Alchemy Of Standards

The more information we get exposed to, the more likely we are to question the very foundations upon which we've built our lives. There's an unsettling effect with consuming information that our minds doesn't have a framework to process.

To me, change, growth and evolution are all in the same bucket and I mostly use them interchangeably. I've changed for the better, I've grown out of my previous self, the body has to evolve into its next iteration.

All of these processes or dynamics are occurring from a certain baseline. Like a foundation of sorts, where structures are built, outlive their purpose and then collapse only for newer structures to get built again and again.

If this sounds a bit abstract, nature can come to the rescue.

What's There To Rush Towards?

A soil is a ground for myriads of plants to grow, those that managed to pass through all the trials to reach maturity stage are flourishing and are standing on top of rich, stable earth.

Those that don't are recycled back into the soil itself, becoming the foundation for the next generation.

In actuality, I think nature is much more discerning than we give it credit for, as in maintaining a rigorous standard for what deserves to survive and thrive.

Now and obviously, with all of these processes happening, the soil is also changing, albeit in a less noticeable way from a relatively short time frame.

In this regard, nature is a bit similar to those who prefer to take things slowly, they're in no rush to get anywhere or rather what's really there to rush towards?

Not to go too off topic but alchemy can be summed up as speeding up nature's processes towards a perfect uncorrupted state, I've read.

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The philosopher's stone will turn everything base and impure into gold. I'm not sure why gold though, probably it's an analogy for the highest, most refined state of being.

I would've used fire but definitely not physical fire, as that one is too volatile.

Cosmic Furnace

Back to topic, a huge problem ensues when this soil is replaced with "something else", maybe a different composition of whatever soils are made of to give the illusion of solid ground.

Somehow we as the farmers couldn't acknowledge this change and kept planting the same myriads of plants into a different-sort-of-soil only for most of the plants to wither and the ones that survive never reaching the full flowering stage in a satisfactory condition.

The tragedy is in our stubborn insistence that the old methods should still work.

What if this soil replacement is part of some greater transformation we don't yet understand?

The alchemists believed in transmutation, not just of metals but also of the very essence of things.

Our standards, like base metals, are being subjected to some cosmic furnace that breaks down and then refines them into something more resilient.

The farmers in us panic because we only see the withering plants and the failed harvests. Not realizing yet that we're meant to become gardeners of a different kind entirely.

Having exposure to endless, conflicting, bizarre, etc. information might be nature's way of ensuring we are prepared and don't become too attached to a single version of truth, so we learn to better navigate the complexity of a multifaceted reality.


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