“Be careful what you water your dreams with.
Water them with worry and fear and you will produce weeds that choke the life from your dream.
Water them with optimism and solutions and you will cultivate success.
Always be on the lookout for ways to turn a problem into an opportunity for success.
Always be on the lookout for ways to nurture your dream.”
— Lao Tzu
As humans, we are on a collective journey to find peace and love, to live in harmony, to create a better world for our children and to surpass the limits of the form we were born into, to evolve the human spirit to new heights. Some may call it a search for nirvana (not the 90’s grunge band!).
Yet, why over the course of human history, and even today, is there so much violence and suffering? Why do so many of us contribute to the discord and suffering in our daily lives and interactions with our fellow humans? Eckhart Tolle in his truly inspiring video called “Finding Your Life’s Purpose” provides a clear, concise recipe for stopping the insanity and reaching a pure state of consciousness where we will find that collective peace and can begin to create transformation in our world.
Everything that Tolle has produced (books, DVD’s, CD’s, lectures) leads you on this path to the ultimate state of being, living in the now, present to the collective spirit and power of humanity. If you’re not already a fan, check out his web site at www.eckharttolle.com to see everything that he has to offer.
Today I want to share some key lessons from Tolle’s DVD that struck a chord with me.
Our ‘mental noise’ distracts us from our true purpose, from reaching these heights. Our endless thoughts, largely based on our illusions about the past, are constantly churning and often repetitive. Most of them you have thought many, many times, and the negative ones can have more power and be more frequent than the positive ones. We do not need to be dragged along by the mental noise, by every thought that arises.
Instead we must be present in the now. It is all that truly exists. The future is an illusion, doesn’t exist except as a thought, it is a conceptual thing. Be aware, present, find the aliveness within by putting attention on your body, on breathing in and out, on the stillness between thoughts. Use awareness of your breathing as an anchor for being present…
The essence of our thinking mind is that it is usually thinking about the past or the future and it is conditioned by our illusions and judgements about what happened in the past. But can you find the dimension within yourself that exists outside the thinking mind?
Our primary purpose in life does not involve time yet we find it hard to believe in a purpose that does not require expectations about the ‘future’. My primary purpose right now is to sit in my chair, hands on the keyboard, breathe in and out and share the wonderful lessons that Tolle has given to the world. The universe has put me here, right now, and this is exactly what I am supposed to be doing.
What you are doing, wherever you are, right now, you are fulfilling your life’s purpose yet your mind doesn’t think that makes sense… if you’re already here, how can that be your purpose?
So to be here fully, you must align yourself with this moment in eternity, and know that wherever you are, is exactly where you’re supposed to be but this is hard because the mind will expect that everything you “do” must just be a means to an “end”. As the “end” is in the future, which is really just a thought/concept in your mind, we can become ‘frustrated’ causing us to live in constant discontent or fear. Being present means every moment that you are ‘doing’ or being, can be joyous and fulfilling.
Remember, our primary purpose is to be aligned with the NOW which we cannot do if we are always trapped in our minds, living only for the next thing to happen..
So, we must stop living in the phantom world of the mind, constantly judging and labelling and reviewing everything that happens and everyone we encounter (this is the insanity, the dysfunction of our existence), and believing our own stories about who we are.
Instead, be present to the other dimension of your being, to the formless presence that exists in the stillness, between thoughts, that is your very essence. You will only find it in the NOW before consciousness becomes thought, a sense perception, your interpretation, your stories about the past, etc., etc…
Sadly, if you read our history books or watch the news, you will be reminded that the collective human ego has wreaked havoc and human suffering for millenia. If there is no shift in our consciousness then the madness will continue. How can our species survive unless there’s a change in our collective spirit, our consciousness? The only way that we can affect such as a transformation is by working on our own individual consciousness.
So, from the point of view of a truly present, enlightened being, you will be able to feel the sacredness of the world around you, of our universe, the sky, the garden, the people around you but when your mind takes everything down to a conceptual state, using judgement and thought, this can deaden the beauty around you.
There is a vast power in the inner stillness of this formless dimension of consciousness.
Achieving this state, right now, in this moment, is our ultimate life purpose..
I recommend that you get Tolle’s DVD and listen to it yourself.
Love and Peace to all…
What is “happy” and is it really attainable? In this age of fast-paced, information overload, what do we really want from life?
