This intuition, mentioned by one of the greatest minds of the recent human history, is precisely what the soul uses as its mental tool. The soul perceives and communicates with our lower mind – the one that operates within the matter – using our sixth sense.

     Only through the awakening of our intuitive faculty, we can fully perceive the natural laws governing everything what we call reality.

     In the very ancient times, when the man-made laws were in the period of gestation, the conscious life according natural laws was a fact. The sacred connection with universe, and thus with the nature around, was actually the main guarantee for the psychic survival of an individual. The world was animated by the deeper meaning, The life’s cyclic nature was framed in various rituals, aimed to celebrate the sacredness of a cosmic rhythm and man’s participation within it.

     The unexpected deer passing by, or the flock of black ravens flying around the settlement, received as deep attention as the inescapable fact of death, or the peculiarity of every single birth within the tribe. All events occurring within or without, being it facing danger during hunting in the daytime, or the same sensation received in the dream by night, were woven into the en-souled fabric of life, that was the main sacred sustainer of wholeness. The boundaries between two worlds were loosened.

     Since the dawn of our intellectual faculty, the intuitive sense of belonging to the greater whole has been put aside for our desire to dominate. As a consequence, the inclination towards separation might take off, being it one of the results of a constant process of evolution. In the last thousands of years, we have learnt about the power, influence and control that we can establish – to some level – upon the nature, yet, we still do not know much about the laws that govern it.

     Consequently, as we are a part of nature ourselves, which once we decided to separate from, we are also living in ignorance towards our own rhythm. The need to dominate and to control the forces, from the – apparently – unpredictable – natural world, goes hand in hand with the illusion of the capacity to rule over our deeper motivations and psychic cycles. Yet, we do not know even about its existence.

     The Natural Laws, however, do not need man’s intervention or validation of them. Neither it is possible for us to control them (although the practitioners of magic assume they can). Humans, by being a part of nature themselves, are under the constant influence of these principles of life. All what we can do, is to fill our days with awareness and humbly obey our cyclic patterns. They will gently unfold their resonance with everything else that surrounds us, but only if we dare to make this first step to re-connect again with sacredness of Universe.

     Our soul – no matter if we are conscious about it or not – is under the process of constant evolution structured accordingly to the Natural Laws. The 7 main principles of the universe, enlisted below and very briefly described, are the strings that are played by our soul in every second of its eternal life.

1. THE PRINCIPLE OF MENTALISM

“THE ALL is MIND; The Universe is Mental.” — The Kybalion.

     All that appear to us as material spectrum of reality, is permeated with spiritual mental substances, that are the main sustainers of what we perceive as a matter.

     In Greek philosophy, Plato was the first thinker to propose the world structure based on transcendent forms – an abstract ideas of things that already exists – as the metaphysical templates of the actual reality. With this intuitively born theory, Plato got very close to The Principle of Mentalism, which could also be compared to the Anima Mundi concept, The World Soul, that animates – and thus is contained within – all creation.

How does it apply to our daily perception?

     “Mental” means “build on thought”, so if we apply this quality to our daily experiences, we could clearly see that we interpret all that happens to us, using our mental capacities. We frame our occurrences in thoughts, an abstract psychic substances that actually give shape to our way of perceiving reality. Everyone has their own “lenses” through which the final picture manifests itself.

     Form many years, the trend of “thinking positively” has appeared in the therapeutic circles gaining many active practitioners and opponents. Naturally, to wiggle with that catchy phrase back and forth, without any deeper background nor regard for personal experiences, can bring more damage than actual benefits.

     Yet, there’s a profound truth that lies behind this over-used slogan which cannot be denied: it is the thought that shapes the matter, so being positively-inclined in facing the world, will remarkably change the outcomes of our day-to-day experiences.

     As a regular human beings – without any occult training, nor karmic stories of being advanced yogi in our last 10 life times – we can not simply manifest our desires through just thinking about them. The strength of mind must be trained accordingly to our individual evolution, and thus is in itself the very subject of the laws that govern our existence. Yet, if one dares to venture into the more subtle realities that build our perception, one can definitely find direct proofs for the mental structure of universe.

