BLUE SKY CLAN
Posted by iqiyou on June 27, 2008
Blue Sky appreciates the beauty of non-ordered structures, and the harmony of unintended consequences. There exists as part of the cosmic reality a portion devoted to potential. It is the invisible hand that guides the sword, and in all observable dynamism it can only be inferred; never perceived. Since it can be inferred, it exists, if only just barely, in the way it affects all things observed. The possibility it represents is seemingly infinite, and therefore not so static as to be remembered by Red Blood or catalogued by White Truth. Since it can’t be observed directly, it constitutes what is often misconstrued as emptiness. One of the most readily observable phenomena associated with this infinite potential is the tendency for form, when left alone and quieted, to bubble, rumble and skew spontaneously. Not to be confused with spontaneous generation, these rumblings of something other within a form are not stable enough to actually transform, become or stabilize. Instead they simply alert that form and any observers to the inherent potential that exists beneath or within all things. “This thing isn’t eternal,” it says. “Nothing stays the same forever, and newness is always on the edge of coming forth.”
When something is possible and the possibility alone, not the manifestation, has an effect on forms, then we are in the realm of Blue Sky. Blue Sky Clan brings together those dynamics that are the pre-conditions for Yellow Fire, and the pre-White Truth chaos. Blue Sky, for instance, exists where White Truth hasn’t yet been able to chip away, and is thus by nature chaotic. However, Blue Sky represents not a pure, malevolent chaos, but rather a not as yet understood order or basic truth. Blue Sky exhibits better acclimatization to chaotic waters than even White Truth, but it does so specifically by trading in the tools to which White Wizard clings. Blue Sky does little to change chaos, and only rarely tries to change ordered things. Sometimes, Blue Sky will actually break apart the work of White Truth or Red Blood, just to reveal the underlying beauty of the natural order of things. In this way, Blue Sky can manifest as destroyer.
The following section is repeated for every individual Clan blog entry. It is meant to draw together meanings from all four Clans, and understand one in relation to the others.
Of the 4 Clans, Blue Sky and Yellow Fire represent the most destructive and simultaneously most creative capacities, whereas Red Blood and White Truth represent the most constructive, and receptive.
With Yellow Fire, we explored the notion of emptiness before the newness came into being. Blue Sky is more at home in this emptiness and doesn’t try to change it. Thus, Yellow Fire which creates the new and Blue Sky have the potential to be at odds. Red Blood understands that emptiness is actually full of something; specifically, all that has ever been or ever will be. Blue Sky also understands that emptiness is full of something; specifically of infinite possibility. Thus, Red Blood and Blue Sky have the potential of being quiet harmonious with each other. However, Blue Sky appreciates the comparative cataclysm that is the new as an expression of infinite potential, while Red Blood prefers things to become quiescent and stable. Since Yellow Fire represents such possible cataclysmic newness, Blue Sky and Yellow Fire are just as likely to be natural allies as competitors, and Blue Sky and Red Blood are as likely to be at odds.
At this point, it is useful to consider the newness of Yellow Fire in more detail. It’s important not to over-define this, since newness must represent infinite potential, but Yellow Fire’s distinctness can be better understood if we relate the new to our metaphors. We have thus far introduced, in addition to newness, the ideas of emptiness, familiar patterns, chaos and potential. We’ve essentially defined emptiness as a cross-over point between the familiar patters, chaos and potential, so emptiness is only another term for reality used to help describe Yellow Fire. The reality as cross-over point should also not be considered to subsume chaos. Chaos, from the point of view of Blue Sky, is merely that which exists but which is not yet known or understood. Thus, there must be pattern in it, and its chaotic state is only a relative judgment from the standpoint of the familiar. We’re left with reality as an expression of what is (what is already understood) and what can be (what may already be but isn’t yet understood. If we fold time over and consider all this reality rumbling to be not only past events but future ones as well, then the concept of something springing into being is negated. It already existed in one way or another and has, at best changed forms.
Yellow Fire and White Truth represent the dynamics of reality changing forms. Yellow Fire transforms the low rumble of possibility that is natural to all reality into something identifiable, observable and dynamic. However, its dynamic is new, in that it still hasn’t been assimilated into harmonic structures. Its dynamic is singular, individual, and to some degree self-sustaining. It has to be, because it hasn’t yet been plugged in to sustaining structures. From the perspective of Red Blood and White Truth, then, Yellow Fire is raw and untamed. It is an active dynamic that lacks specificity and interrelations. It lacks the complexity necessary to interact harmoniously. It is change that moves and eats the old, like Pacman eats all the dots it encounters. White Truth also transforms the low rumble of possibility that is natural to all reality into something identifiable and observable, but not dynamic. White Truth adjusts the fabric of the known to make place for the unknown, adding complexity and flexibility. Its dynamic is multitudinous, universal, but also self-sustaining. It has to be, because it swims in the waters of chaos. White Truth is Yellow Fire in microcosm, and the raw power of Yellow Fire can disrupt White Truth. The tools and complexities of White Truth can only create harmony for Yellow Fire with a certain amount of distance and time; a buffer zone created by Red Blood and Blue Sky.
