Perception-Reception-Imaging-Integration-Impulse

There are better and worse ways to deal with the confusions and distortions of our mixed up experiences.

In The Apocryphon of John (an excellent translation is found in Bentley Layton's Gnostic Scriptures, and also in Barnstone/Meyer's Gnostic Bible) there are glimpses of the wholesomeness and goodness of the Divine Fullness which are contrasted with the nature of experience of Lack.

Perception is both an Aeon of the Spiritual Fullness, and also the worldly domain of forces of ignorance and perversion in this world of the flesh and bondage of the psyche. Spiritual reception is demonstrated in the spiritual realms repeatedly, and is also listed after perception in the realms of lack, and contrasted with the Demiurge's theft of power from Wisdom. Similarly the Image which is an Annointed Spark, Christ, corresponds to the distorted reality in the world of lack in various ways. The wholesomeness and Fullness of Spiritual integration of Aeons is again contrasted with the strife and confusion of the combined actions of rulers below. The impulse of Spiritual Will has its corrupted reflection in the impulses of the bodies of flesh and confused psyches and powers-that-be outside of the Divine Fullness.

Together the process of perception, reception, imaging, harmonizing/integrating images, and impulse to action, can be more or less dominated by lack outside of the Divine Fullness, or illuminated by light of insight. We can persistently work through these ideas, day by day, integrating new insights into our lives. By exploring such subjects and applying insights that are based firmly in our growing experience and increasing clarity, we may grow in Gnosis.

Perception

• Lies and Misdirection
• This World Is Not Home
• Courage
• Wisdom that is Desired-For
• Seek and Find
• Fight or Flight?
• Teacher Taught
• Perception of Wisdom
• Initiating Liberation
• Inviting Guidance
• Formal Introductions
• To Be Sealed
• Asking for a Challenge
• Integrating the Path into Life
• Brevity befuddles the word-ensnarers
• Confusion or Complexity?
• Are you ready...
• This Too Shall Pass

Reception

• Spiritual Reception vs Worldly Reception
• Toward Receiving Self-Knowledge
• Conscious Reception
• Clarifying Reception
• Gracious Reception
• Receiving Aeons
• Receiving From Spirit
• Vision of the Moon

Imaging

• Initial Reflections Upon Imaging
• Image leading to Image
• Making an Image
• Another Visionary Image
• Imagining Spiritually / Spiritual Images
• The Image that Remains when False Images Fade
• Spiritual Shaping, a Blessed Image
• Images in Experience with This World
• A Hint of an Image in Darkness
• Images in Experience with This World
  
• Spiritual Shaping, a Blessed Image
  

Integration/Harmonizing of Images

• Integration of Images
• Spiritual Integration
• Light In Life
• Integrating the Path
• Integrating Images of Others, and An Other

Impulse to Action

• Impulse to Action?
• Spiritual Desire/Will

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[The reader is also directed to Against Archons June 2006 Archives and also the Against Archons July 2006 Archives, which offer additional reflections on these subjects, sometimes as counterpoint or as poetic reflection, sometimes simply as a reflection of my mundane concerns at the time I was making these posts on Gnostic Path. Against Archons is a bit more anarchistic in its approach, and a bit more personal in the sense of venting mundane frustrations and poetic fancy. I try to keep the two separate because I want Gnostic Path to be more focused and more free from such distractions and my personal ideosyncrasies. But often there is counterpoint or relevance, and in this case Against Archons addresses some of the problems of the realm of Lack very directly in terms of the confusion and frustration of perception, etc.]