Blog ~ Page 193 of 348 ~ Fractal Enlightenment

7 Pitfalls on the Path to Enlightenment

Spirituality

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June 2, 2016

Ah, enlightenment… So motivating. So inspiring. So misunderstood. Exasperatingly unattainable when sought after, and yet gratifyingly entangled with all things when practiced with authentic non-attachment.

But where does our unenlightened-self end and our enlightened-self begin? Where does our caterpillar-self die and our butterfly-self emerge? In the cocoon? At the crossroads?

Over the bridge from free animal to individuated Man, from self-actualized Man to self-overcoming Overman? And how many cocoons, crossroads, bridges must we traverse? How many dark nights of the soul must we descend into and ultimately prevail over? The answers can range from “zero” to “infinity,” from “there is no answer” to “there are many.”

When it comes down to it, enlightenment is neither here nor there, but here and there, somehow. It’s a Fibonacci-esc reaching-out toward an unreachable Phi.

It’s a constant overcoming of inconsistency with a healthy detachment from Consistency itself. It’s counterintuitive intuitiveness. It’s insurmountable and yet absolutely effortless. It’s so imperfectly straightforward that it’s perfectly crooked.

So impossibly attainable that it’s probably unattainable. It’s a “going through the motions” of letting go, of being in the moment, with the full realization that the moment is just as illusory as the past and the present.

It’s both a soft animal-dying from moment to moment and a hard soul-survival from day to day, with the uncanny ability to transcend both with a Humor of the Most High.

But it is not without its setbacks. It doesn’t come easy, if at all. The journey is the thing, sure, but the journey can often be a kick in the soul, a thousand blows to the ego, a constant tripping over the self which always seems to be in the way somehow.

It’s a series of sojourns, some of which can be profoundly unpleasant in the short-run but, over the long-haul and in hindsight, they were necessary sharpening stones.

Here then are seven common pitfalls on the path to enlightenment.

1) Fear of change:

“The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.” ~ Alan Watts

This is probably the biggest obstacle on the path to enlightenment. Change is inevitable. We all know this. And yet, on some level, we all fight it. We’re told to live in the moment, after all. And who we are in the moment is seemingly fixed. Though who we are from moment to moment is constantly changing.

We know this, and yet we feel the same. So why embrace change when it is change that seems illusory? That’s the ontological trick. That’s the existential trap. And so we cling to permanence, not realizing that letting go of permanence and going with the flow of impermanence is the more enlightening prospect.

2) Seeking answers rather than questions:

“I would rather have questions that can’t be answered than answers that can’t be questioned.” ~ Richard Feynman

Ah, the elusive answer. So many of us imagine that enlightenment will “give us all the answers.” And yet, it’s more likely to bring about more interesting questions. One realizes that the only “answer” is to question. But there’s a kind of existential elegance to not relying upon answers, a kind of ontological smoothing-out of empiricism that makes curiosity primary and the quenching of curiosity secondary.

Between this answer and that question is a mysterious well of imagination that we can dip into and discover better answers and even better questions. Seeking out better questions rather than settling on fixed answers allows the Great Mystery to be both great and a mystery.

3) The Existential Blackhole:

“The only thing that can fill an eternal hole is the eternal.” ~ Elizabeth Gilbert

Beneath extreme piety and extreme irreverence is a gaping blackhole that sucks the vitality out of life. Go too far into the cultural infrastructure of religious morality and the vitality of your life gets sucked up into dogmatic nothingness. Go too far the other way into the anti-cultural infrastructure of iconoclasm and the vitality of your life gets sucked up into nihilistic nothingness.

Indeed, extremism either way is the bane of enlightenment. The key is moderation, humility balanced with audacity. Avoid falling into either abyss by dancing between them on the Stage of Imagination within the Theater of the Absurd. Life becomes vitalized by transforming extremism into imaginative and meaningful art. As Nietzsche observed, “To live is to suffer and to survive is to find meaning in this suffering.”

4) Putting all your eggs into one basket:

“When you put all your eggs in one basket you must clutch that basket for dear life.” ~ Ernest Becker

Tip the basket. Stretch your comfort zone. Challenge your inner comfort-junky, that part of yourself that clings to security and luxury and tends to become content and apathetic. Toss out your ill-gained consolation prizes and wash off your over-indulgent solace. Too much succor is for suckers. Push the envelope until your red with papercuts.

