Entrepreneur

I often struggle to understand the meaning behind what many of you say on here when you use the words "conscious" and "consciousness". When you say one person is more conscious than another, what do you mean by that? Clear communication is a strong desire of mine. So please help me understand what you mean.

I get this sense that many people on this forum (perhaps all - I don't know) possess a mental paradigm of believing that achieving a higher level of being conscious is ultimately the highest possible achievement in life- Kind of like it sits at the top of Maslow's Pyramid if Maslow had included it in his theory of human needs. I am interested in a few questions: 1) Is that what you believe? 2) Do you think that is what every human's same highest brick is on their pyramid whether they realize it or not? 3) Do you believe something entirely different and if so, please explain.

Sounds a lot like the Mormons who tell me I am going to hell for not believing in their dogma. Just sayin.

I don't think you understood what I was asking. I am saying, who cares? If someone is not seeking a deeper spiritual connection or understanding because they simply aren't interested in doing so, why is it anyone else's concern? Isn't it a person's choice to make on their own as a human, trying to determine their best path in life?

What about all the humans who aren't spiritual seekers because they are either comfortable with their own spiritual understanding or simply disinterested in it entirely?

I don't understand what you mean by the question or what the purpose would be. Why bother predicting what everybody values the most? It is merely a decision they make and continue to make as they go through life. Why not just ask them if you want to know? And what does it matter what the end goal of spiritual practice is in relation to what a person chooses as being important to them in life? On a separate note, I would love to know what you like, dislike, agree with, or disagree with about my paradigm that I presented above?

Just trying to understand. It seems that even though everybody on this forum is talking about "being conscious" there isn't an agreed upon general meaning of the phrase. This is very annoying to someone who thirsts for clear communication. Because when I see someone mention it, I think to myself - WTF is this person even talking about. Then when I ask them, all I get are parables or beat around the bush ideas or half answers. Not one person here can define it? I just want to understand what a person is actually saying when they are speaking. I think humans have brains. If you are telling me that "being conscious" or "consciousness itself" (two different things I presume) have nothing to do with humans or the existence of the human body, that's cool. Then what are they? Just a spiritual sensation? Some imaginary thing that people can sense but can't even define, but they are convinced it exists anyway?

It depends on the person. Not everyone believes in God or a God. If they don't believe in God, then obviously they would choose something else as their highest achievement, no?

I’d love to share my views. Forgive me for the length. I will try to make it short yet comprehensive enough to get my points across. My view is a modified version of Abraham Maslow's theory. It is important to note that Maslow did not present his theory of needs as a pyramid. The pyramid was added later by other people. Maslow believed that there was some hierarchy to needs, but that they all exist simultaneously, with a person working to satisfy different needs at different locations in the hierarchy at all times. Shaping them as a pyramid tends to distort their meaning somewhat in an unintended way. (This is the same beef I have with Spiral Dynamics because I don’t think they are stages that progress in a specific order, but rather they all exist simultaneously as choices a person can make for their own logically explicable reasons.) I believe the first three categories of human needs are in fact strictly hierarchical with the lower needs demanding satisfaction before a person will care about anything else above them. Because of this, I would display them as a pyramid. The base category of my pyramid would be ”immediate physical safety from any life-threatening situations”. The second brick would be “minimally acceptable levels of physical and mental health”. Third would be “a source of enough stable basic income” to provide for other survival needs such as food, clothing, shelter, transportation, etc. Those are all survival needs of any person living in a first-world country. (I would reword it, removing “basic income” if we are talking about people outside of a first-world country, because they might provide their survival needs through methods other than buying them with money.) After a person’s survival needs are met, come desires. It is better to call them desires rather than needs because a person doesn’t need them to live. They desire them because each of us has a fundamental motivation to thrive in life. We try to satisfy all these additional desires in an effort to thrive more (meaning to avoid immediate pain or suffering, enjoy life more, and derive satisfaction from it) I think of these other desires as existing on a priority list rather than a pyramid because some of them will carry equal weight to others. Above survival needs, the next on a typical person’s priority list would be a toss-up between self-esteem and love, depending on the person and whether they are lacking a significant amount of either. After that, the choices of what comes next on the priority list depends entirely on the person, their personality, their beliefs, their upbringing, their decisions, etc. There are many other things that could appear higher on a person’s list including, sexual gratification, career goals, educational goals, family goals, spiritual aspirations, seeking autonomy, financial safety, financial prosperity, relationship goals, health goals, etc. In my paradigm, seeking spirituality is nothing more than a personal decision. It ranks at a different spot on everyone’s priority list according to their own personality, beliefs, and desires. I don’t believe it is fundamental to humanity at all. In fact, I believe there are numerous people who would not place it anywhere on their priority list at all because it completely lacks any meaning in their lives whatsoever. Yet you will not find a single human who does not need food, water, shelter, safety from immediate physical harm, etc. Those are fundamental human needs that apply across the globe to every single human. Once we get past those “survival” needs, everything else is up for question and debate about where it ranks on a person’s priority list and why it ranks there if it even appears there at all. Spirituality and what I think people on this website are referring to as “being conscious” is merely another possible choice of aspirations someone may or may not choose in life at all. And the reasons for that are mostly due to things such as the circumstances the person was born into, who his parents were, what his family was like, what beliefs his family had, what his friends and other influencers believed, how he was raised, who he chose to befriend, as well as a million other variables based on the individual choices this person has made in life about what matters to him and what doesn’t.

