Danger and - significantly, professionalism.
That's a weird relationship that's lost now - we live in the world of guns and I've seen Tarot where the sword was substituted with a gun - but the gun... the gun undermines and is plainly in opposition to the principles behind the sword. A sword - you don't just have one and then have the ability to go around killing guys - that's the gun. The sword needs skill, training and a big investment by the society that arms you and then trains you in the first place. The sword requires skill and it requires training - it signifies membership in a professional caste of killers - people for whom killing is part of their professional capacity. It's not done lightly. Well, it wasn't.
Now we have the pens. There still is a professional class, they still have matters of life and death in their oeuvre, they still have to make decisions and they still are symbolized by something that divides the real and the unreal - in this case The Pen.
See, a pen divides the purely mental from the physical - it's the transcendental bridge between what is thought and what actually is. Because you can write down your thoughts - you can make physically manifest your ideas, your thoughts, your grocery list. Things are recorded, memory becomes irrefutable fact - we live and die by things written by professional men who are tasked with making decisions and signing. Sign your name - something ephemeral, meaningful sure, but spoken and heard on the wind, a sound unlike any other - and you sign, your mark, unlike any other. You turn something from being theoretical to actual. A bill becomes a law, a pad of paper becomes a prescription, a semester of work becomes another grade, a strategy becomes an order.
You get the idea - from a martial ruling class to a technocrat ruling class the transition is from the sword to the pen.
But, briefly, back to duality. Maybe the soul is an archaic idea, maybe it doesn't have a place here - maybe. It doesn't mean that there's not a difference between the substantial, experiential world and the dreamworld of pure consciousness, of reason and dreams. The Pen has the effect of dividing these as well - and combining them. In some respects The Pen is a kind of psychopomp - through physical exertion it generates non-physical ideas. In antiquity it was argued that God must by necessity exist because it was theorized to be perfect, and being perfect it must have the qualities that imperfect things have as well as whatever qualities make it perfect. So since imperfect things exist, the theoretical perfect thing must by needs exist! Since existence is a quality possessed by imperfect things, a perfect thing must have that quality as well. Without getting into too many confusing logical arguments we can extrapolate backward and look at just one confusing logical argument:
So if we consider that we exist and are receptacles for things that do not exist - memories, fantasies, dreams - then it means that the physical by needs contains all perfect iterations of itself. And really - if we conceive of fantasies and dreams as having physical characteristics - and these characteristics are superior to our own then they tell the truth on us - that the physical is the sublime and the imagined is the mundane. Superman. Superman is the manifestation of human wishes and greatness, it is an idea - that became real through the exercise of that noblest of human creations - The Pen.
Anyhow- these sharpies are my favorite pens ever so they will probably figure prominently in the suit.