I believe we want what people have always wanted. We want to be happy. We want to love and contribute to others. We want to be loved. We want to think we’re making a difference, that there’s a “reason” or purpose for our existence.
While some might argue that happy (as in merrily skipping along through life) is an overused term and not a practical goal, let’s consider happy as being peaceful and content, as being the opposite of miserable, as being empowered to be all that we can be in life, to be able to have loving and sustainable relationships. And then, I think, everyone will agree that this is a state where we would all like to be centred.
Based on my own personal exploration into this essential quest, I’ve summarized what I view as the Top Ten tips to a Happy Life, as taught by many of the thought leaders today who are great authors, speakers, and spiritual teachers..
TOP TEN:
1. Be Present, Be Here Now
Studies suggest we have somewhere between 12,000 to 65,000 thoughts per day, although I’ve seen reference to a wider range (between 2,000 to 600,000!). Most commonly, 50-60,000 is considered a good estimate.
Being human means being inundated with thoughts all day, every day: endless observations, judgements, interpretations, complaints, worries, ‘what-ifs’, memories, regrets, wishes, desires, dreams about our future, anger about our past, and on and on. I’ve seen statistics indicating 95% of them are similar from day to day. Some thoughts seem completely random, others can hijack us as we follow a thread and let our emotions react to what are sometimes completely irrational, twisted versions of reality. For me, it has been a major breakthrough to understand that I am NOT my thoughts. For too long, my thoughts ran me. They still try to, every single day, but I am watching them now. I used to look to my thoughts for meaning, wondering why I was suddenly upset when nothing had happened.
So how much of an average person’s thoughts are rooted in the present moment? Some suggest that the majority of our thoughts are rooted in the past (somewhere between 70 and 90%) with about 10-20% ruminating or dreaming or imagining what will happen in the future. A small percentage of our thoughts actually focus on the present moment in a purely experiential manner. Within our minds, our perception of the past, how it is affecting us now and into the future can often become warped.
Eckhart Tolle, author of “The Power of Now” and “A New Earth” and other books is a well-known speaker and teacher in this area. Tolle tells us: “Stay fully present in the now—your whole life unfolds here. In the now there is joy of Being and deep peace”.
In Deepak Chopra’s “Seven Spiritual Laws of Success”, he says that pure potentiality is pure consciousness, the field of all possibilities and infinite creativity. Meditation to connect with our inner being to be present and master our thoughts can help us to find that state of pure consciousness.
2. Your Thoughts Create your Reality
When you start to understand that you are not your thoughts, that you are a being with a powerful inner spirit that happens to also have a brain that does what brains do, non-stop generation of thoughts, you can step back and observe this and take control. Consider how you can choose how your brain operates just as you make these decisions about using your arm or your fingers or your eyes every day of your life.
The realization that you actually could control and direct your thoughts to create whatever reality you choose can open up a whole new world. If, for example, you tell yourself that you cannot succeed at something – then you probably won’t. So, the obvious question is why tell yourself that? And yet we do it all the time..
There’s so much groundbreaking work in this area over the past decade, everything from the books on the Law of Attraction (including the blockbuster work called “The Secret”) and new science indicating that thoughts are actually bits of quantum energy (see previous post “The Science behind the Mystery“), which opens up even more unbelievable implications for our potential capabilities if we can master our mind.
Louise Hay (founder of Hay House) is an inspiring example of this powerful concept in action. Her countless books and CD’s on Affirmations show how you can change your life by the very simple practice of constantly generating positive, life-affirming thoughts. From “Power Thoughts” by Louise Hay at www.healyourlife.com: “Trust life to hear and respond to your positive words. Say these affirmations every day and your whole world will change for the better.”
3. Be Grateful
Expressing gratitude, especially if you can make it a daily practice to declare everything you are grateful for in your life, can create positive self-affirming thoughts instead of negative ones and align your attention to everything that is good in your life. This alone can be transformational. Many current thought leaders and spiritual teachers encourage people to keep a gratitude journal. For a good example of this in practice, check out my Aunt Suzy’s Grateful List that she circulated at Christmas and I have since posted on this blog.
