It's Growing!

Hey all looking to learn and teach.  There is a tsunami of new consciousness out there.  First the concept of consciousness itself is finally hitting the radar in science.  This is alongside the linked view that spacetime is not fundamental.     Donald Hoffman and his co workers argue that space time is part of our "headset" our way of seeing and  is not fundamental .   Hoffman argues that using evolutionary game theory it can be demonstrated that if evolutionary theory is correct (and it isn't but it is widely  believed to be n the Academy and more widely)  then the probability that we see Reality as it is is precisely 0.  Since evolutionary theory like most of current thinking implies spacetime this shows that spacetime is not fundamental.    Donald Hoffman proposes instead  that consciousness is fundamental and has developed a  mathematical model of what he calls conscious agents.  It turns out this model using Markovian dynamics can be mapped into the geometries of  Decorated Permutations.  The geometries of spacetime can then apparently   be derived  from these as a special case.  Decorated Permutations are among other things the geometries that can be used to elegantly and simply  describe the scattering amplitudes. These are the  particles and their components which are generated by the Hadron Collider.  

Another direction comes from quantum physics.   Nima Arkani-Hamed and other quantum physicists  argue that space time is "doomed" as a view of the fundamental nature of the Universe.  This is according to the most evidenced and most mathematically rigorous theories  of reality which we have so far which is quantum physics.   That local realism is false  has now been experimentally demonstrated by the 3 quantum physicists who won  the 2022 Nobel Prize  in physics: Alain Aspect Anton Zellinger and John Clauser.  Local realism consists of  two related views.  The "local" part is the view that the speed of light is the limit to which matter can be accelerated in the material realm and so there cannot be "action at a distance".    Instead the three Nobel prize winners demonstrated that entangled quantum particles interact instantaneously therefore faster than light over any distance even the furthest reaches of the Universe.  Secondly the "realism" part is that objects exist whether we are observing them or not.  Local realism assumes spacetime is fundamental.  Quantum theory says the limit for observing (measuring) time using the widely recognised  Planck scale is 10 to the minus 44.  The limit for observing (measuring)  space is 10 to the minus 34.  That means that given mathematical  assumptions about gravity according to Einstein's General Relativity it makes no sense to talk about observation or measurement beyond these very small but finite  limits.    They can be given no operational or practical meaning. 

Hoffman takes the leap following many other seekers of Truth before him:  the view that consciousness  is fundamental.  Consciousness is then not within space time but outside of it.  Like all good scientific theories it must be made mathematically rigorous so it can be proven to be right or wrong theoretically and experimentally.  He and his colleagues have devised the theory of conscious agents just so.  

So what?  The assumption that spacetime is fundamental have extraordinary and profound consequences.   For instance if there is no space time there is no separation and no lack.  We are all connected and everything is abundantly supplied.  This may seem counterintuitive to all except "god botherers" as Martin Shaw so nicely calls them. The many NDE reports (I heard an estimate that 40 million people have come forward world wide to talk about their NDE's) and the University of Virginia has had a 60 years program headed by Bruce Reyson investigating NDE's from a scientific viewpoint.  Do your own research.  I guarantee if you talk to 10 people in your circle at least 2 if not all are likely to have had NDE's or closely associated STE's (spiritually transformative experiences) including out of body experience , mystical  experiences of  union with the cosmos and experiences of great peace and wellbeing linked to a completely new idea of who  the "I" is.

To end on a personal note. Some years ago now I wanted to have an out of body experiences.  I had by then followed many new age trails and had many  different and wondrful spiritual experiences.  I knew God was real from time I was about 8 years old but no one around me including the dear religious folk at the convent  I attended seemed to have His cell.  Unlike Depeche Mode they did not seem to have their "own personal Jesus".  So I read up and tried for about 6 months,  had some very bizarre experiences including once in the middle of the night getting as far as my toes and panicking and not being able to move my body for half an hour.  But one sunny Monday afternoon in Eltham lying on the bed the "rocking" that I had read  about finally flipped me out of my body.  I had a wonderful experience I have never forgotten which seemed like it was a trip back to a previous incarnation in Vienna at the turn of the century.  I saw my body asleep on the bed before I went on my journey beyond spacetime.  I have never forgotten the details of that experience.  And it showed me definitively that I was not my body.

