Читать книгу Tarot and the Medici Patience. Grimoire - Petr Krylov - Страница 11

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Rice 'I know that I know nothing' (a distorted and incomplete maxim, commonly misattributed to Socrates).⁷⁷

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What does it mean to be in the right place at the right time?

To put it in the pedantic tongue of incorrigibly clever mathematicians: it is to possess the correct spatiotemporal coordinates at just the appointed moment.

In other words, F(x, y, z, t) = f(t), where f(t) is that very sly function responsible for success, acclaim, and the ever-elusive feeling of deep moral fulfillment.

Has anyone understood anything at all?

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Fig. To sleep or not to sleep. Through the dream – to see. If you haven't awakened – you can't unsee it.⁷⁸

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To put it more simply, let's take a simple example: a cat dashes across the road. Right in the thick of traffic. Which, incidentally, could easily run her over.

Personally, three things have always astonished me:

1) The cat, as a Rule, runs without glancing about, but instead fixes her gaze on some distant point;

2) If she stops darting across the road and begins to look around, that's exactly when, as a Rule, she tends to get run over;

3) A simple, yet astonishing fact: where just a moment ago there was a cat, a car now passes by—but the cat is no longer there!

And here, quite naturally, analogies of this very kind come to mind:

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Rice The clever learn from the successful. The wise learn from those who achieve results.⁷⁹

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1. One who successfully darts across the highway of life focuses on a single spot, just like a cat—they see nothing but their ultimate goal and trot towards it (cats, after all, rarely gallop).

This particular brand of fanaticism is a hallmark of those notorious goal-seekers. In other words, those who find success—for it is the goal-oriented who inevitably capture it.

A certain secret lies hidden within all this. In fact, this is simply a feature of human consciousness. A person may cast their gaze upon thousands of things, but truly SEES only those they are SEEKING—and, once found, CLINGS to them with that same gaze. It seems a thing as plain as an orange; everyone knows it—but nevertheless…

…anyone who has ever been duck hunting and fired a shot knows an amusing little trick: when a duck is brought down, it tumbles into the grass. As it falls, the stalker instinctively tracks the duck with his gaze. EVERY stalker sees where the duck lands, and then sets off to search for it in the grass.

But… only the stalker who, as he approaches the spot where the duck went down, does NOT avert his gaze from that place, will truly find it.

Those same stalkers, who more or less remembered where the duck had fallen and went searching there—confident that, with their three or four kilos of brains, surely they would find a lousy duck in the grass—reasoned absolutely correctly! 99% of the time, they’ll never find it! Though, really, where could a dead duck disappear to in the grass? It couldn’t possibly have crawled off to paradise on its own, with zombie-drive, could it?

Look into the eyes of any devotee, fanatic, careerist, or person infatuated with some idea.

You will witness the same absent-minded stare often seen in a cat. Or rather, a gaze fixed on some mysterious goal visible only to them, just behind you.

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Incidentally, here is a very real Anecdote on the topic:

'One evening I stepped out onto the balcony for a smoke. What happened next:

I stand there, smoking. I spot the neighbor’s cat creeping along the cornice—clearly set on plundering a sparrow’s nest.

I hid and suddenly shouted: ‘Hey, scram! What do you think you’re up to here, you little scoundrel?!’

At that very moment, an old woman bolted from her spot, plucking seeds from the flowers beneath the balcony. A lad drinking beer atop a pipe tumbled down and fled.

The girl pinning a notice to the entrance vanished in an instant!

Only the cat continued, stalking slowly and inexorably…

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Rice A hereditary Zen master, undiluted. Utterly focused. There is a goal, and nothing but the goal. And it must be caught and devoured. This is the Meaning, the Truth, and the Path.⁸⁰81

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2. Should one avert their gaze from the original goal and begin to doubt halfway, it is unlikely to end well. Much like a cat, frozen before the oncoming automobile.

Meanwhile, the vast majority of people are in a perpetual state of doubt about absolutely everything. EVERYTHING… AND EVERYONE… but really, what’s the point???

There’s a fine proverb: The brave die but once, the coward a thousand times.

Now let us pose the question to women—those arbiters of natural selection among Homo sapiens males—what, pray tell, is a 'remarkable' man? Answers will be legion, but each will invariably mention at least one key trait: a CONFIDENT man.

