What is Higher Consciousness? - IV
This very sentiment is often expressed by people who lose their lower self willy-nilly after a near brush with death. They say things like, “Now, I’m just taking it one day at a time.” What they are saying is that their eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation with their death has forced them to drop their self-pity: their customary moods and concerns. They lighten up, stop clinging to things, stop resenting the past and worrying about the future. They become more selfless (closer to Higher Consciousness).
Higher Consciousness means that, while both good and bad things still happen to the person, there’s not as much of a “me” there that things are happening to. There’s less personal stake in what happens. Situations just unfold under their own momentum. Things are taken in stride – philosophically, not personally.
Erasing self-pity is not easy or fun; indeed, it’s quite painful. St. John of the Cross characterized it as the Dark Night of the Soul. Since it is our mind, our constant thinking, which stabilizes our reality and which brings the waking world into focus, erasing it means losing our mind. Acting with Higher Consciousness means letting go of everything that we cling to; and of course sanity is one of those things.
Another way of looking at our lower self is to think of it as consisting of concentric rings of decreasing importance, like the layers of an onion. The brain is at the center. The rest of the body forms the next ring. Possessions and intimate relationships form another ring. Religion, country, hobbies, favorite sports team are an outer ring; and so on. If any of these rings are threatened, then most people feel that their self is threatened.
Take, as an example, how most Americans felt about the attack on the World Trade Center in 2001. They felt as though they, personally, had been attacked. Thus it is true to say that to most Americans, the World Trade Center was a part of what they considered to be their self.
From the point of view of Higher Consciousness, however, the self is everything. In other words, to get to our Higher Consciousness, instead of using our brain and body as a central point of reference, we use the world as a whole. To actually make this shift is not an intellectual feat but an emotional one. It involves opening our hearts – having compassion for everything instead of just our onion rings. To connect to your higher consciousness, try using this creative visualization:
Feel that you are truly connected to the universe;That you have been chosen to save the world; That you have been chosen to reach out to every being that comes in contact with you;That your love knows no bounds and gives you joy such as you never thought was possible.
Then go on to visualize how this is being expressed in ways that you would prefer. You can alter the basic formula at will to make it more meaningful to you personally. Do this visualization twice daily. You should become imbued with this visualization, thinking and feeling it all day long, like daydreaming, but in the present tense. Also every day you must sense your connectedness to all that is around you and to everyone you meet. Reject nothing and no one who comes your way. Little-by-little you’ll take possession of your Higher Consciousness and shed the lower one.
(excerpted from Magical Almanac Ezine. Copyright © 2007 by Bob Makransky, all rights reserved).
More of Bob Makransky’s articles are posted at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MagicalAlmanac/files