| | Hello,
First post...this is really just me saying hello.
Supposedly, the center of consciousness in the brain is located in the thalamus. I know that describing what consciousness is from a mental point of use not the real thing, yet I'd still like to and understand how it works from a conceptual point of view. The thalamus is located about 4 to 5 inches inward from the third-eye area. It basically acts as a relay station. All the incoming information goes there in a kind of back and forth rapid energy cycling maneuver. I guess what I'm trying to figure out is from a scientific point of view, what exactly is that center of awareness? How does it work? Is it just energy? Is energy aware? Or is energy itself awareness? When we focus I assume that the focus is initiated from this point… Does anyone else think the center of focus, the center of 'I'ness is located within the brain or somewhere within the body? Or, is it perhaps on some alternate dimension, some level of inmaterial plane? A point of emptiness/awareness that is constantly filled with sensory/perception information? I know that this is the age-old conundrum that the Buddha refused to answer.
I'm trying to explain the center of consciousness from an intellectual/theoretical point of view. If anyone knows any biological explanations for it that would be awesome. I'm just seeing if someone can bump me a sand-grain of knowledge upwards.
Consciousness/center of consciousness is 'reflexive.' Is energy just becoming aware of itself? Is it just that energy is being fed back into itself, and that's where it becomes aware of itself?
If matter and energy are the same (meaning that matter is basically crystallized energy, or slowed-down energy), then it seems that there are really only two things in the universe: energy and space (… Or space/time if we incorporate movement). So yes, here we have Yin/Yang.
So is one side awareness and the other side the object that one is aware of?
Can awareness exists without something to be aware of? Or are they inexorably intertwined?
re·flex·ive (r -fl k s v) adj. 1. Directed back on itself. 2. Grammar a. Of, relating to, or being a verb having an identical subject and direct object, as dressed in the sentence She dressed herself. b. Of, relating to, or being the pronoun used as the direct object of a reflexive verb, as herself in She dressed herself. 3. Of or relating to a reflex. 4. Elicited automatically; spontaneous
That brings me to the next question:
When we use our focusing ability, i.e. as in one-pointed meditation, it seems that what's happening is that the energy is basically being rapidly cycled and intensified between the thalamus and the area of the brain (mind-map/mind-palace/mind-matrix) that contains the object of our focus. For example, let's say I am focusing on a flower… It seems that somewhere in our neural net lies all the associated IS-ness of flower-ness, combined with the specific shape of the flower we're visualizing. So the way I view 'absorption' is that all the other parts of the brain that aren't necessary shut down, and basically only certain neural nets are activated in an intense bioelectrical/bliss-state. The flower, the watcher of the flower, and the act of watching the flower become one, almost in a holographic kind of way. Every square picometer of energy juice/stuff = flower-ness/bliss. So it seems that, although energy= bliss, something else is experiencing the bliss.
Can anyone describe what this something else is? How do we describe something that apparently has no form, cannot be measured, cannot be observed (although it is the observer), etc. etc.
I am not looking for experiential advice; I am basically looking for a scientific explanation of what that seemingly empty space of consciousness is… Or is it just that the thalamus is where consciousness lies?
Is this consciousness something beyond the matter/energy that makes up the thalamus?
Buddha says that there is no self and I agree, yet it seems that there is a Super-Self AKA 'Self' - which is basically awareness wherever it is at...
I guess the whole point of this post is how can we describe awareness from a conceptual point of view, i.e. in a scientific way, instead of just saying 'It is what it is,' 'Just this,' 'Suchness,' etc.
By the time I got down to this point I realize that I was basically trying to describe that which cannot be described, and can only be directly known - which is futile, and so this whole post is pointless lol... I swear I didn't plan this! haha...oh well, better luck next time.
Oh wait… Here is a question I've always been wondering about: is Nirvana itself just a perception attainment? Is there really a self that can go into Nirvana? Still that same age-old question I know.…
Sometimes I wonder if this whole meditation thing is all just about finding bliss in the end…
Is it all just about bliss?
When I say 'past 1st' in the title, I mean can you use a mental technique as a 'boat' to drop you off into a 2nd and onwards attainment, instead of seeking direct perception? I think it may almost be like a Zen koan in fashion. Mind stopper... |