Many think of manifestation as “self-improvement” but if that is all it is, it is but another ego project doomed to failure. To renounce manifestation on the other hand, due to some notion of temporality or futility of this world is to remain in reaction to thought (to samsara) and not to break through to the other side. What then exactly is manifestation?
James Hillman articulates it as follows: beauty is simply manifestation, the display of phenomena, the appearance of the anima mundi; were there no beauty, the Gods, virtues, and forms could not be revealed. Beauty is an epistemological necessity: aesthesis is how we know the world.
This kind of knowledge demands requisite action. The indigenous declaration “to walk in beauty” is more than a pleasant suggestion; it is an acknowledgment of the root of manifestation, of truly respecting what we find right in front of us. In his book Democracy Matters, Cornel West speaks of three streams that nourish the American possibility: The Socratic, the Tragicomic, and the Prophetic, identified correspondingly with Greek, African-American, and Jewish heritage. When we add Earth-based native traditions to this list, we can come up with a model of manifestation that is does not spin off into disembodied or a-historical abstractions. Rather, we can see these in a relationship to the psycho-physical energies of the chakras that have roots as well as wings:
- 1st Chakra – Rootedness, respect for the “ground,” “learning the flowers” (Gary Snyder), knowing the land you walk on, the water you drink, coming to terms with our histories of imperial expansion and dispossessing others of their territories. This is the real work to be done, the healing of the first chakra. You cannot be “grounded” or “rooted” if you live in a rootless land.
- 2nd Chakra – The Force of Feeling and being Connected, the tragicomic awareness of the human spirit in both its triumph and oppression. Reconnecting with your families, known and unknown relatives, your ancestors, your ethnic roots, making a true peace with your past.
- 3rd Chakra – the Socratic cultivation of doubt. The willingness to question authority, to question everything and everyone, the leave no stone unturned in scientific and occult investigations.
- 4th Chakra – The Communal/Christic – the demand for justice for all beings in all circumstances as the pre-requisite to love. The re-visioning and re-practicing of the economy out of exploitation and fear onto sharing and respect, post-capitalism.
- 5th Chakra – The Prophetic Possibility – understanding that the pragmatic and the imaginary need one another, cultivating vision, letting vision sweep you up on its wings, not compromising the flights of your spirit. The beginning of the post-historical, post tribal culture of the Spirit.
- 6th Chakra – The Inspirational – allowing God to be more than a Sunday event or a badge to show others. Really opening to the intuitive guidance of the God/Goddess reality through mindful opening to all circumstances. The light of Ascension dawns upon humanity.
- 7th Chakra – The Reality of forever Now – beyond births and deaths, beginnings and endings, beyond cataclysms and prophecies is always this now breathe in and breathe out IS that always is and ever was: Here O Israel, The Lord our God, the Lord is ONE.
