“It’s all just grist for the mill!”

Historic aphorism about information

Unifying Set Image – The Spade – Assimilation Axis – We can always dig down a bit deeper.

Common Color – Yellow – It is the color of sunlight, the source of all life processes on Earth. And, in metaphysical terms, it is the color of the 3rd Chakra – what we call the Power Chakra or the Core.

Background Image – Decaying leaves. Life is a cycle or continuous transformation and recycling of one energy source into another. With each successive generation, the elements of the original material and anything incorporated into it (like modified DNA or byproducts added). The choice of leaves also presents the idea of Overleaves as part of a physical system. Then, just as every life cycle has seasons (Card 70 – Time), so to do our understanding and use of our Personality go through their stages from composition to decomposition. Inculcation is the assimilation process of re-composition; changing the arrangement of what has been, with that which has been gathered: sometime adding and sometimes subtracting. What follows in the next generation is based upon the substance of its forbearers.

Corner Icons

• Upper Left: (Love Position) – Spade – Assimilation Axis Set –
• Upper Right: (Power Position) – Alpha – Omega – TAO – One of the Four Realms of Michael
• Lower Left: (Knowledge Position) – The Digestive System – Without assimilating the nourishment from food; well…the Earth would assimilate us.
• Lower Right: (Support Position) – Even though there is a repetition of the Spade, as there is on the other 3 Axis Cards, here an peculiar omission occurred. As referenced in the last sentence of the Shadow commentary for this card, the Triality symbol was the intended image in this position corner. Rather than change the image here, and perhaps confuse the user with that discrepancy, I’ve chosen to mention it and offer you a moment to ponder a thought that came to me: Perhaps triality is so completely invisible to us in the woven fabric of all we know, that its absence is an example of assimilation in action? Thoughts? I’d love to hear what you might think. Email me at questions@MichaelCards.com. Who knows maybe your input will be assimilated into the next addition of this book? 🙂

Card Images

Illuminated Position: Human knowledge is built upon what we have learned before. It is an accumulation and (currently, for the most part) a process of accumulation, absorption, and integration: all Assimilative mechanisms.  The image representing these processes portray three components for the inculcation of knowledge – 1) the learner – represented by the person “graduating to the next level” in the traditional cap and gown icon used in modern education. 2) the compass and protractor – the tools of measurement and design created and recreated with each new stage of awareness.  And 3) the chalk board (now an anachronism since the advent of “white boards” and electronic presentation screens), but still symbolic of the medium used between teacher and student to convey what has been learned. Yet, it is also a work space or artist’s canvas where activities of knowledge development are first put into 2 dimensional form. From the first cave art to the computer hologram and now 3D printer; tools of “mark-up” or prototyping have been crucial for us to transfer what has been in the infinite space of our imaginations (the Multiverse collectively or one’s Soloverse individually) and transform ideas into the material physicality. Sometimes, going further, our ability to Assimilate, then Inculcate what we have learned from it, leads to a recombination of ideas which germinate into a new concept, what metaphysicians choose to call a “thought-form”. Those ideas can reconfigure our understanding of the Universe itself. Think: Euclid, Archimedes, Copernicus, Newton, Darwin, Freud, Currie, Einstein, and Hawking. With their reimagining of the substance upon which we stand and from which we think, we feel differently about the Universe we live in. The proof of the power of such ideas is that their work has been seamlessly assimilated into world culture. So complete the adoption, and thorough the adaptation of skills and “truths” that each has become part of the “Collective Unconscious” to use a now familiar meme from Carl Jung.  And let us not forget that iconic individual inspire and lead to knowledge attributable to groups of people. In regards to electricity, for example we must recognize the components added each by: Franklin, Faraday, Bell, Tesla, Edison, and Marconi. This is how knowledge is propagated from teacher (role model) to student (adopter). For individuals, the use of all devices build with electricity from our toasters to computers, or the operation of vehicles, our expectations about there presence and use is so deeply inculcated with our Instinctive Centers (Card 42 – Instinctive) that we take “for granted” these things as part of our daily lives. On a larger scale in industrialized countries such systems as water availability, food distribution, or modes of transportation are depended upon to work without any one of us giving them “a second thought”. Indeed, most of us never give them a primary conscious thought to begin with. Translating this idea in terms developed by Learning Theory, our exposure to and complete immersion in these technologies and beliefs which belie them, have so habituated our use of them, and their ubiquitous presence so completely informs our expectations of their automatic function, that are we now wholly adapted to these embedded, increased abilities, and as such they are a part of our “unconscious competence.” In more colloquial terms, many would simplify this awareness and label it, (only barely correctly – I might add) as “common sense.” So the image I’ve chosen, as I’ve just briefly explored, underscores an entire series of amazing endeavors and milestone developments in human-creativity, born of our expansion of consciousness. But each has slipped silently into the background or our awareness, and programmed into our expectations, all because of the Assimilative process of Inculcation.

