The Consciousness/Perception Problem

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The consciousness problem.

My question is regarding something called the consciousness problem.

To me, the consciousness problem is being locked into certain structures of how you view everything around you. It is all about how you perceive your surroundings and how you limit yourself, better yet, how other limit you. What I mean by this can be seen in this very easy to understand example; take a door and a window. Most of us are programmed to see the door as the only way to enter a building and to see the window as not a way to enter. Little things all around us can be seen the same way weather it be how you perceive people.

What I want to ask is for anyone who has for lack of a better word, re-programmed their mind to perceive things differently, even to extremes. Anyone who has taken complete control of their mind or at least most control and create their own reality. I am sure this is possible as the mind is incredibly powerful but I just don't know a good path to take to break away from the system if you know what I mean.

Take for example the next idea- a "crazy" (whatever crazy is to you) person who in the normal person's mind seems to hallucinate and be talking to themselves is out of the norm, but why?? Isn't that person living that reality although others can't see??? I think so, and I think that with enough control we can create something quite special. I think the only reason why that person is seen as crazy is because the vast majority of people have the same mindset about life and everything around it, they, just like the "crazy", are controlled by something which I can't put a word to. Anyone have any insight on this?????

I guess what I am trying to say is that I want to get away from the norm and live in my own reality.

ANY IDEAS????

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@tkdboy 14,

tkdboy_14;165633 wrote:

I guess what I am trying to say is that I want to get away from the norm and live in my own reality.

ANY IDEAS????

"The limits of my language are the limits of my world." Our eyes are made of sentences-----3 radical writers that will spin you, if you don't already know them:

Rorty (his essays)
Wittgenstein (Tractatus)
Kojeve(lectures on Hegel)
Blake (marriage of heaven and hell)

Also, check out George Cantor --he's a math man who invented an infinity of different infinities. Make of it what you will. It isn't boring.

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@tkdboy 14,

tkdboy_14;165633 wrote:

The consciousness problem.

My question is regarding something called the consciousness problem.

To me, the consciousness problem is being locked into certain structures of how you view everything around you. It is all about how you perceive your surroundings and how you limit yourself, better yet, how other limit you. What I mean by this can be seen in this very easy to understand example; take a door and a window. Most of us are programmed to see the door as the only way to enter a building and to see the window as not a way to enter. Little things all around us can be seen the same way weather it be how you perceive people.

What I want to ask is for anyone who has for lack of a better word, re-programmed their mind to perceive things differently, even to extremes. Anyone who has taken complete control of their mind or at least most control and create their own reality. I am sure this is possible as the mind is incredibly powerful but I just don't know a good path to take to break away from the system if you know what I mean.

I guess what I am trying to say is that I want to get away from the norm and live in my own reality.

When you say "your own reality" I am pretty sure I know what you imply. When I see other human beings, I see them as blind, as though they are living a complete illusion that they call life. When I speak to others and try to contemplate how they perceive what they call life, the way they see things is for me mind bending in comparison to how I see thing. It is like living as an avatar amongst other avatars, but they don't even know it. It is like I am the only one alive and they are just zombies, like they have some sort of beer goggles programed into their consciousness which is all they can see. It is very hard to explain but I don't see my self as a physical body, it is what I have but is not all I am, I am in control of an organic system of utter complexity and order, capable of immense computing power, that gives means for not only consciousness but mixed states of consciousness and awareness. I find it very difficult to see other human beings as bodies, especially those close, I find it hard to have feelings for a mass of matter. I feel NO attraction at all towards beautiful women but I am not homosexual. There are occasions where I would spend longed periods with other humans, and I would get these quick sudden thoughts for a fraction of a second, it is like I briefly mistake myself as being a body. Is this the sort of thing you had in mind?

tkdboy_14;165633 wrote:

just don't know a good path to take to break away from the system if you know what I mean.

Which system might you be talking about?

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@tkdboy 14,

tkdboy_14;165633 wrote:

The consciousness problem.

My question is regarding something called the consciousness problem.

To me, the consciousness problem is being locked into certain structures of how you view everything around you. It is all about how you perceive your surroundings and how you limit yourself, better yet, how other limit you. What I mean by this can be seen in this very easy to understand example; take a door and a window. Most of us are programmed to see the door as the only way to enter a building and to see the window as not a way to enter. Little things all around us can be seen the same way weather it be how you perceive people.

What I want to ask is for anyone who has for lack of a better word, re-programmed their mind to perceive things differently, even to extremes. Anyone who has taken complete control of their mind or at least most control and create their own reality. I am sure this is possible as the mind is incredibly powerful but I just don't know a good path to take to break away from the system if you know what I mean.

