The States of Consciousness

The States of Consciousness

From our friend, David Tuttle

The first state of consciousness is sleep in bed, at night. The second state, also known as waking sleep, is our state of every day. The third state is self-consciousness. It occurs if a shock such as a loud noise, or dropping something, wakes us up, or if we are in new or unusual circumstances. It is a direct perception that “I am here, now”. The production of moments of the third state is generally under the law of accident, while the work means intentionally producing them. The fourth state is called objective consciousness. It occurs very rarely, usually in life-threatening situations.

Part of self-observation is seeing how our state of consciousness fluctuates throughout the day. Sometimes we are practically in the first state, occasionally, for very brief moments, we are close to the third state of consciousness. If we made a graph of our state of consciousness in one day, it would be a very crooked line. Because it is constantly changing, it means that we have the possibility to reach the third state and eventually make it permanent. If we were locked into the second state, there would be no chance.

For much of the day, I find myself lost in imagination, with no self-awareness and little awareness of the immediate environment. Sometimes the level of attention rises and there is attention on the things and people around me, or internally on the sensations of my body, or my thoughts, or feelings. Still further, it is possible to be aware that “I am here, now”, alongside being aware of these other things. This special awareness has degrees.

“Consciousness has quite visible and observable degrees ... First, there is duration: How long one was conscious. Second, frequency of appearance: how often one became conscious. Third, the extent and penetration: of what one was conscious, which can vary very much with the growth of man.”, writes Ouspensky in the Psychology.

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Image: Michelangelo, The Dream of Human Life