Shadow Position: Entropy is disintegration. An atomic breakdown and a break apart, it follows the Universe’s mechanical rules of physics, but implies no extraction of learning or change of function when form is lost. As a metaphorical commentary, the image of “fading away”, representing the negative pole of this Card, suggests that all of us may simply dissolve into the underlying fabric of another man-made domain of Assimilation: history. The organic process known as death, on a larger scale extinction, (Card 76 – Cycle Off), is the closest concept most people can relate to as entropy. However, there are those who maintain, and certainly the Michael Teaching’s theory of Soul Ages infers; that we are constantly in the flux between entropy (the disillusion of particles and disorganization of systems (chaos)) and a concept seldom discussed or given credence extropy (the formation of particles and the progressive expansion of a system (complexity). Between these two states of expansion and contraction lie the moments of stillness, of transition between states, which is the another conceptual element incorporated in the image of Triality.

Card messages in the Illuminated position.

+ Inculcation

(Digestion, inclusion, transition, absorption, distillation, osmosis, transformation, transmutation)

1. Digestion is something you don’t have to conscious attend to. Know that whatever can be absorbed will be done so whether you push it or not.
2. Inculcation is the harvest of the fruit of wisdom. Replanting those seeds from a previous harvest begins growth anew. The germ of new idea spawns a bud of design, then produces the flower of attraction until it has grown through all stages of experience. Direct this cycle and become a garden in yourself.
3. Digest what you need and excrete the rest.
4. The Universe is profound simplicity. Is it time to clear your closet or go on a cleanse? Keep only what you can use immediately.
5. Learn everything you can about the subject right now. Let it all congeal. What forms is a conclusion you can count on.
6. The Universe is profoundly simple! Find your most basic answer in your Soloverse (see the Zing-Click Meter)
7. Embed what you have just learned and make it second nature. Practice makes perfect (see Card 31 – Perseverance)
8. The germ of new idea spawns a bud of design. Then it produces the flower of attraction until it has grown through all stages of experience.
9. Chill-out and assimilate what has just happened. Wait a bit and let things settle out.
10. When you see this card, know that things are falling apart, and necessarily so. Let them unravel and allow the flow and natural processes to take hold. This is a period of incubation, not a failure.

Quotation Illustrating this concept…

• Pure truth cannot be assimilated by the crowd; it must be communicated by contagion. ~Henri Frederic Amiel
• Every acquisition of accommodation becomes material for assimilation, but assimilation always resists new accommodations.  Jean Piaget
• Great genius takes shape by contact with another great genius, but, less by assimilation than by fiction.  Heinrich Heine
  
• Do you know how to digest your food? Do you know how to fill your lungs with air? Do you know how to establish, regulate and direct the metabolism of your body / the assimilation of foodstuff so that it builds muscles, bones and flesh? No, you don’t know how consciously, but there is a wisdom within you that does know. ~Donald Curtis

Card messages in the Shadow position.

