The Map of Consciousness documents the first time that levels of consciousness have ever been calibrated. On this chart we find the entire spectrum of human experience and how to align ourselves for greatest happiness and ultimate freedom. Simply to encounter the Map is an event of great fortune, for certain pieces of information jump our consciousness enormously just to hear about them.
Every person is born with a calibratable level of consciousness, which is an energy field within the infinite field of consciousness. Indeed, everything in the universe constantly gives off an energy pattern of a specific frequency that remains for all time, and we now have a means by which to calibrate energy fields as to their relative strength, similar to what is done with a light meter.
Stratifications of consciousness have been well known, expressed throughout human history in various schematics (for example, Zen ox-herding pictures), yet this is the first time that the levels of consciousness have been scaled according to their actual energetic power and correlated with specific aspects of human experience. (The emergence of this clinical science of truth is described in Power vs. Force: The Hidden Determinants of Human Behavior.)
The technique we use for consciousness calibration is the living clinical science of muscle testing, which utilizes the human nervous system and the energy of life as expressed through the acupuncture energy system as the requisite sensitive biological measuring instrument. (The technique cannot be duplicated by nonliving scientific instruments.) Simply put, in the presence of truth, the body’s musculature goes “strong.” In contrast, it goes “weak” when confronted with falsehood (which is the absence of truth, not its opposite). This is a rapid response that quickly reveals the degree of truth of anything. Integrity of intention is required to conduct the test accurately.
The Map of Consciousness is a reference guide to the spectrum of consciousness, charting the calibrated levels of energy, similar to how a thermometer measures levels of heat, a barometer measures levels of atmospheric pressure, and an altimeter measures levels of elevation. The measurements are not based on personal opinion or relativistic perception. Because they are stationary, they form an absolute scale. Anything can be calibrated and placed somewhere along the scale as a number. The number is not a judgment or a moral statement; it simply indicates the gradient of whatever is being measured. One important statement about the infinite field of consciousness is that it represents the Absolute relative to which all else can be calibrated by degrees. Calibrations do not establish truth; they merely confirm it.
Not surprisingly, for example, the energy of Mother Teresa (cal. 710) was very different from that of Adolf Hitler (cal. 40), and most people calibrate somewhere between them. This has been intuitively known, and now we can verify it on a scale. Music, movies, places, belief systems, books, political leaders, ideological positions, animals, intentions—all life—emit an energy that can be calibrated as to its essence and its degree of love and truth.
On the Map of Consciousness, each level of consciousness is calibrated on a logarithmic scale of energetic power (to the base of 10), ranging from 1 to 1,000, where 1 indicates existence, and 1,000, at the top of the Map, indicates the highest level that has ever graced the planet; it is the energy of Jesus Christ, the Buddha, and Krishna. The level of Shame (20) is at the bottom, close to death, and the level of Courage (200) is the critical point of truth and integrity. Love (500) is the gateway to the spiritual domain.
The level of Courage (200) marks the shift from negative to positive energy. It is the energy of integrity, self-honesty, and real empowerment. The levels of consciousness below Courage are antilife (force), whereas the levels above it are supportive of life (power). We tend to seek out people over the critical level of 200. We say they are “high,” and we appreciate their “positive” energy. Their environment is safe and clean. Animals are attracted to them. They have a green thumb and positively influence everyone around them. At the level of Courage, the negative feelings have not all disappeared, but there is sufficient energy to handle them, because one has reowned self-adequacy. The fastest way to move from the bottom to the top is by aligning with truth and love.
Eighty-five percent of the world’s population calibrates under 200, which accounts for the vast suffering on the planet. Humankind, thankfully, is saved from self-destruction by virtue of the fact that the minority calibrating at positive levels counterbalances the weight of negativity. For example, one individual at the level of Love (500) counterbalances 750,000 individuals below 200. The significance of each person’s inner evolution, then, becomes obvious.
Another notable discovery is that family pets calibrate around 245–250, and their nature is benevolent overall, which means we are safer with a cat or dog than with the majority of people on the planet!
(Such findings may hit the reader with “truth shock,” so we will circle back to these data points throughout upcoming chapters by relating them to various contexts of our common human experience. Learning takes place as a result of familiarity, for each exposure allows for integration of information that may have been missed or not understood the first time.)
