10-12-2011, 12:33 AM
(This post was last modified: 08-17-2012, 06:56 PM by JustLikeYou.)
The Potentiator of the Body: The Sage
![[Image: H0Dpo.jpg]](http://i.imgur.com/H0Dpo.jpg)
78.11 The potentiator of the body complex, then, may be called Wisdom for it is only through judgment that the unceasing activities and proclivities of the body complex may be experienced in useful modes.
79.19 The Potentiator of the Body then is that which, being informed, regulates activity.
This card represents, for me, that part of my Mind/Body/Spirit complex which takes control of my physical vehicle and manipulates it with full awareness of what it is doing. This card can be likened to a martial arts master insofar as that master is at every moment in full possession of his bodily movements.
The Potentiator of the Body is your power to act, a mirror-image of the Potentiator of the Mind whose power is to give knowledge. Whereas the High Priestess depicts the unconscious self which reconfigures the conscious self by informing it, the Sage depicts conscious self which reconfigures the unconscious self by virtue of already being informed.
Though I have often thought of this card (and the entire Body Cycle) as depicting the mind's relationship to the body because words like "judgment" and "informed" both seem mental in content, the Potentiator of the Body, a male archetype, can also be seen as that aspect of your body complex which is conscious of itself.
Whereas the deep thrust of the Mind Cycle is a lifting of the veil to view and operate the mechanisms which control your experience, the deep thrust of the Body Cycle (based on my interpretations of the Significator, the Hanged Man, and Great Way, The Alchemist) seems to be a balanced act of sacrificing energy in order to produce the fruits called for by the mind. Thus, it seems that the responsibility of the Mind Complex (as indicated by the Heirophant and Chariot cards) is to decide the kind of experience created by the body complex based on its relationship with itself. Conversely, we can then project that the responsibility of the Body Complex (as a "mirror image of the thrust of the activity of the mind") is to bring its resources into a more and more perfect balance in order that the unmanifest (the contents of the silver cup) may be poured into the manifest (the gold cup) without spilling a drop. The mind decides what will be, whereas the body decides the means by which it will be. Thus, it make sense to attribute to the body a conscious aspect, for the Body Complex itself seems to be capable of a kind of autonomy, despite its dependence upon the Mind Complex.
The easiest way for me to see the autonomy of the body in my life is to look at my habits. Every single day, there are things I do habitually: when I brush my teeth, the specific motions and progression from tooth to tooth as all determined by previous habit; when I wake up in the morning, the number of times I hit the snoozer is determined by habit; when I eat, the motions and even the choice of which part of the meal I will eat first is determined by habit. If these kinds of habits represent the body's act of committing resources to its efforts, then whenever I follow a habit, I am displaying the unconscious body, and whenever I create a habit, I am displaying the conscious body.
So:
The Matrix of the Body is the body acting without any attempt to revise its habits. Imagine the habits you have which are a consequence of the way you were raised. If your parents were lenient and untidy, you might have a habit of living in an untidy space. These ongoing unconscious and unexamined aspects of the actions you take in the physical reality are the matrix in which bodily change occurs. There is always a flow and a balance, it may be that that flow is aggressive and violent, as the lion suggests, but it is nevertheless a flow.
The Potentiator of the Body is the body acting in an effort to create a habit. This archetype can be seen as your knowledge of positive actions and steps that can be taken in order to change your habit. What the Potentiator is "informed" about is the kind of actions which would be effective in the physical illusion; the "judgment" of the Potentiator is its ability to decide which direction the flow of the Matrix will take. The Potentiator redirects the constant flow of the Matrix.
Now we can expand this confined sense of the Body Cycle into a more expanded sense. While we can imagine the Body Cycle as relating primarily to habits, it is important to realize that the sum total of your habits are what literally bring you the physical reality that you experience. Your Body Complex is constantly generating the physical experience at the behest of the Mind Complex. The energy centers in the Body Complex are constantly emitting frequencies which attract to you or repel from you certain kinds of bodily experiences, and the content of this attraction and repulsion ranges from headaches and orgasms to work environments and friends. Everything around your physical vehicle is part of the Matrix of the Body because it is all generated by your day-to-day habits. And every approach you take to acting within the world is an effort to either revise or continue to follow your habits.