Then, and only then, seek healing, consolation, solace, and succor. Only then, after attempting to slay the dragon and failing miserably, after getting burned to the core, only then should you return to your comfort zone. So that you may transform your failure into robustness and your ashes into a mighty Phoenix that just might (but maybe not) discover the power necessary to get the job done.

5) Thinking you’ve “made it”:

“The usefulness of the cup is its emptiness.” ~ Bruce Lee

The path is the Path. The journey is the thing. The many Buddhas that pop up along the way to convince you that you’ve made it must be bypassed at all costs or the way is lost.

The knowledge gained along the way must be released and absorbed into muscle memory or it will block the path. The water in the cup must be emptied and imbibed so that it may be filled again and again so that the way may remain the Way.

What has been learned must also be unlearned so that what has not yet been learned can be learned and then unlearned, ad infinitum. To ‘unlearn’ is not to forget, but to forgive, to expiate, to surrender, and to reconcile the static past into the dynamic present so that an enlightened future might unfold.

6) Taking yourself too seriously:

“The one serious conviction that a man should have is that nothing is to be taken too seriously.” ~ Nicholas Butler

It’s all a laughably inconsistent song & dance. We lose our way when we vainly attempt to ignore, suppress, or become indifferent to the contradictory beauty of this song & dance. When we become overly serious with our ideas, ideologies, and/or politics we lose the primary experience.

We distort our essential perception and blockade the path. Every time we take ourselves too seriously, we prevent ourselves from experiencing the humorous joy of being sincere with the gloriously inconsistent and mysteriously dynamic song & dance.

Sing sincerely rather than self-seriously, like a mighty trumpet for the mouthpiece of the universe. Dance authentically rather than self-importantly, like a magic wave crashing out of a cosmic ocean.

Sincere and authentic art, rather than overly-serious and strict farce, maintains the path, and being aware of it all as possibility sustains its unfolding.

7) Inability to laugh at the cosmic joke:

“The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity.” ~ Dorothy Parker

At the end of the day, it’s all just one big cosmic joke. Even enlightenment itself is a joke. But that’s okay. It must be okay in order for enlightenment to authentically unfold. And so a provident sense of humor is essential.

The ability to flip the tables on reality itself and laugh whole-heartedly at the absurdity of it all is paramount. Having the courageous aptitude to look into the abyss of the mirror and laugh soulfully into the decaying teeth of Death is vital in order to keep the path jovial and life-bringing, despite mortality and entropy.

Such jocund humor is indispensable on the path to enlightenment. Indeed, it can be argued that it is the epitome of the path itself. Sure, it’s difficult to maintain a sense of humor during dark times. But as Søren Kierkegaard surmised, “It is not the path which is the difficulty.

It is the difficulty which is the path.” And a good sense of humor transcends it all using numinous curiosity.

Image source:

Danger
Third-eye exam

5 Tips to Empower Your Children to Learn from their Mistakes

Nikki Sapp

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June 1, 2016

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5 Tips to Empower Your Children to Learn from their Mistakes

“It’s not our job to toughen our children up to face a cruel and heartless world. It’s our job to raise children who will make the world a little less cruel and heartless.” ~ L.R. Knost

For any parent who has experienced a two year old, they know that the words “no, stop and don’t” can start to feel like the only words we ever say to our children.

While these words are completely appropriate in certain circumstances, especially if our children are about to harm themselves or another person.

At some point or another, a conscious parent must ask themselves if these “disciplinary” words have a lasting impact on how our child approaches his outer world and whether these words are promoting functional cognitive development in them.

Simply put, are the disciplinary tactics we use empowering our children to learn from their mistakes?

As the evolution in consciousness grows more and more rapidly on this planet and is allowing us as human beings to become a more accepting, compassionate and kinder species as a whole, so are the tactics that “conscious” parents use to parent and lead their children with.

It is very common for those who are mostly operating from an unconscious place to use things like fear tactics, positions of power, or shame/humiliation as a means to get their child to act in the way they want them to.

And while these tactics may work short term in that particular moment, what they most likely are not doing is building a sense of confidence and trust inside of the mind of the child.

If the child is motivated to not do something because they are trying to avoid the pain of being punished or being humiliated then this not only promotes a sense of unworthiness (where the child thinks, “I must be ‘bad’ because that is how I am made to feel when I am only being myself”), but also insecurity (where the child thinks, “I am not trusted by my caregivers to make the ‘right’ decisions so that must mean I am not able or smart enough to do this on my own).