– Disintegration

(Indoctrination, destabilization, indistinct, reduction, dilute, entropy)

1. When all is finished and a form is no longer needed, disintegration crumbles assembled energy back into particles. Has your wisdom been dissipated by hardships?
2. Find the golden lessons in the rubble of past experiences. Apply them now.
3. Is it time to clear your closet or go on a cleanse? Anyway, you really might want to flush your system.
4. Entropy happens to all things inevitably. When you see this card know that things are falling apart, rightfully so. Letting them unravel allows for the flow of natural processes. This is not failure.
5. Digest what you need and excrete the rest. Keep only what you can use immediately.
6. Beware of the Borg in any society. They are the ones saying, “Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated.” Get away from people who conform to a reductive and rigid system of thought. They will drain the life force from you. Run!
7. Like a movie has fades between scenes it looks a bit dark right now. It is not the end. The story is about to continue with a change of scenery. Even the cast might change.

Quotation Illustrating this concept…

• “Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated.” Character of The Borg,  Star Trek
• A lot of people ask for assimilation. Assimilation means that you forget about your heritage.~ Thu Nguyen
• We have pacified some thousands of the islanders and buried them; destroyed their fields; burned their villages, and turned their widows and orphans out-of-doors; furnished heartbreak by exile to some dozens of disagreeable patriots; subjugated the remaining 10 millions by Benevolent Assimilation, which is the pious new name of the musket. And so, by these Providences of God — and the phrase is the government’s, not mine — we are a World Power. ~ Mark Twain
• “Reality is not protected or defended by laws, proclamations, ukases, cannons and armadas. Reality is that which is sprouting all the time out of death and disintegration.”~ Henry Miller

Relevance in the Michael Teaching

Assimilation, or the Neutral aspect, is the 4th Axis and is both the ending of a phase and beginning of a new phase. Unlike the other 3 Axes, the Assimilation Axis is a sole, unified, and undifferentiated energy which acts in a way similar to stem cells. Energetic material, acquired during a lifetime, needs to be digested and the separate elements merged into something useful. What is then learned and sorted may then become the catalyst for repair of some part that is damaged; or facilitate the emergence of some new aspect of the Self. This happens through the function of neutralization and the assimilation process concludes with the Personality (within a life) and the Essence (between lives) resolving the amalgamated material though a process called inculcation; i.e. the induction of the elemental qualities. One may think of it as extracting and sorting the nutrients from the food of experience for continued growth and maturity. Then, of course, whatever that is left over is discarded. However, deep within the Personal Unconscious, that which is collected by the Instinctive Center, files it all data away historical long-term memory; even though it is no longer of further importance or priority.

The Overleaves under this axis promote digestion of ideas, emotions, and experiences. Any which fall under this Axis also have an innate stillness or absence of motion until something (one of the other 6 columns of Overleaves) acts upon it. When an Essence chooses one of these qualities in a life, it points to a desire for the Personality to act as if it had a clutch (to use an automobile for analogy) and each event one does not automatically engage, but rather chooses to shift into one of the 6 drive gears. Such events are acquire for the Essence a type of learning that is more trial and error, but can seem rather instinctively reactive.

The Assimilation Axis corresponds to one of the 7 planes of existence (i.e. separation from the TAO);  the one knows as the Akashic Record or Plane. Like the central characteristic of any Axis, the Role, which in this case is the Scholar; the Akashic Plane acts as a storehouse or historic registry of information for the entire Universe and all its inhabitants. Though there is no “higher” or “exalted” part of the Assimilative Axis, some speculate that in one sense, its “higher octave” is the TAO itself.   This conclusion spawns from the notion that its’ neutrality and its containment of the accumulated data relating to the existence of an Essence (called a Grand Cycle) from the moment of a soul’s creation to the moment of total reunification and reintegration with the TAO, a complete Assimilation. Thus, true inculcation of all Essence lessons, reaching complete neutrality and lack of attachment to anything related to existence, the doorway though which all must pass.

In the end, what returns to the TAO is a unique expression of an assimilated form: complexity from chaos. Overleaves mixed into an infinite set of relationships, assimilate into forms that are best analogous to a mosaic.

Cultural Meaning

Perhaps one of the best dramatic character types ever formulated to represent the Assimilative Axis are the Vulcan’s enshrined within the Star Trek universe. A central credo of their philosophy so elegantly captures the Assimilative motif is that of the symbol for IDIC – Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combination. The statement claims the technical precision of a mathematical statement ∞ = infinity. Reversing back on itself to remind us that: anything is possible! Even if it might seem extremely improbable!