So here's to journeys in and out of the body to science,  spirituality and Youtube where people generously share their stories for free.

And all you need is Love .......... as some wise men said. 

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No Fear

 It's been a while.....post covid.  Who would have thought?  Scripture which is  Spirit- inspired teachings says many times Don't fear for I am with you and adds I will deliver you.  This means amongst other things I will come and get you out of whatever trouble you are in. As Job said man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upwards.  But perfected matured Love casts out fear.  Flushes it out.  Like waste.  Not needed.  

What is the source of fear?  It is believing we are alone.  That Spirit is not real or if Spirit is real  is punitive unpredictable cranky.  And you never know what Spirit can do:  sometimes heal sometimes not.  Hurt you or your kids to "teach you something".  And we know that we are by ourselves helpless and alone. Our science seems to confirm that we are an insignificant speck in an infinite waste of cold unfeeling galaxies and stars.  They look amazing but they don't care.  

I don't believe this to be true. Because one day walking back from the beach track in Seaford where I was living I met the great being who I knew was the one who had been Jesus of Nazareth.  And I wasn't at that time a "Christian".  I had been raised Catholic.  I had been looking for God since I was 8 years (roughly).  I did the things the nuns said.  I tried to read the Bible but couldn't get past the begats.  I had a luminous plastic statue of Mother Mary next to my bed which glowed in the dark and freaked me out.  I knew they didn't know God because some of them were very mean.  I went to mass by myself (since my parents were atheists) till I was 14 then decided I didn't care if I went to hell I wasn't going any more.  I gave my heart to the Lord at a Billy Graham convention at 16  and 1/2 but when I went to the local Anglican church the following Sunday it consisted of 4 very old people and a bored preacher.  So I went on a search through the  New Age and was a Sufi for 10 years.  But it didn't get me there. I couldn't connect to Spirit.  It did help me wake up spiritually though.  So when I met the Lord I knew who it was.  I didn't see Him (He was a male) with my outer eyes but in the Spirit.

He said something I didn't understand with my intellect but completely got with my inner self: He asked me: Do you want me to come into your heart?  I was so ready.  I said Yes.  I had tried everything and had hit the spiritual glass ceiling.  I knew Spirit was on the other side but couldn't get there.  I had as they say  come to the end of myself.   I felt Him come into my aura.  Not intrusive but a definite merging.   At that point I started watching Christian TV and understanding what they were talking about and I started  reading and studying the Bible. There are many things to be said about the Bible.  However if we read it under inspiration then it  documents Spirit's laws, helps us understand Spirit's ways and above all is a portal which gives us a connection to Spirit. 

I said all that to say this:  I started learning how not to fear.  I no longer felt alone.  Spirit is real and he did come and get me out of there.  Now this was a few years ago and I continue to learn and grow as I will through all eternity.  I started changing on the inside and the outside.  I started learning about divine healing and how to apply spiritual laws to finances amongst other things.  This was helped by many mentors who had learned and applied these laws and were called to teach them.  

I am a psychotherapist and psychology teaches how to manage fear.  But the goal is to have no fear. And it is achievable.  We are not alone.  

What about evil?

What about evil?

Evil is the elephant in the room.  Back in the 80's Scott Peck wrote an excellent book on the therapeutic journey called The Road Less Travelled which was a great success.  He followed up with a book called People of the Lie which simply dropped off the radar.  It was about 30 years ahead of its time.  Firstly as a child psychiatrist he noticed that some of the parents of the children he worked with had two significant qualities:  1. they always blamed the child and took no responsibility (the big lie) and 2.  they were very concerned about appearances. He called these people evil.   His solution was also a little off putting to many.  He turned to the only place that seemed to have any answers in regard to dealing with evil.  These were  religious institutions who practised exorcism as a solution to the problem of evil. 

Psychology and psychiatry have used the label "psychopath" later softened to "sociopath. The problem was it was simply a label not a diagnosis.  It certainly described behaviours which included the ones Scott Peck noticed, together with others such as they appear to be cold charming manipulative and like to hurt people.  It seemed to be implying that this condition was a psychological condition with possible treatment along with depression and anxiety.   However there was no real understanding of the condition nor was there any treatment.

