Consciousness Survives Death
In order to seriously consider reincarnation, past lives, life between lives or eternal life one must accept that consciousness survives death — a big idea yes, but one which is becoming easier to grasp and more difficult to refute. More on why in a bit. . .
For some time, Western thought and the religious traditions that dominate here have dismissed reincarnation although commonly held in Eastern traditions. This is odd given the seeming paradox with the concept of heaven that is imbedded in the Abrahamic traditions.
A new consensus is forming supporting the likelihood that consciousness survives death. This view holds that consciousness exists outside the brain and while inter-related, consciousness is independent of matter, i.e. the body. That’s right, rather than contradicting views long held by mystics of every tradition, the scientific paradigm initially propelled by quantum physics and more recently advanced by neuroscience and the like is shifting. This new framework is considered speculative by some but convincing by others, including those who proffer the existence of One Mind and our relation to it. Early theorist such as William James, the father of modern psychology, and more recently neuro-psychiatrist Peter Fenwick, Britain’s leading clinical authority on near-death experiences, have proffered how this might work.
In a nutshell, the brain processes but does not produce consciousness. Too obtuse – try this. Think of a television set, it receives signals from an external source (i.e. a network or cable station), decodes the signals and expresses them as the pictures we see and the sound that we hear. This then prompts the experience that we have as we watch (i.e. engage) in the program. If any part of the television breaks, we cannot tune into our favorite program or the nightly news. Consciousness is akin to the television program, while the television is analogous to the brain – inter-dependent but independent. The broadcast of your favorite program survives the ‘death’ of the television set as many believe your mind, soul to some of us, survives death!
I would be naive to assume that the scientific arguments that consciousness survives death would be resolved any time soon. What is more important is that the strangle-hold that the Cartesian material world view, that dominated scientific thinking and so shaped western thought since the seventeenth century, has loosened. The outdated pictures of living organisms including the human body as mere machines occupying a ‘clockwork universe’ while engaged in a competitive struggle for existence are vanishing. And as important, the limits that these paradigms placed on our concept of life and its successive and eternal nature are fading. For the social activists, this shift has profound implications for shifting away from a society structured around a ‘survival of the fittest’ framework to a society that recognizes and honors the collective. But now I am really getting ahead of myself and my three decades in social welfare are oozing through.
This is good news indeed for the humanists and spiritualists in the room. This is great news for those who comprehend the invisible web of consciousness and love that pervades existence and binds us through time eternal. For those who want to delve further in this arena here are a few of my favorite books on the subject: Larry Dossey’s One Mind, Fritjof Capra’s The Tao of Physics, Gary Zukav’s The Dancing Wu Li Masters, Lynn McTaggart’s The Field and Amit Goswami’s Physics of the Soul.
Over the coming months on this blog spot I will be developing a range of ideas from my study, research and practice on the survival of consciousness – the continuance of life – beyond death. Yes, I will say it again because it warrants emphasis – consciousness survives death.
This blog is preface to those posts and meant as an introduction although admittedly for many these are not new ideas. For those in private sessions who have relived past lives or ventured to the life between lives, the terrain is familiar. For others familiar with the countless reports of those who have had ‘near-death experiences’, these concepts and the story-line are well known. For those fortunate to have experienced hyper-awareness and connection with the ‘all’ in meditation, our forays will be reminiscent. But for those not yet immersed in the ideas, case stories or experience of the unifying bliss I hope to forge new territory and to rouse your interest. Along the way, I will highlight experiences, practices, movies and books for you to consider. I will try to get you to think outside the box and in general offer ‘food for thought’ that is at once interesting but most of all provocative.
In The Autobiography of a Yogi, Paramahansa Yogananda wrote “The human mind is a spark of the almighty consciousness of God” . . . adding “Thought is a force, even as electricity or gravitation.” This is a big idea — one which deserves contemplation, reflection and I would suggest implementation in our daily lives. Consider it. Consider what its truth means for your life. Consider that if you change your thinking, you can change your life and ultimately you will be a part of changing the world. Imagine what it truly means if each and every individual mind is a part of a greater consciousness — the One Mind. WOW. . . WOW. . . WOW!!
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