How much of Reality is Beyond Us?

[system]

This is something I have been pondering for quite some time now. As occultist we seek after the mystery and do our best to decode it. We try and make contact with entities outside our normally constructed reality. We do our best to both elevate ourselfs and pull these beings closer and closer to our world. but how much can we really understand about the nature of reality outside the one we experience?

In line with Gnostic thought we are trapped/experiencing in a carefully constructed prison/illusionary world of finite existence. The purpose for us being here is debateble within itself, but my question is how much can we actually peak behind the curtain?

Can we really understand the nature of spirits like demons, djinn, and gods? beings who outside the finite representations we interact with in evocations(even in the case of physical manifestation), exist as potentially infinite, timeless consciousness who exist in conditions that we couldn’t possibly understand do to our apparatus(minds) being finely tuned to our existence of 5 senses.

to simplify how much can we really understand the infinite layered nature of reality so long as we exist as finite beings with no real way to experience realms that do not conform to experiencing with sight, taste, smell, touch, and hearing? and how much of this can we really trust to exist objectively if our subjective reality “colors” everything we view from the levels of existence outside ours so that we can understand it?

[Yuri]

I used to think the human mind had limits in both understanding and what it could decode during an experience. I’ve found that such ideas limit you to your core, it took my guide(s) years to convince me you can have your cake now and eat it this very moment. You probably won’t, because all your energy is focused on this thing “here” you are experiencing, but as far as possibility and potential go there is nothing beyond you. When in doubt consider time and idea we experience and not a set universal law, when you remove time from the equation everything becomes now and you already are - all that remains is perspective.

[NariusV]

We do have a way to experience realms beyond the senses. The problem is that the mind as we currently know it is incapable of expressing it in a comprehensible way.

We are programmed to base our communication and reality on language from a young age. After a few years we have been conditioned to interpret that we only know something when we have language to define it.

This creates a rift between our direct experience of reality. We become necessarily dependent on symbolic representations and abstractions of reality to communicate with others and ourselves about things.

There is no upper limit to the bounds of our knowledge, but as we increase it towards the limit of the known our own minds become the barrier to their own expansion.

As is shown in the cutting edge of all sciences, we constantly evolve new and more complex forms of symbolic maps to represent more and more refined sets of information and knowledge, the unknown becomes the known bit by bit. The limitation of this method is that since we always deal with a separation of the whole into the parts we can measure, there is only ever a partial and incomplete knowledge. This the never ending research continues.

Another route is that of the mystic, were we immerse directly into the vastness of consciousness, where there are no filters, we drop the mind and are plunged into infinity directly. The limitation of this method is that there is a loss of ability or consciousness regarding the use of language systems to convey what is perceived. We can experience direct knowing, premonition, clairvoyance, etc., Yet these states are so far removed from our learned language systems that it is impossible to communicate them clearly.

We have hobbled ourselves unknowingly with the way we have trained our minds to learn.

Most are content with the reality of their minds. Of the few who can tap into the vast consciousness, most are content with the bliss they dwell in and seek no further. The seek enlightenment, find it, and then stop there.

It’s possible that there is a way to bridge this gap. I’m not sure what that is yet. There are so few of us that have any awareness of it, and fewer still that have a concern for it’s resolution. Most people never reach the limit and thus for them there is no problem.

I think as a species we’re on the verge of a fundamental change, where a new type of awareness and mind may emerge that can transcend these limits.

Until then we’re still children playing with blocks. Some of us build towers and some of us knock them down. We still don’t know who gave us the blocks or what they are, or why we care about them anyway.

[Tenebrae_Aeterna]

We live within an infinite existence of temporary constructs; and so there’s an infinite sea of knowledge beyond our comprehension. Were this not the case, our sapient psyches would become meaningless and without purpose. If you have finally understood everything and nothing new were ever brought forth…existence would become rather dull and you’d slip into an apathy beyond anything we can currently comprehend.

[Yuri]

@Tenebrae Aeterna

We live within an infinite existence of temporary constructs; and so there’s an infinite sea of knowledge beyond our comprehension. Were this not the case, our sapient psyches would become meaningless and without purpose. If you have finally understood everything and nothing new were ever brought forth…existence would become rather dull and you’d slip into an apathy beyond anything we can currently comprehend.