The average person (if they calibrate over 200, the level of integrity) can verify the numbers on our scale by using the simple method of muscle-testing. Someone can test you by pressing down on your arm while they say, “On a scale from 1 to 1,000, where 1,000 represents the great Avatars, Courage/Truth is over 100? Over 150? Over 175? Over 200?” At 200, the arm will go weak. As noted in previous publications, these calibrations have been verified worldwide for decades in various countries, in clinical settings, and among different age and cultural groups. (A full explanation of the technique can be found in Appendix A.)
The gist is easy to experience and comprehend. Anything with an energy over 200 makes your muscles go strong, and anything under 200 makes you go weak. Thus we have an instantly available means of discerning truth from falsehood. The body can discern, to the finest degree, the difference between that which is supportive of life and that which is not.
We should not be surprised by this. Living things all react positively to what is life-supportive and negatively to what is life-threatening; this is the fundamental mechanism of survival. Inherent in all life-forms is the capacity to detect change and react correctively—thus, trees become smaller at higher elevations as the oxygen in the atmosphere becomes scarcer. Human protoplasm is far more sensitive than that of a tree. If you use your body as a pendulum, you will notice that you automatically fall forward when holding in mind a truth, and you fall backward when holding in mind a nontruth. “I want to heal” is a statement that can be tested when a person begins therapy. A fall backward indicates a lack of readiness to heal. If they fall forward, indicating the truthfulness of their intention, the prognosis is good.
Now, to quell my fear that perhaps, despite my best efforts, the reader might not get the essential message of this study, I will spell it out here at the beginning: the individual human mind is like a computer terminal connected to a giant database. The database is human consciousness itself, of which our own consciousness is merely an individual expression but with its roots in the common consciousness of all humankind. The database transcends time, space, and all limitations of individual consciousness. This database is the realm of genius; because to be human is to participate in the database, everyone, by virtue of their birth, has access to genius. The unlimited information contained in the database has now been shown to be readily available to anyone in a few seconds, at any time and in any place. This is indeed an astonishing discovery, bearing the power to change lives, both individually and collectively, to a degree never yet anticipated.
The great Swiss psychoanalyst C. G. Jung (cal. 520), noting the ubiquity of archetypal patterns and symbols, deduced the “collective unconscious,” a bottomless, subconscious pool of all the shared experiences of the whole human race. We may think of it as a vast, hidden database of human awareness, characterized by powerful, universal organizing patterns. The great promise of the database—tapping into all that has ever been experienced anywhere in time—is its capacity to “know” virtually anything the moment it is “asked.”
This database is the origin of all information obtained sub- or suprarationally, by intuition or premonition, by divination or dreams, or by “lucky” guess. It is the fountainhead of genius, the well of inspiration, and the source of “uncanny” psychic knowledge. A question cannot be asked unless there is already the potentiality of an answer. The reason for this is that both the question and answer are created out of the same paradigm and, therefore, are exactly concordant. There is no “up” without an already existent “down.” Causality occurs as simultaneity rather than as sequence; synchronicity is the term used by Dr. Jung to explain this phenomenon in human experience. As we understand from our examination of advanced physics, an event “here” in the universe does not “cause” an event “there” in the universe. Instead, both appear simultaneously, but perceptual observation puts a causal sequence on it.
By analogy, we scan the evening sky and find pleasure in identifying a favorite constellation. But in reality, there are no such things as constellations. That familiar pattern of what we call stars is made up of points of light originating from totally unrelated sources—some millions of light-years closer or farther away, some even in different galaxies, some actually separate galaxies themselves; many have, millennia since, burned out and ceased to exist. Those lights have no spatial or temporal relationship to each other except what we project onto them. It is not only the shape of a dipper or bear or man but also the very pattern, the “constellation” itself, that is projected onto the sky by the eye of the beholder.
What is the connection between these events, then, if it is not a Newtonian linear sequence of cause and effect? Obviously, the two events are related or connected to each other in some invisible manner—but not by gravity or magnetism or a cosmic wind or an ether; they are encompassed by an attractor field of such magnitude that it includes both events.
Likewise, when schools of fish swim in sync or birds fly in a V formation with their flock, each one is where they are not as a result of their alignment with the others but because they are all attuned to exactly the same attractor field. Thus a fish swimming at one edge of a school will turn instantaneously in sync with its fellows when they are fleeing a predator, even from a quarter mile’s distance.
The existence of a nonlinear, interconnected database of consciousness may be difficult to comprehend at first, but we will circle around this territory in several different ways so that, in the end, you will have not only grasped the reality of consciousness but also realized your vital place within it.
