Strange beliefs and human consciousness
Viewed through System-Theory, human consciousness is a complex System with various attractors or points of stability. An attractor can be described as a state of consciousness or mode in which one finds oneself for a certain period of time, without immediatly changeing it. It is a point of stability because small variations in enviromental and internal variables do not lead to a change of this state. Consciousness is so to speak stuck at this point or within the basin of it. In a mathematical two-dimensional simplification a point of stability would be a local minimum, while the direction of the mind-movement after a certain dislocation can be discribed as minus one times the derivative. If consciousness has not passed a local maximum, it will sink back into its original state.
States of Consciousness or attractors are for example the wake sate, the dream-sleep state, the no dream-sleep state, shock, various intoxications or deep meditation and even enlightenment. Concerning the wake state though, as we understand it, it is a consensus reality in which we are taught to react to certain stimuli with a certain repertoir of responses, preconditioned and predesigned by our parents, society and the media. Every human follows certain patterns almost ritualistically, habbits, thoughts and emotions are all subject to this consensus-reality-attractor. Given a specific stimuli, there are a number of possible responses out of which there are a number of probable and improbable ones. The System (the human mind) then ”chooses“ one of these responses.
In essence this is a very robot-like mechanism and does not allow for very complex behavoir. However humans have the amazing capacity to leave one system and find another, by changeing internal variables and exiting the basin of their current attractor. On a simple level this is done when moving to different culture with different customs. One set of rules must be exchanged for another, and while in the beginning one may have to make an effort to remember the customs of the new country, after a while it will become natural, meaning a new attractor has been found. Similarly this is the case when learning a new language. Also when solving problems, often a ”new perspective“ is needed, meaning changing the current state of mind ot a different one. This can happen on very small levels, given the multidimensionality of our internal and external selves, leaving our overall consciousness in the greater basin of consensus reality while shifting it around a little to solve our problems, learn the customs of different country or learn to speak a new language.
When trying to change the *every-man's* consciousness in order to attain enlightenment, spiritual growth or for the simple purpose of expansion of consciousness the above mentioned little shifts usually won't do the trick. Hours upon hours of meditation are needed to distance the mind from the consensus reality, so that it can then find a new attractor.
Some Zen-schools use the contemplation of paradoxes to move their minds away from what is generally accepted as real, and they achieve successful changes in their awarenesses.
I believe that there is a movement that is doing something similar to achieve spiritual growth:
They speak of Atlantis, Alien visitations, extra dimensional beings and other countless strange beliefs. A lot of times these people are very elaborate on their odd theories and speak very sophisticatedly, even suggesting they have hard evidence and all the facts agree that whatever they are saying is true. Some of them claim to have their knowledge from intangible forces that they have channeled or that communicated with them. Most of the times whatever they are saying sounds extremley outrageous, considering our *every-man's* reality. Even when trying to keep an open and undogmatic mind, their claims sound unlikely.
However when considering the Zen-schools and their paradoxes, these outrageous beliefs make sense on that level. While explaining how Aliens manipulated our DNA, they preach responsability and hope, love, enviromentalism and awareness. The idea may very well be, to liberate us from our common consumer-driven and ego-centric thought-processes to a better state of consciousness where wer are spiritually in harmony with our surroundings and don't succumb to unneccessary fear, violence and greed.
Believing in completley weird things may be the catalist for this kind of a transition! And as far as I can tell, the weirder the better, since the weirder the belief is, the more it will change the internal variables, and the more probable it is to lift you out of your regular attractor.
However not all beliefsystems will move you in the right direction. It's up to you to decide which weirdness will work best to propell you into a new and unprecedented future, to a new attractor and to a new self!
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The red line is a model of the consciousness-state-equation, with the attractor as the local minimum and the blue area as its basin. The green line is an approximate derivative. If it is negative the mental state will move in a positive direction and vice versa. |
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