Category Archives: Energy

Thorns or Roses May Grow Within.

The individual will grow outward toward the world, encountering and forming a practical experience, traveling outward from his center in almost vine-like fashion, forming from the fabric of physical reality a conglomeration of pleasant or aesthetic, and unpleasant or prickly events.

dd7

The vine of experience in this analogy is formed in quite a natural fashion from “psychic” elements that are as necessary to psychological experience as sun, air, and water are to plants. But as the individual’s personal experience must be seen in the light of all of these issues, so mass events cannot be understood unless they are considered in a far greater context that unusual.

The question of epidemics, for example, cannot be answered from a biological standpoint alone. It involves great sweeping psychological attitudes on the part of many, and meets the needs and desires of those involved — needs which, in our terms, arise in a framework of religious, psychological and cultural realities that cannot be isolated from biological results.

b41

I have thus far stayed clear of many important and vital subjects, involving mass realities, because first of all the importance of the individual is to be stressed, and his or her power to form this or her private events. Only when the private nature of reality was emphasized sufficiently would show how the magnification of individual reality combines and enlarges to form vast mass reactions — such as, say, the initiation of an obviously new historical and cultural period; the rise or overthrow of an obviously new historical and cultural period; the rise or overthrow or governments; the birth of a new religion that sweeps all others before it; mass conversions; mass murders in the form of wars; the sudden sweep of deadly epidemics; the scourge of earthquakes, flood, or other disasters; the inexplicable appearance of periods of great art or architecture or technology.

devo6

There are no closed systems. This also means that in world terms, events spin like electrons, affecting all psychological and psychic systems as well as biological ones. It is true to say that each individual dies alone, for no one else can die that death. It is also true that part of the species dies with each death, and is reborn with each birth, and that each private death takes place within the greater context of the existence of the entire species. The death serves a purpose species-wise while it also serves the purposes of the individual, for no death comes unbidden.

An epidemic, for example, serves the purposes of each individual who is involved, while it also serves its own functions in the greater species framework.

devo435

When we consider epidemics to be the result of viruses, and emphasize their biological stances, then it seems that the solutions are very obvious: We learn the nature of each virus and develop an inoculation, giving [each member of] the populace a small dose of the disease so that a man’s or woman’s own body will combat it, and he or she will become immune.

The shortsightedness of such procedures is generally overlooked because of the definite short-term advantages. As a rule, for example, people inoculated against polio do not develop that disease. Using such procedures, tuberculosis has been largely conquered.

TH45

In the first place, the causes are not biological. Biology is simply the carrier of a “deadly intent.” In the second place, there is a difference between a virus produced in the laboratory and that inhabiting the body — a difference recognized by the body but not by our laboratory instruments.

In a way the body produces antibodies, and sets up natural immunization as a result of say, inoculation. But the body’s chemistry is also confused, for it “knows it is reacting to a disease that is not “a true disease,” but a biologically counterfeit intrusion.

e67

To that extent — the body’s biological integrity is contaminated. It may at the same time produce antibodies also, for example, to other “similar” diseases, and so overextend its defenses that the individual later comes down with another disease.

No person becomes ill unless that illness serves a psychic or psychological reason, so many people escape such complications. In the meantime, however, scientists and medical men and women find more and more viruses against which the population “must ” be inoculated. Each one is considered singly. There is a rush to develop a new inoculation against the newest virus. Much of this is on predictive basis: The scientists “predict” how many people might be “attacked” by, say, a virus that has caused a given number of deaths. Then as a preventative measure the populace is invited to the new inoculation.

88

Many people who would not get the disease in any case are then religiously inoculated with it. The body is exerted to use its immune system to the utmost, and sometimes, according to the inoculation, overextended [under such] conditions. Those individuals who have psychologically decided upon death will die in any case, of that disease or another, or of the side effects of the inoculation.

Inner reality and private experience give birth to all mass events. Man and woman cannot disentangle himself or herself from the natural context of his or her physical life. His or her culture, his or her religion, his or her psychologies, and his or her psychological nature together form the context within which both private and mass events occur. My discussions will be devoted to the nature of the great sweeping emotional, religious, or biological events that often seem to engulf the individual, or to lift him or her willy-nilly in their power.

qq4

What is the relationship between the individual and the gigantic mass motions of nature, of government, or even of religion? What about mass conversions? Mass hysteria? Mass healings, mass murder, and the individual?

 

Each of us possesses a unique, original stance in space and time, regardless of time’s relative existence.

That reality contributes to the experience of others. Only when we operate from our own stance can we help others to the best of our ability. To anticipate danger, or to imaginatively take on the troubles of others robs us of the very energy with which we could help them. I am not saying, therefore, to turn our eyes from the unfortunate conditions of the world. Practical help is needed in all areas of the human life. Yet it is far better, and more practical ultimately, to concentrate upon the beneficial elements of civilization — far better to organize our thoughts in areas of accomplishment than to make lists of man’s or woman’s deficiencies and lacks.

o12

Such a practice leads to feelings of helplessness and hopelessness, in which effective action seems impossible. Life possesses an exuberance. If this is cherished, nurtured, encouraged, then additional energy is generated that is not needed for the purposes of daily private life — a superabundance, that can be effectively directed in those areas of the world where help is most needed.

The strength, vitality, and effectiveness of thought is seldom considered. Though, we may say will not stop war — yet what do we think started such a war? Throughout history the downtrodden have often risen into power, using force, rebelling against their oppressors; and yet, learning little from that experience, they turn and become the new elite, the new power-holders. Their physical conditions may be completely changed, Now theirs, the offices of government, the wealth. Gone are the conditions that, it would seem, caused the uprising. Yet in retaliation they strike out, forming a new class of downtrodden who must in their turn rise and retaliate.

o5

Despite all appearances, conditions of an exterior nature do not cause wars, or poverty, or disease, or any of the unfortunate circumstances apparent in the world. Our beliefs form our reality. Our thoughts generate practical experience. When these change, conditions will change. To add our own energy, focus, and concentration of dire circumstances in other portions of the world does not help, but adds to, such situations.

