Does consciousness require a body-mind apparatus in order to know and perceive?

Does consciousness require a body-mind apparatus in order to know and perceive?

Hello Rupert, 

Is it not the case that consciousness requires a body-mind apparatus in order to become a knower or perceiver, in the same way that consciousness needs a foot and a ball in order to kick a ball? Of course it is consciousness that kicks the ball, and it is consciousness that perceives – but only by means of its apparatus. So there is only consciousness all along, but in order to smell a rose, consciousness must manifest as sense perceptions and brain apparatus. 

Thank you, 
Red 

 

Dear Red, 

I understand why you say this, but you are trying to mix two immiscible perspectives. You are trying to put new wine into old skins, trying to fit a new understanding of experience within the framework of the old, and it just doesn’t fit. 

Consciousness does not have or require a body-mind, nor does it experience a world through a body-mind. The body-mind does not experience the world, but rather consciousness ‘experiences’ the body-mind-world. 

Or we could say that the body-mind-world rises as one single, indivisible ‘perception’ – not consciousness ‘seeing’ a world through a body-mind, but rather consciousness ‘seeing’ or ‘experiencing’ a body-mind-world. 

Or we could say that consciousness doesn’t ‘see’ or ‘experience’ a world througha mind, but rather the world isthe mind (in the broadest sense of the word) that is ‘seen’ or ‘experienced’ by consciousness. That is not really true, but it is a valid statement because it relieves us of the belief that consciousness is located inside the body, looking out at a world. It is a step in the right direction. 

It would be truer to say (though of course not completely true) that sensations, thoughts and perceptions appear – or, more accurately, a sensation-thought-perception appears – in consciousness, and that thinking alone abstracts or conceptualises a separate body, mind and world from the raw data of singular, seamless experience.

In fact, even the slightly more refined concept of a single appearance, the body-mind-world (or sensation-thought-perception) is a concept that tries to evoke the ‘taste’ of experience as it is but refers to something that is never actually experienced as such. However, it is another step in the right direction. It is ‘truer’ than the previous formulation but will, in time, be found to be simply another, slightly more subtle conceptual superimposition upon experience itself. 

 

*     *     * 

 

As we look more closely – and notice that all we are doing is looking – we do not find sensations, thoughts and perceptions, or even a single ‘sensation-thought-perception’. That is, we do not find any objects, gross or subtle, in experience. 

We could say, again provisionally, that we find sensing, thinking and perceiving or, more accurately, sensing-thinking-perceiving – again, another step. What we conceived as a single, multi-dimensional physical object is now conceived as a single, multi-dimensional subtle object. 

And as we go further, that is, as we look with more simplicity and honesty, even the conceptualisation of experience as ‘sensing-thinking-perceiving’ falls away and we could say that there is just experiencing. Another step. 

And what is it that knows or experiences experiencing? Experiencing! There is nothing outside of experiencing with which it could be known. It knows only itself. However, it doesn’t know itself in the way that dualising thinking normally conceives of knowing, that is, in subject–object relationship. For experiencing, its knowing itself is simply its being itself. To know and to be are one.

Now go deeply into experiencing. Does it stand back from itself in order to know ‘something?’ 

Does it take place at a certain place? No, all apparent places would be made only of experiencing.

Does it take place at a certain time? No, all apparent times would be made only of experiencing. 

Is experiencing made of separate parts, entities, objects or things? No, all apparent parts, entities, objects or things would only be made of experiencing. ‘Parts’, ‘entities’, ‘objects’ and ‘things’ are names that are superimposed by thinking upon experiencing and believed (from the point of view of thinking alone) to refer to something that is actually experienced. From the ‘point of view’ of experience itself, they are non-existent as such. 

 

*     *     * 

 

Experiencing is homogeneous, made of only one ‘substance’, made only of itself. Does this one ‘substance’ ever appear or disappear? No! Into what would it disappear and from what would it appear? In order to legitimately claim the reality of such a place, it would have to be ‘experienced’ and would, therefore, be ‘made out of’ experiencing. 

Have ‘we’ ever had or would it be possible to have the experience of the absence of, a change in or a cause for experiencing? No! Even if such an experience is claimed, the ‘we’ that would ‘have’ such an experience would only be made of experiencing. 

Experiencing is ever-present, homogeneous, self-knowing, self-luminous, self-existent. It knows nothing other than itself. 

It knows no time or space, no objects or lack of objects, no cause and no effect, no meaning, purpose or destiny, no lack and no becoming. These are all mental abstractions, apparently superimposed onto the ever-present seamlessness of experience. 

We do not need to give experiencing a name, nor could we give it a name that adequately expresses what it is. At best, we could ascribe the sum total of all possible names (and even all possible words) to ‘It’. That is the best the mind could do. Hence, William Blake, ‘All things possible to be believed are an image of truth’. 

However, even all possible names and words would not be adequate. Thinking falls silent even in attempting to look towards this ‘one’, let alone in attempting to name it. Thinking is destroyed in the attempt like a moth turning towards a flame. It turns and as it turns, it dies. It cannot stand the light of truth. 

 

*     *     * 

 

Having seen this, we can look back at all the attempts of thinking to accurately portray the nature of experience and, whilst we understand that these formulations may get more and more subtle and that some may seem, temporarily and at a relative level, ‘truer’ than others, at the same time, we recognise that ultimately, none are truer than another. 

From the point of view of experiencing (which is, of course, not a pointof view) all viewpoints are made equally out of experiencing and yet none adequately express it. However, from the ‘position’ of experiencing itself, thinking is no longer required to ‘approach’ it, because thinking can no longer get away from it far enough to stand back and ‘have a look’, as it were. 

Where would thinking go? Where would it take its stand? The mind as a separate entity, capable of distinguishing itself, standing apart and conceptualising experience, has dissolved and these questions simply do not arise. 

‘Everything’ is too utterly, intimately, immediately, ever-presently, only experiencing to be able to separate out one little part that can turn round and ‘look at’, let alone conceive of, something called experience. In fact, there is no longer any ‘everything’. 

Water does not know the difference between ocean, wave, river, stream, cloud and rain; only the mind seems to know the difference. But these differences only belong to water from the mind’s point of view, which is, in turn, a valid point of view only from its own point of view. In reality, these differences pertain to the mind, not to water. They do not touch the water itself. 

However, the mind itself is just another ‘river’ – it knows nothing of water. At the same time, it is made of nothing other than water. As ‘river’ it is apparent name and form; as ‘water’ it is always only water. 

Thinking loses its name and form here
and stands revealed as it always only is
in silent wonder and love
knowingbeing only itself
until the next river of words
gently bubbles up, 

Rupert

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