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Creativity As Potentially The Last Human Value

 

In our modern age of robots, machines and computers taking over every task that humans have toiled, we must begin to to ask ourselves … what can humans do that machines cannot? What is the value of humanity?

Victor Frankl says our last human freedom is our ability to choose how we respond to external stimulus. This is something that no person or condition can take away. Not even a Nazi prison camp.

I also say that our last human VALUE is our ability to be creative. This is something that no external mechanism can replace.

I believe that creativity is that last human asset. Creativity in it’s many forms … visual art, dancing, music, theorizing, poetry … is something that transcends logic, linear thinking and potentially even the localized self. No computer can ever create the same way as humans.

Many politicians talk about how we need more jobs; however the jobs of the yore are not coming back. Over a hundred years ago we had the career of the “lamplighters” who lit the kerosene street lamps. But with the advent of new electric lights, this job was quickly made irrelevant. We are seeing the story of the lamplighters being played out across industries today.

This is ultimately a good thing (once again “bad” things being a blessing in disguise) because it forces us to shift towards the last remaining thing that can never be replaced … creativity.

As a successful large-scale steel sculptor, I have learned tools and methods to cultivate creativity. This also includes how to enter the “flow state” which is the present state-of-mind of which insight is spawned.

With the remaining time, I want to cover two broad subjects: How to cultivate creativity and how to be effective in it:

CULTIVATION:

Self-limiting beliefs.

We are all given the paradigms of what the world is and who we are at an early age. We can spend our entire lives trying to overcome these paradigms. Some things people have heard are criticisms of their own creativity which therefore shut down any further expression as well as phrases like the “starving artist” or “you only make money as an artist when you’re dead”. These are toxic concepts which create failure. How do we address these belief systems?

Self-awareness.

Self-awareness is the flashlight in the darkness of unquestioned paradigms. Prioritizing time throughout the day to become present and observe our reactions to external stimulus as well as watch our own thoughts is key to realizing where these belief systems came from. Once we have identified self-limiting programming we are able to dissolve it with the following…

The power of visualization.

Visualization which is the ability to sense things in our minds … the ability to daydream, recall a musical composition, choreograph dance, see colors on canvas, feel softness of a pet all in the mind. Visualization is the stem cell of creativity. Powerful people from Olympic athletes to CEOs use visualization to see their goals before actually manifesting it in reality. But the kings of visualization are those who use it for creative endeavors. Let me explain one of the most powerful times you can use visualization…

Hypnagogia.

Hypnagogia is the transitory state between wakefulness and sleep. This is a powerful time of visualization because disparate parts of your brain begin talking with each other. Your normal logical mind full of paradigms of what “should be” begins to quiet but is still active enough to consciously guide the other parts of the brain in constructive visualizing. One thing about this hynagogic quasi-dream state is you often forget by the next morning which leads me to the next tool…

The importance of writing.

How many times have you had such a good idea that you didn’t need to write it down because you thought you would remember … and then forgot?

This happens to me all the time and I have learned my lesson … Write down everything.

Let me give a metaphor, your brain is like a small desk which can only have three pieces of paper visible at anytime. If you need to look at anything else, you need to file away one of the papers in order to make room for the other information. Writing allows you to expand your desk so you are able to look at dozens of papers. In essence writing is an extension of the brain. Writing does two things. First our minds often are filled with worries, tasks and thought-loops which bog down our brains and disable us from entering the flow state of creativity. Writing allows our minds to relax from thinking about it by putting these things outside of ourselves onto paper. Secondly, writing coalesces the nebulous, an important element of being effective.

EFFECTIVE:

Coherence.

Many creative people have trouble getting past the state of day-dreaming and actually manifesting their dreams in reality. This is where coherence comes in. A 60w lightbulb only dimly lights a room whereas collecting all of those photons into a single laser beam gives enough power to cut through steel. This is what I call “coalescing the nebulous” and is the single most important aspect to becoming effective at turning creative visualizations into reality. Besides writing, we must focus our efforts with perseverance and organization to manifest our creations.

