Posted by Carpefeline in Palau tales - http://blog.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/carpefeline/1/1261606856/tpod.html Throughout the history of humanity, within every culture, and among all levels of society within those cultures, some variation of acknowledgement of a transcendent aspect to existence has appeared in the writings, art, mythologies, and narratives, relevant to the particular culture. In the modern world, we take … Continue reading The World Below the Surface
“I am anxiously waiting For the secret of eternal life to be discovered By an obscure practitioner.” From the poem, “I Am Waiting,” by Lawrence Ferlinghetti While I certainly qualify as an “obscure practitioner,” in spite of many years of tenacious contemplation and unrelenting reflection on the nature of human consciousness, I cannot claim to … Continue reading Mortality and Madness – Part 2
Recently, knowing of my passion for poetry, my nephew and his intended bride invited me to share in their celebration of love by composing and reciting an original poem about Love and Marriage. It was a wonderful gesture on their part to acknowledge my poetic inclinations, and to invite me to perform an original work … Continue reading The Divine Light of Love
[image credit: St. Jude Medical; North East Vision Magazine] I recently reviewed a publication I received a while back from Scientific American entitled, "Mind and Brain," written by Gerald D. Fischbach, who served as Chairman of the Department of Neurobiology at Harvard Medical School from 1990 - 2000. The complexity of the human brain as … Continue reading Human Brain, Human Mind, Human Consciousness, Human Spirit
Simply taking a slow, deep breath out in the woods in the Adirondack region of New York State is so near to a transcendent experience by itself that whenever I arrive there I feel confident in my ability to achieve an even more intense transcendent state with some effort and focus. When I was a … Continue reading Adirondack Dreams
The only means of strengthening one's intelligence is to make up one's mind about nothing-- to let the mind be a thoroughfare for all thoughts. - John Keats (1795 - 1821) No matter what aspect of conscious experience we wish to consider, whether it involves a clearly temporal action or event like wrestling an alligator, … Continue reading The Dynamics of Consciousness
Having just returned from three days and nights in the Belleplain State Forest, the return to civilization always seems to find me rejuvenated in spirit, but also oddly melancholy. The trip was a welcome break from the relentless daily routines that sustain me as I write, and the moments of blissful silence communing with only … Continue reading Spirits in the Woods
Contemplating recent comments about what it means to be a conscious human, I began to consider what really distinguishes us from all the other inhabitants of our planet. There are some distinctively human traits to be sure, but it seems more like a combination of several important capacities and foundational characteristics that sets us apart. … Continue reading Blossoming of Consciousness
Egyptian Heads Mummies of the World Exhibition On loan from the Reiss-Engelhorn Museums, Mannheim, Germany Franklin Institute, Philadelphia, PA Imagine for a moment that you are in Egypt in the latter part of the 26th Dynasty in the Late Period of Egyptian history witnessing the burial rituals of Nespaqashuti, an Egyptian priest in the religious … Continue reading Ancient Worlds and Modern Consciousness
A current exhibition at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, “Mummies of the World,” contains over 40 mummies and a number of artifacts related to these discoveries. In the official exhibition catalog, it states that the goal of the exhibit “is to advance the relevance of anthropology in ancient global cultures, and to provide visitors with … Continue reading Is Matter a Manifestation of the Spirit?
John's Consciousness 