When X Means Y โ Who Decided?
There are symbols everywhere.
We use them so constantly that most of the time we do not even notice we are doing it.
Words are symbols.
Numbers are symbols.
Road signs are symbols.
Money is symbolic.
Photographs can become symbolic containers for memory.
A red light means stop.
A thumbs-up usually means approval.
A tree can mean an actual tree, or in computing it can describe a branching structure.
A mouse can be an animal or something sitting beside your keyboard.
A cloud can hold rain or your data.
Even the same word can shift meaning depending on the system it is being used in.
And once you start noticing this, symbolic meaning is everywhere.
But then comes the interesting question.
Who decided what the symbol means?
Because the symbol itself is not always the meaning.
Take the number seven.
Mathematically, seven is seven.
But ask what seven means and suddenly that depends entirely on context.
It could be a quantity.
A date.
A score.
Part of an address.
Part of a code.
It can mean one thing in one system of numerology and something quite different in another.
The number has not changed.
The interpretive framework around it has.
And that distinction matters.
Because human beings do something very interesting with meaning.
We build systems.
We notice repeated associations.
We create interpretations.
Those interpretations become useful.
Then they become accepted.
Then repeated.
Then taught.
And eventually, we can forget that they were interpretations in the first place.
They become:
X means Y.
And sometimes that is useful.
Sometimes it helps us orient.
Sometimes it gives us language for something we could not previously describe.
Sometimes it helps us recognise a pattern.
But sometimes the meaning becomes more rigid than the thing it was meant to explain.
And that is where things can get messy.
Medicine does this too.
We often think symbolic interpretation belongs to Tarot, dreams, spirituality, numerology or energetic systems.
But medicine works through signs and interpretation as well.
A rash is a sign.
A fever is a sign.
Pain is a sign.
A blood result is a sign.
A change in heart rhythm is a sign.
The body presents something, and then the practitioner asks:
What does this most likely signify?
And those meanings change as knowledge changes.
There was a time when illness was interpreted through miasma theory โ the idea of harmful or corrupted air.
Later, germ theory radically changed the interpretation.
But the body may still have been presenting fever, pain, coughing or respiratory distress.
The bodily expression could remain much the same.
What changed was the framework through which it was understood.
That is the part I find fascinating.
The sign and the meaning are not the same thing.
The sign is what is being observed.
The meaning is the interpretation we place around it.
And then, because we are human, we start arguing over whose interpretation is right.
One system says:
This means X.
Another says:
No, it means Y.
A third says:
Both of you are missing something.
And sometimes the disagreement is not really about the sign at all.
It is about authority.
Whose system gets to define what this means?
Whose explanation counts?
Whose interpretation is legitimate?
This happens in medicine.
Psychology.
Religion.
Spirituality.
Families.
Culture.
Self-development.
Pretty much anywhere human beings create systems of meaning.
And I have seen this with clients over the years.
Someone arrives already knowing what something is supposed to mean.
They have read the book.
Learned the system.
Been given the interpretation.
A particular symptom means this.
A body area means that.
A recurring response must mean something else.
And sometimes that framework has genuinely helped them.
But sometimes it has not.
Sometimes the interpretation does not fit.
It does not lead anywhere useful.
It does not create change.
And instead of questioning the meaning, the person starts questioning themselves.
Maybe I have not understood it properly.
Maybe I have not healed enough.
Maybe I am resisting.
Maybe I need to work harder at the explanation I have already been given.
That is the point where I tend to say:
All right. That may be what this means inside the system you were taught. But it is not giving us anything useful here. Letโs put that meaning down for a moment and see what else is possible.
That does not automatically make the original system wrong.
It means the enquiry needs to remain larger than the interpretation.
And for me, that is the balance:
Stable structure, open enquiry.
A symbolic system needs enough stability to be useful.
If the meaning changes randomly every time you use it, then the system cannot discriminate.
But if the structure becomes so rigid that reality is not allowed to disagree with it, then the system stops helping us see.
It starts telling us what we are allowed to see.
That is an important distinction.
Tarot is a familiar example.
A traditional Tarot reader works within a symbolic pictorial system that has existed for centuries.
The cards have inherited meanings.
The structure matters.
But the reader still has to interpret what those symbols may mean for the person and question in front of them.
The same card can appear in two different readings and be relevant in entirely different ways because the context is different.
And that may be one of the reasons people consult a Tarot reader in the first place.
Not because they are incapable of thinking about their own question.
But because they want another perspective.
Another angle.
Another way of looking.
Sometimes the most useful thing a symbolic system does is not give you an answer.
It changes the way you are looking at the question.
Or it gives you a wider, more complex perspective on the same question.
And this is one of the reasons I use symbolic systems in my own work.
In SSS and QSP, I use structured codes.
Those codes are not random.
They have defined meanings within the systems.
The structure matters.
But the codes are not verdicts.
They do not tell me who you are.
They do not overrule your experience.
They give me somewhere to look.
Then the questioning begins.
What is relevant here?
What is this connected to?
What fits?
What does not?
What appears central?
What is secondary?
What becomes visible that was not visible before?
This is where the symbolic systems and my questioning protocols work together.
The symbol gives us another perspective.
The questioning helps determine what that perspective means in this situation, for this person, around this question.
SSS and QSP also do different jobs.
SSS asks:
What is operating in my body and system right now?
It is more present-time.
Somatic.
Emotional.
Protective.
Response-based.
QSP asks:
What is the deeper pattern beneath this?
It looks more at structure, relationships, themes and movement within a pattern.
And sometimes what comes from either one is not a neat answer.
Sometimes it is a better question.
Sometimes it is a wider map.
Sometimes it is the recognition that the thing you thought was one pattern is actually several things interacting.
And sometimes it gives you a completely different perspective on something you have been looking at the same way for years.
That is the value for me.
Not certainty for certaintyโs sake.
Not another system telling you what to believe.
Another place from which to look.
And if you are listening to this because there is something you keep circling โ something you understand intellectually but still cannot quite make sense of โ then one of these readings may be useful.
If you want to understand what appears to be operating in your body and system right now, an SSS Reading may be the right starting point.
If your question feels deeper, more layered, or tied to a persistent pattern, a QSP Reading may be more appropriate.
And if you already understand a great deal and what you really want is help working with what is presenting, then Biosenetics may be the better pathway.
You do not need to know which system you need before you begin.
You can simply tell me what is happening and what you most want help understanding.
Because sometimes the symbol is not the answer.
Sometimes it helps us ask a better question.
Sometimes it gives us a more complex, wider or simply different perspective on the same question.
And sometimes that shift in perspective is exactly what allows something previously unseen to come into view.
With steadiness and wonder,
Shamarie
