A Course In Consciousness

[vicente]

Part 1: Quantum theory and consciousness
Part 2: The metaphysics of nonduality
Part 3: The end of suffering and the discovery of our true nature

http://faculty.virginia.edu/consciousness/

[Thomas Knierim]

Thank you, Vicente.

This is an excellent introduction to the topic of consciousness. It gives a brief summary of the principal perspectives from which the 'problem' of consciousness can be viewed, namely metaphysics, physics, psychology, and philosophy of mind. Actually, I had planned something similar for the 'mind' section of thebigview.com. Perhaps I should take the paper as an inspiration to finish this work.

Greetings, Thomas

[Nick_A]

At times like this I can only express gratitude to the powers that be that have allowed me to become aware of cosmology and how it puts the material universe and its relationship to consciousness into perspective.

For something that doesn't exist, apparently this illusion has one heck of an imagination that not only creates a subjective conscious perception, but the concept of objective states of consciousness as well. Why this subjective dream unrelated to anything real came into existence is not so easy to explain.

Objective consciousness is really the complete knowing of oneself in motion as opposed to awareness which is the experience of the results of "functions". Of course, the intellectual expression of "know thyself" is far beyond the conscious knowledge of oneself including the entire scale of being that it comprises.

[vicente]

Perhaps I should take the paper as an inspiration to finish this work.


Yes, I thought the subject was very complimentary to other areas of BigView,...even asheera will appreciate the context of the 3rd part.

:)

[vicente]

Why this subjective dream unrelated to anything real came into existence is not so easy to explain.

Does it need explaination? And if the explaination were presented to us, would we be capable to understand? I certainly understand the desire for explaination,...stuff like ACIM made things palatable for me for awhile,...ie:

12. If God did not create the world or the body, who did? Moreover, who are we and how did we get here?
http://www.miraclestudies.net/QuestIndx.html

Objective consciousness is really the complete knowing of oneself in motion as opposed to awareness which is the experience of the results of "functions".

Yes, Object-ive Consciousness would be Consciousness of Object-ivity, or a knowing of motion. Instead of merely projecting outwards, we would grasp what the Buddhas allegedly said was the coming back,...the reverse flow of forward moving things.

My take on 'creation', or the moving universe, is one from Light's point of view. When we arrive at the speed of Light, there is Stillness. At the level of Stillness, all objects are as below it, that is, slower than the Stillness of Light. The material universe is slower than the Stillness of Light. Anything slower than the Stillness of Light is in the past. Our perceived lives are in the past,...however, the we that we truely are, is Fully Conscious in the Now, in the Stillness of Light. There is no future for anything slower than the speed of Light, which is Stillness,...only a past.

In other words,...what we see as us moving towards a future is really our Full Spectrum Consciousness moving us out of the past. Our past and future has already happened,...the way of ascension is simply the reverse of the descension. That's the dream,...the past.

Simply look around yourself. Do you see anything in the Now? No,...all objects are in the past.

The you you really are is at Peace and Joy in the Stillness of Light, and guiding you back to yourself,...the end of the projection, the last scene of the film.

Like a film at a theater, it was made previous to your arrival,...you may not know what is going to happen,...sometimes we can guess,...the point is, it was already completed, nothing the Director did not put there will pop on the screen. Kind of upsets the notion of freewill,...LOL.

:)

[Nick_A]

Vicente

Does it need explaination? And if the explaination were presented to us, would we be capable to understand? I certainly understand the desire for explaination,...stuff like ACIM made things palatable for me for awhile,...ie:

12. If God did not create the world or the body, who did? Moreover, who are we and how did we get here?
http://www.miraclestudies.net/QuestIndx.html

Yes an explanation is essential and it is our responsibility to grow in our understanding so that our being can reflect it.

As far as "A Course in Miracles", I must be sincere and say honestly that I am not happy with it. To be honest, I believe it is "Luciferic" as described by Rudolph Steiner:

http://www.kheper.net/topics/Anthroposophy...er-3streams.htm (http://www.kheper.net/topics/Anthroposophy/Steiner-3streams.htm)

My path isn't Anthroposophy but I like a lot of what Steiner has said including his explanations of the appeal of Lucifer however this concept is understood. The world is being divided into the gross materialism at one level and escapism into dreams and pseudo mystical states of consciousness. There is a danger here and Steiner is quite wise to help us be aware of it.

The point is that many of us are drawn to this escapism that denies human purpose which is the unification of levels for the sake of the spiritualization of the earth and our own transformation in the process. In this way, to our disadvantage, we deny ourselves.

Our perceived lives are in the past,...however, the we that we truely are, is Fully Conscious in the Now, in the Stillness of Light.

You are indicating a "potential" in human transformation. It is just egotism to assume it to be something you possess if for no other reason that we lack an inner unity to be conscious of.

