THE EGREGORE
In the old paper media it was the "bad news" that sold the most papers, today it is "division" that algorithms love and if you are divisive you are poised to gain more likes and followers. Sadly this monetisation of division of "likes" and "followers" can make people end up defending the indefensible, we have all seen it. These divisions create thought forms, named egregores, that radiate out and they are difficult to stop once they gather momentum.
The concept of egregores is nothing new, the ancient Greeks knew them as the "Watchers," and in Tibet they are called "Tulpas." They can be best described as immaterial entities born out of human thoughts, created from the power of a group mind - a nation is a perfect example of a large historical egregore - a nation is an idea that seems like an entity as it acts like a god and its spoken about as if it were a god. Uncle Sam is the "personalised" form of an egregore in the US, an older version is a woman named Columbia, see her picture here. She carries the pentagram stars on her dress and feels very different from Uncle Sam with his top hat. Sometimes she holds a torch for Columbia pictures. Where I am from in Sweden, her name is Svea, in Britain its Britannia, and more etc, they all carry their own symbolic powers, helmets, lions and spears. Today, we are living in the grip of egregore symbolism and it’s getting stronger. When there is excessive egregore possession, our collective group entity becomes destructive and we run into fundamentalism, especially religious fervour mixed with nationalism. Uncle Sam is making a move to become a god. Many generations previously had to learn the hard way of stopping the feeding of these symbols, we have many examples when nations were thrown into a mass hypnosis in the past. Often education is required to acquire freedom from polarity and dualistic possessions, but its not an easy route, division is always easier, like walking down hill.
The way out of polarity is the third way - liberation - but which way to go and how do you start starving these symbols that carry dualistic beliefs and that are growing and getting more and more hungry for conflict? These are urgent questions we need to work with.
I have just had a great interview with one of my favourite thinkers at the moment Dr. Ben Joffe, a Tibetologist and Buddhist practitioner who speaks of the Tulpas (egregores) and this phenomenon of the mind and how it affects the world.
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