Home Blog Page 299

A Journey Through Self

Raghav Bubna
-
2
A Journey Through Self

“No one serves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path.” ~ Buddha

While we understand the implications of this statement we can only know through experience the gravity of this knowledge that’s so commonly tossed away into our mind. I first realized the intention behind this when I finally managed to move my consciousness through my body and sensed that several sensations although constantly changing, were present throughout my body and what was actually moving was my internal gaze of awareness as I journeyed from my head to toes.

consciousness

As I moved from one inch of my physique to the other, I could feel several tiny particles vibrating which revealed the true state of our physical structure at the molecular level and its nature; a constant vibratory change.

I kept moving my awareness up and down at a slow yet constant pace, and while I moved and felt different vibrations I experienced different emotions – joy, euphoria, lust, sorrow – with different sensations of cold, warm, hot, fire, tickles, pricks, pinches to identify a few for general association.

Each moment I traversed this holy path through these emotions and sensations, the esoteric phenomena revealed itself with increasing pace and I was confronted with distractions etched from my subconscious baggage, trauma and happiness.

At this stage I realized the reality of our existence is to detach ourselves from the grosser manifestations of reality to the most subtle ones within ourselves, as we interact with the world external to our only true home on this plane; our body!

Through working with this we can realize that any thing that comes into our lives and begins to cause us joy or sorrow is but a passing whim. And we can finally dance to the tides of time riding each wave.

The sense of right and wrong, good and bad are tailored by our subconscious conditioning to satisfy and calm the ever-challenged ego as it struggles to attain its context torn between the several fabricated tools of mankind: democracy, society, consumerism, capitalism.

elevating-consciousness

All different heads of a terrorizing giant, yet a loving serpent we have created and called ‘life’ for the entertainment of the ego, while we wither waiting yet another force of pure fabrication; God & Judgment. We are thus further deluded in our obscurity from the spiritual trajectory.

In order to break this hold of mistaken identity crisis to reality we need to elevate the need for identity while working in the higher realms of consciousness to only retain our purest intent and essence and not the build up of blocked energy from our material and worldly games.

All sense of boundaries need to be destroyed individually within ourselves in order to function at a higher frequency or we are likely to be pulled out of our bodies while still holding on to our material existence during spiritual journeys and visions. The gravity of the subconscious unearthing of emotions and beliefs during spiritual progression can be strenuous and challenging to deal with.

Every breakthrough in the spiritual essence of the word requires demolishing obstructions esoterically and in such situations if we are alone or in an unprotected space the consequences have a potential to be life threatening, as we are in the particulate flow of the catharsis of evolutionary change.
energy flow
In these situations we are suddenly confronted by our infinite potential for communication and convergence with higher entities. But in order to communicate with them in their world we need to escape the ‘idea’ of this one.

Although we exist together with the higher planes we are removed by our delusions of reality as we grasp for control, and so we turn to religious belief to battle forces we don’t understand.

When we are faced with the reality of spiritual progression we need to be prepared for rapid expansion and to let go of all the beliefs and notions we hold about the laws of reality. As only when we unlearn the lie can we glimpse the truth, and only we can provide ourselves with these means of breaking down the Walls of Jericho guarding our consciousness.

“Some part of our being knows this is where we came from. We long to return. And we can. Because the cosmos is also within us. We’re made of star-stuff. We are a way for the cosmos to know itself.” – Carl Sagan

This life is our journey as an individual through its ephemeral confines. Anyone we meet along this journey are all in fact headed the same way but its prudent to remember, there are no piggybacks or collective journeys in the esoteric realm…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMY6xcaHlN4

Image Source

Fever Blanket
Nick Pederen

Splinter in the Mind, Part 3: The Consciousness Enigma

Gary Z McGee
-
5
Splinter in the Mind, Part 3: The Consciousness Enigma
Enigma
Enigma

“Quantum Mechanics is weird, and so is consciousness. And the weirdness of each is in some ways similar: both, for example, seem to defy space and time, and both exist in a different dimension from material systems ordered by classical physical laws. This is enough, for some, to convince them that consciousness will eventually be explained in terms of quantum theory.” – R. Carter

Consciousness remains an enigma. Quantum mechanics also remains an enigma. The way we perceive these two enigmas is caught in the middle. There’s the way consciousness actually is, and then there is the way consciousness seems to be. There is the way we can explain consciousness using psychological terminology and then there is the way consciousness ‘feels’ to us.

