No one can say why the moth will fling itself into the fire. The senseless self destruction tugs at heartstrings. The constant assault of its own body against light bulbs unnerves us. And we don’t know what the purpose could be.
It seems some have learned that the moth may navigate via moonlight. This leaves a tangle of questions to be answered, such as wondering how a moth navigates on cloudy nights or new moons. But perhaps the clue is enough to inform us. The moth may spiral without that constant light, spiral and spiral toward a destination unknown, flailing in the dark. The moon offers a blessing of a straight path, a destination, a clear sign of how to move forward.
How awful, then, that the moth’s world is now dotted with infinite false lights. The endless street lamps, house lights, porch illuminations…even fires. The candle is enough to draw a moth astray.
The latin languages have a word for candle: vela. Vela, instructs us to look more deeply at the phenomenon of false lights in our world. There is also a time of night, in latin culture, of the same name. It is called vela. The night is split in two, a person wakes, the waking time is liminal space where consciousness can rest in alpha and explore in symbol. Vela is a time where the veil is thin, lifted, exposing a world we don’t often tread, in waking life.
Common vela activities include meditation, journaling, night walking, praying, and pondering. These activities are all often missed in modern culture, in our fast, distracted world. These activities offering a deeper connection to self and surrounding are dismissed in lieu of a more shallow sprinting across flitting misdirections. Flitting like the wings of a moth against the window shining with the false light of a candle.
This division of the night, the witching hour, preceded the candle. It dwindled with the invention of the candle. It died with the invention of the electric light. Our two-REM-cycle night was pushed into one, extended cycle that often does not visit REM twice, now.
Latin cultures divided their day, as well. A siesta was built in…just another liminal pause cast aside for a rush of efficiency and material progress.
So, we find ourselves in a trap. How convenient is the light? How necessary? How could humanity move forward without it? Once a technology takes hold, it does not retreat and we do not give it up. Is there an escape? Do we need to escape?
Our connections to ourselves are crucial. Our nightly delves into our own depths are irreplaceable. Our liminal rests between cycles are natural and mimic the dual polarity in every system, the double toroidal structure of the holofractal nature of the universe. Like the yugas’ golden age and dark age, cushioned on each side by an ascending or descending age. Like the in breath and out breath, cushioned on each side with a pause. Like a day and a night, cushioned on each side with a break, a rest, a pause, a look inward.
Looking outward, we can be led astray by false lights. We can circle and circle in a transverse orientation that leads us to compel our own destruction by fire. Some say there is a light at death, a bright light that drowns out all other visions, a light that draws you down a tunnel that seems straight and that, at the end, all your loved ones are waving and waiting to hug you. You fly that way because it looks like what you thought you were after. But some say that spiraling tunnel is leading you astray…
Some say there is another light, more distant and harder to see, like a moon clothed in clouds and obscured by the brighter, manufactured trap. Some say, if you can fly straight into the dark and resist the spiral tug of the false lights, you can escape, fly to your true home.
May the dusted wings of moth remind us to pause in the middle, find our true selves, and hear the call of our own light, impelling us toward what awaits instead of what ensnares.
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