To close our eyes to them in an ignorant fashion, to wash our hands of them, so to speak, is equally shortsighted. To pretend such situations do not exist, out of fear of them, will only bring the feared reality closer. It is far better to situate oneself firmly in our own reality, acknowledge it as our own, encourage our strength and creativity, and from that vantage point view those areas of the world or of our own society that need constructive help. Purposefully in our own life, in our daily dialogues with others, in our relationships through our groups or clubs, reinforce as well as we can the strength and abilities of others.

o6

That reinforcement will add to the personal power of all other individuals with whom those people come in contact. Find the beliefs responsible for the unfortunate conditions. Each individual should be able to assess his or her own reality realistically. There would be no need to arm a nation in advance against another nation’s anticipated — but imaginary — attack.

Personal grudges would not build up, so that men or women so fear further hurts that they attempt to hide from life or relationships, or shy away from contact with others. It is not virtuous to count our failings. Self-conscious righteousness can be a very narrow road. If each of us understood and perceived the graceful integrity of our own individuality, just as we try to perceive the beauty of all other natural creatures, then we would allow our own creativity greater reign. There is order in all elements of nature, and we are part of it.

o15

The greater sweep of the seasons represents the reaches of our soul. We will not attain spirituality by turning our eyes away from nature, or by trying to disentangle oneself from it. We will not “glimpse eternal life” by attempting to deny the life that we have now — for that life is our own unique path, and provides its own clues for us to follow.

All That Is vibrates with desire. The denial of desire will bring us only listlessness. Those who deny desire are the most smitten by it. Each of our lives are miniature and yet gigantic episodes, mortal and immortal at once, providing experiences that we form meaningfully, opening up dimensions of reality available to no one else, for no one can view existence from our standpoint. No one can be you but you. There are communications at other levels, but our experience of existence is completely original, to be treasured.

o13

No one from any psychological threshold, however vast, can write a book that defines the psyche, but only present hints and clues, words and symbols. The words and ideas stand for inner realities — that is, they are like piano keys striking other chords; chords that, hopefully, will be activated within the psyche of each person.

Each or us is couched now in the natural world, and world is couched in a reality from which nature emerges. The psyche’s roots are secure, nourishing it like a tree from the ground of being. The source of the psyche’s strength is within each individual, the invisible fabric of the person’s existence.

o17

Nature is luxurious and abundant in its expressions. The greater reality from which nature springs is evens more abundant, and within that multidimensional experience no individual is ignored, forgotten, dismissed, lost, or forsaken. A tree does not have to ask for nourishment for the ground or the sun, and so everything that we need is available to us in our practical experience. If we believe we are not worthy of nourishment, if we believe that life itself is dangerous, then our own beliefs make it impossible for us to fully utilize that available help. In large measure, since we are still alive, we are of course nourished. We cannot close out the vitality of our own being easily, and the vitality “squandered” on deeper bouts of depression is often greater than the energy used in creative pursuits. We are a portion of All That Is; therefore the universe leans in our direction. It gives. It rings with vitality. Then forsake beliefs that tell us otherwise. Seek within oneself — each of us — those feelings of exuberance that we have, even if they are only occasional, and encourage those events or thoughts that bring them about.

We cannot find our psyche by thinking of it as a separate thing, like a fine jewel in an eternal closet. We can only experience its strength and vitality by exploring the subjective reality that is our own, for it will lead us unerringly to that greater source of being that transcends both space and time.

o1

The overall stance of the species is largely maintained by the waking-sleeping patterns. In such a fashion, one large portion of the species focuses in physical reality while the other large portion holds a secure foothold in inner reality.

In inner reality we are working on the interior patterns that will form the next day’s realities, and providing probable previews of the future events. Waking and sleeping reality is therefore balanced in the world mind — not the world brain.

o14

However, the sleeping portion of the species represents the brain’s unconscious activities in the body — particularly when we think of the motion of all of the species’ action en masse in a given day. Those conscious motions have an unconscious basis. If we think of a mass world brain — one entity — then it must wake and sleep in patterns. If we think of mass daily action as performed by one gigantic being, then all of those conscious actions have unconscious counterparts, and a great intercommunication of an inner nervous system must take place.

Part of such brain would have to be awake all of the time, and part engaged in unconscious activity. This is what happens.

sl2

Diverse cultures are thus able to communicate as the cultural knowledge of various parts of the world is given to the sleeping portion of the entire organism. When they sleep, the waking nations add the day’s events to the world memory, and work out future probabilities.

When we ask about the beginning of a universe, we are speaking of a visible universe.

There is consciousness within each conceivable hypothetical point within the universe. There is therefore “an invisible universe” out of which the visible or objective universe springs.

I do not mean to overemphasize the point that this particular material is most difficult to explain, yet I can hardly stress the issue too strongly.

NONN

Our universe did not emerge at any one point, therefore, or with any one initial cell — but everywhere it began to exist at once, as the inner pulsations of the invisible universe reached certain intensities that “impregnated” the entire physical system simultaneously.

In this case, first of all light appeared. At the same time Electromagnetic Energy units became manifest, impinging from the invisible universe into definition. Again, because of the psychological strength of preconceived notions, I try to work around many of our concepts. Yet in much of this material is implied, but the implications must have passed on to the reader.

N2

For example, the universe expands as an idea does, and so the visible universe sprang into being in the same manner. The whole affair is quite complicated since — the world freshly springs into new creativity at each moment. No matter what our version of creativity, of the creation of the world, we are stuck with questions of where such energy came from, for it seems that unimaginable energy was released more or less at one time, and that this energy must then run out.

The same energy, however, still gives birth to the universe. In those terms, it is still being created. The Electromagnetic Energy units, impressing a probable physical field, contain within them the latent knowledge of all of the various species that can emerge under those conditions. The groupings “begin” in the invisible universe. We can say that it took untold centuries for the Electromagnetic Energy units “initially” to combine, form classifications of matter and various species; or we can say that this process happened at once. It is according to our relative position, but the physical universe was everywhere seeded, impregnated, simultaneously. On the other hand, this still happens, and there is no real “coming-in” point.

v11

We distinguish between consciousness and our own version, which we consider consciousness of self. When I speak of atoms and molecules having consciousness, I mean that they possess a consciousness of themselves as identities. I do not mean that they love or hate, in our terms, but that they are aware of their own separateness, and aware of the ways in which that separateness cooperates to form other organizations.