Living a balanced life.

The effective creative person must learn how to balance themselves. The past is what we evolve from, the present is where we create and the future is what we plan. Many of us tend to focus on one of these more than the other. Having an imbalance here leads to stagnation and spinning one’s wheels. Likewise it is important to balance productivity versus production capability. In other words, taking time from work to sharpen the saw … but also not perpetually “sharpening the saw” either.

Ritual and routine.

One of the ways to actually bring these diverse tools practically in our life is to create daily rituals preferable in the morning and at night. For example writing three pages of anything and everything that comes to mind first thing in the morning will go a long way to resulting in a more focused day. Taking time to intentionally visualize right before sleep can result in the answers you have been looking for. Going for a daily walk as a form of meditation is another way of which to derive creative sustenance and self-awareness.

Meaning and authenticity.

Your creative endeavors should come a place of authenticity. Not so much thinking of what is commercially viable but rather what feels right to you. Remove all restrictions from creative endeavors and that is how you find new solutions, genres, and concepts to make a better world.

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“Originators” and “Repeaters”

 

There are two kinds of spiritual people in the world…

What I call “Repeaters” and “Originators”.

Both of these people have inspiration and influence from the teachers and wise-ones of past/future; but the Repeaters regurgitate information whereas the Originators digest wisdom.

Most “spiritual people” you meet are Repeaters. The definition is simple, they repeat wisdom they have heard without fully digesting it and making it their own. This can be seen most obviously when they post non-original social-media memes. This is often also seen with repeated, persistent and myopic focus on one master / teacher / guru / path / religion / philosophy / group. Another sign of repeaters is the use of buzz-words specific to their narrow focus in one group. These are words only people “in the know” are familiar with; they are essentially calling cards to other people of similar philosophy. Repeaters recite verbatim what they were taught. Repeaters trust everything their identified group says as truth, in other words are dogmatic … though they all would deny this claim.

The more rare and deep spiritual person is what I call Originators. These people also refer to teachers or philosophies but pursue the wisdom of diverse paths. Not one path such as Buddhism, Christianity, Paganism, Atheism, Islam, or Contemporary Ways … but respect all paths. The Originator knows there are many paths which lead to the same source of truth. Some paths are more direct whereas others meander more. Some more opaque and some more transparent.

While the Originators consume diverse spiritual teachings like some Repeaters, the Originators fully digest the wisdom. Originators are not taught, they are reminded of what they already know.

Originators ask themselves what their wisdom and intuition is before consulting another person, book or philosophy.

Repeaters are important because they amplify certain important teachings. But Originators are more potent because they deeply embody the truth. This creates a stronger amplitude in the waves of positive influence towards consciousness evolution. Their understanding and embodiment transcends verbiage and text.

A synonym for Originators is Leader; and for Repeaters is Follower. However the word “leader” suggests having people follow you. This is not necessarily the case, a true leader can be completely isolated and still be a leader.

As always, metaphor is the often the best way to point towards the deepest truths…

Originators pull from their own deep well of wisdom, not from others’ wells. Originators were reminded by themselves and from teachers how to dig their own well. Repeaters drink from the teacher’s well, but have not learned to dig their own.

If it weren’t for the originators, people would be mightily thirsty.

To put it more simply. Water is the wisdom. Originators are the well. Repeaters are the bucket.

In another analogy…

Originators have roots that grow deep. They can weather the storms of external influence; droughts, disease and wind. Repeaters have shallow roots, where they can easily be toppled.

I believe anyone and everyone can become an Originator. In order to do so, they must limit their external influence and look within for answers. To be alone in nature and enter a state of presence. To feel themselves and dissolve into nothing and everything. To live between pre-determinism and freewill in a state of flow. True understanding comes from personal experience of these universal realities.

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What Does “Consciousness” Mean?

 

In reading “The Power of Now”, I am reminded that we are not our minds. We are not our thoughts despite often thinking we are our thoughts. We are not our ego. We are not “I”.

