UNDERSTANDING THE FUNDAMENTAL METAPHYSICAL QUESTIONS

UNDERSTANDING THE FUNDAMENTAL METAPHYSICAL QUESTIONS

By Sensei Erwin L. Rimban

Who are you?

         “I think, therefore I am.”

         “You are a child of the universe…”

         “We are all in a widowed state, and our task is to remarry.”

         The first one is attributed to the philosopher Rene Descartes. The second is from the poem Desiderata. And the third one is from Louis Claude de St. Martin. Throughout the ages, the greatest thinkers of humanity have endeavored to answer this most fundamental question of human existence. Let us now explore how various paragons of the ages have approached it and savor the insights we can glean from their thoughts.

         “You are a creature of God,” pronounced the Western theologians. But a sinful one, they admonish and thus continue the argument by explaining how you can be saved in the form of the various theories of salvation. “You are atman, a fragment of the Universal Soul,” asserted the Eastern spiritual gurus. Sinfulness is not an issue in the East, compared to the West, but ignorance of one’s true nature is. Therefore, the Eastern spiritual traditions emphasize the need to know one’s true nature. Some would say the East presents a much more cheerful prospect. “Man is rational,” said the ancient Greeks. “Man is spiritual,” countered the ancient Eastern spiritual teachers.

         “You are a body”, intoned the mechanistic Western physiologists. A lack of subtlety there, everyone can see they have a body. “You are a mind existing within the confines of the body,” championed the Platonian idealists. More subtle, assuredly.  “You are a body with a mind that is full of psychosexual dilemmas,” declared the Freudian psychoanalysts. The various psychoanalytic paradigms all flowed from this concept. “Your psyche is rooted to the Collective Unconscious, countered the brilliant Jungian archetypal analysts. And their disciples have been searching for archetypes ever since, uncovering every nook and cranny of the human psyche.

         “You are a battleground of the forces of light and dark,” lamented the dualistic-minded Zoroaster. Dualistic religions and philosophies flow from this theological position. You are a combination of Yin and Yang, but they are enemies on the surface only. This is a paraphrase from the Taoist masters. For them light and dark, yin and yang, are lovers beneath, whose eternal dance comprises the phenomenal world. “You are nothing,” counseled Prince Siddhartha Gautama upon his ascendancy as the Sakyamuni Buddha, perhaps with a twinkle in his eyes. Did he mean it literally? Allegorically? Or was he thinking of something else. “You may be nothing, but you create your reality by your free will,” added the pragmatists and existentialists.

         “You are a collection of atoms, obeying the classical laws of physics, argued the mechanical Western scientists. For centuries, this has been the norm of Western classical thinking. But Heisenberg, Schrödinger, and other more super-intelligent quantum physicists arrived on the scene. And they changed the landscape of science forever. “You are a monad, a fragment of the universe, complete unto itself,” offered Leibniz, co-inventor of the calculus. “And you are immortal,” echoed Vardhamana Mahavira, champion of Jainism, thousands of miles to the East. Both of these thinkers are separated by distance and time, yet show surprisingly similar positions.

         So who are you?

         The best answer to this question comes from the hieros gamos, the sacred marriage, of quantum physics and the mystical arts. The most advanced quantum physicists are penetrating into the deepest mysteries of space-time, nature, and the universe. They are beginning to behold the Divine Wisdom, the wisdom of the ages, which has been shrouded in mystery since time immemorial.

         For centuries, the Divine Wisdom has been in the hands of the mystics of East and West. Experiencing firsthand the presence of Divine Intelligence, mystics are given a true experiential event where they apprehend personally the nature of man and the universe.

         Hieros gamos. The sacred marriage. More and more quantum physicists and mystical philosophers are communicating, sharing knowledge and critical insights. This conference of minds will help usher the Golden Age of humanity.

         This concludes our basic survey of the first fundamental metaphysical dilemma. It logically now leads us to the next question…..

Why are you here?

         “Something is doing we don’t know what.” A legendary remark attributed to Sir Arthur Eddington.  Let us continue our pilgrimage in wisdom by studying the second fundamental question of existence, the question of origin and purpose.

Two great systems of thought contested the nature of man’s origin in the past: creation and evolution. The diametrical opposition of the mechanical scientists and the stubborn theologians dominated Western civilization for centuries. But today, a new kind of thinking is emerging which is destroying the obsolete paradigms of the past. In this paradigm, both viewpoints can be assimilated into a new system of thought, one that synthesizes both creation and evolution.

         The universe is suffused with energy. And Einstein has demonstrated that matter is simply crystallized energy, a new concept that was extended by the mystical quantum physicists. This position correlates well with the viewpoint of mystical philosophers that matter is the lowest form of energy. We can accommodate the creation theory by tentatively accepting that the creation of this universe did exist as a point in time, corresponding with the Big Bang of the Western scientists. That settles the point of view of creation.

         Observe the universe. Explore our world. Open your eyes to your environment. The forms in our world exist as hierarchies. But the hierarchies are inter-related. Atoms give rise to various molecular arrangements. Molecules give rise to mineral categories. All the various kinds of plants are composites of atoms, molecules and minerals. But the whole is more than the sum of its parts. In other words, a plant is more than a collection of atoms, molecules and minerals. It is something more! And by extension, all the forms of life are more than the sum of their preceding hierarchies. Plants exist as the subsistence of some animals. But animals are entirely different from plants. In the same way, humans eat plants and animals, but their forms are different. Humans are infinitely more complex than plants or animals, although these forms are composed of the same fundamental building blocks: the atoms, molecules and minerals.

         Thus, there exist hierarchies in nature. Preceding wholes give rise to new kinds of wholes. The building blocks remain the same, but the configurations are entirely different. All these permutations in nature display the fact that energy configurations are evolving from one context to the next, from one level to the next, from one hierarchy to the next. Visualize smaller circles of life giving rise to larger circles of life. Smaller energy configurations giving rise to higher energy configurations. This, then, is the new paradigm that accommodates both creation and evolution. In this way, we see evolution manifesting as the development of energy configurations in different environmental matrices, each building on the preceding whole. And creation is the original impetus that gave rise to the universal primordial archetypes of these forms.