They are innately aware, in fact, of all such probable cooperative ventures, and imbued with the “drive” for value fulfillment. Every known species was inherently “present” with the overall impregnation of the visible universe, then.

v14

If the universe were a painting, for example, the painter would not have first painted darkness, then an explosion, then a cell, then the joining together of groups of cells into a simple organism, then that organism’s manipulation into others like it, or traced a pattern from an amoeba or a paramecium on upward — but he or she would have instead begun with a panel of light, an underpainting, in which all of the world’s organisms were included, though not in detail. Then in a creativity that came from the painting itself the colors would grow rich, the species attain their delineations, the winds blow and the seas move with the tides.

The motion and energy of the universe still come from within. I certainly realize that this is hardly a scientific statement — yet the moment the All That Is conceived of a physical universe it was invisibly created, endowed with creativity, and bound to emerge.

N6

Because each hypothetical, conceivable portion of the universe is conscious, the Planner is within the plan itself in the greatest of terms — perhaps basically inconceivable to us. There is of course no “outside” into which the invisible universe materialized, since all does indeed exist in a mental, psychic, or spiritual realm quite impossible to describe. To us our universe seems, now, objective and real, and it seems to us that at one time at least this was not the case, so we ask its creation and the evolution of the species. The answer has been couched in the terms in which the question if generally asked.

While we believe in and experience the passage of time, then such questions will naturally occur to us, and in that fashion. Within that framework they make sense. When we begin to question the nature of time itself, then the “when” of the universe is beside the point.

N9

Almost anyone will agree, I hope, that the universe is a most splendid example of creativity. Few would agree, however, that we can learn more about nature of the universe by examining our own creativity than we can by examining the world through instruments — and here is exquisite irony, for we create the instruments of creativity, even while at the same time we often spout theories that deny to man and woman all but most mechanical of reactions.

In other terms, the world comes to know itself, to discover itself, for the Planner left room for divine surprise, and the plan was nowhere foreordained; nor is there anywhere within it anything that corresponds to our survival-of-the-fittest theories.

N22

These are creative distortions on our part, directly related to specializations of consciousness that cut us off from the greater concourse existing at other levels between the species and the land. Again, consciousness everywhere pervades the universe, and is aware of all conditions. The balance of nature upon our planet is no chance occurrence, but the result of constant, instant computations on the part of each most minute consciousness, whether it forms part of a rock, a person, an animal, a plant. Each invisibly “holds space together,” whatever its station. This is a cooperative venture. Our own consciousness has its particular unique qualities, in that like other comparatively long-lived species, we associate our identity with our form far more rigidly. Other kinds of consciousness “leap in and out of forms” with greatest leeway. There is a biological understanding that exists, for example, when one animal kills another one for food. The consciousness of the prey leaves its body under the impetus of a kind of stimulus unknown to us.

v23

The natural interplay among the animals. This is not anywhere meant to justify the cruel slaughtering of animals by man and woman under many circumstances

 

There is no non-matter.

There is simply a point that we recognize as having the characteristics that we have ascribed to life, or living conditions — a point that meets the requirements that we have arbitrarily set.

There is no particular point at which life was inserted into nonliving matter. There is no point at which consciousness emerged. Consciousness is within the tiniest particle, whatever its life conditions seem to be, or however it might seem to lack those conditions we call living.

N1

In terms of continuity, we could say that life in the physical universe, on our planet, “began” spontaneously in a given number of species at the same time.

There were fully developed men — of full intellect, emotion, and will — living at the same time, in our terms, as those creatures supposed to be man’s evolutionary ancestors. Species have come and gone of which we have no knowledge. There are parallel developments. That is there were “apes” who attained their own “civilizations,” for example. They used tools. They were not men-to-be, nor did they evolve into men.

do25

It is erroneous to say that they did not develop. Or that their progress was stunned, for it was not. Their reality explored the ramifications of animal-hood in a completely different fashion. Their development paralleled man’s and woman’s in many respects, in that they lived simultaneously upon the earth, and shared the environment.

I have referred to them at various times as animal medicine men, for man and woman did learn from them. The impact of many of my statements of the past goes unrecognized, or perhaps the words sound pat, but there are other conditions of life that we do not perceive, sometimes because our time sequences are too different. Before the smallest cell appeared, in our terms, there was the consciousness that formed the cell.

dr5

Words do nearly forsake me, the semantic differences are so vast. If I say to you: “Life came from a dream,” such a statement sounds meaningless. Yet as our physical reality personally is largely dependent upon our dreaming state, and impossible without it, so in the same way the first cell was physically materialized and actual only because of its own inner reality of consciousness.

In those terms there was a point where consciousness impressed itself into matter through intent, or formed itself into matter. That “breakthrough” cannot be logically explained, but only compared to, say, an illumination — that is, a light everywhere occurring at once, that became a medium for life in our terms. It had nothing to do with the propensity of certain kinds of cells to reproduce, but with an overall illumination that set the conditions in which life as we think of it was possible — and at that imaginary hypothetical point, all species became latent.

bio1

There was no point at which consciousness was introduced, because consciousness was the illumination from which the first cells emerged. That illumination was everywhere then at every point aware of itself, and of the conditions formed by its presence. In our terms each species is aware of the conditions of each other species, and of the entire environment. In those terms the environment forms the species and the species forms the environment.

As hinted, there have been all kinds of species of animal-man, and man-animal, of which our sciences are not aware, and bones found thought to form, say, a man and an animal that were from the same creature. Afghanistan comes to mind, as a particularly lucrative environment.

dr183

Our own kind of conscious mind is splendid and unique. It causes us, however, to interpret all other kinds of life according to our own specifications and experience. The complex nature of other animal consciousness escapes us completely. And when we compare our technologies, learning, logical thought, cultures and arts with us understand of animal experience, there seems no doubt that we are superior and “the Flower of Evolution” — that all other kinds of life are topped by our existence.

