The Universal Law of Polarity-The story of Danny

This is the fourth Hermetic law. The first of the mutable laws. Mutable means changeable, variable, able to transcend.  Law of Polarity means there are two sides to everything. Things that appear as opposites are in fact only two extremes of the same thing.

Everything is dual, everything has poles; everything has its pair of opposites; opposites are identical in nature but different in degree.

“Some people have everything”, thought Danny. Danny had never been what one might consider “lucky” …

The story below is taken from http://mywriterscircle.com.  I have paraphrased it.

His parents were from a background of poverty and when given the chance to move to an area to better themselves, they left Danny to his wayward friends.  They just left.

Since age 12 Danny made court appearances, for drug dealing and possession.  He was not handsome, He was gaunt, his eyes set in dark shadowy sockets, his once lustrous hair was thin and he was losing weight, not from hunger.  He was now 20, a registered drug addict, cold, penniless and shabbily dressed.  He would do practically anything to feed his habit.  He huddled in a shop doorstep that hadn’t see a customer’s footstep in many years.

There were few street lamps in this dark grimy neighborhood and few people lived there.

Richard sat in his new Daimler. The engine purred and two male acquaintances sat quietly in the back of the car.  Richard checked the time on his Rolex watch. He left the neighborhood of detached houses with sweeping drives and maintained gardens.

Richard was the leading light in the upper echelons of power in a successful company.  His fine tailored clothes and hand-made shoes were a fitting reward for hard work, luck and being in the right place at the right time. 

Like Danny, Richard also took drugs as did his colleagues.  Designer drugs and designer clothes were at all the posh parties.  Richard indeed had it all.

The Daimler turned on to the pitch-black street.   The Daimler moved slowly and as someone moved from the shadows of an old shop, Richard stopped the car.  He lowered the window and leaned across.

“How much?” he asked.

Danny looked into the car and saw the three men. 

“150 Quid for the three of you.”

Richard looked at his friends, who nodded in acceptance.

“Get in.”

I read this story from the writers’ circle as it was labeled “opposites”.  Are they?  The point of the story is they are not.  They are identical in nature but different in degree.  The one who has it all and the one who has nothing.  Richard, in his Daimler is no better a person than Danny, he is just viewed differently by society and so to us, he seems luckier.  Danny is allowing himself to be used for the gratification of these guys, but they could be the losers in the end.  He could have AIDs, Hepatitis B or another disease? So, while Richard and friends seem luckier in some respects, they are all rowing down the same river as Danny.  Just in different boats.  It’s a sinking river, whichever way you row and whatever boat you are in.

This story kind of “shocked” me into understanding the nature of opposites from this identical in nature perspective.

Consider the following opposites:

·       Hot to Cold

·       Black to White

·       Fear to Courage

·       Tall to Short

·       Extrovert to Introvert

·       Hate to Love

·       Fast to Slow

·       Positive to Negative

·       Good to Evil

·       Beautiful to Ugly

·       Light to Darkness

·       Rich to Poor

·       Conservative to Liberal

·       Gay to Straight

·       Happy to Sad

When you really think about it these are all “identical in Nature” they are the extremes of the same thing.  Let’s take temperature for example.  Hot and cold are both on the “Scale” of temperature. At some point in time someone determined what temperature would be considered Hot, Warm, Lukewarm, cool, cold and freezing. 

Let’s look at Happy versus Sad.  They are on the “Scale” of emotions. One can go from Happy, to okay, to down to Sad.  One could be rich and the other poor but it’s the same scale of measure; how much money do you have.

Maybe what we consider “opposites” are just a suggestion toward a better understanding of the Scale.  The Hermetic law of polarity being mutable says; you can transform your thoughts from hate to love, from fear to courage by consciously raising your vibration. (vibration is immutable—it is an unchangeable law that everything vibrates) The law also states this Principal of Duality only operates in the physical and mental realms, not in the spiritual realm where “All is one.”   “God, Spirit is above the Opposites.”

Richard Rohr, a Franciscan Priest, in his daily blog on August 30, stated the following:

“God tells Noah to bring into the ark all the opposites: the wild and the domestic, the crawling and the flying, the clean and the unclean, the male and the female of each animal.  Then God does a most amazing thing. God locks them together inside the ark.  God puts all the natural animosities, all the opposites together, and holds them in one place. I used to think it was about balancing the opposites within me, but slowly I have learned that it is actually, “holding” things in their seemingly unreconciled state that widens and deepens the soul.  We must allow things to be only partly resolved, without perfect closure or explanation.”

-Richard Rohr

I will not look at opposites the same moving forward.  I will not question whether opposites attract or sameness attracts.  Maybe what we attract is what we need to learn.  I will look at the scale on which these opposites exist and allow myself to “hold them” whether it be an easy hold or an unreconciled state. I will then determine if I can move on that scale towards holding mutual respect when it is called for, or if I should distance myself because it may not be good for me.  I choose to strive as much as I can in the spiritual realm where all is one.  That may mean discerning my choices to raise my vibration a bit out of the physical and mental realm.  It may mean recognizing that opposites really are on the same scale.  The question becomes for me, is the scale tipping toward wholeness and health, mentally, physically and spiritually?  

Hermetic laws can be mind twisters indeed. Especially the mutable ones.

Our mind is capable of passing beyond the dividing line we have drawn for it. Beyond the pairs of opposites of which the world consists, other, new insights begin.

-Hermann Hesse

Until next time.

Sat Nam.

Jan