         Fascinating!

         If energy configurations are evolving, then the level of awareness of these energy systems are evolving too! The level of awareness of an atom is limited to energy interactions that maintain its nuclear shape and integrity and insure its ability to form molecules with other atoms. The awareness of a monocellular organism is something else entirely. Its biological activities revolve around the maintenance of homeostasis and the capacity to reproduce. Thus, its awareness of itself has reached a different level, not necessarily higher in essence than the preceding system of an atom, but perhaps richer in context. Because the necessities of homeostasis and reproduction will cause the organism’s awareness of its environment to be on a higher level of context, richer, and more detailed.

          Which leads us to human awareness. The consciousness of the human has reached a level where he begins to inquire on the fundamental questions of existence. His awareness of himself is not necessarily higher than molecules, plants or animals. Rather, it is richer relative to the environmental matrix. Because if the human is to survive, he has to assimilate and conquer more of its environmental variables as compared to the lower hierarchies.

         Therefore, we can see that evolution is proceeding level by level, whole by whole, context by context. This is a secret that used to be shared only by the best quantum physicists and the most enlightened mystical philosophers. This is the fact that evolution means not only the development of outer physical forms but it is actually the enhancement of consciousness as a form experiences its pilgrimage through the levels of complexity in the nature of the universe.

         Creation means the inception of a universe. Evolution means the development of awareness or consciousness in that particular universe as its levels of complexity deepen; thus revealing their inherent beauty.

         And now, we are ready to tackle the final fundamental dilemma…..

Where are you going?

         “The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” This is a mystical saying attributed to the semi-legendary figure of Lao Tzu, reputedly the author of the Tao Te Ching, and considered the nominal founder of Taoism. 

         We have been exploring the fundamental questions of existence. We began with the question of fundamental nature: “Who are you?” Then we continued with the question of origin and purpose, “Why are you here?” Now let us study the question of destiny and finality: “Where are you going?”

         We have seen how the forms in nature are evolving into more complex forms, hierarchy by hierarchy. This process pervades the entire universe. And while matter is the outer form or clothing of this process, it is the evolution of consciousness which is the engine that drives it.

         There have been many allegories of this process. Some mystical writers compare life on earth in particular and life in the universe in general to a school. In this allegory, all beings are enrolled in some kind of school where skills are gained, lessons are learned and insights assimilated. In mystical Hindu philosophy, the tempering forces are called karma, dharma and samsara, among others. When a particular insight is learned, developing beings go on to the next level, where there are fresh lessons and new insights. Another allegory worth considering is that of a pilgrimage or a journey. In this particular allegory, the beings of the universe are on a grand adventure. The goal is perfection in evolution as well as the joy of exploration. I find this allegory to be a perfect educational tool for aspirants in the spiritual path.

         From the point of view of a single individual, life is so complex with its attendant problems and vicissitudes. Anyone can be overwhelmed by the sheer complexity of it all. Yet, all the great spiritual traditions of mankind have maintained that life has a purpose far more magnificent than our mundane existence. The trick is to discover the higher meaning of life. For this, all spiritual aspirants since time immemorial have been challenged to open their eyes to the wider world.

         Expand your consciousness. Inquire more. Reflect more. Contemplate more. Meditate more. Discover more perspectives. Get out of your shell, psychologically speaking. As the forms of the universe evolve into higher and higher modes of expression, so you too are invited in the great banquet of eternity. We have seen previously how the forms of life seek to produce more wholes, each more complex than the preceding one. In the same way, the journey of evolution is a pilgrimage of wholes. Let us see how this journey plays in the dance of the universe. Reflect very deeply as we essay the next few statements.

         You are a whole.

         Yet, you are incomplete.

         This incompleteness is not your fault (paradigm shift in Western religious thought). Rather, it is the product of inexperience. Why is this so?

         As you have journeyed in the planes of existence, you have assimilated experiences from your own perspective. Since you are a fragment of the greater whole, this perspective is necessarily incomplete. You can gain a better understanding of the infinite universe by increasing the quantity of your travels in awareness. This means experiencing more of the whole from your vantage point. More lives. More experiences. Thus, the wheel of time, the cycle of reincarnation.

         Meanwhile, you are a whole that seeks to enhance its wholeness. You seek perfection, but think it unattainable. Well, good news, your lower mind cannot attain perfection by itself. It must use other weapons at its disposal; some of which are known only to the Collective Unconscious. Waiting to be discovered, of course.

         You are a whole.

         Yet, you are incomplete. A fragment of the Greater Whole.

And this is the reason why there is a pilgrimage.

You are bound to evolve, into greater and greater Wholes.

Your coherence increases as your pilgrimage deepens.

Your capacity to process information shall increase!

And you shall evolve, more and more, expanding higher and higher!

Let me conclude by offering this saying of Teilhard de Chardin for contemplation:

“We are not human beings on a spiritual journey; we are spiritual beings on a human journey.”

Sensei Erwin Rimban (See Bios page for more information)

2017 Call for Papers

The Journal of Metaphysics and Connected Consciousness is calling for papers on the supernatural and paranormal phenomenon.  As an academic journal, JMCC requires any articles be based in scientific rational discourse.  We welcome papers outlining case studies, direct experience or existing literature on this esoteric subject matter.

We appreciate articles with abstract, key words and source cited information.  You may review our submission guidelines here:  http://journalofmcc.blogspot.com/p/blog-page_12.html   

Please direct your submissions to jaiehart@gmail.com.

