Forums IMPORTANT: PLEASE READ Beyond Human We use a lot more than 12% of the brain.

Here is my position. The conscious mind, which most of us operate from, represents a tiny fraction of the total operating potential of the body/brain/mind.

Our conscious mind, located mostly in the left temporal lobe, is primarily verbal and it works slowly. The portion of your brain mass devoted to carrying out conscious brain functions is approximately 2 percent. The rest of the brain mass of your cerebral cortex works 10,000 times faster than your conscious mind can. And your limbic system works 10,000 times faster than that. In otherwords, 98 percent of your offline brain functions, those functions other than conscious, work 10,000 to ten million times faster than your conscious mind.

It doesn't mean we don't use most or all of our brain. It means that consciously, we don't have much going...and we can bring a LOT more of our off-line resources into conscious use. That's what our work at Learning Strategies Corporation has been about.

The more I think about this the more of the simple instructions from the programs and praliminals spring to mind. "Relax and let go...". Just let the subconscious do the work. "Notice... witness... look for the signals...". Hi it's me your subconscious with the answers you wanted.

The problem I have is one of control. I like to feel I have control of the situation/problem and letting it go for a greater power to work on is obviously the right thing to do but what about my control - my comfort zone! However convinced I am that this works I feel I should be consciously doing something not just waiting for the answer. There must be a paraliminal for this one.

I guess you never really have control of the subconscious just unrestricted use of it.

The problem I have is one of control.

More, regular and deeper Meditation probably... or...

There must be a paraliminal for this one.

Funny, that's what drew me to LS in the first place. I was trying to find some sort of revolutionary technology that would accelerate the enlightenment process. I didn't want to wait with the slow-going ancient methods. It would probably take me 20 to 40 years with Tai Chi to finally 'GET IT'. The Natural Brilliance Generator is what you seek! I got side tracked from Natural Brilliance with all this photoreading and paraliminal stuff. Natural Brilliance is where it's at for Enlightenment. Used properly, it may just be the most effective method for attaining enlightenment. Is not beta consciousness just a bundle of internal oscillations? Resolve the oscilliations, no more internal struggle, no more consciousness, 'access your genius potential' as Paul says. But I see it as more Enlightening than 'Geniusizing'. Both involve the primacy of the subconscious.

I guess you never really have control of the subconscious just unrestricted use of it.

I could say, 'Enlightenment or Bust!' but it's more like 'Enlightenment AND bust!'.

Is that really a good thing? I see this in the same light I view religion (my mother's obsessive nature over Christianity has spurned many arguments) she expects God to just work things out for her, that whatever happens, it's His will, and that in the end, it's all for the best. I have to look at this as giving up your right to design your own destiny, and giving away responsiblity for your own existance to a distance consciousness, God, the unconscious, whatever you wish to call it. You would be disaccosiating yourself with your own life, and giving control over to someone, or something, you can only hope knows better.

-I have but one life to live, and one life to give to my unconscious, but that is one life too many.

I would argue that this is the only TRUELY good thing within the realm of human experience.

Let's look at what's ACTUALLY going on here and forget all the mumbo jumbo. Here's a model I've created in order to understand consciousness and enlightenment better.

Think of consciousness as merely a 'focusing agent'--The ability to divide things into small bits and analyze them. Think of consciousness as a tremendously focused beam of laser light.

Now take a deep breath, release and notice. What happened? Your brainwaves slowed down just as your light waves slowed down. The result? Your laser beam (or consciousness) now looks something like a halogen floodlight, lighting up the night.

Now do that for 20 years. What happened? The number of degrees of light continued to expand until.... until what? Until finally, your consciousness reaches 360 degrees. When this happens, there is no more 'dark' and 'no dark'. ALL IS LIGHT! The YinYang becomes the empty Zen Circle.

Total awareness. Total knowing. Total goodness. Total bliss. Total power.

From laser beam, to flood light, to sphere of light.

I have but one life to live

And when you refer to 'I', what is that? A collection of tensions? A collections of fears and insecurities and doubts and internal oscillations?

