How does Belief affect Consciousness?
We are biologically programmed to believe. To know. Every thought results in electromagnetic conduits connecting and disconnecting, synapses forming pathways between neurons, forging the personality through experience and intent. The mind becomes whatever we think as our bodies become whatever we eat.
Convoluting the brain in this manner is normative. Even in rejecting belief we are forming a belief. Patterning the brain and its neural structures a certain way as opposed to another.
When we literally change our minds we change our brains physically. It is the way our bodies are set up to host consciousness. Part and parcel of the program. To not believe is a contradiction in terms. And yet, the paradox is that moving beyond belief and knowledge is the path. To change the mind, to change the biology to become perfectly clear is to change the state of consciousness. The correlation lies in the actual physiological shifts that occur in the body when modalities designed to clear the mind are implemented and integrated into a life, becoming the primary mode of expression. The new field of quantum biology explores the unity of mind and body and the physiology of consciousness.
While it is often entertaining and personally gratifying to obtain knowledge and hold beliefs there comes a point when holding on to the ephemeral, the constantly shifting, must give way to the search for inner peace. Returning to the paradox I mentioned above, knowledge flows easily and beliefs no longer hold the power to physically mold the mind once a state of mental equilibrium is reached. Of course many here are familiar with the practices concerned with achieving this state of being.
The important correlation here is the integration of body and mind. Leading to the understanding that this is all more than mere thoughts, word and actions in the colloquial sense of understanding those terms.
There is much more. The entanglement of minds that form institutions, attitudes, mores and norms, our interrelation to and entanglement with the biosphere. The speed with which our bodies change at the cellular level, the interaction of breath with the air and the environment, the passage of germs and viruses, the decomposition of biological matter and reintegration with the world corpus are all examples of the integration of individual and mass humanity with the Earth. The only separation inherent in our existence is the separation we create within our minds. The holistic nature of our entwined unity of consciousness and biology is no mere idea. It is the fundamental substrate of our very existence. Since that is so, beliefs cannot be subtracted from the corpus of cognition that we engage in and co-create every moment of every day.
Beliefs are an expression of consciousness, and the wide variety of beliefs speaks to the divergence of experience for the human family. Different sub-groups of the family hold differing beliefs, but the ability of all humans to access those cultural beliefs is a pale shadow of each individual’s ability to access the core experience of consciousness, which underlies belief and culturally-specific information. Understanding and relegating these beliefs to a supporting role and distancing them from the knowledge of reality that powers our experience of materiality enhances the connection with the deeper streams of material creation and the core aspects of the human biological interface with the world.
Understanding Consciousness Series
Part II
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Thoughts are energetic emanations. Electromagnetic and expansive in nature, thought-forms as processed through the biological conduits of neurons and synapsesare the physical forms of creative communication. They can be measured and quantified. The brain’s biological mechanisms, from the amygdala to the thalamus to the pre-frontal cortex, are the structures by which it is wired to process thoughts and create emotions which provide a chemical momentum that powers not only the body but the non-physical energetic coalescence of presence and intent as well.
Beyond the material world, into the inter-dimensional darkness of the unknown, consciousness connects our 3rd-dimensional reality with other planes of existence as well. In the realm of psychology, the existence of a collective unconscious has been explored and confirmed, humans share symbols and archetypes across the diverse field of biological difference, no matter what part of the globe any individual or group might be from. This holistic field of shared consciousness can be broken down into cultural groupings, as those who share societal mores form smaller collectivities, still connected to the whole, but sharing individuated markers that make them distinct from the larger groups, to the extent that an individual is ensconced within a family collective that nests within a local collective that is also nested within a regional collective that exists within a national collective which is itself a part of a racial collective.
In the realm of experience, cause and effect also seem to be respondent to emotional states, as internal harmonic resonance often leads to positive life events and outcomes, while internal disharmonic resonance leads to the opposite. How and what a person thinks determines the trajectory of potential outcomes along their life-path. In the daily interactions of the awakened consciousness manifest, individuals embark upon vibrant and responsive patterns of thought and behavior, the holistic nature of their cognitive processes emanating outwards and affecting the world around them in all aspects. In the daily interactions of slumberous consciousness manifest, individuals embark upon repetitious patterns of thought and behavior, the fractured nature of their cognitive processes emanating outwards and affecting the world around them in all aspects. Alert and active participation with life is thusly the modus operandi of all those who have direct control over their thought-processes, words and actions. Sleepwalking through life is thusly the modus operandi of all those with no direct control over their thought-processes, words and actions.