We are existence. We are sensory experiential tendrils of “source”. I often relate consciousness to mushrooms and the mycorrhizal system beneath the soil. This fungal matrix underground looks very much like the connections in our brain. It is a place of connectedness, peace and all-knowing. A place analogous to what people have experienced after death. Then when the conditions are right, little mushrooms sprout up. These mushrooms could be seen as separate entities but alas they where derived from and are integrally connected to their unified source… Of which they will rejoin again soon.

A Buddhist monk also said it it very eloquently. We are little rain drops in a waterfall who think of themselves as separate. But they were born from the same source and ultimately rejoin each other in the same whole river of life.

Or we could look at our physical bodies as waves upon the deeper ocean.

Really the only way to explain consciousness is through metaphor.

My interpretation of the phrase “Evolution of Consciousness” is this….
We stem from a place of all-knowing expansive interconnectedness and when we are born into this dimension we loose the awareness of this. I believe evolution of consciousness is remembrance of this essential state. When we remember that the foundational energy of our existence is compassion and that we are all inter-connected, I believe that the atrocities such as environmental destruction, lashing out at other beings and non-aware-states will begin to fade. Evolution of consciousness is simply remembering what we already know at a deep level. The truths of our existence.

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What Do I Feel About Multi-Dimensionalism?

 

Multi-Dimensionalism is fascinating and incomprehensible. One of those things of which words can only serve as sign posts to the true reality. I believe our consciousness can access and live in other dimensions than the one we usually operate in physically. I believe that the “spirit world” exists in these other dimensions. Sometimes the other dimensions reveal themselves when we drop our paradigms and programming of how our reality “should” be.

I think other dimensions are analogous to our different levels of consciousness. Where normal consciousness is the three dimensional physical reality. Subconscious is a dimension deeper. And unconscious is a dimension even deeper. I believe that dimensions are not black and white. I think there is a spectrum. Dimensions do not have hard edges.

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Favorite Part Of Quantum Mechanics?

 

Quantum entanglement, the double slit experiment, dark energy, dark matter, string theory and nothingness.

In quantum entanglement, when you split a particle and shoot the two halves in opposite directions and affect one part — like change the spin or direction –the other distant part also instantly changes.

Implication: I believe this can explain how we can have synchronous experience with people we love and are connected to.

The double slit experiment is where you shoot particles one at a time through one of two slits. When observed, it acts as particle form and goes through either one slit or the other. When not-observed, it acts as a wave form of infinite potential and goes through both slits at the same time.

Implication: This shows how our observation and mind can have a tangible instantaneous effect on our physical reality.

Dark energy and dark matter are confounding things that we know exist but cannot directly interact with. This shows how limited science is and that there are many questions yet unanswered. We know something exists but we do not know what it is.

Implication: I think this is like subtle energy. Just because we cannot measure it with an instrument does not mean it doesn’t exist. It just means we do not have the right tools yet.

String theory is the concept of when you zoom into an atom you find quarks and when you zoom into quarks you get vibrating strings of energy.

Implication: This shows that everything is simply energy. This also suggests how vibration can be healing and have real effects on our reality.

Nothingness is the fact that when you magnify the sub-atomic world, actual particles are minuscule and separated by vast space of “nothingness”. Our solid reality and our own bodies are practically nothing but empty space.

Implication: This shows how our consciousness is more “real” than the physical dimension.

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Vitamin C and Earthing. Are They Connected?

 