We are closed to the intricate, voluptuous, sensuous, social experience of the animals, or even of the plants — not being able to perceive that different kind of biological emotion and belonging, that rich, sensual identification with earth, and cut off from a biologically oriented culture that is everywhere part and parcel of both plant and animal life.

www223e

We are a part of that also, but the conscious mind, with its own specifications, cannot manipulate with that kind of knowledge.

There have also been men and women — in our terms — more developed than us — in terms — for our ideas of development are highly erroneous. But topped us in technology, if that is our criterion.

dr42

I hesitate in many instances to say what I might, because it is so easy to misinterpret meanings; but when we ask what is the purpose of consciousness we take it for granted there must be one purpose — where the greater truth and creativity must be that consciousness itself cannot be aware of all of its own purposes, but ever discovers its own nature through its own manifestations.

To those who want easy answers, this is no answer. There is, I know, in heroic terms a love, a knowledge, a compassion, a creativity that can assigned to All That Is, which is within each creature. I know that each smallest “particle” of consciousness can never be broken down, and that each contains an infinite capacity for creativity and development — and that each is innately blessed.

cre

There is a design and a designer, but they are so combined, the one within and the one without, that it is impossible to separate them. The Creator is also within its creations, and the creations themselves are gifted with creativity.

Consciousness is too creative to confine its activities in one direction

Consciousness enjoys its physical orientation. Dreams provide consciousness with its own creative play, therefore, when it need not be so practical or so “mundane,” allowing it to use its innate characteristics more freely.

double

Many people are aware of double or triple dreams, when they seem to have two or three simultaneous dreams.. Usually upon the point of awakening, such dreams suddenly telescope into one that is predominant, with the others taking subordinate positions, though the dreamer is certain that in the moment before the dream were equal in intensity. Such dreams are representative of the great creativity of consciousness, and hint of it ability to carry on more than one line of experience at one time without losing track or itself.

In Physical waking life, we must do one thing or another, generally speaking. Obviously I am simplifying, since we can eat an orange, watch television, scratch our foot, and yell at the dog — all more or less at the same time. We cannot, however, be in Boston and San Francisco at the same time, or be 21 years of age and 11 at the same time.

do8

In double dreams and triple dreams consciousness shows its transparent, simultaneous nature. Several lines of dream experience can be encountered at the same time, each complete in itself, but when the dreamer wakes to the fact, the experience cannot be neurologically translated; so one dream usually predominates, with the others more like ghost images.

There are too many varieties of such dreams to discuss here, but they all involve consciousness dispersing, yet retaining its identity, consciousness making loops with itself. Such dreams involve other sequences than the ones with which we are familiar. They hint at the true dimensions of consciousness that are usually unavailable to us, for we actually form our own historical world in the same manner, in that above all other experiences that one world is predominant, and played on the screen of our brain.

orr

Take a very simple event like eating of an orange. Playfully imagine how that event is interpreted by the cells of your body. How is the orange perceived? It might be directly felt by the tip of your finger, but are the cells in your feet aware of it? Do the cells in your knee know you are eating an orange?

Take all the time you want with this. Then explore your own conscious sense perceptions of the orange. Dwell on its taste, texture, odor, shape. Again, do this playfully, and take your time. Then let your own association flow in our mind. What does the orange remind you of? When did you first see or taste one? Have you ever seen oranges grow, or orange blossoms? What does the color remind you of?

ora

Then pretend you are having a dream that begins with the image of an orange. Follow the dream in your mind. Next, pretend that you are waking from the dream to realize that another dream was simultaneously occurring, and ask yourself quickly what the dream was. Followed in the same sequence given, the exercise will allow you to make loops with your own consciousness, so to speak, to catch it “coming and going.” And the last question — what else were you dreaming of? — Should bring an entirely new sequence of images and thoughts into your mind that were indeed happening at the same time as your daydream about the orange.

These feel and practice of these exercises are their important points — the manipulation of a creative consciousness. We exist outside of our present context, but such statements are meaningless, practically speaking, unless we give oneself some freedom to experience events outside of that rigid framework. These exercises alter our usual organizations, and hence allow us to encounter experience in a fresher fashion.

doube

A double dream is like the double life lived by some people who have two families — one in each town — and who seemingly manipulate separate series of events that other people would find most confusing. If the body can only follow certain sequences, still consciousness has inner depths of action that do not show on the surface line of experience. Double dreams are clues to such activity.

While each person generally follows a given strand of consciousness, and identifies with it as “myself,” there are other alternate lines beneath the surface. They are also quite as legitimately the same identity, but they are not focused upon because the body must have one clear, direct mode of action.

do14

These strands are like double dreams that continue. They are serve as a framework to the recognized self. In periods of stress or challenge the recognized self may sense these other strains of consciousness, and realize that a fuller experience is possible, a greater psychological thickness. On some occasions in the dream state the recognized self may then enlarge its perception enough to take advantage of these other portions of its own identity. Double or triple dreams may represent such encounters at times. Consciousness always seeks the richest, most creative form, while ever maintaining its own integrity. The imagination, playing, the arts and dreaming, allow it to enrich its activities by providing feedback other than that received in the physical environment itself.

Our memories, feelings, and emotions are connected to the body

It is as if the experience of our life were captured on a film. In this case the film would be the body tissue, the brain’s tissue. The experiences themselves, however, would exist independently of the film, which in any case could not capture their entirely.

In a manner of speaking the activity of our brain adjusts the speed with which we, as a physical creature, perceive life’s events. Theoretically, those events could be slowed down or run at a quicker pace. Again in a manner of speaking, the sound, vision, dimensional solidarity and so forth are “Dubbed in. ” The picture runs at the same speed, more or less. The physical senses chime in together to give us a dramatic sensual chorus, each “voice” keeping perfect time with all the other sensual patterns so that as a rule there is harmony and a sense of continuity, with no embarrassing lapses.

n111

The same applies to our thoughts, which if we bother to listen seem to come smoothly one after another, more or less following the sequence of exterior activity. The brain like the movie screen gives us a physical picture, in living stereo, of inner activities that nowhere themselves physically appear.

