[Glass Joe]

(continued from above...)

Originally Posted by Erock

With David Hawkins and such we always talk about the levels of consciousness, but I was reading I Am That, and Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj discusses going "beyond" consciousness. Here are the quotes I was able to find mentioning this. Is there a way to go beyond simply being conscious or not?

The word "consciousness" (lowercase "c") can mean a lot of different things. So the way that I'm using the word here includes waking awareness, and *maybe* dreaming sleep, and *maybe* deep dreamless sleep. I'm not sure about the two sleep states yet though. I guess I'm including anything that involves thoughts, sensory perceptions, feelings, symbolic representation, cause/effect observations, etc. So I'm calling all of that "consciousness", with a lowercase "c".

Personally, I'd say that "going beyond" consciousness is basically "transcending" consciousness. It's like driving a car. For a while at first, you spend a lot of time thinking about how to use and operate the car. But after you get good at driving and gain some skill, all your conscious thoughts about pressing the pedals correctly and looking at mirrors fade away into your subconscious. You are free to think of about where you are going, rather than how to operate the car to get there.

To milk this driving a car analogy even more, you can even "go beyond" thinking about where you are driving and how to get there. If you drive along the same route from point A to point B enough times, that thought process also can become a habit, freeing you up to think about and do other stuff. So you can (theoretically, though some may disagree) talk on a cellphone, or listen to an audiobook with your conscious mind, while your subconscious mind handles all the details of operating the car and navigating the roads.

So, in this same line of thinking as the analogy about driving a car, perhaps we can "transcend" or "go beyond" all conscious thought altogether. It should be possible. I mean, we can "learn how to learn", to the point that the whole learning process can become automatic. And we can "think about thinking". So maybe we can get to the point where consciousness (again, lowercase "c") itself fades into the background and happens more on automatic pilot, rather than through some willful act and careful scrutiny.

The reason why I say "willful act" here is because I think that if you try to control your thoughts too much, then you can never really "go beyond" them. It's like willfully trying drive perfectly, to the point where you press too hard on the brakes or on the accelerator, or make too jerky movements while turning or changing lanes. If you want to drive like a nascar driver, that's one thing and I think that kind of driving should require your full attention. But you drive better on normal roads when you just let the car do most of the work and let the learning process happen naturally. You basically "get a feel" for the car and you get a feel for the road.

And the reason I say "careful scrutiny" is because I think that if you try to monitor your thoughts too much, then you can never "go beyond" them either. I think it's better to just let thoughts come and go as they please, and try not to police them or force them in any particular direction. If one minute you are thinking philosophically and altruistically, that's great. But if the next minute, you are thinking like that guy on "Kid's in the Hall" who crushes people's heads or you are thinking like Homer Simpson ("No TV and no beer make Homer something something"), that's perfectly fine too.

In times of crisis I can see this kind of unmonitored, un-policed, automatic thought/action process happening. In a natural disaster, people go into "crisis mode" and can think and act, without stopping to think about what they're doing. It all happens automatically. Some people run away from the accident automatically to get out of the way, and some people run towards it automatically to help out.

Of course, going on automatic pilot can be a bad thing too, but I think it's harmful only if you aren't ready to live at that level yet. Kind of like the difference between a breakdancer dancing freestyle (a) before he's practiced anything at all and (b) after he's been dancing for many years. Option A is makes things worse, but Option B (in theory) makes things easier.

So maybe everyday life can be lived at that level of awareness that is "beyond" conscious thought. You still think, move, and act like you normally would. It just happens more automatically and naturally. You no longer are thinking about thinking about thinking. No more worrying. You know intuitively, almost instinctively, that you can handle anything that arises in life. Since you identify with everything you perceive (oneness), you feel totally at home with everything around you and totally comfortable with anything that happens.

Thoughts are just as transient and vaporous as material objects, if not more so. So if you believe in the "subjective-reality" model, it should be easier to make the leap to a "subjective-subjective-reality" model, or whatever you want to call it. Actually, "subjective-subjective-reality" doesn't work, because it still implies the existence of a subject. And I don't think there is one, whether it be higher, lower, ultimate, whatever.

It's all about giving up any notion of control, along with any idea of choice, volition, or free will. Which, I agree, is very hard to do and seems counter-intuitive. But the same can be said for a person trying to accept the notion of "subjective reality", coming from the standpoint of only knowing and experiencing "objective reality".

So all I'm saying is the same thing a subjective realist would likely say to an objective realist. "Come see and experience it for yourself."

The "objective reality" model takes the outer world as a given. After enough contradictions with that model, the "subject" questions the stability of the outer world, and the solidity of perceived objects. However, this "subjective reality" model sometimes forgets to question the stability of the inner world, and the solidity of the "subject".

So this "non-subjective reality", dare I say "non-dual reality", model questions the stability of both worlds. It questions the solidity of both objects and subjects.

Some books I'm reading lately refer to this as a reality that is neither objective, nor subjective. There is no "that" out there, and there is no "I" in here. There is neither "I" nor "that". Except if you 100% equate "that out there" with "I in here". I am That. That is Me. It's all the same.

"Subjective reality" finds an identity with the seer. Basically, the seer "in here", shapes and influences what is seen "out there".

"Objective reality" finds an identity with the seen. The seen "out there" shapes and influences the seer "in here".

"Non-subjective reality" identifies with neither. Seer and seen don't exist. Subject and object do not exist. That which "Sees" and that which is "seen" are 100% illusions. 100% Vapor, right down to the core, with absolutely no solid center anywhere to be found.

If at all, dualities "exist" only when you view them as two parts of the same whole. Like the crest and trough of a wave in the ocean. Ultimately, there is no "crest" or "trough". It's all ocean. If taken this way, only then can you say that "seer" and "seen" exist. Seen and seer are 100% the same. One doesn't control the other. One can't control the other.

But something is happening though, otherwise we wouldn't be here discussing this. But there is absolutely no one, no thing, and no force, that is willing it, controlling it, manifesting it, or dreaming it.

There is nothing "up there", as in an idealistic higher self, higher planes of existence/awareness, God-Mind, or Consciousness (capital "c"), running the show, dreaming or willing everything into existence.

There is nothing "down here", as in selfish genes or vibrating strings, running the show either.

There is nothing "out there", as in a deterministic environment or cultural influences, running the show, pushing everything around like billiard balls.

There is nothing "in here", as in an "I", "self", "thought-intentions", or "free will", running the show either.

To try to explain or conceptualize anything, anything at all, whether it be up there, down here, out there, or in here, is by definition dualistic. To try to say anything in particular is even happening, anything at all, is also dualistic.

All there is, is This. Everything is apparently happening and arising automatically. But ultimately, nothing is happening at all. Everything just appears to be happening. (credit: Tony Parsons)

But a strange thing has now happened, for I realize that the real self within is actually the real world without, and vice versa. The subject and object, the inside and outside, are and always have been non-dual. There is no primary boundary. The world is my body, and what I am looking out of is what I am looking at.

Because the real self resides neither within nor without, because the subject and object are actually not-two, the mystics can speak of reality in many different but only apparently contradictory ways. They can say that in all reality there are no objects whatsoever. Or they might state that reality contains no subjects at all. Or they can deny the existence of both subject and object. Or they may speak of an "Absolute Subjectivity" which transcends yet includes both the relative subject and the relative object. All of these are simply various ways of saying that the inside world and the outside world are just two different names for the single ever-present state of no-boundary awareness.
-- Ken Wilber (from No-Boundary)