 124. Philosophy � Greek |
CONSCIOUSNESS
-Spirit-
From the point of view of the (apparently) individuated (or conditional, and self-contracted) self, there are apparently two principles in manifestation. There is individual consciousness (or attention, the conditional and active, or functional, witness of objects) and there is everything else (or all the possible objects of that individual attention-consciousness).
You habitually exist (or function) as attention-consciousness, and as attention-consciousness you experience and know many kinds of objects (or relations and states of consciousness). You tend merely to experience (rather than to "consider" and transcend) those objects, relations, and states, and so you develop a sense of identification with some, a desire for some others, and a revulsion toward certain others.
This complex of identification, desire, and aversion is the summary of your conventional existence. And in the midst of all of that you are afraid, bewildered, and constantly moved to achieve some kind of experience or knowledge that will enable you to feel Utterly Released, Free, and Happy.
In fact, you never (by all of your seeking for experience and knowledge) achieve Ultimate Experience, Ultimate Knowledge, Ultimate Release, Ultimate Freedom, or Ultimate Happiness. And so your (apparent) existence is a constant search for these, while you are otherwise bound to desire, aversion, fear, bewilderment, and every other kind of egoic "self-possession" (or self-contracted self-absorption).*
There is a Perfect alternative to this bondage and this seeking. It is not a matter of the egoic attainment of any object, knowledge, or state of psycho-physical fulfillment or release. Rather, it is a matter of entering into an alternative view of experience. Instead of merely experiencing (and so developing the qualities of identification, differentiation, desire, attachment, aversion, fear, bewilderment, and the search for experience, knowledge, self-fulfillment, self-release, or even Ultimate Knowledge, Ultimate Release, Ultimate Freedom, and Ultimate Happiness), inspect and "consider" your own Original (or Most Basic) Condition and From That "Point of View," examine and "consider" all of your experience.
If, rather than merely submitting to experience, you inspect and "consider" your own Original (or Most Basic) Condition, it should become clear (as Obvious) that you are Consciousness (Itself) and all of the objects or varieties of experience appear to you only as a "play" upon (or an apparent modification of) Consciousness (Itself). Experience (or the apparent and conditional modification and limitation of Consciousness) is not the dominant (or Most Basic) Factor of your (apparent) existence. Consciousness Itself is the dominant (or Most Basic) and always Most Prior Factor of your (apparent) existence (and of Existence Itself), but you tend (by virtue of a mechanical and habitual involvement with conditional experience) to be submitted to and controlled by experience. Because of this mechanical and habitual involvement with experience, you constantly forget and abandon your Most Basic Position, and, therefore, you constantly suffer the disturbances already described.
*Conventionally, "self-possessed" means "possessed of oneself"- or having full control (calmness, or composure) of one's feelings, impulses, habits, and actions. The state of being possessed by one's egoic self, or controlled by chronically self-referring (or egoic) tendencies of attention, feeling, thought, desire, and action. Thus, unless (in every moment) body, emotion, desire, thought, separate and separative self, and all attention are actively and completely surrendered, one is egoically "self-possessed," even when exhibiting personal control of one's feelings, habits, and actions.
