Friday, March 20, 2009

Attention and Self-mastery

Pay attention as frequently as possible throughout the day. This means frequently touching base with your sense of being present. Paying attention means regaining your sense of being present. Learn to contrast your sense of being present with every other aspect of yourself. Contrast any given emotional state with your sense of being present. Contrast your thought process with your sense of being present. By recognizing the difference between your sense of being present and every other aspect of yourself, you are paying attention. Each time you do this you vest subtle internal energy into your sense of being present and thereby increase it, expand it and prolong it. You grow more conscious.

Consciousness is what recognizes the difference between various internal states. The act of attention is brought to bear on obvious aspects of yourself and then leads into subtler aspects of yourself. Attention begins with outward behaviors and then leads into emotions. Attention is ultimately brought to bear on the source of these, identification and thought. The more you pay attention, the more subtle internal energy is reorganized and invested into consciousness. You become more conscious.

The contraction of negative emotions must be recognized and felt, otherwise the energy of which you consist remains bound in it. Without liberating your energy from the contraction of negative emotions, your power of attention will not become strong enough to bring to bear upon the subtler problem of chronic thought. Negative emotions are the fears and desires and aversions that arise from identification. Identification is generated by chronic thought. Chronic thought is your seemingly involuntary continuous thought process whose primary concept is "I." Chronic thought generates identification, and identification generates the contraction of negative emotions (fear and desire and aversion). Our behaviors are largely determined by our state of identification and the emotions that attend it.

Consciousness is not identification. Identification is the opposite of consciousness.

Contrast your given state with your sense of being present. Pay attention. The exercise of contrasting any given state with your sense of being present literally redistributes subtle internal energy, reinforcing your sense of being present, increasing it while simultaneously decreasing your given state of identification. Paying attention includes the feeling of being present. By truly feeling an emotion, you release the emotion. Paying attention to a negative emotion divests the negative emotion of its energy, thereby dissolving it. Negative emotions dissipate under the light of attention.

As your power of attention increases, you are able to recognize more of yourself. You recognize more of the various aspects of yourself. A powerful and subtle attention is required to grasp chronic thought.

Truly being present means to be continuously present, to remain present and not merely to touch base with your sense of being present. Sustained presence is full consciousness. The act of attention culminates in full consciousness, the ability to sustain one’s presence permanently. That is the aim of attention.

We begin by temporarily touching base with our sense of being present, and by doing so the subtle internal energy of which we consist is reorchestrated. We gain greater consciousness of ourselves, consciousness of the energy of which we consist. We gain mastery over the energy of which we consist. That mastery consists of a conscious unification of the energy of which we consist, a conscious unification of our being.

Self-mastery is full consciousness. A fully conscious being is master of himself. He is not a "separate self" but a whole being, a Microcosm.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

The "Secret" of Attraction

The following observations on the "law of attraction" are intended to promote further independent investigation.

The "law of attraction," popularized by the movie (and book) "The Secret," is essentially "magic" denuded of ceremony and paraphernalia. Magic has been defined as the art and science of causing changes to occur according to will. Or, in other words, to bring about material changes using imagination and emotion. It’s akin to the notions of "creative visualization" and "the power of positive thinking."

The premise of the "law of attraction" is that our thoughts and emotions are invisibly linked to the world around us, and that what we think about (and what we concentrate our emotions on) we attract to ourselves.

To refer to it as a "Law" lends it the aire of scientific legitimacy. Asking for scientific proof of the "law of attraction," however, is rather like asking you to "prove" that you loved your parents.

There are aspects of the "law of attraction" that defy the scientific process (see below).

The "law of attraction" is a technique. Perhaps it works. I tend to believe it does. I have evidence in my personal life to support the notion that it works but my evidence does not constitute scientific proof to others.

Employing what I will call "the technique of attraction" does not imply the possession of the wisdom to employ it. Consider your desires. Are they worthy of realization? What is your measure of value? The technique of attraction is a means of realizing values. In that sense it’s a technology. And, as with any technology, it already possesses values that are innate to it. Frankly those values are the values of thought and desire. There are values innate to thought and desire, values independent of whatever is the object of thought and desire. Consider the values innate to thought and desire.

