The animal kingdom is divided into family groups and there’s a consciousness unique to every group. The same is true of a species group and a subspecies group. Each grouping has its own form of consciousness, divisible into smaller units of consciousness, down to the point of final individuation (the independent, free moving, individual animals). Units are considered to be individual based on their ability to think and move freely.
Certain animal species have a more advanced group consciousness than others. Take fish, for example. Individuals have a way of linking their senses together with other individuals. Fish are known to shoal and move in groups like one superorganism. They move in groups as one, avoiding and outsmarting predators, using shoaling techniques similar to, but more immediate than, the hiving and swarming techniques of insects like ants and bees.
Bees use directional systems to guide other bees. They probably just guide them in the right general direction although I don’t know how accurate they can be, whether they can guide each other to specific flowers or plants. I’m pretty sure that individual senses kick in once they arrive in the general vicinity.
Whatever the case, the point is that regardless of the fact that one bee can move off independently and make use of its individual senses, the hive mind still governs the well-being of all of the hive itself. A larger communication model utilizing electric and chemical signals operates through the ether, overseeing the whole, sharing information, and directing individuals like a dance.
All consciousness is linked in the first place. Certain agents govern the linking of individual units of consciousness and other agents govern individuation of the larger consciousness. There is no denying that everything in the universe is affected by everything else. This is one of the real mysteries of modern science.
In a lot of scientific experiments, there’s a reason why scientists have been unable to apply scientific principles to certain sociological dynamics. Certain principles might apply, but all the criteria for sound testing and experiment can’t necessarily be met. The reason for this seems simply to be that there are aspects which are still unknown. There might be principles which still need to be discovered in order to measure and quantify the unknowns. Scientists may find in the future that each theory has a manner of being correct but a unifying theory is what’s necessary and that’s what scientists are hopefully getting closer to finding.
Certain theories work over others, but not in every case. This could have something to do with the fact that everything that we try to measure is constantly in a state of change. Like a piece of wood with its specific qualities of density and moisture slowly changing, hardening with time and becoming dry, and changing from hard and dense to dust, more or less, everything changes until it is no longer there or until something else eventually takes its place.
In our consciousness, we have the idea of an end time or Armageddon. It’s a warning of a kind of cosmic retribution against a species that has become so corrupt and so evil that it has to be taken down. In Christian thought, the powers can enact this retribution using warfare, plague, and drought. We have existing in our group consciousness the potential for some sort of cataclysmic disaster. There are those with the world view that application of certain rules is the only way this can be forestalled. The result of this is a history in which fairly indistinct or ambiguous texts have been used as an excuse and as back up for the enforcement of discriminatory and prejudiced ideals and laws.
I’m not sure whether it’s always been consciously thought out, but there’s definitely something to be said for the forming of an exclusive, members-only club. One of the most effective ways to make a club exclusive is by catering to prejudice through the adoption of non-traditional practices. Think of the application of ideas, derived from biblical teachings, to emotionally poignant issues such as homosexuality and abortion. The ambiguous texts are interpreted in such a way that they appear not to support such practices, creating or enforcing belief in the wrongfulness of these practices and actually making this prejudice a rite of passage, a prerequisite for membership to the inner tribe and the mark of a true believer.
Jesus himself said “many will come who claim to know me but I will not know them” and you’ve got to see the truth in this.
There are people who have unexplainable experiences which they automatically assume to be the product of tools instead of technique. They believe the experience to be an act of God because they don’t necessarily grasp the nature of the experience and are unwilling or unable to admit to the practices which led up to it. Bad things happen to people and to avoid self-blame, they will often use God as a scapegoat. More often than not, irreverent people attribute the self-serving voice in their head the one God, but it is unlikely that the one God would create discriminatory beliefs that uphold prejudice between people.
In Christianity, the metaphysical god is largely considered as foreign to consciousness, whereas in other religions like Buddhism, the metaphysical gods occupy a much more known place in consciousness. The nature of the experience could tell you whether you’re dealing with the God of Compassion, the God of Long Life, or the God of Medicine (the Medicine Buddha), for example. The names of these deities (or aspects of the godhead) are descriptive of their inherent qualities.
In Buddhism, the practitioner effectively becomes the deity and the practice then is of adopting the qualities of these purest forms of emphasis existing in the celestial realm. This path of adopting the qualities of the gods is considered to be the shortcut to heaven.
There are known deities with certain distinct qualities, and the idea is to align yourself with the desired quality, say, the quality of Good. In Buddhist practice, deities are depicted in particular ways, each of them holding symbols which correspond to the type of consciousness that the deity represents. A painting is created of each god using meaningful symbols which hold the key to whichever deity is being represented, as well as important teachings pertaining to them. These deities are often depicted as conquering one of the three defilements: attraction (greed), aversion (hatred), and ignorance.
Life seems to be about understanding the content of the world, in such a way that we can either overcome it or use it to our advantage. We create the content of the world and what happens in it, but we are by no means purely individual. The aspect of consciousness responsible for the creation of this shared reality is a shared consciousness. It is society which creates it; we create it as a species and as a culture, through combined efforts and beliefs.
Although there are so many things we can focus on and the actual objects of our focus may differ vastly from individual to individual (a wealthy man may focus on properties and businesses, while a poor man might be focused just on putting food on the table), the fact is we are not defined by the objects of our focus. There is a unifying consciousness under all. We may often think we are the things we focus on, but nothing could be less true. Furthermore, we will continue to exist long after these individual objectives, persons, and ideas have faded. There is a group identity, an archetypal consciousness that will, does, and can, which exists throughout our time and beyond it. This consciousness, with its unified vision, has observed the unfolding of life and will observe its passing away. This continues to be the reality.
