Through the looking glass - Expanded states of consciousness

Welcome to this series of blog posts about expanded states of consciousness.

I will post a series of blogs to discuss this topic from different perspectives.

So let me start by explaining why I chose to talk about expanded states of consciousness instead of altered states of consciousness, when we talk about altered states of consciousness it also includes lower states like dream-induced, unconscious, or alcohol-induced states. These are also interesting but I feel more inclined to speak of the expansion states and through talking about them the polar opposite sides will be understood in some form too.

Before we address expanded states of consciousness, it is important to address the word consciousness.

It is important to clarify the word consciousness from my perspective because everyone has their own meaning attached to this word.

If you ask a doctor he will perceive it as your ability to interact with your outer world. Using a test by asking you: “How many fingers am I holding up?”

If you can answer accurately, you will be declared conscious by the doctor.

If you ask a psychologist they might understand the word to mean your awareness of your psyche. “How do you feel about that?”

However, when I refer to consciousness, I refer to the pure knowing awareness/ pure sense of awareness/ the pure ability to perceive. If a sentence could exist only with a verb, I would say consciousness has the essence of perceiving.

I feel it is important to verify states included of awareness. There are 3 major states that can arise in consciousness. Awake, dreaming, and dreamless/ deep sleep. There is something aware of all these states. Every time you are aware of one state or another, you observe a different world. So instead of perceiving that you move into different states, it might be more useful to know that it is different states that move through You.

This is when we are not referring to the body/ mind as self but the body and mind arising within what we are or within Self.

Consciousness doesn’t really exist in/ at any particular point in space. It is a field of awareness that points in space appear in. Attention can focus down to a fabricated point through concentration on a particular set of object/s and consciousness can seem to narrow or expand.

When we are trying to use language to describe the formless we have to know that we won’t ever grasp what it is with words. All words are too limited. But if we stop looking at the words and see where they point then we can use the words to point to what it is and direct experience will deliver awareness into the formless for direct experience.

Oftentimes consciousness is limited by labeling it. This goes for all other labels in my opinion. We limit what we label and we do the same with ourselves.

So then what are expanded states of consciousness?

According to the dictionary: “a sense that one's mind has been opened to a new or larger kind of awareness, associated particularly with mystical experiences, meditation, or hallucinogenic drug use. See also altered state of consciousness.”

For me expanded states of consciousness are when we perceive beyond the normal senses which brings forward an expanded view/perception. I use the word normal here as something that is your personal baseline or what your spectrum is on a regular basis. This can be vastly different from person to person. For someone who is cooler blind and for some reason experiences moments where they see full spectrum colors, that could be considered an expanded state of consciousness. For the person who always sees that spectrum of color, it is not an altered state of consciousness.

However, I do want to mention that expanded states of consciousness do not need the brain or the body to perceive. The body is a beautiful and magnificent instrument that can filter, gather and interpret information but it is not the generator of consciousness as previously believed.

The extensive research in NDE (near-death experience) disproved that consciousness is created and generated by the brain. These people all have out-of-body experiences and perceive things even when their body is not able to interpret the information at that point.

Consciousness is in constant flux, we tend to notice and take interest in the extremes but every time you feel a different emotion, that is a different state of consciousness essentially.

I will name a few ways that we experience altered states of consciousness.

• Pharmacological ( through psychedelics, anesthesia, and other drugs)

• Psychological (Breathwork, hypnosis, meditation)

• Physical (fasting, sex, trauma)

• Pathological (psychosis, epilepsy)

• Spontaneous ( NDE, dissociation, out-of-body experience)

What happens if we look at expanded or altered states of consciousness from a unified physics lens?

Allow me to explain the very start of physics or all things really. The zero-dimensional point.

Also known as Singularity/ Divine plane. It has no length, width, height, or size. It only indicates location but no shape (even though the symbol of a circle is used to indicate it). The point of pure potential. At the very heart of a black hole, you also find the singularity. This is the point where everything starts. And it has now been proven that there is a micro black hole in the center of every atom.

From that point, we get the other dimensions (even beyond the 3d).

Keeping it basic and simple. If we expand that singularity out and create a circumference/ sphere, it looks like this (including all dimensions).

This sphere is alchemically transformed into a dynamic flow between the center and the periphery. The perfect primordial fabric to contain life. Every point in the outer sphere is the same distance from the singularity. So if the point of singularity/ zero-dimensional point is the very start of the manifested then it also means it is the end of it in some way because it is the very point where the unmanifested (so to speak) also starts. This is the most basic and fundamental flow of life in all forms.

Please note something very important Singularity and circumference always go together. Like yin and yang. The one can not exist without the other. Similarly, a vibration has 2 states - on or off.

When we use this model to explain expanded states of consciousness then the circumference will expand. As easy as that.

How does this relate to breathwork?

The inhale can be linked to the singularity and the exhale to the circumference. The inhale increases concentration and the exhale expands. The physiology of the body sometimes makes us think it is the other way around. But there are many paradoxes.

In concentration practice (like breathwork can be) the mind can become so single-pointed that the point (singularity) falls in into itself and dissolves.

Once you lose the center point, you also dissolve the circumference. The elimination of the singularity/ circumference means the end of duality. This means the end of measuring. So any sense of depth, distance, lines, shapes, division, separation, boundaries, space, and time in direct experience vanishes. Why? Because none of them have an inherent existence without measurement and comparison.

Now as previously discussed you are rather consciousness and this body arises within what you are, instead of being this body and consciousness arises from within the body….

When you dream, this physical body is not “you” or with you… You are in a new dream body and world. Your sense of self is still the same with another body in another world (even if that world does arise from your psyche).

This is also why you can recall a memory from childhood and feel that it is still the same “you” that experienced it like it was yesterday, even though the body is not the same at all (your body is not even the same as when you started reading this blog, thousands of cells have been replaced already).

Consciousness does not age because it was never born. Nor can it die.

The fluctuation of time is experienced within it but it is beyond and before time.

Thus you are really boundless, without any limitations but you can’t really expand consciousness or awareness, you can only shrink yourself into the appearance of something with a seaming boundary.

Consciousness is infinite and nothingness.

When a drop of water merges with the ocean… the entire ocean is absorbed in a single drop. The drop does not vanish but becomes the entire ocean.

You are not only everything and nothing! You are that which is beyond everything and nothing.

The direct experience of expanded states of consciousness makes this truth apparent.

If you are interested in experiencing or integrating from expanded states of consciousness, get in touch.