Therefore, it is the responsibility of the Mind Complex to grasp and know those aspects of itself which are hidden. This responsibility includes coming to an awareness of the presence of particular habits in your Body Complex, as well as addressing the aspect of the Mind's relationship to itself which has created that particular habit by delivering information to the Matrix of the Body through the Potentiator, the judgment, the habit creator, in the Body.
This is Ra on the Disciplines of the Body in Session 5:
5.2 The second area of learn/teaching is the study/understanding of the body complexes. It is necessary to know your body well. This is a matter of using the mind to examine how the feelings, the biases, what you would call the emotions, affect various portions of the body complex. It shall be necessary to both understand the bodily polarities and to accept them, repeating in a chemical/physical manifestation the work you have done upon the mind bethinking the consciousness.
The body is a creature of the mind’s creation. It has its biases. The biological bias must be first completely understood and then the opposite bias allowed to find full expression in understanding. Again, the process of acceptance of the body as a balanced, as well as polarized, individual may then be accomplished. It is then the task to extend this understanding to the bodies of the other-selves whom you will meet.
By including other body complexes into the Disciplines of the Body, the implication is that these other body complexes fall into the larger context of the Body Cycle. Everything physical is a body complex of some kind, therefore, all of physical reality lies at the heart of the Body Cycle.
So let us speak about the symbols of this particular card.
The Sage is old, which indicates the passage of long spans of time. It is always noted that experience begets wisdom and that usually experience comes with time. This concept also indicates to me that the disciplines of the body are not the first step. The Sage must have already mastered his own mind before he comes up with any useful ways of acting within the manifest reality. Unless you know what is causing habits that you no longer want, you will never have the power to change those habits. The Sage is old because he has already learned many lessons before he has done anything at all.
The Sage is walking, which signifies the mobility of the Body Complex as compared to the immobility of the Mind Complex. 97.10: "Consider for the self, O student, whether your thoughts can walk."
The Sage faces left, suggesting that the left-hand path is somewhat easier to see than the right hand path. In the context of the function of this card, that tells me that the it is easier to think of positive actions for changing habits which seek to control the manifest reality than it is to think of positive actions which seek to accept.
Two snakes walk just in front of him, wearing hats which signify the female and male energies. The proximity of the two snakes suggests a balance between the male and female energies, but they are not in union, which suggests that they occur each in phases. Thus, we see that the Sage often follows the Female wisdom and the Male wisdom at different times, yet the Sage's communication with these two forms of wisdom is balanced, each getting its turn. Nevertheless, they both lead him onward together, so each next phase is just another necessary aspect of the long process of making balanced use of the Body Complex.
The skirt is once again sharply angled on the left side of the figure, signifying the great distance that the left-hand path creates between different Body Complexes.
Time to address the most significant symbols. The Sage holds a lamp in his left hand. The left hand, in my interpretation, is the input hand, so the lamp must be what the Potentiator of the Body (as a function) takes in. The lamp, the flame, represents the light that "informs" the body so that it may be "experienced in useful modes". If this card is referred to as Wisdom, the wisdom itself is depicted by the flame in the lamp.
The Sage holds a staff in his right hand. As the output hand, this side depicts the yield of this Archetype's effect on your experience. What is known to the Sage is wisdom and what is put forth by the Sage (male archetype that he is) is an action. Thus, the staff appears to me as a tool, more than anything else. The staff represents the body itself in the hand of the wise Sage who knows myriad uses for this one simple tool.
As the flame is the inner guidance to which the conscious aspect of your body has access in order to act wisely in the world, the staff is the tool for enacting that wisdom. If we imagine the mating, the coupling of that female Matrix of the Body and the male Potentiator of the Body, the staff is that which enters into the Matrix in order to divert the constant flow.
I have interpreted the Potentiator as the Significator Hidden from itself. In this card, the rectangular cape signifies the hidden nature of the Potentiator. This cape hides the flame from all but the Potentiator himself, and it is the decision of the Potentiator to reveal his wisdom through his actions. It is useful to imagine this hidden flame as a guru. The guru wants to teach you as much as you can learn, but you are simply not capable of grasping the later lessons until you have grasped the earlier ones. Similarly, your wise self knows that there are many possible ways to act in any given situation, but not all of them will come to be and most of them are best not even mentioned. It is also worth mentioning that there is a double-blind situation with the Matrix and the Potentiator. The Matrix is blindfolded and the Potentiator protects his light with a cape. The significance of this is that there is a great divide between the conscious and unconscious aspects of the body, much greater than that of the mind.
