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Spirituality and the Qualiadelic Experience
September 7, 2008
Eckhart Tolle observes that "how spiritual you are has nothing to do with what you believe but everything to do with your state of consciousness. This, in turn, determines how you act in the world and interact with others." This dovetails nicely with the qualiadelic experience where we play with ideas and experiences as they take root in our consciousness.
With the qualiadelic perspective we learn to recognize the qualiadelic nature (attractiveness) of ideas as we ritual with them. Ultimately, this tempers the ego's need to cling to its beliefs, for in ritualing we soon discover (quite counter-intuitively) that traditions are fluid and changeable, leaving the ego without solid ground to stand on.
The ego, of course, is merely another idea, just like the beliefs to which it clings, which has taken root in the mind. But there are good ideas and there are bad ideas. Self is, maybe, just the good side of the ego, or perhaps it is a more holistic way of looking at the ego. It is not important. What is important is that Self is probably the oldest "belief."
The birth of our sense of Self occurred when the mind, or consciousness, first became aware of its own attractiveness, the way for eons previous it had already noticed the color of flowers, or the appeal of certain vistas or views, or the sound of silence. In short, the Self appeared when qualia leapt from the outside world into the mind.
Once in the mind qualia evolved -- a new life form -- into ideas, beliefs, traditions, and really all the world as we know it today. Now we cannot escape it; we have no privacy from the noise of our thoughts. We can not run away to the desert. We have only the word of others, like Tolle, that we can transcend the noise and acquire some spiritual awakening, and leave it behind.
The sociobiologist Richard Dawkins has suggested that the human body is merely the carrier of the true life forms, such as DNA and ideas (or memes). What this means is that if and when DNA and ideas find an improved vehicle for their replication they will move on; so, perhaps then we will attain our spiritual quiet and peace of mind.
In the meantime, we must practice our ritualing. We can do this and follow the path of spiritual practice or the path of science, or any other path, and live a more enlightened life in the here and now. The world may seem a mess, but it is not yet time to escape the present moment -- we are all too often in the past or the future as it is.
New ideas float down into our consciousness like seeds in the wind. They take root in our minds and they fight for survival with other seeds and other ideas. Democracy, free speech, human rights, and liberty -- they manifest themselves chaotically on our planet, just as they do in our minds. As we sort out the good from the bad in our minds they will make themselves right in the world.
What the qualiadelic experiences teaches us is that this process is not one of control. Ideas will not conform to reason or ritual any more than will a hurricane or a drought. However, just as a community learns to live with hurricanes or other natural disasters, so too can we learn to live in the world of ideas. Not as thinkers, though, but as ritualers.
Ritual is to the community what imagination is to the Self. Conscious ritualing, the craft of the qualiadelic experience, allows us to play with ideas, reinventing traditions and beliefs. By recreating our Selves we recreate our communities, and vice-versa. Instead of finding spirituality through escape we will discover it by exploring the intersection of the physical and symbolic worlds in which we live.
Be Qualiadelic. Be Conscious. Change the routine.
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