Altered States of Consciousness & Aspects of Awareness
February 16th, 2008 by John Wolfe
In my last post I discussed methods for taking an inner journey to discover your own personal truths. One of the methods mentioned for achieving this was using altered states of consciousness. When I refer to altered states, I’m not talking about taking the route Terence McKenna often employed for getting there.
I think the use of psychotropic agents is one of many methods for achieving legitimate altered states; however I’m concerned with having a more intentional, whole, fluid, and intact experience. I want to be completely aware of what’s occurring during the altered state and I want to have full recall of it after the fact; something that drugs may not always grant us. I’ve just never been into hallucinogens (or any other drugs for that matter) and choose to rely on deep meditation as my method for obtaining results. I don’t personally endorse the use of such agents. But I believe we can’t discuss the expansion of our consciousness without at least addressing the fact they play a prominent role in many experiences.
As an aside to what I just wrote- I think Terence McKenna was a fascinating person with awesome insights into existence. If you’re not familiar with his philosophies, I highly recommend doing a search for him on YouTube.
Now, what does it mean to achieve altered states of consciousness or perception?
In the loosest sense, it means to encounter other interpretations or translations of being than that which we typically associate with. It pertains to taking our consciousness and expanding it beyond the boundaries we primarily use for seeing, feeling, touching, thinking, and maneuvering. These altered states can occur within the context of our physical experiences or they can take place in other “worlds.”
An example of an interesting altered state occurring amidst seemingly ordinary physical perceptions would be the story I related about the hole, comprised of static, opening up in my bedroom ceiling. Even though I knew the hole wasn’t there in terms of my physical reality, there was a part of me that realized it did exist in another state, nonetheless.
An example of an altered state occurring in other worlds would be the out of body experience (OBE). Despite the terminology and description of OBE’s occurring out of the body, I’ve encountered information during projections which indicates they are actually a journey inward, further into consciousness or the inner-self I was referring to in Discovering the Truths of Your Existence.
The interesting thing about the experience with my bedroom ceiling was that it occurred immediately after an OBE, so there seems to be some residual lingering effects of traversing my inner nature, which applied itself to my physical environment after the fact. This is why I believe inducing altered states can have a profound impact upon our physical experiences, providing the opportunity for us to look out upon the physical world with a different set of interpreters.
Another example of this lingering effect took place a couple of weeks ago, after opening my eyes, during the initial stages of an afternoon out of body experience. I decided to check out the ceiling in my bedroom during the vibrational state that occurs prior to full detachment. I opened my physical eyes and allowed my vision to sharpen. I then focused on the ceiling light directly over my bed. I could still feel the waves of vibrations pouring through me and the light proceeded to take on these vibrations. It appeared partially solid and partially wave like. It was shaking at a dizzying rate.
I don’t believe OBE vibrations are a physical phenomenon which is affecting the body. I feel they are indications of our focus shifting into a “purer” state of awareness. I don’t think the light was shaking because my body was shaking; because it wasn’t. I believe I was interpreting the object from a state of awareness in between the wave frequency and particle pattern forming tendency of the object. It was as if it was moving in and out of my reality, from wave to particle and back again.
Now, these altered states of interpretation don’t just take place before or after an OBE. In my post If Walls Could Talk, I related some strange empathic experiences that seemed to be brought on from the dream state. I’ve had a reoccurring dream for years that crops up every so often. The contents of the dream are almost always wiped from my memory, despite always waking up in the middle of it. However, I know it’s the same dream because of the feeling it evokes as soon as I wake up.
Each and every time (after waking up) my normally familiar environment takes on a skewed, twisted impression. I feel as if the pre-dream me that’s become accustomed to viewing my world was only a portion of myself. After waking, it seems as if the post dream me is now entering into a strange foreign world where my previous perceptions were somehow invalid, at least in relation to the “me” that’s now awakened into them. The only way I can describe this scenario is in terms of using something visual. It feels as if I’ve awoken in an M.C. Escher drawing- not in a visually literal manner of course, but figuratively and emotionally speaking.
My home and surroundings have the usual, familiar and recognizable visual qualities, yet it feels like the “me” that’s normally living in this environment has taken a back seat. I feel as if someone else (another portion of me) has emerged and is trying to assimilate into the role the old me was playing the part of. This is why I can still recognize my surroundings, but there is a simultaneous foreign feeling that also emerges.
Accompanying these foreign feelings are strong impressions of emotion. I seem to be super sensitive and have a heightened awareness of emotion in my surroundings during these experiences. Depending upon the intensity, I usually feel assimilated back into my normal self within a few hours to days.