I recently read the book “Curing the Incurable: Vitamin C, Infectious Diseases and Toxins” by Thomas Levy and learned about the electron theory of health. Basically disease and inflammation is a result of a lack of electrons. Oxidation and inflammation consume electrons. Anti-oxidants give electrons. Most other animals produce their own vitamin C naturally, but humans do not so we are particularly susceptible to deficiency. While there are many different anti-oxidants out there, vitamin C is particularly good because it goes throughout the entire body whereas other anti-oxidants tend to focus on specific systems. We can only orally absorb 8-12 grams of vitamin C a day. However, intravenous vitamin C allows for substantially more uptake. Many scientific studies prove that intravenous vitamin C injections have healed people from the brink of death. It has been shown to cure polio, ebola, heavy metal poisoning, mushroom poisoning, snake bites, etc. It is truly a miracle substance at high doses (Sometimes 50 gram infusions). However it can be difficult to find clinics outside of big-cities to administer through this route. The good news is they now have “liposomal vitamin C” which is a nutraceutical that encapsulates vitamin C particles at a nano level with a phospholipid layer.. This modified version of vitamin C allows unprecedented oral uptake of vitamin C approaching intravenous levels and with no intake threshold. It is said that Liv-On brand liposomal vitamin C is the superior form whereas others are mostly a vitamin C emulsion with a small amount of true liposomal C.  It is very expensive though at over $1 a gram.

After learning about the panacea of vitamin C, I listened to a book about grounding called “Earthing. The Most Important Health Discover Ever?” by Clint Ober where he talked about how contact with Earth allows us to absorb free electrons. The 100 lightning strikes every second on the planet splits atmospheric atoms into positive and negative ions where the positive ozone goes upward and the negative electrons go downward thus creating a collection of free electrons on the surface of the Earth as if a battery. When I heard this, I made the mental connection that Earthing is similar to having a transfusion of vitamin C.

Unlike vitamin C, Earthing is free.

Before I learned about these two critical keys to health, I was getting sick every three months. Once I started using an earthing pad my frequency of getting a cold went down to one a year. Then I found that if I took 4 to 6 grams a day of liposomal vitamin C for three to four days at the earliest signs of a sore throat I have never gotten sick again. Health is wealth and learning the keys to wellness before dis-ease strikes is critical to living a good life.

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Environmentalism From A Purely Intellectual Perspective?

 

In deep-ecology, eco-centrism and pantheism, there is an inherent element of spirituality. There is the belief that consciousness exists outside of ourselves. That there is value to natural integrity outside of our human utilization. That there is magic in seeing the night sky without light pollution, magic in the curve of the hills, magic in the wetness of water, magic in the song of birds, magic in old-growth forest, magic in fertile soil, magic as we stand barefoot on moss and lichen.

One can be an environmentalist from an agnostic, anthropocentric and/or myopic perspective. But this leads to concepts and approaches that are not holistically ideal. For example, in wanting to prevent climate change, humans have pursued the idea of more nuclear power plants. Even ultra-small nuclear power plants sprinkled throughout neighborhoods. This replaces one problem with another problem of radioactive gene-modifying carcinogenic waste that lasts for hundreds of thousands of years as well as targets for foul play. The same shortsighted concept of replacing one problem with another also lies in genetic modification or using poison to irradiate noxious pests.

The thing that us Deep-Ecologists point to cannot be explained from an purely intellectual level. There is an emotional and spiritual element as well as inner knowing.
When presented with the logical concepts of Deep Ecology such as leaving resources, bio-diversity and natural spaces for future generations; maintaining clean air, water, and soil for our health; and preventing animal extinction. These can all be understood at an intellectual logical level.

But only true understanding will come when you see the Earth as your mother, your lover, your child or yourself. Only true understanding comes when you shed tears for the wise trees being cut down. When your heart beats with loss when you see and hear the bull dozers ripping through the ancient lands home to generations of flora and fauna like a rapists knife through skin. When your blood boils at the paving over soft fertile soil, barking dogs replacing howling coyotes, streetlights replacing stars at night, dryer sheets replacing the smell of sage on a rainy day, whizzing cars replacing the wisdom of silent wind, curvaceous hills being torn into linear lines. Only when we cry for these atrocities will we understand what the Deep Ecologists desperately try to explain. Understanding only comes when we understand the rivers as our blood, the native grasses as our hair, the wind as our breath, the stones as our bones, the soil as our skin and the seasons as our heart beat.

