Showing posts with label melting wings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label melting wings. Show all posts

Friday, June 13, 2008

icarus & spiritual growth: two-edged sword

icarus shot down at night (own work, 2006)

icarus shot down at night, own work 2006

i think the easily understood message of the icarus myth is: if you strive too high -egotistically- without regard for consequence and without a sense of balance, then you will crash. this seems actually the same as my `brave new world' feeling (science, apes fire) discussed in some previous posts.

but again i feel a bite to the story...in the sense that the above is very often abused by people to bring down `highflyers'. act normal, they say. why don't you do as we do? you probably think you're better than we, don't you. but you're just an icarus, and you will crash.

so the spiritual growth that mankind -imnsho- desperately needs, is also stunted by the resistance of the group to anyone who wants to rise to a higher level of spirituality. in that sense the story of icarus could easily be a false account.

what if icarus designed the wings, and flew high? people got jealous, angry, frustrated, frightened by this new power, afraid of their hard-won positions in which they had become entrenched, scared they might lose their standing, their wealth,...

...and therefore they shot him down at night, and covered it up with a good story of melting wings...