Our brain gives us a handy and quite necessary reference system with which to conduct corporal life. It puts together for us in their “proper” sequences events that could be experienced in many other ways, using other kinds of organization. The brain, of course, and other portions of the body, tune into our planet and connect us with numberless time sequences — molecular, cellular, and so forth — so that they are synchronized with the world’s events.

n119

The brain organizes activity and translates events, but it does not initiate them. Events have an electromagnetic reality that is then projected onto the brain for physical activation. Or instruments only pick up certain levels of the brain’s activity. They do not perceive the mind’s activity at all, except as it is imprinted onto the brain.

Even dreams are so imprinted. When one portion or one half of the brain is activated, for example, the corresponding portion of the other half is also activated, but at levels scientists do not perceive. It is ridiculous to call one side or the other of the brain dominant, for the full richness of the entire earth experience requires utilization of both halves, as does dreaming.

n114

In dreaming, however, the full sense-picture usually projected by the brain, and reinforced by bodily action, is not necessary. Those dream experiences often seem out of joint or out of focus in morning’s hindsight, or in retrospect, simply because they occur with a complexity that the brain could not handle in ordinary waking terms.

The body obviously must react in our official present; hence the brain neatly keeps its physical time sequences with spaced neural responses. The entire package of physical reality is dependent upon the senses’ data being timed — synchronized — giving the body an opportunity for precise action. In dreams the senses are not so restrained. Events from past, present, and future can be safely experienced, as can events that would be termed probable from our usual viewpoint, since the body, again, is not required to act upon them.

n12

Because of the brain’s necessary specifications, large portions of our own greater reality cannot appear through its auspices. The brain might consider such extracurricular activity as background noise or clutter that it could not decipher. It is the mind, then, as the brain’s non-physical counterpart, that decides what data will activate the brain in that regard. The so-called ancient portions of the brain among them the brainstem — limbic system contain “the mind’s memories.” Generally speaking, this means important data to which, however, no conscious attention need be given.

None could be given, because the information deals with time scales that the more “sophisticated” portions of the brain can no longer handle.

n21

The knowledge of the body’s own biological probabilities takes place at those ancient levels, and at those levels there is activity that results in a cellular communication existing between all species. The brain has built-in powers of adaptation to an amazing degree, so that innately one portion can take over for any other portion, and perform its activities as well as its own. Beliefs in what is possible and not possible often dull that facility, however. While the neural connections are specific, and while learned biological behavior dominates basically, the portions of the brain are innately inter-changeable, for they are directed by the mind’s action.

This is most difficult to explain, but the capacity for full conscious life is inherent in each portion of the body itself. Otherwise, in fact, it’s smooth synchronically would be impossible. The brain has abilities we do not use consciously because our beliefs prevent us from initiating the proper neural habits. Certain portions of the brain seem dominant only because of those neural habits that are adopted in any given civilization or time. But other cultures in our past have experienced reality quite differently as a result of encouraging different neural patterns, and putting experience together through other focuses.

ddedw3d1

Dreaming, for example, can be “brought into focus” in a far sharper fashion, so that at least some of those experiences can be consciously utilized. When this happens, we are consciously taking advantage of experience that is physically and logically extra-curricular.

We are bringing into our consciousness traces of events that have not been registered in the same way that waking events are by the brain. The dream events are partially brain-recorded, but the brain separates such experience from waking events. Dreams can provide us with experience that in a manner of speaking, at least, is not encountered in time. The dream itself is recorded by the brain’s time sequences, but in the dream itself there is a duration of time “that is timeless.”

dre7

Theoretically, certain dreams can give us a lifetime’s experience to draw upon, though the dream itself can take less than an hour in our time. In a way, dreams are the invisible thickness of our normal consciousness. They involve both portions of the brain. Many dreams do activate the brain in a ghostly fashion, sparking responses that are not practically pertinent in ordinary terms. That is, they do not require direct action but serve as anticipators of action, reminders to the brain to initiate certain actions in its future.

Dreams are so many-leveled that a full discussion requires an almost impossible verbal expertise. For while dreams do not necessitate action on the part of the whole body, and while the brain does not register the entire dream, the dream does serve to activate biological action — by releasing hormones, for example.

e13e

There are also what I will call body dreams. No consciousness, to whatever degree, is fully manifested in matter. There is always constant communication between all portions of the body, but when the conscious mind is diverted that activity often increases. Cellular consciousness at its own level then forms a body dream. These do not involve pictures or words, but are rather like the formations of electromagnetic intent, anticipating action to be taken, and these may then serve as initiators of therapeutic dreams, in which “higher” levels of consciousness are psychologically made aware of certain conditions.

Many problems, however, are anticipated through body dreams, and conditions cleared at that level alone.

We have inner senses that correlate with our physical ones

These, however, do not have to be trained to a particular space-time orientation.

When children dream, they utilize these inner senses as adults do, and then through dreaming they learn to translate such material into the precise framework of the exterior senses. Children’s games are always “in the present” — that is, they are immediately experienced, though the play events may involve the future or the past. The phrase “once upon a time” is strongly evocative and moving, even to adults, because children play with time in a way that adults have forgotten. If we want to sense the motion of our psyche, it is perhaps easiest to imagine a situation either in the past or the future, for this automatically moves our mental sense-perceptions in a new way. Children try to imagine what the world was like before they entered it. Do the same thing. The way you follow these directions can be illuminating, for the areas of activity we choose will tell us something about the unique qualities of our own consciousness. Adult games deal largely with manipulations in space, while children’s play, again, often involves variations in time. Look at a natural object, say a tree; if it is spring now, then imagine that we see it in the fall.

ch299

Alter your time orientation in other such exercises. This will automatically allow you to break away from too narrow a focus. It will to some extent break apart the rigid interlocking of your perception into reality as we have learned how to perceive it. Children can play so vividly that they might, for example, imagine themselves parched under a desert sun, though they are in the middle of the coolest air-conditioned living room. They are on the one hand completely involved in their activity, yet on the other hand they are quite aware of their “normal” environment. Yet the adult often fears that any such playful unofficial alteration of consciousness is dangerous, and becomes worried that the imagined situation will supersede the real one.