Thank you,

Dr. Janice Harter

Dr. Liam Leonard

The Journal of Metaphysics and Connected Consciousness

God, I and the Universe

I see a broken mirror at an unsure time in Brooklyn. The early hours of the morning leave the streets quiet. I am walking with good energy next to me, and a whole lot of conversation that means little to me logically — for opinion appeals to my heart. My friend speaks of god, and inner peace, and my mind is screaming, ’this makes no sense.’ My heart says, yes. This fits like puzzle pieces.

In the beginning, maybe there is silence within. Usually, thoughts create thought processes, which build the scaffolding for a story, which creates a feeling. Beyond this, there is a gut-reaction phase, an ability to intuitively grab what the mind puzzles to understand. But I wish to understand. What happens when I am religious? Is my thought-process in complete submission to superstition? Am I moving sideways to my thinking? Am I shutting down my mind working on blunt ‘faith’?

Is God necessary for morals? I see no statistical difference between atheists and religious believers in making moral judgments. Robb Willer argues, when feeling compassionate, Atheists and Agnostics may actually be more inclined to help their fellow citizens than more religious people. Besides, religious people don't derive their morals from scripture, or if they do, they choose the nice bits and reject the nasty. Their personal judgment of what is relevant from the bible is very much at play. Many Old Testament passages we would now describe as immoral. Richard Dawkins writes: ‘the very idea that we get a moral compass from religion is horrible. Not only should we not get our moral compass from religion, as a matter of fact we don’t. We shouldn’t, because if you actually look at the bible or the Koran, and get your moral compass from there, it’s horrible – stoning people to death, stoning people for breaking the Sabbath.’ ‘You don't need religion to have morals. If you can't determine right from wrong then you lack empathy, not religion.’

Maybe religious ideology exacerbates the world’s problems? Taboos against marrying out, the labeling of children in terms of their religious beliefs (before they even know what they believe), and damaging emotional blackmail, such as threats of Eternal Damnation, and whatever other undefined ideas they can conjure up, leave a person wondering if there is even any space for god inside these archaic structures. I wonder: is religion actively perverting morality? Only religious faith is a strong enough force to motivate utter madness —from holy wars to countless terrorist attacks. The current war against terrorism is a tragic consequence of religious idealists who have an unquestioning faith. Unquestioning faith is not a path to peace, but a pathway to war.

As for the logical reasoning, there is an argument for the existence of god that goes as follows: when I see a complex object such as a watch, I know it has been designed. Therefore, when I see a complex object such as a tiger, I should infer that it has been designed. This act of comparing two objects and drawing similar conclusions based on similarities (while ignoring important differences) is a prime example of a false analogy. The point of the analogy of the watch is that a watch implies a watchmaker, and that the world is like a watch, in that the world implies a world-maker. There are many flaws to this analogy (the world isn't even remotely comparable to a watch, for example), and in fact, Scottish philosopher David Hume pretty much demolished this argument, called the teleological argument, before Paley was even born in his Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion. The watchmaker analogy has evolved to include the notion of "irreducible complexity," a term coined by the prominent Intelligent Design proponent Michael Behe. So now instead of having the mere presence of a watch imply a watchmaker, we are to conclude that the watch is far too complicated to have been created by natural processes, and that therefore the watch must have been designed by an intelligent agent. Thus life, like the watch, is too complicated to have arisen by natural causes. But if the watch looks designed compared to its surroundings, the only logical conclusion we could draw is that its surroundings are not designed. (If we were unable to differentiate the watch from its natural surroundings, then we would deem it to be a natural object no different from a rock or a tree.) If we say that life is designed, again, with what are we making the comparison? Suppose we say that the entire universe is designed. Well, we don't have another universe to compare ours to. We only have experience with one universe, and unless we have the opportunity to examine other universes (which we have not done as of yet), we cannot say with any degree of certainty that our universe is designed for lack of comparison.

Other shaky arguments include that it is impossible to fake a mass revelation (it is), and the cosmological argument of First Cause. The First Cause Argument is popular, and asks what came before The Big Bang i.e. what happened before time, which means something like what was color like before color? The basic premise of the argument is that something caused or continuously causes the Universe to exist, and this First Cause is what we call God. However, ‘any god capable of intelligently designing something as complex as DNA…must have been at least as complex and organized as the machine itself - far more so if we suppose him additionally capable of such advanced functions as listening to prayers and forgiving sins. To explain the origin of the DNA/protein machine by invoking a supernatural Designer is to explain precisely nothing, for it leaves unexplained the origin of the Designer. You have to say something like "God was always there", and if you allow yourself that kind of lazy way out, you might as well just say "DNA was always there", or "Life was always there", and be done with it.’ (Richard Dawkins).

Science has effectively replaced religion in terms of understanding the natural world. Apologists have tried to find God in the realm of physics too, attempting to attribute the big bang to a supernatural origin. Unfortunately for them the data strongly indicates to us that no such miracle occurred to kick-start our universe into being. Some scientists place the formation of the singularity inside a cycle called the big bounce in which our expanding universe will eventually collapse back in on itself in an event called the big crunch. A singularity once more, the universe will then expand in another big bang. This process would be eternal and, as such, every big bang and big crunch the universe ever experiences would be nothing but a rebirth into another phase of existence.

Stephen Hawking wrote in 1988, "In the case of a universe that is approximately uniform in space, one can show that the negative gravitational energy exactly cancels the positive energy represented by the matter. So the total energy of the universe is zero." Apologists will then most likely posit the question 'Why is there something rather than nothing?’

Any attempt to answer the question has to be clear about the definition of “nothing.” It is not enough to describe a mechanism in which a baby universe might spark into being through a quantum fluctuation and then undergo expansion and inflation and increasing complexity until finally we wind up with galaxies and planets and dolphins shooting up out of a pool to grab a fish from the trainer. In that scenario your “nothing” still has qualities that give rise to something. It’s not a true nothing. My version of zero has no superscripts. And if you can tell me there’s a Multiverse from which our universe bubbled forth, you’ve merely moved the fundamental problem of existence back onto a broader platform. This also covers the god explanation. If god is the ultimate cause of the universe I’ll want to know why God exists. The obvious answer is: He just does. He is. He’s what Holt calls the Supreme Brute Fact. He explains himself. And so on. A secular version of that, one that doesn’t require a supreme Creator, is how I approach the something-nothing question.