The evolution of this work, which began in 1965, was fostered by developments in numerous scientific fields—of which three were of special importance:
Attractor is the name given to an identifiable pattern that emerges from a seemingly unmeaningful mass of data. There is a hidden coherence in all that appears incoherent. This inner coherence was first demonstrated in nature many decades ago by Edward Lorenz, the MIT mathematician and meteorologist who studied computer graphics derived from weather patterns over long courses of time. What appeared on the surface to be chaotic, disconnected phenomena turned out in actuality to have a coherent pattern, noted in the attractor pattern he identified, now known as “Lorenz’s Butterfly.”
Lorenz demonstrated the interrelatedness of seemingly unrelated phenomena, such that small changes can have very large effects. As he put it, the flap of a butterfly’s wings might ultimately become a tornado. This was his famous “butterfly effect,” a discovery that challenged Isaac Newton’s “clockwork universe,” the conventional, deterministic view of nature at the time. Lorenz’s findings revolutionized the understanding of phenomena, which emerge as a consequence of interacting attractor patterns, not linear causality.
Most important to our research is the discovery that some attractor patterns are very powerful (Willingness, for instance, or Love) and others are much weaker (Guilt or Anger, for example). There is a critical point that differentiates the two distinct classes. This phenomenon of consciousness is parallel and corollary to the high- and low-energy bonds in the mathematics of the chemical bond.
A field of dominance is exhibited by high-energy patterns in their influence over weaker ones. This may be likened to the coexistence of a small magnetic field within the much larger, more powerful field of a giant electromagnet. The phenomenological universe is the expression of the interaction of endless attractor patterns of varying strengths.
Causality, within the observable world, has conventionally been presumed within the Newtonian paradigm to work in the following manner:
A
BC
This is called a deterministic linear sequence—like billiard balls sequentially striking each other. The implicit presumption of the Newtonian paradigm is that A causes B causes C. In this scheme of material determinism, nothing is inherently free, but only the result of something else. It is thereby limited; what this system really defines is the world of force. Force A results in force B, which is then transmitted to force C with consequence D. D, in turn, becomes the beginning of another series of chain reactions, ad infinitum. This is the left-brain world, mundane and predictable. It is the limited Newtonian paradigm (cal. 450) from which the conventional sciences operate: familiar, controllable, but uncreative—determined, and therefore limited, by the past. It is not the world of genius, but to many it feels safe. It is the world of productivity and practicality. To creative people, however, it seems pedestrian, prosaic, uninspiring, and limiting.
Strikingly, our research indicates that causality actually operates in a completely different manner, in which the attractor pattern complex “ABC” splits through its “operants” and is expressed instead as the seeming sequence “A, then B, then C” of perception.
From this diagram we see that the source (ABC), which is the unobservable attractor pattern, results in the visible sequence ABC, which is an observable phenomenon within the measurable three-dimensional world. The typical problems the world attempts to deal with exist on the observable level of ABC. But our work is to find the inherent attractor pattern, the ABC out of which the ABC seems to arise. This description of how the universe works is in accord with the theories of physicist David Bohm (cal. 505), who has described a holographic universe with an invisible implicate (“enfolded”) and a manifest explicate (“unfolded”) order.
We see that the concept ABC, which is within the invisible, enfolded universe, will activate emergence into the visible world to result in the sequence, ABC. Thus, the visible world is created from the invisible world, and is therefore influenced by the future. The capacity of the invisible concept to materialize is based on the power of the original concept itself. The more an inner ABC is aligned with the universal principles of life, the more effective its ABC in the outer world.
In this simple diagram, the operants transcend both the observable and the nonobservable; we might picture them as a rainbow bridging the deterministic and the nondeterministic realms.
Therefore, nothing occurs in the world that is not first conceived “in here.” The idea of constructing the world’s tallest building produced an invisible concept, which eventually became the Empire State Building within the visible world. All expressions “out there” arise first from “within here.” This scientific insight corresponds with the view of reality experienced throughout history by enlightened sages, who have evolved beyond consciousness to the state of pure awareness. Consciousness itself is the key to the sought-for “unified field theory of everything” (statement calibrates at 1,000).
Certain concepts and values have much greater power than others. An ABC may be either a high-energy attractor or a low-energy attractor. Simply stated, powerful attractor patterns make the body go strong, and weak patterns make the body go weak. If you hold forgiveness in mind, your arm will be very strong in the clinical muscle-test. If you hold revenge in mind, your arm will go weak.
