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Why choosing either darkness or light instead of balance?
- Thread starter agorman
- Start date
Infinitum
Possessed Bookworm
The simplest answer is, I've visited them all, but the Darkness is where I found my home.
Then let's look at it in more depth. First of all I feel strongly that dark entities are the most misunderstood group in the lot. My sympathies were originally kindled when I started looking at how Christians depicted their demons: creatures that once were angels but fell from grace and now fiercely hate humanity for something they cannot be. I felt bad for them. I wanted to approach them and tell them I accepted them even if no one else would do so. That's what changed my attitudes towards darkness and what people easily label as evil. Inside the darkness there are lessons to be learned that are hard to be found anywhere else.
This also relates to psychology, where for example Carl Jung's concept of the Shadow comes to good use. Back when I wasn't even aware of LHP my self-exploration led me to come in contact with my personal Shadow. My encounter with it is surprisingly similar to that described in the article. It changed me, some people thought for the worse, but it also taught me a lot about who I am and what actually drives me in life. I learned to embrace the demon that lived inside me and found myself to be a lot happier and more stable person for doing so. But the Shadow is a lot like Freud's id. It's the unrestrained side of you, the one that society doesn't cope well with. Id doesn't go well with the super-ego, which follows the rules and tries to push the id back into hiding - much like demons are treated by many people. So you have to choose. After having seen the other side of things there was no going back for me to the light side. So here I am.
Hope that makes sense.
Then let's look at it in more depth. First of all I feel strongly that dark entities are the most misunderstood group in the lot. My sympathies were originally kindled when I started looking at how Christians depicted their demons: creatures that once were angels but fell from grace and now fiercely hate humanity for something they cannot be. I felt bad for them. I wanted to approach them and tell them I accepted them even if no one else would do so. That's what changed my attitudes towards darkness and what people easily label as evil. Inside the darkness there are lessons to be learned that are hard to be found anywhere else.
This also relates to psychology, where for example Carl Jung's concept of the Shadow comes to good use. Back when I wasn't even aware of LHP my self-exploration led me to come in contact with my personal Shadow. My encounter with it is surprisingly similar to that described in the article. It changed me, some people thought for the worse, but it also taught me a lot about who I am and what actually drives me in life. I learned to embrace the demon that lived inside me and found myself to be a lot happier and more stable person for doing so. But the Shadow is a lot like Freud's id. It's the unrestrained side of you, the one that society doesn't cope well with. Id doesn't go well with the super-ego, which follows the rules and tries to push the id back into hiding - much like demons are treated by many people. So you have to choose. After having seen the other side of things there was no going back for me to the light side. So here I am.
Hope that makes sense.
Orias
Left Hand Path
How can one seek balance if they don't know what it is?
How can you be ying without being yang? Darkness...light...where is there balance between the two? There is no such thing as balance, only in understanding will you actually see...light and dark.
People seek what they are. People seek what unlocks whatever lay therein, but if they know whatever lay within they have a choice, to unlock or stow away. When you hide, you will be exploited, when you engage you will be engaged. Now choose, will you hide and be taken advantage of? Or will you engage, so that understanding may splashed upon you like water?
Xeper!
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I believe in balance. A large number of us do. Satan/Lucifer is a balanced, multifaceted Deity in my belief.
Darkness and light go hand and hand. The light illuminates the darkness, the LHP is actually the light trying to bring balance back to the darkness created and enforced by the RHP.
nash8
Da man, when I walk thru!
Great point. I wish straw dog was here with his peace and anarachy ying-yang. If you look at the ying yang, there is darkness within the light, and light within the darkness.
I think you will find that LHP is not always the darkness, but rather the light within the darkness, fighting the darkness within the light.
The darkness within the light is absoulte authoritarianism, absolute peace but no freedom of choice.
These are the people that impose peace through elimination of freedom. Authoritatrion rulers, the elite of society, corrupt governments, etc. They keep the peace, or the large white part of the yin yang, by eliminating freedoms.
The light within the darkness is absolute anarchy, absolute freedom but no peace. These are the people that totally oppose the lack of freedom imposed by those in power to keep the peace. LaVey, Crowley, rebels, etc. They teach people that they can have their own personal freedom, which is the large black portion of the yin-yang.
Not all LHP is associated with embracing just the darkness, but in keeping balance some must embrace the darkness more so than others. The LHP is just the opposition of societal norms, more so than just embracing the darkness in my opinion. Hell, I would arge that there are as many societal norms that are "dark" as there are that are light, so if you oppose the "dark" societal norms then are you the light?
/end rant/ Sorry bout that, moral of the story: LHP is not soley about embracing the darkness.
Gjallarhorn
N'yog-Sothep
Why seek any of the above? "Darkness and light" is a projection of order we place on the universe. In truth there is only the Unnameable (which ironically goes by many names).
People typically say they seek the darkness because for most of our lives we are taught to cleave our identity in two: the good side, which we are taught is our only "true self", and the bad side, which we are supposed to ignore and suppress. This leads to a sort of multiple personalities and causes a whole swarm of problems when you "inexplicably" act aggressively or malevolently. Seeking out our ignored harsher facets is a means of becoming whole again, " becoming like gods, knowing both good and evil". No one simply goes dark side in LHP, if they're doing it right.
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Then why is the eye in your avatar in darkness?
Infinitum
Possessed Bookworm
This is a really insightful remark. Frubals incoming!
ScottySatan
Well-Known Member
I didn't choose it any more than a person chooses whether or not to have faith in something.
Gjallarhorn
N'yog-Sothep
I feel I need to clarify my post a bit more. My last statements related to the Serpent's words are not a reference to "balance". Balance is still a form of division. It's taking two things and holding them separate, but equal. Literally no one seeks balance between light and dark, otherwise you'd see people helping the elderly across the street only to continue walking and rob the homeless to set the scales right. What LHP seeks to do is integration of the shadow or becoming whole, so that "good and evil" no longer exist. One must first see the profane as sacred so that eventually all can be seen as sacred.
Orias
Left Hand Path
It depends on what do you consider good or bad. If you consider your "bad side" an aggregate of attitudes like raping babies, I don't see why should you keep your "dark side".
Now, if you talk about divine energy; everyone must definitely balance light with dark, since as a friend once told me "too much light and it will blind you, too much darkness doesn't let you see".
This seems a very RHP view. Are we talkinging literally or symbolically?
Thrice Great
Member
The misconception is that darkness is the absence of light, but it isn't. Darkness is the womb that holds and enables Light.
Orias
Left Hand Path
It all depends on how you to define dark my friend, sometimes its useful. Like in guerrilla warfare.
Indeed.