At the end of the day discipline should always be used in order to help the child not only stop making the same mistakes over and over but to also allow them to eventually begin to be able to assess consequences of their actions from a place of self-love rather than fear.

Below are five tips to consider when disciplining your child and empowering them to learn from their mistakes:

“Discipline is helping a child solve a problem. Punishment is making a child suffer for having a problem. To raise problem solvers, focus on solutions not retribution.” ~ L.R. Knost

1) Be age appropriate

It is no surprise that the memory of a one year old is vastly different than the memory of say, a seven year old, and this is precisely why disciplinary tactics must be age appropriate. What is completely doable by an older child may be a completely impossible fete by a toddler.

And of course every parent would be lying if they said it doesn’t often try our patience to tell our toddler, “no” to the same exact action he or she took only a couple minutes prior only for them to try once again a few minutes later, we must be willing to recognize when our impatience is disproportionate to what is age appropriate for our child.

Toddlers will need to be told things time and time again and that is ok. By using these times where we are aware that our frustration has gotten the best of us as opportunities to heal and transform unhealed emotions within our own selves, we will evolve into better and more peaceful parents in the long run.

2) Explain consequences from a teaching place

Every “mistake” our child makes can be a wonderful teaching tool for us to explain why we don’t want them to do something and more importantly why they shouldn’t want to do it either.

An unconscious parent may say something like, “because I said so” as an explanation when their child asks, “why”, but conscious parents use their child’s curiosity to empower the child.

If the child knows why things like finishing their homework on time, taking a bath or sharing their toys will actually benefit them in the long run they will be more apt to pick these things for themselves in the future because they will associate these things with honoring and taking care of themselves and ultimately being a happier and more functioning human being.

“Because I said so,” doesn’t really teach the child much other than because they are younger or smaller than us they have to listen to everything we tell them to do.

3) Use “preventative discipline”

Just like a good medical professional uses preventative medicine in order to promote healthy habits in their patients BEFORE a bigger health issue arises, a conscious parent uses preventative discipline to build their child’s self esteem and cognitive thinking up so that the child doesn’t need to act out in unsavory ways to get our attention.

When children are taught lessons before it’s too late, so to speak, they will know about consequences of their actions prior to making a wrong decision. And happy, confident children don’t generally act in ways that will harm themselves or others.

Just like in adults, when we are feeling good about ourselves and our lives we generally make choices that coincide with that feeling, but when we are feeling defeated or insecure about ourselves we often make choices that we are not proud of.

Subconscious belief systems are what generally guide our decision making, so when one feel unloved or unworthy of love they will only manifest situations that prove these beliefs to themselves over and over until they wake themselves up out of them.

By instilling worthiness in our children from early on, we create an invaluable subconscious belief systems that allows them to treat themselves with care and self-acceptance.

4) Don’t fight fire with fire

As adults we know that yelling and screaming are rarely effective communication tactics to use to get our point across so it should come as no shock that these things rarely work with our children either.

Often when we are so angry we may require to take a time out alone in order to reconnect with our breath or our thoughts so that we can come back and speak with our children from a calmer and consequently more impactful place.

Children thrive when their feelings and thoughts are being heard and respected by us, and if we learn to talk with them from a place where they can explain themselves while feeling safe doing it, this will promote healthy communication between us and them in the future.

When a child feels unsafe to speak their mind they will often resort to hiding things or keeping secrets in order to avoid being yelled at, and honestly can you blame them?

5) Cultivate trust and faith in them

The biggest and most important thing we can do for our children is treating them like we trust that they will make the right decision. And when the time comes that our child makes a decision that wasn’t in their best interest, we must allow the natural consequences to occur.

They’re not going to be perfect always, but at the end of the day how we treat them or speak to them when they are young will begin to be their own inner voice and guidance system. A child who is treated as though he is capable and trusted to make good decisions will live up to our expectations of them.

A child who is always treated as though they are not trusted or that they must fear the world because it is a scary place that they must protect themselves from will begin to approach their life as a whole from this perspective.

Image sources:

spaghetti baby
footsteps

5 Important Life Lessons from Someone who Nearly Died

Enlightening Video

Clyde

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May 30, 2016

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5 Important Life Lessons from Someone who Nearly Died

What would it be like to have a near death experience where you leave your sick dying body, travel to the other-side and then come back to completely heal your self of your final stages of cancer.

