Playing with Numbers

To the forgetful, life is a painful game of numbers, with emphasis on division. What is forgotten?

The simple.

The simplest is unity: one. We can’t get simpler.

1 is a beautiful straight upright line, clean and fundamental, like a spire pointing heavenward. One is a single sun shining high above the forest.

2 and 3 introduce many, a sequence of angles and curves; so begins in number symbols a winding path in the forest of complexity. 2 and 3 are lovely and useful when 1, the origin, is behind them. In essence 1 always is, but if we don’t look sunward, then all becomes a maze of complexity and separation. Without 1, complexity is depressing, crazy, and painful. With 1, complexity becomes interesting and creative. Sunless and heartlessness are the walking dead who have forgotten 1.

The numbers are abstract, I apologize, but the pure wave of unity is not abstract. Bang or bloom, the origin of stars begins. Bang or bloom, spirit-thought strikes downward.

Remember, without 1 there is no joy, and everything is blank, sunless, without true dimension. A teacher said, “The world has lost its happiness because happiness is in spirit.” Spirit is 1, and life begins with the simple realization of 1.

Geometry of Consciousness

Let’s think and play a bit with geometry, proceeding from the most simple.

Geometry begins with a point. It is a focus and in way the most illusive, being abstract and without dimension. We might think of the point as unmanifested potentially. And we might say that, being without visible aspects, it is unity, or the source of unity, and that it is the beginning point or cause from which everything flows. Since it is origin, it is an apt symbol of spirit.

A ray, extended from the point yields a line. This first radiation has a terminus. Let us call this terminus dense matter or effect, or that which is most remote from the origin. So, from potentiality (spirit) comes radiance, relationship, and relativity.

The simple line itself yields three entities: the origin (spirit), the terminus (dense matter), and all relativity in between. The line is also a unity in polarity, and is essentially one, a single line.

If we extend an infinite number of co-equal rays from our central point, the collective end points of these rays describe a circle, or if we add another dimension, a sphere. Perhaps we may take this as symbol of all possibilities, of all that radiates from the Alpha point or cause.

But, returning to the simple, we have three: point, endpoint, and the relation between. Relations are part of knowing. Consciousness means “to know,” and the simplest form of knowing is that of the relation between two entities. So let’s call this relational middle ground “consciousness.” So in our play with the line symbol, we have:

• Point, line, endpoint
• Cause, relativity, effect
• Spirit, consciousness, matter

Apart from the line, the simplest regular geometric representation of trinity is the triangle, and the next simplest such form is the square. The triangle gives us three points and the square gives us four points, and we might picture these two figures as a basic duality, analogous to the start and endpoint of our line. These two simple figures, the triangle and square, give us an added dimension in that their combination (3 + 4) yields seven entities.

It’s an entertaining thought that “a square” is a person regarded as dull, rigidly conventional, and in another sense a square suggest something block-like, solid, or sturdy. We might take the square, externally considered, as a symbol of spiritless personality. We can then, easily see the square as correspondent with matter. The triangle or trinity principle stands behind the square as spirit, and one often finds the triangle as the symbol of deity or of the higher self.

There are many alternative symbol systems that have some value. In thinking with and about symbols, it is not so important to derive a fixed or rigid system (which would be a uninspired personality thing to do), but it’s important that we think and strive to get at the meaning of things in the most simple and clear terms.