Category Archives: Abstracts

VIJNANA IN THE WORKS OF SWAMI VIVEKANANDA AND SRI AUROBINDO CONVERGENCES AND DIFFERENCES

Jean C. MacPhail (Sister Gayatriprana), MD, Ph.D.

This paper compares and contrasts the model of consciousness as developed to understand Swami Vivekananda’s transformation of consciousness under the supervision of Sri Ramakrishna in my doctoral thesis, Learning in Depth: A Case Study in Twin 5×5 Matrices of Consciousness, with that developed by Sri Aurobindo and presented by Debashish Banerji in Seven Quartets of Becoming.

As part of the integral approach of both models—posited on vijnana, a state beyond traditional cognition that combines into a whole many elements that previously were not considered even compatible with each other—the basic presupposition is that matter and spirit are valid, totally interconnected elements in a holarchic spectrum of conceptual levels. Both models present a conceptual and experiential aspect of each level. In addition, each side of each level is investigated by a gamut of experiential content that internally transforms the context of the levels themselves, creating a kind of fractal pattern throughout the internal range of both models. In addition, each model emphasizes the evolutionary and involutionary dynamic of human self-realization and self-manifestation “up” and “down” the range of levels and their transformation through state experiences. Finally, both models bring out the role of the mantra Sat-chit-ananda as a type of algorithm that inspires and holds together the matrices.

Purusha, Prakriti, Vedanta and Sri Aurobindo: Anthropogenesis, Holovolution and Integrality

Debashish Banerji

A discuss of how the dualism of conscious being (purusha) and automatisms (prakriti) in Sankhya is integrated in a monism in the Upanishads through the use of the Idea of an involution-evolution machine using the categories of Vidya and Avidya and the Ideational principle of Vijnana. Vijnana manifests its Real-Idea meant to explore the bliss-play of Relationality in a graded and phased manifestation. Sri Aurobindo draws attention to this Reality and its phenomenological and Ideational significances. My paper will relate the idea of Purushartha to the achievement of the five stages of Brahman realization spoken of in the Taittiriya Upanishad and show how this understanding informs the cosmology, teleology and individual and collective praxis of Sri Aurobindo’s Integral Yoga.

debbanerji@yahoo.com

Addiction Recovery: The Result of a Radical Change in Consciousness

Constance Scharff

How is it that addicts recover? It is an age-old question that until recently has had no good answer, because by and large until the middle of the 20th century, addicts didn’t recover, at least not in any appreciable numbers. However, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, thinkers like William James, Carl Jung, and Bill Wilson (one of the founders of Addicts Anonymous), posited that addiction recovery is grounded in a spiritual shift, a change in consciousness so profound that addicts are “miraculously” transformed from addict to non-addict, a person who has “recovered.” Alcoholics Anonymous is founded on this very principle.

Recent research in addiction and addiction recovery is confirming this early theory. Scholars like Gregory Bateson and Bradford Keeney suggest that addiction recovery is a 3rd order change, a radical shift in consciousness that allows the addict to both perceive and live his/her life differently, not as an addict, but as a person in recovery. Contemporary neuroscientists and neuropsychologists also seem to be confirming this idea. In particular, Dan Siegel shows how mindfulness meditation makes changes in the brain in line with both addiction recovery and profound consciousness shifts. Other research shows how intensive one-on-one psychotherapy can create the psychic shift of the “educational” variety that is so well-known in Alcoholics Anonymous. Finally, renewed research into the use of entheogens will be discussed. How can substances like ibogaine, ayahuasca, LSD and others be used in therapeutic settings to create the circumstances for consciousness shifts that will lead to recovery or improvement for those suffering from alcoholism, drug addiction, and co-occurring disorders such as depression, PTSD or anxiety? Do these treatments have the potential to decrease the amount of time individuals spend in addiction treatment centers or the costs associated with addiction treatment and are they an option for nations where access to quality addiction treatment is limited or nonexistent? Are entheogens the future for creating shifts in consciousness for addicts, allowing even greater numbers of those who suffer to recover?

constance.scharff@cliffsidemalibu.com

A Continuum of Persistent Non-Symbolic Experience in Adults

Jeffery A. Martin

Center for the Study of Non-Symbolic Consciousness and Harvard University
Keywords: non-symbolic consciousness, non-symbolic experience, consciousness, spiritual growth, enlightenment, nonduality, cognitive science.

Non-symbolic experiences have been reported for millennia and are generally attributed to spiritual and religious contexts, although atheists and agnostics also report them. Popular terms for them include: nondual awareness, enlightenment, mystical experiences, peak experiences, transcendental experience, the peace that passeth understanding, unity consciousness, union with God, and so forth. Most are temporary, but some individuals report a persistent form of them. Persistent non-symbolic experience involves a fundamental change in the experience of what it is like to perceive the world.

Over the past 7 years our research project has sought to map this experience in over 1000 adults who report persistent non-symbolic experience (PNSE). Methods used included long semi-structured interviews, a wide variety of gold standard psychometric measures, physiological measurement, and experimentation. Five core, consistent categories of change were uncovered: sense-of-self, cognition, emotion, perception, and memory. Participants’ reports formed clusters in which the types of change in each of these categories were consistent. Multiple clusters were uncovered that formed a range (or continuum) of possible PNSE experiences.

This continuum seems to begin with a tightly constructed individualized sense of self and end with an individual being unable to at all detect an individualized sense of self. When examined, the clusters, or locations on the continuum between these two points, form a logical series of stages in the deconstruction of the individualized sense of self. They also appear to correlate with specific brain regions and processes. The variety of these clusters and their underlying categories may inform the debate between constructivist, common core, and participatory theorists; and finally provide a generalizable conceptual map and psychological framework for these types of experiences.