AryaS
Member
Sorry, I should have said counterpart, not counterpoint. Ok, I believe that we exist in two realities at once - the physical and the psychic. The physical needs no explanation. The psychic is the realm of dreams, psychedelic experiences, spirits, astral travel, NDEs, etc. Although we always exist in both worlds simultaneously, our awareness follows our attention. So, when our attention is focused on embodied existence, we primarily inhabit the physical. When we dream, use active imagination, or enter a trance, our awareness begins to shift into the psychic. Presumably the psychic realm operates under laws that resemble the dream-state.
Panpsychism confers some degree of consciousness on all matter, with the level of consciousness increasing with complexity. I don't think it would be too much of a stretch to confer consciousness on complex systems like forests, stars, galaxies, etc. Now, if plants, animals, forests, planets, etc. have relatively high-end consciousness, then they should also exist within the psychic realm. (I can't help but see this as a good fit with shamanic experience and ability.)
Now for the Jungian bit! Literally everywhere we look in nature we see wholes made up of smaller parts that are themselves wholes. These systems within systems are transcendent, in that they are always more than the sum of their parts. I see no reason why this pattern should not carry through to consciousness. Thus we may be individually (and collectively) intimately embedded within a pyramid of greater consciousnesses.
So, maybe, within the psychic realm, we are able to move beyond our personal consciousness and operate within the field of humanity's 'collective unconscious' - with its attendant archetypes and complexes. After all, altered states do seem to contain a strange blending of the personal and the transpersonal.
I hope that was a little more coherent than my last attempt!
EDIT: I should point out that I see this 'psychic realm' as being, in some way, an actual independent reality.
Thank you for the elaboration, dpdown. I think I understand a little better. I guess I'm still trying to understand how the concept of evil or a moral universe fits into this panpsychic/pantheistic worldview -- if at all? If all of consciousness is just evolving and learning and adapting -- and we are essentially little fractal consciousnesses within a larger consciousness (but still having all of its parts within us, somewhere), then I presume that even acts of what most of us would consider to be "great evil" in the physical realm are just learning/evolutionary experiences and just another (amoral) aspect of consciousness exploring itself -- what a Jungian might say, exploring our Shadow Self? So in your opinion, is this world just the individual and collective consciousness exploring its own Light and Shadow? With the ultimate end being, what, a total understanding of its/our entire (amoral) nature? Or is there no end -- is this all cyclical, ever evolving, a snake swallowing its own tail forever?
I do see a somewhat similar concept with the study of the Kabbalah -- the consciousness evolution towards Keter and then beyond into the Ein Sof -- that which has no form or separation but is pure consciousness. But I have issues with these kabbalistic/panpsychic models in that it doesn't allow me to reconcile the subjective experiences of (a majority of) NDE experiencers and others having powerful positive spiritually transformative experiences who speak of an ultimately moral universe, with the primary energy being "Love"?
I feel I have to toss out what NDE'ers are claiming as either wishful thinking, delusion, or deception (intentional or even as a result of trickery by higher consicousness beings who want to keep humanity in this loop of human suffering for whatever reason....). Because the less subjective evidence of reality here on this plane does suggest to me either a completely amoral evolving consciousness -- or some form of Dualism that would allow for separate higher beings of good/evil.
Going to get some more strong coffee now!