Feel The Rain: An Introduction to the Complexity and Expansion of Conscious - David James Pritchard

Feel The Rain: An Introduction to the Complexity and Expansion of Conscious (eBook)

David James Pritchard (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2021 | 1. Auflage
282 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
978-1-6678-0083-7 (ISBN)

'Feel The Rain' explores the enigmatic and long disputed nature of consciousness as well as best practices for expansion of consciousness. There is nothing more essential for living an authentic life, yet nothing more difficult to understand, much less achieve. The subjects and challenges involved are complex, subtle, and constantly evolving. Pritchard has a gift for explaining seemingly ineffable concepts and processes. He deftly weaves together the teachings of the great mystics from both Western and Eastern cultures, historical scholars, cutting edge scientific research, and his own unique experiences to meet this challenge. He brings a deeper understanding to the learning process, including matters you were sure you already understood. This is a book for anyone searching for life's deeper meanings, whether you are just beginning to search, or if you have been on the path for some time.

"e;Feel The Rain"e; explores the enigmatic and long disputed nature of consciousness as well as best practices for expansion of consciousness. There is nothing more essential for living an authentic live, yet nothing more difficult to understand, much less achieve. The subjects and challenges involved are complex, subtle, and constantly evolving. Pritchard has a gift for explaining seemingly ineffable concepts and processes. He deftly weaves together the teachings of the great mystics from both Western and Eastern cultures, historical scholars, cutting edge scientific research, and his own unique experiences to meet this challenge. He brings a deeper understanding to the learning process, including matters you were sure you already understood. This is a book for anyone searching for life's deeper meanings, whether you are just beginning to search, or if you have been on the path for some time.

INTRODUCTION

The unexamined life is not worth living.

—Socrates1

Tradition holds that these were among the last words spoken by Socrates (470-399 BCE) before being sentenced to death. Although this quote seems quite apt to introduce a book on the complexity and expansion of consciousness, I hesitated to use it because of its tinge of egoism. Socrates argued that it is only the pursuit of wisdom (philosophy) that raises human beings above animals that live only through instinct. Does this mean those of us struggling and overwhelmed by work, bill paying, and child raising are not leading lives worth living? Of course not. So what makes life worth living? At least for me, it doesn’t get any better than the welcoming smile of a grandchild, a cold beer after working a long day in the yard, or the embrace of my wife at night. It is a promise of this book that these precious life pleasures as well as life’s challenges will become more vivid, less fearful, and more meaningful as your consciousness expands.

Understanding the nature of consciousness and expanding its temporary and false boundaries provides the potential for you to see and relate to yourself and to the world as if from a new dimension. You discover new values, new realities. . .a more authentic plane of awareness and existence. This is accomplished in large part through a new freedom from habits and fears. These are often deeply penetrating habits and fears of which you are not even aware. This new freedom of expanded consciousness welcomes you into an accessible lightness of being.

The promising benefits of meaningful expansion of consciousness certainly sound awe-inspiring, and indeed they are. Yet they cannot be achieved by the widespread “magical thinking” of our so-called New Age. If we hope to change/expand our consciousness, a bit of academic rigor is first required to get a better understanding of the enigmatic nature of consciousness. After all, the essential first step in attempting to change something is to first try to understand how that “something” operates. Understanding the nature of consciousness is no easy task. For example, it may surprise you to learn that the definition and significance of the nature of consciousness have been disputed for more than three thousand years. The disputed theories about consciousness are numerous and contain extreme differences. At one end, there are those who believe there is no such thing as individual human consciousness, and that we are all essentially biologic automatons responding only to our instinctual evolutionary needs. At the other end, there are those who believe that the entire universe is the manifestation of one, singular, and omnipresent consciousness; and that humans, animals, plants, minerals, and even a grain of sand share in this singular consciousness. Many dozens of theories on consciousness fall between these two extremes.

Many of the topics covered in this book are complex, subtle, and constantly evolving. These are ideally topics for academic scholars who dedicate their time, energy, and lives attempting to better understand phenomena such as: the societal understanding of consciousness throughout history; the neu-roevolutionary origins of consciousness; the developmental levels of human motivation; the neurophysiology of the brain; meditative and other “altered” states; and even whether there is a “Transcendent” reality distinctly separate from our commonly accepted understanding of existence. Mystics also serve an invaluable role in investigating and describing their deep immersions into the nature of consciousness and reality itself. While I am by nature (and by years of disappointing experience) a skeptic who strongly prefers so-called “scientific” proof of all claims regarding reality, to dismiss the wisdom of mystics is to foolishly miss out on some of the deepest and most beautiful insights about life. This book will include the findings of both leading academic scholars and mystics, which I will refer to collectively as “scholars and mystics” with “scholars” referring to the academic professions and “mystics” referring to the spiritual/transcendental practitioners.2 Citational footnotes are provided should you wish to consult original sources or investigate further.