     The effectiveness of prayer is one of them, as the thought infused with emotional intention eventually gains enough power to become externally manifested. Obviously, the intention can not go against the Natural Laws, which grant the smooth flow of existence.

     Even the black magician, who proudly use his own long-trained mental capacities to influence the life’s current, will have to pay one day for causing the state of unbalance.

2. THE PRINCIPE OF CORRESPONDENCE

“As above, so below, as below, so above. As within, so without, as without, so within.”

     This law emphasizes the intrinsic interrelation between all the layers that our existence is composed from: our mental expression, the physical body, our spiritual realm, etc. All bears the very same patterns, so by observing one, we can reach a clearer understanding of another. Despite our mind being very limited in connecting to different levels of life’s manifestation, for example the world of – so called – spirits, by studying the processes that undergoes in one spectrum, we can learn about what occurs in the plane, that we are not able to access using our mental tools.

     Astrology, as a science of correspondences, is one of the best examples of how this law manifests directly in our lives. By looking into the macroscopic condition of the universe, we are able to find an exact resemblance with the microscopic spectrum of our inner psychic depths.

     By diving deeper into the fabric of our reality, we can come to a conclusion that the planet in its physical appearance has no direct influence upon us. It is not an astronomic body called Saturn with its gaseous physical structure the one, who will make your life a bit more difficult for few months, nor it is the red planet Mars the one who will deliberately kick you off the stairs, so you can put blame on it for your broken leg.

     Thanks to the principle of correspondence, a good astrologer will however know, that the planets show an exact mirror of the greater energies that are constantly at play, shaping everything that surrounds us, and thus our psychic constitution. The planets are symbols, which correspond to something that we still do not have words for. Therefore, symbology of a zodiac is in use, thanks to which we can relate our experiences to those psychic energies called archetypes. The whole mythology is based on stories about human condition, which is a direct effect of the greater forces shaping our experiences of being human. By following the hermetic axiom “as above so below”, we can admire this eternal play looking at reciprocal connection between stellar objects, as they are the manifestation of infinite elements of human condition.

How we can apply this principle without being acquainted with astrology?

     As example, we can look at our own body, its structures and patterns that correspond with the structures and patterns of external world which -apparently- does not relate to us. The menstrual cycle is mirrored by the Moon Phases, while our circulatory system resembles the topographical depiction of river and streams running through our lands. We breath in and breath out, in the same way as the waves hit the sandy beach, and as the sun rises and hides every single day behind the horizon.

     In Hindu cosmology, it is said that the whole universe is subjects to the periods of creation and dissolution, that some scriptures call “the days and nights of Brahma”.

Our emotions could be beautifully mirrored in the surface of water, how it fluctuates, move in the currents and floods the river banks.

     Our entire life seems to be reflected in the four season cycle, which constant flow is repeated year after year. Also, if we would pay more attention to the astrological seasons that we are undergoing, we would observe that we are naturally more inclined to ponder upon death during Scorpio 29 days from second half of October to the first half of November. The temporal death of nature around corresponds with our psychic whereabouts, in the similar way like the the late April fool bloom turns our inner focus into cherishing simple pleasures (Taurus).

     If we are able to see all the spectrum of reality through mutual correspondences, we will gradually gain a necessary wisdom not only about our own processes. We will also start to admire the magnificence of the entire creation and our deeper connection to it.

3. THE PRINCIPLE OF VIBRATION

“Nothing rests; everything moves; everything vibrates.”

     What has been declared already two thousand years ago, as one of the basic principle of nature, was finally confirmed by scientific discoveries within the field of quantum physics, in the last century.

     It may seem inconceivable at first, that the solid objects that we are surrounded with, are in constant movement. Yet, the science already managed to verify it through the research of the atomic structure of matter. The atoms vibrate at various degrees of frequencies, move at different speeds, and thus are energetically in constant fluctuations. There is absolutely nothing, that rests; nothing that would be lack of movement. Everything around us is a vibration, which manifests itself through various levels of frequencies.

