The Three Degrees of initiation

Years ago, I became interested in the theme of initiations, trials, ordeals, etc - as part of the Hero's Journey, of course, but also in relation to the Gnostic approach, which considers our essential nature as a spark of light, that has slowly fallen into matter, and becomes trapped, and seeks to escape again.

I came across an interesting book, in my mother's collection, by Colin Still, "Shakespeare's Mystery Play - a Study of The Tempest".  The only review I can find of this appears on a theosophical site, and doesn't really elucidate the story as he tells it.

I made the above 'chart' as a way of clarifying for myself the ideas the book contains.  I can not find this model in any other traditions, and can also find almost nothing about Colin Still (although T.S.Eliot and W.H.Auden seem to have known of his work), so this stands alone.

He uses the four elements, and the three 'transitional' phases between them, making seven steps, in all.

In regards to The Fall, we can see how light/consciousness gets tempted down to this earthly plain, and then can - with sufficient effort or luck, escape again, through a series of initiations, which appear in many traditions.

[edit]

It turns out that Colin Still is not quite as obscure as I assumed, and I found more references to his work in Northrop Frye's late notebooks, etc.  More research needed...

Just get on with it!

Hey ho, sorry 'bout this, but most of my typing vanishes into the ephemeral trivia of social media, and blogs have slowly gone dormant.

I keep meaning to complete an autobiography, which I already started on, and which I even commissioned a cover for, from the excellent Bob Campbell (which is ready to go, on standby).

Of course, I remain schtum about the title I chose, so let's call it Work-In-Process...

Back in the day, I challenged myself with writing 50,000 words in a month, as part of NaNoWriMo - a personal marathon to write a short novel in the month of November.  At that speed, an autobiography could get finished before Christmas.  I actually finished the marathon half a dozen times.  No great books emerged (although I quite liked Infinite Monkeys - and even played the game of getting a cover and promo image from Bobby Campbell, and then publishing it on Lulu, as paperback or ebook, just to see how it all worked).  Still, I failed to go back and do a serious edit of most of the other attempts, and the editing process matters much more than just dumping out a first draft.

November looms, so perhaps I should push myself to write at that frenzied pace (1667 words per day) and get the damned autobiography into first draft, at least.  I might even enjoy it!

2007:  I wrote "Foolproof", my very first attempt at fiction.  I struggled, but completed the task.  It muddled up bits of my own life, with bits of imagination, and prove simply a slog to the finish.  I can't re-read it.

2008: I decided in advance, at least, on a theme, of a quest, and hidden items, and puzzles, etc.  This led to "Infinite Monkeys".  I still quite like to read bits of this...and I love holding a real book!

2009: This time I wrote "Handwaving", more or less about "Art" and the empty space, the white room, the blank canvas.  I think I included a small esoteric group, as well, as a source of inspiration.

2009a: enthused by the process, I also did a film script, on Script Frenzy, "One White Crow".

2010:  I wrote "Does Not Compute" aka "Spooking the Herd" which I can't remember much about. Something to do with business, and money, and hustles, etc.

I skipped 2011

In 2012, I decided to actually work to some kind of game plan, so read and analysed a bunch of conspiracy thrillers.  I didn't want to have a hero who was ex-SAS, though, who could field strip a bunch of weapons, fly a helicopter, etc, so made him a diffident Englishman abroad.  But apart from that...

2012: The Columbus Caper  I quite liked this book, and really should go back and look at it again, do some editing, and maybe even follow through with a Lulu version.  If it amuses you to see the process, I did the work on Scrivener, and used this blog as a diary of the days of November 2012.

I tried using 2013 to work on the autobiography with the same level of motivation, but it felt like cheating, as NanoWriMo has a specific brief of writing fiction. 

And then I pretty well put it all aside.  And six more years drifted by...  Hey ho.  So it goes.