Scale

For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
or your ways my ways, says the Lord.

– Isaiah 55:8

To understand scale is to understand that there are levels upon levels of creation and being, from the infinitesimal to the infinity of the cosmos.  There are levels of being, there are levels of consciousness, there are levels of meaning.  Scale teaches us that our perspective is small and relative, and thereby full of error when not considered in the context of the Whole.

Events are on different scales.  For example, losing a wallet happens to millions of people every day, not just to “poor me.” There is the violence of an argument between two people and the violence of war between countries. Scale teaches us that our life and so-called problems cannot be addressed from the level at which they were created; we need to rise to a new level to seeing, being and understanding.

“Everything in the Universe, visible and invisible, known and unknown, is at some point in this vertical line. Everything is inevitably at some point in this vertical scale, for everything finds its own level in it, according, as it were, to its density, like objects floating in the sea. All evolution, in a real sense, is to pass from one point to a higher point in this scale. Scale means ladder. In all the diagrams we are going to study, this idea of the Universe as a ladder or scale is found, and that is why it is so necessary to gain some preliminary conception of the significance of this vertical direction, that does not lie ahead of us, in the future of Time, in next year or the next century, that does not lie either in Space or in Time, but lies in another dimension – namely, above us. In a limited way, we all know of the existence of this vertical line, for we all know better and worse states of ourselves. …

“Man is born as a self-evolving organism. He can rise from one level to another in this vertical scale. And that is why there is such a thing as esoteric teaching. All the knowledge belonging to this system is about the possibility of man’s undergoing an inner transformation and rising in the scale of being…

“The Universe is a series of stages, of levels, of degrees, extending vertically from the highest to the lowest, and everything is at a certain point in the Universe. The chair you are sitting on is at a different point in the Universe from yourself. … Man as a child of the Universe, as a product of it, bears in himself the stamp of the Universe – that is to say, Man has scale in him.”

– Maurice Nicoll, Commentaries, “Commentary on Effort, Vol. 1, pp. 102-104

Apprehending scale can inspire feelings and states of awe, wonder, humility and oneness. Therefore, scale, when applied to oneself, can be a tool for Self-remembering – for seeing and feeling from a different level and thereby neutralizing identification.

Scale is illustrated in the Work teaching of the Ray of Creation and shows us that we are at a very low level of being compared to the level of planets, galaxies and the level of the Absolute. But we can awaken, evolve and rise to the level of the Sun/Son – to Christ-consciousness.