The opening chapter of Gospel of St. John says:

” In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”

     The word is a sound, and the sound, is a vibration, thanks to which everything that exists, manifests itself accordingly to the density of these pulsations. What makes matter and the substance of a spirit so distinctive, and -apparently- unrelated, is precisely the degree of intensity of vibration. Its frequency will determine, with the most unimaginable details, how the energy will be manifested: will it be shaped in iron-solid matter or rather maintain a more gaseous form?

     The transition form one state of aggregation to another goes hand in hand with the change of the vibratory rates of the atoms involved.

Then, how is this law experienced by the soul and how it could be applied to our daily life?

     The ways how we respond to life and how broad our perspectives are, depend on the frequency of the energy that endows us with life and consciousness – the soul itself. Therefore, despite how trivial and “new-agy”, “to raise one’s vibration” may sound, this – perhaps overused – slogan bears certain truths.

     In modern astrology all the signs have their lower and higher expression. Leo, for example, might have a bad reputation of being too self-absorbed, too self-centered or too bossy. Yet, some leonian individuals are tuned into the higher vibratory rate of their own sign, by becoming the most inspiring and humble example of what it means to be creative in one’s leadership. The difference lies precisely in the levels of frequencies of the energetic psychic structure called “Leo”.

     The soul, through the appliance of the Law of Attraction, chooses to be surrounded by individuals, who share a similar vibrational field. Consequently, the energy that we emanate with, is the main result of who we want to spend our days with and what type of events we unconsciously invite to our lives.

4. PRINCIPLE OF POLARITY

“Everything is Dual; everything has 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-truths; all paradoxes may be reconciled.”

     There’s nothing surprising to the fact that day is always accompanied by night, and the birth will always end up with death. The brilliance of light would be unrecognizable without the previous experience of darkness and the electricity could not be produced without the alternating conditions between two opposite poles of the magnets. Notwithstanding, the inherent mystery that lies within the 4th principle is a bit different.

     The law states that everything is built upon a constant play between polarities, but what is the most significant, is that those -apparently- opposed poles are themselves extremes of the very same thing.

     In the same way that a stick has two ends, our physical life has them too. The 24 hours that we count from one sunrise to the next one, includes also the darkness of night. This framing of time into 24 hour-long days, shows that once, by observing the natural world, we collectively agreed upon this essential aspect of duality, wherein one extreme complements the other, creating one harmonious form.

     Those, who have once experienced what passion is, instinctively might have grasped that love lies not so far away from hate. Being mutually opposing in their expression, these emotional states are actually two extremities of the one disposition: the affection that we show toward or against someone/something.

     If we start to hate, we unconsciously make a decision, what degree of affection we want to focus upon. By choosing hate, we place ourselves in the lower, darker space and – through the Principle of Vibration- we are instinctively starting to tune in to the similar frequencies emanating from what is negative. Unwittingly, we attract the very same psychic energies, that we self has been generating. That is why, it is so beneficial to reflect upon the degree, we heat up or cool down our emotions to. The skills of recognizing polarities as a mutually opposed stages of one process, gives a opportunity to live a live with more inner peace.

     In the recent history of psychology, the Jungian term of owning one’s own shadow, turned into an essential requirement for undergoing the process of individuation: the blending of our shiny virtues with dark aspects of our nature, in order to may live out our highest potential.

     Our conscious – awake – state of being corresponds to the daily beam of sunlight. Yet, at night, when our diurnal awareness is switched off, the unconsciousness invites us for a ride through the dark fields of our shadows. Both polarities constitute ourselves, framing our experiences into one undivided piece of art: our life, painted with the chiaroscuro techniques.

     When the shadow becomes aware that is a cast by light, the reconciliation of the opposites becomes possible.

5. THE PRINCIPLE OF RHYTHM

“Everything flows, out and in; Everything has its tides; All things rise and fall; The pendulum swing manifests in everything; The measure of the swing to the right is the measure of the swing to the left; Rhythm compensates.”