For our purposes, it is really only necessary to recognize that power is that which makes you go strong, while force makes you go weak. Love, compassion, and forgiveness, which may be mistakenly seen by some people as submissive, are in fact profoundly empowering. Revenge, judgmentalism, and condemnation, on the other hand, inevitably make you go weak. Therefore, regardless of moral righteousness, it is a simple clinical fact that in the long run, the weak cannot prevail against the strong. That which is weak falls of its own accord.
All the great teachers throughout the history of our species have merely taught one thing, over and over, in whatever language, at whatever time. All have said, simply: Give up weak attractors for strong attractors.
Attractors are organizing principles, and organizing principles have different levels of power. This is one of the secrets of the success of powerful people. Their entire lives are automatically and effortlessly organized by their complete and total alignment to very high and powerful principles.
We now understand how Mahatma Gandhi, a 90-pound quiet man wearing only a dhoti, defeated the British Empire. It is very simple. Gandhi was totally organized in everything he thought, did, felt, and expressed, by the universal principle that everyone is equal by virtue of the divinity of their creation, with intrinsic human rights. Comparatively, the British Empire was coming from a limited principle of what was only good for the advantage of its own political aims; therefore, its self-centered attractor was overpowered by the universal attractor that was activating Mahatma Gandhi. What played out historically in India was merely the outer expression of the less powerful attractor having to conform to a more powerful attractor (in accordance with “fields of dominance”).
There is great power in a principle such as love. We know the truth of this from our own human experiences—that out of love we would do things and take risks that would be ridiculous from a logical viewpoint. We have experienced this in the matter of personal vendettas. We resent someone for a lifetime for something that we always held was vicious and unfair of them to do. Then one day while we are out gardening, it suddenly strikes us how sad it was for that person to be so limited at the time. They had to come out of such fear to be that way. Suddenly, the compassion of understanding opens up a powerful attractor. In one split second the unresolvable is instantly resolved. Not only is the unpardonable pardoned but we realize that there was nothing to pardon in the first place, except that the person was guilty of humanness. Once we own our own humanness, it is simple to forgive other people theirs. The more frequently we do this, the more effortless it becomes.
Obviously the one attractor pattern that dominates all of us is the attractor pattern of life itself. Just as nothing in our universe can escape the influence of gravity, either the principles upon which we operate coincide with the attractor pattern of life itself or they do not. Power comes from aligning with the dominant attractor patterns that are aligned with that which supports life.
Contemplating the Map of Consciousness reverses the world’s understanding of cause and effect. In this respect, the Declaration of Independence can provide a rewarding study. This document calibrates very high, at about 700. If one goes through it sentence by sentence, the source of its power appears: the concept that all are equal by virtue of the divinity of their creation, and human rights are intrinsic to human creation and therefore inalienable. Interestingly enough, this is the same concept that was the source of Mahatma Gandhi’s power. This very powerful ABC accounts for the success of the United States as a democracy on the observable level of ABC. If the reference to Divinity were removed from the founding document, the calibration would drop considerably.
◆ The center column of the Map consists of the levels of consciousness for each energy field, alongside the corresponding logarithmic numerical values. The next chapter describes this center column and details the essence of each level. The present section introduces the other four columns found to the left and right of the levels of consciousness on the Map. They indicate key aspects in human experience that correlate to each level of consciousness: view of God, view of one’s self, emotion, and the process going on within consciousness. A later section in the book shows that brain function and rates of happiness are also correlated with level of consciousness.
◆ The column on the far-left side of the Map shows the view of God at each level of consciousness. Each level has its own understanding of God, a fact that explains the existence of widely different theologies and religious beliefs. A person’s view of God has nothing to do with God; rather, their level of consciousness determines the God-view.
At the bottom of the Map, we see the demonic depictions of God, the anthropomorphic projections in which God is punitive, capricious, cruel, and terrifying. In certain books of the Bible and in primitivistic beliefs, God has to be assuaged by sacrificial killing animals and humans. Even today, “end times” predictions abound that describe natural occurrences such as tsunamis as evidence of God’s anger or the fulfillment of some prediction from the Bible. This is the downside of religion and why many people become spiritual and not religious. The fallaciousness of such depictions of God is obvious when we recall that tsunamis, earthquakes, and hurricanes occurred on the planet long before humankind got here! It was a natural disaster that ostensibly wiped out the dinosaurs. So, was God angry at the dinosaurs? Such views of God are obviously negative projections from the human ego.