I suppose awakening fully to the knowledge that you’re not being all you can be is a daunting prospect. Realizing that all that you’ve done during your life is only a portion of what you’ve always been fully capable of is an indictment of intention and purpose that really begs the question, why?
Continuous series of memories of ghostly interactions that are no more real now than they were when they occuring. The statement by the spiritually-evolved that life is an illusion makes a little bit of sense when you think about how quickly things happen, and the fact that by the time something happens it’s already over and you’re interpreting it in your mind, applying weight and meaning to events that occurred in the space of an instant and then receded, becoming memory almost before you even knew that it was happening. All of life is like that, and most of our mental work is concerned with keeping up, trying not to go down beneath the continuous flow of happenings, of thoughts, the cause and effect of all movement, be it mental, physical or spiritual in nature.
Taking control of your mind will be a form of warfare. It is used to being in charge, to defining who you are, to telling you what your goals are. Becoming familiar with what lies beyond the mind, then, becomes our paramount task. That powerful consciousness that observes, watches, calculates and stores energy and intention in a depthless resevoir of potential. Accessibility is gained through prayer, service and meditation. Prayer addresses the Divinity in Creation, the perceived Outer World. Service is an affront to the Ego, because the Ego is selfish, and so by serving others with a good will and true heart, the Ego retreats from the stage, leaving your individual portion of Divine Love shining like a star for all to feel, and bask in. And meditation familiarizes you with those inner shores of your spiritual sea, the waters that connect to the greater consciousness without, making what is within part of that greater whole.
It is understood that we exist within Creation, or, the Material World. The 3-dimensional world of our senses (sight, sound, touch), plus time, the 4th dimension. It is also understood that, from the perspective of consciousness (mind, spirit, soul), this Creation is also Maya, a sanskrit word for the illusory world of the senses or, again, the Material World.
Our experiences bind us not only to Creation, but also to each other. I used to always emphasize to my physical geography classes that our most fundamental and intimate relationship – post-birth – is not with each other, but with the world around us. We share Incarnation, as a human family, within the bounds of the Material World. We share, as a human family, the generic symbols and archetypes of collective unconsciousness. We share, as a human family, the range of emotions that cause us to smile or frown. We share, as a human family, the progressive and encompassing stricture of time and space. Therefore, we share, as a human family, all of the requirements necessary to create an illusion of reality that binds us, in turn, to the Material World.
In fact, that selfsame creativity that we often associate with artists and the insane is the common birthright of all children. We think of artists as strange, eclectic and wierd because they don’t think like most people, because, generally speaking, they remain open to ideas and experiences. We don’t think of children as strange, eclectic and wierd because we associate their curiosity about the world and everything in it as a function of their youth and inexperience. Once children gain more experience, we expect them to settle down, to conform and to take on a more conventional and acceptable attitude that plants them firmly in the cultural ground tilled by their ancestors and elders, to themselves then become to propagators and protectors of our collective experience of reality.
Life would be lonely without this ability, without this connection, the confirmation of which also substantiates our sense of belonging within the human community, the human family. We find comfort, then, in co-creating the illusion. In the telling and sharing of our stories, in whatever form, as our distant ancestors did as they huddled around the tenuous fires of primeval humanity, set against the encroaching darkness of an unknown and dangerous creation that threatened our very survival as a species.
The contradictory nature of spirituality and nationalism confront all spiritual seekers at some point of their personal evolution. And yet, our specific circumstances, our dharmic inheritance as it were, serves a purpose in the unfolding of our spiritual destinies as nationless Citizens of the World. Coming to grips with one’s Past and integrating it with one’s Present is a key component in the journey towards Transcendence of the material plane of existence, which can mean many things to many people. For me, personally, Bush’s War on Terror and Obama’s War on Liberty aftermath has left me struggling, caught within the grips of an extreme case of cognitive dissonance as my training and upbringing as a member of the American Warrior Class(AWC) surges within my mind. Memories of soldiering, the endless repetitions of the National Anthem, Pledge of Allegience and Star Spangled Banner during my early years combine with the direct military indoctrination of my young adulthood and the subsequent, rough cameraderie of soldiers, as well as the life and loves that have formed an indeliable impression upon me in the Past have made me the man that I am in the Present. I would not be who I am now, if it were not for who I was then.