What you are describing here is, in my paradigm, nothing more than a human accessing their prefrontal cortex (short-term working memory) instead of relying on their long-term implicit memory. Here is what I mean. Humans are fundamentally decision-making machines. Everything you do in life, every action you take, is either a decision you are making right now because you are thinking about it and choosing to do that, or it is a decision you have previously made that you are repeating. For example, you get out of bed. You have a routine that you do pretty much on autopilot without giving it any meaningful thought. Every step you take in your morning routine is you repeating a decision that you made earlier in life. Those decisions are embedded in what people refer to as the subconscious or what scientists might refer to as long-term implicit memory. Things that exist in long-term memory do not require much brain energy at all to access. The reason you can drive a car to work everyday without thinking about "how" to get there is because the trip and even alternate routes for the trip are deeply engrained in your long-term memory. So your brain can easily recall them with very little stimulus at all. This allows you to focus your attention on something else "to actively think about something else" even while you are driving from point A to B. The act of "thinking" of "focusing your attention on something" is nothing more than you activating your brain's prefrontal cortex (working memory) to analyze complex data in order to make a new decision about something, anything. Once a decision has been made with conviction, that decision gets moved through a chain of steps, eventually residing in your long-term memory. Now, it can be accessed using very little brain power (energy) to recall it for use at any point in life from then forward. Humans are not designed to make every decision moment to moment using their prefrontal cortex. They are designed to use their prefrontal cortex to do heavy lifting for short bursts in order to make decisions. Then those decisions (just the ones in which we have convictions) get moved into long term memory (what you would call subconscious) where the brain no longer needs high energy demands to access them. Humans are fundamentally designed to go through their day mostly on mental autopilot just as a way to conserve precious energy. Throughout most of humanity's existence, energy (calories) was scarce. Calories aren't scarce anymore. But throughout humanity's existence until agriculture was systematized, calories were scarce. So based on what you said I would interpret it as meaning - A person who is being more "conscious" than another is simply one person using their prefrontal cortex (actively and intentionally thinking about whatever they are doing at that moment) rather than a person who is currently allowing their long-term memory autopilot to keep repeating old decisions. Is this accurate?

Interesting. I suspect many here see it the same way as you. Thank you for the direct answers.

What is this "hard" thing you speak of that is hard for 99.9 percent of people?

Thank you master Yoda.

Aware of what? So a human is more aware than a dog and a dog more aware than an ant? Are they really more aware or do you mean one is more intelligent than the other? What do you mean when you say that your experience of life goes beyond that of most humans?

Interesting. So in your paradigm, would you say a more conscious person accepts and focuses on things like beauty, love, joy, and peace while rejecting or ignoring anxiety, frustration, suffering and doubt? Or would you explain it some other way?

Perhaps there are or should be better words to describe what people mean when they use the words "conscious" or "consciousness"?

Then what parts of me are conscious and which are not?

Ok. So being conscious means being more focused on the present moment? So a person who is more conscious than another is simply more focused on the present moment than the other person he is being compared to? And then "consciousness" is a state of spiritual existence? Are these descriptions accurate in your view?

@Nemo28 Your explanation doesn't help. So a person who is more conscious than another is simply a person who has abandoned more beliefs in more things until they reach a place of not believing anything at all?

Words have meaning; otherwise, why use them at all? I am trying to get at what people here mean when they use those words "conscious" and "consciousness". If there is something that is and something that observes what is, then what is "consciousness" or being "conscious" in relation to that?

Okay. So being more conscious means adopting the belief that I don't exist and that I am hallucinating? So a person who is more conscious means that they have adopted this belief?