Take for example the next idea- a "crazy" (whatever crazy is to you) person who in the normal person's mind seems to hallucinate and be talking to themselves is out of the norm, but why?? Isn't that person living that reality although others can't see??? I think so, and I think that with enough control we can create something quite special. I think the only reason why that person is seen as crazy is because the vast majority of people have the same mindset about life and everything around it, they, just like the "crazy", are controlled by something which I can't put a word to. Anyone have any insight on this?????

I guess what I am trying to say is that I want to get away from the norm and live in my own reality.

ANY IDEAS????

The door, window example is simply learning to think outside the box. I once worked as a locksmith for a time, you'd be surprised at the number of people who lock their keys in the car and the passenger door is unlocked.

There is no pinacle of free thought, it is a process, a direction, outside of each box is another box. The trick is to realize, the less you think you know, the better.
Each bit of knowledge is but a stepping stone.
Of course it's important to realize that stepping through the door is more practical than climbing over a windowsill.

The single most effective tool ,for my own journey outside the box, is learning to set aside my opinions and see things through other perspectives. This requires communicating with an open mind. Seek to understand rather than be understood. Most of us spend far more effort trying to be understood than we spend trying to understand.

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@tkdboy 14,

tkdboy_14;165633 wrote:

To me, the consciousness problem is being locked into certain structures of how you view everything around you. It is all about how you perceive your surroundings and how you limit yourself, better yet, how other limit you... What I want to ask is for anyone who has for lack of a better word, re-programmed their mind to perceive things differently, even to extremes.... Anyone who has taken complete control of their mind or at least most control and create their own reality.

To completely remove yourself from the way you view your reality would be to change the very essence of who and what you are. Even the mind that wants to do this - that very motivation - would cease to be were this possible (wanting, thinking or being something else). Why would you want to radically alter it on such a scale?

The way our consciousness views, interprets and interacts with the world around is is, in part, a reflection of that mind's interpretational and conceptual habits - to be sure. But this doesn't mean its all 'constructed'. I think it wise that while we acknowledge the "spins" our minds put on all we perceive, but that doing so does not negate any 'trustable' correlation to reality. I don't think there's anything undesirable in the view that windows aren't immediately seen as an exit, I'll bet your mind would step out of that concept just fine on its own were you stuck in there while the house burned.

I suppose what I'm suggesting is this: Yes, you can step our of your own chains-of-preconception; as needed and as desired for any single concept. Simply decide upon "Bill the Neighbor" or "that telephone pole" as something different that its conventional definition and let your mind wander, as an exercise. But do do this on a large scale is probably not something you can even do - and if so, its not likely something you would want to do.

I think you're right in how you've described seemingly-crazy people as being in a separate reality (or a reality that; based on their differing perceptions, has not the same correlations as yours). But I believe that the extent to which our perceptions do jive with observable reality is also the extent to which our minds are healthy. While we all can't reach any level of "absolute and untainted accuracy", we can and should trust the majority of our senses.

Reconstructo;165669 wrote:

I guess what I am trying to say is that I want to get away from the norm and live in my own reality.

So in summary and answer to this:[INDENT]1) You're already doing this to some extent

2) Simply decide step out consciously on a case-by-case basis as an act of will to break from the conventions you find limiting.

3) To radically change or obliterate your own processes - if it were possible - would undermine your connection to the physical world. Is this a good idea?
[/INDENT]Hope this adds somehow to the direction and thought process of your intent.

Thanks

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@tkdboy 14,

tkdboy_14;165633 wrote:

and live in my own reality.

"My own reality" = What I believe is real. Living exclusively as if what you believe is real is real, with no external check on what is real, inevitably leads to a very brief life. Therefore, in order to extend the lives of such people, we institutionalize them.

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@Soul Brother,

Soul Brother! thats pretty much what I have in mind. I also don't see myself as a physical "thing". I think of myself as having the ultimate power of thought but not really knowing how to use it. The universe is made up of the same thing we are, energy and thought, this gives us the ultimate power.

---------- Post added 05-18-2010 at 04:48 PM ----------

thanks for all the replies from everyone, they posses great knowledge and wisdom. What about the same issue but this time with language. Let me just quickly express something to see what you guys think.

I don't believe in hope or any other word like it. Reason behind is that these words, hope and faith, all have the capacity to "fail". When one says that they hope they get this job they imply within their subconsciousness that there are probabilities of failure. I do not believe in hope as to me I look at everything as never failed. This example of language is very small in comparison to that of completely altering your reality but I think it at least serves a great purpose.

What do you guys think?

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