Supernatural Consciousness (Does not exist)

That New Old Time Religion 

The popular use of phrases such as “higher consciousness,” “mass consciousness,” “a new level of consciousness,” and “transforming consciousness” shows how supernatural ideas degrade the general body of thought. Phrases such as these are used by elites who employ supernatural mumbo-jumbo and a contrived vocabulary to make people think that they have rejected Old Time Religion for advanced spirituality. Discarding reason, gullible devotees buy into scam “religions,” part with large sums of money, and turn over control of their lives, to unsavory and controlling personalities.

“Supernatural consciousness” has replaced “higher education,” “familiarity with a range of information,” “exposure to other cultures,” “self-improvement,” “reading and study,” or “guiding children to become functioning adults.” “Higher consciousness” was used in the 1960’s to describe drug experiences, which are physical, but nevertheless, drugs were sold as the path to a supernatural dimension: by means of magical drug experiences mankind would be saved, universal love would become effortless, and paradise would be established, at least in California. The result of this misrepresentation is an epidemic of substance abuse across the United States.

As used in popular culture, consciousness has become just another word for “spooky and unexplained” and joins soul, spirit, god, angel, or ghost, which also confer the unwarranted belief that awareness and consciousness (what is it anyway?) originate outside the human brain as some kind of vibration – a gigantic radio that special people can hear – (you to, for a price) .

Claims that the supernatural version of consciousness is scientifically or medically based are deceptive; an entire industry has been built on promises of instant magical solutions to real physical problems such as insomnia or depression, or to sanitize anti-social impulses like greed. Hey! Let’s create wealth the spiritual way. This oxymoron has passed into Christian churches as, “Jesus wants you to be rich.”

Contrary to the emphasis on change, the supernatural version of consciousness erects a barrier to change by removing the physical brain and its functions to a non-existent dimension where nothing can occur.

The following quotes are a sample of what has become an epidemic of supernatural thinking that is passed off (for profit) as intellectual innovation.

“A radical inner transformation and rise to a new level of consciousness might be the only real hope we have in the current global crisis brought on by the dominance of the Western mechanistic paradigm.” _Stanislav Grof       

Translation: Education about technologies that have harmed the environment would help people to make necessary and urgent corrections more quickly. By posing a supernatural solution as the “only real hope”, Mr. Grof makes the situation hopeless.

“All historical experience demonstrates the following: Our earth cannot be changed unless in the not too distant future an alteration in the consciousness of individuals is achieved.” _ Hans Kung 

Sorry Hans, the earth has been changing for 4.5 billion years without Homo sapiens. “Alteration in consciousness” is being used instead of “becoming educated.” Again, change is impossible because the solution is defined as magical.

“Art is the production of objects for consumption, to be used and discarded while waiting for a new world in which man will have succeeded in freeing himself of everything, even of his own consciousness.” _ Eugenio Mont 

This is a ridiculous statement, but such nonsense is regarded as visionary wisdom by many Americans.

“And we’re seeing a higher level of consciousness and many more opportunities for people to challenge their present ways of thinking and move into a grander and larger experience of who they really are.”­_Neale Walsch

Nonsense. Any one of us can make changes in both the content of our thought, in our patterns of thinking and behavior, at any time, but we are constantly told that we can’t, or that it requires secret supernatural knowledge.

“If you put yourself in a position where you have to stretch outside your comfort zone, then you are forced to expand your consciousness.” –Les Brown  

This idea was formerly expressed as, “Education broadens one’s horizons.”

Mass consciousness

Mass consciousness is not supernatural in origin; it is an experience of the body, freely experienced in music and dance, which have their parallel behavior in the animal world, and these behaviors connect us where we are literally connected – the shared physical origins of living creatures. It is not an imaginary supernatural connection at “the top”, but the very physical common denominator of “animal existence” at bottom, that connects human beings. The history of our species is the journey of animal evolution. We need to be animals because we are animals. Our bodies are landlocked containers of seawater and a complex integration of myriad cell types that have emerged over hundreds of millions of years, ancient components that do their part in every corner of the body. We are not single life forms, we are composite beings. It is contrary to common sense to believe that we are aliens on our home planet, doomed to estrangement from all life.