Several speakers who have popularized the "law of attraction" have a naïve notion of wealth. Wealth is a matter of distribution, not creation. One of the contributors to "The Secret" vaguely asserts that there is enough "good" to go around, implying that there is enough wealth for everyone. A simple understanding of economics is required here. Consider what money is. Consider what profit is.

The thought process is a small calculator compared to the balance of Nature.

To apply the "law of attraction" essentially means to concentrate on an object of desire, to desire it to the extent that you "assume" it is a present possession, and to feel and act as though the object desired is a present possession. This is only accomplished at the expense of a measure of scientific objectivity. Any "doubt" (objectivity) in regard to the "assumption" that the object of desire is presently possessed is considered a "denial" of that object. Not only is this an obstacle to the application of the scientific process but it also resembles brainwashing and even psychosis. A cautionary note.

In as much as the "law of attraction" exercises willpower it can be very useful toward developing consciousness. Developing higher consciousness requires the development of a measure of willpower and concentration, although consciousness itself is not a product of concentration or will.

In as much as applying the "law of attraction" draws one’s internal energy toward the present (by concentrating thought and emotion on the present possession of the desired object or state) it may increase consciousness. Consciousness is an acceleration of internal energy into the present. In the application of the "law of attraction" there is a tendency to empower the present, to vest one’s internal energy (with concentration and desire). That can be useful in preparation for the exercise of what I call attention, the fulcrum of conscious development.

But in as much as applying the "law of attraction" means reinforcing thought and desire, it is ultimately a technique of the personality and not (in and of itself) conscious development.

Tuesday, March 17, 2009

The Mystery of Rennes le Chateau

One of my favorite stories is that of "The Mystery of Rennes le Chateau," popularized in the 1980's by the book "Holy Blood, Holy Grail."

In the late nineteenth century, in a tiny village called Rennes le Chateau located in the mountainous region of the south of France, the local pastor, named Sauniere, while renovating the church, discovered secret parchments concealed under the altar there. The parchments are said to have consisted of genealogies and of copies of Latin scripture containing ciphers, codes. One of the more easily recognizable and decipherable codes referred to a treasure and to Dagobert II (a Merovingian King who ruled in France in the 7th century, who had married a Visigoth wife of royal lineage at the church in Rennes le Chateau and who supposedly had amassed a treasure in the vicinity of Rennes le Chateau, a treasure that may have included the legendary lost treasure of the temple of Jerusalem). The treasure of Jerusalem was originally taken from Palestine by the Romans when the Romans sacked Jerusalem in the first century, and then later taken from the Romans by the Visigoths when the Visigoths sacked Rome in the fifth century.

Sauniere took the cryptic parchments to a group of ecclesiastical authorities at San Sulpice in Paris. San Sulpice was a center of the Catholic modernist movement which involved applying rigorous modern research methods to the Bible and that resulted in a great many doubts cast on the legitimacy of the Bible. Not long after Sauniere returned to Rennes le Chateau from Paris, he began to spend enormous sums of money, renovating his church (that he also decorated with unorthodox symbolism), building a new road and modern facilities for Rennes le Chateau, in all spending the equivalent of several million dollars. Did the money come from the discovery of a treasure in the vicinity of Rennes le Chateau? That’s part of the mystery. When Sauniere was in his sixties he suffered a stroke which occurred curiously enough on the day that is celebrated as the feast day of Saint Sulpice, which was where Sauniere originally took the coded parchments. He died soon after and never revealed where his money came from.

According to the story, the "treasure" that Sauniere discovered had to do with a "secret." The secret, among other things, had to do with the fact that Jesus sired a bloodline that migrated to France and intermarried with French nobility, creating the Merovingian royal line that was eventually deposed (in part with the collusion of the Roman Church).