     Each manifestation of life has its own rhythm of unfoldment, which grants to the constant process of evolution its particular speed, esoterically framing our journey in a form of facing-up spiral.

     The Law of Vibration emphasizes a ceaseless movement. Now, thanks to the 5th Principle, we can observe, feel or hear its rhythm.

     The rhythmical flows and inflows form a basis of our existence to such extent, that we hardly recognize its tides, allowing ourselves to be unawarely swept out by them. If we are deaf to our individual rhythm, we tend to loose control of our unraveling psychic melodies, and thus we make our evolution fully dependent on other, external factors.

     The four seasons of the year are a result of all pervading cyclical beats. We are consciously witnessing them while admiring autumnal colors of decay, or while absorbing the excitement of the new beginnings in early spring. As we can observe, our own bodies – without our special approval – follow a very similar cyclic pattern.

     History shows us that every – even the greatest- empire is subject to an eternal rhythm, usually divided in four stages: 1) rise, 2) expansion, 3) culmination, 4) gradual fall.

    The Hindu cosmology beautifully expresses the cyclic nature of the universe in forms of four yugas, where each stage takes approximately 4 millions years. Every rise will end up in a fall; every birth will evolve towards death.

     This pattern is wildly duplicated in everything touched by our perception, being it the roman empire, the apple-tree in our garden, the singular motion of a sea-wave and our own constitution, both the physical and psychological one.

     Particularly, the latter one, we can consciously follow with the help of the the Principle of Correspondence by directing our gaze to the sky.

     There, on the celestial firmament, month after month, we can observe the rhythmic unfoldment of the moon cycle, which is one of the many manifestation of the cyclic pattern mentioned above.

     There is no mystery in the fact, that during the Full Moon, the culminating phase of the moon cycle, our emotions are prone to reach some peaks as well. Yet, after a few days, together with the waning moon, they start a gradual descent. Just to may rise again in approximately 28 days.

     The main quality of any rhythm is its constant repetition, therefore what our limited perception understands as death, from the soul perspective is just as entrance into a sort of cloakroom, where one will pick the best garments for the next adventure in the physical world.

     Astrology, by being a science of a planetary cycles, is a tool that facilitates a recognition of one’s own psychic rhythm that is individually crafted to our soul’s evolution.

     It helps to designate which stages of a cosmic cycles we are in. Thanks to astrology, we can become more conscious about our individual soundtrack.

6. PRINCIPLE OF CAUSE AND EFFECT

“Every Cause has its Effect; every Effect has its Cause; everything happens according to Law; Chance is but a name for Law not recognized; there are many planes of causation, but nothing escapes the Law.”

     Coincidence is a mere word in the world governed by Natural Laws. We use that expression to may describe, something that simply escapes the order we used to take for granted. Consequently, the causality that rules our lives, usually is not recognized as such.

     Actually, due to the vast complexity of the layers which our reality is build of, it will never be possible for human mind to identify all the various causalities that we stumble upon every single day.

     Thanks to law of correspondence, we can intuitively acknowledge, that our perception and experience of reality is built upon some greater scheme, with which we are closely connected to. Hence, the causes, which may originate from one layer, may manifest their effects in other spectrum of life.

     The yoga practitioners have probably noticed more than once, that some emotional states caused by various – often traumatic – past situations, will manifest in form of pain or simply unease in the body. This condition usually applies if the effect of initial occurrence, caused by some psychological turbulence, was not properly incorporated, digested or released.

     A as example, if we decide to repress the consequences of being hurt by someone, if we will chose to avoid facing sadness or anger (which are natural effects of being betrayed or rejected), the psychic energy caused by this emotional break-up, will move to some other layer through which we experience life: our body.

     The effect, does not necessarily have to be stored in our physicality, as it depends on many other factors. What is absolutely certain however, is that its psychic imprint will be build into our emotional body, which rules over our attitudes towards ourselves, our life and the companions that we share it with.

     The cycle of reincarnation, based on the Principle of Rhythm, is one of the best examples of the manifestation of the Law of Causality. The emotional body – that was mentioned above- together with all its psychic imprints gained through our life-experience, is used as a mold for the next personality, that our Soul will eventually create.