Then in 2011 BBC Horizon ran a documentary called "Are you good or evil".  You can watch it on Vimeo.  Everyone should see.  It is cutting edge science.  There are many interesting things about things documentary but two stand out:  firstly it is cutting edge science using neuroscience and the technology of brain scans as well as scientific investigation into the chemicals that seem to be present or absent which are related to compassion.  The key thing is that it is proposing that evil is fundamentally  a genetic disorder like Huntington's disease or spina bifida, not a psychological one. Everyone should watch this video.  The documentary explored two groups serial killers and CEO's of companies:  25% of the CEO's had the distinctive brain pattern.  What is not yet known is how this is distributed in the general population.

As a clinical psychologist and psychotherapist as well as spiritual seeker, I deal with the nature and effects of evil behaviour as reported to me by my clients ranging in ages from 8 to 80.  I have been working in the area of developmental trauma (early abuse and deprivation) for over 25 years.  I have heard consistent and awful stories of the behaviour of people to their children and to their partners.  I have done a considerable amount of workplace counselling so there is also the bullying and persecuting behaviour of people in the workplace to employees staff and co workers. 

Evil is real.  As a genetic disorder we do not have solutions or treatments at this time: we don't yet do brain transplants.  A scientist is working on synthesising compassion chemicals and scientists are able to change the DNA of organisms.  People who have the genetic disorder usually do not think there is anything wrong with them and blame others (as Scott Peck noted). They would not voluntarily seek out treatment.  Unless they break the law they are unlikely to get caught.  My hunch is that they are more widely distributed in the gene pool than we might think, looking at human history and current human behaviour.  The really challenging news is that we all have some corrupted genes:  we all have evil within us to some degree as well.

Ultimately I believe that the question of evil is a spiritual question with spiritual answers.  This simply means our science has not yet fully caught up since scientific knowledge usually takes time to catch up with spiritual knowledge.  In the spiritual law in Isaiah it is stated that time can travel backwards or forwards.  This knowledge did not emerge fully into Western Science till the early 1900's  with the understanding of the arrow of time not operating at the quantum level (and going only forwards as time appears to. 

Our science now says evil is real:  a genetic disorder that can be identified.  Scientists are looking for answers.  Psychology and the study of human nature has much to say about evil inside as well as outside of us.  It is something Jung wrote about in depth and often as did his peers like Robert Assagioli and Sigmund Freud.  We cannot look into evil without looking into human consciousness and what Joseph Conrad rightly termed "The Heart of Darkness". One of the best portrayals of evil has be Marlon Brando's portrayal of the colonel in Apocalypse Now.  The question is Where do we go from here?

Good or evil?

BBC Horizon made a ground breaking documentary about 5 years ago.  Google  [ "Are you good or evil?" youtube 1hr documentary] to find it.  Everyone should see it. It is presenting cutting edge scientific evidence that evil is a genetic disorder.  Why does this matter?  Firstly because it means evil is real and identifiable even if we don't yet have the technology to do anything about it. Secondly because it means it is not just a moral or religious judgement and thirdly because it means it is not just a psychological problem and the result of a bad childhood.  We cannot fix a problem if we don't know what we are dealing with.  As a matter of interest science has again caught up with teachings from the spiritual law.  Jesus said that there were two species wheat and darnel.  Darnel is a weed that looks like wheat when it is green.  It is invasive and destructive and intertwines its roots with the wheat and kills it. When it matures it is black upright and twisted unlike wheat which is golden and bowed down with grain.  The metaphor of "intertwined" is interesting.  Firstly the evil is in the gene pool in the DNA.  Not only has science found that it is possible to change the DNA when it was thought previously it couldn't be changed, and not only can it be changed in one generation but scientists using scissor enzymes are working on changing the DNA in small organisms.  There is another connotation to intertwined:  that the darnel and wheat the good and evil ones are interwoven into our families and our communities.

