Everything Soup
by Barry Carter

One day a long time ago in our distant future Everything was like a thin soup--nothing was different from anything else. Then it occurred to Everything that things might be more interesting if there were some chunks of stuff in the thin soup. The thin soup of Everything decided to make some chunks of stuff.

This was more difficult than it would seem since Everything was undifferentiated. Differentiated means that it looks like there are two things but Everything was all One. So Everything decided to pretend to be two. When this happened a chunk appeared in the thin soup of Everything.

Everything used a pretense to create a chunk of structure in the soup. The chunk seemed thicker than the rest of the thin soup of Everything. The chunk had an outside and an inside. This made it look like there were two things--Everything and Something. In order for Something to maintain an identity distinct from Everything, Something had to maintain the belief that it was separate.

This all worked out very well for Everything and Something. Things became much more interesting and they decided that the infinite broth would be even more interesting if there was Something Else.

After Something Else was born more new interesting things started happening fast and soon Something Else had many siblings. Pretty soon the universal broth started to look more like a chunky vegetable stew. It looked like there were different things everywhere. Carrots and peas, celery and brocholi floated indescriminately.

Everything was quite happy with this, as things had become much more interesting. Sometimes it even seemed as if there really were different chunks around to chat with.

There was still one problem though. Change was still happening instantaneously and there was no time to savor things so Everything and Something decided to slow things down a bit by postulating time.

This helped out a lot and for a long time it looked like things were going swimmingly for all the little chunks. Then one day Everything noticed that some of the chunks wanted things that the other chunks did not want. This was a wonderful event for Everything and Something because it meant that the chunks were starting to show some individiual initiative.

Some of the chunks, however, did not like it at all. They felt limited and since they knew that their heritage was limitless this really bothered them.

Everything and Something proposed a solution to all the chunks. They suggested that areas of the stew be further divided into pools of similarity. Since they did not want to make this a limiting thing, Everything and Something decided to make the division between pools a very thin veil that the chunks could move through at will.

This new arrangement worked quite well for the chunks. Mostly they stayed in their own pool of broth but occasionally they would move to another pool.

Initially the chunks knew that they could manifest any structure that they wanted. This was great at first but eventually some chunks realized that things would be even more interesting if somehow they could forget this and experience powerlessness.

This was a very difficult task for chunks with a direct heritage from Everything and Something. How do you use your inherited power to experience powerlessness? What a contradiction!

Eventually some chunks discovered forgetting. Forgetting is like pretending but much more effective. By forgetting their powerful heritage they were able to experience powerlessness. This allowed them to learn the distinction between what they wanted and what they did not want because it enabled them to manifest what they did not want by focusing lots of attention on it.

Thus contrast was born. Everything was very pleased that things had again become even more interesting. The chunks were really expressing their creative heritage!

But sometimes the chunks felt that contrast was not all that it was cracked up to be. Sometimes it really hurt. Not that this really deterred the chunks from experiencing lots and lots of contrast. They felt that they were explorers on the edges of infinity and some of them even realized that the thing about infinity is there sure is a lot of it.

One day a chunk was really exploring the cutting edge of isolated misery and decided that it might be more interesting to explore something else. This chunk wondered if it would be possible to leave the lonely isolation of misery and dive back into the broth of Everything.

Let's call this chunk Celery (I think Celery was a female but one can never be sure about these things). In order to really get out on the cutting edge of isolated misery Celery had to forget almost everything that was true. It was a nasty job but someone had to do it and Celery was particularly well equipped with the ability to forget Everything.

Anyway, Celery was sitting totally wrapped in isolated misery in some sort of cell somewhere. Maybe it was a prison cell or perhaps a cell in a monastery or maybe even a cell in a larger organism (it really does not matter as the feeling was the same for her). She thought "I am so alone--how do I get back to Everything".

Earlier, before the walls of her cell were completed, someone in another cell had told Celery that all of the structures in the world were built by belief and that you could change the structures by changing your beliefs. Celery really did not believe this but she was quite miserable and willing to try almost everything.

She remembered a time in her life when everything that she wanted just seemed to flow toward her but then she remembered how she became afraid of loosing what she had so she built a wall to trap all that flowed in so that it would not flow away again. It was like a dam on a river to catch the energy and life of the river but the dam only created a stagnant pool which eventually filled up with crap.

She realized that thinking about what she did-not-want only brought more of what she did-not-want into her life because the fear that was generated by thinking about what she did-not-want built the "protective" walls that were trapping her in the cell.