     Hence, all our actions that we will undertake in this lifetime, will – sooner or later – bear consequences. The way how will we act upon them, will cause new wave of repercussions. From one life to another, the ocean of our deep psychological conditioning is in ceaseless movement, strictly obeying the rhythm of causality.

     In the same way, like the fall and rise of the sea-waves is conditioned by the everlasting-interaction between our two luminaries: the Sun and the Moon, so our soul’s evolution is affected by the reciprocity between our conscious decisions and instinctive patterns originated in the past.

     This 6th Principle gives us an opportunity to reflect upon our daily actions, thoughts and instinctive overemotional reactions. These last ones are usually the effect of some traumatic scenarios from the distant past, that we are – fortunately- not conscious about, while the first two ones, will definitely create its consequences for our future, bearing their fruits within the next 5 minutes or the next 5 lifetimes.

7. THE PRINCIPLE OF GENDER

“Gender is in everything; Everything has its masculine and feminine principles; Gender manifests on all planes”

     Nowadays, the word “gender” is reaching the zenith of its widespread use in our daily narratives. The principle difference between woman roles and man-dominated structures, has been a subject of vivid discussions from many decades. Unfortunately, this essential duality that manifests in all planes of life, turns too often into conflict about who rules over who.

     Our gender being it male, or female is only one of the infinite expressions of the this polarity. On the mental and spiritual levels, this essential distinction is manifested as two different energies, whose mutual collaboration is the factual cause of everything what exists. If we apply the Law of Correspondences here, we can clearly see that through the sexual act, the female and the male are in the same way the creators of a new born child. Hence, without their close cooperation, the new life simply is not possible.

     The biological genders are only one physical manifestation of this principle. The law in itself enhances the existence of two energies, that are strictly related to each other.

     The Taoist metaphysics express this indivisible whole in form of yin and yang symbolism, where the feminine principle of receptivity embraces the masculine principle of action. Yet, both elements owns a little part from the opposing force within.

     Growing up in a western culture, the image of female being passive and male directly acting out upon her submissiveness, does not make the best impression. Yet, this perception is a direct result of strong imbalance between these two energy fields that we, as mankind, are replicating since thousands of years.

     Those, who are interested in anthropology know very well that the matriarchal society structures, where the female nourishing energy was the one most venerated, also had reached its climax followed by its fall during the Bronze Age. Today, we are approaching similar point, wherein the patriarchal (and thus masculine) overused patterns will be gradually disappearing.

How we can differentiate both energies in our daily life?

     While the feminine element nourishes, sustains and protect our values and everything what is important to us, the masculine forces us to act; to make the necessary steps towards progress, asserting our will upon reality.

     Astrologically speaking, while the Moon in our chart points toward an emotional past conditioning, and thus describes our instinctive reactions, so the Sun underlines our will to act and our own conscious active expression.

     We all contain this vivid energetic interplay within our physical and psychic structures. In Jungian psychology, the balance between these two elements is crucial to may find one’s own true expression. Therefore, women should embrace their Animus (masculine counterpart), while men need to work upon their Anima (the feminine counterpart).

     In our daily lives, we can easily spot when one element is dominating over the other. Too much masculine energy usually results in cold action that leads toward the aimed goal, without any concern for others nor any deeper reflection. Our economy system is a perfect example of an overdriven masculine element, where the constant growth (something that is per se completely unnatural) is a indisputable quest forced from above.

     Form the other side, the overflow of feminine energy may result in excessive emotionality, stagnation and tendencies to depression coming to the surface when there is a lack of masculine will to act.

     Yoga practitioners try to balance the flow of these two elements in their life, usually knowing what kind of style of practice suits them best. Is it the yin style, where one learns to be more receptive, more reflective and more passive, or perhaps the vinyasa, an active movement which helps to awaken the – masculine in nature- self-assertiveness?

     Both elements are equally significant in our lives. By trying to observe their interplay “outside”, we can easier recognize their presence inside, in our psychic inner worlds.