It's really an inside job.
“The power of a car is separate from the way the car is driven.”
Edward de Bono, English psychologist, b.1933
If you’ve spent any time wondering about, and questioning life, (and it always shocks me, but many do not) you’ve no doubt reached an understanding of how significant “perspective” is. And how changeable. Different variables; different perspective. Different person; different perspective. Different day; different perspective. Our perspectives are living, changing moments of vision. As much as we might like to think they are constant, they are not. Because we are not constant. We are ever changing. And so our perceptions change with us, for they are simply our unique, subjective viewpoint.
The naysayers will vehemently protest that this is absurd. They will roll their eyes, shake their heads and say, “You can’t change reality. It’s just the way it is. Black and white.”
And then they might have a drink and see it all differently. Ah, that famous altered state of consciousness cocktail. Or as they grow older, they might see it differently. But they may never see that they see it differently, saying instead: “It’s changed. The world has changed. I still see it as black and white.” And if that works for them, let’s just leave them be.
But the rest of us can admit that really, it’s all gray. Really, it’s always changing and we change along with it. Because we all have such a unique angled view of the world and ourselves. Because our perspective is slightly different from our neighbours. Because time changes that view. Our own personal experiences alter that view. What we read or see changes that perspective. And ultimately, we can become aware that our perspective is really a matter of choice.
We call the level of reality that we all more or less agree on, consensus reality, or primary reality. It’s very basic. An apple to me is an apple to you, kind of agreement. Our laws and morals are composed from consensus reality, claiming wrongs and rights and goods and bads. And even though artists, theorists, conspiracists, philosophers, creators, inventors, romantics can all subscribe to their own specific channel of reality, unless you subscribe to that channel, it probably won’t be your operating system. (Just the software you use that evening at the illusionist’s stage show, or the software you use at the abstract art exhibit. Just enough minor change in perspective to believe in their viewpoint, and have fun, or perhaps buy a painting.) But most of us operate more or less from this flat-reality, detouring slightly under the influence of altered states of consciousness (alcohol, drugs, sleep deprivation, and the like) or, intrigued by expanded perspectives (philosophy, hearing a speakers tale, endorphin highs, etc.) But we don’t typically allow that shift in perspective to affect our life and our vision of life, as we continue living it.
But we can.
We can define consciousness (or expanded awareness) as our primary reality. We can develop a trust of it as our major belief system, making the physical reality, (the flat-reality, as I see it) the illusory one. We can choose to see that there is more to life than the flat-reality, and we can invite or engage those perceptions into our viewpoint, if we want to live in that sense of more. And if we want to establish a significantly brighter perspective. And life.
Our physical brain is built for it. Consciousness is identified as a “phenomenon that arises as a result of the number of interconnections among neurons in the brain.”1. We have a fully built-in ability to be aware of ourselves as a “broad, deep, continuous entity across time.” 2. We call this type of consciousness, autonoesis and it’s completely recognized as a facet of our make-up. We have some vital, tangible components within us, to substantiate our ability to trust that there is more to life – more to living - than meets the eye.
Our choice of perception though is not just in what we do. It’s in how we do it. Of course. We know this in our heads but so often forget it, as we live our lives. The how-factor is a non-linear, multi-facetted experience that’s always difficult to explain to another, because it’s so personal. Try explaining love to someone. Tell them how love has so many layers and dimensions of experience and see if they can feel it by your description. Of course they can’t. Not enough. Which is why people say that until you’re in love, you can’t know what it’s like.
Reality is the same thing. The flat-reality is the baseline for the three-dimensions of physical matter that is only one channel. And there are a multitude of channels of reality. Without knowing that, we typically pick our favourite channel. The one that works for us, the one we were taught, or the one we taught ourselves. Maybe the one we see others using, or the one we were told we should strive for. Perhaps our perspective, our channel of choice, challenges us, or makes us feel good. Or perhaps our choice makes us feel bad, but we keep on that channel regardless, thinking we don’t have any other choice, telling ourselves, “life is hard; I was dealt a bad hand; I have to do it this way”, and other limited justifications.
Regardless of which choice of perspective we use, that channel is how we therefore connect to life. It’s our viewing window. And we look at everything in the world and everything within ourselves through this specific channel.
That’s powerful.
That means our choice of perspective can make or break us. It means our perspective can deliver us happiness or sorrow. That it can even differentiate between the two. Or that it may even want to.
The sad part is that most of us do not even know we have the power to change the channel and alter our programming. We think that even if we do, it’s only for a short time and then, well, you know, I am what I am and that’s the truth and I can’t escape it. !
So it takes a lot of something for us to switch the channel and find another perspective on life that works better for us. And then it takes a lot of something else to keep us on that channel through whatever adjustment periods we may go through.
Sounds simple enough. But I want to make it even simpler.
Life is constantly providing us with opportunities to shift our perspective, because we are constantly experiencing life. And it’s in those experiences that the power of choice lays. If we can see these life experiences in a different light, we can use them to continually shift our perspective again and again and again. And then it adds up. Then it builds momentum. Then we have a new operating system in place.
I like to roll the whole thing into one big ball, one big theme, and call the process of expanding our perspective, “meditation”. That’s the biggest word that fits. And it’s the most fitting, because meditation is a natural state of perspective expansion. For a while, forget what you may have heard or read or tried with regards to meditation. That was then and this is now. New day; new perspective. If you’re still with me, let my words shift your preconceived ideas of what meditation really is.
The best choices we have to live our best life seem to lie in our selection of experiences. I’ve spent my life experiencing. So have you. I was educated in non-ordinary states of experiences (transpersonal psychology, clinical hypnotherapy, etc.) and I was attracted to that education because I found myself so often in those states and it seemed important enough to ask why. Which led to asking other important questions, from those states. Why did I have the family life I had? Why did I have the kind of response to it that I did? Why did I have the kind of other relationships that followed those primary ones? Why did I expand beyond the physical view and into the expanded perspective? Those may be your questions too. Or not.
There are many ways that meditation and life share the same space. Many ways in which meditations assist us in our lives. And many ways that life assists us in our meditations.
Ever since I was little I believed there was something dignified and mysterious about meditation and about those that meditated. As though there was something magical about those who hummed on a different channel. I never knew that I was doing the same thing. That meditating, done in a natural and modern way, represents who we are and what we are doing in our life. We’ve evolved and so has meditation. It is not something purely ethereal and separate from our human existence. Meditations are an extension of our human existence. They are completely about our human life and they help make it run smoother. Yeah.
So there are options out there. Or in here. Options that help us reconcile meditation with life. I have experienced and witnessed four distinct ways that life gifts us with the opportunities to enter into the meditative zone, naturally and without force. A zone that represents a choice of perspective on how we see and feel about ourselves and the world around us. Four opportunities that invite us to answer that call of our wild nature, that call of our undomesticated side. Four avenues to feel the pleasure. These are the moments when we can melt into another offered energy, become the offered energy, and boldly, passionately engage with the experience all around and within us. We can emerge from the cocooned self directly into the essence of life. Into the best of life. Asking, how alive am I willing to be? These are fresh, unbridled moments. Who could resist?
1. R. J. Larsen and B. L. Fredrickson, “Measurement Issues in Emotional Research,” in Well-Being, 40-60
2. Tulving, “Memory and Consciousness,” Canadian Psychology 26: 1-12 (1985)
Jonni's writings have appeared in The Common Ground, The Good Life in Vancouver, First Lines, The Intuitive Connections Network, The Good Life Connoisseur, Planning For Profit, Burnaby Now and other local and national publications.