Similarly, there is the way reality actually is, and there is the way reality seems to be, the way we perceive it. Quantum mechanics is the theoretical tool we have devised to help us in understanding the way reality actually is. But, as we have seen, consciousness seems to be inherent in physics, and vice versa. The question we must ask ourselves is: What creates the difference between perceptual and actual reality? And is there even a difference?

108337-106065

“Consciousness is a proactive agency in the establishment of reality,” said Princeton physicist Robert Jahn and parapsychologist Brenda Dunne, who drew on their empirical data to conclude: “Consciousness has the capacity not only to absorb and process objective information, but to create it in rigorously measurable quantities.” Taking this statement into consideration, along with the concepts derived from Schrodinger’s equation, one can see how this thesis could be viable. Jahn and Dunne write further, “Consciousness enjoys a ‘wave/particle duality’ which allows it to circumvent and penetrate barriers and to resonate with other consciousness and with appropriate aspects of its environment.”

Similarly, Henry Stapp, in his book A Quantum Theory of Consciousness, uses Heisenberg’s principle as well as Shrodinger’s equation in his model to describe the brain itself as a type of Heisenberg measuring device where quantum processes are involved to ‘actualize’ and ‘eradicate’ potential observable states. Stapp wrote, “Heisenberg’s picture allows quantum theory to be viewed as a coherent description of the evolution of the entire physical reality itself, rather than a set of stark statistical rules about connections between human observations.

What is the data showing us? If we take every single conscious organism off the planet, from single-celled amoeba to fully erect Homo sapiens, what do we have? Is that which is left over what should be considered ‘real’? Is matter the same if a conscious organism is not there to perceive it? Are mountains the same? Are clouds the same? Is light and gravity the same? These questions can easily spill over into philosophy, but the point is that ‘reality’ may not be the way our perceptions tell us it is when we are not there to perceive it. In fact experiments in modern physics are showing us that ‘reality’ isn’t there (in the objective sense) until a conscious observer perceives it as being there.

Zen Consciousness
Zen Consciousness

“Why should we not see the occurrence of this necessity for a conscious observer in quantum theory as something that tells us about the nature of reality?” writes Walker in The Physics of Consciousness. “So far, nowhere else in all of science have we seen anything that gives us any hint about what consciousness really is. Maybe this Gordian knot is simply something we have created in our own minds because we cannot see the simple solution.” What could be the simple solution? Could it be that it is our perception of reality, not reality itself, that’s the paradox? Could it be that reality and we are the same thing, and we’re simply not aware of it because our perceptions are bias to finite conceptualization?

Here’s the thing: if reality is actually infinite, but perceptually finite, wouldn’t that create a paradox? Of course it would. And it does. The paradox isn’t out there somewhere. It’s in here, right behind our eyes. It’s our beautiful brain’s bias to finite perception attempting, and failing, to perceive an infinite reality. The paradox inherent within the quantum enigma is exactly consciousness itself.

But what a beautiful paradox it is. I mean, it gives us meaning in an otherwise meaningless universe. It gives us beauty in an otherwise ubiquitously banal cosmos. It gives us such concepts as Truth, Justice, and Love in an otherwise unbiased, unloving, flat reality. Conscious observation is the fly in the ointment of understanding both consciousness and quantum theory. But what a beautiful, meaningful, loving fly it is, lapping up the ointment like it was mother’s milk.

brain-manmoon

At the end of the day, our brains are the Gordian Knot of reality. Whether our brains evolved by chance, or as a compulsory process in the fundamental makeup of reality so that reality could eventually bring meaning to itself, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that there is meaning. There is beauty. There is love. And we are the ones who perceive it. Without our finite-bias perspectives none of these concepts would exist.