Google tells me this Google's description is how I have always thought about it. You guys are making me think that the words "conscious" and "consciousness" are the wrong words for what you are trying to describe. @Hojo Seems like you are describing a belief. A belief that humans don't really exist and that you are just an invisible puppet master controlling the strings of a marionette. Like the invisible and spiritual wizard of Oz behind the curtain. Is this what you mean? Being more conscious means adopting that belief? @theleelajoker So a conscious person is just more aware? Why not use the words "more aware" in place of consciousness then? Wouldn't that make for a clearer understanding? Or does it mean something else?

So a person who is more conscious than another is more "nothing" than the other person? I am no clearer on what that means. What does it mean when one person is more conscious than another?

I am in my fifties. I am still friends with every girl I ever dated seriously, including my first high school sweetheart (we both lost our virginity to each other). My wife is also friends with them. She shares a bond with them of knowing me on a deep level, as well as knowing what I look like naked. They all seem to get along quite well. They can crack jokes about me together as they can all relate to me on a level that others can't. Each breakup was painful, some more than others, and each required some time completely apart from the other person in order for me to heal emotionally. As you get older and keep maturing, you may realize that it was a good thing that you broke up with this other person who wasn't a good enough fit. It is better to have broken off the relationship so that you could find someone who is a better fit, rather than having gone on to marry them at some point and just end up divorced. Looking back, I am convinced I would have been divorced by now if I had stayed with any of those previous women. Instead, I am in a much stronger marriage with a wife who happily lets me lead the relationship and really shares the same values as me. I can't imagine kicking these other women to the curb for life just because one of us decided the other person wasn't marriage material. They are still all people I care deeply for. In some cases I am still good friends with their families. I have attended their parents' and siblings' funerals. My wife and I have been invited to and attended their family gatherings. I consider myself fortunate to still have this level of connection to those people who were extremely important to me at earlier points in my life. They are all still part of my extended social circle. I intend to maintain these relationships for the rest of my life, so long as I still feel enriched by them. If you can get to a point where you can savor the relationship you have with this ex-lover without any desire to be intimate with her again, I think you will find that it greatly benefits your life. I am sure you both still love each other to some extent on some level that does not involve sexual intimacy. I would not totally discard such a deep and meaningful relationship. Those deep relationships are precious. They are the true riches of life. You realize that more and more the older you get.

All over this site, I see numerous members referring to the Spiral Dynamics model of human and societal development as being taken for granted truth about how humans and societies work. What if the model you are basing your thinking around isn't even accurate? What if you have your ladder leaning against the wrong wall and you keep climbing it anyway? Have you ever carefully thought about it, scrutinized it, and questioned whether or not the theory is even based in truth? Or did you just accept it and run with it because other people have done so, and it is easier to just agree with them? Here are some things to ponder: 1 - Humans are 99.9% identical in DNA, whether they live in a first-world country with all the technological advances it has, or if they live in some tribe in a jungle or desert halfway across the world. 2 - Fundamentally, humans, regardless of where they are located in the globe, are driven in life by the exact same underlying forces of human nature. You and the Pygmy are no different in this regard. Compare yourself to any of the many evil dictators the world has seen throughout history. You and he are no different in terms of your human nature. Your personalities might be different. Your priorities in life might be different. Your beliefs might be different. But, at your core, your human nature is no different. They were also driven to acquire safety, basic resources, love, belonging, self-esteem, etc. 3 - Whether a group of people (call it a country, community, or whatever) decides it wants to exist as economic equals or not has nothing to do with whether that community is "more evolved" than any other community anywhere in the globe. The same is true whether a group of people is more concerned about the well-being of every single member of the community or less concerned. That decision that each of us makes on our own has more to do with individual personality traits and the programmed belief system that we get programmed with starting in our youth. It has nothing to do with being "more evolved." The reason I mention this is because I see so many decisions and opinions on this forum shaped and based under the assumption that their model of how the world works is accurate. I suggest that this Spiral Dynamics model isn't accurate in the sense that it claims one color as being more "evolved" than another. Using the word "evolved" suggests that communities, states, countries, whatever, will eventually reach Green, Yellow, or Turquoise as they evolve. It also makes the "unstated assumption" that a community based on principles that would make it Green, Yellow, or Turquoise is superior in some way to all the so-called "lesser evolved" societies. I would suggest that this idea is nothing more than the authors who think themselves to be "morally superior" to the rest of the world trying to convince you to conform to their belief system. I suggest they are not evolutionarily superior to anyone else. They just think very highly of themselves and want all of humanity to adopt the same mental paradigms and belief systems that they hold. Is the Spiral Dynamics model truly accurate?