Exploring Beyond the Maps

February 16, 2024

José Stevens

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a new article by José Stevens, PhD

Maps are essential for locating yourself and finding where you have been and where you are headed. This is true for google or Apple maps and it is equally true for maps of consciousness. However, your smartphone map will not tell you that there is a spectacular sunset going on at mile marker 35 because this is outside its purview. Something like a rainbow is temporary, so it will not be on your map either. No one expects a road map to give you this information but people sometimes do expect their consciousness maps to tell them more than they are designed for.

There are many consciousness maps that are very useful and can give you important information about where you are in your life. For example, the overleaves of the Personessence chart is an extraordinarily useful map. It can tell you many things about the general terrain of your life. It can tell you that you have a goal of acceptance or growth, an attitude of idealist or pragmatist, or a mode of caution or passion. It will even give you the positive and negative poles for each so you know what your options are but it will not tell if you are in the positive or negative right now or anytime for that matter. You have to observe and determine for yourself where you are. Similarly, the map that tells you where you are in your seven main initiations in life, the seven internal monads as they are called, can be enormously helpful. When it tells you that you come into adulthood at age 35 you can determine where you are in reference to it. If you are 28, you can then accept the fact that there is more growing to do in the next seven years and if you haven’t found your life task work yet, that is okay, it is still early. However, this map will not tell you whether you are making the best use of your big inventory at age 56. That you have to look and determine for yourself or perhaps get help from a guide.

Astrology too is a map to your personality and what the influences are but it also will not tell you how you are managing the different planetary positions with reference to your various houses. This is also true of the Enneagram map to your tendencies and overall approach to life. It can’t tell you how you are choosing to respond because this is up to you. A roadmap will not tell you if you will arrive at your destination. It only can indicate how far it is and if all goes well what time you can hope to arrive if you keep driving. There are no maps I know of that will tell you how you are choosing to respond, they only show you what your choices are.

When we are born onto this planet each life, we arrive with a rudimentary map to help us navigate our lives. We are not just dropped willy-nilly with no direction, no support, no marching orders so to speak. The map we are given is given to us by our own essence selves to help us survive. As we navigate childhood periodically we are provided with various more sophisticated maps that help us navigate ever more complex lessons and life situations. This is where soul level comes in. Very young souls are not able to comprehend more sophisticated maps and so they retain the rudimentary ones provided as children throughout their lives and this accounts for their lack of sophistication. As the soul grows older and more complex through incarnations ever more complex maps are provided by the higher self, essence or Spirit if you will. Think of it this way. At first you are provided with a very rudimentary road map. This map is very helpful but does not have extra information. As you grow older in soul age with more lifetimes of experience, various chunks of information are included in the maps that you download as you live your life. So, elevation may be added, important landmarks, less traveled dirt roads may be added as well as weather conditions and on and on until your map is very complex and informative. Little by little all maps are upgraded either very slightly or in some cases comprehensively and this accounts for the quantum leaps people sometimes make.

These layers are added as you gain experience. They are provided to you in your dreams and as you sleep and periodically you may wake up in the morning with a new download. Your essence self is good at knowing exactly what you need at the right time. If you cannot comprehend certain information, it will not be provided on your map until you are ready. This is not unlike the downloads of upgraded applications that you receive for your computer or smart phone during the night. The only difference is that the maps you receive from Spirit are individually tailored for you based on how your skills are developing. Similar to computer software, there are certain points where the spiritual software or map you are using is no longer viable for upgrades. It has reached its limit and a whole new generation of software needs to replace it. As you know, these major jumps only happen occasionally. Most of the downloads involve smaller fixes or improvements to the software you are using. Mostly, these upgrades are made without you even noticing. The big ones you are notified about. In the case of paradigm shifts on the planet, you will definitely know one way or the other that one is occurring.

The transition we are in on the world stage is one of these occasional paradigm shifts or whole new software replacements. We are going into an entirely new generation of the program or map for humanity if you will. Few of your programs will work anymore in the new system. Try as you might, they will fail one after the other. This means that almost all of your applications have to be upgraded and reengineered to be used in the new system. When this happens there is predictably great grumbling, some glitches, and great sighs and groans as each person struggles to adapt to the new system on their computer or phone. Never mind that the new system is dramatically better and allows for many more possibilities than before. Adapting always takes some time and energy and many of us resist it like crazy at first until we learn, develop new skills, and are smoothly integrated with the new system. The difference between technical software and our personal upgrades delivered by the higher self is that the technical upgrades from Apple or Google etc. need fixes but the ones from essence are always perfect.