Sounds like a fairy tale doesn’t it? But it isn’t, it’s Anita Moorjani’s story who the doctors predicted had a couple of hours to live. While in hospital she slipped into a coma, her body lay lifeless but her consciousness experienced what we call an overview effect. She could see everything happening around her body her husband holding her hand, the doctors in distress and even beyond the hospital.

She discovered the oneness that we all share, she sensed people who were boarding planes to come for her funeral and encountered her two closest loved ones that had passed away and conversed with them and she understood that she had to come back, even though she was happier not being in her cancer stricken body. She knew that when she came back she would be healed completely.

In five days after her return, her cancer tumors shrunk to 50% of what they were when she was in hospital and in a months time her body was completely cancer free.

She came back and has devoted her life teaching the 5 main points that can help everyone turn their life around.

1) To Focus our Awareness on Love

To always operate from a point of love is not easy, with circumstances and the routine of everyday life, love takes a backseat. Focusing on love isn’t easy especially when it comes down to loving oneself, its easier to love another human and sometimes there just isn’t time to love your own being. As they say, “If your cup is empty how can you pour from it?”

It is my own understanding that once you love yourself you begin to value and take better care of yourself. This enables you to extend your love to others, the key here is to focus your awareness on love. To do that you consciously choose to be kinder to yourself, to make choices that will make you happy of course, sometimes this requires a lot of healing and going deep inside to get those skeletons out of the closet.

There are methods to aid the process on your journey if you need help feel free to ask <3

2) To Live Life Fearlessly

This is a tough one, isn’t it, I have my own set of fears and I’m sure you do too. Its obvious, we’re conditioned from the time we grow up. Don’t climb that wall or tree, you will get hurt if you fall. Don’t eat certain meats or do certain things to displease God. Go to church every Sunday or you will be punished. The list is never ending, but as you grow up depending on your experiences in life you tend to outgrow some of these, as well as gain some more.

After I slipped down a snow-clad mountain with a river flowing I seem to have developed a stronger fear of heights. But I don’t let that stop me from climbing more mountains or hampering my trekking trips. Fear is one of the leading cause of illness within our body, it kickstarts our fight or flight system that releases a bunch of useful hormones, but if you live in fear you have too much of these hormones pumped into your body all the time which ends up having a negative effect. Perhaps this is a good starting point, turning the tables on fear.

3) The Importance of Humor, Laughter and Joy

How do you feel when you laugh at a joke? It releases stress and your worries seem to disappear in that moment. As they say laughter is the best medicine, imagine if everyone around the world had enough reason to laugh. The whole world would be a different place, but to put it to use, it’s you who has to laugh and also spread the joy as well.

Make more people laugh every minute you can, crack a joke do something funny, though it isn’t easy and the sacred clown may not be your path, go forth and spread the joy whichever way you can. If its not humour that for you, let it be joy, you could hold the door open for someone or hail someone a cab. Never stop changing the vibrations around you.

4) Life is a Gift

Do you really need someone to tell you that your life is a gift? Well if you needed to hear it you have! There is no greater joy than being alive this moment. No matter what your pain is, no matter what the circumstances are, just the fact that you are here in your body is reason enough to celebrate.

Even if you don’t believe it you are here for a purpose, if you don’t think so you haven’t discovered it yet. Don’t wait for death to catch up with you to find out what it is, start working on what you like doing. Do what you love and somewhere along the way the purpose of your existence will come into play.

Each day welcomes new opportunities to make a fresh start, don’t carry yesterday’s baggage to slow you down today. One of my favorite sayings comes from the Tibetan Book of the Dead, each day you die and born again. It isn’t easy but try seeing things with a new perspective, be the lotus in a pond!

5) Always be Yourself

“Today you are You, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is Youer than You.” ~ Dr. Seuss

We are flashed with ideas of beauty, of what is cool, what we should wear, how we carry ourselves throughout. But trying to keep up with other people’s ideas of what you should be is not only taxing but it also means that you don’t value the person you really are.

You’re not perfect, neither am I, no matter what the media tells us, we are a bunch of imperfect misfits that fit together better than lego. Stop trying to be what you’re not and just begin to flow, if you do what you like doing you automatically attract people with similar interests. Being part of the right circles does amazing things, you get the support, love and attention to propel you further.

If you liked reading this, you’re thoroughly going to enjoy the video below.