'Confident' is the antonym of 'doubting.' In the eyes of women, a man can be anything at all—even a criminal, a sadist, a murderer, a rogue, a beggar—and still be attractive to one of them. But… take away a man's confidence, and that's it—he's unlikely to impress even a single one. !!!!!!!!

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Rice. To gooooo or not to goиииииии? Thaaat is the questioooon! Is it nobler to waaaait for the machiiine foreeeever? Should I bow in submission and linger as a sile-e-e-ent sto-o-one, stranded by the roa-a-adside of Destin-yyy? Or ought I rise in defianceееееееее? And slither between the eve-e-e-en arms of De-e-e-athоооооооsuffocating? Or muиииииииrder? And de-e-evour? Juuust in caaase? (As ‘Mumbles’ would say, by Chic Spear)⁸²

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A woman's finely honed instinct for selecting promising suitors tells her without fail—a man lacking confidence will achieve NOTHING—he simply has no prospects.

The archetypal outsider hero, straight from the pages of any bestseller, can only become an idol for other outsiders. And it is only within the pages of a bestseller—a narcotic for the unsuccessful—that he can achieve greatness.

Had the bestseller followed a different script, its readers would be few indeed. The successful have no use for such tales, while outsiders require the hero to mirror them if they are to see themselves in him.

In the Real, those who trust in their own strength generally repel failure by sheer force of confidence. And, of course, with an unshakable sense of humor and the priceless gift of laughing at oneself.

This is precisely why small children (and professional dog trainers) can blithely approach the largest, grumpiest dogs and pet them with total nonchalance. Absolute faith and utter fearlessness, the sheer absence of fright, does not provoke the dog to bite the stranger.83

‘…And if you had faith even the size of a mustard seed, you could move mountains…’ 84

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Rice – 'Calling Mission Control, calling Mission Control, come in…' – 'Mission Control here. Go ahead.' – 'Reporting in.' We're now on the second day of our voyage. Flight normal. All systems are operating within standard parameters. Over.⁸⁵

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NдддддддAaaaa… But let us note that faith is not a thought, nor is it some grand Kung Fu theory—rather, it is a special psychological state, the very first habit a Stalker must unlearn.

It’s a unique state and a worldview, a genuinely real mood of the psyche—not just mumbling ‘I believe, I believe, I believe… yes, I swear I do—on my honour!’

For those initiated in extrasensory arts, you can simply point and say—this is energy, a sensation—this is the 22nd Arcana of the Tarot (‘The Fool’): a man with a knapsack, his head thrown back, eyes skyward, seeing his Path up in the clouds rather than down on the earth.⁸⁶

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Fig. 22. The 'Fool' Arcana, from the Rider-Waite deck.⁸⁷

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It is this Arcana, after all, that both commences and concludes the study of the Tarot. No wonder, then, that Tarot sages still debate—is it the 22nd Arcana, or the zeroth?

Indeed, it is this very card that portrays Stalking and, in general, the entire curriculum of learning on planet Earth.

And it is precisely the energy of this Arcana, the taste of its sensation, that grants 'faith,' the very capacity for learning itself—and every consequence that follows. Including, of course, that dazzling, bulletproof smile for any bullets whizzing straight toward your face!

'Fools have all the luck,' as people say. And indeed—they do! And how!!!!!!88

For those truly curious about understanding and mastering this energy, let us consider the 22nd Arcana in somewhat greater detail.

What, then, is the energy of the 22nd Arcana, and wherein does it truly lie?

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Rice The mask will reveal—who am I, where am I?! What afflicts me. What can I do.⁸⁹

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When that pillar of Ancient Greek philosophy, one of the wisest and most learned men of his era—Socrates—was asked about his own learning and to assess it, he replied more or less as follows:

'The more I know, the more I realize that I know nothing,' and 'I know only that I know nothing, but others don't even know that.'90

And although Socrates here, it seems, was speaking about the ever-receding horizon of Knowledge, what interests us is not his central argument, but rather the psychological mood itself.

Consider this: a man no longer in his youth, endowed with a tremendous stockpile of knowledge and experience, a thinker and intellectual whose authority was universally acknowledged in his time—in other words, a true titan of thought, father of ancient Greek philosophy—publicly and consciously admits, in essence, that…

…that he's simply a fool?!

…!!!

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Rice And now the children will discover how things truly are in this world.⁹¹

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How different this is from when the self-important, sky-gazing dabblers fancy themselves sages and authorities—the Alpha and Omega of Truth, the final arbiters!