 

There is a distinction between knowledge and understanding. Indeed, knowledge is not understanding. This is a concept I have been exploring a lot over the past month. From the perspective of knowledge,  humans think they are superior.
Let me expand this concept further… Humans think they know best, they think they can be gods over everything else which is why we are artificially modifying the genetic code that took millions of years to create thinking that we actually know what we are doing. Our pursuit of “knowledge” but lack of holistic understanding is liable to destroy our existence and everything else. Indeed, the relativistic large hadron collider which we are using to discover the “secrets” of the universe has the very very ultra small potential to create something called “strangelets”; a particle with the ability to turn every other particle it comes in contact with into a strangelet turning the world into a sci-fi nightmare of a homogenous blob. When humans where first testing nuclear weapons, they were not sure if the chain reaction wouldn’t just continue infinitely and destroy the entire world … but despite this horrific potential they pursued it anyways. Looking to the future, our pursuit to terraform Mars will require an exporting of our valuable finite Earthly materials to this barren planet. How about we just protect the sacredness of what we have?

In understanding. In being present. In being self-aware. In observing the inner and outer worlds, we would not have the compulsion to move in a linear fashion to pursue knowledge without ethical understanding. To pursue “development and growth” without holistic respect to cycles and homeostasis.

Humans like to think of themselves as gods that know best and are superior to all other things. It is this thinking that causes our problems. When we know ourselves as Gods just like everything else — the plants, animals, minerals, air — then we will find peace, contentment and joy.

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About Symbolism

The power of symbolism is a potent language and gives purpose to my being an artist. Symbols speak directly to the sub-conscious and are instantaneous. In manifestation work, sigils are preferable to word phrases because of this instantaneous and sub-conscious effect.

It also reminds me of gestalt psychology. Simply explained, when we see something like a tree, we know it instantaneously, we do not need to parse that it is green, with bark and branches and leaves, and is growing upright and THEN figure that it is a tree. We know it instantly. When we see another human being, we don’t need to think “there is the right width to height ratio tolerance, there is an oblong orb with eyes, nose, ears, lips, hair (or maybe no hair), there are some legs and arms … I think that is a human right there because of all this informational data”. NO!!! This shows the power of the subconscious ability to instantly know something without having to go through lengthy deduction and parsing of data.

Back to sigils…
Symbols debatably have no power until you program them with personal meaning. When you draw your own sigil, you put intention, emotion and thought behind it. Everytime you engage with it, you repeat these feelings and thoughts. Eventually when you look at or visualize your symbol, it manifests these feeling naturally.

Another example … the swastika symbol used to be a sacred symbol of Native Americans but is now the symbol of Nazis. This illustrates how our conditional programming can change the original meaning.

As a a side tangent, one can also say there is a collective unconscious element to symbolism. Where there is an innate understanding of symbols that transcend our individual lifetime’s programming. A baby seeking a nipple for nourishment is an example of this inherent knowing. Many animals have a natural knowing for what plants to eat without being trained. There is often an instinctual element to symbolism.

Thus our understanding of symbolism is a combination of consciousness, sub-consciousness, and the collective unconscious.

What symbols are you drawn to?

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Pondering Of Consciousness

 

A person I know recently lost a loved one which caused me to ponder the meaning of life and definition of consciousness. While I am certainly not qualified to describe any of it with authority, I want to provide a few humble thoughts.

If we look at quantum physics, we see within every atom are quarks and within every quark are vibrating strings of energy. At this level, everything is the same. Everything is one. Perhaps this explains the phenomenon of quantum entanglement where when we separate something the parts remain mysteriously connected; what happens to one affects the other instantaneously. We also see that two lovers or a parent and child separated by walls and distance remain connected. When they create a physiological reaction in one person by showing images, the other person reflects the physical reaction even when they are not seeing any images or their partner.

In essence, there is something that connects us all together; perhaps this is what some people call “God”. There is a realm that exists of which we cannot see, touch or measure.

I am reminded of a wonderful metaphor for life…..
We start from a river. Our life, as we know it, begins when we pass over a waterfall and see ourselves as separate little drops of water floating down until we reach the end of the waterfall and once again join the mighty river.