You would be disaccosiating yourself with your own life, and giving control over to someone, or something, you can only hope knows better.

Exactly.

I would argue that those who are driven by Reason and Thinking are driven by the notions of cause and effect and therefore exist within the realm of Karma. Your perception of free will is largely an illusion, in other words. I would further say that one attains a much higher degree of freedom via enlightenment (via letting go) simply because you are using the spontaneity of the subconscious--the source of all creativity--as your guide. Thus, one transcends karma IN THIS LIFE and gains true freedom via the application of God's Grace--aka subconscious spontaneity.

"You've got to let it all go, Neo. Fear, doubt, and disbelief" said Morpheus from The Matrix. Neo runs... and jumps... and falls... But by the end of the movie, he attains that sphere of consciousness--a state far superior to his former self, I think you'll agree. The Matrix is a useful allegory in chronicleing the path to enlightenment.

Further, you are not 'destroying your ego' or 'personality' as some traditions would say. You are simply removing all the 'stop signs' so you can go from stop and go traffic (15mph) to the autobahn (150mph). Think of 'ego' as a synonym for 'fear' or 'limiting beliefs'.

Tim is still tim, just minus all the crap.

At least, this is what the great champions of Intution say. The champions of Reason give an entirely valid argument the other way as well. It's just like I mentioned in the other post on Decisive Action. Do you want to be a laser beam or (ultimately) a sphere of light? It's a very personal matter. And both are entirely valid forms of existence.

Choose wisely.

I'm of the opinion that it's not a question of one or the other, but of 'when'. 'You've got to know the rigid self-disciplined life, before you can lead a life of liberation.'

To be sure, focusing has its uses...in the begining. For example, you've got to learn how to read first with your laser beam, before you can use your flood lights to photoread.

Anyway, a number of those self-help books that left me in a funk were the "The Secret of Letting Go," "Freedom from the Ties that Bind," both by Guy Finley and also, his mentor, Vernon Howard, and the book of his that I have read is "The Power of Your Supermind." All three of these books talk about a negative self that keeps you back, and ruins your life. So the idea is to destroy this negative self and let your positive self prevail. He used a bunch of confusing metaphors that he never really connected back to reality, and all in all just gave me an identity crisis. Not very enjoyable, I'll tell you that. But it did get me thinking about the meaning of self and consciousness, which I'm sure pretty much everyone has done, so it wasn't a complete loss. My point was, is, that when you start seperating different versions of yourself, questions must be raised, questions about the meaning of self that I can't at my current status in life really get a feel for. My loss I guess.

Oh well, I'll just have to make the best of what I've got.

As Paul asked, "To what extent am I the thinker of my thoughts?"

It's a wholly experiential kinda thing, and impossible to quantify--which, I guess, is why many people do not acknowledge it.

If you are looking to either expand your consciousness or become and intuitive genius and you have the Natural Brilliance Generator, why not try listening to side A every night before you go to sleep and side B every morning before you awaken? I think after a week, you'd start to 'experience' some noticable expansion.

It's not explicitly mentioned anywhere by Paul, but I believe that this tape installs a model of the Zen Mind onto its listener. I further believe that this is the most powerful, 'all-around' tape that Paul has produced. It is 100 tapes in one!

In the meantime,

Stay Cool

Brian: There are so many different models and metaphors one could use, but it seems to boil down to: do I stay (consciously) "in control" and continue to live a in halting, frustrated and diminished manner, or do I choose to have the results I want without being able to "take credit" for them?

All of our conditioning tells us to stay "in control," but experience has shown this to be an inefficient (and uncomfortable) way to operate...

Perhaps there is some middle ground--hey, why should we have to wait for the Big Enlightenment to enjoy the benefits?--of dancing with the para-conscious mind: gently playing with it, turning over more and more of our functioning to the faster and smarter parts of ourselves, and gradually expanding our trust in the process.

To use your analogy, we can gradually broaden our focus from laser to flashlight, and so forth, without scaring or straining ourselves in the process. I think I could handle that...

Gassho/Namaste!

[This message has been edited by shinsei (edited March 19, 2001).]