Category: What is Consciousness?

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Protecting the Vulnerable – True Spirituality

A King may move a man, a father may claim a son, but remember that even when those who move you be Kings, or men of power, your soul is in your keeping alone. When you stand before God, you cannot say, “But I was told by others to do thus.” Or that, “Virtue was not convenient at the time.” This will not suffice. Remember that.”

– King Baldwin IV, from the movie “Kingdom of Heaven,” 2005

Parzival and Condviramur from the illuminated manuscript of "Parzival" by Wolfram von Eschenbach
Parzival and Condviramur from the illuminated manuscript of “Parzival” by Wolfram von Eschenbach

– Dr. Jaime G. Corvalan, MD, FACS

For those who are awake and aware, for those who would operate at a level of consciousness in which loyalty, compassion and love are the uppermost spiritual values, protection and care of those most vulnerable among us is of critical importance . . . And those most vulnerable are not only our fellow human beings but all life, great and small – Nature, our very mother.

We must always strive to be our best – and our best selves are those in which we work to achieve alignment between our souls and our facades, the ego images we project out into this world. When we operate from our souls, we instinctively seek to serve something far greater than ourselves; we strive to protect and nurture those most fragile within our midst, whatever they may be. This is true, honest spirituality.

We must also strive to recognize and be aware of those who would appropriate religions or ideologies of any denomination in order to further their own unquenchable desire for power, control and domination. Fanatics of every stripe who claim to know the will of god, or who claim some illusory group superiority, know only their shallow yet unending desire to exercise dominion over those who would fall prey to their words.

True holiness, true spirituality, is in knowing deep within your soul what is right and in having the courage to act upon it. What the divine desires is right here in you, in your heart and soul; it cannot be found in the empty words of charlatans and zealots. Every choice YOU make determines whether you live from the highest spiritual values or merely from the basest desires of man.

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How Does Humanity Structure Consciousness?

– Dr. Jaime G. Corvalan, MD, FACS

Having addressed what Consciousness Is and Humanity’s Function in Manifesting Consciousness in other articles, this post asks the question, “How Do We Manifest or Structure Consciousness?”

It is useful in addressing this question to consider the “Principle of Opposition,” as articulated by the great psychologist, Dr. Carl Jung. Everything, he notes, within the world we know appears to us in pairs of opposites: up and down, light and dark, hot and cold, male and female, time and space, conscious and unconscious (these ideas can be traced back to Hegel and Kant). We live within this realm of duality.

We discover early on, however, that in order for us to grow and to become fully formed individuals, we must engage in a process of bringing together these opposites, in order to become whole. Dr. Jung called this the Process of Individuation, the emergence of a whole, integrated Self from undifferentiated unconsciousness.

Essentially, this is the battle, played out in the human ego and psyche, between “I” and “Not I,” the resolution of which manifests and structures new consciousness. It is this process of becoming aware of one’s true self, wholeness within and beyond the realm of duality, that structures consciousness and brings purpose and meaning to human existence – it’s why we’re here.

The Yin Yang symbol in Chinese philosophy describes how apparently contradictory opposites are actually complementary and interconnected in wholeness.
The Yin Yang symbol in Chinese philosophy describes how apparently contradictory opposites are actually complementary and interconnected in wholeness.

It is in the synthesis of the opposites, taking place within the crucible of the human ego, that consciousness is structured, is uncovered and shared (with all life and with the transcendent). In essence, the synthesis of the opposites (in this process of Individuation) connects the Ego with the Soul – that which transcends the Ego.

This forms the essence of what Dr. Jung identified as the New Myth for Humanity. “God,” or the Transcendent, in this new myth, is unaware of creation but wishes to know it, thus occupying one end of an opposition. Humanity, on the other hand, is conscious of creation but is unaware of its divinity, forming the other end of this pair of opposites (Divine and Man).

Human consciousness endows the Transcendent’s creation with objective existence by the observation of and participation in it, bringing into awareness that which was merely potential within a world of non-being.

So, humanity is indispensable to the Transcendent for the completion and perfection of creation – humanity is, in essence, the second creator of the world by observing and interacting with it. Man’s conscious knowing and God’s unconscious being form two poles in opposition to each other that, when synthesized and resolved, unfolds and manifests consciousness.

As such, for “God” to become aware of creation, all opposites must be united within the human psyche. As we bring union to the opposites, we actualize that which was only in potential; by making conscious what is unconscious, we arrive at wholeness, allowing the Soul and Ego to exist in beautiful alignment, while serving a purpose far greater than any individual Ego could imagine.

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The Purpose of Human Life

All life is informed and shaped by Transcendent Energy Consciousness
All life is informed and shaped by Transcendent Energy Consciousness

– Dr. Jaime G. Corvalan, MD, FACS

Transcendent energy consciousness is what gives form and function to everything. This consciousness is in everything in our world of duality, because consciousness is what informs all things. For instance, a flower is the way it is because transcendent energy consciousness give it its form; everything, from bees and birds, to worms, bacteria, trees, rocks – everything we perceive around us is informed by consciousness. This happens in a non-dual way – that is, transcendent energy consciousness is beyond the world of time and space (which is what defines duality, or our reality). This consciousness is not dual, but it informs everything in duality.

All societies depend upon a central, living myth that gives its members a meaning for existence. Today, we face what Dr. Jung called a crisis of mythlessness. The traditional myths of Western society have value, they point to something beyond this world, but they are increasingly losing their capacity to provide us with a relevant meaning for our existence. Dr. Jung, like Krishnamurti, both indicated that religious myths are valuable not because they are literally true but because they have symbolic value (something that represents transcendent nature).

What we need is a universal, transcendent myth, one that is non-local and gives us purpose and meaning. Dr. Jung indicates that we are currently in about a 600 year process of developing a new myth, one in which humanity and the divine are co-creators of our existence. That is, humanity’s conscious knowing combined with the divine’s unconscious being is what structures reality. Both compliment and affect each other.

So, the purpose of human life is the structuring or unfolding of consciousness. Humanity is necessary for the completion and perfection of the creation of the divine, or transcendent energy consciousness. Every individual participates in the manifestation of consciousness, acting as a light in the dark of what otherwise would just be mere existence.

 

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What is Consciousness?

Consciousness is a feature and function of time and space, it is how we know duality.

• What is Duality?
– The Dual Nature of Reality

• What is Consciousness?
– Definition, Spectrum of Consciousness, Duality Consciousness, Understanding Time and Space

• Soul, Body and Mind
– The Meaning of Soul, the Connection of Soul to Mind and Body

• What is the Unconscious?
– Jung’s Concept of the Unconscious, the Shadow and the Ego, Masculine and Feminine Energies

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What is Consciousness?

Edward Edinger, in his seminal work, The Creation of Consciousness: Jung’s Myth for Modern Man, notes that Dr. Jung felt that “the experience of consciousness is made up of two factors, “knowing” and “withness,” i.e., knowing in the presence of an “other,” in a setting of twoness.” Essentially, Jung is saying that consciousness emerges from the experiencing of opposites.

Using the language of psychology and psychoanalysis, he further defines the concept of individuation as the “process whereby a series of psychic contents – complexes and archetypal images – make connection with an ego and thereby generate the psychic substance of consciousness.”

Consciousness is our awareness of our existence within this realm of duality. The degree of our awareness is of key importance as it allows us to transcend our more base needs and behaviors and eventually allows us to operate from the heart and soul.