It’s a very bizarre dual experience with lingering effects. But I do appreciate it because it’s helped me tap into the awareness that we can become comfortable in our repetitive interpretations of our experiences. When these events come along and shake things up, I realize there are an infinite number of channels and ways of perceiving. It also suggests we may have multiple perceivers slightly shifting into and out of our experience (sometimes without our even knowing it). This brings me to a great theory on what may be causing these occurrences.
Jane Roberts (of The Seth Material) introduced Aspect Psychology in her book, Adventures In Consciousness
The signals are received by these personalities that are focused upon innumerable forms of varying dimensional realities. The specific focus personality we identify with is only one of many of these selves existing simultaneously throughout the broad spectrum of different planes of focus. Jane suggests each specific focus personality ordinarily receives one main signal, but by turning its abilities of perception off its home station, it can pick up on other realities and/or the other personality perceivers of those realities.
This means the aspect of awareness that’s reading this text is your focus personality in this form of reality, yet your source consciousness has many other focus personalities existing simultaneously throughout the broad spectrum of other realities. It also means if we “change the station” a bit, our focus personality may be slightly overridden by another channel; which is what I believe is happening to me during my dream triggers.
When I awaken, it’s almost as if I perceive two separate radio signals vying for the same spot on the dial. Both are audible and both belong to me (the source me), yet one is not usually focused upon my current version of reality and the other one is- hence the similar yet simultaneous foreign feeling associated with interacting in my present surroundings.
This may also indicate that another of my source’s aspect personalities is having a similar experience to the one I’m having at that exact same moment. We are both crowding the specific focus personality’s position on the hypothetical radio dial in each respective version of our separate realities. However, because the physical designation of John Wolfe is my specific primary focus in this dimension, I will almost always (at least until I pass on) interpret this effect through my current physical vehicle and interpretation of reality.
I believe we may encounter experiences, to greater or lesser degrees, of this phenomenon throughout our life. There are probably many instances and circumstances in which a bleed through among multiple focus personalities occurs. How often have we said or done things which seem extremely out of the ordinary and uncharacteristically like ourselves?
If the situation is extremely pronounced we can sometimes tap into a quick feeling of “observer and actor”; in which it feels like we are removed from the scenario and are witnessing our “actor-self” performing out of character. Aspects of the focus personality you identify with (as you) could also be crossing over into the other personalities’ realities as well.
Jane’s theory of Aspect Psychology also does an excellent job of explaining the mysteries of reincarnation and why the current moment of now is all that has ever existed. If we only truly exist in the moment of now, then how could we be incarnating chronologically? By understanding our source consciousness projects its awareness, from a timeless state, into multiple personalities that only appear to be moving through chronological and sequential sequences; we can develop a new understanding of past and future lives.
The problem with most interpretations on reincarnation is they ignore the fact that time ceases to be once we move beyond this plane of existence. Of course, the reason for this is still based in the premise that we are incarnating to resolve karmic debts. We have to disregard that dogmatic new age approach to be able to embrace a more powerful and logical explanation of human consciousness.
Using the idea of personality aspects, we can understand how we are living all of our lives simultaneously through each individual personality. This opens the door to understanding that we could also be living our future lives simultaneously as well. Each aspect of awareness is always being launched from the present powerful moment of now.
The aspect theory doesn’t negate the fact we still have full control over our life experience. We aren’t completely aware of the other aspect personalities due to compartmentalization. And even though there is always the potential for slight seepage into our experience, we still have free will and full rein over the development and evolution of our focus self. The only area I see this being an issue is with certain situations where the focus personality has seemingly lost its ability to sector off and compartmentalize the other aspects.
This leads us to the concept of multiple personality disorder and schizophrenia. Aspect Psychology could go a long way in helping us to better understand these misunderstood “disorders.” It’s quite possible that the only difference between people that are considered “normal” and those considered schizophrenic or suffering from multiple personalities is the ability or lack thereof to compartmentalize the information.
Maybe the seepage of information is in extreme overdrive in certain individuals. For some reason, their specific focus personality’s radio station is picking up many other frequencies, almost all of the time. In fact, the tendency is so strong at times; it actually cancels out the main focus personality all together and picks up another station entirely. For people that are that sensitive, it then becomes a case of confusing their reality with the realities of other aspect personalities.
Achieving altered states and recognizing aspects of our awareness provides a glimpse into the multidimensional abilities of consciousness and our psyche. Without delving into studying these events and phenomena, the psychological mapping and understanding of human awareness is incomplete.
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If Walls Could Talk
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