The story explores the history of the order of the Knights Templar, founded at the end of the eleventh century when the Franks conquered Palestine and Jerusalem. The Templars may have uncovered some secrets in their excavations on the temple mount where they were headquartered in Jerusalem. The story speculates the Templars were expressly sent to Jerusalem for the purpose of uncovering certain secrets there, sent by a secret society later referred to as the Priory of Sion. According to the story, one of the aims of the Priory of Sion was to restore to power the Merovingian royal line. The Templars, among other things, served as protectors of the bloodline. The bloodline was symbolically referred to as "the holy grail" in the so-called "grail romances" that became popular in Europe.

Jerusalem fell to the Muslims after only about a century of occupation by the franks, supposedly due to the ineptitude (or treason) of the grand master of the Templars. The Templars only survived for about one more century after that when, by order of the king of France in collusion with the pope, the Templars were arrested on Friday October the 13th 1307. Some Templars were tortured and murdered. The Templar order was officially dissolved, although it may have survived in some form in Scotland. The treasure that the Templars had supposedly amassed mysteriously disappeared. The Priory of Sion meanwhile went on to become instrumental in the creation and dissemination of Freemasonry in Europe and was behind several failed attempts to restore the bloodline to power in France.

The story examines how the Roman Church opposed alternative forms of Christianity. The so-called Albigensian Crusade is an example of how the Roman Church murderously opposed those who had unorthodox beliefs. In the thirteenth century, the Cathars in the temperate Languedoc region of the south of France did not adhere to Roman Christianity and so the Pope ordered a Crusade against them, resulting in the slaughter of a large population and the destruction of their culture which was one of the more advanced in Europe at the time. When the crusaders laid siege to the last Cathar stronghold (of Montsegir), the so-called "Cathar treasure" was safely smuggled out before Montsegir fell to the crusaders. That treasure may have included "the holy grail."

The story explores how the Roman Church distorted the true history of Jesus, how the formation of popular Christianity involved deifying Jesus and appropriating preexisting elements of other pagan religions (like Mithraism), and how the political side of the life of Jesus (and the zealots that constituted his entourage, their opposition to Roman rule) was historically obscured in order for Christianity to appeal to a Roman audience.

The story speculates that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene, who may have also been Mary of Bethany, and that Lazarus may have been Jesus’ brother-in-law as well as the author of the fourth Gospel.

Regardless of whether the story is historically accurate, it remains one of my favorite mysteries.

Monday, March 16, 2009

Dimensions

We only understand a dimension from a higher dimension. Within a given dimension we cannot understand that dimension. Only from a larger dimension do we understand the smaller dimension. The "point" is understood from the perspective of the "line," and the "line" is understood from the perspective of the "surface," and the "surface" is understood from the perspective of the "solid." The "point" within itself cannot understand the "point." It just can’t get the "point." But the smaller dimension is wholly contained within the larger dimension. The larger dimension grasps it. The notion of "non-duality" is at best a reference to a larger dimension. Or at worst it’s a fuzzy concept. "Non-duality" is a perspective existing within a hierarchy of dimensions, a perspective from a larger dimension. Is a perspective reality? Only from a certain point of view…

From a limited perspective, a subject is "unknowable." The larger dimension is only "unknowable" from the smaller dimension. However, the smaller dimension reflects the larger. The higher dimension is reflected in the lower.

The mind can reflect what is larger than the mind. Modeling consciousness is the reflection in the mind of what is larger than the mind. That reflection can inspire a recognition of ourselves in a dimension outside of the mind. The purpose of modeling consciousness is to inspire a recognition of ourselves that is consciousness itself.

Consciousness exists in a dimension larger than the mind. The dimension of consciousness contains and understands the mind. The mind can only reflect the dimension of consciousness but cannot understand it.

Friday, March 13, 2009

About the Tao Te Ching

The Tao Te Ching is a great collection of aphorisms, very fruitful to contemplate, one of my favorite books. In a very concise way, the Tao Te Ching explores "the Force," non-action (detachment), right conduct, the process of awareness, the problem of desire, the reconciliation of opposites, how Nature exemplifies wholeness, the relationship between government and individual, among other subjects. Lao Tzu doesn’t emphasize the distinction between awareness and consciousness the way I do in my model. I don’t see the Tao Te Ching as a comprehensive model of conscious development. The Tao Te Ching has more to say about relaxing into awareness than developing consciousness, and this can lead to the problem I’ve defined elsewhere as the "witness protection program" prevalent in Eastern teachings. There are specific differences between my model and the Tao Te Ching, features of my model that have no correlation in the Tao Te Ching. Yet there are also many parallels between the content of the Tao Te Ching and my model. I wrote an interpolation of the Tao Te Ching, called "The Way of the Force," in which I give my understanding of the meaning of each of the chapters, using the language that I’m familiar with.