Through training, many adults have been taught that the imagination itself is suspicious. Such attitudes not only drastically impede any artistic creativity, but the imaginative creativity necessary to deal with the nature of physical events themselves.

i2

Man’s or woman’s creative alertness, his or her precise sensual focus in space and time, and his or her ability to react quickly to events, are of course all highly important characteristics. His or her imagination allowed him or her to develop the use of tools, and gave birth to his or her inventiveness. That imagination allows him or her to plan in the present for what might occur in the future.

This means that to some extent the imagination must operate outside of the senses’ precise orientation. For that reason, it is most freely used in the dream state. Basically speaking, imagination cannot be tied to practicalities, for when it is man or woman has only physical feedback. If that were all, then there would be no inventions. There is always additional information available other than that in the physical environment.

i6

These additional data come as a result of the brain’s high play as it experiments with the formation of events, using the inner senses that are not structured in time or space.

Put another time on. Just before you sleep, see yourself as you are, but living in a past or future century — or simply pretend that you were born 10 or 20 years earlier or later. Done playfully, such exercises will allow you a good subjective feel for your own inner existence as it is a part from the time context.

ree4

To encourage creativity, exert your imagination through breaking up your usual space-time focus. As you fall to sleep, imagine that you are in the same place, exactly in the same spot, but at some point in the distant past or future. What do you see, or hear? What is there?

For another exercise, imagine that you are in another part of the world entirely, but in present time, and ask yourself the same questions. For variety, in your mind’s eye follow your own activities of the previous day. Place your self a week ahead in time. Conduct your own variations of these exercises. What they will teach you cannot be explained, for they will provide a dimension of experience, a feeling about your self that may make sense only to you.

sasa343

They will teach us to find our own sensation of oneself, as divorced from the official context of reality, in which we usually perceive our being. Additionally, we will be better able to deal with current events, for our exercised imagination will bring information to us that will be increasingly valuable.

Do not begin by using your imagination only to solve current problems, for you will tie your creativity to them, and hamper it because of your beliefs about what is practical.

ewui6

Playfully done, these exercises will set into action other creative events. These will involve the utilization of some of the inner senses, for which we have no objective sense-correlations. We will understand situations better in daily life, because we will have activated inner abilities that allow us to subjectively perceive the reality of other people in away that children do.

There is an inner knack, allowing for greater sensitivity to the feelings of others than we presently acknowledge. That knack will be activated. Again, the powers of the brain come from the mind, so while we learn to center our consciousness in our body — and necessarily so — nevertheless our inner perceptions roam a far greater range. Before sleep, then, imagine your consciousness traveling down a road, or across the world — whatever you want. Forget you body. Do not try to leave it for this exercise. Tell yourself that you are imaginatively traveling.

w56t

If you have chosen a familiar destination, then imagine the houses you might pass. It is sometimes easier to choose an unfamiliar location, however, for then we are not tempted to test yourself as you go along by wondering whether or not the imagined scenes conform to your memory.

To one extent or another your consciousness will indeed be traveling. Again, a playful attitude is best. If you retain it, and remember children’s games then the affair will be entirely enjoyable; and even if you experience events that seem frightening, you will recognize them as belonging to the same category as the frightening events of a child’s game.

dres7

Children often scare themselves. A variety of reasons exist for such behavior. People often choose to watch horror films for the same reason. Usually the body and mind are bored, and actually seek out dramatic stress. Under usual conditions the body is restored — flushed out, so to speak — through the release of hormones that have been withheld, often through repressive habits.

The body will seek its release, and so will the mind. Dreams, or even daydreams of a frightening nature, can fulfill that purpose. The mind’s creative play often serves up symbolic events that result in therapeutic physical reactions, and also function as post-dream suggestions that offer hints as to remedial action.

tlt879

I mention this here simply to point out the similarity between some dreams and some children’s games, and to show that all dreams and all games are inherently involved with the creation and experience of events.

 

 

 

The brain is primarily an event-forming psycho-mechanism…

Through which consciousness operates. Its propensity for event-forming is obvious even in young children. By obvious, I mean active, when fantasies occur involving activities far beyond the physical abilities as they thus far developed.

Children’s dreams are more intense than those of adults because the brain is practicing its event-forming activities. These must be developed before certain physical faculties can be activated. Infants play in their dreams, performing physical actions beyond their present physical capacities. While external stimuli are highly important, the inner stimuli of dream play are even more so.

ch56w

Children practice using all of their senses in play-dreams, which then stimulate the senses themselves, and actually help ensure their coordination. In our terms, events are still plastic to young children, in that they have not as yet learned to apply our stringent structure. There is an interesting point connected with the necessity to coordinate the workings of the senses, in that before this process occurs there is no rigid placement of events. That placement is acquired. The uncoordinated child’s senses, for example, may actually hear words that will be spoken tomorrow, while seeing the person who will speak them today.

Focusing the senses in time and space is to some extent an acquired art, then — one that is of course necessary for precise physical manipulation. But before that focusing occurs, children, particularly in the dream state, enjoy an overall version of events that gradually becomes sharper and narrower in scope.

chk1

A certain amount of leeway in space and time lingers, for even biologically the child is innately equipped with a “forevision” that allows it some “unconscious” view of immediate future events that forewarn it, say, of danger. From this more plastic, looser experience, the child in dreams begins to choose more specific elements, and in so doing trains the senses themselves toward a more narrow sensitivity.

In periods of play the child actually often continues some games initiated quite naturally in the dream state. These include role-playing, and also games that quite simply involve physical muscular activity. All of this teaches a specification. In dreams the mind is free to play with events, and with their formation. The actualization of those events, however, requires certain practical circumstances. In play the children try out events initiated in the dream state, and “judge” these against the practical conditions. In such a way the child juggles probabilities, and also brings his physical structure precisely into line with a given niche of probability. Basically in dreaming the brain is not limited to physically encountered experience.

ch15

Mentally it can form an infinite number of events, and consciousness can take an infinite number of roles. The child may easily dream of being its own mother or father, sister or brother, the family dog, a fly, a soldier. In waking play the child will then try out those roles, and quickly see that they do not fit physical conditions.