We are the befuddled sentinels of the cosmos, confused and perplexed by a plethora of paradoxes; unaware that the paradox is us. But what a ride! And around and around we go, which brings us all the way back around to the colossal importance of practicing the discipline of mindful meditation.

Indeed, mindful meditation is the disentangling of the “impossible” knot, the cutting of the Gordian Knot. We can calculate the mathematical probabilities all we want. We can wrestle with paradox after paradox all we want. We can discover correlations between consciousness and physics all we want. But at the end of the day, the only way we can ever make sense of it is to get to a place of peaceful, mindful awareness of ourselves, and our paradoxical place within an otherwise non-paradoxical reality.

Image Source:

Enigma
Alex Grey
Zen Consciousness
Moon

Splinter in the Mind, Part 2: Modern Physics

Gary Z McGee
-
3
Splinter in the Mind, Part 2: Modern Physics

“Quantum Mechanics is different. Its weirdness is evident without comparison. It is harder to train your mind to have quantum mechanical tuition, because quantum mechanics shatters our own personal, individual conception of reality” ~ Brian Greene

Quantum physics is arguably the most profound scientific discovery in the history of mankind, and yet even with its amazingly accurate experimental results, it remains a quandary when applied to everyday common sense reality.

Even in a world where one-third of all production (Lasers, transistors, and magnetic resonance imaging machines to name a few) is based off of quantum discoveries, it is difficult to relate to what quantum theory is showing us.

atom-electrons-uncertainty-principle

Nevertheless, it stands as the number one theory in all of science and must be heeded lest we lose the much needed sharpness on the edge of Ockham’s Razor.

Like Rosenblum & Kuttner wrote in their book Quantum Enigma: Physics Encounters Consciousness, “The experimental results of quantum theory are completely undisputed. It is the mystery these results imply beyond physics that is hotly disputed.”

There are four major discoveries in quantum mechanics that are applicable to the nature of consciousness: (a) Einstein’s special theory of relativity, (b) the interference phenomenon, (c) Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, and (d) Schrodinger’s equation. Each of these theoretical discoveries have quite literally entrenched conscious observation into the realm of theoretical physics.

einstein-theory-of-relativity

Before Einstein it was assumed that time was uniform throughout the universe and that the velocity of light depended upon the velocity of the observer. Einstein’s special theory of relativity, essentially, states that light and time are relative to the observer.

“Any observers, whatever their constant velocity, could consider themselves at rest” writes Rosenblum & Kuttner, “There is no absolute velocity; only relative velocities are meaningful – hence, the theory of relativity.”

Far stranger than the relativity of light, however, is the relativity of time, wherein time passes slower for a moving object than a stationary object. The famous twin paradox is a result of such reasoning, and has baffled physicists since its first conception.

If Einstein’s relativity isn’t mind boggling enough, the results from experiments that have been done on photons definitely is. The most famous of these experiments is known as the photon interference experiment; or two-slit experiment. This experiment shows us that particles are also waves and are possibly, somehow, being influenced by phantom particles in other dimensions.

It shows us that reality is more than what meets our eyes, or even our instruments, are telling us it is. Common sense tells us that light must either be made up of particles or waves, but what the interference experiment proves is that light is both.

Before Heisenberg it was assumed that anything within nature could be measured with accuracy. His principle, however, brought about a humility that has baffled scientists for years. Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle states that you cannot make measurements with infinite accuracy, such as measuring the velocity and position of an electron.

No matter how sensitive your instruments are, there will always be uncertainty in your measurements. If you know an electron’s velocity you cannot know its precise location; if you know its location you cannot know its velocity.

uncertainty-principle

But what is it that makes light both a particle and a wave? It is only after a measurement has been made that light is perceived as a particle or a wave, so it must be the measurement that is causing the phenomenon. In other words: conscious observation.