The expression of this dichotomous viewpoint, the struggle between the World and one’s current circumstances and understandings is the stuff of spiritual elevation. In each moment, it is possible for us to let goof the Past, to die to who we were in order to become who we are meant to be. As an example, it is as if there were a grand template of Rahkyt out there somewhere, a vision of perfection and peace whereby I realize my inherent probabilities, manifest at the highest level of Being, the possibilities of my spirit and my soul. A similar vision exists for all of us, regardless of our stations in life, or our individual experiences, because we are all One, connected at every level of interaction, our actions and reactions being determined by the chaotic effects of stimuli too many and diverse to specify ranging from an vast number of options spanning both space and time, creating matrices of chance and probability that result in our individualized Destinies, sending us upon life-journeys of perfection and peace, despite the emotional highs and lows of illusory materialism that distract us from what is really going on, beneath the surface drama of life and its attendent trials and tribulations.
It almost goes without saying that the connection of body and mind, and some aspects of the spirit, to the collective of humanity is of necessity a mandatory expression of Oneness and that Nationalism, even considering all of its ills, is reflective of this subconscious desire of disparate groups of humanity to express this reality, given their shared ethnic and cultural affiliations. Group-mind, mob behavior, both have an aspect of shared consciousness at the level of the human sub-conscious, binding individuals together in ways that are scientifically documented and verifiable through varied methods utilized by the mass media, corporations and governments in order to direct and control populations.
This body I inhabit is formed of Stardust born of Earth, third planetary body from Sol, one solar system among many clustered within the Milky Way galaxy, reflecting the Infinite Array, expressive of the expansive nature of both matter and consciousness and the continuing evolution of the multiverse, transcending time and space within the remorseless imperative of the evolutionary process occuring within the soul of each moment, born anew with each thought and subsequent action at every level of Creation Become. My experiences and genetic programming, explicit towards the manifestation of my own personal destiny as a microcosm of our shared, collective destiny, the fulfillment of an imperative born far beyond my, or our, capacity to conceive of in its awesome and terrifying immensity.
The latter, from the Bhagavad-Gita, which is the text of choice for those adherents of Hinduism and also those who observe the tenets of Krishna-consciousness, who have also been called, sometimes derogatorily, Hare Krishnas, and who also engage in what has become a sect-less practice known as Transcendental Meditation.
Learning new things has always come easy to me. A Blessing from God that has allowed me to pick up and hone talents that have helped me to shape my life and express my interests, beliefs and thoughts in a form that people seem to resonate to. At the age of twelve, I learned to play the Happy Days theme on my saxaphone so well that none of my peers would believe that I’d learned it just by listening to it on television. In 8th grade, a young Jewish boy named Joel and I used to improvise together, he on clarinet and I on sax. We particularly enjoying jamming to that old standard, The Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company C, upon completion of which Joel would be left giggling uncontrollably and I, laughing along with him, also enjoying the fact that I’d finally found somebody else who could play like I could.
We are all born within a certain context. Our lives lead us, inevitably toward the fulfillment or the renunciation of those contextual events that make up the days, weeks, months and years of our lives. Our ability to fulfill those duties is reflected by the choices that we make, whether they be for the better or for the worse and regardless of our choice, our decisions are made within the greater context of our individual, family, cultural, ethnic, racial and greater-human dharmic narratives, and it is our decision whether or not we are going to fulfill our dharmic duties or whether we are going to renounce all responsibility and take the path of the Lone Ascetic and Wanderer, the innermost, contemplative path. Self-actualization refers to our ability to either fulfill or not fulfill these dharmic duties to the best of our abilities, and to manifest the skills and talents that we’ve been blessed with for the greatest glory of Divinity.
I find many correspondences in the teachings of the Bhagavad-Gita and Christianity, from its ideas of karma (sowing and reaping the whirlwind/children responsible for the sins of the fathers, etc.) and dharma (giving unto Caesar what is his/utilizing talents for the glory of God), to the physical manifestation of Krishna in human form, as Jesus was also considered to be God in human form, was born and died, vacated the flesh and returned again to prove his eternal and abiding nature.
After a year of track at Morehouse College (where I reached 6’10 in the high jump) - and which is also a blog in and of itself - and a semester at San Antonio College I joined the Army and went to Basic Training at Fort Jackson in Columbia, South Carolina and Advanced Individual Training (AIT), at the signal center at Fort Gordon, in Augusta, Georgia. I did well on the Army Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) and chose to train as a Single Channel Radio Operator, which was a combat military occupational specialty (MOS 31C) and that also gave me access to both the GI Bill and the Army College fund. Excelling in that training (Honor Graduate), I was also chosen to learn International Morse code (IMC), which was an additional skill identifier. That course was a month long and consisted of sitting at a desk wearing headphones and armed with a morse code tapper of Vietnam-era vintage, as had been the radio and teletype equipment that I’d trained on for the initial operator’s skillset, I proceeded to embark upon an amazing inner journey.