At higher levels of consciousness, God is viewed as benevolent, wise, infinitely loving, and merciful. From these levels, God is realized to be the source of love, of oneness, of all-being-ness. Finally, Divinity itself shines forth in all things, at which point Gloria in Excelsis Deo (Glory to God in the Highest) is all that can be said.
◆ The Map also has a column for one’s own life-view. Those at a low level of consciousness hate themselves, and they project their hatred onto the world, seeing evil everywhere. As you move up the scale, your view of yourself and your life becomes more and more positive, and finally you are comfortable with yourself. “Be as you are” calibrates at 590, the level of consciousness of Joseph Merrick, the so-called Elephant Man, who, because of a bone disease, became extremely disfigured. Despite taunting, ridicule, and social rejection, his attitude and demeanor were described as truly saintly. He was gentle, forgiving, nonreactive, and compassionate, even in the face of the basest ignorance. His uniqueness implies that his singular life symbolized spiritual possibility under even extreme conditions. Notably, he ignored the temptations of self-pity, victimhood, resentment, and hatred of his tormentors. At calibration level 590, he stood at the doorway of Enlightenment and was at peace with himself and the world.
A benign view of yourself is an important step, as it affirms the truth that you are doing the best you can. In fact, every human from moment to moment is always doing the best they can. Nothing else is possible except as a hypothetical mentation. From a negative energy field, people hypothesize impossible ideals for themselves and then go into guilt or self-punishment if they fall short of them. The self-satisfaction of Neutrality (250) offers considerable relief from the negative self-talk and immobilizing self-doubts experienced in the lower levels. People who operate at an integrous level overall may find that there is a certain area of life where they suffer a negative self-view, and it can be very liberating to let go of the resistance. For example, the woman who lets go of her negative body image is freed from the constant drain of comparing herself to other women. The man who overcomes his fear of public speaking is freed into new areas for career advancement and self-expression.
◆ To the right of the list of levels are the emotions associated with each specific level. These are the classic stages found in perennial philosophy, psychoanalysis, and various religious traditions. Under 200, we find what psychoanalysis terms the “emergency” emotions, and over 200 are the “welfare” emotions. All lower emotions are limitations and blind us to the reality of our true Self.
Resisting a negative emotion keeps you stuck. If you are willing to let go of negative emotions, you get freer and move up the scale, eventually experiencing predominantly positive feelings. At the very top of the scale, there occurs the realization of one’s true Self and the varying levels of Illumination. The main importance of this is to note that, as one gets higher and freer, what the world calls spiritual awareness, intuition, and growth of consciousness occur. That which is impossible to see or experience at lower levels of consciousness becomes self-evident and glaringly obvious at higher levels of consciousness. For example, when one is in the grips of Desire (cal. 125), one cannot imagine that Serenity (cal. 540) could ever be possible. Yet for the person who has recovered from addiction, Serenity is a daily reality.
It is well to remember that the emotional correlates of the energy fields of consciousness are rarely manifested as pure states in an individual. A person may operate on one level in a given area of life and on quite a different level in another area of life. An individual’s overall level of consciousness is the sum total effect of all the various levels operating within their life.
◆ Farther to the right shows the process going on within consciousness itself. On the level of Pride, for example, inflation is the process going on within consciousness and is of particular danger in our society, with the contentious narcissism of “I’m right” (at both ends of the political spectrum) and the ego inflation of the megalomaniac who leads the masses to their deaths. This phenomenon can be observed historically in the case of Napoleon, whose level of consciousness started out quite high, at 450, as a very good tactician and genius at mathematics and other accomplishments. Then suddenly, when he crowned himself emperor, his level dropped below 200. The Pope had always crowned the heads of Europe, but Napoleon crowned himself—the ultimate self-inflation! In that instant, his calibrated level went from 450 to 175. When he faced the Duke of Wellington (cal. 420) at Waterloo, Napoleon’s intention was at 75 and thus he was defeated. The same thing happened with Hitler, who dropped from 430 to 40. When megalomania hits a leader, the populace is not aware that it has happened. In the beginning, Hitler’s programs advanced society—autobahn and so forth. Then suddenly he crashed, and the monster emerged. What had been a great benefactor became the great killer of society.