78.11 The potentiator of the body complex, then, may be called Wisdom for it is only through judgment that the unceasing activities and proclivities of the body complex may be experienced in useful modes.
79.19 The Potentiator of the Body then is that which, being informed, regulates activity.
This card represents, for me, that part of my Mind/Body/Spirit complex which takes control of my physical vehicle and manipulates it with full awareness of what it is doing. This card can be likened to a martial arts master insofar as that master is at every moment in full possession of his bodily movements.
The Potentiator of the Body is your power to act, a mirror-image of the Potentiator of the Mind whose power is to give knowledge. Whereas the High Priestess depicts the unconscious self which reconfigures the conscious self by informing it, the Sage depicts conscious self which reconfigures the unconscious self by virtue of already being informed.
Though I have often thought of this card (and the entire Body Cycle) as depicting the mind's relationship to the body because words like "judgment" and "informed" both seem mental in content, the Potentiator of the Body, a male archetype, can also be seen as that aspect of your body complex which is conscious of itself.
Whereas the deep thrust of the Mind Cycle is a lifting of the veil to view and operate the mechanisms which control your experience, the deep thrust of the Body Cycle (based on my interpretations of the Significator, the Hanged Man, and Great Way, The Alchemist) seems to be a balanced act of sacrificing energy in order to produce the fruits called for by the mind. Thus, it seems that the responsibility of the Mind Complex (as indicated by the Heirophant and Chariot cards) is to decide the kind of experience created by the body complex based on its relationship with itself. Conversely, we can then project that the responsibility of the Body Complex (as a "mirror image of the thrust of the activity of the mind") is to bring its resources into a more and more perfect balance in order that the unmanifest (the contents of the silver cup) may be poured into the manifest (the gold cup) without spilling a drop. The mind decides what will be, whereas the body decides the means by which it will be. Thus, it make sense to attribute to the body a conscious aspect, for the Body Complex itself seems to be capable of a kind of autonomy, despite its dependence upon the Mind Complex.
The easiest way for me to see the autonomy of the body in my life is to look at my habits. Every single day, there are things I do habitually: when I brush my teeth, the specific motions and progression from tooth to tooth as all determined by previous habit; when I wake up in the morning, the number of times I hit the snoozer is determined by habit; when I eat, the motions and even the choice of which part of the meal I will eat first is determined by habit. If these kinds of habits represent the body's act of committing resources to its efforts, then whenever I follow a habit, I am displaying the unconscious body, and whenever I create a habit, I am displaying the conscious body.
So:
The Matrix of the Body is the body acting without any attempt to revise its habits. Imagine the habits you have which are a consequence of the way you were raised. If your parents were lenient and untidy, you might have a habit of living in an untidy space. These ongoing unconscious and unexamined aspects of the actions you take in the physical reality are the matrix in which bodily change occurs. There is always a flow and a balance, it may be that that flow is aggressive and violent, as the lion suggests, but it is nevertheless a flow.
The Potentiator of the Body is the body acting in an effort to create a habit. This archetype can be seen as your knowledge of positive actions and steps that can be taken in order to change your habit. What the Potentiator is "informed" about is the kind of actions which would be effective in the physical illusion; the "judgment" of the Potentiator is its ability to decide which direction the flow of the Matrix will take. The Potentiator redirects the constant flow of the Matrix.
Now we can expand this confined sense of the Body Cycle into a more expanded sense. While we can imagine the Body Cycle as relating primarily to habits, it is important to realize that the sum total of your habits are what literally bring you the physical reality that you experience. Your Body Complex is constantly generating the physical experience at the behest of the Mind Complex. The energy centers in the Body Complex are constantly emitting frequencies which attract to you or repel from you certain kinds of bodily experiences, and the content of this attraction and repulsion ranges from headaches and orgasms to work environments and friends. Everything around your physical vehicle is part of the Matrix of the Body because it is all generated by your day-to-day habits. And every approach you take to acting within the world is an effort to either revise or continue to follow your habits.
Therefore, it is the responsibility of the Mind Complex to grasp and know those aspects of itself which are hidden. This responsibility includes coming to an awareness of the presence of particular habits in your Body Complex, as well as addressing the aspect of the Mind's relationship to itself which has created that particular habit by delivering information to the Matrix of the Body through the Potentiator, the judgment, the habit creator, in the Body.