Seems to me that “nothing,” for all its simplicity and symmetry and lack of arbitrariness, is nonetheless an entirely imaginary state, or condition, and we can say with confidence that it has never existed. “Nothing” is dreamed up in the world of something, in the brains of philosophers etc. on a little blue planet orbiting an ordinary yellow star in a certain spiral galaxy. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that nothing could not in theory “exist,” but seems to me that it hasn’t. We live in the something universe, either in our tidy little Big Bang universe or in a Big Bang bubble within the Multiverse, and no amount of deletion of the elements and forces of this universe would ever get us to a condition of absolutely nothing.

The idea of nothing has bugged people for centuries, especially in the Western world. We have a saying in Latin, Ex nihilo nihil fit, which means, "out of nothing comes nothing." It has occurred to me that this is a fallacy of tremendous proportions. It lies at the root of all our common sense, not only in the West, but in many parts of the East as well. It manifests in a kind of terror of nothing, a put-down on nothing, and a put-down on everything associated with nothing, such as sleep, passivity, rest, and even the feminine principles. But to me nothing — the negative, the empty — is exceedingly powerful. I would say, on the contrary, you can't have something without nothing. Image nothing but space, going on and on, with nothing in it forever. But there you are imagining it, and you are something in it. The whole idea of there being only space, and nothing else at all is not only inconceivable but perfectly meaningless, because we always know what we mean by contrast.’ (Alan Watts).

So, then, why is there something rather than nothing? Or rather, is there everything? Obviously there remain huge cosmological questions, and we’d all like to know what happened before the Big Bang, but I’m fairly persuaded by the Hawking notion that time itself begins at the Big Bang and there’s no “before.” There’s no boundary. The universe is finite but unbounded, like the 2-D surface of a sphere.

Next, is when people resort to using the word god interchangeably, saying that scientists replace the word god with the word energy, and so on. However, the laws of nature are not the laws of God. Rather than have a reverence for existence as we understand it to be as science has revealed it to be.

If there is no ‘nothing’ maybe we have everything, I wonder. Naturalistic pantheism paraphrases and reinterprets our current understanding to ascribe nature with a higher meaning. Something that does not exist, except in peoples imaginations — as of yet.

Next, comes the question of psychic phenomena. If you strip away the fallacy of most of it, you are left with a nagging something: people seeing spirits, reading minds and auras, telling the future, or the past. But to define this we must first define the self. And ‘I find that the sensation of myself as an ego inside a bag of skin is really hallucination. What we really are is, first of all, the whole of our body. And although our bodies are bounded with skin, and we can differentiate between outside and inside, they cannot exist except in a certain kind of natural environment. Obviously a body requires air, and the air must be within a certain temperature range. The body also requires certain kinds of nutrition. So in order to occur the body must be on a mild and nutritive planet with just enough oxygen in the atmosphere spinning regularly around in a harmonious and rhythmical way near a certain kind of warm star. That arrangement is just as essential to the existence of my body as my heart, my lungs, and my brain. So to describe myself in a scientific way, I must also describe my surroundings, which is a clumsy way getting around to the realization that you are the entire universe. However we do not normally feel that way because we have constructed in thought an abstract idea of our self.’ (Alan Watts). From there, we can surmise that altered states in consciousness can bring about altered states of perception. And sometimes these perceptions will include the breakdown of prescribed frames of mind, and an introduction of psychic phenomena.

In Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass, the White Queen tells Alice that in her land, "memory works both ways." Not only can the Queen remember things from the past, but she also remembers "things that happened the week after next." Alice attempts to argue with the Queen, stating "I'm sure mine only works one way...I can't remember things before they happen." The Queen replies, "It's a poor sort of memory that only works backwards.”

People I’ve met, and those I’ve read about, who claim that psychic abilities (such as telepathy, clairvoyance or telekinesis) or paranormal phenomena (such as ghostly apparitions) do not exist because there is no scientific basis or proof for such things, do so out of sheer ignorance. Both the British and the American Societies for Psychical Research, established in the late 1800s, have tons of research data pointing to the existence of psychic and paranormal phenomena. Psychic skills are totally real. We are all wired to do it. The problem with 'natural' psychics is that they do not know the exact and precise method, which the subconscious mind communicates with conscious awareness.

But the truth is that these effects are actually pretty consistent with modern physics' take on time and space. For example, Einstein believed that the mere act of observing something here could affect something there, a phenomenon he called "spooky action at a distance.” (Quantum Entanglement). Similarly, modern quantum physics has demonstrated that light particles seem to know what lies ahead of them and will adjust their behavior accordingly, even though the future event hasn't occurred yet. For example, in the classic "double slit experiment," physicists discovered that light particles respond differently when they are observed. But in 1999, researchers pushed this experiment to the limits by asking, "what if the observation occurred after the light particles were deployed?” Surprisingly, they found the particles acted the same way, as if they knew they were going to be observed in the future even though it hadn't happened yet.

Such trippy time-effects seem to contradict common sense and trying to make sense of them may give the average person a headache. “Quantum Mechanics is completely counter-intuitive and outside our everyday experience, but physicists have kind of gotten used to it.” (Chiao). So although humans perceive time as linear, it doesn't necessarily mean it is so. If we suspend our beliefs about time and accept that the brain is capable of reaching into the future, the next question becomes "how does it do this?" Just because the effect seems "supernatural" doesn't necessarily mean the cause is.

