The Principle of Polarity in Connection with Compensation and Affinity
The Fourth Hermetic Principle of Polarity
Everything is dual; everything has two poles; everything has its pair of opposites; like and unlike are the same; opposites are identical in nature, but different in degree; extremes meet; all truths are but half-truth; all paradoxes may be reconciled – Kybalion
“Everything has two sides” is a popular quote. The 4th Hermetic principle is part of our general knowledge and as natural as the principle of cause and effect. Everyone knows, that magnets have plus and minus poles. In every textbook of teaching physics you can read, that the flow of electricity depends on the two poles and you find the two poles in every socket, they are marked on every battery. It is a general knowledge, that the electrons of an atom represent the minus pole and the protons in the core of the atom stay for the same amount of plus charge, so the atom appears neutral. We live with the fact, that there are nights and days, sun and shadow without reflecting that those opposites determine one another. “They are identical in nature but different in degree” as the Kybalion quotes. All manifested things have two sides. Without a day, there would be no night, without a front, there would be no back. Even a globe has – from the point of the viewer – a rear side.
Polarity is the foundation of all matter, a basic principle of all manifested creation. And – as all the other principles – it operates absolute precisely, independent and untouchable for the human mind. We cannot change it, but we can use it for our benefit!
Though we might shrug our shoulders because all that is said here seems to be so evident, we never realize to figurate this law into our behavior. And even more – we are not aware of the effect this law has for us and our surrounding. Either we ignore the law or even worse – we misuse it for our own egoistic benefit. In the course of history artificial laws of polarity were created by the ruling class, just to stabilize their position but in no way coherent with the hermetic principle.
Opposites as the Foundation of Rating and Judging
Every epoch of history has used polarity for their own egoistic purpose and has imparted them as unbreakable laws to their subordinates. In the archaic tribes the rules were helpful for all members to survive in the wilderness. Those, who didn’t obey to the rules were killed or outcast. Not to make sacrifices to the gods was a terrible sin, because the gods would take revenge on the whole tribe. What made sense in those times of magical thinking was passed on to over many generations, although it didn’t serve any more the survival of a community but just confirmed the authority of a few. The Middle Age were packed with those self-made instructions only to bend the people’s will. By threatening them with cruel punishments they spread fear and terror and they had the right to resolve on life or death – just as they pleased. The church dominated by including polarities of sin and righteousness in their dogmas and terrorized whole Europe over many centuries. The church consolidated the definition of good or evil and presented these manmade laws in public as God’s will. Those, who dared not to fit in were persecuted ruthlessly. The time of inquisition demonstrates the gruesome regiment of all sorts of its inexpressible cruelty.
Polarities were and are always the tool of dictatorship. The dictator referred to the well-being of his people and declares everything that could destabilize his position to be liable to prosecution, but every extreme provokes the opposite – for everything is dual! The more radical a system acts, the more it provokes the other extreme. When we look at dictatorships, there are always rebellions as we see in Hongkong nowadays.
The Law of Polarity in Nature
But the environmental sins due to the ignorant attitude in our times activate the other extreme as well – the climate changes. The chopping down of the rainforest in the Amazonas area leads to storms and flooding, but as this happens quite often in regions far away from the scene of the crime, the close connection between the two has been denied for a long time, but becomes more and more obvious now. Another drastic example are the heavy bushfires in Australia. They are a counter reaction to the ruthless skimming of the groundwater for commercial purpose. And – the fires are also manmade, as the ground free of trees can be used as grazing ground for the quite profitable cattle ranching. The ignorance of the government there baffles description, they deliberately don’t want to understand. So they are planning the biggest coal mine on the planet in Australia. All that counts, is short term profit, craving for more and more. But without doubt, the law will catch up with those people as well, even if we don’t hear about it in the medias – the law is always working!
The Law of Polarity in our Everyday Life
The effect of this law is present everywhere – also in our everyday life for each and every one – without exception! If we are totally convinced, that we have found the absolute truth in some issue, we automatically provoke a person, who will confront us with the opposite conviction.
