The 2 Forces: Positive and Negative

Everything Starts from Desire

The previous section explained that desire is the cause of Existence, as the Absolute splitting Itself up in order to view Itself and thus appreciate Itself.

The only ingredient needed by the Creator to generate Existence is the Desire for It.

We observe this in ourselves. Before we do anything, we have to want or need to do it.

The longer we retain the desire for a thing, the longer we keep that thing.

When we totally lose the desire for what we are doing, then we stop doing it.

If we are passionate about what we do, then our actions reward us, giving incentives to keep us doing what we are doing.

Within Existence-Consciousness, this Desire becomes a Force that pushes aethereal ideas down the 4 Elements to make them physically real.

If there were only 1 Force, then:

• all ideas would be converted into reality in no time
• Existence would turn static right away

It would be like us waking up with a desire to do just 1 thing and then going back to sleep for the rest of the day after we finish it.

Yet we obviously see a lot of dynamism in our universe along with some staticity.

Likewise, we ourselves are never satisfied to do just 1 thing in a day.

The Positive and Negative

Therefore, there are 2 Forces in Existence-Consciousness to enable the transition from the Absolute One (Nirguna) to the Supreme Many (Saguna):

1. One to divide and separate the Supreme into parts – we call this the Negative Force
2. Another to unify those parts back into the Supreme to create a great loop – we call this the Positive Force

It is these 2 Forces that create disturbances in the ‘flatline’ of Pre-Existence to give it life as the dynamic waves Existence.

Without these disturbances the Supreme Entity reverts to the peaceful Absolute Entity without Existence. This is the goal of Yoga.

These 2 Forces are called:

• Yang and Yin in Taoism
• Shiva and Shakti in Hinduism
• Love and Strife in Empedocles’ philosophy

Love unites all into One. The same One is ripped through the hate of Strife. The One grows from the Many. The Many, again, springs from primeval scattering of the One.

Empedocles

On Nature

According to Pythagoras, the world was divided into opposite powers:

• the “one” was a better monad, light, right, equal, stable and straight
• the “other” was an inferior duad, darkness, left, unequal, unstable and movable

Propery

The Life of Pythagoras by Propery

There are 2 forces present at the same time. The notion of both is the same notion. But it has passed out of its unity into duality… The elements when set up as independent, pass directly over into their unity. Their unity passes directly into its explicit diversity. The diversity passes back once again into the reduction to unity.

Hegel

The Phenomenology of Spirit

These 2 Forces fight each other, leading to the polarity within the 5 Elements:

Duality from the Two Forces

The Negative force splits the theoretical Absolute Entity into a dualistic Creator, as the real Supreme Entity.

This latter Entity creates Existence by making imperfections of Itself, as Its dualistic ideas and feelings:

• The creation of the idea of beauty also leads to the creation of ugliness.
• The creation of order also leads to the creation of disorder.
• The creation of tastiness also leads to the creation of blandness.

Since the One exists, then the Whole has the One and Existence as Its parts. Each of these parts have both the One and Existence as its parts and is at the least made up of two parts. The same principle goes on forever. Every part always has these two parts because existence always involves one, and one involves being, so that one is always disappearing, and becoming two. This makes the One infinite in multiplicity. The One has Existence and therefore exists, leading it to become many.

Parmenides

Parmenides Simplified by Plato

The Positive Force: Shiva, Yang, Love

The nature of the Positive Force is to unify identities. This leads to integration which implies absorption, learning, or realization. We call this the Positive Direction.

This is why the Positive Force is the intelligent side of the 2 Forces and is associated with consciousness and subtlety.

Moreover, Its unifying nature allows Existence to:

• loop back on Itself, creating the Cycle of Creation
• stay together, creating the Conservation Laws

Without the Positive Force, Existence would fizzle out into the Absolute immediately after creation.

The Negative Force: Shakti, Yin, Strife

The nature of the Negative Force is to split up identities.

It began by splitting up the Absolute into parts called monads which are idea-objects.

This ability to split up identities implies that it has a force that is stronger than that which binds the identity.

And so we say that the Negative is crude power that leads to destruction and dissociation and change. We call this the Negative Direction.

This is why historically It was assigned a female quality that is powerful yet creative – the destruction of the old leads to the creation of the new.

This dissociation is also the basis of dynamism – an Existence without any change remains frozen.

This frozeness is different from staticity which implies a deadlock or cancelling-out of equally strong forces.

Without the Negative Force, Existence would not begin since there would be nothing to destabilize the Absolute.

All Things Can Perceive, But Some Might Not Be Able To Express

The dynamics of the 2 forces implies that everything is conscious, having the ability to perceive.

It is the inability of some identities to express those perceptions, due to the influence of the Negative Force, that makes things not seem to have any perception-ability (not be aware).

But the fact that they can react to actions done onto them is proof that they are aware or can perceive.

For example, ice thaws when heated.

This reaction is proof that the ice atoms were able to perceive the heat and reacted accordingly.

There is nothing that does not react to actions done on it. This is proof that the universe is aware and conscious even if their reactive potential is very limited.

The perception-ability or consciousness in a piece of paper is proven when it:

• falls to the ground (reacts to gravity)
• is lifted by the air (reacts to aerodynamics)
• burns from a flame (reacts to thermodynamics)
• is cut by scissors (reacts to contact forces)
• and so on

A piece of paper that does not react to gravity, air, scissors, fire, etc has no perception-ability.

But such a paper has never been observed and therefore does not exist.

This removes any mystical connotation on what consciousness or the perceiver is. Instead, the mystery is with:

• the nature of the mind that houses it, and
• what its perceptions are (i.e. how does a piece of paper feel about being cut, burned, or written on?)