Thursday, March 12, 2009

X-Files Movie Review

Concerning the second X-Files movie (if you haven’t yet seen the move then don’t read on because my review is a spoiler). The movie is very moody and thought provoking. It’s not about aliens but about serial killing and the horror of medical technology gone off the deep end. The setting is fittingly in winter, in the snow and ice. The supernatural element of the movie is restricted to the creepy psychic link between the priest (a convicted sex-offender who is helping the FBI) and one of the villains (a boyhood victim of the priest who is also in a homosexual relationship with another one of the villains). The movie characterizes the theme of alienation and disgrace in the role of the priest, whose motives for helping the FBI remain in question throughout the movie, and also in the role of Mulder who has become an exile, no longer an FBI agent but instead living like a shut in, bearded and reminiscent of the unabomber.

Reluctantly at first, Mulder answers ‘the call of the hero’ to help the FBI in their investigation. Scully answers ‘the call’ with even more reluctance. Mulder and Scully are in fact lovers, an inevitable plot development of the series. As the story unfolds, the strength of their commitment is tested. The movie explores the conflict between religious belief (including a belief in psychic ability) and science, a conflict that constituted a major theme of the original series and that was epitomized by the interaction between Mulder (the believer) and Scully (the skeptic). In the new movie, that conflict is reserved for Scully alone, while Mulder has reconciled the two within himself. Scully, also no longer a member of the FBI, works as a full-time physician at "Our Lady of Sorrows" catholic hospital where she struggles against the somewhat faith-based values of the establishment. There is a disturbing (and intentional) parallel between the exotic crimes of the ‘Doctor Frankenstein’ character (the villain) and Scully’s efforts to apply experimental medical therapy to save the life of her patient (a young boy suffering from a terminal illness). The medical experiments of the ‘Doctor Frankenstein’ involve abduction, torture and murder (not only stealing human organs but also surgically transferring a human head to another’s body, presumably to accomplish a form of immortality). While Scully’s own medical endeavor to prolong the life of her patient (admittedly a very painful form of treatment) is neither against the will of the boy or his parents, nevertheless as Scully opposes the prevailing opinion of the establishment on the matter she is regarded as something of a villain. At the end of the movie the results of her efforts are left in question while the moral of the story is evident in her determination to not give up (to not give up on her patient and to not give up on Mulder). That moral is summarized by the subtitle of the new movie, "I Want to Believe." The statement indicates to me the struggle of the mind to grapple with a reality that it cannot comprehend but whose existence is palpable and undeniable. Understood in the context of the movie, Mulder discovered undeniable evidence of a psychic link, whereas Scully found the strength of her moral conviction to help her patient. While these are both evident to Mulder and Scully, they remain either dismissed by (or contrary to) the prevailing opinion of established authority.

The movie provokes questions about where we draw the line in relation to medical technology and its role in preserving life. What does the ‘right to life’ entail? To what extent is it ‘right’ to preserve life, to prolong a life? Also the movie provokes questions about the subject of forgiveness. Are some crimes unforgivable? Are some people unredeemable? And there is the question of trust. By what criteria do we place our trust in someone or in some form of technology or procedure? According to what values do we entrust others with power over ourselves and those we love? There is the age-old question of why does a loving God permit a child to suffer. And, of course, the age-old question of why did I spend $7.50 on that movie?

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Time and Consciousness

Let me characterize how I regard Time and its relationship to consciousness.

First of all, there is no "present moment." Time is a stream, not a pebble.

Identifying oneself as a thinker means staying in the past (downstream). Being conscious means remaining present (one foot in water and one foot on land). Simply witnessing appearances means being passed by (upstream).