According to the documentary people who are termed evil have a different brain pattern that can be recognised by amongst other things gaps in the frontal lobe which governs cognitive functions, an extra gene called the "warrior" gene and a lack of chemicals associated with compassion.  Two groups were looked at serial killers and CEO's of companies.  It turned out 25% of this latter group had the different brain pattern. There are scientists working on synthesising compassion chemicals and maybe one day soon we will be able to do brain transplants or give people compassion injections.  In the meantime they are people who are characterised by coldness and emotional and physical violence to others.  They seem to like seeing people suffer.  If they rule a country they cause havoc.  If they have a family they are extremely destructive to their children.  Especially as seems to often happen they marry someone like themselves.  They are very good actors and often are involved in church groups and on the local Council and use philanthropic activities as a cover because they know people don't like the way they really are.  They generally don't think there is anything wrong with them and tend to blame others including their children for their behaviour.  Back in the 80's Scott Peck the author of  The Road Less Travelled and a child psychiatrist wrote a book called People of the Lie.  He used the term evil to describe the parents of the children he worked with.  He noticed two characteristics they shared:  they blamed others  and they were very concerned about appearances.  The book was ahead of its time and "dropped off the radar".

The BBC documentary goes to a place of compassion.  There was a court case in Tennessee where a man committed a horrible violent crime  A psychiatrist presented the evidence of his genetic condition and  in a landmark decision the jury came back with a finding of involuntary manslaughter on the grounds that the man couldn't help what he did.  He couldn't help his genes or the horrible childhood he had which may have potentiated his genes even more.  But he was never to be released.  Compassion is the order of the day since people cannot help and do not want to help their genetic disorder.  However these people are dangerous. And they are not just in some other country or some other decade they are here now and in our workplaces and families and communities.

I have strong spiritual beliefs.  Light is stronger than darkness and good stronger than evil.  Evil isn't sustainable because it destroys the host.  It is temporary.  I believe the spiritual technology is already available to deal with this condition:  it is the state of transformation called "being born again". I have experienced it and know of others who have been radically transformed  Science is working on catching up.

Spiritual laws: the Codes

Spiritual laws are real like physical laws.  They exist whether people know about them or not.  The law of cause and effect is a special case of the spiritual law of "what goes around comes around" or the law of seed and harvest:  plant corn you get corn.  Plant thistles you get thistles.  The laws of physics were just as true 10,000 years ago as they are today:  it is just that no one knew about the laws of gravity and thrust or had the technology to build an aeroplane.  Though some dreamed like Da Vinci with his gyrocopter or Jules Verne writing about travelling to the moon.

Spiritual laws are higher order laws, that means they govern lower order laws like the laws of physics.  Just like the laws of the quantum realm which we can't see govern the natural world which we can see. Quantum mechanics is the most supported scientific theory that has been to this point.  Spiritual laws today are roughly like the laws of physics were 10 000 years ago:  they existed but very few knew about them then .  Most do not know about or understand spiritual laws today.  Spiritual laws are the codes or formulas which govern for right living.  Breaking them doesn't lead to punishment.  It leads to consequences.  If we jump off  a roof gravity dictates we will fall. It isn't anyone punishing us though the pain we feel may seem like it.  Gravity applies to everyone all the time.  Knowing about gravity however not only stops you trying to jump off things without a parachute it can ,together with other information, help you to fly.

The main spiritual law is the law of seed and harvest.  It is clearly reflected in the natural law and every farmer knows about it.  You sow what you reap: other things being equal.  As a spiritual law however it is even more significant.  The spiritual law says this:  the "seeds" are the words we speak not only out loud but inside ourselves.  if we want good "crop" we speak good words.  If we don't we will produce the result of bad words:  a bad crop. What goes around comes around.

Just as a farmer couldn't possibly be successful if he didn't know that seeds reproduce in the natural so we cannot be successful in life if we don't understand that what we say matters!  Not just what we say out loud but what we dwell on in our hearts and minds, what we mull over, obsess about at 4am  going over and over in our minds.  These words are seeds.  They create the conditions that produce what we are pondering on.  If we continually dwell on fear words and sickness words and words of not having enough or negative words about other people  that is exactly what will be created in our environment over time including the environment in our body which we call our health and well being. As Joyce Meyer a great teacher of the spiritual law said: unforgiveness is like taking poison and hoping someone else will die!   If on the other hand we dwell on good words true words positive words uplifting words compassionate words  then that is what will be created both within and without ourselves.