Schrodinger’s equation is probably the most difficult concept to understand in modern physics and it is, arguably, the most bizarre discovery in science. It birthed the concept of the wavefunction.

It is the cornerstone of all current research in physics. Shrodinger’s equation shows how a quantum wavefunction is in two different states simultaneously until a conscious observer intercedes, thereby collapsing the quantum wave function into a particular state.

It shows, with blinding accuracy, that the probability of an object (photon, atom, electron, etc.) being there is dependent upon conscious observation! It’s “not that the object was there before you found it there,” writes Rosenblum & Kuttner. “Your happening to find it there caused it to be there. This is tricky and the essence of the quantum enigma”

Indeed, understanding quantum mechanics can be quite daunting, and even depressing. It is not for the faint of heart. Truly applying quantum theory to the perception of reality is a very humbling experience, because at the quantum level there is no self, no ‘I’, no separation of this or that. To truly understand quantum mechanics you must leave your sense of reality at the door.

At one end of the spectrum we have the physicist. While at the other end of the spectrum we have the psychologist. Each one is intent on learning and discovering new ways of observing certain aspects of reality. Each one is aware of the natural correlations between subjective conscious observation and objective physical measurements.

Each one is an observer. Each one is conscious. “Consciousness,” writes K. Ramakrishna Rao in his book Consciousness Studies: Cross-Cultural Perspectives, “does seem to coexist and interact within physical events. Such an interaction would be as much of interest to a physicist as it is to a psychologist”

The brain, in classical physics, is a subjective measuring device that sits inside the skull and interacts physiologically with the rest of the body which, congruently, interacts with the environment. But what is going on at the subatomic level of the brain?

Might there be a wave-like/particle-like duality inherent within neurons? If Schrodinger’s equation applies to all particles, whether wave-like or particle-like, then why wouldn’t it apply to a brain, or a tornado, or the way water flows down a creek?

It seems that there is a fine line between perception and reality. That fine line is the psycho-physical interaction between the brain, the body, and the environment. Discovering the correlations between consciousness and the new physics might help to turn the complexity of that fine line into a simple one.

As it stands, the implicate and explicate aspects of the quantum/consciousness enigma continues to boggle us. Perhaps it’s as David Bohm surmised, “The mental and physical are two sides of one overall process that are (like form and content) separated only in thought and not in actuality”

Image Source:

Atomic energy
Einstein
Uncertainty Principle
Schrodinger’s Cat

Splinter in the Mind, Part 1: The Nature of Consciousness

Gary Z McGee
-
5
Splinter in the Mind, Part 1: The Nature of Consciousness

“Understand how great is the darkness in which we grope, and never forget the natural-science assumptions with which we started are provisional and revisable things” ~ William James

ConsciousnessWhat is consciousness? What is the true nature of consciousness? How does a being of consciousness approach an interrogation of his/her own consciousness?

These are just a few of the many mesmerizing questions that arise when we contemplate the nature of consciousness. Ask any two random people about what they think the nature of consciousness is and they will almost certainly have dissimilar opinions on the matter.

It turns out that our perceptions of reality are as unique as our fingerprints. We all have fingerprints, just as we all have conscious awareness, but our fingerprints are just as individually unique as our conscious awareness (or lack of awareness) is. So can we ever achieve a working definition of consciousness?

“It is not possible to specify precise objective criteria for identifying consciousness,” wrote G. W. Farthing in The Psychology of Consciousness. “Nor can consciousness be given a clear functional definition, since its specific function within the mind system is still a matter of controversy.”

It is astounding how complex it is to give a working definition for consciousness, and yet it is so simple for us to feel what it is like to be conscious.

Defining consciousness is like breaking down reality: it’s an infinite progression. Being conscious and living in reality is simple because that is what we are designed to do. Indeed, that is what we are doing. But once we attempt to define either, a rift between two different realities seems to appear and all reasoning becomes bias and myopic.

