A journey must be taken to get to a specific desired destination. It is facilitated by specific instructions from a GPS, a map and a compass, and road signs that have been designed by those who have previously made the journey and arrived at the destination. All members of the traveling company need to follow these directions and travel at a similar pace in order to arrive at the final destination in safety and to have joy in the journey.
All games have goals. They have rules that need to be played by in order to attain those goals. Referees or sets of instructions enable us to know those rules. All players need to submit to the same set of rules in order to achieve the goals, while also having a fair, fun, and challenging experience. There may be handicaps or exceptions to the rules but those are either written into the rules or subsequently agreed upon by the majority of players.
Often the journeys we take to get to a specific desired destination require us to climb mountains. This increases the challenge of the journey. Hiking to one level of the mountain is one difficulty level. The higher we hike, the higher the difficulty level. Thus we see the process that is attached to a result is correlative. That is, we cannot obtain the higher level on the mountain, by climbing to the lower level. We must actually develop the skills to climb to the higher level.
A friend once told me about Mount Everest Base Camps. They are camps at lower levels of Mount Everest. Hikers will climb to one level and stay there for a couple of days for acclimatization before progressing higher. Sometimes hikers can only make it to a certain level. Sometimes they progress to the next level camp only to have to return to lower levels for a while before trying again to go back up. This is a great metaphor for the spiritual journey we all are on to increase the level of Values we each can live by, while still enjoying the journey.
We used the Scientific Method to discover truths that are presently unknown to us. Since the process to obtain a Soulmates Marriage is somewhat of a mystery to us, we are researching other general truths such as a physical journey, a game, a mountain, or a scientific experiment that we can liken to this unknown process. There are general rules to identify as well as specific ones that are only true for us and our relationship with our spouse. We put both kinds of rules to the experimental test. We hypothesize. We evaluate and analyze what happens when we test our hypothesis out. We try to eliminate as many confounding variables as possible. We use the most accurate tools of measurement in order to come to the most accurate conclusions. Our heart is the most accurate tool of measurement. It will testify of truth if we are seeking to be truthful to the best of our ability. We understand that the accuracy of this measuring tool varies based on our own obedience to God's rules, as we presently understand them. If we are lying, cheating, breaking rules, abusing substances, or being dishonest, it decreases our heart's accuracy.
Throughout the next several chapters we are going to introduce additional known truths as metaphors to further aid us in identifying the process to obtain a Soulmates Marriage such as learning to speak a foreign language, finding the right key or code to fit a specific lock, and understanding the politics of dancing (a double metaphor).
The challenge for me is to use one metaphor at a time. So many pop into my mind all at once and each one has such amazing value to me. Bear with me. If I'm confusing you, please comment so I can revise what I have written.
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