When the opportunity presents itself to venture out into the natural world for a camping trip, performing my traditional morning rituals in the woods is like meeting with old friends in a forest. The simple pleasures of preparing the first meal of the day beside the trees and in the cool early morning air are … Continue reading Our Connection with the Natural World
The title of the song in the background of the video below is “Beyond This Moment,” by Patrick O’Hearn. I’ve mentioned his work before and heard it on the radio on the way home one evening, and it stuck with me. The title started me to thinking about how we might discover what lies “beyond … Continue reading Consciousness Video Series: Episode 8: Beyond This Moment
Last summer, in August of 2022, I posted episode six of my “Consciousness Video Series: Metaphor and the Inner Experience.” https://johns-consciousness.com/2022/08/27/consciousness-video-series-episode-6-metaphor-and-the-inner-experience/ This video described metaphorically my immediate impressions, as I struggled to express, understand, and relate my very personal interpretation of a profound sense of recognition of my inner life, which invariably suggested the elements … Continue reading The Path Beneath the Terrace
"Driftwood," by Winslow Homer (1836-1910) “I can reach a state where I seem to be watching things happen as if I were there. That is, I suppose, that my memory supplies what I had forgotten, so that it seems as if it were happening independently, though I am really making it happen. In certain favorable … Continue reading Blog Post #400 – Moments of Being
Webster’s Encyclopedic Dictionary says: “A supernatural event regarded as due to divine action; an extremely remarkable achievement or event; e.g. “it was a miracle he wasn’t hurt.” Anyone possessing even a passing familiarity with religious ideas has probably heard of what holy books have described as miracles—turning water into wine, healing the sick, and other … Continue reading The Mystery of Miracles – Divine Intervention or Just Impossible To Explain?
Anyone even vaguely familiar with the term “mystical,” whether from a religious practice or simply from an investigation into the subject generally, can usually agree that it includes a whole range of possible experiences which may qualify. In his classic volume, “Varieties of Religious Experience,” William James writes: “The adjective ‘mystical’ is technically applied, most … Continue reading The Mystical Is Often Metaphorical
Day six of covid infection... Finally beginning to feel human again after five horrendous days of illness this past week. My experience with this illness has been very educational and directly responsible for an environment where my basic brain functionality suffered a major impairment of unprecedented character in my nearly seven decades of life. In … Continue reading And on the seventh day…
There have been moments lately, where it seemed to me, that I, myself, have been chasing the shade. Clearly, in the summertime, when it gets particularly hot, and the sun is particularly dangerous, we find ourselves moving our chairs so that they remain in the shade. As the sun creeps up, we move the chairs … Continue reading Winter Pastoral: Chasing the Shade
This most recent effort in producing video content has been the most challenging of the series, for a number of reasons, and the software I'm using continues to provide a fair amount of aggravation as I worked at putting it all together, but I think the result is interesting enough considering the subject, in spite … Continue reading Consciousness Video Series: Episode 7: A Theory of Everything
I finally had a chance to post the poem I worked on during my recent trip into the mountains, and hope my readers and visitors will enjoy this brief video. https://videopress.com/v/SlIyuuM6?resizeToParent=true&cover=true&preloadContent=metadata&useAverageColor=true Here is the text of the poem, so you can read along as I recite it. Enjoy! The Only Light in the Wilderness The … Continue reading Light in the Wilderness
John's Consciousness 