A Simple Model of Reality
An Introduction to my textual and visual language.
When it comes to explaining certain states of being, a consistent model of reality becomes really useful. Being a visual learner myself, I believe that it can be much easier to explain concepts like these with drawings. This post will define how I plan to use certain words and visual representations.
A Note to Atheists, Agnostics and Anyone Else who is Creeped Out by Religion
There will be a few spiritual concepts that I cover, but these concepts will not be functionally relevant to most of the ideas covered in this blog. That said, Trust Me… I Get It. I get why you would be turned off by God and/or religion in general. In most cases religion in this world has been corrupted. There are true pathways out there, but they’re hard to find. I was raised Catholic. I was raised to thank God for everything good that happened in my life. Well, there’s a logical equivalence that I made where if I have to thank God for all the good, then God must be allowing the bad. And there’s so much bad! The truth is, we’re responsible for our own lives and what we believe about our own lives. There are horrible things happening all over the world just as I type this, but the good news is for many of us, our suffering can be mitigated. And that is what this blog is about. Religious beliefs not required.
Ultimate Reality
AKA God, AKA The Universe, AKA Heaven, AKA Home. I’m sure there’s a bunch of other AKA’s, but I’m not that familiar with other religions. It’s not functionally relevant. Well, the New Message says that it is completely relevant, but whatever, let’s just move on.
Consciousness and Experience
When you really think about it, the only thing we can really prove about our experience, is that we experience it. Everyone can prove that they are conscious because we exist, and we’re aware we exist, and we experience things. At a fundamental level, that’s all there is. Still not quite relevant, let’s keep going.
Knowledge
AKA Higher Self, AKA Deeper Mind, AKA Holy Spirit, AKA Christ, AKA True Self, AKA Inner Person Self, AKA a million other things.
We can’t prove that a higher self exists, but we can prove that our thoughts and emotions are not who we are fairly simply. I’m going to provide a set of prompts. For each one, observe your thoughts, emotions and feelings.
A box full of kittens! Close your eyes and imagine a big box full of kittens getting poured on top of you. All that purring and meowing, and cuteness. Awwww.
Assuming you actually closed your eyes and experienced the kittens , lets move on to Donald Trump. His hair, his skin, his social media account, his immigration policies. You’re all alone with him. What would you say to him? What would he say to you? How do you feel about being with him?
Okay, now you’re in a burning building. It’s not just starting to burn, you woke up to a full-on inferno. The person you love most in the world is on the other side of the building. The only way out is through the door on the other side of the room. Judging by your room it will be just bad on the other side, but you have no choice but to run through the fire, grab that screaming hot door handle and hope for the best.
I’m sure you get the point. There is a part of our minds that can control our thoughts and emotions. This part of our mind doesn’t judge, it doesn’t compare and contrast, it doesn’t speculate, or hope, or fear. It doesn’t think the way we logically understand thinking. It accepts reality as it is. This is the part of our mind that is who we really are.
Knowledge is a term from my religion, The New Message. You can get the full definition from the source itself here. As an experience, Knowledge is usually felt internally and it’s different for everyone. I won’t go into that in this blog, but the best way to get in touch with this part of you is to find your spiritual path. If you haven’t found your path yet, I suggest the Steps to Knowledge.
Awareness
In this blog I’ll use awareness as descriptive. As in, where is your awareness? Awareness could be 100% in your mind. It could be 100% on YouTube. It could be split between your mind and your body. In illustrations I’ll circle different aspects of where awareness is split in certain states of mind. I’ll have some example drawings below, stick with me.
Inner Experience
Exactly how you would expect. Our experience consists of our inner experience and our outer experience. Inner experience is our feelings, traumas, instincts, triggers, love, fear, anger, etc. And of course, Knowledge.
Outer Experience
Also exactly how it sounds. Our 5 senses; seeing, hearing, touch, taste and… and… (had to google it) SMELL. How could I forget smell?
Overall, these are the fundamental building blocks of our experience in life.
Examples
Here are two quick examples of topics that I’ll cover more in-depth in later posts.
People Pleasing
Here we can see in this case our awareness is largely in our own mind. Some of our awareness is on the person we’re trying to be with, but mostly not. Also notice that awareness is not with Knowledge. No condemnation here, it’s just not the best way to be with someone.
Listening
Conversely, when listening intently very little awareness is in the mind, but we are with Knowledge.
Conclusion
So there we have it. Awareness, Knowledge, Inner Experience, and Outer Experience. Hopefully this model will help to explain some ideas that can be difficult to explain in words. Next up?! My model for healing and the relief of suffering.