The thinker appreciates Time from the vantage of the past. To a life let live (witnessing appearances) Time flows inexorably forward. A fully conscious individual appreciates Time forwards and backwards.

Thinking remains bound to the past (while forecasting probabilities). Awareness remains bound to the forward motion of Time (with little or no appreciation of either past or future). Consciousness remains present, bearing both the past and the future.

To "remain present" is only possible for a conscious individual. Awareness does not "remain present" but merely passes on because there is "no one" to remain present.

Awareness, upstream, can be regarded as existing prior to Time. Awareness is prior to thought, prior to the past, whereas consciousness bears Time, remaining present with one foot in Time and one foot outside Time. Awareness, however, has no "feet" to stand on.

Monday, March 9, 2009

A Worthy Individual

The fullest expression of human nature is embodied in "a worthy individual."

A worthy individual is the Microcosm, a perfectly proportioned self-sustaining totality, illustrated by the final Tarot Trump THE WORLD.

A worthy individual is fully conscious. He realizes the significance of life. He fulfills his potential.

A worthy individual’s life itself reflects the significance of mankind.

He exemplifies the virtues: Justice, Prudence, Temperance and Fortitude.

We recognize him in the spiritual masters of the ages: Socrates, Buddha, Joshua the Messiah.

We recognize him in the iconic heroes of mythology, past and present: King Arthur, Percivale, Superman, Aragorn and Obi-Wan Kenobi.

He is the aim of mankind.

Our love for the worthy individual elevates us to his presence.

Saturday, March 7, 2009

Man or Machine

The content of thought consists of memories and of concepts made from pairing memories, all of which is derived externally. Who "I" am as an identified "self" is a product of thought. In fact, who "I" am as an identified "self" is a patchwork creation, a collection of borrowed parts, not an independent individual. "I" am an "it." When I am identified, who I am is not a genuine individual but a thing put together by external relationships, a product of environment and the past. "I" am not an individual in the true sense of the word. We presume we are self-determining individuals while in fact we are automatons. We are basically robots programmed by external events. Our "independence" is merely an idea that we cling to in order to cope with the underlying truth of our mechanical existence.

Consider the content of your mind at any given time. It’s a reheated version of the leftovers of data gathered from your environment. You haven’t got one original idea in you. What you consider "original" is only a slightly different combination of pre-existing parts derived from outside of "yourself." The recognition that we are machines is preliminary to the development of our conscious potential, our potential for genuine individuality. Our fleeting sense of being present is the seed of our conscious potential. The more we get a feel for our conscious potential, the closer we come to an understanding of consciousness as self-evident, a self-determining existence. We begin to recognize the difference within ourselves between what is determined by environment and what constitutes our conscious individuality. Initially our conscious individuality is minute, hardly self-evident, a mere glimpse of a potential for freedom. With the exercise of attention, however, that fleeting potential grows into an existence that is truly ours, a conscious existence tacitly experienced rather than merely contemplated theoretically. What I refer to as attention is a growing sense of being present.

Innate to our sense of being present is a potential to grow, to develop and unfold.

Friday, March 6, 2009

Degrees of Consciousness

Consciousness as we know it is not continuous or homogeneous. Our given consciousness is intermittent and variable. There are degrees of consciousness.

Without going into a detailed definition of "consciousness" here, I will try to illustrate my point with a few simple examples.

Consider the difference between dreaming and being awake. What distinguishes a dream from waking life? One of the distinguishing characteristics of a dream is the lack of self-consciousness, specifically the lack of a sense of being present. While you’re dreaming, you aren’t aware that you’re dreaming. While you’re dreaming you have little sense of self, little consciousness. You are merely "aware" of the content of the dream. Awareness is a register of impressions, not specifically a sense of being present.

When you are awake, you can become aware of being awake. You can become self-conscious while awake. While you are awake you can have a sense of being present, although perhaps only for a brief moment.

In as much as consciousness is a sense of being present, we are unconscious during a dream. In other words, we are aware and unconscious. Or, to put it another way, we are less conscious. If we regard awareness itself as a form of consciousness, then while we are dreaming we are less conscious than we are while awake.