Dying to be me! Anita Moorjani at TEDxBayArea

6 Ways to Get Happier Naturally by Boosting Your Serotonin Levels

Life

Pia

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May 27, 2016

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6 Ways to Get Happier Naturally by Boosting Your Serotonin Levels

Serotonin, the ‘happy hormone’ is a neurotransmitter predominantly created in our digestive tract. It’s known to influence our mood, memory, sleeping habits, appetite, cravings, pain senses, digestion, blood vessel tone and even our body temperature regulation.

While Dopamine is responsible for that instant gratification feeling, Serotonin is all about delayed gratification for larger rewards. It helps us look for better things, persevere, and be patient. Low amounts of serotonin have been linked to depression and other mental health issues.

When our levels drop we start to feel irritable, impatient, uncontrollable in our impulses and have difficulty concentrating. Decreased serotonin could mean a number of things: either our brain is just creating less of it, we have fewer receptors or the receptors that exist aren’t sustaining it very well, or even that it is being broken down too soon for its effects to take place properly.

We don’t need to pump big pharmaceutical pills into our bodies to take care of this, unless it’s a complicated case. There are tons of accounts of people increasing their serotonin levels through organic therapies and even just simple exercises.

Here are some ways to boost Serotonin in your body naturally…

Eat a Serotonin-Friendly Diet

This neurotrasmitter is synthesized from an amino acid known as Tryptophan. Although you can get dietary supplements of this, it is better to take foods that are rich in Tryptophan like chocolate, oats, milk, yogurt, cottage cheese, eggs, fish like wild salmon, mackerel and tuna. Vegans can try dried dates, chickpeas, almonds, peanuts, sunflower and pumpkin seeds, spirulina, avacado, olives and bananas.

Grain-like seeds like amaranth, buckwheat, millet, and quinoa also work. They are high-protein carbohydrates (although it is recommended to stick to a lower carb intake and get them from the right source) and are also rich in B Vitamins, which are essential for mental health and keeping our neurotransmitters functioning seamlessly.

You can also include fermented foods and drinks in your diet. They promote digestive health and enhance nutrients in our food including B Vitamins.

As Good as they Feel, Avoid Stimulants

“An over-indulgence of anything, even something as pure as water, can intoxicate.” ~ Criss Jami

Usually, when you’re low on Serotonin, your body will try and make up for it by sending intense sugar cravings to the brain. Sugar helps in the production of insulin, which helps Tryptophan to get to the brain. However, we know that too much insulin can make your body resistant to it and create diabetes, hypoglycemia and addiction. To satisfy sugar cravings, try Stevia leaf or Lakanto and avoid artificial sweeteners at all costs.

Caffeine is an antioxidant and an activity booster with an array of benefits. However, when taken with excessive sugar or in excess by itself, it can be detrimental. Soon after its rush wears off, it gives us that quick coffee crash that leads to fatigue and dependency.

Exercise for Every Aspect of Your Well-Being

Practice yoga, tai chi, qigong or aerobic exercises like running, cycling or dancing. Even doing any of these for 20 minutes daily will send jumpstart your neuro-chemicals with joy. An interesting fact to think about is that there’s been a noticeable change in effect when people exercise from a sense of free will and optimism as opposed to a robotic, routine activity.

Basically, when you work out because you want to be healthy, and feel good, then your neuro-chemical reactions will reflect that. Do not work out for the wrong reasons like to achieve some unrealistic body-standard and then burn yourself out, as that will have an adverse effect.

Recognize that the point is to feel healthier not just with your physical state, but mentally and emotionally as well. I’d also advise doing meditation, even if it’s 4 times a week. This can even include walking meditations, sound or guided meditations and anything that helps you disconnect and let go of stress.

It will allow your natural state of bliss to sync with this body that you inhabit.

Sunbathe

For any of our neurotransmitters to function, in fact for us to operate well in any aspect, we need sunlight. Vitamin D is part of what makes our life force energy. The best time to get optimum amount of sun exposure is from 11am to 3 pm for a minimum of 10 minutes. The sun’s UV light gets absorbed by our skin and then converted to vitamin D. So take walks, exercise, swim outdoors or just sunbathe.

Bright light in general also increases serotonin activity, however man-made light pales in comparison to natural light and cannot fulfill the bodies requirements completely. Avoid staring at blaring LED screens in the night as that actually prohibits the conversion of serotonin into melatonin which is required for peaceful sleep.