Before a child has seen mountains it can dream of them. A knowledge of the planet’s environment is an unconscious portion of our heritage. We possess an unconscious environment, a given psychological world attuned to the physical one, and our learning takes place in it subjectively even as objectively we learn exterior manipulation.

ch3e

The imagination is highly involved with event-forming. Children’s imaginations prevent them from being too limited by their parent’s world. Waking or dreaming, children “pretend.” In their pretending they exercise their consciousness in a particularly advantageous way. While accepting a given reality for themselves, they nevertheless reserve the right, so to speak, to experiment with other “secondary” states of being. To some extent they become what they are pretending to be, and in so doing they also increase their own knowledge and experience. Left alone, children would learn how to cope with animals by pretending to be animals, for example. Through experiencing the animals’ reactions, they would understand how to react themselves.

ch211

In play, particularly, children try on any conceivable situation for size. In the dream state adults and children alike do the same thing, and many dreams are indeed a kind of play. The brain itself is never satisfied with one version of an event, but will always use the imagination to form other versions in an activity quite as spontaneous as play. It also practices forming events as the muscles practice motion.

bbbn

The brain seeks the richest form of an event. I am speaking specifically of the brain, as separated from the mind, to emphasize the point that these abilities are of creature-hood. The brain’s genius comes from the mind, which can be called the brain’s biophysical counterpart.

Physical events are the end products of non-physical properties

The formation of events is initially an emotional, psychic, or psychological function. Events are physical interpretations, conventionalized versions of inner perceptive experience that are then “coalesced” in space and time. Events are organized according to laws that involve, belief, intent, and the intensities with which these are entertained.

Events are attracted or repelled by us according to our loves, beliefs, intents, and purposes. Our world provides a theater in which certain events can or cannot occur. Wars, violence, disasters — these are obviously shared by many, and are a part of our shared psychological and physical environment.

ee31

Some people encounter war directly, however, in terms of hand-to-hand combat, or bombing. Others are only inconvenienced by it. Here the mass shared environment is encountered as physical reality according to individual belief, love, and intent. In the deepest meaning there is no such thing as a victim, either of war, poverty, or disease. This does not mean that war, poverty, and disease could not be combatted, for in the terms of conventional understanding it certainly appears that men and women are victims in many such cases. Therefore they behave like victims, and their beliefs reinforce such experience.

Our beliefs form our reality, and this means that our beliefs structure the events we experience.

ev21

Such experience then convinces us more thoroughly of the reality we perceive until a vicious circle is formed, in which all events mirror beliefs so perfectly that no leeway seems to appear between the two.

If this were really the case, however, mankind’s history would never change in any true regard. Alternate paths of experience — new possibilities and intuitive solutions — constantly appear in the dream state, so that man and woman’s learning is not simply dependent upon a feedback system that does not allow for the insertion of creative material. Dreaming then provides the species with learning experience not otherwise available, in which behavior and events can be judged against more developed and higher understanding that present in conventional daily reality at any level.

ev22

There may be, for example, complications arising from a person’s intents, loves, and desires that cause the individual to seek certain events that his of her very beliefs make impossible. Current experience will provide a dilemma in which desired goal seems impossible.

In such instances a dream, or a series of them, will often then alter the person’s beliefs in a way that could not otherwise occur, by providing new information. The same data might come in a state of inspiration, but it would in any case be the result of an acquisition of knowledge otherwise inaccessible. Love, purpose, belief, and intent — these shape our physical body and work upon it and with it even as at other levels cellular consciousness forms it.

eefgf

Love is a biological as well as a spiritual characteristic. Basically, love and creativity are synonymous. Love exists without an object. It is the impetus by which all being becomes manifest. Desire, love, intent, belief and purpose — these form the experience of our body and all the events it perceives. We cannot change one belief but it alters our body experience. The great give-and-take between biological and psychological integrity occurs constantly. Our thoughts are as active as our cells, and as important in maintaining our physical being.

Our thoughts are also as natural as our cells. Our thoughts propel us toward survival and growth also, and in the same way that cells do. If we find oneself in physical difficulties health-wise, we cannot say: “Why doesn’t my body stop me and assert its own wisdom?” Because in the truest sense there is no division between our thoughts and our body. Our thoughts multiply even as our cells do. Our thinking is meant to ensure our survival in those terms, as much as our body mechanism.

evvd7

The give-and-take between the two occurs largely in the dream state, where constant translations of data occur. Our thoughts and our body cells are reflected one in the other.

I am going to suggest a series of exercises. They should be regarded as creative exuberant games. They will acquaint us with our psyche, or our own greater experience of oneself, by helping us shift our attention to aspects of our own experience that usually escape our notice.

ch

The exercise will not work, however, in the way they are meant to if they are embarked upon with too serious an air or intent. They should be considered as creative play, though of a mental nature, and they actually consist of mental endeavors tried quite spontaneously by children. So they are not to be regarded as esoteric accomplishments. They represent the intent to discover once again the true transparent delight that we once felt in the manipulation of our own consciousness, as we looped and unlooped it like a child’s jumping rope.

The dream state is the source of all physical events, in that it provides the great creative framework from which we choose our daily actuality.

verhjj

Children quickly learn their parents that experience must be structured in a certain conventional pattern. In their own periods of imaginative play, however, children utilize dream events, or events perceived in dreams, while clearly realizing that these are not considered actual in the “real” world.

Physical play is pleasant, and accompanied by high imaginative activity. Muscles and mind are both exercised. The same kind of activity occurs in the child’s dream state as it learns to handle events before they are physically encountered. Intense dream activity is involved. Some dream events are more real to the child than some waking events are — not because the child does not understand the nature of experience, but because he or she is still so close to the emotional basis behind events. Some of the exercises will put us in touch with the ways events are formed.

yjj

Children’s play, creativity, and dreams all involve us with the birth of events in the most direct of fashions. The games that we play or habitually observe will, of course, tell us much about the kind of organization that occurs in our own experience. Overall, we organize events around certain emotions. These can be combative, in which there will always be good teams and bad teams, salvation or destruction, winning or losing.

add3d

The events of our life will follow a similar structure. Before conditioning, children’s play follows the love of performance, of body or imagination, for performance’s sake only; the expansion of mental or physical abilities. The most satisfying of events involve those characteristics. The exercises will have to do with the natural joyful manipulation of the imagination that children employ.