If you do a search on Gratitude quotations, you will find many empowering thoughts. Here’s a few:
“I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought; and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.” G.K. Chesterton
“God gave you a gift of 86,400 seconds today. Have you used one to say ‘thank you?’ ” William A. Ward
“If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, ‘thank you’, that would suffice.” Meister Eckhart
4. Trust that the universe is unfolding as it should..
Or perhaps an easier way to say this is, Have Faith. Sometimes in our darkest hours, when nothing seems to be going as we had wanted or expected, we can’t see this. We want only to fight against what is. Everything will not always go our way but, if you trust life and let it unfold, as Mick Jagger said, “you just might get what you need”.
For some this could mean a belief in God, aligned with one of the great faith traditions, for others it might just mean knowing that there is a greater life force, that we are all a part of it, and that life will take us where we need to go if we surrender to it.
5. Practice Forgiveness
Oprah and others, have defined Forgiveness as recognizing that you can’t change the past. We hold onto a lot of resentment and in the end, who does it hurt? We hurt ourselves more than anyone else. Accepting what has happened and creating the space to move on can be a powerful step forward.
Sometimes, particularly if you have been a victim of crime or abuse, whatever happened may seem ‘unforgiveable’. In these cases, remember that forgiveness does not mean you have to let that person back into your life but it can release you from the hold that this has on you.
In other cases, we may have imagined transgressions that were in reality, minor. Caroline Myss, medical intuitive and author of a number of bestselling books including “Sacred Contracts”, outlines the common archetypes that drive our behaviours. She identifies the “Victim” as one of the four archetypes for survival which can lead you to believe that “you are always taken advantage of and it’s never your fault.” If this feels familiar, her work may be of interest.
Regardless of the situation (and many may lie in between these two extremes), if you have anger or bitterness in your heart, you must do the work needed (whatever that is for you) to let it go. It literally will suck the life out of you and can affect all your relationships. The serenity prayer from AA says it all: “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, Courage to change the things I can, And wisdom to know the difference.”
6. Follow your Bliss
One of Joseph Campbell’s famous quotations….
Many will say that they would love to follow their bliss but they have to pay the bills, don’t have time, it’s too late to change course, or any other number of excuses.
I would contend that for many of us, we don’t really know what our ‘bliss’ is. Of course, it seems like it must be the greener grass on the other side. Certainly, the idea of walking away from a tough job and living in luxury seems blissful – but this is not what Campbell intended.
Sometimes we need to take a hard look at our life circumstances and make adjustments along our journey. The important thing is to be conscious. Make conscious choices. Embrace work that you love. Remember, even when you’re “following your bliss”, there will be tough sledding at times. This is certainly not a free ticket to quit.
7. Choose your Life
This is another perspective on “Follow your Bliss”. Sometimes, it’s not our outside circumstances that need to change but our interior dimension.
I took a course called the Landmark Forum many years ago, and this was a key concept after 3 long days of workshop. It correlates back to the idea that ‘your thoughts create your reality’.
When you declare that your life, your spouse, your children, your job, your world are all exactly what you always wanted, then they will become that for you.
8. Don’t take yourself too seriously
Or, put another way: “Get over yourself”.
No one likes criticism and we all have fragile egos… but sometimes, when our thoughts hijack us, we can turn the simplest comments into conspiracy theories.
The truth is that not everything is about you, sometimes when people scowl at you, it’s because they’re unhappy inside. If a person says something to you that you don’t like, you don’t have to react in kind. In fact you may be able trigger transformation in another by not letting your ego take over, instead be present with that person and be compassionate.
Deepak Chopra asserts that “…the ego is not who we really are. The ego is our social mask, it is the role we are playing.”
If you are aware and present with people, not coloured by past injustices or imagined indignities, then you can choose to always have powerful, meaningful conversations.
Not being driven by ego takes focus, commitment, and courage…
9. We are all one
When you take steps to be present, become committed to not ‘be your ego’ or run by your thoughts, to be grateful for the people in your life, and to create your reality then you will start to sense more and more that you are not alone but a part of something much greater, the collective spirit of humanity.
Even the latest scientific breakthroughs with respect to quantum consciousness and unified field theory are demonstrating that the universe and everything in it, ourselves included, are interconnected by a vast field of energy.
In this collective space, love and contribution become natural which in turn can fuel harmony and peace in your life.