This is intricately linked to our bodies (and every other creature on Earth) circadian rhythm that is in tune with sunrise and sunset, which means having a proper sleep cycle is also necessary. Milk is also packed with Vitamin D so if you can’t get enough sun make sure you drink a glass of milk daily!

Get a Massage

In a recent study conducted by Touch Research Institute concluded that massages increase serotonin by roughly 28% and decrease Cortisol (the stress hormone) by 31%. One of the studies was done on pregnant women suffering from depression.

The partners of the women were instructed to give them massages twice a week for 4 months and by the end of it, their levels had increased by 30%! Another study was on babies of depressed mothers.

The infants who were about 1-3 months old were massaged twice a week for 15 minutes for 6 weeks, and their levels shot upto 34%. Massage therapy also helps facilitating deep sleep, relaxation and is a great mood enhancer.

Heal your heart

Perhaps, this is the most important of all. Changing your lifestyle and your environment will help you to an extent, but to make lasting change, we must transform our internal environment. It will, in turn, manifest in our external environment. Learning to forgive, value and love ourselves are much needed tools to propel us forward, evolve and grow through the toughest challenges we face.

Mantras and positive affirmations help to bring a sense of peace back into our lives. Having a sense of community solidarity, a supportive friend circle or family is also important in this journey. Remember how in times of trouble, just being around a close friend or confiding in a family member washes away your stress.

Gratitude as well as remembering all the love and good times you’ve had in your life as a practice also helps free us from our pain spirals.

References

Boosting Your Serotonin Activity

Food Combining: The Little-Understood Secret to Optimal Health & Weight Revealed

7 Foods That Could Boost Your Serotonin

10 Quick Tips to Boost Your Serotonin

5 Ways to Launch Meta-mind: From Cognitive Kansas to Imaginative Oz

Life

Gary Z McGee

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May 24, 2016

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5 Ways to Launch Meta-mind: From Cognitive Kansas to Imaginative Oz

“The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination.” ~ Albert Einstein

Writing a review for Terence McKenna’s book Archaic Revival, Tom Robbins wrote, “A cyclone of unorthodox ideas that will raise every any-mind out of its cognitive Kansas.”

This concept struck a chord. How can individuals raise their own mind out of its cognitive Kansas? How can we inject the mundane with the exotic, the merely banal with the sincerely novel?

How can we, like Dorothy, ride the tornado of imagination into the transcendent Land of Oz? In short: how do we launch the Meta-mind of flexible thinking, despite the stagnant mind of fixed thinking?

Here are five strategies for doing precisely that.

1.) Dissolve boundaries

“What if we could use those peak experiences to make us whole, to render us holy?… and in Houston Smith’s immortal words: “Might we begin then to transform our passing illuminations into abiding light?’” ~ Jamie Wheal

You are the universe awake. You are inherently anti-entropic. It’s time to act like it. So what the majority of the universe suffers from entropy? You represent the opposite of that —life. So live!

Dare yourself into self-discovery. Double-dog-dare yourself into dissolving boundaries and transforming them into horizons where you’re free to launch a thousand adventures. This is your life. It’s time to fall in love with it.

It’s time to disappear from the static past and reappear in the dynamic future which all takes place in the ecstatic present.

Right now is all you have to render yourself whole, to re-imagine self-limitation into self-liberation. Your current independence is only slightly less stifling than your previous co-dependence. Launch yourself past both. Interdependence is where Meta-mind breathes.

So dissolve your too strict ego and allow it to resolve into insouciant inter-connectedness. Shatter your fragile mental paradigm on the hard concrete of your creativity. Bear witness as the pervious fragments melt like seeds into the rich loam of your imagination and produce rich, oxygenated, numinous fruit forthwith out.

2.) Re-enchant the world

“We are Ontological Engineers: hacking reality and constructing worlds.” ~ Diana Slattery

Hack Nirvana through the use of your own imagination. Re-enchant the world. It’s nobody’s responsibility but your own. Become a conduit, a Meta-catalyst between the ordinary and the extraordinary, from neurons to nebulae and back again.

Transform everyday routine into carpe diem excellence. If you have the capacity to turn your life into a work of art, then there’s no reason why you shouldn’t. There’s no reason, other than fear, not to inject poetry into all things.

Interpersonal transformation begins with the solitary decision to be an aspect of the magical whole. You are the author of your own cosmic significance. Sieving mundane reality through personalized poetry is done not just in order to survive but to flourish and thrive.