This shows up in our behavior as well. For example if we are fanatic followers of vegan diet, we don’t stop the suffering of animals, in contrast, we even strengthen the other extreme of consuming meat. Every extreme creates the opposite, whether we realize it or not – the law is working precisely.
For example, we try to sustain our way of living by sticking to our daily rituals and avoid everything, which could disturb our routine. But the more we cling to something, the more we provoke the other side – we are forced to change. This can be a disease, forcing us to change our habits or we receive a notice to quit our apartment – so we have to move. The more we cling to something, the more likely we lose it.
People living constantly in extremes wonder, why they never find peace. They think, life doesn’t allow them to be happy – but they are not aware, that they themselves are the cause of their never ending unhappiness. So we should find balance in our life to avoid to be pushed from one extreme to the other. We are all individuals, so we must find out, what sort of balance suits us in our personality, which extremes do not serve us.
The Law of Compensation
Here the law of compensation comes in. Everything in creation strives for compensation. This applies for science as well as for our practical life. This homeostasis – as it is called – is present everywhere. If hot and cold water are separated by a semipermeable membrane, an intense activity of the molecules persists until the temperature is equalized in both sections. Poles are always parts of one system. All poles like hot and cold, day and night, low and high are inseparably connected. “Opposites are identical in nature but different in degree”, as the Kybalion quotes. If you write cold on one end of a sheet of paper and hot on the other end, and form a circle – they are side by side. When one extreme vanishes, the other one stops existing as well – like in the water experiment – both sides finally have the same temperature! Nature is always compensating and strives for balance.
The Law of Polarity in Reincarnation
In past life therapy this law can help to understand our present state we are in. If we become a victimizer in one lifetime, we experience the opposite side in the next life – then we are the victim – and even more: the former victimizer has the part of the victim now. We stay imprisoned in this ongoing hamster wheel of mutual victimizer. Victim shifts until we realize that we are repeating the same thing only from the opposite point of view over and over again and decide to leave this never ending story by forgiving both of us and let go – without any resentment. We become aware of our responsibility for all we say and how we act, considering the cosmic laws. We understand that the desire for revenge and vengeance provokes the opposite and finally bring us in the position of the victim – we are the loser then, in that way we can never win the game. The way we think, speak and act should be in favor for ourselves, because we create, what comes back to us – like a boomerang. We become aware that we are our own creators.
The pendulum sways from one side to the other, but the amplitudes diminish more and more until it comes to rest in the center. In Buddhism it is said, “Life is like the ever running circle of a tire – a never ending repetition of polarities. But we should strive to come to the hub. Only there we can overcome the necessity of reincarnation.”
The Principle of Polarity in Health
Our life has become restless and hectic nowadays, so we constantly trespass the law of polarity. But we don’t do so deliberately, we simply don’t realize, that the universal laws rule our life the same way they rule nature.
Frequently we live as if we would try to fasten the pendulum in one corner. For example we hurry through our day without stopping. We schedule every minute, our spare time is also covered with private appointments. Even during our holidays we are involved in all sorts of activities. Everything has to do with “Doing” – there is no room for “Being” which is as essential as the other pole for a healthy life. But we can’t go on like that for ever – life forces us to include, what we negotiated – a stroke, a heart attack or a blow of fate provoke the other pole – whether we accept it or not. The law is never personal, it just seeks balance. If we look at the increase of such life threatening diseases at a young age, from that we can conclude, how weird our society must be! If we look at the increasing rates of psychic disorders like burnout or depression, it is obvious that there must be something wrong with the way our professional lives are structured.
Here two extremes depend on our constitution. Every personality is different, for one this is an inspiring challenge, for the other one it is completely overwhelming. We have to find out, what suits us, where is our balance between “Doing” and “Being”. But to include both poles is vitally important to keep us healthy in body and mind.
This is a big issue also in the field of nutrition. We should find out and become sensible to, what and how much our body needs in specific situations. If we just stuff some junk food in our stomach, because it is quick and cheap and we have no time for a proper meal, we shouldn’t be astonished, if we are confronted with the consequences: diseases in various forms.
