> While I was (...) a psychology major, I did some surveys (1957) relating to creativity and types of thought and dreaming, following up some ideas I found in Brewster Ghiselin's book The Creative Process. I felt that the current US view of the [[brain]] as a computing device with nerves serving as wires and switches was completely inappropriate, even for understanding things such as the perception of odors and musical pitch, and around that time a practical [[study]] of creativity was published, in a book called Synectics, and I saw that Pavlov's colleague P.K. Anokhin had been developing a much better understanding of [[brain]] function. The fact that sensations and perception of space in dreams can be so convincing led me to feel that biological/metabolic processes in the [[brain]] reproduce in fairly direct or literal ways things in the external world, i.e., that our experience of internal colors and smells and sounds are probably a sort of electrochemical [[resonance]] within nerves---with a nerve and its surroundings, spatial parts of the [[brain]], taking on energetic states with the frequencies that are closely analogous to the frequencies produced by the external objects, colors, chemical odors, sound vibrations, as well as other kinds of patterned relationships. If "photons" or electromagnetic interactions within the organism are the substance of consciousness, then the electronic properties of nutrients, hormones, and drugs are important, rather than their geometric form, as interpreted by the "lock-and-key" "receptor and ligand" doctrine. I think the active chemical in St. John's wort is hypericin, an anthroquine (very similar to [[emodin]], in [[cascara]], and to [[vitamin K]] and tetracycline), which is a large system of conjugated electrons, that interacts powerfully with our cellular regulatory systems. (...) I suspect that growing up with creativity involves opportunities that cause the [[brain]] to develop various sensitivities and resonances, and that the [[brain]] functioning in these ways calls up the energetic and hormonal resources that it needs, and ideally that includes an array of chemicals that enrich and intensify consciousness, allowing very complex internal experiences to be generated. > At any moment, one's position in the world is part of one's image of the world, and body awareness is part of our consciousness of our position. Being is the basic thing, and there is really no understanding separate from that, although there are symbolic patterns that can be manipulated as if they were separate from the substance, but that's just a matter of habitual attention. The "faint glass" people are identifying with the constructed story about life, rather than seeing it as an aspect of a single substance-awareness. Toes (and internal organs) are part of everything we do, making up part of the substance and meaning of things, except when indoctrination directs attention away from them. > Going to [[sleep]] and the few minutes after waking up are good times to see how things are working. Stresses and obligations shape the digestive and metabolic processes, and the rhythms of the intestine add to the shape of the day's thoughts. There are usually about 16 small cycles during a day, and watching for them can make things more spontaneous. > Besides articles in psychology and medical journals, the ultradian cycles have been described from a variety of perspectives. R.O Becker discussed weak natural electromagnetic rhythms, Frank Brown did many experiments showing the effects of surrounding fields on biorhythms, Solco Tromp's publications on biometeorology and Michel Gauquelin's statistical studies showed other effects. There have been quite a few Hindu publications on body cycles. When I taught school and had to get up at the same time every day, I developed a strong metabolic rhythm that made me go to [[sleep]] immediately at 10:30, and if I had to stay awake, I had a sudden loss of energy exactly at 10:30. A daytime nap that's timed according to the small cycles can be very effective. [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10783477](https://archive.ph/o/OJZkW/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10783477) [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10564105](https://archive.ph/o/OJZkW/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10564105) [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10235198](https://archive.ph/o/OJZkW/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10235198) [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8252751](https://archive.ph/o/OJZkW/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8252751) [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nasal_cycle](https://archive.ph/o/OJZkW/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nasal_cycle) > **[Question on how to access/reassess emotions independent of language]** There are some ways of directing the attention that I have found to be useful. Thinking about the sensing surface as distinct from the thing sensed is a way to start to get away from language’s control of consciousness. After-images of bright objects are a convenient place to start. Coffee and vitamin B1 are helpful while doing the practices. With [[eyes]] closed, watch for spontaneous visual events after the after-image has faded. Putting attention on the solar plexus region while thinking about people you know, noticing the abdominal sensations related to different people, is another kind of sensory [[exercise]]. > **[follow-up: Sensing surface as distinct from thing sensed?]** Just for an example, if you touch a marble with the tips of crossed fingers, the first reaction is that there are two marbles, because of the normal projection of awareness of objects in the world. When you look at an empty sky, you can usually notice different kinds of “objects” or textures, that aren’t the sky (some people insist that those are something in the sky; others that they are nothing but debris in the eye); when you direct your attention to the sensory surface, rather than to the object, you can notice that the process of noticing affects what you notice. Attention to this process makes it possible to feel the process of thought interacting with sensations. Inattention to those processes leaves a person trapped in the system of verbal concepts and rules. > **[follow-up: What does “projection of awareness of objects in the world” mean?]** Every tissue contains nerves, and for some of these, the proprioceptive nerves, their object is what we feel as our body. Other nerves sense things that we understand as objects in some sense—sound is felt to come from somewhere in the space around us, smells usually the same, and tastes represent the objects that we are eating. But in each case, it’s possible to experience our sensing without imagining objects as the cause of the sensation. The value of that is that it gives you an absolute, uninterpreted, experience, which makes it possible to put the verbal life history that we normally inhabit, into a new context. In the case of seeing with your [[eyes]] closed (with [[light]] on the closed eyelids, the situation is similar to looking at an empty sky), a finely granular texture is the retina itself, and/or the optic nerve. A textureless, dreamlike substance of space filling images, a relatively free activity of the visual cortex and more complex [[brain]] systems, will gradually be noticed, when there’s the right combination of nervous arousal and relaxation. The behavior of after-images will change according to the state of the whole organism, for example the length of time that it stays positive, and the length of time that a following negative image lasts. It’s the same with after-images of motion; their differences between people are very interesting. > **[Consciousness, electric universe]** With an orientation of radical empiricism and process philosophy, I have some sympathy for Einstein’s project and his reluctance to accept quantum theory. I think the quantum theory was created by philosophically inadequate people. > Conventional views of electrons were built on just a few kinds of experiment, and I think new approaches to understanding matter will be found. While I think consciousness is electronic, I don’t think it’s appropriate to think of it as being just inside cells (much less simply a matter of synaptic interactions). Electricity’s space-filling property is relevant. The process (or background, that we call body or self) that gives continuity and meaning to our perceptions and actions is something that’s always happening, and people usually turn their attention away from it when they aren’t in some practical or objective activity. The organism has many potential intentions, and if we let our attention respond, they can appear as hypnagogic images or dreams. Ordinary metabolism, and its variations, are always producing these parallel spaces, and their quality varies under the influence of various metabolites and “dopants.” I think the electric universe is analogous to the electric organism. [Forum Discussion](https://archive.ph/o/OJZkW/https://raypeatforum.com/community/threads/rp-email-advice-discussion-consciousness-is-electronic-dreaming.13573/)