[vicente]

My path isn't Anthroposophy but I like a lot of what Steiner has said

I studied Steiner once myself,...belonged to an Anthroposophical group for a year. I especially liked his work on Colour. Sort of suprised he didn't figure out the Christian thing,...but those were different times.

The point is that many of us are drawn to this escapism that denies human purpose

I prefer the Buddhist notion that purpose is responsible for suffering,...that is, when we identify with the purpose. Christians on the other hand, at least the Christian model, have a purpose to fulfill their God, which only implies in my reasoning that their God is lacking. ie:
http://www.saigon.com/~anson/ebud/beyond/beyond04.htm

You are indicating a "potential" in human transformation. It is just egotism to assume it to be something you possess if for no other reason that we lack an inner unity to be conscious of.


On one hand I have pondered if that is merely conceptualization on my part,...yet from a different view, one from NDE, being in Light, Connected Breathing, some hypnosis, JBC (Just Because Club) techniques, etc., I have experienced being complete, lacking in nothing, in perfect Joy and Thoughtlessness through which is a realization (for me) that there is nothing to learn, merely to unlearn. I suppose unlearning could be considered a purpose, but the unlearning I'm speaking of only manifests by way of effortlessness. It's sort of a great Catch-22,...effort is useless to realize reality,...it's only realized through effortlessness.

You are indicating a "potential" in human transformation.

Reminds me of the Andrew Cohen and Ken Wilber dialogue on the Conspiracy of Mediocrity:

"To dare to even speak about radical transformation, let alone call other people to a higher level, is against the unstated rules. And of course, one's definitely going to be put in one's place for doing something like that. But unless the possibility of genuine transformation is actually declared, unless one is willing to demonstrate it publicallyand to call other people to the same, no one is even going to know that it's possible. And than unknowingly, everybody's going to be participating in the conspiracy of mediocrity.

The conspiracy of mediocrity is basically the conspiracy to express your own ego instead of transcending it or letting go of it. The idea has become "if I can really emote and express my self-contriction with sincerity, I'm somehow spiritual". Actually, people who are involved in this boomeritis even deny the importance of Enlightenment or Awakening, because that's saying some states are higher than others - and we shouldn't be so judgemental. But guess what? Some states are higher. And so the entire raison d'etre gets tossed out because it offends the pluralistist ego.

The spiritual experience, which ideally should be a stepping stone to less ego and greater transparency, has become a victim of our therapeutic culture, where we don't make judgements because that would hurt egoic self-esteem, and so all we do is embrace, console, and celebrate the personal self. Spiritual practice has become nothing more than a form of therapy where self-acceptance rather than ego-transcendence is the goal. And the problem is that therapists are basically pimps for samsara. They want to hold onto the egoic self-contraction and make it feel good about itself.

This conspiracy of mediocrity is very unfortunate. The great promise of the human potential movement was very straightforward - there are higher human potentials. Now, from the therapeutic culture, people say, "wait a minute. you're saying there are higher potentials, so does that mean I'm lower? because that can't be right". All of a sudden it implied a judgement, and nobody's allowed to be higher because that means someone else is going to be lower. And you're not allowed to call anybody lower; therefore nobody's allowed to be higher.

So the Human Potential movement got derailed and was replaced by this therapeutic self-expression, self-acceptence movement, which catastrophically prevents higher transformation and mystical breakthroughs. What is missing in the New Age Community is real intellectual vigor. Under the therapeutic culture, if you feel good, you're enlightened. That is mediocrity, and a conspiracy toward mediocrity. In our current therapeutic society people don't want to see that what they thought was meaningful may actually be meaningless".

:)

[Nick_A]

Vicente

I prefer the Buddhist notion that purpose is responsible for suffering,...that is, when we identify with the purpose. Christians on the other hand, at least the Christian model, have a purpose to fulfill their God, which only implies in my reasoning that their God is lacking. ie:
http://www.saigon.com/~anson/ebud/beyond/beyond04.htm

Yes, the dukkah is this ever-changing impermanent process in which suffering takes place. Modern Buddhism begins to go wrong here as it must because of human nature. Concepts become lumped together losing a necessary discrimination in this case between qualities of suffering. Dukkah and suffering rae often seen as the same but they are not.

If people could just forget all the experts for a moment and just try to ponder objectively for themselves, so much could be different. Clearly though, that is just wishful thinking. Compassion, for example, is an important idea in Buddhism as part of its purpose. To experience it and to genuinely act from it as a human being requires suffering. Does that mean that a person must avoid compassion because it leads to suffering? No, it means something different that requires some genuine introspection and self knowledge to truly understand.

Yes Christianity is a Way that helps God and ourselves. Creation itself is a response to a "need". God as "love" was insufficient. It is not God that is omnipotent but God's Will.

