1. INSIGHT ACROSS THE BORDERLANDS

I did not know whether I was Chuang Tzu dreaming I was a butterfly; or a butterfly dreaming I was Chuang Tzu.

There is a state of consciousness with which we are all familiar, although most of us see the state as only an artifact, and not as something ‘real’ nor of any practical use in consensual reality. Psychologists refer to this as the ‘hypnopompic’ state, the borderlands between sleep and full awakening. It is somewhat similar to the ‘hypnogogic’ state which sometimes occurs, say, when one is reading and drifts into another reality where everything has full meaning, but when one snaps back awake, one sees – no matter how ‘real’ it had seemed just a moment before - that ‘that other reality’ was but a dream artifact.

These two ‘hypno’ states are similar in that they are both windows to natural non-ordinary states, yet are vastly different for the purpose of accessing non-local information, or – for the purposes here – of acquiring insight. For one thing, the hypnogogic state occurs through involition – i.e. when one’s physical body is tired and under stress; whereas the hypnopompic state arises on awakening, when one’s body is refreshed and at maximum relaxation, and when one can allow one’s mind unfettered access to its internal resources without the usual daily overburden of ego, image and physical concerns. One can then ‘quest’ for truth without concern for conventional (and consensual) reality. One is simply lying quiescent on one’s back, with hands folded over the chest, while breathing lightly and slowly; floating between dream and full awareness. Some meditation streams – e.g. insight vipassana – in a way parallel both the processes and the goals of what occurs naturally in this awakening state. As well, some people claim the same results through ‘lucid dreaming’ or ‘astral flight’ experiences such as Robert Monroe described in his books “Journeys Out of The Body”, etc. Also similar in goal was the extensive US government research over the last couple decades at the Stanford Research Institute (SRI) into remote viewing. In all of these practices, the objective is to transit from one ‘reality’ to another, and ‘come back’ with information which in one’s normal state is beyond access. To see or attain insight into the heart of dynamics without personal emotional bias, egocentric preference nor pre-judgment.

My own initial experiences in this area commenced in the late teens, spontaneously and without any prior preparation nor study into the process. One can perhaps appreciate how fascinated I was by this apparently new-found ability to “escape the surly bonds of earth” – to ‘visit’ far realms and states of being and thereby acquire experience and insights. In my naivety I even thought that this was a personally unique phenomenon and little realized at the time that it occurs to all humans, and most assuredly to other animals and lower orders, in that other sentient creatures are not so reliant on ‘analyzing’ everything as we humans are. So personally unique did I think the experience was at the time, that I analyzed the process as being one in which a numerical formula was required to dial up each astral destination, and these ‘akashic formulae’ were a personal gift from the creation gods – one of the keys entrusted to a deserving quester. Ah – the subjective rationalizations which a person indulges in when there is no teacher. And of course this one doubted, and desired a sign – to bring back something tangible so that one could ‘realize’ those other non-tangibles brought back –

What if you slept?

And what if in your sleep you dreamed?

And what if in your dream you went to heaven

and there plucked a strange and beautiful Flower?

And what if, when you woke,

you had the flower in your hand?

Ah !! What then?

Samuel Taylor Coleridge)

- see how young this one then was, to put more tangibility reliance on material ‘proof’ than upon insight – but with enough time and experience we are all able to prioritize such earlier egocentricity, aren’t we. And in time, this one did encounter – in writings and in person – others who were aware of their transiting experiences, and who could consciously engage the process so as to benefit their lives with deeper meaning.

As is the case in so many things, conscious intention (rather than dismissal of any states as useless artifacts) makes all the difference in results realized. One time I had an extended series of discussions with a Transcendental Meditation teacher (formerly a Catholic priest) who one day described his amazing experience upon awakening that morning, and while in a hypnopompic state, had in his mind viewed creation, the accreting of stellar gases into density states which gravity collapsed into ignited novae – stars from which solar systems evolved so that sentient life could manifest. Time-lapse of this observation – only a few moments. Upon my query as to whether the experience were one of observation as opposed to participation, the response was “observation”, which reminded me of my own early trips wherein I had adhered to a felt admonition to “observe all, but affect nothing” – and thus the teacher’s personal progression was known. This individual’s major insight concerning his experience was that ALL reality was essentially of MIND, which in turn gave rise to physical cosmology; and further – that his experience of cosmological creation, through having observed it, deeply impressed him in a way that reading about it as a theory never would have. An example of the vast difference between experiences ‘known’, rather than merely ‘believed’.

