Which one will you choose? Which one do you want? There is the world, and there is the illusion of the world. Both are strikingly beautiful, appearing almost exactly the same in every detail. The dramatically bounteous trees appear just as fruitful in the illusory world as they do in the real world. The colors in the real world are perfectly matched and echoed in the illusory world. The light shimmers and sparkles and glows in both worlds. Both reflect fullness and abundance, but only one can deliver it.
How do we know which world to choose? The first rule to remember in the world of
Faerie is the Rule of Glamor. First and
foremost, this is the most important rule.
The Rule of Glamor states that appearances are deceiving--always. The eyes are the easiest of the senses to
fool. The reason for this is because
human beings rely so very heavily upon their sight, and in doing so, their
other senses have taken a back seat--that is, if they are noticed at all. Because they have relied so heavily upon their
sight, this is the sense that has been targeted by those who would command man’s
world, and as the millennia have ticked by, they have perfected the Glamor.
 |
| Mirror, mirror on the wall. |
Some people spend their entire life in the illusory world,
and from start to finish they never know it.
They truly believe themselves to be in the real world. The illusion becomes reality, and reality
becomes a dream. Both still exist, but
the illusion becomes the world in which they dwell. Even if you were to point it out to them, to
show them the facts in no uncertain terms, they would look at you as if you had
gone mad. If they could see you at all,
that is, which is very unlikely.
The answer, then, lies in the other senses. The illusory world can also reflect the other
senses in addition to sight, but it cannot do so nearly as well. It will become obvious very soon what is real
and what is not. So the practitioner
must close her eyes. She must rely first
on sound and then on scent. She must
move onward then to taste and touch.
These senses, so much more dramatic and shattering than sight, cannot
lie, or at least not very well. The
illusion is always found out with the other senses, which grab it roughly by
the collar and smash it upon the ground.
The other senses are the savior.
One last thing to keep in mind about the Rule of
Glamor: Unlike a mirror, which when
smashed is destroyed, the illusion, when smashed, opens the door to what is on
the other side. Have a care when you set
out to dismantle the illusion--which you must do if you are to live
authentically--that you do not fall into what the illusion was set up to
conceal in the first place. There is
something there, and that world has its own rules and powers, which you might
wisely choose to avoid.