Perceived Events Come Packaged in Time Sequences

We are used to a certain kind of before-and-after order. When we build physical structures we pile brick upon brick. It may seem that psychological events have the same kind of structure, since after all we do perceive them in time.

w23

When we ask: “How are events formed?” We more or less expect an answer couched in those terms. The answer is not that simple. The origin of events lies in that creative, subjective realm of being with which we are usually least concerned. This state of dreaming provides an inner network of communication, that is its way far surpasses our technological communications. The inner network deals with another kind of perceptual organization entirely. A rose is a rose is a rose. In the dream state, however, a rose can be an orange, a song, a grave, or a child as well, and be ach equally.

p8

In dreams we deal with symbols of course. Yet symbols are simply examples of other kinds of quite “Objective” events. They are events that are what they seem to be, and they are equally events that do not “immediately” show themselves. One so-called event, therefore, may be a container of many others, while we only perceive its exterior face — and we call that face a symbol.

The other events within the symbol are as legitimate as the one event we perceive.

pui80;

Basically, events are not built one upon the other. They grow out of each other in a kind of spontaneous expansion, a profusion of creativity, while the conscious mind chooses which aspects to experience — and those aspects then become what we call an objective event.

Events obviously are not formed by our species alone, there is a level of the dream state in which all earth-tuned consciousnesses of all species and degrees come together. From our standpoint this represents a deep state of unconscious creativity — at the cellular levels particularly — by which all cellular life communicates and forms a vital biological network that provides the very basis for any “higher” experience at all.

pr3

What we call dreaming is obviously dependent upon this cellular communication, which distributes the life force throughout the planet. This formation of any psychological event therefore depends upon this inter-species relationship.

The psychological symbols with which we are familiar in natural terms rise up like smoke, inherent in cellular structure itself. In deepest terms animals and plants also possess symbols and react to them.

pr89

Symbols can be called psychic codes that are interpreted in infinite fashion according to the circumstances in which consciousness finds itself. Dream events “come together” in the same way that the universe does. Events, therefore, cannot be precisely defined. We can explore our own experience of an event, and that exploration itself alters the nature of the seemingly separate event that we began to investigate. We share, then, a mass dream experience as we share a mass waking world. Our daily experience is private and uniquely ours, yet it happens within the context of a shared environment. The same applies to the dream state.

Our dreams are also uniquely ours, yet they happen within a shared context, and environment in which the dreams of the world occur. In that context our own existence is “forever” assured. We are the physical event of oneself put into a given space and time, and because of the conditions of that framework, within it we automatically exclude other experience of our own selfhood. The greater event of oneself exists in a context that is beyond our usual perception of events. That greater portion of ourselves, however, forms the self that we know.

pr076

In dream state we step into a larger context to some extent. For that reason we also lose the special kind of precise orientation with which we are familiar. Yet we begin to sense, sometimes, the larger shape of events and the timeless nature of our own existence.

po980

Individually and en mass in the dream state we change the orientation of our consciousness, and deal with the birth of events which are only later-structured or physically experienced.

The Biological Cooperation of All Species Creates The NATURAL STRUCTURES OF THE EARTH

Consciousness itself is independent of any of the forms that it may at one time or another assume.

Therefore, at levels that would appear chaotic to us, there is a great mixing and merging of consciousness, a continual exchange of information, so to speak; an open-ended exploration of possibilities, from which in our terms events privately and en masse emerge.

st2

I am simply explaining the characteristics, aptitudes, abilities, and tendencies of Nature. There are so many different levels in what we call the dream state that they are impossible to list, except in stereotyped ways. This is particularly because some dream sequences involve biological comprehensions that are not literally translatable.

It has been truthfully said that the “unconscious” is intimately aware of the most minute details of our health, state of mind, and relationships. “It” is also aware of the state of the earth’s health — even of the familiar with the cultural climate also. Our recognized consciousness operates as it does because of immense information-gathering procedures, — procedures that unite all species. Biologically such information is coded, but that physical information, such as in the genes and chromosomes, can be altered through experience and mental activity in other species as well as our own.

stuct

On the one hand, dreaming on the part of animals — and men and women in particular — involves not only information processing, but information gathering. Dreaming prevents life from becoming closed-ended by opening sources of information not practically available in the waking state, and by providing feedback from other than the conventional world. Data gained through waking learning endeavor and experience are checked in dreaming, not only against physical experience, but are also processed according to those “biological” and “spiritual” data: Again that information is acquired as the sleeping consciousness disperses itself, in a manner or speaking, and merges with other consciousness of its own and other species while still retaining its overall identity. These [other consciousnesses] are dispersed in like manner.

In such ways each individual maintains a picture of the ever-changing physical and psychological mass environment. Physical events as we think of them could exist otherwise. Basically, information is experience. In dreams we attain the necessary information to form our lives. That state of sleep, therefore, is not simply the other side of our consciousness, but makes our waking life and culture possible.

nonnye8kiky

In rudimentary form children’s dreams also involve mathematical concepts, so that formal mathematical training falls on already fertile ground. The arts, sciences, agriculture — all of these reflect natural contours and tendencies inherent in man’s and woman’s mind, as general rather than specific attributes emerging first in the dream state, and then sparking specialized intellectual tendencies in the waking state.

Cities, therefore, existed in dream before the time of tribes. The dream state provides the impetus for growth, and opens up to the earth-tuned consciousness avenues of information for its physical survival.

w18

Because that state is also connected with waking life, we also take into it many of the elements of our daily existence, so that our recalled dreams are often cast in fairly conventionalized terms. As a rule we remember the dream’s outer veneer, or what it turns into as we approach our usual level of consciousness. In a dream we are basically aware of so many facets of an event that many of them must escape our waking memory. Yet any real education must take into consideration the learning processes within dreams, and no one can hope to glimpse the nature of the psyche without encouraging dream experience, recall, and the creative use of dream education in waking life.