I recognize the possible affront offered by this essay. But I cannot and will not apologize for who I am and what my experiences have been because they are mine, and they have made me the man that I am. I am manifesting, with all glory given to Divinity, a potential that we all have, and that we all make real in our lives - to a greater or lesser degree - depending upon our own proclivities and potentials, which have been shaped by our life experiences and our individuated zodiacal natures. What we are capable of doing is so much more than what we generally allow ourselves to do, or even to believe can be done. The human mind and body are the most amazing energetic and physical creations upon this planet. To seek to discover their capabilities and manifest them in our lives should be among the greatest goals of a lifetime.
Use your talents for God, Krishna, Allah, Oldumare, Legba, Yemaya, Buddha, or whomever your personal diety is. Be thankful for your gifts, and share them equitably. Be sure of your present and future paths, and know that Divinity is within us all, watching ever, loving fully and understanding us each, with all of our failings, neuroses and problems. No matter our current paths, or the extent to which we feel we’ve doomed ourselves to eternal hell, the potential to achieve what we were born to achieve remains real.
That, once upon a time, many, many suns ago, in fact, before there were any suns at all, there was no you or I, no here or there, no up or down, in or out. That all that there was, in the Entirety of Creat-no, wait. There wasn’t even a Creation, yet! That all there was, in the entirety of this Formless, Void of Potential, was Awareness. Not even thought had been separated yet! Omniscience was eternal and infinite, there was nothing beyond. Nothing within, or without.
But, it was not that smooth, or simple, was it. Such things never are. Before that Big Bang occurred, Hierarchies of Powers and Principalities evolved as Consciousness continued to coalesce and differentiate Itself from the Void of Potential and descend further through the etheric, vibratory levels of dimensions in ever-decreasing collectivities at every stage approaching material manifestation excepting only that final, precipitous descent into Form. That last choice was made after the coalescence of separate Collectivities of Mass Consciousnesses that were distinct in and of themselves, creating vibrational energy families, if you will, formed to abide and rule in sharply distinct dimensional levels, interacting with each other and permeating the bubble of consciousness - still and always ensconced within that infinite Void of Potential - yearning for experience and curious as to the possibilities of even more radical interaction and differentiation.
If this ancient paen, a truism of cosmic unity, holds, then it only stands to reason that our most sacred beliefs do not tell the entire story. If there is Good and Evil on the material plane of Creation, why should there not be Good and Evil – or, altruism and malignant narcissism - at the higher etheric vibrational levels? Perhaps the terminology is a distraction, one that draws away from the underlying abstract, scientific concepts. If there is Dichotomous Opposition at all levels of nature, why should this not also be so at every dimensional level leading back from Form, into Formlessness?
The mythopoeic era of Humanity, often called the Golden Age, is distinct in that, during this time period – an Age of Gods, Goddesses, Heroes and Monsters - people spoke to Divine Beings directly. People saw the Gods and Goddesses, interacted with them. The nights were filled with horrible creatures and fear and dread were not inculcated purposefully, as we do today, with our scary movies and pathological curiosities toward the perverse. Magic was in the air, the Fairies (Sidhe, Tuatha de Danaan) lived on the Earth and in the Earth, with Dwarfs, Gnomes, Druids and Witches behind and in every rock and tree, hiding under every hill and sneaking across every dale. Perhaps the side-effects of a burgeoning earthly population – and a corresponding increase in collective, psychic detritus or background noise -taken alongside the increased static of various families of electromagnetic radiation pervading the ether have reduced our ability to sense the influx of extra-dimensional communications.
Our experiences, as individuals, are diverse. And yet, there is a similarity, a connection between us all that links us as One, that has been explored psychologically and spiritually, acknowledged, its ramifications considered, expounded upon, its implications far-ranging. The viscerality of experience connects us and yet separates us as we coexist within the shifting boundaries of perceptive constraints that comprise this shared illusion of individuality. There is no doubt that we all share a genetic heritage and there should also be no doubt that we share a spiritual heritage. The Imperatives of Incarnation demand the expression of difference. And yet, there is so much more to Reality than what we see, hear and feel. Those vibrational changes in the atmosphere that we sense before a storm or in the quiet of a room, that quality of alone-ness that might change in an instant, raising hairs on the backs of our necks, causing us to crane our necks searching the room for the entry of another, those feelings that we get when we consider a course of action, either affirming or denying our intellectual decision-making processes, causing us to squirm in discomfort as we battle within ourselves to come to a decision, or not.
