Spirituality Revealed

🐟 06. CONSCIOUSNESS:

CONSCIOUSNESS means “that which knows” or “the state of being aware”, from the Latin prefix “con” (with), the stem “scire” (to know) and the suffix “osus” (characterized by).
Higher species of animal life have sufficient cognitive ability to know themselves and their environment, at least to a measurable degree.

HOWEVER, in recent years, the term has been used in esoteric spiritual circles (usually capitalised) to refer to a far more Universal Consciousness, due to the fact that the English language doesn’t include a single word denoting the universal Ground of Being (for instance “Brahman”, “Tao”, in other tongues).

The Tao which can be expressed in language is not the REAL Tao. All concepts are, by nature, relative, and at most can merely point to the Absolute.
That explains why some branches of theology use the apophatic method of pointing to The Infinite ("neti neti", [not this, not that], in Sanskrit). Also known in Latin as "via negativa” or “via negationis” theology, this philosophical approach to discovering the essential nature of The Tao, gradually negates each description about Ultimate Reality but not Reality Itself.

The brain is merely a conduit or TRANSDUCER of Universal Consciousness, explaining why the more intelligent the animal, the more it can understand its own existence (or at least be aware of more of its environment – just see how amazingly-complex dolphin behaviour can be, compared with other aquatic species), and the reason why it is asserted that a truly enlightened human must possess a far higher level of intelligence than the average person. The brain is the equivalent of computer hardware, whilst consciousness is akin to the software programme, using deoxyribonucleic acid as the memory chip. A person who is comatosed has lost any semblance of individual consciousness, yet is being kept alive by the presence of Universal Consciousness (here, the word "coma" is not to be taken by its etymological definition of "deep sleep").

So, then, one could complain: "That's not fair – why can only a genius be enlightened?"
The answer is: first of all, as stated above, every species of animal has its own level of intelligence on a wide-ranging scale. Therefore, a pig or a dog could (if possible) ask: "That's unfair – why can only a human being be enlightened?"
Secondly, it is INDEED a fact that life is unfair, because there is no "tit for tat" law of action and reaction, even if many supposedly-great religious preceptors have stated so. They said so because they were preaching to wicked miscreants who refused to quit their evil ways, and needed to be chastized in a forceful manner. It's not possible to speak gentle words to a rabid dog to prevent it from biting you.

There is evidence of consciousness being a universal field in SAVANT SYNDROME, a condition in which someone with significant mental disabilities demonstrate certain abilities far in excess of the norm, such as superhuman rapid mathematical calculation, mind-reading, blind-seeing, or astounding musical aptitude. Such behaviour suggests that there is a universal field (possibly in holographic form) from which one can access information. Even simple artistic inspiration could be attributed to this phenomenon. The great British singer-songwriter, Sir James Paul McCartney, one day woke with the complete tune of the song "Yesterday" in his mind, after hearing it in a dream. American composer, Paul Simon, had a similar experience when the chorus for his sublime masterpiece "Bridge Over Troubled Water" simply popped into his head.

Three states of being are experienced by humans: the waking state (“jāgrata”, in Sanskrit), dreaming (“svapna”, in Sanskrit), and deep-sleep (“suṣupti”, in Sanskrit). Beyond these three temporal states is the fourth 'state' ("turīya" or “caturīya”, in Sanskrit). That is the unconditioned, eternal 'state', which underlies the other three. So, in actual fact, the fourth state is not a state but the Unconditioned Ground of Being (or to put it simply, YOU, the real self/Self).

Perhaps the main purpose of dreams is so that we can understand that the waking state is practically identical to the dream state, and thereby come to see the ILLUSION of this ephemeral world. If someone were to ask your dream character if the dream was real, you would say, “yes, of course this is real!” Similarly, if someone were to ask your waking state character if this world was real, you would respond in a similar manner. The Ultimate Reality ("Brahman", in Sanskrit) alone is real – real in the sense that it is the never-mutable ground of being. Reality is clearly seen by those self-realized persons who have experienced spiritual awakenings, yet only intellectually understood by those who have merely studied spiritual topics (that is, practiced one of the four systems of religion described in Chapter 16).

"If you remain as you are now, you are in the wakeful state. This is abolished in the dream state.
The dream state disappears, when you are in deep sleep. The three states come and go, but you are always there.
Your real state, that of Consciousness itself, continues to exist always and forever and it is the only Reality."
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”It is fallacious to think that there is an individual self, which functions through the body and the mind.
The 'me' as an individual self, is merely a mental modification, and there is no such thing as a mind, apart from thought.
When the source of thought is probed continuously as it arises, it is revealed, that there is no such thing as mind, or an individual behind it.”
Ramesh Balsekar,
Indian Spiritual Teacher.

“As a man who has devoted his whole life to the most clearheaded science, to the study of matter, I can tell you as a result of my research about the atoms this much: There is no matter as such! All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particles of an atom to vibration and holds this most minute solar system of the atom together. We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent Spirit. This Spirit is the matrix of all matter.”
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“I regard consciousness as fundamental. I regard matter as derivative from consciousness. We cannot get behind consciousness. Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness.”
Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck,
German Theoretical Physicist.