10. Conscious Evolution
Last summer, I took the Evolutionary Worldview Course through Enlightennext Magazine and Andrew Cohen and then a few months ago, I watched the event: “A Call to Conscious Evolution, Our Moment of Choice” which was also hosted by this group. Both experiences were inspirational and eye-opening. As Deepak, one of the many renowned speakers at the Evolutionary Leaders’ event, said: “…the only way to transform the world is to transform yourself..” and “…even well-meaning activism is often coming from a place of outrage rather that creative consciousness..”
This jives with many of the teachings of Andrew Cohen and his team with respect to the evolution of our interior dimension and our culture. Last year, I wrote a short post on “Evolution of Consciousness” vs.”Conscious Evolution” when I began to perceive the difference. Our mind, our being, or our “interior dimension” as they call it have evolved just as our bodies have. They talk about 4 billion years of evolution on this planet and how we, as sentient, powerful beings, can now choose where we go from here. They ask questions like: “how does your own evolution come into the culture, into changing the world?” and “To what degree are you enabling this process of evolution through your own heroic efforts?” so that we can leave the world a better place because we were here.
Andrew Cohen’s annual Being and Becoming Retreat delves deeply into these possibilities. I hope to attend this one day myself and will continue to explore and discourse on this topic in future posts.
I recently spoke at a women’s dinner meeting and shared my Top Ten tips, asking for their feedback. One suggestion, which happened to come from a Chinese medicine doctor, was “Your Body is your Temple”. A wonderful suggestion and I believe that, in many ways, this is an extension of this commitment to conscious evolution.
Making conscious decisions everyday to feed and exercise your body for optimal health and well-being is the other side of the coin to choosing the thoughts that you feed yourself for optimal mental health and well-being. WILL POWER has a whole new depth of meaning…
If you’re reading this post and have opinions or suggestions on what your top ten are, don’t be shy. Share your ideas.
I’ve just finished viewing the Evolutionary Leaders’ “A Call to Conscious Evolution, Our Moment of Choice”. This was a special evening held at UCLA on August 31st. They had some technical challenges with those of us who signed up to watch the evening event live online so this weekend was our opportunity to view the program with the sound issues resolved.
The roster of speakers at this event were a long list of the “Who’s Who” in the evolutionary, quantum consciousness, personal transformation world of thought leaders (see list). The common message was that we are all living at a unique moment in time, facing global crises. In this pivotal time, we must consciously evolve or face the danger of extinction. Gregg Braden gave an impassioned talk and referenced Scientific America’s recent cover: “A World of Crisis, Crossroads for Planet Earth…. will we choose to create the best of all possible worlds?”
Deepak was the opening speaker. He must be one of the most prolific authors/speakers in this area today. With over 50 books, a radio show, and connections or partnerships with countless, it seems like I’m hearing something from him everyday – whether it’s an email, a tweet, his radio show or something I’ve found on youtube.
A couple of Deepak’s significant points were that the only way to transform the world is to transform yourself and that even well-meaning ‘activism’ is coming from a place of ‘outrage’ rather than creative consciousness. Conscious evolution calls for more creative powers. A couple of hours ago, en route to the Home Depot to pick up paint supplies, I turned on my XM radio and guess who I heard? Deepak chatting with his pal Stuart Hameroff about Consciousness. Yippee, my favourite topic! They were comparing the Vedic concept of pure consciousness being before ‘perception and thought’ with Hameroff’s “proto-consciousness” and how this relates to the quantum super-position idea where observation of a particle collapses it down to one place (just like conscious thought collapses us down to a specific reality).
Sorry, I digress! Back to the Evolutionary Leaders’ event..
Jean Houston gave an energetic view of the evolution of the universe, our planet, life on earth, and humanity, with special emphasis on the “jumps” that caused significant transformation. She said we need to be the ‘creative wellspring’ to trigger our new evolutionary path.
Bruce Lipton talked about the collapse and rebirth of various civilizations and reiterated that we now face crises at the global level unlike ever before. He reviewed four ‘Myth Perceptions’ that we must overcome to build the foundation for the next civilization where we live in harmony and balance with the universe, with nature. To give you an idea of his four myth perceptions, he talked about our current understanding that our biological processes employ quantum physics (not classical), that our perceptions can control our biology, overcoming genetic, that rather than the survival of the fittest which says our evolution is driven by competition, it can be driven by cooperation, and that evolution is not just random but adaptive.