Consider the difference between your state of consciousness when you’re tired and your state of consciousness when you’re vitalized. When you’re tired, you are less conscious. You are less self-aware. Your sense of being present is dim compared to when you are vitalized. When you have a lot of vitality, you are more conscious. Your sense of being present becomes strong. Consciousness tends to diminish with diminishing vitality. When you lie in bed at night to go to sleep, your sense of being present diminishes by degrees. You lose consciousness as you drift into sleep.

All of this is rather common sense. It’s a stepping stone to a deeper understanding of what consciousness is, the significance of consciousness. There is a potential latent within our elementary consciousness. Pay attention and discover that potential.

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

A Model of Consciousness

What is consciousness? The dictionary definition of the word is ambiguous. It’s important that we understand why this is so. We need to understand what are the capacities and limitations of the language we are using to communicate on the subject, and that includes understanding the capacities and limitations of the thought process itself.

If we fail to examine our language, if we fail to examine the thought process, if we merely take these for granted as a given basis of discussion, I think our discussion becomes unscientific and is likely to end with a failure to communicate and with misunderstanding.

The given language we are using, conversational English, is based on the established paradigm of human nature, and that established paradigm is (in my consideration) a false paradigm, a paradigm based on false values and a misunderstanding of human nature. Examining that paradigm is one of our first tasks.

What is the mind capable of? Is the mind capable of modeling the subject? By that I’m asking if it’s possible for the mind to formulate a concept of what we are, a concept that is useful, a concept that facilitates an understanding of ourselves. Understanding is more than merely conceptual. Understanding includes every aspect of ourselves: physical, emotional, mental and spiritual. What is "spiritual" is another subject of our study and requires definition.

The mind can be applied with precision or not. Science is a precise use of the mind. The scientific process is systematic and methodical. Let me define those two terms. A system is a unity of arrangement. That means all the parts are present and interconnected to form a unified whole. A method is a regularity in procedure. Method implies consistency, rhythm, logic and predictability. The scientific process has been successfully applied to a variety of subjects. But one of the subjects that remains relatively untouched by science, at least by mainstream science, in my opinion, is the subject of consciousness. What I mean by the word "consciousness" needs some clarification. There are of course established sciences of psychology, psychiatry, sociology and philosophy. But these have, in my opinion, missed and avoided the real issue of consciousness.

Before I begin to explain what I mean by the word "consciousness" we need to come to an understanding of how to apply our minds to the subject. In other words, we need to recognize the necessity of applying the scientific process. Without using our minds precisely we are likely to misunderstand the subject and to misunderstand each other. Even when we try to communicate with each other on relatively trivial matters it’s easy to misunderstand each other. On a subject as complex and subtle as human nature, the interior workings of a man, the possibility of misunderstanding and of miscommunication increases dramatically.

I assert that it is possible and useful to apply the scientific process and to model the subject of consciousness. While any concept or model remains in itself a concept, that does not negate the usefulness of its application in life. I regard the concept or model as a mirror that reflects the subject. The subject is, essentially, ourselves. A reflection of ourselves, a clear reflection, can provoke a recognition in us, a recognition of ourselves. That recognition itself occurs within us, in life, and is not equivalent to the reflection or contained within the reflection. But the reflection can inspire a recognition of ourselves, and therein is the usefulness and application of the model.

Ordinary conversational English, like our given paradigm of human nature, fosters a misunderstanding of ourselves. It fosters the slurring together of facets of ourselves. It fosters the misidentification of aspects of ourselves. It fosters overlooking certain aspects of ourselves. If we are to get anywhere with the subject, we must apply our minds scientifically, that is to say with precision, and we must begin to construct a more precise vocabulary of our subject. We need to formulate a model of the subject and apply that model to ourselves in life, to test the model and thereby fulfill that aspect of the scientific process, independent verification.

The awakening of our intention to understand ourselves is itself the very understanding of ourselves. In other words, the intention with which we approach the subject of consciousness is consciousness itself. But our intention is fleeting and faint. It tends to fade. We are easily distracted. One moment we are genuinely interested in the subject and then the next moment we are lost in another. This is one of the most important points to recognize in our investigation. Our so-called consciousness is fleeting. It is dim. Our intention is weak. This is the problem. The recognition of this problem is the beginning of its solution.

