Consciousness is confined within bodies, shaped by the emergent properties of the organism, yet we are not equally aware of this predicament. Many remain trapped in the first layer of perception, bound by the immediate pressures of instinct and the unspoken protocols of conformity. Some people experience the pressures of instinct and the emerging properties of the organism as an immediate, total felt-sense, interpreting these drives as the sum of meaning. Meta-level awareness, however, can perceive consciousness as a separate self distinct from the body and observes the emerging properties of essence arising from within.
We have two general essences in the species: male and female. What people call “gender expression” is the instinct of the essence as an emerging property of the organism. Beyond this, what they call “roles” are shaped by tribal conformity pressures, which attempt to streamline the general essences into easily grasped conduits and categories of behavior. Each essence has a general expression, with outliers at either end—those outliers have always faced difficulty fitting into the streamlined tribal categories.
The emergent properties of male and female instincts are in tension with one another. Each struggles for primacy as the “image of God,” perceiving the immediate felt sense of its drive as “total proper reality.” In the feminist narrative described in The Great Cosmic Mother, the world was harmonious until the penis appeared and disrupted the natural order. In the Abrahamic narrative, the world was fine until the actions of the female derailed the proper order. These narratives attempt to ground the emergent properties of male and female will into justified primacy, creating a sense of “ought” in relation to their drives. These ‘oughts’ manifest as ideologies or belief systems that favor particular societal structures aligned with the dominant drives of each gendered essence.
If we can perceive one another as consciousness confined within bodies, with drives emerging from a determined essence, we can begin to understand each other as subject to the same fundamental affliction, even if it manifests differently. In the gender conflicts of our species, deviations occur when expressions of one polarity’s essence do not complement—or sometimes directly oppose—the drives of the other polarity’s determined will. This is a tension encoded into the very structure of our bodies, and the downstream drama it generates inevitably produces suffering.
Just as adherents of certain religions or political ideologies claim, “If the world aligned with our vision, we would solve this problem,” the gender conflict operates in a similar manner. “If the vision emerging from our instinctual drives prevailed, we would have a better world." However, the persistent, unceasing reality of these conflicting drives in the other polarity perceived as “deviations” continually resurfaces, ensuring an ongoing, perhaps eternal, conflict. From this perspective, we can begin to see ourselves as trapped in an unfortunate universe, subjected to this paradox. Let us direct our anger towards God, or the Gods, for turning us into the playthings of its vision.
There is a strong temptation to align oneself with a tribe, movement, or ideology that reflects the immediate felt sense of one’s will—essentially, the instinct emerging from one’s general essence. This alignment offers a way to satisfy those drives, to act in concert with like-minded individuals, and to find comradery or validation for the aims of one’s essence. By joining a collective that channels these instincts, a person can experience a sense of power, purpose, and belonging that mirrors the “rightness” of their internal drives.
However, this collectivization of instinct can eclipse awareness of the larger predicament. While the tribe or ideology serves the aims of a particular essence, it can narrow perception so that one sees the world primarily through the lens of that polarity’s drives. The structural reality—that all consciousness is confined within bodies, shaped by emergent properties of essence, and subject to the tensions and pressures inherent in this—is obscured. The focus on collective alignment amplifies perceived opposition, reinforces the sense of conflict with other essences, and diminishes recognition of the shared condition that binds all conscious beings.
In short: joining the tribe satisfies the instincts of one’s essence, but it risks making the universal predicament invisible, keeping one trapped in the same first-layer perception that the instinct itself produces.