I have experienced being complete, lacking in nothing, in perfect Joy and Thoughtlessness through which is a realization (for me) that there is nothing to learn, merely to unlearn. I suppose unlearning could be considered a purpose, but the unlearning I'm speaking of only manifests by way of effortlessness. It's sort of a great Catch-22,...effort is useless to realize reality,...it's only realized through effortlessness.

For me it is neither learning nor unlearning but of coming into "being". What good is learning or unlearning if our "being" cannot make human use of it? As an analogy to chemistry, we are a mixture with the potential of existing as one or as a "solution". It is though all our inner psyche exists inside a glass jar and what ever comes to the surface in this mixture depends on external circumstances.. We can arrange it for ourselves most easily with drugs to bring forth higher aspects of our psych that are beyond our normal awareness. Existing as a mixture and as various degrees of "being", other aspects soon become activated in response to the external world and our psych changes. In this way we are always turning in circles with no inner stability.

A real man of inner unity would IMO have a balance between higher consciousness and mechanical reaction with the intermediate being self awareness.

This is part of the deeper meaning of the profound biblical passage explaining the Faith of the Centurion: Mat 8: 8

The centurion answered and said, Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof: but speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed.

The centurion could be a leader to what is beneath him in rank yet openly receptive to that which is above. The inner psychological meaning shows the scale of being of a real individual where they are not confused as is normally our case.

So the efforts as I understand it are not in the learning but in the conscious struggle "to be" met by the habitual tendency "not to be" in order to allow for us to come into being. This is not "effortlessness", but real efforts of the appropriate kind.

So the Human Potential movement got derailed and was replaced by this therapeutic self-expression, self-acceptence movement, which catastrophically prevents higher transformation and mystical breakthroughs. What is missing in the New Age Community is real intellectual vigor. Under the therapeutic culture, if you feel good, you're enlightened. That is mediocrity, and a conspiracy toward mediocrity. In our current therapeutic society people don't want to see that what they thought was meaningful may actually be meaningless".

Agreed. This is why I admire the "black sheep" or true individuals as I described in the "Individuality" thread. It also relates to the little known psychology of "Acornology" which may at some point be worth exploring.

[Nick_A]

As I've said, the relationship of consciousnes to an objective scale of "being" IMO is essential for any realistic understanding and it is also one of the meanings of "Christ Consciousness". It fascinates me to see how quickly the concept of being or existence is defined as purely black and white in that something exists or it doesn't. the whole idea of the scale of objective quality of existence defined by the distance from the "center" so to speak gets lost yet it was known since ancient times. The idea was known as "Theosis" but its value got lost in the shuffle

Those like Meister Eckhart and others knew of it yet just this knowledge made them hated men. The church tried to get rid of Meister Eckhart but finally and only recently he became accepted.

Clement of Alexandria recognized it also but much fell on deaf ears.

http://www.monachos.net/patristics/clement_intro.shtml

But for all this breadth of coverage, Clement suddenly takes on a very focused tone at Strom. VII, presenting therein a meticulously detailed picture of man’s salvation in Christ. The conception (we might hesitantly call it a ‘model’) here encountered is, at its essence, one of vertical motion: that which is saved is so by a ‘movement’ or progression from what is ‘lower’ to what is ‘higher’. From the lowest ranks of material existence, the object of salvation ascends to the pinnacle of perfection in God. We might represent it thusly:

His diagram is of course, cosmological yet such ideas never took hold

There are manifold differences between the conceptual schema outlined above, drawn primarily from the Stromateis, and Clement’s second model, found most clearly in the Paedagogus. In this latter system he takes firm hold of his conception of the true pai/dwn a)gwgh/j: humanity’s true teacher, who leads forward in all things by example. The salvation of humankind is tied together with its sanctification into perfection, which in turn is united in form and essence to the life of the incarnate Logos, who leads the way to this end [16]. As such, Clement first sets out a model of Christ’s life in relation both to His divine perfection and His growth as human person:

This again is cosmological understanding that must include the relativity of human "being" itself and how it can manifest on different levels of existence. Christ's mission was to connect these levels. This is the relative "Quality of Consciousness". But so often consciousness is understood as black and white, either conscious or unconscious and modern psychology has no idea of the necessity for shades of grey in its discrimination. discrimination.

It has been said that real spiritual work doesn't teach you anything new but instead allows you to remember what has been forgotten. How true!

[bito]

Yes an explanation is essential and it is our responsibility to grow in our understanding so that our being can reflect it.

seeking imagined final feast is hungering feasting

feasting is now

:)

[Nick_A]

Hi bito

seeking imagined final feast is hungering feasting

feasting is now

Not easy; must learn how. Normally we starve.

I've learned on this site of two main obstacles: Republicans and hemorrhoids. Both cause pain in the neck making now feasting very hard.