The Map of Consciousness, therefore, casts new light on the progress of history. An important distinction for our purpose is that between force (energy below 200) and power (energy above 200). We can, for example, investigate a historical epoch such as the end of British colonialism in India. As touched on earlier, the position of the British Empire at the time (cal. 175)—which was one of inflation, self-interest, and exploitation—was, we find, below the critical level of 200 on the Map of Consciousness. The motivation of Mahatma Gandhi (cal. 760) was near the top of the Map. Gandhi was victorious in this struggle because his position was one of far greater power. He was aligned with the universal principle of Truth: that all people are created equal by God with the inherent right to self-determination. The British Empire represented force, and whenever force meets power, force is eventually defeated.
Throughout history, all the world’s great religions and spiritual disciplines have been concerned with techniques to ascend through these levels of consciousness. Most have also implied, or specifically stated, that to move up this ladder is an arduous task and that success depends on having a teacher (or at least teachings) to give specific instruction and inspiration to the aspirant, who might otherwise despair over this inability to achieve the goal unaided. Hopefully, the Map will help to facilitate this ultimate human endeavor.
A: An individual’s level of consciousness is determined by the principles they’re committed to. To maintain progress in consciousness, there can be no wavering about principle, or the individual will fall back to a lower level. Expediency of “the end justifies the means” is never an adequate justification. If it is wrong to kill another human being, that principle can allow no exceptions, regardless of how emotionally appealing a construct used to justify the exception may be. Gandhi did not waver from his principles; for him, peaceful nonviolence was both the means and the end, and he held to the principle of nonviolence in “thought, speech, and action” (Gandhi’s phrase).
A: According to our research, every single entity—at the moment of conception (the spirit enters the body at the third month of gestation)—already has a calibratable level of consciousness.
A: The Map does not denote “better than,” which is a projection of the ego. The Map merely denotes position or location that, in turn, denotes associated characteristics. A large tree is not “better than” a small tree. A brick at the bottom of the wall is not “better than” a brick at the top; they are both equally necessary to hold the wall in place. Thus, the consciousness level denotes a locus on a learning curve and a stage of the evolution of consciousness. The joy of life comes from fulfilling one’s potentiality at any given level. Each level has its rewards, and they actually feel the same to each person. A life dedicated to God or a higher purpose is endlessly self-fulfilling—whereas, in contrast, a life devoted to personal gain is full of pitfalls and suffering.
Each level is suitable for that which it is. Somebody at 700 is not suitable as a carpenter, is not suitable to run a church, and is not suitable as a president. Most sages at 700 cannot function like that at all. They just sit in their ashram, and people come to say hello as they smile happily back at them. The 200s and the 300s—the builders of the world, the construction workers, the steelworkers, the people who go to work every day—are the backbone of our society. The 400s is the world of the intellect, with its logic and reasoning, that dominates America. The realm of Love, at 500, is rare, with Unconditional Love, at 540, being extremely rare, and upwards of 540 there’s practically nobody. It isn’t that 500 is better than 200. It’s just that you’re in a different space, like being at a different place on a map. Your problem to get from here to there is different if you start off in Albuquerque or if you start off in Denver. You’re at a different place, and therefore you’re looking at different terrain with different lessons.
Everything is complete just as it is. There’s no deficiency anywhere. When you understand the universe, you see everything is going from “complete” to “complete.” Everything is complete and perfect right now. Everybody is just completely the perfect manifestation of their total karmic evolution up to this point in time. Everyone serves the whole no matter their condition or level.
A: The Map of Consciousness allows us a way of discerning essence as opposed to perception. For example, let’s say someone tells you, “I come here out of friendship.” If you calibrate him at 190, it’s a good idea to search him! He says one thing and may look benign, but in truth, he’s up to something else. His intention is not in your best interest. “Wolf in sheep’s clothing” is how we might describe such a person.
When we calibrate something according to the Map of Consciousness, we are discerning the level of truth, love, integrity, and benignity in something or someone. We’re interested to know the truth and the essence of the energy field, which is about motive and intention. We get a positive answer if the question has a reality. Consciousness calibration depends on the question and the answer having an equivalent reality. That which is false has no reality within the infinite field of consciousness. Consciousness can only register what exists as true. Therefore, if we ask about something that isn’t true, it has no reality, so the arm goes weak. If we test a true statement, the arm stays strong. The personal opinion or perception of the testers are irrelevant. When we utilize the living science of muscle-testing to calibrate the truth of something within the infinite field of consciousness, we are using the mechanism of quantum mechanics to collapse the wave function from potential to actual. When the question matches reality, we get a strong response.
