All and………

There is a saying that has become common of late, “both and”, which is intended to replace “either or”. It is intended to be inclusive.

I think that it is all a matter of how many perspectives you can hold at once. From a Spiral Dynamics perspective, one transcends and includes all components of the spiral from which one has arisen over time. All are “included” from the broader perspective from which one peers out at a given “moment”. Thus, none are excluded and the more developed a consciousness is, the more particles and parts are included. They are its components; its cells, if you will.

Now, how do we describe our experiences? We enjoy, we observe, we examine etc. As with the levels of the Spiral, we ARE the experience that we are having AND we are observing it, examining it, assessing it etc. and can access any of these at any “time” or, perhaps, all at the same time. In my view, the rate of experiential time that we choose to dwell in determines if we are multi-tasking – holding many views – or allowing a single one, or a few, to dominate.

What I am suggesting is that ALL perspectives – points of perceiving consciousness – exist simultaneously, whether we experience their expression at a given experiential moment or not. A galaxy includes all of its stars, black holes, cosmic dust etc. From the galactic perspective, each component is a constituent part of the whole regardless of its particular localized perspective. In fact, we are a constituent part of the galaxy too. As with our own perspectives, they all exist, all of the time. So it is just a matter of “where” you, as a component part of consciousness, are observing from and which points of perception, or groups of points, you happen to be focused on at any given moment of relative time. Even those perspectives that are directly contradictory exist at the same “time” in some temporal frame of reference.

Our galaxy rotates about once every 225-250 million of our years. To it, that could be an experiential year, just as we relate to our experiential year. So the galaxy’s relative time could be much slower, riding those much longer wavelengths, than the range that we normally inhabit. Its processing of experience, as a component of consciousness, would seem to include a vaster amount of perspectives. It may be mostly unconscious of them, as we are unconscious of our cells, but they exist nonetheless. [And yes, I’m saying that consciousness is in everything.]

Just as quieting our minds, via meditation or the like, tends to reveal more inclusive perspectives upon exiting, if we tuned to the frequency of the galaxy, we too would “see” more ranges of consciousness and their relative parts. As stated above, the more developed a consciousness is, the more particles and parts are included. As we expand our ranges, we move up the Spiral. Consciousness contains every perspective that exists and all of those that are coming into existence through all of the aspects of its creative imagination, past, present and maybe even future.

We are imagination, we are experience, we are curiosity, we are timeless, and a multitude of other aspects of awareness. On the grandest scale, everything exists all at once, even as new perspectives unfold at various rates of temporality. Most simply, WE are every bit of it and can choose to experience any of it, any portions of it, or all of it.

But since there is all that vastness out there and all those possible perspectives to experience from, exploring, and sharing, seems like a great idea. All and………each.