There is however an important proviso:  just exercising what we call "positive thinking" and "affirmations"  will not undo the usually unconscious negative words we might be saying in our deepest being. Our unconscious which we may be unaware of always rules the conscious.   Our unconscious is our operating system.  If it is faulty we have to fix it otherwise the positive thinking will not override it.   Just like with the computer: if we have operating system problems which we cannot see we cannot fix them by doing things on the screen we can see  We have to know that there is an operating system (some don't) we have to know how to get in there (some do) and we have to know how to to navigate through the blue screens to find and fix the faulty instructions (relatively few know how to do this )

We have to get in touch with our unconscious our operating systems and change faulty instructions and  replace outdated drivers.    Our beliefs are programmed in.  They can be wrong no matter how passionately we hold to them.  The earth is not flat and coloured people (yellow black or red)  are not inferior to white people. We can learn to re program. We were programmed through repetition and corresponding actions.  We can re program the same way.  Find a good coach someone who can help you if necessary.  Most of us come from deeply troubled families as Bessel Van Der Kolk's study on Developmental Trauma showed.  His book the Body Keeps Score is a great resource on programming and reprogramming. 

Spiritual laws embed spiritual Truth.  Truths work and lies don't.  If we align our words with spiritual truths like Do unto others as you would have them do unto you: and speak them to ourselves  and act on them they must come to pass.  It is spiritual law as inevitable as  the law of gravity that says if you jump off a roof you will fall or if you build an aeroplane according to laws of gravity and thrust you will fly.  Better to fly than fall. 

Why Codebreaking?

Life can seem like a code  to which someone forgot to give us the key.  It can then seem full  of mystery (and not in a good way).  It can be challenging difficult and frustrating and painful.  And we can't find the key to deciphering it though we try and no one else really seems to know either.   Or we are sidetracked from looking for the code or we are told there isn't one.   Because the life codes are actually within us as well as all around us.  But we need to have some basic information about how you recognise and decipher them.  It isn't that difficult but someone has to tell you.  An  example is learning to listen to our own inner guidance.  This is as fundamental  code and is something that will guide you right even when  other people or our programmed beliefs from childhood and from what we have learned tells us differently.  If we do learn to listen though and act on our inner guidance and do it consistently it will lead us right.   Every time.  So that is a true code:  to learn to listen to ourselves.

But in families that are stressful and troubled which  the latest research indicates is probably most families, we grow up disconnected from ourselves.  So we are not able to listen to ourselves.  We are then lost.  Our heads are full of information and mis-information.  And we cannot tell the difference.  True knowing is experiential. It is what Peter Levine an animal physiologist and traumatologist calls the "felt sense".  It is what Aristotle called wisdom: knowledge- in- action.  It is personal knowing which no one can give you and no one can take away.  Knowing the true code is not just an intellectual thing like knowing who was the 15th president of the United States.  It is knowing in our heart our gut it is experiential personal knowing.   If we know something in this way we will act on it.  Knowledge which has no application in life has no value.  If something is right it works if it is wrong it doesn't  Truth works. Lies don't.

So why codebreaking?  It is so we can have successful fulfilled lives  instead of feeling that life is incomprehensible  and disturbing.  When we start codebreaking we start feeling that we are part of life. And part of a greater Life.  We feel connected.  We feel connected to the animals and plants around us, we feel connected to ourselves and  to other people.  There is a felt sense of belonging not as for many people a sense of isolation and alienation. And a terrifying crushing loneliness.  Like we are looking at life through a plate glass window.

Instead you know that when the birds come in the morning they have come to say hello to you.  That when the koala turns up outside your front door and starts his song it is because he is letting you know that he is there so you can come out and say Hi to him. Or as I do sing him my song.  It is knowing that the magpie sitting on the dog pen with fishing line wound around his foot he has come to let you know that his foot is sore and he expects you to do something about it.  Of course you do.

The spiritual law is written in our hearts and it is evident around us in Nature. It is also contained in what is called the Bible  though there is a true code to it being revealed.  It can only be discerned by a spiritually awakened heart.  This is a true code.  And what is revealed are the spiritual laws the codes for an effective life. Spiritual laws work and religious laws don't.    The spiritual law says we don't feel whole unless we are connected to the natural environment because we are part of those living organisms and beings and they are part of us.  For us to be whole we have to be in union with the living beings that comprise our biosphere.  One of the great Native American chiefs Sitting Bull wrote in a letter  to the American Government about the destruction of the land:  if people get too far from nature they get crazy.  That is absolutely true.  So the answer to the question Why codebreaking? is so that we can learn the true codes and make life the successful joyful adventure it is supposed to be and  learn to recognise false codes so we are not misled..