Lastly, we have spiritual experiences. The concept of seeing God, of seeing angels, of seeing Jesus, or whomever. Seeing things within the mind is imagination, and the expression of these visions can result in beautiful works of art: writing, paintings, religious text etc. As J.K. Rowling famously wrote: “Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” The experience of someone who is having a spiritual experience is profoundly ‘real’. But this in no way makes it true to shared reality, much in the way that someone can hallucinate an experience, to the extent that they can taste and smell and see the experience, without ever having had the experience. “What is real? How do you define real? If you're talking about what you can feel, what you can smell, what you can taste and see, then real is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain.” (The Matrix, 1999). The things we imagine are ‘real’ within our heads. But then again, so is life.

Waking up like lucid dreamers, fantasy and reality become a matter of converting ideas into form. Humanity takes an early retirement. Physics continues. Computers replace us and we evolve further. We go home, we stare the most powerful creator we have witnessed in the mirror.

‘Have you been I all along?’ We think aloud.

 Rachel Landes

A Beautiful Revelation

Abstract

The purpose of this essay is to critically examine the ways by which Beauty is revealed to the human consciousness and how this impacts its expansion and evolution from an individual and collective standpoint. Three main aspects of how Beauty is revealed is identified and situated in the context of its impact on the evolution of human consciousness.

Keywords: Beauty, Consciousness, Humanity, Evolution, Physical, Creativity, Art, Emotion

A Beautiful Revelation

From the dawn of civilization, humankind has always sought to answer the question “What is Beauty?” This simple question has perplexed philosophers, theologians and scientists alike and has resulted in the postulation of numerous definitions across different disciplines. What has emerged is an abundance of terminological ambiguities that neither satisfactorily encapsulate the underlying essence of Beauty, nor provide for any critical insight into its revelatory aspects. Perhaps this is because Beauty has myriad expressions that are revealed to the human consciousness at different levels or stages of its evolution. This essay will examine three revelatory aspects of Beauty and situate them in the context of the ongoing evolution of human consciousness.

As sentient beings in a physical universe, we perceive reality through sensory perception from which we construct and make sense of our world. In doing so, we interact with nature and each other which necessarily opens us up to what we come to know as Beauty. This element of truth is more than a mere ideation or construct of the human mind. It aids in the evolution of our species from a physical, emotional, and spiritual perspective by how it is revealed to us.

We can approach the concept of Beauty as being revealed to us in three primary ways. First, because we are part of the natural world, we perceive Beauty through our senses. When we employ these senses via sight, sound, taste, touch, and smell to our environment, our consciousness can become aware of Beauty as it is revealed in nature. Hence symmetrical patterns inherent on a butterfly’s wings or on a nautiluses’ shell can appear to be beautiful to us because of their aesthetic qualities. Similarly, the sound of rustling leaves or the taste and smell of food, or even the sensation of wind upon exposed skin, can all be perceived as being beautiful.

This particular revelatory aspect of Beauty can be viewed as Topical Beauty. Topical Beauty is the physical manifestation of Beauty as revealed to us solely via our senses. This aspect of Beauty exists in the natural world and is apparent to us from a mathematical standpoint. For example, symmetry can be perceived in the face of a young woman or man and harmony can be gleaned from the acoustics of natural or manufactured sound. The sensations of taste, touch, and smell can also be measured and quantified in a scientific manner.

Such beauty however, is topical because it is revealed only on the surface of what we deem to be reality. In other words, it can be construed as the proverbial “tip of the iceberg”. It is expressed in nature through geometric patterns and is readily observable and measurable to all. Topical Beauty thus represents the physical aspect of Beauty.

The second way in which Beauty is revealed to us is through works of art. When the consciousness of humankind engages in creative pursuits, we are able to perceive the revelation of Beauty on an emotional level. Thus when we listen to one of Chopin’s piano concertos, we can come away feeling deeply moved by the beauty of the piece’s arrangement. Similarly, when we look at a Van Gogh painting, it can have a profound emotional effect on us because it possesses the capacity to elevate our consciousness to a level that is at once both physical and emotional.

When artists engage in creative endeavors, they are opening their consciousness to the apprehension of Beauty that exists in the sphere of imagination and wonder. This is outside the purely physical realm and enables the mind to transcend it by acting as a conduit through which Beauty can be revealed to us from an individual and collective standpoint.  

Art forces us to look beyond the physical and allows for the evolution of human consciousness beyond its material limitations. When we have achieved such depth and breadth of consciousness, Beauty is revealed to us Sub-Topically. At this stage, Beauty has the power to move us in a physical and emotionally way simultaneously. Thus some individuals may weep at a musical concert or be left breathless upon seeing a sculpture, while for others; touching a quilt their grandmother made years ago can move them in a very deep and personal way.

Once revealed, Sub-Topical Beauty allows for the evolution and transcendence of human consciousness beyond the purely physical or emotional. This is because it engenders capacity building by elasticizing our consciousness through art. We can no longer just apprehend beauty via the senses, but we can now feel it in the very core of our being. This further enables us to partake in the beautiful for when we create, we beautify.

Upon reaching this level of consciousness, we are now in a position to understand how Beauty is revealed to us in the third way. When we engage in acts of virtue, whether towards other humans or to other species, we perceive Beauty that transcends emotion and reason. In such instances, the laws of nature do not apply since there is no inclination towards self-gain. Our actions become altruistic and in doing so, they beautify us collectively.

When we show compassion to the other, we engage each other in a beautiful way. When we impart kindness or tenderness to others, there need not be an aesthetic quality to such acts for us to find meaning and beauty in them. When we show love to an animal, it beautifies the human in us. When we forgive, our mercy allows us to redeem and beautify the other and this in turn, beautifies us. Understanding and perceiving Beauty in this manner allows for not only an expansion of our collective consciousness, but a deepening of it too. As human beings, we are flawed creatures. But, if our imperfections are what make us human, when we consciously engage in a virtuous act, it is our humanity that ultimately makes us beautiful.