The challenge is to be completely detached from the outcome. Most people have an unconscious attachment to a certain answer, so their testing is not accurate. When I test something, I don’t care what the answer is. I only want to know the truth.
A: I advise people not to calibrate their own consciousness, because they can’t be detached and objective. You’d have to be beyond sainthood to not have a vested interest in knowing your own level of consciousness, so you won’t be able to get an accurate result. If you study the Map, you’ll see the prevailing emotion and the way you view God and so forth, and this will tell you about where you are. If you hate everyone and you’re paranoid, you’re probably not too much into the heart yet! You can also tell where you are by how people respond to you. If people hate you, you’ve got a problem!
A: Believing in God is not a requirement. As we know from the daily news, so-called believers do all sorts of horrible things in the name of God and calibrate quite low on the Map, due to their intention arising from hatred, guilt, fear, righteousness, and pride. The Buddha himself avoided reference to God because of all the baggage associated with it. He spoke instead of Buddha-nature, which we might also refer to as Truth. Is one devoted to Truth or not? That is what matters in the evolution of consciousness.
I spent many years as a devout atheist, so I have sympathy for the atheist. As an atheist, I was dedicated to getting to the core of the Truth of existence. Thus, I have sympathy for genuine doubt because of its intellectual honesty. If I honestly cannot say that I am able to confirm the believability of a Divinity, then at least I’m being honest, and being honest is the first requirement of integrity on the Map of Consciousness. Then I moved from atheist to agnostic, where one can’t say yes or no; we might say this is more sophisticated and humble than atheism, because it acknowledges the limitations of the intellect and its inability to transcend linear causality as an explanation for phenomena.
Quantum mechanics is the way out from the restrictive linear domain of the Newtonian paradigm, via Heisenberg’s principle—in which we find the interesting discovery that to observe a thing is already to change the outcome because you’ve introduced the impact of consciousness itself. The level of consciousness of the observer has a profound effect on what is being observed. One doesn’t have to believe in God to agree with this scientific principle.
Doubt and disbelief often presage major leaps of consciousness that may arise consequent to remotivation due to frustration, calamity, or merely maturation and the emergence of wisdom. This has been noted by many people, even saints, who went through major conversion experiences, including the miraculous. One such pathway can involve the loss of early-life religious faith due to catastrophic circumstances, which is then followed by years of seeking for confirmable truth. Such inner exploration is accelerated by the practice of meditation without an associated belief system. Thus, for the nonbeliever, Buddhism is often practical and attractive, as the Buddha taught the Eightfold Path without belief in “God.”
Another pathway suitable for the nonbeliever is provided by the ancient Vedas and Upanishads that anticipated the discoveries of quantum mechanics. They also spoke of the Ultimate Reality of the Absolute Principle and the infinite field of consciousness itself as the primordial Reality that is beyond the illusions of perception as well as mentation. The pathway of Advaita (nonduality) is the pristine avenue for the integrous search for Truth that excludes all belief systems. (This has been described in detail in prior works, The Eye of the I and I: Reality and Subjectivity.) Although nonduality leads to Enlightenment, the study of Vedanta can lead to overinvolvement in various Indian schools of philosophy that may then become distractive belief systems.
A: It is possible for isolated individuals to make sudden positive jumps, even of hundreds of points; however, the energy field calibrated for an individual at birth only increases, on the average, by about five points. The majority of people utilize their life experiences to elaborate and express the variations of their native energy field; it is the rare individual who is motivated and manages to move beyond it. Without the exercise of choice, no progression will occur. It is also possible to “crash” to a lower level, as we saw with Napoleon and Hitler. This has occurred in the lives of spiritual teachers who crashed from a high level of consciousness consequent to errors of judgment. They had not been warned of the temptations faced at that level: money, sex, fame, and power over others.
An important element of chaos theory, which is helpful in understanding the evolution of consciousness, is the law of sensitive dependence on initial conditions. This refers to the fact that a slight variation over a course of time can have the effect of producing a profound change, much as a ship whose bearing is one degree off compass will eventually find itself hundreds of miles off course. This phenomenon is an essential mechanism of all evolution. Committing to the practice of even one spiritual principle can eventuate, in time, a profound change. Similarly, a single error or falsehood, if repeated often enough, can lead a person (or institution or society) significantly off course.