It practices the art of concealment and you probably had no idea.
Add a "d" and it becomes something else altogether, an entirely new beast. Or does it?
The link is conceptual and esoteric — but you’ll need the right lens to see it.
Have you ever wondered why you see the world the way you do?
Why you say the things you do?
Use words the way do you?
A lot of the time we’re running on full auto-pilot — like driving on a highway and spacing out, thinking about something mundane or something beautiful, but when you're back online, you're unable to recall a single detail from the past five minutes.
Except we do this when we communicate too. We run on programs that remain unseen.
For the vast majority of us they dictate how we experience life.
Take LinkedIn, for example, it has a professional consciousness that runs on certain ideas and systems of belief. This is how the majority of “professionals” see the world. Sure there are subsets within it, but generally there is a collective consciousness to this platform.
I’m sure the many would agree, even if they disagree. It's a true statement. (It's relatively true, or do you think that what you believe is absolutely true, as in it's the absolute truth?)
LinkedIn has a consciousness. (relatively and absolutely true)
I'll give you an example, the consciousness here is drinking the AI Kool-Aid, hard. They're all gulping it down. Even college frat bros, experts at doing keg-stands would be jealous! Zero original thought and all parroting. With few exceptions. So that's just one example of what makes it a general platform consciousness.
What am I talking about in that last paragraph? What's the example? Everyone is repeating the same things about AI. Only a handful of people are actually engaged in original thought on the matter. If you happen to disagree, that gracefully places you deep inside the pitcher of Kool-Aid.
Don't get me wrong, AI is a tool. I use it as a thought partner and to help me process information. But it doesn't think or write for me.
There is a Japanese proverb about getting on the wrong train.
"If you get on the wrong train, get off at the next station. The longer you stay, the more expensive the return trip will be."
When I figured how AI would, slowly but surely, strip me my creativity if I let it write for me, I got off the train.
The lens of perception.
Someone called them the doors of perception.
"If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite." —William Blake
The way we see the world is shaped by the lens we use which is determined by our paradigm for reality. Those who understand what I’m saying here, more than likely, can already switch lenses to an extent. That gives you an edge which allows you to sneak a peak behind the veil of reality.
Or, the matrix. Matrix after all, means womb. So the matrix of a thing, is the womb of existence.
But back to lenses, and choosing which ones to use. So a question: what kind of life are we living when we’re not aware of the lens or lenses we use habitually?
Are you aware of your lenses? Or do you automatically assume there is only the ONE lens to see the world?
The ONE reality.
The limited consciousness that postures: "I'm right, you're wrong."
Language, culture, society, parents, teachers, friends — they all shape how we see the world. And for the majority of most people’s lives, they never question where these beliefs come from.
Who shaped them? How did they become “yours”?
Did you consciously choose them?
Or were they inherited like your body or blood type?
Choosing our lenses is how we discover more about ourselves and this game of existence some people call a rat race and others call a beautiful life.
Ask two people, get two different answers — depending on their lenses AND their levels of conscious awareness which is the what that determines their lens in the first place.
Here’s the thing -— both can be true. One moment it’s one, the next another.
A or B
We’ve been conditioned that it’s this or that, A or B, right, or wrong, i or o.
It's on or it's off.
(But that's not even how a quantum computer works. It works with AND, not i or o, but rather BOTH.)
However, this idea of this or that is entirely false. There can always be a third option, even a fourth, and a fifth, or more.
When you realize that it’s not OR, but rather AND, that is the pivotal moment when you’ve taken a conscious step that leads you closer to regaining your power. This is the start of choosing your lens.
This insight will change your life.
Now how does this apply to language and words?
There are so many words we use that we NEVER question.
Where did they come from? What do they mean? Why are they important?
We think we know what they mean, but more often than not, what we think about the origins and meaning of a thing wind up being completely incomplete, reductive and actually false.
Socially true, but actually not even close to the real McCoy.
I like working with examples so let’s take a popular one from ancient history and contemporary times.
Amen.
Let’s start with what you think you know it means.
Amen is used in the Bible to close a prayer.
It means: “it is so”, or “so be it”.
It’s a phrase used to express agreement.
Curiously enough, an amend-ment ratifies an agreement.
So, amen and amend are both final words of agreement.
See how that works? We’ve just gone full circle from conceptually and esoterically to practically. They are literally connected by the very structure and fabric of language itself.
Now let’s go deeper.
Amen. Amun. Amon.
Three different spellings for the same word, the same name.
Where does it come from?
It goes back to ancient Egypt, back to the pharaohs, and likely even before that.
Amun-Ra was the supreme deity of Ancient Egypt.
The combination of two deities: Amun and Ra.
Also spelled, Imn, Amen or Amon.
Ra or Re was the Sun God. Hence the Eye of Ra and the Eye of Horus.
Amun was the “Hidden One” and the personification of air or breath whose name was based on the Egyptian root imn which meant to hide or conceal.
He was associated with air, wind and the unseen — the invisible forces that nonetheless influence the world.
The breath is the word. You cannot speak without breath. Hence the Logos is the first spoken word.
Breath carries the Word. And the Word is the first form of creation.
So I can tell you this fact:
Christians use Amen.
Jews use Amen, too.
Muslims use Ameen or Amin.
Ancient Egyptians used Amun and Amon.
This has nothing to do with religion, or dogma, so if you’re reading this from that lens, consciously take it off.
Put it down, even if for but a moment.
Breathe for a moment and take if off.
Just the breath.
Why are yoga and meditation all about the breath?
Because the breath is very important.
In Greek, Pneuma means spirit or breath (hence pneumatics and pneumatic guns).
In Latin, Spiritus means breath, soul, or life.
In Sanskrit, Prāṇa means life-force carried through breath.
In Chinese, Chi or Qi means life-energy (hence body-breath practices like Qigong and Tai Chi).
In Japanese, Ki, means vital force (hence martial arts and energy practices like Aikido and Reiki).
In Hebrew, Ruach means spirit, breath, or wind (hence in Genesis: "the Ruach of God hovered over the waters").
So Amen, takes us back to breath, esoterically speaking.
Now you get to see it with a different lens, even if for but a moment.
This is a sacred space for insight, growth, healing and transformation.
It’s a community for our journey inward through honest introspection and profound spiritual healing — something the world desperately needs now more than ever.
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Thanks again for reading The Unsaid Underside!
Michael Logan 🖤