So – what seems to be going on here in this access for insight?? A developing view is that all information exists everywhere concurrently (see Nature's Mind: The Quantum Hologram by Edgar Mitchell, in The Sublime section of ‘remedy’) – the challenge is to intentionally tune in to information desired, selecting it out of all-that-is, and then decode it into structures that one’s experience allows one to understand. There is an emerging field of study – named psychophysiology – which may render a key here: Apparently all information – whether idea, thought, feeling or emotion – is only in a virtual state unless allowed to take form through mind, i.e. in an embodied, sentient observer-participant. Many therapies – both somatic and psychological – focus on moving memories stored in parts of the patient’s body (not just in their ‘minds’) into consciousness, where – in the open – coping strategies can be organized. [One can’t handle what one can’t see]. This key in some way appears to apply not only to the microcosm (you, or I, and our realized experiences) but likewise to the macrocosm – all that is – from which all virtual and embodied experience can be accessed: Just as we are part of the All, the All is part of us; all is already imbedded within us, awaiting our access.

As to information about anything ‘here and now’ [or, for that matter, processes in time or abstraction], seemingly a non-material ‘Matrix’ exists in which any and all information about any person, place or thing is embedded and accessible through the agency of a signal line. The Matrix has been described as a huge, non-material, highly structured, mentally accessible framework of information containing all data pertaining to everything in both the physical and non-physical universe. Take insight meditation as an example. The observer/meditator psychically perceives and decodes the signal line and objectifies the information so obtained. In the same vein as Jung's Cosmic Unconscious, the Matrix comprises and is open to all conscious entities as well as all information relating to everything else living or nonliving. It is this informational framework from which the data encoded on the signal line emerges and is realized by – in our example – the meditator. In a manner roughly similar to standard radio propagation theory, the signal line is a carrier wave that is inductively modulated by its involvement with information and it is this information that is decoded as a quested insight by the meditator. Essentially, when the meditator accesses the information signal line through disciplined humility – one approaches rather than demands insight, and waits upon the response – it is in effect a re-membering from within, as Plato wrote.

Some can better understand the insight process in terms of a Freudian model of human consciousness levels. The lowest level of consciousness is paradoxically named the “unconscious.” All this label really means is that the part of our mental processes that we know as cognitive awareness or consciousness does not have access to what goes on there. It is apparently this part of the individual's psyche that first detects and receives the quested signal line. From here it is passed to the autonomic nervous system (ANS), and when it impinges on the ANS, the information is converted into a reflexive nervous response conducted through muscular channels controlled by the ANS (as in the dowsing process); or – if one is consciously stilled at the physical level, it may manifest itself as an ideogram – an insight.

At the same time that the signal is passed up through the subconscious, it is ‘kindled’ across the limen and into the lower fringes of the consciousness. However, our normal waking consciousness poses certain problems, occasioned largely because of the linear, analytic thought processes that are societal conditioning ingrained from our earliest stages of cognitive conditioning. While extremely useful in a society relying heavily on quantitative data and technological development, such analytic thinking hampers intuitive processes by the manufacture of what can be thought of as analytic overlay. As the signal line surges up across the consciousness limen and into the threshold areas of consciousness, the mind's conscious analytical processes feel duty-bound to assign meaning to the signal, and this is the stage where it is absolutely necessary to be unattached to the insight – one’s mind will try to ‘protect’ one by interpreting the signal into preferential or existing belief comfort areas. Conscious mind will try to make a ‘logical’ assessment based on the impressions being received.

[This bias is completely reflexive and will occur naturally unless one is truly impartially receptive to the insight. Instead of allowing holistic right-brain processes (through which the signal line apparently manifests itself) to assemble a complete and accurate concept, untrained left brain based analytical biases seize upon whatever bit of information seems most familiar and form a familiar construct based on it.]

All information has a specific nature or gestalt that makes it uniquely what it is. Unbiased humility – a quest for insight truth no matter what – allows the meditator to acquire the signal line, attune himself to it, and proceed to decode and objectify this information gestalt. The focused quest itself is the main pointer – all information is available from the Matrix – but information for its own sake is stupefying – the individual’s personal concerns are what he must tune himself to when engaging the hypnopompic or meditative states.

There are those that look at things the way they are, and ask why? I dream of things that never were, and ask why not. (Robert F Kennedy)

As to the evolution FROM merely observing the truths of different states of reality, TO participating as co-creator? For this, one wants to not only access different states of consciousness, but to identify and bring back analogues of those states for replication within one’s normal awareness – i.e. to learn how to create otherwise unavailable perspectives, emotions, attitudes and approaches to challenges as required: “I choose to realize this particular mind-set over that one, and thus have new coping strategies in this life”. To focus their results in this regard, some people use dream journals, with emphasis on remembering those dreams experienced just before arising. Others may ‘walk’ their insight into embodiment. The important thing in any event is to treat one’s dreams with respect – to wonder about them and try to find their value in our lives. Dreams can either provide entertainment, or meaning. They are an essential part of us, through us and for us. Expansion of cognitive capabilities engenders optional variations in role execution.

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