It is precisely the clear and conscious admission of one’s own limitation, folly, and amateurism—one’s deep, endless, and inevitable imperfection—that opens the way to Knowledge and self-perfection.

It is impossible to teach the supremely confident in their own omniscience. It is impossible for the smug to set foot on the road of Knowledge—they ALREADY know and understand everything. So why bother going anywhere, discovering anything new, or learning at all?

For this reason, most people swiftly fall into the trap of latent or flamboyant know-it-all-ism, and remain ensnared in it for the whole of Life.92

And though armchair experts ‘know’ ‘everything’ ‘about everything,’ they never move beyond their own self-assurance, narrow horizons, and, more often than not, a rather basic illiteracy.

Only the irrevocable admission that you are 'The Fool,' 'nobody, called nothing,' regardless of how impressive your list of accolades and merits may be, and the ability to see the World through the eyes of a child—still capable of believing and being amazed—opens the way to Knowledge, learning, and Stalking.

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Rice Heavens! What is happening here? It smells delightful! And—not a bit frightening!⁹³

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For Stalking is, at its heart, a two-way (!!!) dialogue with the World of the student—who, more often than not, does not walk the path of Knowledge, but is led along it by the World itself. It’s just that The World converses with humankind in the language of circumstances and situations. Otherwise, the doctors will diagnose schizophrenia.

"When a person speaks to God, it is called prayer.

When God speaks to a person—that’s schizophrenia."94

(A widely circulated medical joke.)

To the novice stalker, it may appear that he is but a marionette, that nothing truly depends on him; merely a foolish plaything in the hands of Fate. In a sense, that is exactly the case.

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Fig. Threads stretch from the puppets. The net rises and falls. Yet the puppets remain blissfully unaware: the Puppeteer is a marionette himself!⁹⁵96

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But a marionette, having become aware of its submission and feeling the strings on which it dangles, paradoxically attains a certain degree of freedom and choice.

All the other unique and inimitable individuals, who would never for anything admit they are marionettes, will never gain this freedom and choice.

For, in their invincible self-assurance, they will never notice the strings that control their one-of-a-kind and singular puppet of flesh and bone.97

And he who does not see the bars of his own cage shall never escape it by his own hand.

Incidentally, in the runes, this Arcana is in many ways akin to the rune Raidho.

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Rice A schematic depiction of the rune Raidho.⁹⁸

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Which, in its essence, describes the aftermath of the 22nd Arcana—the journey along the path of Knowledge—and thus is intimately bound to this Arcana.

The key to comprehending and harnessing the energy of the rune Raidho lies in the fact that, by the Law of Correspondence of Hermeticism, the rune’s form aligns with a particular pose (Kama) and the practitioner’s psychological state.99

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Rice Gray life, gray life—how thoroughly dissatisfied I am! Dissatisfied I am! Soothe me, will you?¹⁰⁰

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The rune Raido is, in its way, a symbolic sketch of a person flinging their arms to the side (elbows stuck out).

This reflects dissatisfaction and discontent with the current state of affairs. Which, naturally, gives rise to the urge to depart from one’s current place and situation. It prods one to take a step—if not forward, then at least 'away from here.'

This, incidentally, is precisely what the right, outstretched ‘leg’ of the rune is illustrating. It’s as if she’s been ‘lifted’ in anticipation of a step forward.

It is precisely one’s discontent with their current state, and the inner challenge thrown at society (arms bent at the elbows and resting on the hips—a classic pose of defiance, symbolizing a readiness to elbow one’s rivals out of the way and push through the crowd towards the goal), that compels a person to peel themselves off the plush sofa and take a Step along the path of Knowledge.

Incidentally, a remarkable number of Instagram photos featuring ladies with designs on a blissful future, oddly enough, are taken in exactly this or similar postures!

This inner impulse—this mood of chronic discontent, of dissatisfaction with oneself and one’s lot, and the attempt to escape it by setting out on the Path—is both encrypted and, in essence, inscribed in this rune.

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Rice. Did someone summon an Expert? A thumbs-down for a false alarm!¹⁰¹

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How different this attitude is from the psychological posture of the 'sofa sages'! They, after all, have already reached the summit of evolution: Homo Stibadium Peritus—the Couch Expert!

And for them, as with all perfection, there is simply nowhere left to evolve.

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