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

What is Attention?

What I refer to as “attention” is the process by which a human being grows more conscious. Attention is the exercise of a latent human ability to vest subtle internal energy.

Within the human body, subtle energy is organized. Thought is an organization of subtle energy. Emotions consist of organizations of subtle energy. Sensory awareness itself is an organization of subtle energy. Any given sensation is a form of energy.

Consciousness, in its elementary form, is bodily awareness. Bodily awareness is our simple sense of being present, our rudimentary sense of being a body within the universe. Bodily awareness is generated by the continuous automatic process of sensory awareness, prior to thought. Consciousness itself is not thinking. Consciousness, in its elementary form, is prior to thinking.

Our rudimentary consciousness, bodily awareness, our basic sense of self, consists of an organization of subtle energy within the body. Our given sense of being is faint and fleeting. We only momentarily touch base with it. We quickly lose our sense of being present. We generally dwell in continuous thoughts and emotions. We are hardly conscious.

Attention reorganizes the subtle energy of which we consist. The act of attention is both a vestment and divestment of internal energy. Vestment is volitional action. Volition is a voluntary investment of energy. Energy in itself is the potential for work, a capacity for action. Vestment means increasing the capacity to act.

Touch base with your sense of being present. That is the act of attention. By getting a feel for yourself as presently conscious, you are exercising your power of attention. Get a feel for the dimension of yourself that is presently conscious. Contrast it with thought, with emotion, with awareness. By drawing a contrast between these, you are exercising your capacity to pay attention. You are increasing your consciousness.

The act of attention divests energy from emotions and reinvests that energy into bodily awareness, thereby increasing bodily awareness. Attention divests energy from the thought process and reinvests that energy into bodily awareness, thereby increasing bodily awareness, increasing consciousness, expanding and prolonging the sense of being present.

By exercising our latent ability to vest subtle internal energy, we increase our bodily awareness. Bodily awareness increases until it becomes an energetic body of consciousness. That energetic body of consciousness is our real Self, who we really are, a genuine individual, the immortal soul. We do not automatically possess an immortal soul. The soul is forged through the process of attention.

The vestment of awareness with energy increases the product of awareness, that is bodily awareness. Bodily awareness, our elementary consciousness, our sense of being, is itself an action. To be implies a special kind of action, a special organization and circulation of subtle internal energy. Continuity of being is a sustained action, a continuous circulation of subtle internal energy. The act of attention prolongs and sustains consciousness. Attention exercises consciousness.

The process of attention culminates in full consciousness, permanent consciousness.

Monday, March 2, 2009

What is Art?

A definition of Art requires a definition of Beauty. What is Beauty? There are many aesthetic theories, many attempts to define Beauty, as many it seems as there are people who consider the subject. Everyone has felt a sense of beauty at times, a sense of beauty derived from a book or a movie or a song. People typically don’t distinguish between pleasure and a sense of beauty. They regard the sense of beauty as a higher degree of pleasure. Whether pleasure or a sense of beauty, people generally identify it with the object or event from which it was derived, and in doing so regard the object or event as Beauty itself or as definitive evidence of Beauty. And as others differ in their regard for those objects or events, differences of opinions about Beauty abound. Beauty is soon relegated to an opinion of an object, and the sense of beauty itself is forgotten.

Sunday, March 1, 2009

Paperback Physics

Discussing the relationship of consciousness and Nature, invariably someone refers to what I call "paperback physics." It’s always someone who isn’t a physicist. They refer vaguely to mainstream science the same way a churchgoer refers to the church Father as authority. We visualize gaunt men in white lab coats (physicists) pronouncing gravely something to the effect that the subject is "indeterminate" and "unpredictable" and that it defies scientific explanation. Their reference to "particle physics" is a means of furthering an argument that is essentially in opposition to science. Mainstream science is certainly not complete. Let’s stick to the scientific method, which is really what’s relevant to the discussion, and not what amounts to "superstition" about "particle physics."