Systems Theory, most certainly a postulate from a Scholar (Card 4), pronounces the interplay between two forces which exist within the third the Universe itself. The two are the Yin (Card 54) and Yang (Card 55) of evolution in a dynamic system: chaos into complexity; and eventually the latter disintegrating back into the former. The Earth itself is such a system. It begins with a raw mass of molten chaos in the form of lava, which flows in patterns of seeming random placement but which lay the initial matrix from which all geology and life will follow.  And in the end, perhaps countless eon’s of geologic time, land is reclaimed back to a molten state. And eventually, the process begins again. It is the alpha and omega of creation.

Science designates this cycle of creation and cataclysm the inevitable force of Evolution. Christianity proclaims this cycle under the purview of Jesus. As the Son of God, he alone is responsible for creation and then the bringer of Judgment Day at the other end.  When a war these two schools of thought, representing the rational and the mystical, or the mind and the heart, cannot find common ground; there is no assimilation and thus no growth – just polarization! When polarized, there can be no learning just reactivity and resistance, no advancement just stagnation. (Card 14) Yet, when assimilation – whereby a catalyst is included and a third way produced; generates the possibility for advancement up the spiraling wheel of fortune we call existence. But there is another form of assimilation, one that human beings have tended to favor through many cultures and points of history: annihilation – to render something, or someone, completely inert or extinct.

We stand at an Assimilative moment in the human epoch. Our choices are to learn and include -extropy, or watch the destruction of things to be – entropy. Regardless of the path chosen, to the degree we exercise active choice rather than allow the consequences of previous ones; we are reminded of another Truth often invoked by another set of characters from Star Treks universe: “resistance if futile, you will be assimilated.”

The Meta State – Distance and Perspective

Assimilation, is the ability to dissolve and incorporate necessary extracts from a solution or situation. This is the process of digestion that leads to new energy and eventually, the budding of new growth. Though some things may be hard to swallow or breakdown the process is completely without bias or preference. It is neutral in that it acts upon all things without deviation. With this definition in place, let us assume that one could ingest the communications of another person without any bias or distortion regardless of how difficult it is to chew or breakdown the words you are hearing. This ability has been called the Meta[1] state.

[1] Coined by Heidi Fox and Andrew Kaiser in their work: Loving Communication.

Science designates this cycle of creation and cataclysm the inevitable force of Evolution. Christianity proclaims this cycle under the purview of Jesus. As the Son of God, he alone is responsible for creation and then the bringer of Judgement Day at the other end.  A war these two schools of thought, like the rational and the mystical or the mind and the heart, cannot find common ground, their is no assimilation and thus no growth just polarization.

When polarized, their can be no learning just reactivity and resistance, no advancement just stagnation. Yet, assimilation whereby something is included and a third way produced reflects the possibility of advancement. But there is another form of assimilation, one human beings have tended to favor through many cultures and points of history: annihilation – to render completely inert.

We stand at an Assimilative moment in the human epoch. Our choices are to learn and include -extropy, or watch the destruction of things to be – entropy. Either way, as another set of characters from Star Treks universe remind us: “you will be assimilated.”

To be Meta is primarily the ability to both witness the emotional intensity attached to incoming information, but not allow its’ unique distortion to go unnoticed, or to engage an automatic strategy of reaction or retaliation. In doing so, you momentarily arrest the mind’s desire to interpret a person’s meaning, or the intent behind it, through your own filters. In Metaness, one develops the ability to hear content (the words spoken and tone of voice) and context (the emotional charge and unspoken possible motives propelling the words.) Your Being is present, and its’ ability to think “outside-the-box” more facile and available to you. To be Meta, the most important thing is find neutrality, but not passivity. All the Overleaves in the Assimilative Axis are in a sense strategies or frames of reference which provide a moment of delay for any immediately reactive action. Said another way, the built in strategy of the Assimilative Axis itself, is to assist you in becoming aware of your instinctive strategies rather than automatically deploying them from habit. Yet, at the same time, it activates your animal instincts to be on high alert: ready, steady and capable of being used with precision. Using another parlance, it is being present with the other person, while at the same time being aware of all of the incoming stimuli in the situation, like the image of the mountain lion: vigilant, totally observant and still; but with all attention focused. The actions (and lack thereof) which comprise the meta response begin activating your listening (hearing is a physical capacity – listening requires attention and intention). Track the words and the emotional vibration they are conveyed upon. Watch the gestures and posture of the speaker or of the actors in the situation, which of course if Observation Mode. (Card 35)