This is Ra on the Disciplines of the Body in Session 5:
5.2 The second area of learn/teaching is the study/understanding of the body complexes. It is necessary to know your body well. This is a matter of using the mind to examine how the feelings, the biases, what you would call the emotions, affect various portions of the body complex. It shall be necessary to both understand the bodily polarities and to accept them, repeating in a chemical/physical manifestation the work you have done upon the mind bethinking the consciousness.
The body is a creature of the mind’s creation. It has its biases. The biological bias must be first completely understood and then the opposite bias allowed to find full expression in understanding. Again, the process of acceptance of the body as a balanced, as well as polarized, individual may then be accomplished. It is then the task to extend this understanding to the bodies of the other-selves whom you will meet.
By including other body complexes into the Disciplines of the Body, the implication is that these other body complexes fall into the larger context of the Body Cycle. Everything physical is a body complex of some kind, therefore, all of physical reality lies at the heart of the Body Cycle.
So let us speak about the symbols of this particular card.
The Sage is old, which indicates the passage of long spans of time. It is always noted that experience begets wisdom and that usually experience comes with time. This concept also indicates to me that the disciplines of the body are not the first step. The Sage must have already mastered his own mind before he comes up with any useful ways of acting within the manifest reality. Unless you know what is causing habits that you no longer want, you will never have the power to change those habits. The Sage is old because he has already learned many lessons before he has done anything at all.
The Sage is walking, which signifies the mobility of the Body Complex as compared to the immobility of the Mind Complex. 97.10: "Consider for the self, O student, whether your thoughts can walk."
The Sage faces left, suggesting that the left-hand path is somewhat easier to see than the right hand path. In the context of the function of this card, that tells me that the it is easier to think of positive actions for changing habits which seek to control the manifest reality than it is to think of positive actions which seek to accept.
Two snakes walk just in front of him, wearing hats which signify the female and male energies. The proximity of the two snakes suggests a balance between the male and female energies, but they are not in union, which suggests that they occur each in phases. Thus, we see that the Sage often follows the Female wisdom and the Male wisdom at different times, yet the Sage's communication with these two forms of wisdom is balanced, each getting its turn. Nevertheless, they both lead him onward together, so each next phase is just another necessary aspect of the long process of making balanced use of the Body Complex.
The skirt is once again sharply angled on the left side of the figure, signifying the great distance that the left-hand path creates between different Body Complexes.
Time to address the most significant symbols. The Sage holds a lamp in his left hand. The left hand, in my interpretation, is the input hand, so the lamp must be what the Potentiator of the Body (as a function) takes in. The lamp, the flame, represents the light that "informs" the body so that it may be "experienced in useful modes". If this card is referred to as Wisdom, the wisdom itself is depicted by the flame in the lamp.
The Sage holds a staff in his right hand. As the output hand, this side depicts the yield of this Archetype's effect on your experience. What is known to the Sage is wisdom and what is put forth by the Sage (male archetype that he is) is an action. Thus, the staff appears to me as a tool, more than anything else. The staff represents the body itself in the hand of the wise Sage who knows myriad uses for this one simple tool.
As the flame is the inner guidance to which the conscious aspect of your body has access in order to act wisely in the world, the staff is the tool for enacting that wisdom. If we imagine the mating, the coupling of that female Matrix of the Body and the male Potentiator of the Body, the staff is that which enters into the Matrix in order to divert the constant flow.
I have interpreted the Potentiator as the Significator Hidden from itself. In this card, the rectangular cape signifies the hidden nature of the Potentiator. This cape hides the flame from all but the Potentiator himself, and it is the decision of the Potentiator to reveal his wisdom through his actions. It is useful to imagine this hidden flame as a guru. The guru wants to teach you as much as you can learn, but you are simply not capable of grasping the later lessons until you have grasped the earlier ones. Similarly, your wise self knows that there are many possible ways to act in any given situation, but not all of them will come to be and most of them are best not even mentioned. It is also worth mentioning that there is a double-blind situation with the Matrix and the Potentiator. The Matrix is blindfolded and the Potentiator protects his light with a cape. The significance of this is that there is a great divide between the conscious and unconscious aspects of the body, much greater than that of the mind.
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). 