This third way of perceiving and understanding Beauty thus transcends the physical and emotional. It is, in effect, apprehended by our consciousness intuitively. Such beauty affects us spiritually since we begin to see the other in ourselves and better understand our interconnectedness with all forms of life, human or otherwise. This is what I call Intuitive Beauty.

In conclusion, the apprehension and understanding of Beauty is directly linked to the evolution of human consciousness. As we mature and evolve as a species, so too will our capacity to beautify and become expressions of Beauty ourselves both in a concrete and abstract manner. Our pursuit of knowledge inevitably opens us up to the possibility of finding elements of verisimilitude from a physical, emotional, and intuitive perspective. In this respect, our potential to find Beauty within ourselves is, ultimately, one of humanity’s most profound endeavors.

Jeevan Bhagwat, See Bios Section for more information -

Contact Information:  @j_bhagwat

What Was it That Was Leaving Me? An Unusual Out-of-Body Experience (OBE)

Abstract

This paper is a narration of a unique experience, that which is arduous to circumscribe as an out-of-body experience; ambiguously to-be called a fractional out-of-body experience or a partial autoscopy. It was an experience in the presence of observers who were naive of what the individual was experiencing. This experience has surely helped the individual plummet into imagining the existence of an form beyond the body; the existence of a soul; that which is conscious; that which can think like the mind; that which resides within the body and that which can detach from the body when death advances. There is a possibility of it being a neuro-psychological or neuro-parapsychological experience; an experience whose actuality is grim to prove or construct in third person, but certainly subsists for the experiencer; the experiencer being myself.

Key Words 

Out-of-body, Experience, Soul, Consciousness

The experience of being out-of-my body

It was a beautiful day; I was with a few friends sitting on the over-head water tank of my 6 storied building, approximately 90 feet high. This place was our regular hangout, as it always felt great to be up there, as the view till today is always amazing. I was 18, with an eagerness to enjoy and explore life; with an enthusiasm to do things that would defy life, but the least I knew that this day would change my perception of life forever. As we chatted, jokes filled us with joy and play, which somehow lead us into trivial games; games that one should never play. The over-head tank is laden with water-pipes and has a large water-pipe approximately 2 inches thick, that runs along the tank, where one could attempt to balance on it; an insane thing to do at such a height, but definitely gave a feeling of achievement if completed. It was not something new that I was doing, as I had been repeatedly doing it whenever I would go up there and therefore was confident about completing it without tripping over.

Excited and with my adrenaline all pumped up, I challenged my friends that I would complete the walk in one go and I decided to attempt the task, not knowing what I was about to experience. Over-confidence made my strides wider and faster, and with everyone cheering, it heightened my confidence and inadvertently my ego. While balancing on the water pipe, I missed a step and slipped, I lost my balance and at that point I felt my body fall off the water tank; I felt my body being pulled away from the tank and with nothing there to cling on to, I knew that it was the end; I was aware that my body would fall 90 feet to the ground and death was approaching. My confidence and ego was shattered as my legs left the ground and my hands precipitously moved around to grab whatever came my way, but all that I felt was nothingness. That moment resulted in an experience where in a flicker of a second a life review began; my past flashed in front of my eyes and I saw images as one would see it in a personal scrap book; my life story in frames flashing in front of my eyes.

As my life review began, I somehow felt being detached from my body and lost sensation of being within it; a feeling of weightlessness. I felt as if I was rising rather than going down. My life review stopped and I could see myself in a form emanating out of the body from the face till my chest and at that moment I felt someone grab me and pull me to the ground. It was my friend who did this as part of his reflex and therefore I owe my life to him. I was back again in my body when I hit the ground and passed out. All of a sudden my eyes opened and I saw all my friends staring at me, all perplexed. It felt as if I had just woken up after a long night sleep, to see my friends looking at me. The frightful feeling of falling didn’t seem to exist and at that moment I felt a feeling of joy and happiness; a feeling as if I had learned something.

As I woke up, my friends asked me what happened, but I did not know where to begin or rather I could not put it into words; I was confused. I asked them how long did I pass out, and they said that it was just a few minutes, but for me the whole episode seemed to have lasted for almost half an hour. The trip, the fall, the review, the experience of the departing form, all of it happened in just a few minutes, but for me it seemed like a long period. As I narrated this experience to my friends, they laughed and joshed about it. It was a personal experience, a beautiful experience where I defied death. If that was my soul, it was definitely nimbler than my body, and in case I would have fallen, that form would have taken off from my body. It was my experience and I felt no one and neither did I see anyone; all that came as a flash in front of me was my past in the form of images.

It seems that my nimbler form exists within my body and knew the limitations of my body as I felt it ripping out of my body, for it knew that my body would not survive the fall; a mutilated body is definitely no place to reside. The moment I was held and pulled back, it realized that my body is safe and it pulled itself back, putting me into a deep sleep. It is an experience that bought a significant change in me; a change that has made me fearless of death; changed my perception of death. I have been very reluctant to share this experience, but my endeavors to understand the existence of a non-local soul or consciousness or mind has made me more open towards sharing it. The vividity and richness of the experience still persists that only I as the experiencer could experience.

Conclusion

My out-of-body or fractional out-of-body experience fortified the feeling of the presence of a form that resides within me; call it my soul, consciousness or mind. Based on this first experience, it can be said, but not concluded that this form that resides within me is aware, it thinks and sustains. This event could be easily passed-off as a neuro-psychological or neuro-parapsychological event associated with the dysfunctioning of the brain, where the brain in mental shock could possibly result in such an event. But for me as the experiencer this event will always remain phenomenal until proven within the realms of scientific explanation. It is definitely a difficult experience to understand and explore from a scientific perspective, but surely a vivid experience that made me realize the beauty that lies within; for it remains as my experience and therefore is purely my opinion. 