There were so many fabulous speakers and the messages all coalesced. I was thrilled to see Lynn McTaggart of “The Field” and “Intention Experiment” fame talk about the power of intentions and how we must be committed to an “enormous paradigm shift” together, in order to overcome the world’s challenges. I think it was Barbara Marx Hubbard who talked about the physical emergence of a co-created world and introduced a video talk by Marianne Williamson whose message on our evolutionary potential and the danger of a species who has become maladaptive to its environment (yikes, that’s us!) was very powerful.
For more information on this organization, the evening event and the conference they are planning for 11/1/11, go to the Evolutionary Leaders web site.
I’m inspired by this event as I continue to discover how best to contribute and consciously evolve – along with these transformational leaders.
Maybe I’ll see you there in 2011.
The conflict between Science and Religion, raging for centuries, has taken a surprising turn over the past few decades. In this new age of spiritually and in the labs of enlightened scientists, the spark of attraction between the two, the esoteric and the practical, is stimulating exciting new ideas. In some circles, they’re practically dating.
So in taking a glimpse into some of these scientific theories, let’s define “THE Mystery” as not being just any old mystery but rather THE Mystery of the universe, of life and death and afterlife, of the nature of our consciousness, of creation, and the existence of some greater life force. Some might call this universal life force God, others might say it is an interconnected field of energy to which we are all part of the greater sum. Regardless, I think we can all agree that this is the mother of all mysteries.
It’s also noteworthy that the title says the science ‘behind’ The Mystery, not that science has “solved” it. In fact, it might be more relevant to this discussion to say that science today is “enhancing” or “expanding” The Mystery, giving it more colour and depth than ever.
It wasn’t very long ago that many thought they knew the answers. The laws of Classical, or Newtonian, Physics explained how our physical world worked in deterministic, predictable ways. Our religious institutions turned a blind eye to science as they already had the meaning of life, death, and creation explained. Darwin’s theories exploded onto this scene to mess with their creation stories but from a scientific perspective, the evolution of species did appear to connect the dots.
But in the dawn of the twentieth century, brilliant scientists revealed new depths to our understanding of science. They discovered Quantum Physics, which explained how the very smallest bits of matter behaved (of which everything, even our bodies, are comprised) and then General Relativity which explained how very large objects and spacetime behaved. And yet, neither of these new areas of science jived with the laws of Classical Physics, nor with one another.
So now the brilliant scientists are searching for a unified theory which will explain how these branches of physics inter-relate.
And meanwhile, the subatomic world of quantum mechanics has demonstrated some astounding properties. One established behaviour (Heisenberg uncertainty principle) identified that particles are constantly in motion, in a state of superposition (many places at once) which is seemingly affected by observation. If one attempts to measure the position of a particle, then it collapses down into one place but it becomes impossible to measure its speed, and vice versa.
As Dr. Stephen Hawking stated in his book “A Brief History of Time”, “The uncertainty principle had profound implications for the way in which we view the world.” … and it is “not fully appreciated by philosophers and still the subject of much controversy.”
Even more bizarre are the properties of entanglement and nonlocality which state two particles can have interconnected states even if spatially separated by extreme distances. Once in contact, they remain in contact throughout spacetime.
The implications of this are summarized In “The Field” by Lynn McTaggart: “Nonlocality shattered the very foundations of physics. Matter could no longer be considered separate. Actions did not have to have an observable cause over an observable space. Einstein’s most fundamental axiom wasn’t correct: at a certain level of matter, things could travel faster than the speed of light. Subatomic particles had no meaning in isolation but could only be understood in their relationships….”
In the search for the “theory of everything”, quantum field theory is a framework which relates laws of relativity and quantum mechanics. The zero point field, postulated as a future unlimited source of energy in science fiction and now by real scientists, is a field of energy that underlies and interconnects everything in the universe. When you try to wrap your brain around this, that our brains, our bodies, our thoughts, the room we’re in, the trees, our planet, the sun and everything in the universe are all part of a quantum web of interconnected energy, you must be struck by the enormity of the possibilities.
In the words of Dr. Hal Puthoff , this means that “so called empty space is not really empty at all, it’s actually full of energy.” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pbn5vPhLjk0 . What we do know is that this sea of energy is electromagnetic in nature and vast beyond our imagination. If we could find a way to tap into this source, our energy troubles might be over.
