They are delicious – or can be. I’m sure you’ve had one before. Snow cones are perhaps the most popular and biggest rip-off treats at amusement parks and county fairs. Pack some shaved ice into a paper cone and drizzle your favorite sugary syrup on top.
Three bucks, please.
But have you ever looked more closely at a snow cone? What you’ll see is a model of Reality – right there in your hand.
The sphere of shaved ice arching above the rim of your paper cone represents the expansive System of existence, where everything is connected, included, and incorporated into a universal order.
Rather than a mere collection of countless elements, however, the System of Reality is a consilience – literally a “jumping together” of simpler forms into a higher pattern.
A synergistic dynamic of 1+1=3 catches the individual forms and incorporates them into this higher wholeness, not canceling their unique contributions but instead building on their diversity.
At this systemic level, Reality is not something else or a mere aggregate of things, but All of it together as One.
In its systemic nature, Reality is a “nested” affair where the cosmos includes systems of galaxies, galaxies include solar systems, solar systems include planetary systems, planetary systems include ecosystems, metabolic systems, social systems, and nervous systems. All of it together turns as One: a uni-verse.
That’s pretty cool, right?
Now, turn your attention to the paper cone in which the spherical System of Reality is supported. What’s inside is hidden from view, and yet without it the System would lack stability and substance (referring to what “stands under”). In our model of Reality, this internal dimension of depth is the Ground, the underlying essence (Greek esse = being) that generates everything into existence (Latin existere = to stand out).
Don’t think of what’s inside the cone as just “more shaved ice and syrup” – more individual forms like what you see in the visible overarching System. Deep down and inside Reality is a grounding mystery that has no tangible form, no distinct features, not even a definite location.
Ground is the “withinness” of things: the ineffable and undifferentiated power of being-itself.
Using the snow cone as our model of Reality can easily mislead us to believe that the Ground is underneath and separate from the individual forms themselves, when it is really the essence of all things – the deep down withinness of everything.
Yet another dimension of Reality is represented by the line, or transverse plane, slicing across the top of the paper cone, separating the System from the Ground – but again, only in the illustration. In Reality, System and Ground are not separate sections but complementary dimensions of existence: the higher wholeness (consilience) and deeper oneness (essence) of all things.
This third dimension is the Field where individual forms stand in proximity to each other and interact in various ways.
Interaction is the critical dynamic of the Field, where the cómponent nature of Reality is such that every individual form is a consilient System of smaller elements, but also constitutes the Ground or essence of higher and larger scales of organization.
Cómponence is a newly coined word for naming this structural principle where wholes are “made of” parts which are themselves wholes to still smaller parts. Although the term itself is not widely used, it best describes the paradigm of modern science: particles in various patterns of interaction.
Interactions in the Field occur between and among individual forms (e.g., particles) that emerge by a process of differentiation out of the Ground. Matter differentiates from energy, life differentiates from matter, consciousness differentiates from life, and self-consciousness (ego) differentiates from consciousness: At each stage in this evolutionary process, the Ground manifests in distinct forms that also separate from and engage with one another. Separation is the “space” where interactions in the Field occur.
At a certain point in the interaction of individual forms, a synergy begins to lift their engagement into a higher frequency called participation.
They are no longer just connecting or colliding with each other; an “attractor” above them starts to guide and coordinate their interactions into a pattern of higher wholeness. With this move of transcendence (literally “going beyond”), Reality pulls the interactions between and among separate forms into its System.
Eventually, as in the case of self-conscious forms known as human egos, these creative affiliations give rise to intentional communities of trust, compassion, generosity, and goodwill. The worldwide wisdom tradition of Sophia Perennis regards this up-shift from mere personal (i.e., egocentric) interests and concerns to the transpersonal dimension of shared interests and communal concerns as the critical threshold in human transformation.
So far, only rarely has our species successfully gained liberation from the bonds of egoism to enjoy the larger vision and expansive freedom of transpersonal awareness. And whenever it has happened, it’s just a matter of time before ego ambitions drag the Enlightenment Project back down the dark spiral of “What’s in it for me?”
Alas, the Enlightenment Project itself is a long journey fraught with setbacks and drop-offs that threaten to end human history in an apocalypse of mutual self-destruction.
As the shared record of spiritual wisdom – the DNA of the Enlightenment Project – Sophia Perennis has been discovering, developing, and preserving both the aspiration and the understanding of what human nature has in its potential to become.
Every generation has the opportunity to cultivate this wisdom from seeds inherited from previous generations, along with the responsibility of imparting its fruits to the generations still to come.
So you see, that snow cone in your hand is a lot more than just shaved ice and syrup in a paper cup.
Other posts on the “snow cone” theme:
Tracts of Revolution 