The Weight of Consciousness
The Weight of Consciousness

Nevertheless, attempting a definition is important.

In Psychology: the Science of Mental Life George Miller said, “Consciousness is a word worn smooth by a million tongues.”

Indeed, words create an interesting dynamic in the mind.

Not only are they symbols of the reality that we usually take for granted; they are also a psycho-physical stimulus that induces a physiological reaction by their mere conception. The problem with such a word as ‘consciousness’ is that it represents our most cherished possession: ourselves.

Our notion of consciousness is our sanity, literally. Without a stable definition we are lost. It is almost an evolutionary must that we define consciousness in a certain way so as to maintain our delicate grip on reality. But this is where things go awry. And this is where our notion of consciousness might become a snake that eats its own tail (i.e. religion and dogmatic ideologies).

At any moment we are consciously aware of only a limited part of all the stimuli – external and internal, micro and macro – of what we might potentially be aware. A selection process is necessary because of the limited capacity of consciousness and working memory (finite perception).

So what could be happening outside of our perceptual capacities? And does it even matter? Consciousness seems as simple as a brain and its physiological connections reacting fluidly with and within an environment. But how much of this process is mere perceptual assumption? And what is the overall understanding of this process?

Steven Pinker’s Surface Perception Module accounts for how the brain makes up for any missing information on the perception of objects by explaining how the brain ‘assumes’ the ‘world’ it is living in. If the brain did not assume certain rules for its environment then it would have to filter through an infinite amount of data which would make survival impossible.

Instead, it does assume finite aspects of its reality, oscillating objects into perceptual existence, thereby making it possible to traverse reality and bring meaning to it through precise perceptual injections of finitude.

Can Science Explain Consciousness?
Can Science Explain Consciousness?

The problem with the scientific study of consciousness, however, is that it is typically broken down into only three categories: physiological, cognitive, and experiential. There’s no doubt that these are all aspects of consciousness, but they are by no means separate; nor are they the only ones.

Consciousness study cannot (except in a generic sense) be systematized lest important data is lost. There is something lost between the physiological and the cognitive when we bring our labels to bear and neatly pigeonhole our ‘discoveries’ underneath them.

Conscious events are more than what our science can currently explain in a rational way. Like particle physics cannot explain what is light. They may postulate light’s particle-like nature, they may postulate its wave-like nature, but in the end the phenomena of light is just as systematically indescribable as the nature of consciousness.

Similarly, psychologists researching the physiological aspects of consciousness may postulate its neurological patterns, its cognitive aspect, and its functions of memory and perception, but in the end consciousness is just as systematically indescribable as light is. Only in the most generic sense can consciousness or light be explained systematically.

“Conscious awareness” writes philosopher-psychologist Owen Flanagan “is as ubiquitous as light, sound, heat, and color. Indeed, one might argue that it is even more ubiquitous than any of these, since there is light and sound and heat and color only insofar as these phenomena are revealed in experience.” Insofar as consciousness cannot be explained systematically it can be explained perceptually.

cosmic-consciousness
Quantum Consciousness

Consciousness is what we are aware of in regards to our relationship with reality, both inner and outer. Being aware of that which is ‘out there’ is a process of objectivity, whereas being aware of an ‘inner-state’ is a process of subjectivity.

Perception seems to be that which ties it all together, as people who perceive (subjectively) devise a perception (objectively) of the environment around them.

So what about the experience of that which is ‘out there’? Is conscious perception, together with all its prejudices and biases, enough to discern what is ‘actually’ happening in the cosmos?

The rift between perception and actual reality starts with the assumptions that we have regarding our environment. There’s the way we perceive our environment, and then there’s the way our environment ‘actually’ is. In order to get closer to the latter, we must focus upon a science that dissects reality itself.

That science is found in modern physics, particularly in the field of quantum mechanics.