In the religious life of most Americans, it is the way of the Monk that resonates the most. It is the way of our religious practices. Christianity deals primarily with the emotional body, and we see our world and our spiritual evolution in the context of feeling close to G-d, and feeling the love of G-d and demonstrating that love to those around us. We see our pain and heartaches as trials and tribulations, as ways by which G-d tests our souls and purifies us on the crucible of experience. A Monk dedicates himself to the glorification of G-d and the mortification of the body. Since all is contained within the Bible, intellectual pursuit is discouraged and prayer and dedicated reading, the method of coming to know G-d. G-d is in Heaven above, the devil is in Hell and the battle for souls is the cause for all horror on Earth.
The requirements of our daily lives are often enough to leave us breathless by nightfall and yet there are other, higher or lower demands upon our energy quotients. Channeling, Ouija boards, prayer and meditative states open conduits to these higher and lower influences and, unless great care is taken, can lead to negative consequences in the lives of the unwary. Releasing energy haphazardly, or without defined purposes, is, then, a dangerous proposition, considering the nature of Creation and the existence of Predators, be they human, ethereal or otherwise. Keep in mind that we ourselves, as humans, are Predators, and that the Law of Karma pervades the lower levels of consciousness.
Since all is One, all of this talk of Predators can be seen as an expression of psycho-spiritual dramas that we work out through deep-consciousness interactions within the span of lifetimes lived simultaneously – outside of time and space, i.e. perceptual dimensionality – as we each are reflections of the Infinite and Eternal “I”. All that is without is an expression of what is within. Practically speaking, our lives are the lessons we learn, and we work them out in the context of greater forces. The personal dramas in our lives can be seen as the expression of dramas originating in higher densities of conscious awareness. Or, in more metaphoric, mythological terms, the war between G-d and Lucifer is ongoing and works itself out in each and every one of our lives; G-d being the Multiverse and Lucifer being humanity, the return of consciousness from material incarnation to ethereal Oneness being the goal as we – our collective Soul-group – climb the branches of the Tree of Life.
The coalescence of the 3 distinct ways under the holistic 4th way becomes the path less traveled, combining body, mind and heart in holistic resonation to the final stages of material incarnation. Conserving and utilizing our energies in proportions exact to the need of the moment indicates a gaining of wisdom and a consolidation of incarnate experience. Becoming cognizant of the energetic maelstrom within which we manifest experience is a necessary step in navigating it and finding our way through life’s storms intact, ready to take on the next stage of our spiritual, evolutionary development.
There is a disconnect between objective reality and subjective reality. The many viewpoints of the human family seem to indicate that the realities that we create are equal to Reality itself. That, depending upon what we believe, the world around us will reflect that belief and will, in fact, conform the Objective Reality to the subjective, or perceived, reality. We labor to greater or lesser extents to live and carry out the plans that we have for our lives against a stream of events that either support or negate our desires, and we proceed or stall based upon the strength of our willpower and intentions.
A monarch butterfly fluttered up to me as I came to this realization, stalling for a few seconds in the space before me, seeming to confirm this understanding with its implicit presence, its symbolic representation as an Archetype of Transformation causing an unmistakeable resonance of truth to thrum through my entire body, the vibrations and warmth coursing through me as the sunlight brightened and colors strengthened. The butterfly continued upon its course and I sent it thanks in the form of love and telepathic gratitude, as I continued to contemplate upon how to approach this topic in a measured manner.
The actually implementation of this seemingly innocuous and abstract knowledge is resonant with consequences too wide-ranging for me to discuss in complete detail here. But Sufism, Gnosticism, the Cathars, the teachings of Gurdjieff, Castenada, as well as many native traditions around the world, all speak of the dangers of human interaction with these supernal entities and state, succinctly, the world is a prison.
Matrix-like truisms would be apt, at this point. To see beyond the flimsy, cloth walls of the carnival tent requires a desire to do so; to cast off the shades of ignorance to don the clear, glass spectacles of truth. To tune out the gaudy tunes and ephemeral exhilaration of the Ferris Wheel and look beyond the grotesque vision of the Lizard man and the Giant in the Side Show. To realize, once and for all, that knowledge without application is the very expression of ignorance.