Who are we really?

We are a spirit with a soul in a body.  I spent 6 months trying to have an "out of body" experience.  I had some strange things happen including getting stuck at my feet and coming back in my body and not being able to move for what seemed like a very long time: probably about half an hour.  But one sunny afternoon in Eltham  I flipped out of my body and went off on a journey leaving my body lying on the bed.  I seemed to go back in time to Vienna around the turn of the century and following the sound of a piano saw some hands playing the piano and they were old hands.  I realised they were mine.  I then looked out through the thick red velvet curtains on the street and saw horses and carriages.  Then I came back into my body.  I never felt the need to do it again.  I found I can travel further and easier with the mind.  But I learned that  I definitely was not my body.  Many cultures and all spiritual paths talk of leaving the body and of "astral" travel.

How do we know we are a spirit? the same way we know we are alive.  It is not something that can be justified by reasons.  It is experiential knowledge: personal knowing that can only come from experience.  It is what Peter Levine calls "the felt sense" a whole body awareness not an opinion or an idea which is intellectual.  Experiential knowing cannot be transferred.  If someone doesn't believe they are a spirit you cannot persuade them.  It is like eating a peach:  if someone hasn't eaten a peach you might be good at describing the experience but they will have to eat a peach for themselves to find out what that experience is like.

In the terms of modern physics  matter and energy are interchangeable (E =m multiplied by c (the speed of light 186,000 miles per second) squared).  Thank you to dear Albert (Einstein).   What we see with our senses as solid matter is really according to quantum physics vibrating packets of energy with large spaces in between.  According to the latest view in quantum physics the fundamentals of matter are not teensy weensy particles or quanta but rather can only be described in terms of the qualities of sound:  frequency and amplitude..  Basically this means the fundamentals of matter can only be described in terms that describes sound waves:  frequency: how fast are the waves are coming and amplitude:  how big they are.    This would be no surprise to Hindu teachings on spirituality which has since the Vedas were written 10,000 years ago regarded Sound as the basis of Creation.  Neither would it surprise  Christians Jews or any who reads the Codebook we call the Bible:  Genesis 1:1 says: "In the beginning was the Word......".  A Word is Sound made by a voice.  So to say we are a spirit is to say we are energy vibrating at a higher frequency in a body which is energy vibrating at a lower frequency.

However there are huge ramifications to accepting that we are spirits in a body. As someone said the body is our "earth suit" we can't live on the earth without one.  How did we get here? Where were we before we were in the body and where are we going after we leave the body? What is our relationship to the Great Spirit as the Native Americans so aptly  call the Spirit?  If we are a spirit with consciousness and awareness are other beings such as plants and animals also spirits in bodies?  Many would say undeniably Yes. I know my dog Grace has a soul and is an "angel with fur" and a spirit. 

I know that my German Shepherd girl Taj who came to visit me often after she passed and  was seen by friends and family members) is definitely a spirit.   And can we commune with what people call the Universe (rather than using the religiously loaded term God)?   God is actually derived from a German word Gott which means a supreme being whoever and whatever we conceive them to be.   I prefer the Hebrew Yahweh:  when this is translated it means the yearning burning passionate one (Yah) who manifested  or fell from a higher to a lower place (hayah) by the Breath (ruach or spirit in Hebrew) which refers to the spoken Word.    Why? to make things whole.  The word translated incompletely as "save" means make whole in both Hebrew (yasha) and Greek (sozo).  Nice thought.  

Sometimes we spend a lot of time searching for something which is right under or sometimes right on our noses (like glasses).  The spiritual law says the Word is close to you:  in your mouth and in your heart (Romans 10:8). Rumi the great mystic Sufi poet wrote  "My love, you are closer to me than myself" talking of the One whom he knew intimately as his Lover .  Jesus said "The Kingdom is within you".  Maybe we should make time in our busy, device-filled, distracting world to consider the question:  Who am I really?