Just like you said, there is infinity “out there” (in us actually^^). Infinity ensures one can never understand everything and thus never becomes struck by apathy, so in that sense we can play this game as long as we like. We however come back to the shared idea of Maya through exploring this (illusion), claiming that at some point we realise we’ve seen it all although we have not experienced it all, thereby accepting the concept has had its run and is at an end. I’m not there yet but I’ve seen the idea manifest before me and have explored it, instead of becoming sad and desiring an exit it has made me feel empowered to change my experience in any way I see fit.

[Orismen]

All we have is lenses that we view reality from. They filter things it that stop us from ever truly experiencing what is real…of course that is just my view, from my lense.

[TheLotusEater]

Anything our human senses can’t interpret is “beyond” us. However, when you go outside the mind, we are fractal apertures, and there is nothing that we are limited to, the only problem lies in the coming back, and trying to describe in 3 dimensional terms what you just experienced. Even the memory itself will be skewed somewhat since it has to fit within the parameters of your mind. So I wouldn’t say that any of reality is beyond us, its the definitions of it which lie beyond, and only until we discover a new form of language

[The_Cusp]

Cursed are the list makers, for their work is never done.

If there is any one work that embodies the struggle against infinity, it’s the books of Carlos Castaneda. If you’re reading this thread, do yourself a favor and download them now. The internets are filthy with his work. One of them is titled “The Active Side of Infinity”.

I’ll paraphrase from memory because I don’t want to sift for the quote, his mentor Don Juan says something like anyone can delve into eternity, but a teacher’s job is to mercilessly push them further so the student doesn’t stop and pat themselves on the back.

Feel free to skip his first two books. Ironically, he wrote two whole books about what he though magic was before he even began to understand what was being taught to him. In his third book, he goes over the time period covered in the first two with his new magical insight.

Normally I wouldn’t recommend people start with “The Art of Dreaming” (which has little to do with actual dreaming), because a lot of it is pretty far fetched. But in context with this discussion, that far fethedness is exactly the kind of journeying into eternity we’re addressing here.

[NariusV]

I’ve just finished several weeks of reflection and contemplation about these issues. I feel now that my understanding of reality, assemblage point, self-image has shifted to an extent that I can elucidate my position a bit further.

In the past I had felt an apparently un-resolvable tension between the personal incarnate self as I experienced myself through self-reflection within my body-mind, and the access to infinite consciousness or god-self that seems to defy any limitations.

There seemed to be a paradox where I can know there are no limitations and experience supreme knowing-ness and at the same time realize I’m hungry and if I don’t sleep I’ll soon begun to function less effectively.

I realize now that the problem I was having was one of assuming that both of these states were somehow separate. That I could tap into the infinite god-self or become it at times, and then ‘return’ to my more mundane existence with a lessened capacity of, having lost my immersion into all-encompassing awareness.

This was due to my habituated reliance upon my mind, where I could not accept things easily without fully understanding them with a mental system or model.

I realize now that these mental models can co-exist within and as I immerse myself into the river of infinite awareness, and that my limitation was not one of an inherent limitation between two states, but a tendency to separate the external infinite flow of ever present awareness from the thought patterns I use to communicate aspects of it.

The limitation was with the limits I put upon the aperture of my minds attention.

Due to habituated training with concentration exercises I intentionally trained my mind with to exclude and narrow my focus, I paradoxically limited my mind and consciousness from full access to its own functioning.

I am now experimenting with holding the bridge between the incarnate and infinite mind states, where both are necessary and not opposed. I feel that I’ve uncovered for myself a new aspect of what it means to become a living god, and my journey has just begun.

I appreciate the opportunities I’ve had here to ask as well as answer questions. I do not believe that the forum existing here has been by chance. I choose to focus on the benefits I have received and the knowledge I have achieved. Many thanks to all of you.

Limitations are illusions waiting to be revealed. Once they are, they can become allies, tools, and methods to further ascension.