Contzen Pereira, Ph.D. Independent Scholar, Mumbai, India. Email Address: contzen@rediffmail.com, contzen@gmail.com

 

Cadence

Introduction
I have had many meditative experiences.  Some I documented, many I did not.  After my experiences, I have had and probably always will have many questions.  I will share one here that I titled Cadence.  There could be many rational explanations for what I experienced but I choose to keep an open mind rather than judge a thing.  For me, I find that once I have judged a thing, I have limited the scope of its potentiality.  I don't like the idea of limited potential.

Meditative Vision
Into the depths of the darkness of the void I traveled with my consciousness. No sight or sensation to guide me, just this sound that seemed both within me and outside of me. For long moments I drifted with one foot in two worlds. Before long the entirety of the Multi-verse appeared in my field of vision. No longer had I a physical body but rather a strand of energy consciousness that comprised my being. In the heart of the Multi-verse did I appear to be and then with lightning speed, it began to grow distant. So distant, in fact that the Multi-verse itself seemed to be one tiny pinprick of light in a vast canopy of pure darkness.

To the very edge of the Multi-verse I had somehow traveled and within this space of pure darkness all I saw were thin wisps of blue lightning that appeared now and then without any sound. The peace and the stillness were palpable, peaceful and awe inspiring broken by this beautiful cobalt blue streaks of light. A voice spoke with such a richness of tone that reverberated throughout the whole of my being but there were no words to recount. Being so used to using words, I sent out a thought, “Where are we?”

“We are outside of both space and time as you know it,” said my companion in a wave of feeling interpreted by some understanding I had lost touch with.

“Why am I here?” I sent back to my seeming companion still awestruck at the blue light flickering now and then in the pristine darkness of the void.

“You wanted to explore and so you have come,” my unseen but very much felt companion conveyed.
“Who are you?” I asked so very curious.

“I am the Omega or the Alpha but words and names mean nothing here in this place. Be not so concerned with words,” my companion said.

Contemplating the tiny dot of light in my field of vision, I asked, “Are you the Creator of that?” I indicated focusing on the tiny pinpoint of light that was the Multi-verse.

“I am and I am not,” my companion said.

“Well if you are not the creator then who is the creator of the Multi-verse?” I asked still so very curious.

“The Elohim created the Universe that you know and the Multi-verse that houses it,” the presence answered in response feeling sympathetic to my questioning.

Thinking carefully about the fact that if the Elohim created the Universe and the presence referred to the Elohim as separate from it, I assumed he may have had a different creator. I asked then, “Who is your creator and where do you come from?”

My companion said, “Come, I will show you.”

We traveled, I sensed, as I felt a strange movement as in slight changes in barometric pressure on Earth. I asked about the “traveling” and received in response that we were traveling not within a dimension but through dimensions. After a short time the void of pure darkness was replaced with a light. Glowing pink living light filled my field of vision. A sight my mind could not interpret but for the color and a visual beating with the same cadence as a human heart. A slight motion to the right of the pink light was a blue light and again with a visual I could not interpret or put to words but the same beating and cadence. Another turn and there were more colors that I could interpret but the rest I could not. I felt completely at peace but surrounded by these fields of pulsing light. I asked again, still so very curious, “This is your Creator?”

 Instead of a direct response to my question, my companion said, “The time for thinking is done. Notice the beating of your human heart so very far away back on Earth. Notice how the cadence is the same as it is here and feel it. There are no words but there is feeling, so feel it. Tune into the cadence and know the answer to your questions. The time for words and thinking, the time of questioning and answering is done. It is time now to feel,” the presence said again without a single word.

And the rest was lost in translation and I fell from that place in my consciousness. I opened my eyes and saw a single candle flame dancing on an altar. It was my own back on Earth comprised of sacred things to me. I stared at the flame for a time trying to understand and I heard a faint whisper, “There are no words, there is only consciousness.” I blew out the candle.

Conclusion
I can conclude nothing from my vision with certainty.  Perhaps I simply have a very imaginative and creative mind, maybe I connected with something or maybe everything I saw, felt and seemingly "heard," was just symbolic of what was happening at this point in my life.  I note this experience occurred before my kundalini experience.  In fact, I had many of these types of experiences before my kundalini experience.  Maybe they are related?  Honestly, I do not know.  The feeling during the experience was beautiful and peaceful.  So, maybe I just suspend the desire to judge or label it and leave it at that?

 

© 2016 Jaie Hart

Rev. Dr., J.L. Harter, see Bio Section for more information.

The White Hot Light That Burns (without hurting)

Introduction:
I had a personal experience with Kundalini back in February of 2013. Having read about the experiences of others with Kundalini, nothing could have prepared me for my own experience. It occurred unexpectedly and was life changing in ways I am still only discovering. I was skeptical of the experience even though I had read about it. I am a skeptic, no more. The experience is real, the life changes that followed were truly in my best interest and I’m truly grateful to be able to finally recount it in this way. I’m sharing this experience here for others who may be curious.

A Beautiful Memory:
I was never certain that I believed in Kundalini experiences. I've read about them off and on for over 30 years since I took an interest in life before lives, rather than life after life. I guess the journey began for me some time ago with what was termed for me as a "spontaneous past-life memory." That event lead me on a quest for over 30 years. I didn't have a teacher, a guru or spiritual wise one to guide me in my search for answers to all the questions I had about some pretty amazing experiences I can recount over the whole of my life. At some point during my journey, I picked up meditation. I'm not sure why exactly. Maybe it was the promise of peace, calm and even greater self-understanding. Did it bring me that? Yes, I suppose it did. Some 14 years or so after experience an Near-Death-Experience during pregnancy, and following some pretty tiring and trying life experiences, I just started. I started meditating out of desperation to find calm, peace to reconcile disappointment, anxiety, heart-break and this weird sense of knowing that none of the experiences I've ever had were anything to be concerned about.