To White Truth, then Blue Sky and Yellow Fire have certain similarities. Blue Sky represents peaceful chaos, which White Truth seeks to disrupt by assimilation. Yellow Fire represents raw, untamed influx of identity, which White Truth seeks to distill by assimilation. White Truth is better suited to assimilating Blue Sky’s reality, and thus looks to hold its distance from Yellow Fire through Red Blood. But, in a way, White Truth seeks to eat away at both of these dynamics, Blue Sky and Yellow Fire. What White Truth excretes goes to Red Blood.
To Red Blood, White Truth and Yellow Fire are similar in that they both excrete toward it. Red Blood receives the vast new from Yellow Fire and the minutiae of truth from White Truth. This makes Red Blood naturally receptive—reality flows into Red Blood like rivers into the ocean—but causes its dynamic to also be resistive, to control the influx—Red Blood builds damns, canals and irrigation to keep from flooding. Blue Sky, contrarily is eaten away at by both White Truth and Yellow Fire; White Truth transforms its homey chaos into truth and Yellow Fire manifests its infinite potential into something more static. Blue Sky is therefore naturally expansive—reality flows out from Blue Sky like rain from clouds, pushing outward into White Truth and Yellow Fire. It is this dynamic that emphasizes how Blue Sky represents potential, the bubbling of reality into something new, rather than down into history (which would be the antithetical Red Blood dynamic). Blue Sky is not passively in love with chaos, it is actively pushing things into new being—chaos as an intermediary step to evolution.
At the center of the galaxy is an area that is so massive that nothing appears to emit from it; all movement is into its center. The stars that make up the obvious form in the galaxy contrarily are almost entirely radiative, pushing themselves outward into the void. In between, in what is generally termed “interstellar space” is a region with much activity that is mostly deemed to be a subtle balance of the two dynamics, involution and expression. The galactic message is thus writ large and small, and human dynamism is a microcosm of these possibilities. Interpreting the Clans usefully will involve assigning life situations and issues in terms of these metaphors.
If you were, let’s say, a human Yellow Fire Clan member, then it would be useful to consider how what you perceive and deal with in your life seems to be relatively empty of whatever you value or delight in, and how particularly well suited you are to bring some of these things into that emptiness. It’s of little use to decry the emptiness when you, yourself are intended to be its solution. So, if you’re a Yellow Fire and you’re depressed over what isn’t the way you want it to be, it should be helpful to receive the Yellow Fire advice that potential exists all around you and wants only your power to ignite into something new. In relationships with others, it’s important to know that not everyone will be comfortable with the changes, and that social responsibility demands that you find accord in place and company before setting fire to things. In particular, understand and respect the safe distance that members of the White Truth Clan may need to keep from you for their own comfort. Additionally, if you can stomach helping your Red Blood acquaintances get used to your new ideas and projects, and allow for plenty of versatility for your Blue Sky acquaintances, you may find that there is much support and even assistance available to you.
With Red Blood, we explored the differentiation between the bubbling that is the baseline of reality, and represents everything known, understood and comforting, versus the bubbling that is the baseline of reality that is unknown, unrelated and comparatively chaotic. As Yellow Fire was to Blue Sky when reality was emptiness or form, White Truth is to Blue Sky when reality is chaos and the familiar. While Blue Sky appreciates the chaos unaltered, White Truth is moved to make of it that which can be understood and used. It would be appropriate to suppose that White Truth is the spontaneous generation of truth and pattern from chaos, the Yellow Fire of chaos.
Red Blood appreciates the ripples on the pond that have resulted from a past event, but shies away from turbulence of unknown origin or intent, and is awakened to action when the ripples of the past begin to subside or disappear, creating augmented reminiscence. White Truth, contrarily, appreciates pattern and synchronicity, shies away from undifferentiated wholeness (Yellow Fire), is awakened to interest and action by the unknown, and creates as a result of its action, that which can be known. Blue Sky appreciates all the ripples just as they are, without requiring understanding of them, but avoids the sedentary and static. Blue Sky unlike the other three Clans isn’t called into action by anything, but rather represents a default state of action, a kind of always boiling, a mixture of stasis and change. It’s avoidance of static structures, however, make it appear to be called toward undeclared, undifferentiated, unmanifest areas. When something eats away at it, like White Truth or Yellow Fire, it glides away like oil on water.
Your friend in the Tao,
Lihai Sherman, CMQ
Qigong Instructor
I Qi You
© Copyright I Qi You, June, 2008. All rights reserved.