This book, however, was not written for scholars or mystics. I wrote this book for myself and for people like me. People who are blessed (or as my mother once said “cursed”) with a compelling need to understand how life works. Maybe even begin to understand a few of the so-called mysteries of life. I know there are people out there like this because I have been fortunate to meet and even become friends with many. By no means do I call myself a mystic or an academic scholar on consciousness. I am a searcher with a decades long passion for investigating, practicing, and learning about these matters. Quite frankly, the more I think I learn, the more I appreciate how very much I will never really know. Yet hopefully, I have an ability to communicate to other like-minded searchers an understandable yet penetrating introduction/overview of the key issues, challenges, and practices regarding the nature and expansion of consciousness.

We will explore together both the fundamental challenge and the hopeful promise of consciousness expansion. The fundamental challenge is that, while most scholars and mystics agree that endeavoring to expand your consciousness is arguably the most authentic and worthwhile of human endeavors, actual progress at consciousness raising is extremely difficult. This difficulty is due in large part to six major filters which affect how we take in information, process that information, and act upon that information. Those filters are:

1. ignorance;

2. genetics;

3. the non-conscious;

4. culture;

5. emotions; and

6. circumstances of the moment.

The hopeful promise is that the very fact that you are reading this book is an important sign that you are considering making the difficult changes necessary to begin to expand your consciousness and begin to bring deeper and more authentic meaning into your life. To counter-quote Canadian rapper, Drake, “If you’re reading this, it’s not too late”.3

It is a primary premise of this book that discipline, courage, and radical humility are each absolute requirements to help see past the filters and begin to expand consciousness. It takes “discipline” because meaningful growth of personal consciousness may be the most intense work/challenge you have ever undertaken. It takes “courage” because to expand your consciousness, you will need to leave the conscious and non-conscious comfort of your own culture, habits, beliefs, and even your genetics. It takes “radical humility” because the most fundamental belief you must question and eventually abandon is that you are a separate, independent, and permanent self who is in total control of your own consciousness. These absolute requirements are not only mandatory first steps, but they will continue to be constant and challenging requirements to strive for during the quest to see and understand yourself and the world other than through a glass darkly.

This book is divided into two sections which are entitled: “Recognition” and “Transformance”. These are the most fundamental steps for any attempt at consciousness expansion. Each section takes a different approach to introduce and assist you in understanding and expanding your consciousness.

Section I “Recognition” introduces you to the highly disputed and ethereal nature of consciousness. Chapter One addresses the question, “What is consciousness?” This first chapter describes the evolution of human understanding of consciousness from the animism of Paleolithic times to the latest neuroscientific discoveries, and even onto claimed “Transcendent” theories based on phenomena such as quantum entanglement and wave-function collapse. This fascinating look reveals how each otherwise advancing society was still unable to grasp the true nature of consciousness. This reveals a deep truth that must be understood and accepted to expand consciousness in a meaningful way: No matter how brilliant they were, no society nor any brilliant individual thinker of their historical time period ever had the final understanding of consciousness. When a person or a society believes it has all the answers (on any subject not just consciousness), then they have closed and limited their consciousness. There is no expansion of consciousness without an open mind, period. Chapter Two takes a lighter look at why we should want to expand our consciousness. Chapter Three examines the historically evolving understanding of distinct “levels” of consciousness from the introduction of the concept by Freud, through Maslow’s “Hierarchy of Needs Theory”, and onto the argument for multiple “Transpersonal” levels beyond the current scientific understanding of reality. This third chapter presents compelling reasons why it is so difficult to expand consciousness to a new level. Chapter Four helps to identify and explain the almost insurmountable power of the main filters to our individual...

Erscheint lt. Verlag	7.9.2021
Sprache	englisch
Themenwelt	Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Gesundheit / Leben / Psychologie ► Esoterik / Spiritualität
ISBN-10	1-6678-0083-3 / 1667800833
ISBN-13	978-1-6678-0083-7 / 9781667800837

Haben Sie eine Frage zum Produkt?

EPUB (Ohne DRM)
Größe: 1,9 MB

Digital Rights Management: ohne DRM
Dieses eBook enthält kein DRM oder Kopierschutz. Eine Weitergabe an Dritte ist jedoch rechtlich nicht zulässig, weil Sie beim Kauf nur die Rechte an der persönlichen Nutzung erwerben.

Dateiformat: EPUB (Electronic Publication)
EPUB ist ein offener Standard für eBooks und eignet sich besonders zur Darstellung von Belletristik und Sachbüchern. Der Fließtext wird dynamisch an die Display- und Schriftgröße angepasst. Auch für mobile Lesegeräte ist EPUB daher gut geeignet.

Systemvoraussetzungen:
PC/Mac: Mit einem PC oder Mac können Sie dieses eBook lesen. Sie benötigen dafür die kostenlose Software Adobe Digital Editions.
eReader: Dieses eBook kann mit (fast) allen eBook-Readern gelesen werden. Mit dem amazon-Kindle ist es aber nicht kompatibel.
Smartphone/Tablet: Egal ob Apple oder Android, dieses eBook können Sie lesen. Sie benötigen dafür eine kostenlose App.
Geräteliste und zusätzliche Hinweise

Buying eBooks from abroad
For tax law reasons we can sell eBooks just within Germany and Switzerland. Regrettably we cannot fulfill eBook-orders from other countries.