As Nietzsche said, “No artist tolerates reality.”

So make a masterpiece out of your life. Do not tolerate entropy; transcend it instead. Possess, and be possessed, by the power of your own inner archetypes. Use their symbolism as mythical hooks that have the power to drag you into infinity.

3.) Probe the adjacent possible

“Just as the biosphere stands above the world of nonliving matter, so an abstract kingdom rises above the biosphere. The denizens of this kingdom? Ideas.” ~ James Gleick

Think inversely. Counter the weltanschauung. Discover that sacred space where the Great Mystery itself is free to breathe. A place where juxtaposition re-positions itself, where worms become wormholes like caterpillars become butterflies.

Where the cocoon of the mind cracks open and the flourishing-flutter of frontal lobes becomes full-frontal conscious in an otherwise unconscious universe. And pow! Suddenly the entire universe is perceiving itself through you, using your meta-cognition as a vehicle toward a heightened state of ecstasy.

Investigating the adjacent possible is exploring the union of opposites. It’s diving into the Middle Gray and realizing that the black and white answers pouring into it are merely the sum of its parts, dwarfed by the whole.

Within this great pool of imagination are infinite ideas just waiting to be imagined into the world. Just waiting for our perceptions to become elastic enough to manifest them. Meta-mind is the medium through which such magic becomes self-evident.

We are the living breathing biosphere, standing above the nonliving matter, building Meta-mind’s astonishing abstract kingdom.

4.) Merge with the cosmic narrative

“Happiness is absorption.” ~ T.E. Lawrence

Our failure to imagine is our failure to notice. When it comes down to it, there are no ordinary moments. Every moment is extraordinary. Each and every second is an infinite branching out into ecstatic union. When we merge with the cosmic narrative we see infinity in all things.

As Henry Miller intuited, “Even a blade of grass, when given the proper attention, becomes an indescribably magnificent world in itself.”

This is Meta-mind engaged: to perceive infinity through the pupil of the eye and eternity in a heartbeat.

This moment is a seed bursting into infinite potential, a finite Fibonacci sequence compelled to engage with the infinite Phi. It matters little that infinity, like enlightenment, is unreachable. What matters is the journey.

And the enlightened journey is a series of aha moments, a sequence of awes, a succession of astonishments, all connecting and interconnected despite the perceived duality of it all. It’s an existential crossroads and you are the adventuring sojourner.

Jean-Paul Sartre’s being-in-itself (what you are physically), being-for-itself (what you are consciously), and being-for-others (what you are to others) is all an aspect of the greater cosmic dance of being-in-fate (What you are in relation to all things).

5.) Reprogram your programming

“Monotony collapses time; novelty unfolds it.” ~ Joshua Foer

Pattern and sequence your own catharsis. Creatively scramble the self. Push the envelope of experience. You are the ultimate canvas and your experience is the ultimate art. Having and seeking out new imaginative experiences is the best way to reprogram your programming.

Adventure is the thing. Recharging your body-mind with Meta-mind is an act of transcendence despite the inevitability of entropy and death. Don’t fall prey to fixed thinking. Don’t become a victim of monotony.

Discharge yourself from the trivial. Thrust yourself into the numinous by reprograming your original programming through novel experiences. Slip into the masterpiece of your life. Dive into the magnum opus and become a tour de force all your own.

We are but intermediaries, smack in the middle between the sacred and the profane. But we are intermediaries with a vision, armed with imagination. And so we also have the profound ability to create the sacred and the profane as we see fit.

We are self-organizing feedback loops bootstrapping on its own feedback loops, thereby leveraging Meta-mind over no-mind over mindfulness over feral-mind. The universe is spilling in, and we are (as far as we know) the only vessels that have the capacity to capture the magic elixir, the liquid ambrosia, the nectar of the gods.

Our cups runneth over. But our host —the Sacred Cosmos, the Divine Everything, the Dancing Nothing, the Blooming Haha (as Rob Brezsny says)— is more than generous, and it is up to us to empty our own cups, from time to time. In order that we may refill it with shock and awe, with astonishment and wonder, with jouissance and cognitive ecstasy.

So that we may always remain in a state of relearning what we have learned, in order to rise above it, to transcend it and, indeed, to go completely Meta, frontal lobes spread out like wings, over and beyond it all.

The Power Of Ideas