She noticed that these walls were composed of many beliefs which were built up layer by layer like bricks. Some of these beliefs were very comfortable and others were very strict but they all were structures designed to prevent change or movement.

One of the bricks was a belief that others built the wall that trapped her. Another brick was a belief that she would grow old and die before she got out of the cell. There was a belief that she wanted the power to fly away from all of those who had hurt her. Another brick was a belief that where she wanted to go was a place of endless, changeless bliss. Still another was a belief that she might end up in a place of endless pain.

Celery knew from her stagnant life in the cell that she did not want to be trapped anywhere forever. She wanted to see change. So she started to take down the bricks one by one.

As she changed one or two of the beliefs that were damning the river and holding her in, she noticed a bit of flow out through the holes in the wall that she had created. This movement felt refreshing and new, so she kept examining the beliefs which maintained the structure of her life.

It was not long before she had a hole big enough to swim out of but she was afraid to leave this familiar place behind so she packed some of her favorite bricks into a suitcase, wedged it into a corner and tied a rope to the handle so that she could ease herself into the flow of the river without being swept downstream too fast.

Once she was out in the river she noticed other chunks bobbing around in the pool below the dam. She noticed that each of them was holding a rope which kept them from flowing with the river down to the great sea soup of Everything.

Celery could not get very close to any of the other chunks because she was tied to her suitcase full of beliefs and her suitcase was still wedged in the corner of the cell. So she shouted to some of the other chunks who were floating past her and asked why they were moving while she was not.

One of them answered that she was still tied to her cell by the brick that was wedging her suitcase into the corner. She remembered that belief. It was something about how one must not allow others to influence one's beliefs and the instant she realized that this brick was just a belief it was dislodged allowing the suitcase to break free of the cell that had trapped her for so long.

Celery noticed that she was now moving along in the river with the others. She did not notice that she was still tied to the suitcase full of her favorite beliefs.

She was enjoying the freedom of floating down the river with the other chunks. Some of them were wonderful to chat with and she really learned a lot from them. One of the other chunks told her that he had heard that there was a signpost coming down the river a bit. He said that this signpost had the following words on it:

Psychic abilities
Prophecy
Levitation
Clairvoyance
Manifestation
Bilocation

This signpost really interested Celery so she pumped her new friend for more information. She asked him what each of these words meant and he described each of the abilities mentioned on the signpost.

Celery very much wanted to progress down the river. Once she learned about the signpost she associated it with the progress that she sought. This was a new belief that she stuck into her suitcase.

She watched for the signpost at every turn. She asked every other chunk she met for more information about the signpost. No one seemed to know everything about this signpost and some of the other chunks told her things which she just knew were not true about the signpost.

When Celery finally spied a signpost as she rounded a bend in the river she swam for it with every fiber of her being since she did not want to be swept past it. Eventually she got close enough to the signpost to see that many other chunks were swimming around and around it.

Some of them had gotten their ropes and suitcases full of beliefs completely tangled around the signpost and were being drawn in tighter and tighter.

Celery had just escaped from a prison of beliefs and she did not want to get tied up again so she reluctantly started to swim away from the signpost in the river. Unfortunately the swift currents had pulled her suitcase full of beliefs toward the other side of the signpost. She knew that if it went on the other side of the signpost from her that the current would wrap her rope around the signpost too.

Now she had to swim with all her strength toward her suitcase full of beliefs so that her progress down stream would not be stopped by getting wrapped up around the signpost of that progress.

When Celery reached her suitcase full of bricks she immediately opened it and discarded some of the beliefs that had almost entrapped her again. With her load lightened she noticed that the flow of the river was more rapidly carrying her where she had decided she wanted to go.

This is fun, she thought. She began to talk more with the others who had not been trapped by the psychic signpost. She noticed that these chunks were really quite nice and she felt like being quite nice to them. They all talked about the river and speculated about its nature. Some said that it would take them to the sea of soup where they would dissolve into Everything. Others said that once you reached the sea of soup you could learn to create chunks of your own which would start the cycle over again.

Celery liked the second idea because she had noticed that sometimes it is more fun to breathe in and sometimes it is more fun to breathe out but it really hurts to hold your breath all the time because then things don't change and new things do not happen.

She wanted to learn more about the nature of the river. It seemed to connect everyone she knew to each other and it also seemed to connect her past with her future. She discussed this with the other chunks. Some of them called the river Spirit. Some (who had a more scientific bent) called it Quantum Coherence. She liked to call it Love because love is what connects us to each other.