The central skill and muscle to be developed is to actively disengage the clutch on your judgment gears, not so much to coast but to become motionless. Some might see the paradox of action here: to be actively still? It represents the two aspects of control: self control, but also release of situational control by you, in so far as one does not try to steer or manipulate what the other person is trying to convey. Ironically, being meta tends to release one from any preconceived strategy and thus releases one to be more adaptable and responsive (Card 21 – Pragmatist).

The Brain is a Part of the Assimilative Axis – The Mind an aspect of the Expression Axis

Like all life vertebrate life forms on planet Earth, and some invertebrates, we share a central nervous system. The nervous system collects sensory data from all parts of the body and relay’s it to the organ which represents the highest evolutionary development to date: the human brain. Our system governing “wetware”, as it is sometimes referred to by computer designers – making it analogous to the hardware of machines; is the electrical transceiver of information between the biology of the body, and the quantum mind[1] which transmits between various Planes of Existence.

Understanding this distinction is fundamental to a metaphysical understanding of the interplay between physical life (Card 56 – Personality) and an eternal existence of Essence (Card 58 – Soul).  Engrams of the brain, called neural pathways are continuously in flux: forming, deepening, or shifting dendritic connections, but also fading or becoming integrated into a newer, sometimes more intricate – sometimes less -formations of neurons. Those formed and reformed structures become a point of emanation which transmits a vibration that will resonate with similar structures in either physical or quantum memory. It operates much like a key word search in a database or in a search engine on the Web, scanning the Internet as a whole. As we change, particularly in terms of acquiring experience, intellectual information, all processed through the filter one calls aging; the number, type, and how those associations activate vary, but tend, to be more refined, not less. In other words, as one grows-up in body and older in Soul Age (see Soul Age Group), what is transmitted to Essence from Personality will add, and presumably clarify, misunderstanding and in many cases resolve it. Yet, it is not always the case to be sure. One can classify into types: simple ignorance (what is previously unknown or not experienced), that which is Karmic (Card 65) (emotionally charged events resulting in misinterpretation because of partial completion) or self-karmas’ (Card 66) (persistent patterns which function to draw attention to the Self because the effects it reinforces a fixed perspective or set of behaviors.) This information exchange between brain and mind is the process which facilitates the bidirectional transmission for recording new ideas and experiences; but also sending back additional knowledge to complete an otherwise incomplete perspective. The latter is what one can call “past-life healing” or “completing a karmic ribbon”. (Card 65)

Of course, completion does not always gain us resolution, (Card 76 – Cycle-Off) but it is possible to at least conclude upon a partial acceptance called closure. In both cases the process is best, and most simply, classified as maturity. Assimilating what has happened to oneself during a particular life is bringing self-awareness into play. The alchemy that understanding brings to Personality, in the end, allows it to merge with Essence in peace.  In no way, does understanding downplay or minimize the degree of pain one may have endured from whatever source. Full assimilation does not mean one is unscathed, or for that matter unmoved by the love one experiences; it simply means one can leave that lifetime, unattached to whatever might have been unfinished.

In this final process of crossing over, incorporation of an entire life’s experience gives rise to the formation of the next incarnations design (See Soul Age Group). It is how the continuing cycle of metamorphosis enables the caterpillar to become the butterfly. And in turn the butterfly to deposit the seeds of the next generation before its dying breath. You are both the caterpillar and the butterfly; but also the seeds which Essence incubates for the next iteration of the cycle to continue. Your information is held in the both Akashic Record and in the memories of those you have influenced.

[1] Refer to the discussion had by Deepak Chopra and the other Indian physicist. (find it)

by Stephen Cocconi © 2011, Updated, 2024

For a Motivation Cards or Channeled Consultation call: 209.768-4956 or email Stephen at channeling@themichaelteaching.com