Two aspects of reality are in play: the first is the reality of the contents of the universe apparent to individuals in the here and now and the second is the reality of the emptiness of a universe in which all things which come about will also pass away. As you become aware of this, certain things will become apparent: one of these is that what you do matters and another is that there is just cause for humility. Buddhists believe that the most important task is that of self-awakening. This is a task that the Buddha fulfilled and it is something for which every individual should strive. This one thing is the recommended focus of one’s life for the benefit of all beings.
“The benefit of all beings” is the part that is so easily misunderstood, but let me explain what this actually means. It means everything. Everything continues to be real; Maslow’s hierarchical needs are all a part of happiness, absolutely. The recognition that all things are temporary and that form is nothing but concept filled up with empty space. Emptiness itself is nothing but form. These realizations are not beyond our grasp, so to speak. Grasping as an action, however, might not be particularly helpful.
This realization is always right here. It’s always with us and there’s never a time when this doesn’t apply. All the things which are arising and passing away are the shapes within the emptiness. The void permeates the entire thing; everything is the nothingness. If you know that everything is the nothingness, then what do you have?
Here’s the thing, everything has a corresponding type of energy to it. We have been making our priority the enrichment of the individual humans on the planet through the burning of fuel which creates a disturbing amount of toxic by-products. We’ve been doing this all over the world. We have been courting with these people because there’s so much money in it. The internal combustion engine is responsible for our way of life today to such a huge extent. Let’s face it! Rockefeller knew that he was onto something.
This is what we have invested in. We need to stop it and we need to stop it now. We need to stop procrastinating. We need to drive the price of these things down to the point where we can have them everywhere. We need to build electric cars and we should have a national referendum on it; we just need to get it done. We need to not mess around with it. We need to stop China from polluting, yes. We need to stop India from polluting, yes. We need to stop a lot of other countries from doing a lot of other things. What the oil companies have done in some of the African countries is appalling. It’s awful: these are environmental disasters.
So we need to stop all that and we need to convert everything over to a more sustainable type of fuel, a type of fuel that doesn’t create all these problems. We need to see if we can find a way to make these panels white so that they reflect light, well probably not, but we do need to find a way to prevent them from heating up, to allow them to be cooler and keep the heat retention to a minimum. We need to cut the greenhouse gases altogether. We need to stop the natural gas people from leaking any more gas. That stuff is extremely toxic and it just keeps leaking everywhere.
How much gas could be leaking out over the course of a month? Everybody knows that there are little leaks throughout the system, think about it, there have to be unless we’ve really put forth an effort to check every single join and to make sure that every one is solid and that none of them leak (starting with the biggest ones). That’s what it would take but do you think we’ve got the will to do that? That’s what needs to happen because we can’t afford to have these things leaking. We need to make sure that we’re taking care of it.
We also need to figure out what we’re doing about the population. Good grief, the people in the world that are living in refugee camps, in squalor, in poor countries, or trapped in the middle of warzones. When I think about some of the tragic things in the world, the animals being slaughtered in the wild, some of them just choked out by civilization moving in, everything kind of going backwards on them, it seems humans are just indiscriminately taking over everything and not leaving room for the other animals, especially the great beasts of the world. Think of the elephants that form those tight emotional bonds. Elephants form bonds that last for decades, which actually last well over a hundred years for many of them. They are highly sensitive when they get together, the females anyway; the bulls definitely have a way of being dominant. At any rate, just the idea of breaking up those social groups is really tragic. Humans are so callous that they can do that.
I believe that the animal realm has the same consciousness as the rest of us. Animals act in a more restricted way. Their bodies are clearly designed to do things other than what human bodies are designed to do. Their brains function similarly and yet in some aspects differently. I live with cats now and it’s harder to tell this with dogs because dogs are so involved with you. It’s so much about the relationship with a dog and it’s not necessarily that way with a cat. The cat can live in the house and everything can be really good, and yet the cat might not really have much of a relationship with you at all or else it might crawl up into your lap and purr everyday. It could be either way.
So I live with cats and I see how in the animal realm the parenting skills are potentially about the bonding experience. The kitten might do something like fall, the mother cat may let it all happen, but when the kitten approaches she will groom it, pay attention to it, and take care of it. That is a non-demanding type of relationship and it’s not the same way with dogs.
With dogs, the puppy will cry out for help, be vulnerable, more or less, to get the mom’s attention. Cats are different, although they certainly can also crave attention. Watching animals has taught me more about how interdependency can work. I have recently taken some time to really focus on myself, just being alone and sorting out what’s important to me and how I want to present myself to the world. During this time, my emotional bond and relationship with the cats has gotten stronger.
In a way I’ve had to rely on my bond with them, and our behavior towards one another has changed accordingly. We are more affectionate with each other now, both I and the cats, and there have been definite improvements in a lot of areas. I’ve had more opportunity to play with them and pet them. I’ve just taken the opportunity to pay attention to them rather than do anything else and that has resulted in some significant benefits for all of us. I’m sure we will always have this when we meet in the future. In fact, the bonding time I had with Ray when she was sick seems to have made a big difference to her and it helped her to get closer to me; she was always available to me from that point forward.
Life is a mirror and will reflect back to the thinker what he thinks into it. -Ernest Holmes