Unconsciously Conscious

"We accept the reality of the world with which we're presented. It's as simple as that". 

- Christof from the 1998 film The Truman Show

"We accept reality so readily – perhaps because we sense that nothing is real,"

- Jorge Luis Borges

Are we unconsciously conscious, or consciously unconscious?

Even though we are aware of certain things happening around us, our body sensations, and our feelings, we are mostly passive participants in our consciousness.

We go about life in a rather automatic way. Our brain and neurological system have developed integrated patterns of habitual firing that allow for unconscious facility. Imagine how dysfunctional it would be if we had to think about planting one foot in front of the other so to walk. Not so different with thoughts and feelings: they just come up.

We don’t make a conscious choice as to what to think or feel. We very much accept whatever surfaces as legitimate, and identify them as our ‘selves’. In other words, our consciousness is largely unconscious, guided by a program we hardly understand. While it makes for great efficiency this unconscious system becomes a huge problem when it comes to negative thoughts, emotions and addiction.

Is there a way out of this labyrinth?

A Frog’s Dream

A Frog’s Dream

Many times I’ve been asked, ‘Do you believe there is life after death?’.

My answer is no, not in the way we experience life, not even in the way we are conscious. In fact, the very nature of human consciousness prohibits knowledge of what happens after life, and what happened before it. We are the proverbial frog at the bottom of the well: we can only see the little patch of sky that is open to us. The human capability for knowledge is also its limitation. The rest is speculation.

Allow me to share a dream.

Imagine a stream, a stream that is infinite, that both its origin and destination are infinite. There is only the coursing and flowing, and we are part of this stream. Imagine that life is a blip in the flow of this stream in which we assume a body and consciousness. If all goes well, there is birth, childhood, growth, puberty, love, hate, parenthood, maturity, aging, death, and all the drama in between. All in a bubble of the stream. When the bubble bursts, our consciousness disappears with it. The only sure thing now is that we’ve embarked on a mysterious journey.

Can we transition with courage and curiosity and not fear?

After all, when we were born into this world, our journey was equally mysterious. We had no idea what it was all about. We were born into a mystery. Out of the mystery came experience, even knowledge. The new mystery is something to get excited about!

Now let’s come back to mundane time. Happy New Year!

And for a New Year’s resolution, I suggest creativity. Resolve to be more creative and adventurous, to step out of your habitual mode of thinking, feeling, and doing. Try something different. Climb out of that well and explore new horizons!

Five Element Body Types

Five Element Body Types

The five elements are Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal and Water. Each element has it’s own physical, psychological and spiritual characteristics. Here we are most concerned with differentiating the body types: how to tell a person’s elemental affiliation based on physical features. The key is the ‘Threes’:

Wood

• The Wood-type person can be identified by the 'Three Longs': long face, long body trunk, long fingers.

• The Wood-type person is shaped like a tree, with a long face; wide on top and narrow at the bottom, bony with scant flesh, and has wide, slouching shoulders.

• The Wood-type person has a greenish complexion and a solemn looking demeanor. The Wood-type person is prone to anger manifested by bulging, green veins.

• The Wood-type person's speech is blunt and short, with words sounding "thin," as though coming from the teeth.

• The Wood-type person walks with a noisy, marching gait, lifting the feet and letting them drop.

Fire

• The Fire-type person can be identified by the “Three Pointies": a pointy nose, a pointy chin, and a pointy top of the head.

• The Fire-type person's body is shaped like a torch: pointy on top, narrow on the bottom, and flared in the middle. The face is round and full, and the hair is thin. The body is plump, of medium build with sloping shoulders.

• The complexion is reddish; the ears and the neck turn crimson when the temper is roused.

• The voice is sharp and high-pitched, with a broken quality, the sounds seemingly come from the tongue.

• The Fire-type person is light-footed and walks at a hurried pace, dashing forward with the upper body swaying from side to side.

Earth

• The Earth-type person can be identified by the “Three Shorts’: the body is short, the neck is short, and the fingers are short.

• The Earth-type person has a square face with big ears and a bulbous nose shaped like a head of garlic. The muscles are strong and both the waist and back are thick. Movements are clumsy and the demeanor is honest and sincere. Not well-educated but a simple person with no guile.

• The complexion is yellow, which turns into a withered yellow when the person is unhappy.

• The Earth-type person speaks with a loud, low-pitched nasal tone. The gait is heavy-footed with every step solidly landing on the ground.

Metal

• The Metal-type person can be identified by the “Three Thins”: thin lips, thin eyelids, and the flesh on the back of the hands is thin.

• The Metal-type person is attractive-looking. The face is rectangular in shape, with a pointy chin, and well-defined, well-distributed features. The body is slim, and the movements are graceful and lively.

• The Metal-type person has a good way with words and is a persuasive communicator.

• The complexion is white, and turns pale when the tempers are aroused.

• The voice is bright and clear as a bell with the sounds coming from the throat. The gait is swift, light, and lively.

Water

• The Water-element person can be identified by the “Three Thicks’: thick eyelids, thick jaw, and the flesh on the back of the hands is thick.

• The face is large, fleshy, round, wider at the base than the top, and often with a double chin. Big eyes, thick eyebrows and thick hair, both the face and body are full and chubby.

• The complexion has a black tint, which darkens when the temper is roused.

• The Water-element person speaks with a relaxed, low tone with the sounds coming from the throat.

• The Water-element person walks slowly, with the feet dragging on the ground.

Pure types are caricatures. Every pure type represents a distortion in which one elemental force dominates to the exclusion of the others. Perfect health implies a life in which the tendencies of all five elements participate in equal measure, promoting, checking, and balancing each other.

Few of us enjoy such perfect health. Elements are like roadways in life. We tend to take the same roads repeatedly while leaving the others untravelled. The energetics of the ones we travel on repeatedly become excessive while the ones we ignore become deficient. In time, this imbalance become our personality, defining the the way we interact with other people, with the world, and with ourselves.