Image Source:

The Weight of Consciousness
Can Science Explain Consciousness?
Quantum Consciousness

Nothing Bad has Ever Happened to You

Nikki Sapp
-
13
Nothing Bad has Ever Happened to You

“We acquire the strength we have overcome” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

every cloud has a silver lining Nothing bad has ever happened to you. For most people, a statement like this will prompt them to do either one of two things.

Either they will pause, smile, nod and agree because after some reflecting they find that this statement is in fact true, or they will immediately be offended, defensive or sometimes even get angry and start spouting off the 5-10 bad situations that have happened to them that month alone.

A person’s knee-jerk reaction to this statement may signify something much deeper than who sees their glass as half full and who sees it as half empty.

It may be an indicator as to how attached they are to their “story”, their past, or even just negative emotions in general.

When we become so attached to a past trauma, or negativity, that we use it as a part of our identity, we run the risk of becoming addicted and dependent upon the negative emotions to establish our sense of who we are.

“A sense of suffering is a small assignment when compared to the reward. Rather than begrudge your problem, explore it. Ponder it. And most of all, use it.” – Max Lucado

The concept of becoming addicted to negative emotions or suffering may sound absurd at first, because who would choose to become addicted to something that makes them feel bad?

However if you form your identity as “I am the person who many bad things have happened to,” or “I am the person who dealt with this trauma,” or “I am the person who had such and such terrible experience that made me who I am today,” your sense of self starts to depend on the negative story in order to reinforce your sense of self.

light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnelWhen your sense of who you are is formed around a past traumatic experience, you may feel defensive against anything or anyone who threatens to debunk or negate your “story”. In order to protect ourselves from our mind building up a story about a past event, we must first look at how it all happens in the first place.

When something happens to us that we did not plan for, our mind creates a story about the situation through our thoughts. The story we create will determine whether we label the situation as “good” or “bad”. Good situations get filed under the “things that have gone well” file, while perceived bad situations get filed under the “things that have gone badly” file.

However, true wisdom comes from knowing that no one situation is unequivocally good or bad. If you take a moment to think back on any given good or bad situation, it is guaranteed that you can find at least one bad thing that has happened due to a “good” situation, or one good thing that has happened because of a “bad” situation.

This exercise alone proves that the statement is actually true.

Nothing bad has ever happened to you. When we look at situations from a broader perspective we are able to see that there is in fact a silver lining to every cloud. The only thing holding us back from seeing this silver lining is our ego or sense of identity.

How attached we have become to our story will determine how fiercely the ego will hold on to its judgment of a situation.

The stronger the hold the more protective and defensive we get in trying to protect our story and identity at all costs. In order to avoid living in a past reality over and over again in our thoughts, and become who we desire to be in this present moment, we only need to adjust one thing…how we process emotions and feelings.

“When we can no longer change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.” — Viktor Frankl

Yes it is true that an experience we’ve had may have made us feel hurt, sad, angry, depressed, frustration etc… However, feelings, like situations, come… and they go.

As long as we bring awareness to the feelings, and allow them to process to completion, there is never any reason that we have to live with past hurts over and over and over again by retelling our sad story to ourselves through our thoughts.
turning wounds into wisdom
Feelings are merely a representation of how our brain has chosen to process a particular event. And though they feel extremely real at the time, feelings and emotions do not equal truth.

Our feelings help reinforce our perspective on an event and can even manifest outward into our physical body, which makes them feel even more real, but a shift in perspective is all a person needs in order to not become attached to a story.

It is important to remember that we shouldn’t judge the feelings themselves, nor should we avoid them and pretend they are not happening, but rather we should feel them completely, and use them constructively.

When we feel the feelings to their completion we are able to move past them. We discover the light at the end of a tunnel and more often than not feel better at the end of a traumatic event rather than worse. It is at this point we are able to rewrite our story.

Instead of letting the bad event define who we are in this present moment, we start seeing ourselves as someone who dealt with a less than desirable situation but was able to take the good from it and move past it. Instead of being a victim, we allow ourselves to be the victor.

Image Source

Silver lining

1...298299300...348Page 299 of 348