While some ‘nay-sayer’ scientists or strict religious leaders, committed to their dogma, may scoff at how far imagination and speculation might be going with quantum theories of consciousness, these possibilities take concepts of human spirituality and our place in the universe to a new level.
An interesting anecodote to end with is Arthur C Clarke’s Law of Revolutionary Ideas: “Every revolutionary idea — in science, politics, art, or whatever — seems to evoke three stages of reaction. They may be summed up by the phrases:
(1) “It’s completely impossible — don’t waste my time”;
(2) “It’s possible, but it’s not worth doing”;
(3) “I said it was a good idea all along.”
A couple of summers ago, my aunt came for a visit. She offered me an unusual ‘gift’ for my bottle of water. She had clear labels with the words “love”, “grace”, “peace” and other positive, life-affirming words printed on them. She said I should stick one on my water bottle.
I thought she was a little nuts, to be honest, but I went along with her. She’s a sweet lady and her intentions are always good. Her husband, a golf fanatic, had a sticker that said “hole in one” on his.
Imagine my surprise when she, and my mother, both insisted there was real science behind this.
If this is new to you, check out http://www.masaru-emoto.net/english/e_ome_home.html – the official site of Masaru Emoto – or his books (“Messages from Water”, “The Hidden Messages in Water”, “The True Power of Water”, and “The Secret Life of Water”) documenting his scientific research on the effect that positive intentions can have on water crystals.
This research is astounding… but when you remember that the human body is comprised of 90% water, it really makes you think about what’s possible..
I wonder if the next great stage in mankind’s evolution will occur when our conscious and unconscious “minds” become so connected and in tune with one another that they become one. What would this mean for future generations? If one believes that the unconscious mind is akin to our soul, our spirit within, which connects us to the greater life force and to every other living being in the universe, then this transformation could indeed be glorious.
Some of my readers may be thinking that I have just taken a great leap with my opening statements, so let me back up, starting with the early pioneers of the unconscious mind – Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud. Jung was also a key influencer for Joseph Campbell, a mythologist who applied Jungian theory to his vast knowledge of mythology, spirituality, and religion. Campbell’s work, among many others, has continued to advance us on this journey to understand our psyche and our connection to one another throughout time, particularly at this ‘unconscious’ level. And today’s thought leaders are progressing these concepts to new realms as we are now able to connect quantum theories into our understanding of consciousness.
So first a (very) brief history…
One book I recommend in this area is Carl Jung’s last work, before his death in 1961 which was his only project not targeted for psychology and medical professionals but rather it was intended for the general public, so that we could all benefit from an insight into his lifework. This book – “Man and his Symbols”, edited with an introduction by Carl Jung – was a great source of information for me when I was working on “Vision Speak”. Jung’s quotations referenced below are all from his writing in this book.
“Man and his Symbols”, although intended for the ‘layman, is still not exactly a ‘light read’ so for those who may not be familiar with the breakthroughs and disconnect between the two most famous psychologists of all time, here’s a brief (and simplified) view of Freud and Jung’s material on the topic of the conscious versus unconscious mind.
In the nineteenth-century psychologists, psychiatrists, and neurologists were beginning to inquire into both the existence and importance of the ‘unconscious’ or ‘subconscious’ mind. The most renowned figure of this period, Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), developed comprehensive theories on this subject and early psychoanalytical techniques with an emphasis on the importance of dreams.
Freud believed that dreams were the key to exposing repressed desires and memories, using techniques such as free association, to cure people of neuroses.
Freud’s younger colleague – Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961) – disputed some of Freud’s theories on the unconscious mind. He said Freud “worked on the assumption that dreams are not a matter of chance but are associated with conscious thoughts and problems.” Jung maintained that a psychoanalyst could work directly with a patient without need to lead them away from the actual dreams which he believed had “some special and more significant function of their own”. In other words, “one should pay more attention to the actual form and content of a dream, rather than allowing free association to lead one off through a train of ideas to complexes that could as easily be reached by other means.”
“..part of the unconscious consists of a multitude of temporarily obscured thoughts, impressions, and images that, in spite of being lost, continue to influence our conscious minds.” These hidden areas of our unconscious can be uncovered – sometimes triggered by our senses (such as the sound of music or smells from the past), possibly revealed by unconscious behaviours. Sometimes lost memories can be exposed in hypnosis and often appear symbolically in our dreams. But the unconscious is much more than just a repository of past information that is no longer ‘stored’ in our conscious.