And all those diets, recommended in magazines and TV-shows can’t help us to reach our goal, if we blindly follow the instructions without regard to our individual system.
Medication is another issue, not regarding the poles. If doctors prescribe remedies the pharmaceutical industry recommends for this diagnosis, and they don’t pay attention to the patient’s personality, to other remedies he might take, the result is not an improvement in the patients’ health, but an aggravation of his condition! They support the pole of disease – and if this pole is overloaded, death is the other extreme! In statistics you find high death rates as a consequence of false medication, more death rates than there are in car accidents.
The Principle of Affinity as a Support
Even if we are aware of the law of polarity in our life, it isn’t easy anyway to realize when we are tending to move towards an extreme in our daily behavior. How can we avoid to be corrected in a painful way, how can we compensate before the pendulum swings to the other extreme?
In the second part we had talked about the Law of Vibration. Everything in creation has its own vibration causing a specific field. Those field are – beyond our awareness – communicating with one another. This results in sympathy or rejection. Similar vibrations attract one another, an incoherent vibration creates resistance.
As we don’t realize our own vibration most of the time, the best evidence is our surrounding. People or situations coming into our life recurrently show us our own condition. And – when a lot of anger or aggression is additionally arousing in us– this is the best proof, that it has something to do with us!
This is a great chance to dive inside and face our shadow, who is trying to drag us in an unhealthy place!
Or we meet just the opposite of what we are in at the moment – we meet people, we see as lazy or too slow, and don’t realize, that we are running like crazy through our day. Here too – if we get upset – it is a signal to look closer.
It could as well be, that we are obstructed again and again – stuck in a traffic jam, long queue in the supermarket, delays in all levels, then the universe is sending us very clear messages to slow down.
Life doesn’t knock us down without warnings! Many small signals precede the event to show us our grimness to fulfill the expectations we are confronted with. But we don’t see or ignore them. Then the Signals are increasing, becoming more and more obvious. If we don’t act appropriately to the warnings, the law of polarity is taking over.
Complement rather than Opposite
Does this conclude, that life is tossing us from one corner to the other? Are we at the mercy of the ups and downs until we leave this world? Life is a constant flow like a river, always changing, never standing still!
We haven’t come into this life to stick to the ground like an oyster as long as we live. We are here to make experiences to learn from, which may help us to become gradually wiser.
But this vibrant river of life shouldn’t be packed with rapids, which toss us around constantly. We can operate our ship consciously by avoiding to judge, to validate and attract situations reflecting our own behavior in the outer world.
As we have learned, that every extreme is just one aspect of one principle and in between endless shades are included, which we can use to soften the waves of the sea of life. We can become the observer from a higher point of view instead of running back and forth between the poles, which we could call thesis and antithesis as well. The synthesis is always situated at the top of the triangle, never on the same level as the two opposites. Only the top of the triangle enables us to come to a suitable solution and to a balance in our favor.
There is always a Second Pole
And even if life has confronted us with a very bad situation, we can be absolutely certain, that there is the opposite as well concealed in it. Nothing can be so awful, there must be the opposite – that’s the law! There must be something good in every fatal situation! This will be shown to us – often only some time later – but we will see if we are ready to receive the gift hidden in the disaster. Later on such dark periods can turn out to be the greatest blessing that could have ever happened to us.
Anita Moorjani is a living example: She was diagnosed with lymphatic cancer in a final stage. Being in a coma, her family members prepared themselves for her dying. But on the other side, she met a friend and her father, who had passed away some time ago. They told her, that a big purpose was waiting for her, if she agreed to go back to life. She accepted, woke up to the great astonishment of everyone. In a very short period of time, the tumors shrinked and vanished completely. Today she is presenting her story on stages worldwide – completely healthy – to show people a path out of a dead-end situation and encourages those, who seem to break apart under the weight of their sinister fate.
The more challenging a situation appears, the greater the gift, hidden behind it!
Comments are closed.