Now let us imagine ourselves as the engineers of the new system. In order to upgrade to a new system, we first have to look at all the ways the old system has failed us and all the shortcomings of that system, given the new era we are in. Maybe it does not operate fast enough to handle the huge new downloads and experiences coming that we need to use it for. The new system needs way more memory, speed, and simple shortcuts or hacks to handle new complexities. With technical upgrades on our devices we also need new firewalls and levels of security. If we do not look at the way the old system is failing us with the new conditions then we cannot know what to build into the new system. So, this takes an arduous process of running the old system and taking a very complete inventory of its failings and we may be horrified as we do this. We may forget we are doing the inventory to build a new and better system and just become lost focusing on the failings of the old one. This is what is now happening to the human race as we inventory how our governments and economic systems are creating poverty and inequality and sparking mass migrations as people move to what they believe are safer and better living conditions only to be turned away by walls and guns. We are finding that good medical care is no longer available because of insurance companies’ policies and schools are failing our students due to so many new stresses and cultural unanticipated conditions like novel coronavirus epidemics, book bans, cancelled diversity programs, poor teacher pay, old infrastructure, and political interference.

The conclusion that many people have reached is that all systems are failing or about to fail and this spells the end for the human race. This is a faulty conclusion and unfortunate because it distracts us from what is actually happening and as a result it reinforces a lie, that all is lost. I say reinforces the lie but it does not knock out the truth because truth cannot be knocked out, just obscured with blindness and perhaps delay. Think of it this way: Let’s say you have arranged to stay at a friend’s rustic cabin in the woods for a couple of weeks. There is actually a lake in front of your friend’s rustic cabin but it is obscured by some trees and upon arriving you might believe there is no water source when an abundance of water is actually readily available. You struggle along with just the water you brought until that runs out. After a day or so you might begin making plans to leave the cabin because you believe there is no water to be had. Your growing belief and lack of curiosity are to blame for your mistake because if you looked around you would surely find the lake. As your thirst grows, your desperation becomes ever greater leading to further blindness about the huge resources available.

There are huge resources available to us during this transitional time frame but the belief that there are no options is creating disillusionment, discouragement, and suffering. This is because we are fixated on the unsustainability of our failing systems and not on the replacement of these systems with new sustainable ideas. For example, what if we were to simply replace the profit motive and value with a service motive for the entire business world? What if corporations were rewarded for being more creatively service-oriented by slashing prices, raising quality, and selling more goods to more people at reasonable prices allowing companies to make at most a 5% profit on everything they produce? This was the model for Ben and Jerry’s ice cream that made them both multi-millionaires. This was the original idea behind competition between multiple companies before merges, fixed pricing, and bought legislation corruptly was allowed to undermine the whole system. Here are just a few what if’s that might be considered in a new map to the future.

What if companies were to compete over who produced the highest quality with the greatest and most affordable services?

What if companies collaborated to produce new innovative sustainable products? Without the greed motive and fear of loss this could be a boon to companies and customers alike.

What if the educational system was free for everyone, geared toward truly producing an educated public and the elite, expensive status-oriented schools were a thing of the past? What if the motive was to identify the life task of each student and prepare them for their true work, their true, life purpose? What if these new educational centers gave credit for real life experience?

What if the privatization of prisons for profit was eliminated and instead all efforts were made toward re-socializing and re-training prisoners for productive life endeavors? What if the prison system were to eliminate punishment as a motive to handle prisoners and prisoners were treated humanely and with respect to teach them to do likewise? What if we gave them animals to raise and nurture? This has been tried in Chile and the results are incredible.

What if it was agreed that all corruption would be eliminated from all aspects of the culture? AI could be given this job easily, overseen by a court of real persons in case of lack of clarity.

In fact, what if we were to clearly designate what AI could be helpful with and what it should not participate in? That would be an interesting challenge.

These are just a very few ideas. How about a whole lot more coming from the citizens at large? Naturally they would stir much debate and hidden problems would be revealed to be dealt with. Isn’t that our job? Let’s get started.

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maps of consciousness

José Stevens

José Luis Stevens, PhD is the president and co-founder (with wife Lena) of Power Path Seminars, an international school and consulting firm dedicated to the study and application of shamanism and indigenous wisdom to business and everyday life. José completed a ten-year apprenticeship with a Huichol (Wixarika) Maracame (Huichol shaman) in the Sierras of Central Mexico. In addition, he is studying with Shipibo shamans in the Peruvian Amazon and with Paqos (shamans) in the Andes in Peru. In 1983 he completed his doctoral dissertation at the California Institute of Integral Studies focusing on the interface between shamanism and western psychological counseling. Since then, he has studied cross-cultural shamanism around the world to distill the core elements of shamanic healing and practice. He is the author of twenty books and numerous articles including Encounters With Power, Awaken The Inner Shaman, The Power Path, Secrets of Shamanism, Transforming Your Dragons and How To Pray The Shaman’s Way.