The Experience:
After about 5 years of nightly meditation of at least 30 minutes, something changed. I began my nightly routine as I usually did. I cleared all of the negative energy from my being merely breathing in each of the colors of light of the rainbow. It began with a deep beautiful purple light extending into the core of my being, followed by blue extending further out to my entire home, then a deep emerald green encompassing the entirety of my city, then a beautiful sunny yellow to encompass all of the united states, then a beautiful brilliant orange to encompass the Earth, a deep magenta/red expanding into our galaxy, I brought in a beautiful golden color when I imagined the entirety of the Galaxy and then beautiful opalescent white I as I extended the light into the void and beyond. I stayed there for the longest time, it seemed. When all thought of my own existence dropped away, I heard a faint pure tone. I could not tell you the key but it was beautiful. I felt then a vibration that seemed to start in the very Earth and move up into my body. I breathed gently and slowly to stave off the thinking part of my mind that prickled with a feeling of something supernatural about to occur. Just then, the vibration seemed to swirl in a clock-wise fashion physically about me. I stayed with the feeling and allowed myself to remain present. Another tone came faintly, at first, into the edges of my consciousness. Another pure tone, I also could not describe by note. It harmonized with the first tone but was higher in pitch. I stayed present with the sensation of swirling, not one tone now but two and then I felt a white hot burning in the very base of my spine. It did not hurt but the more I felt it, the more I felt the swirling, felt the tones vibrating and a hissing sound became apparent. I sat with the feeling not knowing what was happening, trying with all I had in me to keep my thinking mind partitioned. Then the third and final tone, even higher pitched than the other two began and it blended in beautiful harmony. The white hot burning sensation began to move up my spine. It moved slowly to the middle of my back but the higher it rose, the louder the hissing was.

I noticed I felt a sensation of pressure now along with the white-hot burning that did not hurt, the swirling, the hissing and the beautiful tones that I just wanted to become forever lost in. I willed myself gently now to just stay present for the experience and the feeling moved into the space behind my heart. The intensity of feeling, hearing, sensing grew and grew and then the white hot burning moved again to the back of my throat. I involuntarily sat up very straight and aligned my neck because I knew it was going there next. The white hot burning moved into my neck and it stayed there for the longest time. My throat felt warm and tingling and the other sensations continued. The white hot burning moved seemingly into the very center of my brain and I could feel it there and the moment I did, the colors burst into my inner vision like fire works. The most memorable ones where the beautiful purple and orange colors, burgundy and blue, blinding white and golden light. I could feel this light in a way my words will not do justice. It was alive both inside of me and outside of me. I stayed with the feeling enjoying it so much. I could feel the tears falling as I very emotionally began to feel pure joy. The white hot burning sensation began to move again and I thought of the crown of my head and I had an urgent thought to will the crown of my head to open to allow the energy to come all the way through me. The feeling of energy was so intense that this was something I really felt I had to do as if my very life depended upon it. In my mind, with all of these colors flashing, the heat of the white hot burning sensation filling me fully now as if it were 100+ degrees there in my room on a cool February night and finally I could collect the thoughts, OPEN, OPEN, OPEN.

I felt the energy rushing through me like a white hot raging river but it was gentle as much as it was forceful and the colors and feelings just continued to explode. I felt bliss. I felt love. I felt absolutely wonderful. As the last drops of that white hot energy sailed away through the top of my head, I was left in this dreamy, comfortable space of pure peace, calm and silence. I could physically feel the pressure of the energy all around me and I could not stop crying. When my normal and logical senses began to return, the thought occurred to me to just be very grounded. I held a small stone my youngest daughter had given me. A simple rock we found on the beach that had been perfectly tumbled smooth in the waves. I imagined feeling so very connected to the Earth. It helped with the very drunk and giddy feeling the energy left me with. I had to get outside and so made my way down stairs and stood barefoot on the cold concrete just staring up at the stars feeling so very connected. No longer able to fight my logical mind, I thought - is THIS what a Kundalini experience feels like?

The Aftermath:
The weeks that followed brought me frequently interrupted sleep as the energy would often surge at night while I was sleeping, waking me up with that feeling of overheated and swirling or pulsing. It would pass fairly quickly and I'd fall back to sleep, only to be awakened again in an hour with the same sensation. It passed in intensity and still comes at times even though 3 years have passed. The things that followed were interesting. In the physical world, there was recovery to do. Things I thought I wanted no longer worked. I gave up a challenging position I worked long and hard to get that no longer suited me. I changed my perspective on much. I met my life partner after that as well and well, I nearly had a nervous break down. It was not harsh and overly painful but clear...clear in that I felt the impetus of change upon me and new I had to follow my intuition. I had ignored it for far too long.

Conclusion (or New Beginning):
I became much more intuitively sensitive. Things got my attention more clearly than before. The experience of my NDE coupled with a Kundalini experience has left me feeling so strange at times. The things I once loved to do, to strive for and to agonize over just no longer served me. I had to let go of so much because the thought of carrying animosity or even trying to made me sick. I forgave a lot, became much more gratitude focused and all the energy seemed to calm within me. I could feel people differently than before. No matter what they said to me, I could feel the origin of the feeling behind their words at times. It was a bit strange and at times left me feeling both very connected and yet also a bit isolated and sometimes confused. My Kundalini experience occurred in 2013. Following that experience and a near nervous breakdown, I was medicated for a couple of years and that got me through the worst of it. I don't recommend that route though as it is a long and arduous journey out of it. Today, today things are so much better. I am peaceful and accepting and have given up my spiritual quest. I learned that I hold the answers I seek. If my NDE and the Kundalini experience brought me this, well, I'm just grateful. I have enough and I now finally realize, I am enough. For the first time ever, I am comfortable in my own skin even if the bulk of my world and responsibilities feel a bit limiting at time. At some level I realize that I have the life I always wanted, the perfect existence for me and I'm still just so very grateful.

In a way, I am still recovering and discovering exactly what that means. For the rest of my life I will be integrating the experiences of both my NDE and Kundalini experience and I welcome every breath and step with much gratitude.

© 2016 

Dr. J.L. Harter, Editor see bio section for more information.