“..it is a fact that, in addition to memories from a long-distant conscious past, completely new thoughts and creative ideas can also present themselves from the unconscious…” In fact, our most creative and innovative ideas and inspirations come from this part of our psyche and, we can also attribute our instinctive, psychic, and intuitive insights as coming from the unconscious.
However, one of Jung’s most important theories – the collective unconscious – came when he explored the unconscious mind as it related to more spiritual realms such as religion and mythology, which Freud thought ‘unscientific’.
More on this in future posts … but, for now, here are some more words from Carl Jung from “Man and his Symbols” on the subject of the collective unconscious.
“Just as the human body represents a whole museum of organs, each with a long evolutionary history behind it, so we should expect to find that the mind is organized in a similar way. It can no more be a product without history than is the body in which it exists.
The experienced investigator of the mind can similarly see the analogies between the dream pictures of modern man and the products of the primitive mind, its “collective images,” and its mythological motifs.
My views about the “archaic remnants,” which I call “archetypes” or “primordial images,” have been constantly criticized by people who lack sufficient knowledge of the psychology of dreams and mythology.”
Excerpt from “The Joinings“:
As we were born into new bodies and new capabilities, we walked upright and surveyed our world. Our instincts and intellect drove us forward. We built tools and fire. We mastered the planet and its creatures. We became self-aware and questioning. We formed tribes and worked together to build homes and families. We hunted together, collectively sensing the mystical forces at play in the universe. Our early cultures honoured our elders, worshipped the beasts that we killed, developed cunning and resourcefulness, as well as a spiritual sense to help us not only survive but thrive in an untamed world.
But as our populations grew and agriculture led us to create permanent homes and settlements, our aggressive tendencies turned us away from our instinctive, spiritual natures and instead forged warriors and conquerors. We built empires and dominated those that were weaker physically. Groups that remained in the more primitive, mystical world of the past became easy targets for slavery and slaughter, oppression and cruelty. Individual power became an ambition of man, overcoming the clan lifestyle. The value of human life was low if it stood in the way of progress and domination. Instead of honouring the natural world and the creatures that sustained us, we created new gods, powerful ones that would lead us forward in our quest for domination.
Ultimately, we awoke to a more sophisticated age and began to move away from the barbarianism of the past. We formed governments and religion. We created classes and rulers. Laws governed our behaviour in society; religious leaders dictated morality. The human consciousness imagined exultant possibilities and followed the new orders without question.
But our curious minds would always lead us to new territory. While authority and discipline, piety and unquestioning belief in a higher power may have been necessary at a particular stage to drive us forward, eventually, it became oppressive. Despite the answers to life and creation offered by religion, we dug deeper. Science and astronomy, philosophy and art triggered a renaissance of new ideas and new abilities. We discovered ways to manipulate our planet’s resources, asked new questions about our existence, and uncovered previously unimagined answers. Humanity’s progress could not be stopped. Prosperity and technological advances transformed our way of life at an increasingly rapid pace. Empire-building again became a focus but we discovered that war was not the only way to dominate other cultures.
At each stage in the development of our culture and our consciousness, the life conditions of previous stages influenced our direction, in some cases as a negative force. We reacted to that which seemed wrong instead of out of pure creation and conscious choice. Not all areas of the world progressed at the same pace and within regions one might find evidence of past and present cultures. Yet, overall, our progress was steady.
A natural next stage was a revolutionary worldview, an understanding that many of our advances were endangering our planet. For peoples who had been born and bred in a prosperous environment free of war and struggles, many grew more sensitive to less fortunate citizens of the world. They understood the effect that man’s rapid progress was having on our natural resources. They fought to bring harmony and spirituality, a return to more primitive principles when the earth was worshipped for sustaining us – not destroyed and used without concern. This led to a philosophical merging of all great wisdoms, religion, and spirituality and a natural disdain for past structures that still sought to dominate the planet.
But a power struggle remained and for those cultures left out of the prosperity and advancement curve, still rooted in past cultural stages, resentment and violence brewed – particularly towards those who dominated the world stage.
And it came to pass that with so many disparate cultures and worldviews, with violence and unhappiness rampant in some areas of the world, that a relatively small percentage of the human population were able to instigate unprecedented death and destruction upon the entire planet.
Copyright © Eden Remme Watt 2010